Second Heart: Bones of Eden Page 5

  “Don’t you want to know more? Don’t you want to know what we’re getting into?”

  “Yes. Of course I do. But not if it means going back to Eden. We don’t know what’s there, Charlie.”

  “We know what might be there. The information we need. Tools, even. More books. Precious things.”

  “And ghosts. What if more teachers are there? What if they blame us? What if we get trapped in there again? No. We live on the islands for a reason.”

  Charlie sighed, and after a moment, Whiskey got up and padded away. Charlie never did find out why she was still hanging around in the middle of the day, though she supposed it didn’t matter. Maybe India would be more receptive to the idea of going back to the mainland. Maybe Sugar would. Charlie pushed that thought away. She didn’t want to think about Sugar. She knew she’d been in the wrong, planning to keep Fox after she’d been kidnapped. But Sugar’s fury, her refusal to accept Charlie’s apology, had wounded her.

  She’d made a mistake, and the Elikai seemed determined she should suffer for it.

  She wanted—well, she wasn’t exactly sure what, but when she thought of Sugar now, her throat tightened and her belly clenched. It wasn’t going to make negotiating for sex any easier. She didn’t want Sugar or any of the other Elikai to touch her right now. Not because Sugar wasn’t attractive, but because Charlie didn’t want to be hurt again.

  Maybe Eden would have answers to those problems too.

  Eden—Before the World was Born

  They had both been blonde—Teacher Elaine had short hair, and Teacher Helen had long, wavy hair, with a small cluster of tumors and scars under her left eye. Every few weeks she would have them burned off again, but within a few days they would be back, forming like a bunch of grapes hanging from her eyelid. Both teachers were nearly twice Charlie’s height. Giants, by anyone’s standard. They wore white coats and black shoes with blue shower caps on them. They carried black screens they drew on with stylus pens and ID badges with holographic photos of themselves. These were the keys to open the doors throughout Eden, and Charlie often wondered how she could get her hands on one and if she could use it to move around freely between the domes and the wards, even into the laboratories.

  “Is chamber three available?” Teacher Elaine asked.

  “Peters has T-male in there, and D-female is in chamber one.”

  D-female. That was what the teachers sometimes called Delta, but only when they were talking to each other. In the corridors, they almost never spoke to Charlie or the other Varekai. They simply led them to and fro, talking to each other and using terms like “D-female” and “T-male.” She’d heard them call her “C-female,” she supposed because she was “Charlie.”

  “Chamber four, then. Chamber two is still sealed since the incident.”

  “Still?”

  “We have a new B-female in the growth center.” Teacher Helen turned to Charlie. “Would you like to go to chamber four today for your test?”

  Charlie shrugged. Everything in the corridors was white except for the doors. White floor, white walls, white ceiling, gray doors. There was a lingering scent of paint and bleach, almost overwhelmed today by Teacher Elaine’s perfume.

  “It won’t take long today,” Teacher Helen continued. “And no needles. Just a few puzzles. You like puzzles.”

  Charlie liked climbing on the roofs of the houses in the dome, but she’d gotten in trouble for that. Puzzles were okay. When they’d left, though, the other girls had been playing soccer, and Charlie was struck with the intense feeling of being left out.

  They passed chamber one and the sealed chamber two. Charlie walked past the door on tiptoe, trying to see through the high, round window into the room beyond. She could only see the ceiling, which was splattered with a brown-red streak that looked like dried chicken blood. Chickens often sprayed blood everywhere when they were killed. Sometimes they even ran around with no head for a while. Blood did not faze her.

  “Chamber four,” Teacher Elaine said, opening the door for Charlie.

  Inside, there was a table sized for a Varekai and not one of the teachers. On it were several three-dimensional puzzles, a workbook and a pencil. A mirror dominated one wall. It led into a small room the teachers would watch her from. In the ceiling were vents. The walls, ceiling and floor, like the corridor, were white. The table was white too, but the chair had blue legs.

  Obediently, and somewhat resigned, Charlie sat and waited. Behind her, the door closed and locked. There was a delay as the teachers did something in the other room. She started to flip through the workbook. There were math puzzles, logic puzzles, word games, rows of pictures where you had to pick the odd one out, and grammatical and spelling tests, where you had to correct the mistakes. Charlie didn’t like those, but she did a few of the compound math puzzles absently while she waited.

  “Okay, Charlie,” Teacher Helen’s voice came through the speakers. There was a pause. “You’ve started. You know you’re not supposed to start without being told.”

  “Sorry,” Charlie muttered.

  “We’re not being mean,” Teacher Helen said. “We need to time you. If you’ve already started, we can’t.”

  “Just don’t count those ones.” She put an X beside the ones she’d already done.

  There was another pause. They were talking with the speaker off. She wondered if she was going to be punished, and if that would mean she could go back and play soccer or not.

  “That’s okay, Charlie,” Teacher Helen said. “Are you ready?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Okay, begin.”

  “Is it ready?” Teacher Elaine asked. Charlie paused, then realized Teacher Helen had forgotten to turn off the speaker. She kept working, keeping her eyes on the workbook, hoping they wouldn’t notice.

  “Contagion 77GH-A is loaded and prepped,” Teacher Helen said.

  “This is test one with Subject C-female number seven exposure to contagion 77GH, a weapon-grade airborne bacteria. Estimated termination is eight minutes.”

  “And god save our souls,” Teacher Helen muttered sourly.

  Charlie almost asked “what’s god?” then remembered she shouldn’t be able to hear them.

  From the grill overhead, there was a low hiss, and a fine white mist began to drift down from the ceiling. Charlie could smell something faintly unpleasant, chemically and off, like ammonia and sour milk. She crinkled her nose and kept working. There was a sort of pressure and an uncomfortable need to sneeze. She was surprised when spots of red began to drip onto the paper. She touched her nose, and her fingers came away bloody.

  “It’s okay, Charlie... Shit, has this been on the whole time?”

  The feed cut a moment, then Teacher Elaine said, “It’s okay, Charlie. Just a little nosebleed. Keep working, okay?”

  Charlie looked up and saw in the mirror her eyes were red. She blinked, her vision blurring, and realized she was crying blood tears. Her ears felt odd. There was a loud gurgling, then blood began to drip onto her shoulder. She pushed her hand to her nose, and the blood pooled on her palm, running down her wrist. She stood up, pushing the chair back and leaving a wide splatter of blood across the desk. It was hard to see with her vision hazed with red.

  “It’s okay, Charlie, just relax,” Teacher Helen said, but in the background, Teacher Elaine was saying, “No, we’ve lost her. We’re going to need a disposal crew.”

  Charlie staggered back against the wall, then sank down, confused. The blood kept coming, and neither of the teachers said any more. She was silent, very bloody and lonely. Slowly the blood slowed, stopped and began to dry. Charlie was coated in it. She blew clots of black from her nose onto the corner of her shirt, wiped her hands as best she could on her pants, then slowly picked blood out of her ears with her fingernails.

  Nothing happened for hours. Ch
arlie called out a few times, asking for the bathroom, for a drink, for tissues and soap. No one answered, until finally a computer-generated voice spoke.

  “Please close eyes for decontamination.”

  This time the mist was thick and blue. It filled the room completely, and it burned Charlie’s throat and eyes. She tried to blink a few times, and her eyes watered outrageously. When the mist faded, her skin was itchy, but it hurt to scratch. She felt scalded all over, and every breath ached. But, finally, the door opened. Teacher Helen and Teacher Elaine were there, but with gloves and face masks.

  “Hello, Charlie,” Teacher Helen said, as if nothing had happened. “That took a little longer than we thought, huh? Do you still want to go to the bathroom?”

  Charlie nodded, angry, but her throat tight with tears at the same time.

  “You did very well,” Teacher Helen told her. “We’re very proud.”

  “Jesus, Helen,” Teacher Elaine muttered, shaking her head with disgust.

  Teacher Helen gave her a hard look, then turned back to Charlie. “Really well,” she repeated. “In fact, if you like, you can come and pick a puppy.”

  Charlie forgot the blood and the burning blue mist. She forgot the hours of being lonely and scared. “A puppy? Of my own?”

  “Yep. Any one you like.”

  * * *

  Looking back, Charlie could see the incident with more clarity. Then, she had not really understood death. They killed the chickens, certainly, but she didn’t understand that it could happen to Varekai. She did not understand that she, too, was mortal. She did not realize that the doctors had meant for her to die.

  Experiments. They had all been experiments. Just like India putting chickens in cages to test her theories on babies and sex.

  Yes, there would be answers at Eden. Charlie suspected they would be horrible ones.

  Chapter Five

  Since the funeral, Juliet’s pup had stayed faithfully by Tango’s side. When she woke, it was sleeping outside her tent, and for every waking hour it dogged her footsteps, a constant and unwavering shadow. Tango chucked it scraps of food and made sure it got water when she did, as it did not seem overly inclined to go off alone, even to tend to those necessities. It was quiet, too quiet for a young dog, and seemed to have little interest in doggy things like chasing chickens and small prey. Instead it was always alert, ears and nose always quivering. When Tango slipped into her furs at night, the pup collapsed outside with sheer exhaustion and did not move until dawn.

  It was easy to feel sorry for it, and after a few days, Tango found herself enjoying its company. She petted it absently while she was relaxing and found herself looking for it if she lost track of it. She was growing fond of the way it licked her hands when she fed it. Maybe having a dog wasn’t so bad, even if it was rather funny-looking. Tango was ugly too, with the terrible scars marring her face and side. They could be ugly together.

  It had proved very adept at climbing rocks and even easy-to-navigate trees—so when she climbed the sloping trunk of a half-fallen fig, it scrambled up beside her.

  Tango had her bow at the ready and a clear view into a clearing that hugged the side of a small freshwater spring. There were signs that pigs had been here recently, and she hoped they would come back again. Another smoked pig for the wet season couldn’t go astray, though smoked fish would probably keep better. Setting traps for eels was not as much fun as shooting piglets, though, and required much less skill.

  She heard voices long before she saw movement. The pup whined, and Tango hushed it, putting her hand on its head. It fell silent, ears pricked, eyes keen.

  The two Elikai came into view, carrying woven baskets full of still-live eels and fish. They put them down, crouching by the spring to drink and wash away the salt and sand.

  It was Zebra and Xícara, Elikai Tango recognized from when the Varekai were still playing the stealing game. Tango had got the jump on Xícara once, though she had almost escaped. Not by using her strength, but by flirting, which had caught Tango off guard.

  The memory made her smile a little, and she lifted her bow, taking careful aim. A little scare would remind them who had come out on top of that little incident.

  She fixed her sights on a long, gray log. It was a few yards away from the Elikai, not so close she risked hitting either of them by accident, but close enough the hiss and thunk of the arrow would startle them. She drew the string and...

  The tree trunk moved, sighing and shifting slightly to the left.

  “Xícara! Zebra!” she yelled.

  The two Elikai turned to look up at her in surprise, and behind them, the tree began to shake itself.

  “Run! No, this way!”

  They hadn’t hesitated to heed her warning, but both had turned to leap over the trunk and flee in the opposite direction. A crocodile-sized head snaked up from the bushes. It was definitely no crocodile. Black, viscous drool leaked between the lizard’s lips, and its flat, broad shoulders rippled as it took two heavy steps toward the Elikai.

  Tango let the arrow fly. It whizzed through the air, almost clipping Xícara, and embedded into the monitor’s flank. The creature gave a deep hiss, a trunk-sized tail whipping back and forth flattening bushes and small trees.

  The Elikai broke and ran, scrambling through the brush toward Tango. The pup began to bark furiously, high and hysterical. Tango reached down to help haul Zebra up beside her, and Xícara scrambled up behind her. The lizard crashed through the undergrowth in their wake, then stopped under them, looking up with silver eyes. Its forked tongue was long and purple, flicking to and fro in the muggy air. The heat made the reptiles fast. A cold morning would see them dragging themselves along like seals, but on hot days like this, even small lizards were much faster than Varekai.

  “What is that?” Zebra demanded, spear pointed down at the lizard’s head.

  “I’d say it’s what killed Juliet,” Tango said.

  “It’s huge,” Xícara muttered. “It’s the world’s biggest goanna.”

  “Yeah, but—” Zebra looked at the other two, “—goannas can climb.”

  “There is no way this tree can support something that big,” Tango said.

  “Okay, well, I’m sure it knows all about mass, gravity and tensile strength. Giant lizards are fantastic at math,” Zebra said.

  “Remind me why I saved you?” she muttered, drowned out by the pup’s barking.

  The lizard flicked its tail slowly. The arrow was still in its side, though the ooze of blood was slow. It was not a life-threatening wound. Not even close.

  For a moment, the Varekai and Elikai were as helpless as any prey, waiting for the predator to make its choice. Chase, or give up and leave.

  “I think it’s going to—” Zebra started, and the creature slithered forward, planting its excessively long-toed feet on the base of the trunk. The tree groaned, and the creature’s claws cut deep, weeping wounds in the tree’s bark, but the trunk held steady as the huge animal began to climb toward them.

  “Give me your knife,” Xícara demanded, holding out her hand to Tango.

  “Why?” She clutched the knife tightly.

  “Quickly!”

  Tango handed it over, though part of her was screaming not to trust the Elikai. Slashing Tango’s hamstring and running would be the surest way for the Elikai to survive. Xícara clutched the bone blade tightly, frozen a moment, before scrambling down the trunk toward the lizard. It reared back to snap at her, but she jammed the bone knife to the hilt in its nostril.

  The animal tossed its head, giving several tree-shaking sneezes, and then dropped back to the forest floor, clawing at its own face, trying to dislodge the blade.

  “Go, go, go!” Xícara gave the other two a shove, and the four of them—the pup too—jumped to the ground and ran for their lives.


  * * *

  Sugar watched the Varekai canoes approach. It was a hot day, muggy, and the air felt wet. The dry season was coming to an end, and it would not be long before the storms. Cyclones would ravage the islands for much of the summer, and the rain would be constant. Soon both tribes would abandon their villages and seek shelter on Pinnacle Island in the caves hundreds of feet above sea level, where they could not possibly be flooded out. Food would be scarce, as there would be long stretches where it was too dangerous for them to leave the safety of the tunnels. Everything they needed was already stored and prepared, ready to be carried up the mountain with them when they fled the first of the rains. This time of year was an anxious one for everyone, though it was Charlie, and not the pending weather, that was making Sugar feel ill.

  Charlie had brought a few of his Varekai brothers with him. Bravo, India and Mike. No sign of Whiskey or Tango, who were almost always at negotiations because of their superior speed and strength. Sugar didn’t know if that was good or bad, though the sight of Mike alarmed him. He might not be as bloodthirsty as Whiskey, but he would be just as quick to jam a spear into someone if things went badly.

  More than ever before, he could see Charlie was beautiful. His curls, his big hazel eyes, the hourglass shape of his breasts and hips, all left an ache deep in Sugar’s chest. It had not been so long ago the Elikai thought the Varekai were ugly and strange. Funny, how quickly things could change. He wished Charlie wasn’t scowling as he padded over the sand. Sugar much preferred it when the Varekai was smiling and teasing him, even if he did always end up making Sugar look like a fool.

  Maybe Charlie didn’t like him anymore. Maybe the attraction he’d thought was forming between them had faded for the Varekai. Maybe he wouldn’t get another chance to win Charlie back. The ache got worse.

  “I’m a little surprised you came,” Sugar admitted as he met the Varekai on the sand. He’d brought Fox, Tare and Maria with him. India and Tare wasted no time, stepping away from the others and into the shade of a nearby tree to talk, hand in hand, heads close together. Even with just a glance, Sugar could see they didn’t care about anyone else. Mike could have stabbed Sugar through the chest and Tare wouldn’t even have glanced up.