The Descent into the Maelstrom (The Phantom of the Earth Book 4) (10 page)

“They have to let us have
some
free time,” Oriana said, thinking about the constant simulations and studies and meditations and training between Harpoon classes.

Gaia grinned in that mysterious, mischievous way she would when she chatted about boys. “That they do.” Her eyes searched past Oriana to where Pasha stood.

“Pleasure to see you, Miss Gaia,” Pasha said. He sounded like Lord Thaddeus, and acted like him when he took Gaia’s hand in his, kissing it.

Oriana rolled her eyes.

“Ho, Oriana!”

Knowing Nathan’s voice without seeing him, she turned. “Ho, Nathan.”

He stood beside Duccio, Gaia’s blood brother. Biologically they were the same in late adolescence, similar to Oriana, Pasha, and most other candidates. In truth, while Gaia was born a full fifteen days after Duccio, she often acted like the elder. Oriana didn’t understand how the two candidates, developed by the same house, born of the same parents, could be so different.

“I thought you weren’t coming.” Nathan strode the last few meters between them, all smiles. He reached for Oriana, his cufflinks sparkling in the strobe light. He held her for a long moment. When he pulled back, she felt a little giddy.

The tingly sensations disappeared when Duccio winked at her. There was something about him that made her stomach uneasy in a decidedly squirmy way. He had the robust build of a Rastedes candidate and moved as agilely as his sister did. His hands looked thicker and stronger than Nathan’s or Pasha’s, yet felt soft when he touched her. He made a show of lifting her forefingers to his lips. Closing his eyes, he gave them a long, loud kiss, then angled his face toward hers and grinned.

She pulled her hand away.

“Sweet princess,” Duccio said, “some say you and your brother are tearing up the leaderboard.”

Oriana hated it when he called her
sweet princess
. She at first didn’t know how to respond, though she noted the glance Duccio shared with Gaia, who shook her head disapprovingly. Unlike Pasha’s thoughts, Oriana couldn’t hear Duccio’s or Gaia’s. Gaia was always so kind to her, but her brother spoke emotionlessly, revealing neither his sentiment nor his intentions.

“Is that what they say?” Oriana couldn’t figure out why Duccio would lie to her. While she’d not seen her ID number in the Summersets’ ticker, she’d been rising in the candidate ranks, clearly. Thinking more about it, she couldn’t keep the pride from her face.

Pasha stepped beside Oriana without greeting the boys. “From the top,” he said, “my sister and I will see farther—”

“And fall harder,” Duccio put in, “if you’re not careful.”

A silence lingered, until Nathan broke it. “Care to try out the lounge?” he said. He unbuttoned the top of his shirt, revealing his chest. “It’s a little cooler back there.”

“More private too,” Gaia agreed. She massaged Nathan’s shoulders, nuzzling her chin on his shoulder.

Oriana’s breaths quickened with her thoughts.
Don’t trust them.
“Let’s go then.” She pulled Nathan away from Gaia.

“Hold up,” Nathan said. He nodded to a girl at the bar, who flipped a few benari coins to the waiter bot. She lifted a Dunamisian-designed polychromatic handbag. Desaray Hawkins. Her colorful hair puffed high from a widow’s peak and splayed around her head, down her shoulders, and over her black and orange gown, which matched her eyes. Oriana marveled at her slender, muscular body, a body Oriana noticed caught Pasha’s attention as well.

The lounge was less crowded than the spherical hall, not at all similar to the scientific cafés that Oriana discovered during her research into Beimenian architecture. This one had circular booths, waiter bots, and a dizzying silver-and-blue ambiance, with colorful laser lights that streamed from a central orb and struck the dark ceiling in time with the music, a combination of jazz and electronica. Desaray waved to a waiter bot as if she’d done this a million times before.

“Six glasses of Loverealan wine and six shots of the finest cinnamon rum this establishment offers,” Desaray said next to the bot’s audio capture. The bot flashed its eye slit as if to indicate its understanding, then it scurried away.

“I hope you ordered me sparkling water,” Oriana said.

Duccio laughed. Desaray grinned. “Relax,” she said, “a glass of wine makes you feel fine.” She giggled, pushing Duccio’s hand away from hers. “That’s what Lady California says—”

“We’re not supposed to drink that stuff, even if it’s virtual,” Pasha said, sliding in beside Desaray, “and I’m not letting my sister get sick—”

“Oh,
pul-ease
, cut the bullshit,” Desaray interrupted. Her forefingers crawled over Pasha’s arm. “We’re in the virtual Candidate Café, Mr. Hero.”

Nathan gave Desaray a cautious nod, and he smiled at Oriana, who felt her body turn hotter than the sun. “There’s a reason the chancellor outlawed VR outside the Harpoons,” Nathan told Oriana. “No consequences in here. No worries. No hassles.” He leaned closer, his nose nearly touching hers. He moved his lips near her ear, and she could feel his warm exhalation. “Just … discovery …”

Oriana struggled to draw breath, and part of her, not an insignificant part, wanted to pull Nathan closer, but instead she pushed him away. “Just … forget it.”

“We’re not breaking any rules,” Gaia insisted.

A boy Oriana didn’t recognize whispered in Gaia’s ear. His groomed sideburns looked like claws; his eyebrows, too perfect, angled up at the sides. Gaia ignored him. The boy closed his eyes, sniffing her hair. He whispered in her ear again. Gaia turned away, cringing.

The boy persisted. “You don’t look like you’re having any fun,” he said. He nodded awkwardly to his table. “I’ll give you a night you’ll never forget.” On the boy’s table, surrounded by candidates, stood five bottles of Dunamisian liqueur that glowed with white phosphorescent light.

“You won’t survive a night with her!” Duccio said.

Gaia glared at him, twisting her lips.

“Don’t do it! Don’t do it! Don’t do it!”

Nathan laughed, and Oriana with him, though she didn’t find Duccio amusing at all.

Gaia ignored her annoying brother. She tugged on the boy’s shirt, undoing his buttons with practiced fingers. She pouted with her naughtiest grin. The boy moved closer to her as if to kiss her. He closed his eyes. Just before his lips touched hers, she pushed away from him and spun elegantly, sitting beside Nathan in the booth.

Duccio laughed obnoxiously at the boy, who weaved into the flow of candidates through the lounge. Soon Oriana could no longer see him. When she looked down, she noticed Gaia’s hand resting on Nathan’s thigh.

“Where were we?” Gaia asked.

“Breaking the rules,” Desaray said, and when Pasha tried to interrupt, she put up her hand, “all part of the preparation.” She slid away from Duccio, closer to Pasha. “We work with the developers for what, six-hour increments?” A group of rowdy candidates roared nearby, and Desaray smiled their way. “Six hours on, three hours off. Six on, three off. Train, stimulate, train, grow, stimulate, learn, and the problem with that is we aren’t like the bots, you know.” Desaray nodded at a group of robotic waiters near the café stalls. “We’re still
transhuman
.” She teased her magenta nails through Pasha’s dark blue hair. “We still have those primal human desires and needs, you know—”

The Granville sphere at the center of the table burst into a holographic world, lighting their faces. Oriana recognized Pasha’s work: a pond over a transhuman hand, and a girl and a boy with a tree, clouds, and lightning bursts over a blue-green pastoral landscape.

“Looks like we’ve got a genius with us tonight,” Gaia said to Nathan, who agreed.

Boom!

Desaray screamed.

Falcon Torres slammed his palms through the hologram, and it shattered and disappeared. “Looks like this is where the party’s at tonight.”

He flashed his teeth at Oriana.

She grimaced. Why, with thousands and thousands of tables, did Falcon choose to start trouble at theirs? Ursula Dearborne emerged from behind him. She artfully placed her hand behind his back, and he covered her fingers with his hand.

“Guess you were right about her,” Falcon said. “She does look pathetic—”

“I bet she gets bids before you,” Nathan said.

“I wouldn’t,” Duccio said softly.

Falcon grinned. “She couldn’t even lift her finger in a Granville world.” He leaned closer to Nathan, and Oriana smelled his alcoholic breath. “Care to place a wager on your prophecy?”

“Forget it!” Pasha said. “There’s no candidate gambling allowed at the Harpoons!”

Two more boys, unfamiliar to Oriana, flanked Ursula and Falcon. The boy on the left was even more muscular than Falcon, with reddish-hazel eyes and a cherry-colored mohawk. The one on the right sported animated tattoos of skulls that bit down on his arm as if they were feeding.

Nathan moved his hand across his face and around, as if he were a holographic artist. A handful of benaris dripped from his palm. He rolled those that remained off his fingers onto the black-and-yellow neon table.

“One
million
benaris says Oriana Barão is bid for ahead of you,” Nathan said, as calm as a Halcyon evening.

“Don’t do this,” Oriana said to Nathan. “These guys aren’t worth it—”

“A candidate is sworn by his word,” Ursula said, “and I’m no guy.” She twirled her hair between her fingers and leaned over the table, right hand extended. “Do we have an accord? The Barão girl over Falcon Torres. One million benaris. All or none.”

Oriana stared at Ursula’s hand and at Nathan’s. She closed her eyes when they shook.
Not real. Not real. Oh gods, oh gods, this isn’t happening.

“Look at her,” the boy with the skulls said. He laughed. “She’s as scared as she was on the first day.”

Oriana exhaled.
I’m a champion
. “I’ll receive the first bid.”

Pasha turned, mouth open, eyes blinking.

Oriana leaned forward. “I will be the Harpoon Champion, and you’re going to pay
us
one million benaris.”

“Bring it,” Ursula said.

She whipped her hair around and slung her arm over the cherry-mohawk boy’s shoulders, and he put his arm around her. Falcon’s nostrils flared. He grunted, spun around, and waltzed with his crew through the crowd at the center of the lounge.

“Are you nuts?” Pasha said.

“Are you?” Oriana said. “If we don’t believe in ourselves, no one else will.”

“They’re being developed by the
Variscans.
”

“I don’t care if they’re being developed by the gods themselves, and neither should you.”

The waiter arrived with their wine and rum shots.

“And on that note,” Gaia said with an ear-to-ear smile, “I think a toast is in order for the next
Harpoon Champion.
” She sang the words.

Duccio ran his hand through his spiked hair. “Joy,” he said with a resigned smile.

Pasha frowned but accepted the wine and the shot glass filled with a simmering, florid, luminous liquid from Gaia, as did the rest of the group. They raised their shot glasses. The lasers danced around them and colored their faces.

“To new friendships and memories and victories in the Harpoons,” Nathan said.

They gulped, and Pasha winced. Duccio pounded the table in a drumbeat. Desaray screamed cheerfully.

Oriana was laughing when Nathan leaned closer, wiped the cinnamon rum from her lips, and kissed her.

Desaray kissed Pasha.

Oriana felt as if all her blood had rushed to her face, leaving none for her brain or her lungs.

She still couldn’t breathe when Nathan said, “And may the most exquisite candidate prove worthy of her smarts and her lineage …”

Oriana pulled her face away from his. Did he think her intelligent, truly? What did he know about her lineage?

Sweat budded on her forehead, and she felt as if she might faint. A tickling sensation spread over her arms and legs, as if a thousand insects ran up and down her body—foreign, though not unpleasant.

She struggled to find the right words. She swiped sweat from her brow and thought about the Trimester Trek. The Granville sphere at the center of the table ignited into a new world. Her vision of Alpinia City filled it, with its maze of streams between marble pillars, domes, lion statues, glass skywalks, scientists in transparent lab coats, Beimenians in colorful bodysuits, and artists and tradesmen and dancers and the terracotta Granville sun. Oriana turned to Nathan Storm and grinned.

This time, she kissed him.

Beimeni City

Phanes, Underground Central

2,500 meters deep

The sheep who denied Antosha a place among them sat around the rose-laden mercury pool on the Brezner Building’s rooftop deck. The supreme scientific board, a board of fifteen members under normal circumstances, presently held twelve. Supreme Scientist Broden Barão was in Farino Prison prior to his stay in the Lower Level, a stay Antosha hoped would be as brutal as his had been and end mortally should the gods be kind; Supreme Scientist Damosel Rhea lay in a grave in Livelle Cemetery; and Prime Minister Carillon Decca, ever the fifteenth and swing vote for the board’s decisions, didn’t attend. Antosha wasn’t surprised. The fool still called
him
an enemy of the state and blamed him for his daughter’s death. As if Carillon Decca knew anything about love. The prime minister’s eternal partner had taken her own life, jumped clear off the side of Luxor Citadel.

Antosha was surprised that Minister Tethys Charles, the minister who dared challenge him at Brody’s hearing, didn’t also boycott the board meeting. He sat on the other side of the pool, and it took all Antosha’s self-control not to use the CRISPR system, send new instructions through the ZPF and into his DNA, force his cells to create an extinct virus with a twist, an incurable hantavirus or a norovirus or, even better, amoebas to eat his brain, slowly and painfully. Or perhaps something a bit subtler, like the asphyxiation-inducing adjustments he’d made to Damosel Rhea’s lung cells.