Alight (11 page)

Bishop has purple bandages wrapped around one shoulder. The other shoulder is tied with strips of blood-streaked white cloth.

I realize that most of Spingate’s shirt is gone, shredded into strips. The fabric that remains barely covers her breasts.

“We ran out of bandages,” she says. “Bishop insisted I use what I had on you first. I improvised for his wounds.”

We climb up the wall of vines. Coyotl stays close to me, helping me when I stumble. I feel weak. Weak and dizzy.

At the top, I pause, look out at our shuttle. Lights on the tail, the wing tips, the top, all gleaming in welcome.

We made it.

Coyotl helps me descend the ring of vines. I’m almost to the bottom when I freeze, that now all-too-familiar blast of paralyzing fear driving straight through me—two Grownups, sprinting toward us.

“It’s all right,” Coyotl says. “That’s Visca and Bawden.”

As soon as he says that, I see it. Visca and Bawden, yes, but dressed all in black. The coveralls in the storeroom. My pulse is racing. I can barely see straight. I need to lie down.

The two circle-stars sprint to the top of the vine ring, scouting for danger in case we were followed here. The rest of us shuffle to the shuttle.

Farrar, Spingate and Coyotl start up the ramp. Bishop stops at the base. So do I.

Spingate turns. She’s beyond exhausted.

“Em, come on—you need to see Smith.”

“In a minute,” I say. “Just go.”

She doesn’t need to be told twice. She drags herself through the door.

Bawden and Visca return. I send them into the shuttle, leaving Bishop and me alone once again.

He can barely meet my eyes—he’s ashamed. At the hole in the wall, he panicked and he knows it. He wanted to protect me, but I sent him into the tunnel first, exposing myself to danger so he could get away.

He tilts his head toward the shuttle door. He wants me to go inside. He needs to be the last one out here.

“Bishop, we should talk about what happened at the waterfall.”

“What happened is we were stupid,” he says. “We were selfish, only worrying about ourselves. People could have been hurt.”

As if I didn’t feel guilty enough about that already.

In at least one way, Bishop and I are the same: we have a need, an
urge
to protect everyone. I don’t understand why sometimes I can’t think straight when I’m around him—or O’Malley, for that matter. What I
do
know is that my selfish actions almost got our friends killed.

I glance up at the shuttle, out to the vine ring—no one else is here. I reach out and take his hand.

“We just have to be smarter,” I say. I think about him kissing me. I want him to do it again. “We won’t do anything like that around other people.”

He stares at our hands for a moment, fingers intertwined. He gives me one short, firm squeeze, then pulls away.

“We won’t do anything like that,
period,
” he says. “We’re fighting to keep everyone alive, Em. I can’t lose sight of that, not even for a second.”

When we kissed, there was this look in his eyes—he couldn’t get enough of me. That look is gone. I feel like everything is ruined.

I trudge up the ramp.

This is what happens when you let your emotions control you? Well, never again.

At the shuttle door, O’Malley is waiting for me. He’s wearing black coveralls. A scabbard hangs from his waist, the jeweled handle of his knife sticking out. And…he has
boots
. My leg hurts so much I’d almost forgotten about my poor feet, beat up from the long hike, punctured by dozens of thorns. A Mictlan patch—just like the symbol on our ties—is stitched in metallic thread on O’Malley’s left breast. He’s holding a black blanket. When I stumble in, he wraps it around me.

“Welcome home, Em.”

He’s clean. His hair is combed, glossy black and perfect. It surprises me how good it feels to see his face.

I glance back down the ramp at Bishop, notice the contrast between the two boys: one scrubbed and neatly dressed, as if our living nightmare never happened, the other shirtless, bloody and bandaged, a walking testament to what we just endured.

O’Malley’s smile fades. “Bad news. Aramovsky got into Deck Four.”

His arm around my shoulders, he guides me into the coffin room. I see the familiar faces of Gaston, Beckett, Smith, Visca and the others. I see Zubiri, Walezak and the kids we found wandering the halls of the
Xolotl
.

I also see faces I don’t recognize.
Hundreds
of them. No, not hundreds, I already know the exact number—168.

Aramovsky, godsdamn him…he opened the coffins.

Little faces on little bodies. Kids dressed in clean, perfectly fitting white shirts, red ties, and black pants or red and black plaid skirts.

More mouths to feed.

Everything catches up with me in a crashing wave of despair that washes away the last of my strength. The room spins. I’m tired,
so
tired.

“O’Malley, get me out of here. Take me to Smith.”

I don’t care what she does to me, as long as she gives me more of that gas and puts me under.

M
y eyes flutter open. I’m lying on firm padding. I see something white, close above my face…too close—I’m in a coffin again.

I am
trapped
. Someone put me in here Matilda put me in here she won’t take me she
won’t
I’ll fight and have to get out
have to get
…

No. It’s not like that. I think I remember people putting me in here. O’Malley. Yes, that was it. And Smith. I’m not trapped, but this tiny space is squeezing in on me.

“Um…can I get out?”

“Yes, hold on.”

Someone is nearby. Such a relief. I close my eyes and take deep breaths, try to control myself. So confined in here, so
tight
.

The white above my face splits down the middle, slides away to the sides. Spingate grins down at me. She’s dressed in black, just like O’Malley.

“Hello there, Sleeping Beauty!”

Someone else leans in next to her, smiling at me. It’s Smith, the skinny circle-cross girl with the short brown hair who was in Bishop’s group back on the
Xolotl
. She’s also wearing the black coveralls. Her gray eyes are so pretty.

“Your leg was badly wounded,” she says. “Spingate did a good job binding it, but there was only so much she could do in the field. You lost enough blood to make you dizzy. Or maybe you were just exhausted and stressed.”

“Leaders don’t get stressed,” I say.

Smith sighs. “As you like. How do you feel now? Better?”

I do. I take a deep breath. I don’t just feel
better
…I feel
great
. They help me sit up.

Cloth against my skin—I’m wearing black coveralls. I stretch my arms out, look myself up and down. The coveralls have long sleeves and many pockets. New black socks on my feet. Except for my face and hands, I’m completely covered. For the first time in my few days of life, I’m wearing clothes that fit. My hands are clean. I touch my face: also clean. And the big bump on my head…it’s almost gone. I tenderly try out my split lip—healed.

Smith and Spingate steady me as I step onto the floor. The room marked
MEDICAL
is small and white. There is a second coffin, open and empty. Both coffins are dark brown, glossy and clean. They are free of intricate carvings, but other than that, they look just like the one I fought my way out of on the
Xolotl.

Off to the right, a single white pedestal with a red circle-cross engraved on the stem.

Smith taps the coffin’s edge. “Put your foot up here.”

She sounds as confident as Gaston does in the pilothouse. I do as I’m told.

She slides my pant leg up to my knee, touches my calf. She leans in, checks the area that was wounded. She squeezes the muscle and I wince.

Smith’s smile is full of pride.

“All better, Em. See for yourself.”

My calf is slightly bruised. There’s a thin pink line that shows me where the tear was, but it looks like the wound happened years ago.

“That’s amazing,” I say. “How did you know what to do?”

“Gaston said you wanted me to come in here and learn all I could. As soon as I started, some of those blank areas in my head filled in. I remembered medical classes, people teaching me things, and how to use the medical system. The machines perform most of the work, I just use the pedestal to ask questions and make a decision as to what needs to be done.”

Another person with recovered memories. Some, anyway, and these particular memories are critical to our survival. It feels good knowing that Smith is ready to take care of us.

She opens a cabinet, hands me a pair of black boots. It’s all I can do not to squeal with delight. As I put them on and start tying them, I look up at Spingate.

“Was I asleep long?”

“All night and half the day.”

That’s a long time. Too long.

“Has the spider shown up?”

Spin shakes her head. “Not yet, anyway. O’Malley made everyone stay inside the shuttle. He said that if it can stop attacks from the Grownups, it can probably stop the spiders.”

I finish tying my boots. I stand, put weight on my leg, bounce on it. My calf is sore, but feels so much better.

“Smith, you’re amazing.”

She blushes. She can be as modest as she likes, as long as she keeps fixing us up.

“Hey, where are my old clothes?”

Spingate’s face wrinkles. “Incinerated, I hope. Em, we
stank
.”

O’Malley brought me down here. My face flushes hot as I think of him seeing me naked.

“Who, um…who undressed me?”

“Don’t worry, the med-chamber did it,” Smith says, gesturing to the gleaming coffin. “It removed your old clothes, cleaned you up, treated your wounds, fed you intravenously, handled your waste and fixed your hair. It even put on your new clothes for you.”

She calls it a
med-chamber
? I like that, although I suspect she’ll be the only person to use that term. This thing “handled my waste.” Disgusting, but it explains a lot. I was in my original coffin for years—
centuries,
according to Brewer. The coffin took care of me.

Some of the
Xolotl
’s coffins broke down. The kids inside of those died.

If things break down here, what will happen? Smith can use this equipment, but can she fix it if it stops working? Same thing with Gaston and flying the shuttle, or Spingate and the bracer. Knowing how to
use
technology is not the same as knowing how to
make
it, or how to
repair
it.

Spingate puts a hand on my shoulder. “Time to go up. Everyone is waiting for you on Deck One.”

“Why?”

“The meeting,” she says. “O’Malley said when he brought you down here, you told him as soon as you woke up you wanted a meeting about the food situation.”

Other than O’Malley putting that blanket around me and showing me the new kids, I barely remember talking to him. I must have really been out of it. Still, a meeting is exactly what we need.

“So many people to feed now,” I say. “Aramovsky’s stupid act might mean we starve. Gods
damn
him.”

Smith’s eyes narrow. “Because you’re in charge, you think you can curse like that?”

Because you’re in charge
…so close to what Coyotl said at the waterfall. Do people think I’m abusing my position as leader? Well, someone has to make decisions, and I have every right to be angry at Aramovsky.

“He shouldn’t have woken them,” I say. “They were in those coffins for centuries. A few more days wouldn’t have hurt. How did he wake them up, anyway? Did his progenitor know how to operate the coffins?”

Spingate looks down, takes a small step away from Smith.

Smith glares at me defiantly.

“You,”
I say to her. “You opened the coffins.”

She crosses her arms. “Aramovsky asked for my help. He said the gods willed it. The pedestal had instructions for waking them, just like it had instructions for healing you.”

I remember Spingate’s words in the pilothouse, her worry that the kids might already be overwritten.

“Spin…are they like us?”

She nods quickly, instantly understanding my concern.

“O’Malley and Gaston said the new kids didn’t know who they were or where they were, just like when we woke up. The kids were terrified.”

There is anger in her voice. Like me, she understands how much trouble we’re in now that our numbers have doubled but our food has not.

I wish I had my spear. I’m so mad I could almost use it on Smith. I’m hot in the face and chest. It feels the same as when I lost my temper with Spingate—the difference is Smith
did
do something to deserve it.

“You woke them up, Smith,” I say. “Can you put them back to sleep?”

She juts out her chin. “You don’t have the right to do that, you—”

“Answer my question.”

Something in my voice makes her take a step back.

“It’s not safe for them,” she says. “Once someone comes out of a coffin for the first time, they’re
alive
. Putting them back into deep sleep could kill them.”