Flux (29 page)

“You think she’s the one they’re looking for?” the other man asked quickly.

“I don’t know,” replied Hadden. “You’re sure they didn’t come through here?”

“Been here for hours,” the other man assured him. “No one’s showed.”

“I’ll have to call headquarters then,” Hadden said. “Could be the contact point screwed up and downloaded them somewhere else in the system. The receiving stations will have to be notified.”

“There’s a direct line at the front desk,” said the other man. “It’s a Goddess freak day and everyone’s on holiday, praying to their star charts.”

Nellie’s eyes slitted. A pagan, just as she’d thought. She turned toward the hallway, intending to run toward it, then felt a hand grab her arm and whirled to find Deller pulling her through a second doorway close to the reception desk. Quickly his mother eased the door shut behind them. Huddled in the dark, they listened as Hadden stalked into the lobby and picked up the phone.

It sounded as if it was going to be a long, very muffled conversation. Restless, Nellie let her mind tilt to the right and began to scan the molecular field. They appeared to be standing in a small storage room. Outlines of several filing cabinets glowed quietly in the dark, and she could make out rows of shelving along the far wall. Further probing revealed what was probably a small lamp sitting on top of a filing cabinet. Tuning back into solid reality, Nellie crossed the room and touched the object. Yes, it was a lamp, and it appeared to be plugged in. Cupping her hands around the knob to muffle any click it might make, she turned it on.

The room lit up with a gentle glow. Immediately Nellie’s eyes flew toward the others, who were still standing by the door. As the light hit him Deller whirled, then relaxed and nodded. His mother simply opened her eyes and closed them again. It must have been twelve hours, Nellie realized, since the woman had had anything to eat. Glancing around, she spotted a box of sugar cubes next to some coffee supplies on a shelf. Carefully she opened the box, wincing as the cardboard rasped slightly, then tiptoed to the door and placed a cube against Deller’s mother’s mouth. The woman’s eyes flew open, and she took the cube from Nellie and fit it carefully between her swollen lips. Handing the box to Deller, Nellie watched him lift another cube to his mother’s mouth.

She turned from them and began to prowl the room. Part of a secretary’s work area, it was consumed by shelves of office supplies, a photocopier and a row of filing cabinets. Stopping in front of the latter, Nellie scanned the labels that appeared on the drawers.
MB129QS.
Detta 093
.
Quadrant
74QA
. What kind of codes were these? Curious, she pressed a release button and slid open a drawer packed with file folders. But the files were labeled with incomprehensible technical jargon, and none of the diagrams in the folders made any sense. Bored, she moved on to the next filing cabinet and opened the top drawer. Pulling out the first file, she almost grinned as she read the label.
Breeding Program?
Was the government of the Interior getting into the dog-breeding industry?

Slipping the file back into the drawer, Nellie flipped to the next one and read the name Gemma Abreen on the label. She opened the file and saw the photograph of a seven-year-old girl in the top right-hand corner and her case history typed into the appropriate boxes below. Unease rippled through Nellie and she scowled. What would a seven-year-old girl have to do with a breeding program? Opening the next file, she saw another photograph and name—Phillip Acker, fifteen years old. His mother was an engineer, his father ...
See File PRADS01
was typed into the appropriate box. The next several files revealed a similar scenario—a child’s photograph with an address, birthdate, and mother’s occupation, and a similar reference to the father’s identity:
See File JQFR1011
or
Refer to File MTZFN1201
.

Nellie’s heart began to thud painfully. Mysterious unnamed fathers—it had been a sore point between her and her mother. While Interior children didn’t live with their fathers, they were usually given the basic facts about their lineage, including their father’s name, caste and medical history. But all Nellie’s mother would say about her father was, “He’s with the stars now, honey. It doesn’t matter what his name is—he belongs to the Goddess.”

Nellie shivered once, uncontrollably, then got a grip and began leafing through the files until she reached the back of the drawer. The last file contained the case history of a boy named Sean Edden and she shifted to the next drawer, continuing her search. She was looking for the letter K—K for
Kammer, Kendricks, Kidder
... And then, there it was—
Kinnan, Nellie Joan
. Soundless bells tolled in her palms, blackness oozed through her brain and cleared. Slowly she pulled out the file and opened it.

There was her photograph, taken when she was eight, approximately two years before she and her mother fled the Interior. The home address listed was for an apartment she remembered as having bright yellow walls and a landlady two floors down who owned a pet canary named Holy Moley. Her school had been just around the corner, a two-minute dash. Nellie’s eyes roamed the page, scanning her uneven academic record and the lists of
her recreational activities and closest friends. Why would anyone want to keep track of her friends? And why had a dark stroke been drawn through the box that listed siblings? She had no siblings. It had been another sore point to pester her mother about.

Without warning, Nellie’s eyes locked onto her mother’s name:
Lydia Stella Kinnan
.
Occupation: elementary schoolteacher. Terminated in Dorniver, traitor’s death
. The death date given was sixteen months previous. As Nellie read it, the floor wobbled under her feet and she slumped heavily against the filing cabinet.
Deaddeaddead, my mother is dead
. Finally it was official, more than a deep dark question hovering at the back of her brain. For a long moment she stood caught in a nothing place, sucking her pain into a small black box and burying it deep within herself. Then she forced her eyes to return to the page and scan for details about her father.

There was the appropriate box, but a heavy stroke had also been drawn through it. Nellie whimpered in dismay, then glanced up, terrified at the sound she’d released. Her eyes locked with Deller’s, and they waited, strung like live wires across the muffled staccato of Hadden’s voice. Finally Nellie shrugged and Deller shrugged back. Handing the box of sugar cubes to his mother, he crossed the room and stopped beside her. Instinctively Nellie’s arm shifted to cover the page, resisting when he tried to move it. Then her eyes fell on the gap in his hand that had once held his missing finger. Everyone had something missing in their life—with Deller it was his father and brother, with her it was her mother and her past. Slowly she let her arm slide off the file.

Deller glanced at the page and his eyebrows rose disbelievingly at the sight of her name. “What is this?” he whispered.

She shrugged, not able to speak the words
Breeding Program
, and flipped to the file’s second page. Filled with diagrams of the human brain, it was marked with small Xs and arrows. Tiny print gave complex medical explanations. Nellie scowled as she stumbled over the unfamiliar terminology.
Biotelemetric, electromagnetic, bio-chip, nerve chip, radio-transmitter—
what was this but fancy talk
for some kind of machinery that had been stuck inside her head? Shrill stars sang in her ears; for a moment she felt everything she knew and understood slip completely away from her.

“Nellie?” Deller whispered, gripping her arm. The warmth of his hand brought her back to herself, but she shrugged him off and glanced again at the page before her. According to this file she’d been part of a secret government breeding program that wouldn’t even list her father’s coded file number. Her mother had been murdered for trying to rescue her, and her brain was filled with technology she couldn’t begin to understand. Shakily Nellie flipped to the file’s final page and read the last typed entry:
Contact lost near Dorniver
. The date listed was the same as the one given for her mother’s death. A single hand-scrawled phrase dominated the bottom half of the page:
Operation 9Q4L incomplete
. Quickly she flipped back to the previous page. There it was—the code 9Q4L, written next to a profile of her brain showing two implants inserted into the right temporal lobe. Was this the reason her mother had taken her and fled to the Outbacks, then died a traitor’s death—for trying to save her from the completion of Operation 9Q4L?

Clutching the file, Nellie stared at the cabinet drawer. There were so many folders, surely one file marked incomplete wouldn’t be missed. But what if she was caught with this information on her? Any Interior agent would immediately know who she was. Long-ingly Nellie traced the phrases typed onto the first page. There was her mother’s name, her own name, the name of her school and her former best friend. She was real, she did exist, and this file was her only evidence that she’d once belonged with people who’d known and loved her. It felt like missing breath.

Without glancing at Deller, she returned the file to the drawer and tucked it into place. She took one last look, straightening the file’s edges, matching it to the previous one. As she did, the following file sagged and she reached for it, intending to straighten it too, but then her heart stopped beating and she was falling through a long silence. When the falling stopped, she found herself once
again standing before the filing cabinet, her eyes focused on the new file, repeatedly scanning the label.
Nellie Joanne Kinnan
—the name came at her like a whisper that had been buried deep underground. Sliding the file out of the drawer, she opened it.

The photograph was obviously recent. The girl facing the camera had long blond hair. Her eyes were gray and curiously slanted, her nose thin and snubbed at the tip, her lips smiling but unsure of their meaning. Something about the corner tuck of her mouth told Nellie this girl could get pretty weasely. Maybe that was why they looked so much alike. But then maybe it was because the girl’s birthdate was the same as Nellie’s, and her mother was also listed as Lydia Stella Kinnan, an elementary schoolteacher who’d died a traitor’s death. Her father’s name had been blacked out, as had the box listing siblings.

Nellie Joanne’s current address was unfamiliar, but Nellie read it several times, imprinting it to memory, as well as the incomprehensible phrase, “Black Core Program: Advanced Stage.” Then she flipped to the second page and saw the same diagrams of the brain, only this time operation 94QL was marked complete. Further operations had followed. A third page revealed a full-scale drawing of the human body with Xs marked all over it. Nellie’s face blanched as she saw some of the sites. The girl was a walking implant factory.

Nellie stood in a terror vast and silent as a slowly spinning universe, and listened to her heart beat. She had a twin. Somewhere in a past she could barely remember they’d probably lived together, shared a bedroom, played with the same toys, and breathed one another’s air. While the details had been forgotten, she finally recognized the sensation of absence that had always been with her, sliding across the edge of her thoughts like a reflection in a mirrored mask. In some deep buried part of herself she’d always known about Nellie Joanne, had always missed her.

Slowly she slid the file into the drawer and closed it. Turning, she saw Deller standing inches from her and staring openmouthed, and
his mother beyond him, still leaning against the door listening to the uneven rumble of Hadden’s voice. Frozen, Nellie stared back at Deller, her mouth also open, filled with the same silence. It felt as if it had been years since she’d opened the first filing cabinet drawer, as if she’d traveled several universes since reading the label
Breeding Program
. Through the door came the muffled click of a phone being returned to its cradle. Footsteps stalked out of the lobby, down the long tiled hallway of her mind, and faded.

“He’s gone,” Deller’s mother mouthed.

Nellie nodded blearily. Crossing the room, she grabbed several sugar cubes and shoved them into her mouth. Grimly she fought off the urge to gag, sucking and swallowing until her head cleared and her blood quickened. “I guess we should try going back now,” she whispered. “Are you okay enough to do that?”

With a grimace, Deller’s mother closed her eyes and murmured, “Dizzy, but I’ll try.”

“C’mon, Mom,” Deller said, slipping an arm under her shoulder.

Quietly Nellie eased open the door and tiptoed across the lobby. Peering into the office, she saw the man still working at his computer and the set of metal brackets just beyond him, close to the far wall. An attack of shivering hit her and she hugged herself fiercely. What would happen this time when they stepped between the brackets? Would they be sent back through Ayne, or downloaded somewhere else in ‘the system’? And if they returned through Ayne, where would that be—to a laboratory full of waiting lab-coated men and priests?

It was only when she was a third of the way into the room that she realized the man at the computer was no longer wearing headphones. Fortunately the floor was carpeted and he was clicking furiously at his keyboard, but as she reached the room’s halfway point a phone sitting next to him began to ring. The man reached to pick it up and his eyes fell on her, frozen mid-step. Briefly he sat, mouth open and staring at her, and then she felt him tense, about to spring.

Sending her mind into the molecular field, Nellie brought it abruptly to a standstill. Shock reverberated through the molecules in her immediate vicinity and she wondered helplessly what this was doing to Deller and his mother. For a long stretched moment she stood fixed in position, watching the man who sat facing her, frozen in his chair. Then she braced herself and revved the vibratory rate back up to its normal speed.