The Nightmare Virus, page 32
Gasps litter the crowd.
“Liar,” someone shouts.
“Those of you with children, ask them,” I challenge. “See what they’ll tell you about life before the Emperor and his tirones captured them.”
“You’re a Spore!” comes the accusation.
“I’m not,” I say, my heart sinking. “You know what Spores smell like. You see the sparks when they move. You’ve seen their Spore swords that have minds of their own. I have none of those things. But I share their beliefs.” The grief of defeat in my voice is unavoidable. Never have I wanted to be an Adelphoi so badly. How long do I have to share their faith before I’m accepted and transformed into one of them?
I wish the spectators could smell me, whether as a stench or as cinnamon. I wish I sparked like Erik did in the cage. I wish the Adelphoi sword wouldn’t burn me.
But I’ve done too much damage.
“We know who you are!” a woman yells from over my head somewhere. “Spore or not, you’re the guy on the Outside who sold the fake cure. You lied to us and doomed us to life here!”
Will my past sins never leave me?
Voices rise in a cacophony. Most are angry. Some people are moving from the back rows of the Arena to the front. As close to the mysterious bags as they can get.
“I’ve only ever wanted to save lives!” My shouted plea is lost amid their rage. I close my eyes as it builds and am transported back to the Macella Quarter when the people attacked Stranna. I know once the anger takes root, it spreads and grows, and there’s no stopping it.
The tirones around the edge of the Arena draw their swords, even though the crowd remains in the stands. For now. One tiro eyes the gate.
I’d flee too.
“This cure isn’t like that,” I say, though my voice is unheard. I have to say the words, even if no one will listen. No Adelphoi is willing to say them. And though they won’t change the tide of the crowd, maybe one person—a tiro or a noxior or a parent missing their child—will take it to heart.
“It’s warm,” I blurt, thinking of the wheat field.
Some shush others, curiosity winning out, and the voices die down a little.
“It feels like the sun. No injection, no ImagiSerum, no LifeSuPod, no pills. The disease is in our minds . . . but the cure is there too. God has not left us without a way out.” It’s like Mom’s and Nole’s words are coming out of my mouth. “He is the way—”
Something strikes my cheek with such impact my vision goes black. When it returns, I see a man leaning over the wall to my right, a rock the size of a baseball in his hand. He reaches his other hand into the bag on the edge of the Arena and pulls out another rock. A few others come to his side and do the same.
The bags are filled with . . . rocks?
That’s not what I expected. A chill sweeps over my body.
Now I understand. The bags. Luc’s words about a traitor. The crowd’s curious whispering. My body laid out in full vulnerability.
They’re going to stone me.
The crowd presses against the edge of the Arena’s seating barrier gathering their stones. This is going to get ugly fast. Those who don’t join the rush do nothing to help me. They sit mute, watching. Resigned.
A form drops from the sky like a plummeting meteorite. Luc is here. He lands in the sand and straightens in an all-black Roman toga. No weapon at his side. No blood on his hands. Unafraid and in power. He’s never looked so strong or commanding.
Most of the standing crowd stops cheering. I search for those who seem to remain silent, keeping away from the bags. Anyone who might still hear me.
“You started without me?” Luc says amiably.
There is laughter, like murder is nothing more than an inconsequential game of Uno. He creates a long straight sword from nightmist. It’s not tapered like a gladius but is instead the type a Roman leader might wear. A spatha.
He paces around me in a circle, dragging the sword in the sand, sliding stones aside as he goes. “So tell me. What is his crime?”
“He’s a Spore!”
“He lied about cures!”
“He wants to kill our Emperor!”
After a full circle, Luc surveys the ground. Then starts again, a yard farther than the first circle. He’s making a bull’s-eye. And I’m in the middle.
“All of those are correct.” He completes the second circle. “I’ve just come from the stronghold of the Spores, where they are holding your children. We were unable to breach it.”
Hisses from the audience.
“Those Spores could be doing anything to your children,” he declares. “They are the worst kind of people, and he”—Luc points his spatha at me—“supports them. What kind of person wants to keep children hostage?”
He’s stoking the fire, and anger rages. Nightmist roils off the crowd like a waterfall, cascading down to the sand and sending all manner of unformed venom toward me.
“Let’s remove this poison from our city. And once we’ve done that, let’s take up arms together and get our children back!” He thrusts the spatha into the air to the eruption of cheers and stomping.
A stone flies my way, followed by ten more. I can see which ones will hit their mark as they arc through the air. One strikes my hip. Another my midsection, and for a moment I can’t breathe. Luc steps back and watches, spatha sheathed and arms crossed.
I struggle against my bonds. I twist my right wrist in the looser leather strap. It hardly gives, but it’s the only one that will allow me any hope of escape.
A stone smashes the knuckles on my other hand. I roar, tugging harder. Twisting, yanking. Thinking of the martyr Nole so admired. Stephen or something. I don’t want to be Stephen.
I’m not brave enough.
Finally, my right hand slips out of the leather. I swing my body over and hunch as best I can to protect my core, while picking at the bond on my left hand. I have a bit of leverage now. Stones pelt my body from every angle. Spine, knee, shoulder, head.
My consciousness slips for a moment.
I suppose that wouldn’t be too bad—to be knocked out and miss the death part. But I can’t die. Once the crowd is finished with me, Luc is taking them to the wheat field. To Castle Ithebego. The children will let their parents through, drawn in by the desire to be reunited. But when those parents enter, Luc and his tirones will too.
I force myself to sit up and yank my right hand against the spike in the ground. It gives a little, and that’s all I need for adrenaline to kick in. If it’s able to give at all, it’s able to give the rest of the way. I pull, ignoring the flying stones, except for when I need to duck one.
Finally my arms are free.
Luc still watches me with an amused expression. He holds up a single hand. It takes a few seconds, but the crowd gets the message and stops throwing.
Warmth trickles down my body in so many areas I’m not sure if it’s blood or torn muscles or if my body will still obey me once I get my feet free. I’m nearly numb from pain.
If I get my feet free.
Luc shakes his head. “This is what I liked about you, Cain. I liked the fight in you. How you never give up. You could have been such an asset to our city.”
“I don’t want to be an asset to just one city, Luc.” My words are slurred with pain, and I have to deliberately form each syllable through the swelling of my face. “Not when it’s a prison. There’s a whole world out there that you’re keeping from your citizens, all in the name of fearing and hunting Spores.”
He stabs his spatha into the sand. “You’ve been infected. Every word you speak is a deception.” He lifts his hands to the sky, and the gray blanket above swirls in obedience, sending down a black lightning bolt that crackles with promised pain.
He grips it in the middle. The hairs on my arms straighten.
I get a foot free and force myself upright, pivoting around my anchored foot. Searching my belt for a weapon. I’ve never fought a lightning bolt before.
Luc surveys me and seems genuinely sad. “No roots. No nightmist. We don’t even recognize our Icarus anymore.”
“Good,” I retort with effort. “That was the problem from the beginning.”
He looks past me at the tirones. Gives a small nod. They leave their posts against the walls and approach me. I try to dodge them, but that’s hard to do when I’m chained at the ankle like a dog. They grab my arms and tunic and hold me in place.
“Really, Luc?” I croak. “You’re not even going to fight me man-to-man?”
“Why endanger myself in the name of pride?”
A tiro grips me from behind, yanking my head back. The crowd hoots its approval. I can see only the top of Luc’s head. His lightning bolt raised to the gray lifeless sky.
I hear the swoosh and static of the weapon. It pierces my gut. I make a sound of agony foreign to my ears. Jolts of electricity pound my body like waves.
The tiro releases me. Luc yanks out the lightning bolt. Warmth spreads across my middle. He lifts the weapon again.
This time, in the last moments before he lunges, my body relaxes of its own accord. Submission. Fear flees. When he splits my chest open, all I can think is, I’m going home. To light. To Nole.
Heaven smells like dust and grandmother quilts.
My eyes hurt like a headache has been pounding behind them for days. I try to open them, but it’s too bright. I’m gasping for breath. My body hurts. But my chest and stomach are still intact. I manage to reach up and rub my sternum, expecting blood. Burns. Shocks of electric nightmare.
Everything feels too real. Too physical.
I’m not in heaven—I know this before I manage to keep my eyes open. I force myself into a sitting position.
I’m in the cabin with the two LifeSuPods. Galilei’s body and Crixus’s body. I’m awake.
With a jolt I realize what this means.
I’m a Spore. An Adelphoi.
I leap to my feet, but my body reminds me what it’s been through. I lurch sideways and brace myself on the bed. I suppose I rolled off in the Real World at some point during Luc’s attack in Tenebra.
The strange feeling of spiked fear and resigned peace still thrums in my veins. I still feel the cut of the lightning bolt and the severing of my consciousness. As I feel it, I notice all my swelling and inner pain is healed. So when an Adelphoi dies, the wounds from the Nightmare disappear.
Amazing.
I get my balance and take a few steps, but the greatest need that hits me is a parched throat. Water. I need water. Food.
My muscles quiver as I toddle toward the sink and turn the tap. I guzzle as much as my belly will hold before I stop. Afterward I grab the bag of pancake mix from the cabinet. Feeling weirdly normal, I slap a pan on the stove and combine the pancake powder with water and get one giant pancake browning on low heat in the skillet. I’m tempted to eat a mouthful of raw batter, but I refrain.
I watch in a tangle of wonder and disbelief. Here I am, alive. Gutted mere moments ago, and now cooking pancakes while my murderer’s father lies helpless in a LifeSuPod a few feet away.
At that thought, my hand on the pan stills, and my surroundings seem to fade, leaving only the LifeSuPod directly across from me.
Galilei. I cross the space and look down at the weathered face with the bald head.
He’s not as pasty as when I saw him last. In fact, he looks ready to rise out of his LifeSuPod like a vampire waking to feed.
Because I rejuvenated him by saving his LifeSuPod and plugging it in.
I sigh and turn away, feeling like I’m letting down the Adelphoi. The children. I’m not defending or protecting them like I promised.
But can I betray my own soul to do it?
They are more important to me than Luc or Galilei. They’re more important to me than me, but they’re not more important to me than God. Somehow I know neither Luc’s life nor Galilei’s is mine to take in hand. Maybe He’ll give them to someone else, but it’s not me.
I have to trust.
I take a breath and flip the pancake.
When it’s done I transfer it to a paper towel on top of the counter and get another one cooking. I tear off a bite of the cooked one and stuff it in my mouth.
So what now?
I flip the second pancake as a thud comes from behind me. I whirl so quickly the pan flies off the stove, clattering to the ground. My eyes are fixed on Galilei’s LifeSuPod.
The thud comes again, with a cry this time, and the heavy lid of the second LifeSuPod pops open.
Crixus sits up so suddenly the IV is pulled out of his arm. He growls and grabs his arm to clamp the small spurt of blood. Serves him right for stealing my LifeSuPod.
Apparently he got killed in Tenebra too. Does that mean he turned on Luc?
He looks over at Galilei’s LifeSuPod, then at me. Neither of us says anything for a moment. Actually, I’m not sure what to say.
I pick up the dropped pan and hold it out to Crixus. “Pancake?”
“So you were a Spore this whole time,” he says.
I shrug. “I only just found out.” I wave a hand toward his body. “How did you get here? Well, I guess, how did you die there?”
“Tried to stab Luc in the back when he decimated you.”
I lift my eyebrows. “My great defender.” I pour the last of the batter into the pan.
“It wasn’t about you.” He detangles himself from the cords of his LifeSuPod and steps out. Joints crack as he stretches his arms over his head.
“Not an ideal time to reveal your duplicity.” I tear a pancake in half and wad the entire thing in my mouth. “So you missed, then?” I say in a muffled voice.
“Got his shoulder before he got my heart.”
Stabbed heart versus a thorough gutting. Not fun for either of us. “Why now? Why in the Arena surrounded by other tirones?” Was it possible Crixus attacked Luc solely to stop him from going after the Adelphoi?
He walks over and takes a corner of one of my pancakes, despite the fact that his body has been living off the LifeSuPod. Well, I did offer him one. “I did it for the people.”
“That’s a bit vague.”
“I am the noxior trainer,” Crixus states. “Almost everyone in that Arena is alive because of me. I trained and taught them and got them their citizenship.”
“They trust you.”
“For the most part. At the very least, they see me as a leader they’re used to following. If they saw me turn against the Emperor, perhaps they’d ask themselves why I did it.”
“You really thought that through,” I comment.
“Well, it didn’t work.”
“Maybe it did. You’re gone right now, you don’t know.” I flip the next pancake too early, and batter splatters the counter. This guy-buddies-on-a-camping-trip conversation feels itchy and refreshing at the same time. It’s surreal. Like if there were no virus or apocalypse we’d be friends who actually grilled over an open fire together or something.
“Why have you never joined the other Adel—Spores?” I ask. “They could have been a great support for you and you for them. All this time they’ve seen you as an enemy.”
He huffs. “What can they offer me?”
My reply is instant. “Friendship, for one.”
He turns an annoyed gaze to me. “Do I look like I need friendship?”
“Grinches and Scrooges need friends most of all.” I finish the pancakes and turn off the stove.
He shakes his head and moves to the window. “Look, you found a girl you like and that’s great. You’re new to the whole Spore scene—equally great. But even before the Nightmare Virus, I kept to myself.
“I went to church for almost thirteen years. Volunteered, attended regularly, and got lunch after service with various families. But when my daughter died, the pastor didn’t even know her name. I got one Sunday of ‘I’m so sorry for your loss,’ and that was it. They held the funeral, but then they went about their lives. It was like I’d never been a part of them.”
Crixus had a daughter? How different was he before his daughter’s death? Grief changes people—I know that firsthand.
Crixus has been so stuck in his Old World experience of church that he’s missed out on being part of the new one.
“I’m going back to the Spores,” I say. “They need me, and I need them. That’s where life is, Crixus.” I look at him. “Come with me.”
“No thanks.” He tugs at the tube weaving from his LifeSuPod into the wall, checking its connection.
“C’mon. Give them another chance.”
He moves to the IV to get a new needle for reattaching it. “There are no second chances.”
“That’s not what I understand.”
He stills but doesn’t give. This is Crixus’s opportunity, but he needs to choose it for himself. And I need to get to the Adelphoi house, check on the kids, and get back into Tenebra.
“I’ll be in the truck. I’m going to the Spore base. You get one minute.” I walk outside, not sure if I should have offered what I did. Who in their right mind would leave behind a perfectly good LifeSuPod to trust strangers to keep him alive?
Maybe I’m not in my right mind. But part of me hopes Crixus isn’t either.
The moment my foot lands on dust, a strange mixture of emotions hits me. Relief and something else. Something invigorating. I stand still for a moment before I place it.
Sunlight.
I’m in the sun. I almost drop to a knee beneath the glorious heat I’ve longed for. It’s a dim sun and near to setting, but it’s bright and life and warm.
With a literally lightened heart, I get in the truck and start it up. I count to 60. Then I do it again. Then, determinedly, I turn on the engine, ready to be rid of this place. I glance at the cabin door one final time, wondering if this is going to be one of those movie scenes where Crixus walks out just as I start to drive away.
I inch forward. Surely he’s heard the truck engine by now. But he’s still not here.
Disappointment settles in my gut. I pull away from the house. It’s like he wants to stay behind, on his own. He thinks he’s playing both sides, but he’s not involved in the Adelphoi side at all. He’s an Adelphoi, yes—even if he doesn’t know the title—but no one besides me knows who he is. How is that serving anyone?
