False Future (7 page)

T
he director jumps off a nearby Ax that’s hovering twenty feet off the ground. She falls into a forward roll and pops up like she didn’t just leap off a jet. Adrenaline hits my bloodstream, a punch to the stomach that sets my legs trembling again.

My fingers go to the RAW on my back. I even get my hand closed around it. I’ll spin the dial up to ten, then fire right between her eyes. But a strong hand grabs my wrist, squeezing until I let go. It’s not Rhys, because he’s staring straight ahead at the director, with his mouth slightly open. I turn my head and see Olivia.

The Original Olivia, one of the Ruling Five, dressed in her golden armor polished to a mirror finish. It has to be her. This is the woman who has lived for a thousand years. She has the same almond eyes, pale skin, and midnight hair as my friend Olive did, before she was killed. She stopped me from grabbing my RAW but didn’t make a scene, or even eye contact.

“Don’t,” she whispers, then releases me and walks to the director. An elderly man cowers away from her, falling against a woman. His khakis are wet with urine. He’s terrified, and not from psychic waves. Just good old-fashioned fear; I can taste the difference somehow. It makes me sick to my stomach. This guy didn’t wake up this morning thinking he was going to be so scared he’d piss himself.

My hand is on the RAW again, but I don’t pull it. I know I need to give Olivia a chance to do something,
anything
. I force myself to let go of the grip a second time, exhaling slowly as I do.

“Is one among you Noah East?” the director calls out. Her hair is golden, not auburn like every other Miranda. The light is gray and fading, but the scales of her suit still shine like Olivia’s.

Olivia and the director begin circling the group of people. Behind them, a pair of Axes hover over the molten wreckage of the building, scanning with lasers that sweep back and forth. The air is sharp and bitter with chemicals and smoke.

The people stay silent. Just a whimper here or there.

The director confers with a nearby Rhys wearing silver armor. The Rhys goes into the crowd and pulls out a short balding man wearing a coat too light for the weather. His breath comes out in short, machine-gun-like puffs.

I creep closer. Rhys reaches to grab my arm, but I move out of the way.

“Why did you say the fugitive was here?” the director asks the man.

The man trips over his words. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry. I—I—I thought I saw him. I wanted you to have what you wanted. Please. My family.”

The director clenches her jaw. “You’ve wasted my time.”

“I’m sorry! I—”

The director punches him so hard in the face I hear his cheek crack. He drops straight down to his knees, then onto his side, one foot twitching. Everyone starts screaming, but the screams turns to whimpers as the Roses deliver a short fear wave meant to subdue.

This is madness. What am I even doing here if I’m just going to let people die? But even if I shoot the director dead, she’d just come back in another body. Her identity is saved in several different places—where, I have no idea—and constantly updated. I could never really kill her. Meanwhile I would die for nothing.

Again.

“This is what happens when you waste our time,” she tells the cowering people. “Go to Central Park. We have a shelter there.” The people don’t move right away, and I feel the director give off a short, hard burst of fear. The people scream and trip over themselves and take off up Broadway toward the park.

The director notices all the Roses standing around. “Back to work!” she yells.

“You heard her,” Olivia says. Her eyes settle on me, then flit away.

The Roses walk back to their Thorns, then drive to wherever they’re supposed to go.

My arm buzzes with a new order.

TEAM 16 REQUESTS COMM CHECK

N-7: M-96 & R-34—WHY DON’T YOU HAVE YOUR EARPIECES IN?

O-9: WE CAN HEAR EACH OTHER. CAN YOU HEAR US?

I stare at the words on my arm for a full two seconds, my heart pounding again.

Rhys is reading his arm too. “Oh my God,” he says. “The Roses have some kind of hidden communications gear.”

I look up and the director is gone. Olivia is climbing into her Thorn across the street.

Our “team” has been trying to get in contact with us, yet the captured Roses in our apartment haven’t told on us. Why?

I tap my ear to activate the comm Noble gave me. There’s a click to let me know the channel is open, followed by the hiss of open air at the other end. “Noble. Noble, are you there?”

No response.

Olivia starts her Thorn across the street. She looks at me again. It’s an invitation. The only Roses nearby are the ones walking around on the steaming ruins of the building, looking for something—the Key, presumably.

I grab Rhys’s arm. “You have to go back and make sure Noble and Sophia are safe.”

He nods sharply. “I’m on it. Where are you going?”

I’m already walking across the street. “To find out what the hell is going on.”

O
livia tracks me through the windshield as I walk around the front of the Thorn. I scan the area quickly, but no one seems to be watching. Every citizen in the immediate area has split.

The passenger door slides up, and I fall into the seat. The blast of heat is glorious. I almost feel like a real person again.

Olivia starts driving without a word. We plow through the giant cloud of steam lingering in the street.

“That was very stupid, what I stopped you from doing.”

“Then it’s a good thing you stopped me,” I reply. “How did you know it was me?”

She gives me a look like,
Please, do you know who I am?
“I’m sorry. I’m sorry your sacrifice didn’t buy more time. I thought it would.” But she says it like she knew it wouldn’t. “It must have been an unpleasant experience.”

“I barely felt it,” I say, because it’s true. Just that brief pain, then nothing, and even the memory of the pain is fading. Maybe my mind is trying to protect itself.

Now that the initial assault seems to be over, pedestrians have appeared again, though the streets still feel half empty. Every eye is on the Thorn as we pass. People have armfuls of stuff—clothes, food, whatever they can carry. A few of the stupider ones are carrying electronics.

The streets are still clogged with abandoned cars, but Olivia swerves around them, or plows right through, wedging the cars aside. A FreshDirect delivery van has been completely gutted, the boxes torn open and emptied, vegetables smashed in the snow.

“What can I do for you?” Olivia says.

“I need to know what the Key is.”

She turns into a parking garage and drives right through the gate, snapping it off. We cruise up and around a few levels, fast, until Olivia slides into a spot.

She sits with both hands on the wheel for a moment. “Your world is about to change.”

“You don’t say.”

She shakes her head. “I haven’t been honest with you. From the beginning.”

I feel a pang deep in my stomach, the kind you get when you know bad news is imminent, but you can’t even guess what it is.

Olivia lets the seconds tick away.

“Tell me.”

She sighs through her nose. “I can’t just yet. Because I don’t know what telling you will do.”

“Okaayyyy.” Tick tick tick. “You have to tell me something.”

A muscle in her jaw twitches. “I can’t tell you what to do next, and I can’t stop you. I can only offer a bit of guidance.”

“What have you been lying about?” The heat is stifling inside the Thorn now, and I feel like I’m going to throw up. “Tell me. You have to tell me.”

She ignores me. “I don’t think you should fight back this time.”

“Excuse me?”

A car door opens and closes on our level, then I hear an engine starting sluggishly in the cold. I watch out the back window as a car creeps by. When the driver spots the Thorn he peels out around the corner.

“True Earth is here to do a very specific thing. And stopping that thing might end this world for good.”

“So now you’re saying they want to
save us
?”

Olivia nods. “We’re here to release the Black into your world. It will no longer be a buffer between universes—it will be a part of your reality.”

“Which means what?” My mouth is sticky with fear; I can’t swallow.

“Releasing the Black into your world would re-create an event that we erased by accident.”

“You’re not making any sense.”

“Listen. I helped you in the beginning because I wanted to prevent something awful from happening, something only I knew about. Something I couldn’t share with the other Originals.”

“Which is what?”

She still won’t look at me directly. “Before I tell you, you need to understand that this world, the world you live in, is not a different universe. It is the
past
of my world.”

“Come again?”

Now she looks at me. “This world will eventually become True Earth, far in the future.”

“Bullshit.” My hands are shaking.

“It’s true. When the director decided it was time to cull this world, I wanted to stop her—”

“Why didn’t you just
tell her the truth
?”

“I couldn’t.”

“Why not?”

“Because I did something wrong!” She screams it. I’ve never heard her scream before. I’ve never heard
any
Olivia scream before. “The director knows the truth now. She knows what this world means for our future, for the future of True Earth. And, Miranda…if she doesn’t win, it’s going to be bad for
everyone
.”

The silence in the Thorn is heavy.

Finally, I ask, “What did you do wrong?” She looks down at her lap and it hits me. This being who has existed for a thousand years is unsure of herself.

“I don’t know what would’ve happened if the eyeless were allowed to consume this world. I don’t think I can ever know. But I do know what happened after you stopped them….”

“What?” It should be something good, but it sounds like it’s going to be bad.

“I’ll show you everything,” she says quietly.

Olivia pulls out a mask like the one I’ve used many times before. It allows the wearer to experience memories a previous user has stored on the device. But this one has a strip of wires running off it, wires that lead to another mask.

“I will show you what you need to see. Just listen to my voice.”

I slide the helmet on and close my eyes, waiting for the familiar sting as microscopic needles pierce my skull, but it never comes.

When I open my eyes, I’m seated at a table with three other Originals—Peter, Noah, and Rhys. They’re all talking, but I can’t hear them. I’m seeing through Olivia’s eyes.

In the Thorn, Olivia says, “We had a meeting one day in September. I will never forget it. It was the day we decided to overthrow our own leadership. Once, we were not the Ruling Five. We were underlings to Miranda. She was the supreme ruler. And she was bad.”

Shocking.

Olivia goes on to explain that during her journeys through the Black, she discovered a new world. But it wasn’t an alternate universe…it was the past. It was our world. Our world and True Earth are the same place, just over a thousand years apart.

“The other three Originals and I wanted to remove the director from power,” she says. “But the change in balance would’ve made us appear weak to other worlds like ours, ones highly advanced. So I came up with a plan based on my discovery. Only I didn’t share what I’d learned with the others. I foolishly decided to take it into my own hands….I thought I could change things myself.”

The scene changes, and now we’re in a school—a junior high school judging by the kids. We watch a young girl with auburn hair carry her books through a hallway. I recognize the girl. It’s me. No one seems to notice Olivia is watching her—it’s like Olivia is invisible.

A boy with short hair and dark eyes approaches the girl from the side, but she can’t see him because her hair is in the way. He brushes it out of her face and she jumps, then smiles when she sees it’s Noah. Slowly, she wraps her arms around his neck and looks up into his face. The way Noah smiles at the girl reminds me of how he used to smile at me.

But that can’t be
me
; that isn’t right. At that age, I wasn’t in school—I was training with Alpha team.

“Is that the director?”

“Yes,” Olivia says. “Back when she was living a normal life.”

My heart starts to race. “Wait. Does that mean she’s still out there? In her normal life? If this is the past of True Earth, then she’s out there walking around right now.”

“Yes…” Olivia says.

“Well, where is she? We can find her. We can stop this right now.”

“No, we can’t. I already had the director killed when she was a teenager.”

“But you just said—” I begin.

“Just watch.”

The scene changes again. We’re on top of a building. It’s pouring rain. There is a dead body on the ground far below, blood pooling under it and mixing with the rainwater, but I can’t make out many details from this distance. Olivia turns her face to the rain, and I can feel the cold drops on my skin like it’s happening inside the Thorn.

She keeps talking. “I replaced the teenage version of the director, the one who knew nothing of this, with a clone, one I could guide from a distance. And it worked. When I returned to True Earth, things had changed. I’d altered the entire history of True Earth, and my companions never knew any differently. The planet was stable. The director was a partner to us now, not a queen. We ruled together.” She shows me snippets of images, of the five of them ruling side by side, of the golden landscape I remember from my brief visit to True Earth. I watch the citizens of True Earth firing rockets into a smoggy gray sky. When they explode, a golden wave spreads out, changing the color of the sky permanently. “It was like recording over a tape.”

Her words wash over me like water. I feel like I’m dreaming. What an unnatural thing, for us to exist right now. She’s stopped showing me images—I see only darkness.

“Changes happening here and now had affected the future, but the trouble was, some changes don’t have as big an impact as others. And in the moment, there’s no way to know what’s important. Until you do it.”

She sighs. “But I noticed things were beginning to deteriorate for True Earth. The unity was short-lived, and when it began to crumble, it was worse than before. I couldn’t explain it to the others without admitting what I’d done—it was all my fault. I knew they’d never forgive me.

“Things got worse and worse, and eventually there was no unity. There were power grabs. There were secret wars.”

Her voice is thick with emotion. And regret.

“So I went back again. To try again.”

Something buzzes inside the car. I hear her take off the mask, and I do the same.

“I have to go,” she says, looking at the readout on her arm.

“You promised you would tell me everything.” I know I’m still missing something crucial. It’s like a missing piece of lung.

“And I will. Just stay out of trouble.”

She reaches into the pouch on her waist. The distrustful part of me, the part that will never, ever go away, tenses, preparing for the possibility of a weapon. Of course there is none, just a small disk, like the one adhered to the base of my skull.

She drops it into my palm. “Use this when you’re in a quiet place, a
safe
place. Do you understand? It may disorient you—I don’t know how much, or for how long.”

I nod, staring at her bloodred eyes, like the ones I now have after using the machine. I was hoping I’d be able to keep my green ones for a while.

“Are the other Originals here?” I want to know how many enemies I have.

“No. They’re busy trying to take control of a world in shambles before it’s too late. We no longer control True Earth the way we did. Now, please, get out.”

I actually listen to her without putting up a fight for once. But before I shut the door, I have to ask, “What will releasing the Black do? What happens if the director finds the Key and uses it? I mean, that’ll affect True Earth, won’t it? Hurting us hurts you.”

The look in Olivia’s eyes erases any leftover warmth from the Thorn. “Anyone who possesses the Key when they enter the Black will go to a specific room between universes. There they are able to control and direct the Black as they choose.”

“You didn’t answer my question.” But I tattoo that information into my brain—possess Key, control Black.

Her grim expression somehow becomes more grim. “Upon releasing the Black there will be darkness. Few will survive. But in time, you will flourish again.”

I try to wrap my mind around the idea of my genetic twin thinking—
You know what? Screw it, let’s try again. We can just wipe most of their world out!
Did she come to that conclusion during dinner? While she was showering? Or perhaps over drinks with some friends. Does she even have friends?

“Why don’t you do something?” I say very quietly.

“Because it needs to happen. It
all
needs to happen. Use the disk I gave you, and you will understand.”

“What am I supposed to do in the meantime?”

“Stay alive,” she says.

Olivia zooms down the ramps to the street, and I take the stairs, thinking about Keys and clones and the end of the world. It doesn’t seem real.
It needs to happen,
she said. I rub my thumb over the disk in my pouch, wondering what it can possibly show me to convince me that this needs to happen, that many
need
to die. I don’t buy it. For so long I thought she was on our side.

On the street, the wind is blowing, and darkness has fallen. At the nearest intersection, two cars are smashed together, their windshields frosted with snow. I jog to a truck that looks like it’s in better shape, and get inside. The keys are still in the ignition. I start it up, then head in the general direction of “home.”