Flux (8 page)

The question was whether to ditch him here in this level, or take him back to their home level before losing him. A tiny grin played across Nellie’s mouth as she considered the first option. Why not? It wasn’t as if she’d asked Deller to follow her through the gate, and she was hardly his babysitter. If he got stuck here alone, that was his problem. So what if he ran into his double and eventually
figured things out? Without the ability to open the gates, he would have no way of tracking her down to seek revenge, and she certainly wasn’t planning on returning to this level anytime soon. He would be missed in their home level, of course, but everyone would assume he was another kid who’d been picked up and shipped off to the Interior for experiments. Best of all, the Skulls would be useless without him. All things considered, his absence would improve her life considerably.

Besides
, thought Nellie grimly.
tit for tat
. He owed her for the haircut. Straightening, she focused on her surroundings, probing for information. The immediate area smelled musty and the air was so still she could hear the slight pound of her heart in her ears. Leaning to the left, she felt her arm brush against what seemed to be a stack of crates. Slowly she tuned into the molecular field and watched the quiet play of energy in the dark. Except for the rapid pulse of Deller’s body to her right, it was all low-key. The room appeared to be a storage area, jam-packed with boxes and crates, and she sensed nothing that would leap at her, snarling, in the dark.

Carefully she assessed the harsh rhythm of Deller’s breathing, with its tiny whistle that meant his nose was packed with snot. About a foot to her right he seemed to be just sitting, probably assessing things like she was. The question was: How clued in was he? Could she count on him being disoriented by his abrupt passage between the levels, or at least stunned temporarily stupid? Cautiously Nellie raised herself to a crouch. All she had to do was put some distance between them and lose him in the room’s absolute darkness, then reopen the gate, get herself through it, and shut it again real quick. That shouldn’t be too difficult. Quietly she shifted to get a better balance. A soft swearing started beside her, but Deller seemed to be muttering to himself. So far, so good. Edging her right foot forward, Nellie leaned her weight onto her left, ready to push up into a standing position, and heard her ankle joint crack like tinder wood.

Instantly Deller was on his feet, shoving her against the wall. “Where d’you think you’re going?” he hissed, his stinky weasely breath all over her face.

“Somewhere else,” she hissed back. “I’m not spending another minute breathing the stink that comes off you.”

“You’re not moving an inch without my say-so,” he replied grimly. “Sit back down until I tell you to move.”

“Why should I listen to someone stupid enough to sneeze a pack of devils down on us?” Nellie grumbled, but she subsided against the wall and felt him draw back a bit ... a very little bit. Holding her breath, she listened to his nose whistle in the dark. Deller breathed the rhythm of quick narrow air, as if he was sitting on some intense private pain, holding it in, containing it. Pain had a secret hold on this boy, it clutched him from the inside out. Keeping that pain at bay—managing it—was what made him such a swift thinker.

Not that being a quick thinker made him any more difficult to handle, Nellie decided quickly. Here in this room he couldn’t attack or hurt her because her screams would summon the men. Nor could he force her to go anywhere with him for the same reason. All she had to do was sit tight until he got bored and left. Then she could reopen the gate and return to their home level. The levels were great for getting rid of people who were bugging you. Eventually you could always find a way to be left alone. An inexplicable pain hooked Nellie’s heart, and she listened without moving to the rasp of Deller’s breathing in the dark.

Grunting softly, he shifted. “This place has a real buzz,” he whispered. “Can you feel it?”

With a start, Nellie realized he was sensing the new level’s vibra-tory rate. That was no good. If he kept thinking along these lines, he might figure things out. “You’re just jumpy,” she said dismissively. “That’s why you’re leaning all over me.”

Immediately Deller pulled back. “Just making sure you don’t take off,” he muttered, coughing low in his throat.

“So what if I did?” she sneered. “Scared of the dark, Dellie? Scared you can’t get home to Mommy?”

He snorted and a pause floated between them, waiting like that moment on the top of the warehouse fence when they’d tensed, watching each other before she’d sprung. Then Deller spoke again, struggling to pull his voice out of an airy arc of fear.

“How did you know about the secret door in the wall?” he asked.

She fought the sudden scattering of her thoughts, lacing her voice with obvious scorn. “What secret door?”

“You didn’t even touch it,” Deller faltered. “Just sort of
looked
at it, and it came open.”

“It was already open,” she scoffed. “You didn’t notice. The hall was dark.”

“Then how’d you get it closed?” Deller demanded, leaning toward her again.

“Just pushed,” she said vaguely, fumbling for a better lie, but was spared the effort as a shout went up on the other side of the wall.

“Sssst,” Deller hissed unnecessarily and they both froze, listening to the tramp of approaching feet and the terrified pleading of a fourteen-year-old boy.
So
, thought Nellie with satisfaction,
Deller’s double had been caught and hers had escaped. Didn’t that just tell you who could take better care when things got into a ruckus?

“Who was that?” whispered Deller, as the pleading voice faded down the hall.

“Who was who?” mocked Nellie, her triumphant grin taking over the dark.

“Who’d they catch?” asked Deller, obviously exasperated. “I didn’t see anyone hiding in the church but us.”

Nellie couldn’t help it, her entire body convulsed with satisfaction. “You!” she crowed and knew the game was up, the secret out, but she couldn’t help it—the truth was beauty in her mouth,
a moment of singing revenge for the razor and the taunts that had dug deep, deeper than she’d ever wanted to go.

“Me?” said Deller, thunderstruck. “But I’m right here, beside you.”

“Your
double
,” Nellie gloated and listened to his breath quicken. “Don’t you know anything about traveling the levels?”

Deller’s silence was so intense she could feel it like a wave, permeating the surrounding dark. “So,” he said finally, his voice husky with thought. “You’re a rerraren, are you, Bunny?”

Rerraren
. The word hung between them, one of those fragments of the old speech that Outbackers used to shut everyone else out. “What’s that?” Nellie asked suspiciously, her eyes narrowing. “You calling me crazy?”

“Maybe,” Deller said slowly. “Or maybe I just figured out why they were after your brains.”

She opened her mouth but there were no words, just the abyss of her mind opening endlessly down.

“So, we’re somewhere else then?” Deller asked, after a pause. “Lulunar took us into another world? That’s why the air’s got such a buzz to it. What did you call it—a level?”

Lulunar?
she thought.
Fine, let him think it’s the twin moons that did it
. “Don’t worry,” she said casually. “We’re only one level over, so it’ll be easy to get back. We just have to wait until we’re sure there’s no one in the hall, and then I’ll open the gate.”

“But that’s the hall in this level, isn’t it?” asked Deller. “How d’you know it’ll be quiet in our level?”

A grin of admiration flashed across Nellie’s face. He was quick, that was for sure. “Because everything’s the same in the levels,” she explained. “They’re copycats. If the hall’s quiet here, it’ll probably be quiet there too.”

“Probably?” asked Deller.

“Well, they’re
usually
the same,” Nellie admitted. “It depends on flux, I guess. And on how much you mess things up when you travel from one level to the next.”

“So what you’re saying is that when this hall gets quiet, we won’t have a clue about our hall—” Abruptly Deller cut off, listening, and then she heard it too—a long wavering cry, so faint it seemed to caress the air.

“That’s ... me,” said Deller slowly. “Isn’t it?”

“Not
you
,” Nellie scoffed, trying to shake her unease. “Just one of your doubles. And you can thank the Goddess for that. If we were in our level, it
would
be you.”

“But it
is
me, isn’t it?” said Deller. “Some kind of me, in a different place?”

“Don’t be ridiculous,” Nellie snapped, her unease growing. Some kind of
me
—what was he talking about? Doubles were just ...
doubles
. “Doubles are like shadows,” she said quickly. “Just
ideas
of yourself. You should be glad those men are busy with your double. It makes it a zillion times easier for me to open the gate and get us back home.”

Instantly Deller’s hand gripped her shoulder. “We can’t,” he said hoarsely.

“You bet we can,” Nellie hissed, trying to shake him off. “
I
can.”

“They’ll murder him, Bunny, don’t you know that?” Deller whispered and she froze, thinking of the Interior agent and the line of listless children standing beside the burgundy van. That agent’s double now had hold of Deller’s double, and she knew better than Deller how much mercy the man was likely to show. But so what? This wasn’t her home level, what did she care about what went on here? There were hundreds of levels—you could go crazy trying to keep track of them all.

“You’re thinking too much,” she said. “This place isn’t
real
, not like our home level. Once we get back, it’ll fade like a dream. You’ll see.”

Another cry wavered in the distance, and Deller’s grip tightened. “We can’t go,” he said thickly, “until we get him out.”

Fear turned cartwheels in Nellie’s head. The guy was a lunatic. She had to dump him, and fast. “You go rescue him,” she hissed, “and I’ll wait here. That ain’t my kind of foolishness.”

“I can’t get back without you,” Deller said doggedly. “Either you come with me, or I start yelling so loud they’ll find us in five seconds flat.”

Nellie’s brain blew itself out with shock. “You got a death wish?” she squeaked. “He’s just a stupid double.”

“What kind of a rerraren are you?” Deller leaned so close she could smell each word. “Don’t you know what a double means, Bunny? You ever seen what happens to a person who goes on living after his soul’s died?”

“But you’ve got hundreds of doubles,” Nellie protested. She wanted to rake her fingers across his face, scratch some sense into him. “What does one matter?”

“Do I start yelling now?” Deller whispered threateningly.

Another scream stroked the air. Nellie hesitated, pondering her options. She could try slowing down the molecular field so Deller couldn’t move, then speed it up again and count on his disorientation to jerk her arm free of his grip. But then what? Better to fool him into thinking she was going along with him, then make her escape when he wasn’t breathing down her neck.

“I guess not,” she muttered, faking passivity as he started pulling her across the room. Hissing at a bumped shin, she fumbled with her free hand, feeling her way in the dark.

“Here’s the door,” Deller whispered.

Nellie sent up a fervent prayer to the Goddess, hoping it was locked, but the door creaked open to reveal another shadowy hallway. Domed and narrow, its only light came from an entranceway to the right.
The sanctuary
, Nellie thought, looking at it in dread. Muffled voices could be heard through the opening—short staccato questions, interspersed with whimpering replies. Tightening his grip on her arm, Deller started down the hall. Another scream cut the air, rising as if it had wings.

“Wait a minute,” Nellie muttered, fighting the ooze in her knees. “Can’t you just
wait
?”

“Ssst,” hissed Deller, flattening himself against the doorjamb and peering around it. “They’re right over there.”

Peering over his shoulder, Nellie saw the men at the front of the sanctuary, swarming beneath the floor-to-ceiling statue of the Goddess. Lit by candles and EXIT signs, the room was a dance of elongated shadows, but she could make out the priest in his green robe and the Interior agent, body tensed snakelike to strike. A space opened between the swarming men and she caught sight of Deller’s double with his arms raised, trying to protect his head. The men seemed to be doing more yelling than hitting, but there was blood on the boy’s face and he kept shifting his arms, as if unsure which part of himself to protect.

“We need a decoy,” whispered Deller. “If I run across and lead them off, can you get him out?”

“They won’t all go after you.” Nellie fought the urge to claw his hand from her arm. “They’ll see doubles and know it’s a trick.”

“Huh,” Deller grunted, his eyes running restlessly across the sanctuary. Nellie had to give him credit—all he’d let go upon seeing his double was a single muttered gasp. Scanning the room, she noted the back entrance next to the confessional booth. That escape route wouldn’t help this time—the gate to their own level had to be opened from the wall in the storage room. Grimly she scanned the sanctuary again. The place was a mirage of flickering candles, voices of fire crying out to the Goddess. Shadows and light danced across the tapestries on the walls, the room’s molecular field pulsed like a long slow ache. At the front of the church, the Interior agent ducked forward. Deller’s double gave a hoarse grunt and Nellie felt brilliant flames of pain shoot from his body—another entreaty to the Goddess, unseen and unheard.

“Fire,” she hissed, her eyes skittering across the sanctuary. “We’ll set this place on fire with candles.”

Deller stiffened, his gaze racing from tapestry to tapestry. “You game?” he asked, darting her a glance. Heart thundering, she nodded. In the last few seconds, everything had changed. Her
eyes had been opened, she’d sensed Deller’s double cry out to the Goddess and now she could feel Ivana responding to his plea, filling the sanctuary with Her holy anger. This place was about to go up in a fiery prayer—anyone who’d ever suffered and cried out to the Goddess would be part of Her blazing revenge.