The Lost Code (8 page)

“NoRad lotion makes the lines invisible,” said Lilly, kneeling above me. “Need a hand?”

“Nah,” I said, “I got it.” I yanked on the side ropes, kicking my feet in the water and struggling to get up onto the smooth rubber, feeling too much like a turtle climbing onto a log. Seconds felt like hours ’cause I couldn’t be this pathetic in front of them all . . . but finally I dragged myself up onto my stomach and hopped to my feet.

“Look what I found,” Lilly announced.

The CITs peered at me.

“Who’s that?” Marco asked. He was shaking water from his shaggy black hair. His shoulders didn’t rival Evan’s, but they dwarfed mine.

“Owen, from the Hyenas,” said Lilly.

“What are you doing here?” Evan asked me. It looked like he was scowling.

“He’s one of us,” said Lilly.

“One of us?” said the other girl. “He’s only been here, like, a minute.”

Lilly gathered her hair and squeezed water from it. “Yeah, well, duh, Aliah. He’s got ’em.” She tapped at her neck.

“That kid?” asked Aliah skeptically. She was smacking on a piece of gum, her face a fine art piece with dark flicking lashes, a little silver nose stud, and tiny eyebrow ring all accenting smooth brown skin. She looked me over. I figured I knew the verdict. But then she just shrugged and said, “Okay.”

“Wow,” Marco added. He was studying me like I was something foreign, but interesting, at least for the moment.

“You lied yesterday, didn’t you?” asked Evan, peering at Lilly. “You told the doctor he was only down on the bottom for, like, three minutes.”

Lilly started bouncing in the center of the trampoline. “Yep. It was eleven, actually,” she said with a smile. She glanced back at me and added, “But I had my eye on him.”

I felt a little surge at hearing that,
She had her eye on me . . .
but tried not to give away that I was thinking about it. I had to seem cool, collected.

Lilly meanwhile shot up into the air, her body long, painted silver by the MoonGlow, then twisted and knifed cleanly into the water.

I was still standing unevenly by the edge of the raft. “You guys all have . . .”

“The gills.” Aliah made a motion toward her neck, fluttering her fingers playfully. “Cool, huh? We’re a new race.”

Marco was still peering at me, an eyebrow wrinkled. “But none of us got them until our second or third
year
here. How did you get them in, like, two days?”

“I don’t know,” I said. “But what . . . I mean, why—”

Lilly shot out of the water behind me, landing on the raft and making it buck. I staggered, but managed not to fall. “Relax, Owen,” she said, and threw a wet arm around me. I felt her skin against my shoulder, the hairs of her forearm briefly against my ear. I tried to stay still, to play it cool. I glanced at Evan. He was watching this. Lilly went on, “We’ll explain everything.”

“Everything we
know
, anyway,” said Aliah.

“Right,” said Lilly. “But here’s all you need to know tonight. Number one, you’re going to be fine.”

The trampoline rocked, causing Lilly’s hip to lean against mine. Fine . . . right.

“Now that the gills have set, you can use both them and your lungs without a problem,” Marco added.

“Okay,” I said.

“Number two,” said Lilly, “you’ve got gills because of
this place
.” She swept her hand to indicate the lake, the dome.

I wanted to stay quiet, to just be cool with everything, but questions popped out anyway. “What does that mean?”

“Like we even know,” muttered Aliah.

“We do know a little,” Lilly snapped. “There’s something about this place that’s caused this reaction in us. Caused us to change, but we don’t know what. And number three, you can’t tell any of
them
what’s happened to you.”

“Who, you mean, like, the adults?”

“Especially Paul,” said Marco.

As Marco was saying this, Evan got up and started bouncing. He flipped into the air and dove into the black with barely a splash.

“But he knows about my wounds,” I admitted.

“Yeah,” said Lilly, “he knew we had the wounds too, when they started a couple years ago. There were five of us who got them first. The other was Anna. Her gills set the fastest, and when she showed them to Paul and Dr. Maria, they started doing all these tests on her—”

“Tests that made her sick,” added Aliah, sounding bitter, “but the more sick she got, the more tests they wanted to do. They said it was to make her better, but she said it was like Paul was looking for something, trying to figure something out, but he wouldn’t tell her what. . . .”

“And then she was gone,” Lilly finished.

“What do you mean, gone?” I asked.

“Like one day she just didn’t come back to our cabin, and Paul told us that her condition had gotten worse and she’d been sent to the hospital over in the city for advanced care. And we haven’t seen her since.”

“Can’t you ask someone to find out?” I asked. “Like, your parents or something?”

“Ha, parents,” said Marco.

“What?” I asked.

Lilly’s face softened, like her eyes had increased a size. “None of us have parents. We’re all Cryos,” she said. “Aren’t you?”

“No,” I said. “I’m from Yellowstone Hub. I live with my dad.”

“He’s the first non-Cryo to have the symptoms,” Aliah said, looking seriously at the others.

“That we know of,” said Evan.

“Anyway,” said Lilly, “there’s nobody we can ask about Anna. I mean, we tried, but Eden runs Cryo House, just like they run camp. Just like they run the whole city.”

“Mama and Papa EdenCorp,” added Aliah.

“We’ve asked people about Anna: our house guardians, hospital directors. Nobody ever knows anything,” said Lilly. “Bastards,” she muttered to herself. “She was my best friend.”

I felt a little tremor of nerves inside me. “So, are you guys being tested, too?”

“Nah,” said Aliah. “We never told Paul anything, but as long as we stay like this, he seems to just leave us alone.”

“But he’s always got his eye on us,” said Lilly. “We think he knows.”

I thought about the surveillance insects, and the bats, and checked the sky above. “Probably,” I said.

“Which means he’ll have his eye on you, too,” said Aliah.

“Okay, but how did this even happen?” I asked.

The CITs glanced at one another.

“That,” said Lilly, “is the big question. But don’t worry, O. The point is: just stick with us, and we’ll keep your secret.”

What we were talking about was crazy and serious, but at the same time, I had just heard Lilly shorten my name. I tried to keep my expression calm, like the opposite of how that made me feel.

“Cool?” She looked at me expectantly.

I glanced around at the CITs and realized that maybe I had just been invited to join their club, their secret gill-breathing, raft-swimming society.

“Yeah,” I said, and I tried to return Lilly’s gaze like I had at the dock, saying that yes, I could do this. Only this time, I maybe believed that I could.

“Good.” She smiled.

“Can we stop with all the serious talk now, please?” said Marco. “Dawn is going to turn on in, like, two hours.”

“Right.” Lilly turned to Evan and Marco. “Boys, let’s give our newest member a slingshot.”

“All right.” Evan didn’t sound thrilled, but he stepped beside me, towering over me and smelling of some better form of sweat. Then he grabbed me under the arms. “Hang on.” He sprang and hurled me straight up into the air.

I tensed, hoping I could keep my feet beneath me when I landed. Below, the other four fish dashed to the corners of the trampoline. “Ready!” Lilly called.

I hurtled down, and the moment I squished into the trampoline center, they all stomped down too. I sank deep, then shot up into the night.

“Nice!” shouted Marco.

I arced through space, losing my balance, cocking sideways. As I plummeted toward the black water, I tried to straighten myself, but I slammed into it in a chin-first belly flop. I dunked deep underwater, my chest compressing, and hung there, for a moment not knowing which way was up or down. My face throbbed. So did my stomach. Then, without even really thinking about it, I made a gulping motion that sealed my throat, and my gills fluttered to life. I sucked in water and relaxed.

A hand closed around my wrist. I looked over, and there was Lilly, cast in moonlight and blue, hair snaking around her, a siren calling to me: ‘Come on.’

She pulled me deeper, toward the cold depths. I heard tinny splashes, and soon the other CITs were around me, and we were plunging into the dark.

As we descended into the abyss, I glanced from one outlined figure to the next and wondered how this had happened. Sure, there had been each moment—I remembered those—but it seemed like there had to be something more at work, like a plan or even a God, that had orchestrated this: me, Owen, suddenly something new, a creature of the deep, of mysteries. And I felt like I wanted to be down here forever, in Lilly’s grasp, with these others who I almost dared to think of as my own.

[
GAMMALINK CONNECTION LOADING . . . 100%
—welcome back to the Alliance Free SignalCast—
buffering—
you want to know what EdenCorp is really up to, just look at the locations of the domes. They claimed that their placement was based on climate stability, but the proximity to ancient sites can’t be a coincidence. Then there’s the secretive EdenNorth complex. No one can confirm its location, but our sources say it’s on the coast of Greenland, and is rumored to be some kind of modern-day Area 51. It was the first one they built. So you have to ask yourself: What is Eden hiding up there? And does it connect to what we’ve heard coming out of Desenna, the former EdenSouth? Rumors of some kind of awakening, or calling, that’s only happening to certain rare people? They believe that it’s the Gods returning, but what if it’s something else? Something ancient, like—
connection fail
]

THE MOON PROJECTION SET OVER THE BLACK OUTLINE
of the hills to the west, fading into the faint amber glow from the city. Camp Eden was located on a secluded inlet, hills to three sides and Mount Aasgard to the fourth. That distant hazy brightness was the only thing that indicated there was a city in here.

As purple lights imitated predawn on the eastern curve of the dome, we emerged from the water, wading to shore like some kind of invading monster army.

Walking alongside the CITs, I considered that we looked like one of those groups, the kind I always saw from the outside, that seemed so exclusive, such a natural part of the universe, and you wondered how things like that formed, and why they didn’t happen to you, and you wanted, just once, to be in one, and to
know
what that secret, sacred thing was that created such an impenetrable unit. Apparently, gills could do it.

I felt the disappointing grit of sand, the pressure of solid ground beneath my feet. Back on land. Dragged down by that persistent tugging of gravity, eliminating possibility, turning me from shark back to turtle. I felt my gills sealing up, tucking themselves away until . . . when? Could this happen again? Tonight? I was already hoping, but would they really want me back?

Distantly, the blowers cycled to life to warm the air. SimClouds began to form along the dome edges. Humidifiers created a hazy effect. I found that my body was staying damp, the moisture not just evaporating right off, like it would have back home in the dryness.

The CITs had thoughtfully brought towels.

“Here,” said Lilly, handing me hers after my attempts to use my damp T-shirt only left me with sand streaks on my chest. Her lime-green towel smelled salty from sweat, and there was that strange metallic tinge of NoRad, and it was maybe a little dank too, from lots of uses between washes.

“Thanks.”

Birds had begun to chirp and dart around. Off to the north of the beach, a raptor of some kind was circling over the Preserve, a section of forest set apart by nets that reached all the way to the roof. I wondered if the bird was real or a robot.

“Time for bed,” said Aliah, starting up the beach. The CIT cabins were straight ahead, in the trees between here and the dining hall.

A clock hanging on the snack shack showed the time was four forty-five. Just over three hours until wake-up. I could already feel that I was going to be exhausted all day.

“See you later, Owen,” said Marco.

“Yeah,” I said, “Bye, guys.” I picked up my sneakers and headed to the right.

There was mumbling behind me, then, “Owen, wait up.”

I turned to see Lilly jogging after me, towel around her waist, her damp hair now chaotic. She walked beside me, brushing at the dark tangles with her hand. I could see the faint lines of her hidden gills, like little pencil streaks.

“How are you doing?” she asked.

“Fine, I think.”

We left the beach and crossed the grass. The sprinklers were on, so we walked in S curves to avoid the spinning tentacles of spray. “Oooh, water, watch out,” I said, trying to be funny. Then I flinched inside because what if Lilly didn’t think I was?

But she chuckled. “I know, right?” Then she was quiet.

The sky began to hint at blue. Color was seeping into the trees. A first ray of orange SafeSun lit the top of the flagpole to our left. We would be right back here, in a few hours, just like any other camp day. “It’s a lot to absorb,” Lilly said quietly.

“I guess,” I said. I figured she was right but I wasn’t really feeling that way. The gill stuff already felt normal, a part of me like my arms or feet. Okay, maybe not that familiar. But still, it wasn’t really on my mind, at least not as much as the fact that here I was, walking beside Lilly. Just a day ago she had seemed so mysterious, a member of another race of beings—which, it turned out, she was. But now so was I.

“Listen, Owen,” Lilly began, but she paused, two seconds that I spent wondering if she might say something about us, about me. About this connection we seemed to have now . . . but instead she said, “I just wanted to say I’m sorry for, you know, you drowning.”

“Oh.” I didn’t feel like she needed to be. “That’s cool. I mean, you said you had your eye on me.”

“But I didn’t,” Lilly admitted. “Not at first.” She stopped, turning to me, but with her eyes focusing somewhere beyond my shoulder. “The truth is, I didn’t know you were gone. Not until the test was over. Everybody was back on the dock, and one of your cabin mates asked about you. That kid Beaker, I think. Then I started looking, and dove down and found you, and
that’s
when I saw your neck, and knew you’d be fine. But, before then . . .” She shrugged.

“So, you lied back there,” I said, “on the raft.”

“I just didn’t want them to know I’d screwed up.”

I didn’t know what to make of that. It was maybe a little disappointing. Lilly hadn’t had her eye on me, hadn’t even noticed me really, until someone else did. So, was this pity? Was she just hanging out with me because she felt guilty about almost letting me die? “Why are you telling me this?” I asked.

“I don’t know,” she said. “I wanted you to know the truth, I guess.”

I thought about that. I wasn’t sure if it changed anything. “You still saved my life.”

“No, you saved your own life. I made a show of it, when I brought you to the surface, but that was just to help keep your gills a secret.”

“Well, but if you hadn’t said that stuff to me, I probably would have gone and told Paul and Dr. Maria everything.”

“Yeah, I guess I did that part right.” Lilly stopped walking. “I should get back.”

“Um,” I said, like I was going to say something else, but I couldn’t think of what.

“I’ll see you at breakfast,” Lilly said. She reached out and rubbed my forearm. “Thanks for coming swimming. You’ll come back tonight, right?”

“Um, sure. Yeah.” I nodded and smiled but tried not to do either too much while inside I was thinking,
Yes!

“Good.” She smiled at me and turned, crossing the field. SafeSun warmed her tangled hair and her shoulder blade, sparkled on her toe rings.

I watched her go for a second and then headed into the trees. The wood-chip path poked at my bare feet. Other than in our apartment, I couldn’t remember a time when I’d ever been barefoot back home. I thought about slipping my sneakers on now, but didn’t. I walked on my toes, enjoying the pine needles clumping between them. I passed sleeping cabins that vibrated with chords of heavy breathing and snores. Even though I was tired, I was kind of hopping along, feeling something like nervous or maybe excited.

I reached our cabin. With the side door shut tight, I’d have to sneak past Todd. I couldn’t let him discover that I’d been out, not just because I’d get in trouble, but also because then their eyes would be on me. I needed to stay unknown, easily forgettable, so I could meet my nocturnal friends again.

I was passing the vertical pairs of bunk windows, hearing everyone sawing away inside, when I spied the tangle of Beaker’s blanket and sheets, now covered with a day’s worth of dirt. He still hadn’t come out after them, or hadn’t been allowed to by the killer pack.

I stepped over them, then stopped, turned back, and picked them up. I went back around the cabin and walked down into the trees until I figured I was out of earshot, then I shook them out, the blanket then the sheets. I got as much of the dirt off as I could, and folded each up.

It occurred to me that yesterday I wouldn’t have done this. Even just helping out Beaker this much was an act of defiance against the pack, and it was going against my plan to stay invisible. But that was with the staff and counselors. When it came to Leech, well . . . maybe if he wanted to harass me about it, I’d introduce him to the monster from the deep, take him on a little ride.
Come on
, I thought.
Try it. I dare you.
It was a new thought for me. A thought with power. I liked it.

I walked back up the rise toward the cabin. I was almost to the little wooden staircase and landing at the side door when I heard creaking footsteps from inside. The door popped open. I froze. Too late to make it back around the corner—I lunged under the stairs, my face meeting spiderwebs.

Someone stepped outside. Probably Todd. He’d noticed I was gone. Caught. Footsteps down the stairs, onto the wood-chip path . . . but then heading away. I watched through the gaps between the warped stairs. The person was walking slowly, with trudging, tired steps. I saw faded sneakers, jeans, the proportions too small to be Todd.

It was Leech. He had a long, black, tube-shaped case over his shoulder. It looked like it was made out of leather. I’d never seen anything like it, except for rifle cases back home, but this was too short, too uniform in shape. What would you put in there? I saw his head cock to the sky as he yawned.

Above, the door was slowly closing. Ahead, Leech was disappearing from view around the next cabin. I ducked out from the steps, put Beaker’s bedding on the landing, and jumped up, grabbed the railing, but my knee didn’t make it all the way, instead scraping the hard wood, the opposite of fluid water. Stupid surface world, stupid gravity! I hauled myself up, got to my feet, the door almost closed . . . then it paused.

Beaker’s head appeared, his hair in a ridiculous black frizz. He squinted at me. “You’re not supposed to be out here,” he said groggily.

“Yeah, so what?” I whispered back to him, feeling a flash of the annoyance that probably led the other kids to torment him. Little Beaker, always worrying about the rules. As I swung my legs over the railing, I wondered if he was considering turning me in, seeing a chance to earn points with Todd, his only ally. I picked up his sheets and blanket and handed them to him. “Here.”

Beaker looked down at them. He looked back at me. His eyes narrowed further, like he was trying to figure out the inevitable joke.

“They were on the ground. I shook them out.”

Beaker kept staring, then looked back down at them again and nodded. “I’ve been using my sweatshirt to sleep,” he said. “Thanks.”

“Sure.”

He turned and went back in. I followed. Everyone else seemed to still be asleep. Except Leech, who was gone. Wouldn’t Todd be interested to know that?

But all I wanted right now was sleep. I climbed up into my bunk and rolled over and felt only exhaustion, my muscles relaxing, body melting into a pool, no neck burning, just stillness and peace and thoughts of Lilly, amazing thoughts, but even they couldn’t keep me awake.

It seemed like only a second had passed when the reveille horn sounded. My eyes blinked open feeling dry. I was groggy, thirsty for hours more of sleep.

Todd came in. “Another beautiful day, girls!” he said, showing us his pit-hair progress.

“Where’s Leech?” Jalen asked, looking at his empty bunk.

Todd glanced in that direction, too. “He had to go see the director.” I listened for some giveaway in his tone. Was Leech in trouble, or what? But there was nothing. “Owen,” Todd said. “Your neck’s all better?”

“Oh,” I said, remembering that my bandages were gone. “Yup. All good.”

“Cool,” said Todd like he only cared because it was his job.

We got dressed, passed around the NoRad, and headed for flagpole. Everyone was quieter without Leech around. I noticed Bunsen and Wesley and Xane talking, even Noah joining in, combinations that wouldn’t have been allowed otherwise.

The Arctic Foxes were already there. I heard them whispering to one another and I glanced over without really meaning to. I saw Paige and Mina and a couple of the others looking at me. Paige’s eyes were narrowed as if she was studying me, and then she put a finger to her lips and nodded, like she was coming to some conclusion.

“Okay,” she said, and she must have known it was loud enough for me to hear, “I can go with CP.” I couldn’t tell if she was being serious or joking and I wondered, did just losing my bandages make the difference? Wasn’t I still the same kid otherwise?
I’m not, though
, I thought.
Maybe it shows in some way or—

Hands shoved me forward. “Sit down already,” said Jalen from behind me.

“Knock it off,” I snapped over my shoulder, but at the same time I realized that I had been holding up the line, so I didn’t push it any further and I moved and took my seat on the bench.

Claudia started leading cabins in cheers. Once they got going, my eyes immediately started to shut, falling half asleep, the world outside my head becoming a distant drone. . . .

“Thanks again for getting my stuff from outside.” I opened my eyes to find Beaker right beside me.

“Sure.” I glanced around out of instinct to see if anyone was listening, but then remembered that I didn’t care. I shouldn’t care. I could help Beaker; my cabin could even think we were friends, for all I cared.

A rush of whispers rippled through the Arctic Foxes. I heard someone say, “Here he comes,” and saw them huddling their heads together and gazing out at the playing fields.

There was Leech, walking back from the lake beside Paul, who carried a fishing pole by his side. That must have been what was in Leech’s black case. So, he got to go on special morning fishing trips with the director? Was this another perk of being here the longest?

Leech left Paul’s side and headed up the aisle between the log benches. He was smirking like he could tell that all eyes were on him.

I glanced at Paul, who was circling around the campers. He was looking at me. I tried not to react. There was his slight smile again, the one that was so hard to read with those glasses on, and it was even weirder now, with everything the CITs had said. What did he really know? Another couple seconds passed and he was still looking at me, and I realized that he probably noticed that my bandages were gone. Maybe that was all it was. But he was still staring, and I felt like ducking or something, just to get out of that spotlight. . . . Then he turned and headed up the hill.