The Neo-Spartans: Altered World (25 page)

              Bagpipe man was Grant Hughes, the great and glorious. The wealthy and untouchable. Lips apart, the wheezing bagpipe noise coming from his nose and mouth. For a moment, Gabriel wondered how quickly a pillow held over the mouth of this barely breathing wretch would kill him. Is that why he’d come in here? His reverie was cut short as Hughes shifted his body position. He croaked out something Gabriel couldn’t understand.

              “I didn’t hear you,” Gabriel said, not sure he shouldn’t haul ass out of there, and fast. But something fascinated him, he had to admit it. Grant Hughes in this condition… it was unthinkable, and likely the tip of an iceberg he wasn’t sure he wanted to know the nature of. He moved closer.

              Hughes’s crone-like finger pointed at a water bottle on the bed stand. “Water,” he managed hoarsely. Gabriel opened the bottle and cautiously held it to the man’s lips. It went down fine until his mouth broke into a strange, demented smile, causing the water to drool. His eyes squinted at Gabriel, clearly trying to focus. “You doctors… younger every day,” rasped the great Grant-pipe. Gabriel started to retreat but his attention was caught by a tablet screen. He pulled it toward him and swept his way along it to a list containing organs and the cell numbers of their donors. His guys. His friends. He committed what he saw to memory.

              Hughes watched him studying the list and emitted a twisted laugh. “We’ll show the world what science can do, huh?” The laugh transformed into a coughing fit and Gabriel quickly offered him the water bottle again. Hughes struggled to size him up. “You’re new here.”

              “Yessir, I am,” said Gabriel. He gestured to the camera gear and the technology that allowed Hughes to appear to be anywhere, and twenty years younger. “All those vids, the scuba-diving, the skiing, guess you did all that here, huh? With special effects? You’re always so healthy and tan, and those babes you’re with… wow.”

              Grant Hughes’s blood pressure monitor suddenly went into overdrive.

              “Don’t worry, sir, I’m sure we’ll have you back there in no time. And in three dimensions. That’s the goal, right? That’s what we’re all working for here,” Gabriel said calmly.

              Bagpipe man suddenly shot out a bony arm and pulled Gabriel close to him. “Thank you, son,” he said, his voice a chafed whisper. “Thank you for all that you’re doing…” But the blood pressure monitor was still soaring and began to emit a distress call.

              “No need to thank me,” said Gabriel, biting his cheek.

              The pressure monitor was now screeching. Voices could be heard down the hall. Gabriel clenched his fist in case that was the only way out.

              “I’ll remember you. I’ll remember everyone who helped me,” croaked Hughes, and with that he released Gabriel, the effort of holding onto him overcoming his strength. Gabriel dashed for the door, but stopped shy of the threshold as the inevitable phalanx of doctors dashed inside. Gabriel hugged the wall, hidden, let them pass and dashed out, his own heart pounding. Gabriel swept up the wall to his forest of beams.

              As he made his way back to his infirmary cell, Gabriel couldn’t shake the feeling that something profound had happened to him. It wasn’t just coming face to face with the man most responsible for the horrible conditions people were forced to endure. Yeah, that was weird. He really could have taken the guy out, but not only did it feel wrong to hold a pillow over the face of a ninety-pound bag of bones, what would it have proved? Still, there was more. Something deep inside. Questions he’d always pondered rushed through his head like a hurricane. He had to get over the shock of it all and put together what it meant. What Gabriel had discovered was huge, he knew that.

              But seeing the wealthiest man in the world in that condition really brought it all home. How mortal we were. How we were these tiny little pieces of dust in the universe, completely helpless. It didn’t matter how much money we had, how much power and control over other people, eventually we very quickly went from this magnificent guy having fun to this helpless dying bagpipe. Kilbert and Quinn were right—we had to be aware and not just parkour our brains out. Gahh… we—that is he, Gabriel McKenna—had to put aside the dark, pessimistic world, the “Society’s screwed, so screw society, I’m just gonna have fun” attitude, and acknowledge his responsibilities. His head spun. He knew this was the moment that would change him forever. Kilbert had been saying that either he or Quinn had to step up and prove what was inside. But more, on top of proving himself he had to make amends: his guys were here, his friends, and what the powers that be had in mind for them was anything but pleasant. Gabriel was sure that helping them get free was where his new life had to begin. But how? How would he free his guys and mess up the Eugenics’ great scheme?

              Gabriel found himself formulating a plan, using his memory of whose organs were where. He stopped, astounded. Morgan Kilbert—what was he, a shaman? How did he know that if Gabriel were really pushed up against the wall that he would find something inside that he could develop into an idea and save himself, and maybe even save others? Because that was what had hatched as he lay on his bunk and sorted through all of Kilbert’s teachings—the sacrifice of Gabriel’s father dying while trying to put out the silo fires that had destroyed so much of their stores. About Kilbert himself—how he’d forced himself to learn and analyze all those new things while he was in prison and replace his resentment against the system with the patience he relied on to guide the kids in the Triffid Forest without being eaten alive. What was that if not a life lesson about saving others? Somehow, when he wasn’t looking, they’d got through to Gabriel.

              Plan in place, Gabriel climbed the wall of his security-light incarceration, leapt into his sea of beams and followed his mental map. As guards meandered casually on the floor below, Gabriel moved spider-like among the beams. He quickly reached the hallway he’d been kept in originally. He’d already done the footwork determining how to get from the beams to that open area above the ceiling of his glassed-in cage, and he scooted there now.

              Hidden between ceiling and attic space, Gabriel counted out a three-room distance, to what he knew must be the room of a guy he didn’t know personally, named Davies. Lung number one. He skittered along the support beam next to the ceiling panel then stopped and knelt. He clenched his fist and—wham!—punched through the ceiling panel and dropped into the room.

              Davies, bigger and a little older, was so shocked he tipped his cot over on himself and yelled out spontaneously. Gabriel leapt forward and wrapped a hand around his mouth. “Quiet!” he whispered, “It’s me, I’m a Neo-Spartan too. McKenna.”

              “Is that supposed to me mean something to me?” said Davies.

              “Gabriel McKenna. Look, it doesn’t matter.”

              But Davies looked him up and down and something connected. “You’re the one with the hard-ass sister,” he said. “Your dad died trying to save some crops.”

              Gabriel did his best to hide the pride that was bursting forth inside.

              “Kilbert’s little prince.”

              “His what?!” That pride bubble popped.

              “Yeah, no matter what you do he looks the other way. I know who you are. Everybody knows who you are.”

              Gabriel made himself as tall as he could and strode forward, fists clenched for action. Davies had a good half a foot on him. “Yeah, well, we don’t find a way to co-operate it won’t matter if he treats me like an emperor, we’ll be toast.”

              Davies mulled it over as Gabriel gathered his wits. He knew he had to make amends with friends and family, with people closest to him, but people he didn’t even know? That sucked. But it didn’t change the plan. “Look, I have a plan to get us out of here,” he said.

              “What are we doing here anyway?” said Davies.

              “They want to harvest our organs and rebuild Grant Hughes with them.”

              “Whoa. Man, not much chance of living through that,” Davies said wryly.

              “Right. Look, if I get you outta here maybe you’ll stop thinking I’m the little prince?” asked Gabriel.

              “You get me out of here and I’ll carry your cape,” said Davies.

              Gabriel explained his simple but elegant plan: he and Davies would locate and inform the other Neo-Spartans who had been grabbed. Gabriel would show them the way to the pantry, all pitching in to keep watch in case somebody wandered in for a midnight snack. They’d eat altered food in doses sufficient to make them sick, but not so severe as to simply kill them. Gabriel was sure everybody would agree to that aspect of the plan. If they could all get sick enough, the Eugenics’ intention of harvesting them would be thrown into a tailspin.

              “Look,” said Davies when he heard it explained, “Say this works… doesn’t that just mean they’ll go grab somebody else?”

              “It would,” said Gabriel, “but Kilbert must have sent a team to look for us by now. It’s just a matter of time, isn’t it? We’ve got to stay alive until they find us.”

              “Sounds right,” said Davies. “Not bad. For a little prince.”

              Gabriel slugged him, but for the first time in his life, he began to feel as if he were part of something, something big, something important. All they had to do was stay alive.

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

              For the fifteenth time Quinn splashed cold water on her face and looked at her reflection in the murky mirror of the changing rooms. Her lips moved as she voicelessly rehearsed her speech. She didn’t want to falter while delivering the news. She wanted to be calm and composed and make Nico see she meant well, that she was an ally not an enemy. But her heart raced, her mouth was dry, and she was scared. Not scared of what was going to happen to her, scared that if he took it wrong the threads that tethered her to him and the Vaqueros would get severed. Those invisible links that weaved themselves between her and the gang had made her happy and at peace. She felt connected and she didn’t want to go back to being the ostracized member of the weird society they were living in.

              Quinn studied her own reflection for a long time; the person staring back at her had changed so much. She took a deep breath, asked her heart to stop pounding so loudly and left the changing rooms to look for Nico.

              She found him polishing his bike with deliberate, meticulous movements. He didn’t react to her approaching steps. Quinn cleared her throat. Nico’s movements slowed down a bit but he continued polishing the bike. She knelt down next to him.

              “You better put on some sunglasses,” she tried to joke her nervousness away. Her voice brought him back from wherever he was and Nico looked at her uncomprehending. “I mean, er, it’s getting so shiny you might get blinded.”

              She just needed to blurt out what was on her mind and be done with it. But the words were stuck down her throat. Nico stopped polishing and looked at her. It would’ve been easier to read the eyes of the Sphinx. Quinn looked at the shiny motorcycle and an idea emerged.

              “Hey, let’s take it for a ride, huh? Go back to the canyon, what do you say?”

              She looked at him full of hope, her eyes practically begging. The memory of their flight over the canyon and Quinn’s burning lips flashed in front of him. He was tempted, it was a perfect escape, but he was too cynical to believe that life was offering the chance to suspend reality and repeat that blissful moment. He knew there was a price attached to this offer.

              “Why?” His voice sounded hollow.

              “I don’t know, I like it there…” Her heart was thrashing inside her like a wounded bird.

Nico narrowed his eyes. He wasn’t going to let her off the hook so easily.

              “… I want to talk to you,” she forced the words out.

              “You can talk to me.” He tried to sound casual.

              “Not here, not with everybody around.”

              Her torment was palpable and Nico gave in. He mounted the bike, started it up, and motioned Quinn aboard. Quinn let a sigh escape and got on. He tail spun out of the arena as Quinn wrapped her arms tight around him and the speed of the bike rocked her body. He felt her warmth and trust and was ready to pay any price to relive their moment at the canyon.

* * *

              The bike stopped at the edge of the massive crevasse. They both stood there a moment, listening to the wind chase its tail through the deep gullies. It felt good being there, sharing the silence. He turned around and looked at Quinn. She studied his face as if she was committing it to memory.