Departure (12 page)

THIS UNDERGROUND CHAMBER MUST HAVE BEEN BUILT LONG
after the original farmhouse. It's adjacent to the basement and deeper. Instead of rough stone walls, the room is lined with smooth concrete, painted white. There's no need for candles here: a bright computer panel glows on the far wall just next to a large, arched alcove that holds what looks like a black tram car. But there are no wheels under it, only a steel platform. Does it sink into the ground and connect with a rail system?

I bet it does. It's like a single-car tube station, buried below this farmhouse.

The black car's long sliding door is open, revealing brown leather couches on three sides and a large wooden table in the center.

Sabrina and Yul turn away from the panel to face Nick, Grayson, and me. The rifle leans against the wall, within Yul's reach.

Nick breaks the silence. “What is this?”

“We're not sure,” Sabrina says, her voice flat. Yep, she's back to normal as well—her normal, anyway.

“I doubt that,” Nick says, stepping closer, scrutinizing the car and the glowing panel.

“Our theory is that it's a mass transit apparatus.”

“Connected to?”

“Everywhere, it would seem.”

Nick looks up. “You were going to leave us.”

Yul just cuts his eyes away, but Sabrina says, “Yes.”

“At least you're honest.”

“I've never been dishonest with you, Nick.”

“That may be, but you also haven't told us the full truth, have you? The two of you know what's going on here, maybe what happened to the plane. I think we're entitled to answers.”

Sabrina opens her mouth, but Yul speaks for the first time. “We don't have them.”

“I don't believe you. What year is it?”

“I don't know,” Yul insists.

“What year do you
think
it is?”

Yul hesitates. “We believe we're in the year 2147.”

“Why?”

Yul shakes his head and glances at Sabrina. “This is what I mean: we don't have time for this. If we start answering questions, we'll be here for three hours, and we still won't know any more than we did before. And neither will you—you'll just be more confused.”

“So confuse me,” says Nick. “Start talking. I want answers.”

“Our
answers
are mostly conjecture, based on incomplete information. That's why we're going to London.”

“And leaving us here.”

“For your own safety.” Yul gestures to his bag. “I believe they're after Sabrina and me, and possibly what's in my bag.”

“Which is?”

“Explaining that will take more time than we have.”

Nick pauses, thinking. “What's in London?”

“We don't know.”

“Then why go?”

“Because seeing London will give us some idea of what we're dealing with. Look,” Yul says, “stay here. You're safer. They may have
placed a tracking device on the two of us, and it's possible they can monitor activity on the Podway.”

So that's what they call this underground network.

Nick shakes his head. “We're not splitting up. And you're wrong: we can't stay here. We're out of food. We'd have to venture out just to feed ourselves. It's only a matter of time before they find us. Finding help is our only hope. You know that as well as we do. You're looking for answers in London, but that's not all, is it? You think you'll find help there.”

“Yes,” Sabrina says. “We have reason to believe we'll find help in London. Our plan is predicated upon that assumption.”

“If there's help in London, then we are
all
going to London.” Nick steps closer to the panel. “Now how does this work?”

“We're not sure,” says Yul. “We've been trying to learn the system before we connect to the network, just in case they can track us.”

“That's the other advantage to London,” Sabrina says. “It's a short trip. Hopefully we'll be far away from this network by the time they're aware we used it.”

“Makes sense.”

Yul taps the panel. “It keeps asking for a GP, which we assume is a universal identification device, possibly implanted. Its backup is fingerprint ID.” The panel switches to a screen that reads,
STEP CLOSER TO THE TERMINAL TO SIGN IN
. There's a small box in the lower right-hand corner with text inside it:
DON'
T HAVE A GP? PRESS YOUR THUMB TO THE SCREEN HERE
.

Nick motions for me to step forward, and I press my thumb to the cold surface of the lighted panel. Red letters flash on the screen:
NOT RECOGNIZED
.

“Try it again,” he says.

Three tries later, the screen still blinks a rejection notice.

Grayson tries his thumb next, with the same result. Not recognized.

Nick glances at Yul and Sabrina suspiciously, then presses his own thumb to the panel.

NICHOLAS STONE. ENTER YOUR DESTINATION.

“So the three of us”—Nick motions to Yul, Sabrina, and himself—“can use the Podway, but neither of them?”

“It seems so,” Yul says.

“Why?”

“I don't know.”

“Speculate.”

Yul shakes his head. “Where do you want me to start? It could be any of a number of reasons.”

“Give me a few, just for kicks.”

“Okay, then: when this transit network was created, Harper and Grayson could have been living outside London and not been registered.”

“Or we could have died long before this was even invented.” Grayson sounds mildly amused. “We'd all be dead by 2147.”

“True,” says Yul. “The most likely scenario is that Harper and Grayson used alternative forms of transportation in the future. An automobile, an airship, or a teleportation booth. Who knows? Satisfied? Can we go?”

“Not satisfied at all, but we should definitely go,” Nick says. “Will another empty car arrive after this one departs?”

“Yes. Within a few minutes if the panel is correct.”

“Good.” Nick nods at Yul and Sabrina. “Since only three of us can activate this thing, we'll split up: Grayson and Sabrina in the first car, Yul in the second, and Harper and me in the third.”

Yul smiles. “You're splitting us up to keep an eye on us.”

“That's right. Because we don't trust you. Because you've been keeping secrets from us. Because you were going to leave us. How's that for full disclosure? Get used to it, because you're going to do a lot of it when we get to London, no matter what we find.”

Grayson moves closer to Nick, standing shoulder to shoulder with him. He stares at Yul, silently communicating our numbers and firepower advantage.

Yul mutters to himself, but grabs his bag. He glances at the rifle but decides to leave it, which is a relief.

Sabrina works the computer panel, entering the destination, then she and Grayson climb into the first car and pull the door shut. The floor below it parts with a barely audible hum, the car descends, and two minutes later an identical car rises into the alcove. Yul loads up
and leaves without another glance at us, and Nick and I slip into the next car.

Inside, the car feels almost like a train compartment. We sit across from each other on the brown leather couches, the glossy wood table between us. The imitation windows on each side simulate an idyllic English countryside flowing by peacefully. In fact, this is the first moment since the crash that Nick and I have had together without the immediate threat of death, starvation, or mutilation—either to ourselves or others.

Nick speaks before I get a chance. “I heard you and Grayson talking in the cellar. What's up with you two?”

“He hates me.”

“And you hate him?”

“Not really. I don't know him. His father is Oliver Norton Shaw.”

“The billionaire.”

“Yeah. You know him?”

“I've met him.”

“Me, too. Only once, a few days ago in New York. He flew me out—that's actually the only reason I was in first class. It was a perk, a gift to try to convince me to write his officially authorized biography.”

“And Grayson's upset about that?”

“Not per se. His father is planning something big. Shaw wants to give his fortune away in grand style, establishing a new kind of charity. He's calling it the Titan Foundation. He wants the book to detail his life and his journey to a series of revelations about the human race, lay out his vision for the role his fortune and foundation will play in the future of humanity.”

“Certainly thinks a lot of himself.”

“He does. And not much of his son. Grayson will get nothing when the foundation is established. Shaw sees it as a way to force Grayson to finally forge his own path in the world. When I was waiting to meet with Shaw, Grayson was in with him. He was furious, shouting that he was being cheated out of his inheritance. Called his father a glory whore reaching for the spotlight one last time after his business career was over, among other even worse things. He stormed out, and that's the first time I saw him. Shaw told me Grayson was threatening to
sell his own tell-all book to a publisher in London. If he didn't get the inheritance promised to him, he'd air the dirty laundry, as they say.”

“Interesting.”

“It's funny, I've barely thought about my dilemma since the crash, but it was all I could think about on the flight.”

“Dilemma?”

“Whether to write Shaw's biography.”

“What's the problem?”

“The problem, more or less, is that I don't know what I want to be when I grow up.”

“Who does, these days?” Nick laughs quietly.

“I was a journalist for a few years, then a ghostwriter, but Shaw's biography would be my first chance to have something published with my name on it.”

“Sounds great.”

“It does. It's what I thought I wanted. But I've also been working on a novel, what I hope will be the first in a series. That's my real love, and I'm afraid that if I write Shaw's biography, I'll never finish it. My whole life will change. I just want to know if I could make it writing fiction. If I knew that, the decision would be so much easier.”

Nick nods, and we sit in silence for a while.

“What about you? Any career angst?”

He laughs. “Yeah, I'm . . . at a bit of a crossroads, too.”

“With work?”

“With everything.”

He leaves it at that, suddenly looking a lot more tired. He's not very talkative—about his personal life, at least. It's funny, I've heard his voice so much the last few days: His speech by the fire in the cold dark night that saved all those people. The way he organized the camp, keeping everyone fed and away from each other's throats. His instincts and quick decisions. But in the face of a simple question about his own life, it's like every word is an anvil in his bowels, yours truly trying to reel it up from the depths with a flimsy fishing line.

“I meant it last night,” he says.

“About what?”

“That I was really glad when I got there this morning and saw that you were alive.”

I take a deep breath, calming myself. “Yeah. Me, too. Wasn't sure if I would make it another day. And seeing you when I opened my eyes . . . that was nice, but God, you looked a fright. Scared me half to death.”

“Rough couple of days.”

I move around the table to sit next to him and touch his forehead at the hairline, inspecting the wounds where I wiped the dried blood away. I smile. “But, hey, you cleaned up okay.”

He reaches for my arm, closes his fingers around my wrist, and puts his thumb in my palm, half filling it.

I feel myself holding my breath.

Neither of us says a word, but our faces edge closer, slowly. I'm not even sure if he's moving or if I am. Or both of us.

The booming computer voice shatters the silence. “You have reached your destination.”

But I don't look away. And neither does he.

Behind me the door slides open, and I feel the rush of cool air on my back. Nick's eyes go wide, and I turn, getting my first glimpse of what's become of London.

THIS IS LONDON LIKE I'VE NEVER SEEN IT.

In the subbasement of the farmhouse, there was some debate before we left about where to get off the Podway in London. We considered Parliament, 10 Downing, and Scotland Yard, among others, reasoning that if any form of civilized government or law enforcement still existed, it would be found at one of these locations. The rub, however, is that the powers that be and the cloaked beings hunting us may be one and the same.

In the end, we settled on a compromise: a stop in a residential section, Hampstead—at least, it was mostly residential in 2015. We also reasoned that a stop outside the center of power would give us a peek at the state of things in the city and would likely be unguarded, increasing our chances of escape if things went awry.

We were right on one count: the Podway station is unguarded. In fact, it's utterly deserted.

Nick and I stare out of our pod for a moment, taking in what seems
to be a converted tube station. Sabrina, Yul, and Grayson are waiting outside. At the sight of us sitting so close in the pod, Grayson rolls his eyes and wanders off through the cavernous stone and concrete space, which is almost unrecognizable now. Where tracks used to be and trains moved through, a series of large booths now stand, each providing access to a single pod. The sight of the dark, empty rows and columns of pod booths rattles my nerves a bit.

It's surreal, seeing what was once a busy tube station devoid of its shuffling crowd: people talking and staring at cell phones, coursing through every nook and cranny. At peak times, people once covered every square inch. You could barely breathe then.

You could hear a pin drop now.

Outside, on the street, there's still no sign of life—human life, anyway.

Some buildings are boarded up, some battered, their windows smashed in, glass scattered across the empty sidewalks and streets. Grass and weeds shoot up from cracks, and vines twine up buildings, the lush green in bizarre contrast to the crumbling ruins of civilization. This city, which I love so much, which was built by the Romans more than two thousand years ago, which has survived endless conquerors and countless plagues, including the Black Plague and Nazi bombing raids, has finally fallen. But to what?

The sun has set now, and dim moonlight casts a strange glow over the empty streets. I walk out into the empty lane and stand there, awestruck by the total silence, something I've never experienced in London. It's almost transcendental, hypnotic. I feel like I'm in an overbudgeted television program, though it's terrifyingly real.

“What now?” Nick asks sharply, looking at Sabrina and Yul.

“We . . . hadn't gotten that far,” Sabrina says.

“Wonderful.” Nick glances back at the station. “I don't think we should stay here. We should get out of sight—and talk.”

“My flat's three blocks away,” I say, almost without thinking, the mystery irresistible to me.

“Okay. We'll check it out and stay just long enough to work out a plan.”

CLUES. THE THREE-BLOCK WALK TO
my flat has provided a cryptic set of leads as to what went on here, passed along in the form of modern
cave paintings, if you will: graffiti. Many of the messages are incomplete, washed away by the wind and rain, some obscured by weeds, trees, and vines. But fragments remain, and they reveal a city on the brink.

PANDORA WAS INEVITABLE.

MAKE US ALL TITANS OR NONE.

TITANS BETRAYED US.

WE DESERVED THIS.

THE TITANS WILL SAVE US.

GOD BLESS THE TITANS.

HUMANITY DIED YEARS AGO. THIS IS JUST THE CLEANUP.

WE WILL WIN THE TITAN WAR.

On the street, the outer door to what was once a town house, long ago converted to eight flats, stands open. We climb the narrow stairwell to the third floor, where my cramped flat used to be.

As we ascend, I suddenly become self-conscious, nervous about showing my place to visitors . . . one in particular. But that's silly. It isn't actually my place, not now. I mean, if we are in 2147, then I certainly don't live here, haven't for maybe a hundred years. Yet it's still a bit nerve-racking for Nick to see where I live.

On the landing, the door to my unit stands slightly ajar. I push it open. Incredible.

It's bigger.

The future owner joined it with the adjacent flat. My furniture's gone, but the style, the feel . . . it's mine. I must have decorated this place. Or . . . my daughter did. Someone with my taste. I'm frozen in the doorway.

Nick peeks his head around my shoulder. “Everything okay?”

“Yeah, fine.”

I wander in, the voices and movements behind me fading away. My first stop is the bookcase. On the top row, a dozen hardcovers with dust jackets line the shelf, all authored by Harper Lane. All have the same look and feel, block letters over mostly black-and-white photos on the covers. Biographies. The first is
Oliver Norton Shaw: Rise of a Titan.
The next biography is of David Jackson, a name I'm not familiar with. I briefly scan the row below, looking for a different kind of
book, in another style, a book about someone named Alice Carter. She's the one I care about. But she's not here. Just thick biographies, all in the same style. The lettering runs together as I scan again. There must be twenty or thirty Harper Lane–penned biographies in all. Not a single work of fiction.

There are also no photo albums. Picture frames cover the tables and small shelves on the wall, but they're blank. They must be digital, their memories lost to whatever catastrophe occurred here in the absence of power. I ransack the bookshelf, hoping to find something printed, a yellowed photo of me and a smiling gentleman or a child playing in the ocean at sunset. But as I move down the shelves, I find only reference books, two dictionaries, a thesaurus, and an assortment of worn novels, favorites from my youth.

I hear Nick's voice—my name, the word
Titans
—but I move to the bedroom in a trance.

Again, it's my style.

It's brighter in here. The moonlight glows through the two windows, almost reflecting off the blue walls with yellow accents. I collapse onto the bed, sending a cloud of dust into the air. The floating motes sparkle in the shafts of light, as if my bedroom were a life-size snow globe with me inside.

My arm drifts down, out of the moonlit haze, to the side of the bed, to the place where I hide them, where visitors, even my closest friends stopping by after a shoddy day, could never find them. I would be mortified.

This will clinch it.

I slip my fingers into the crack between the mattress . . .

Yes, I live here.