Crucible Zero (8 page)

The rest of the crew in the living room must have heard the commotion. They came pouring into the kitchen, and in an instant there was no place to stand in the room that wasn't filled with a Gruben looking to say farewell or jostling for seats at the table, while fussy children were being soothed by mothers and fathers alike.

I tried to slip out onto the porch without being noticed, but Evelyn must have been a favorite among the family members. Each and every one of them gave me a hug and made me promise to stay safe and keep that brother of mine out of trouble.

The sea of faces all blurred into each other, and I felt bad that I didn't remember their names. It was overwhelming to be cared for by so many people. I'd never had a big family, since all of my life I'd lived on this farm, hiding from the world with just Neds, Grandma, and Quinten.

But this comfortable chaos put a real smile on my face. It might be a hard life these people were living; it might be a hard life I was living. But it was a good life, with joy and good people in it. And these Grubens were good people.

I finally escaped the kitchen and hugs and stepped outside. During the good-byes, I had been handed a cloth-wrapped wedge of chocolate; the cotton thread Tom had teased me about and a few other good-luck charms, buttons, and stones. I tucked them all away in my duffel, but pocketed the good-luck stones.

I figured I could use as much luck as I could get.

Abraham and Foster had long ago exited the kitchen. They stood a short distance from the house.

Morning light was just edging the sky with a pink blush, and the occasional birdsong peppered with the other stitched beasts' warbles and growls.

I walked over to the two men. “Sorry about my brother's lack of manners in there. Did you two get something to eat?”

Foster smiled and made a little grunting noise, then looked over at Abraham expectantly.

“We were up before the Grubens arrived,” he said. “We ate. Evelyn, is it now?”

“Thank you for going along with that.”

“Your brother called you that yesterday. Why do all those people think you are Evelyn?”

“Because I was. I guess. Up until yesterday.”

Abraham was not a dumb man. He seemed to put the pieces of the puzzle together. “She's been alive in that body up until recently?”

I nodded.

“When?”

“Just before you showed up. For me, just after the Wings of Mercury experiment exploded and the infinity bell rang out.”

“September thirteenth, 1910,” he said.

“And yesterday was September thirteenth, 2210.”

“So, when you said your brother had lost a sister . . .”

“He did. And she was a sister he very much loved.”

He was silent a moment. I wondered, in his three hundred years, how many people close to him he had lost.

Abraham shifted his gaze to the horizon, and the specter of pain fell over him briefly.

“So, you're not seeing him at his best,” I said. “I mean, he's smart—a genius, really. Runs a little hot on the temper side, but he's a good man. He's done a lot to help people, even when he didn't get anything back from it.

“And there's one more thing you should know. The plague hit Compound Five. There are six people infected, as far as we know. I'd understand it if you don't want to go there with us.”

“Why?” he asked, turning back to me, his left hand tucked in his belt, his shoulder lowered.

“Well, it's a plague. A bad one,” I said.

“And?”

“And if you don't want to be exposed . . .”

“It is the small details like that, Matilda, that makes me want to believe your outlandish tales.”

“True tales, outlandish or not,” I corrected. “What details?”

“Galvanized aren't affected by the plagues.”

“We aren't?”

“No.”

“None of the plagues?”

“No. We've been through all of them, and all of us are standing.”

“Oh. So that's good.”

“Seems to be.” He was smiling, the stitched corner of his mouth lower than the other. I liked that smile on him. Especially when it was aimed at me.

“Well, Quinten has a friend there who's infected,” I said.

“That makes sense. I couldn't fathom why we'd have to go out there in person, when you have a radio in the basement.”

“How do you know about the radio?”

“Every 'steader has a radio.”

“Okay.”

“You might not want to do that.”

“Do what?”

“Believe everything I say. I could be lying, you know, and have just found out you have a radio.”

“Don't worry. There's something I haven't told you about me.”

“Oh?”

“I can tell when anyone lies. It's a gift.” I was lying through my teeth.

His eyebrows ticked down, and he bit his lip.

Okay, the lip thing was totally becoming a distraction. It made me want to kiss him, to taste him, to run my tongue along that curve of him and see what he'd do to me in return.

“Evelyn?” Quinten called out from the kitchen door, where I was sure the Grubens could still hear him. “Do you want to say good-bye to Grandma?”

I knew I should. “Sure. Be right in.”

I left Abraham and made my way back through the noise and laughter, which was layered with comments about how quickly I'd made it to Compound Five and back. Grandma was at the table, as excited to be there among the noise as I'd ever seen her.

“I wanted to give you a hug,” I told her, doing just that.

“Are you going somewhere, dear?” she asked.

“Just for a little while. I'll see you soon.”

“Shouldn't I go? I should go. It's time to go. Always time. I'll bring the sheep.” She patted her lap, looking for the sheep, which were not there.

“It's time to stay. I'll be home before you know it.” I gave her a peck on the cheek. “In the meantime, the Grubens will be here with Floyd, and that's going to be fun, isn't it?”

“Oh yes.” She brightened a little, then gave me a very clear look. “I will see you in time, Matilda. Be safe, my child.”

I glanced up, and a couple of the people looked uncomfortably at me or at her with concern in their eyes.

“I will be careful,” I said. “Don't worry a bit.”

The people around us seemed to relax when I took the name change in stride. I said one final farewell and got the heck out of there.

They were good people, loving people. I could see that. But the longer I stayed with them, the easier it would be for me or Quinten to slip up and reveal that I wasn't who they thought I was. And explaining what I was, who I was, had quickly become tiresome.

I strode outside again, and found Neds had brought what must be the “truck” out of the barn.

It was not now, nor had it ever been, a truck.

It looked more like an armored bus and a Conestoga wagon had had unprotected sex. The engine was running strong and smooth, a deep, chugging growl, but I didn't smell gasoline. I wondered what it used for fuel.

Quinten walked out of the kitchen, waving his hand behind him one last time. He wore a backpack slung over one shoulder and a duffel that looked like it weighed something in his hand.

Peter and Jacinta were in the doorway, his arm around her shoulder. “Bye, now!” Jacinta called out. “Safe travels.”

I gave them a wave too.

“Let's go,” Quinten said as he passed me.

I followed him into the vehicle, which was separated with seats up front and benches that looked like they could break down into beds in the back. The rear of the vehicle was also fitted with cupboards and a small table.

Neds sat the driver's seat, and Quinten made himself comfortable in the middle of the bus.

Foster and Abraham stepped into the vehicle and paused just inside, as if committing the space to memory. Then Foster moved silently down to the back and chose a seat, while Abraham took the seat in the front, nearest the door and Neds. He reached over and slid the door closed.

“The direct route?” Right Ned asked, glancing in the rearview mirror at Quinten.

“To begin with,” Quinten said. “Once we make Copple's Rise, we'll decide which road looks best.”

Neds slipped the beast of a vehicle into gear and put his foot down. The vehicle lunged forward, then smoothed out, taking us down the dirt road of the farm, past lizards of various sizes.

I stared out the window, hungrily taking in the view. The farm was beautiful in the pale beginnings of the day. Fields neatly tacked down by split-wood fences; orchards of pear and also plum, peach, and apple; and generous acreage set aside for vegetables and grain.

“Just the three of us work the land?” I asked.

Quinten was watching out the window too, but he was much more subdued. “We bring in the Grubens during harvest when we need it. Trade our grain for their meat.”

I noticed a clump of cream-colored sheep, small but not as tiny as the pocket sheep Grandma kept around. They were normal-looking except for their ridiculous rabbit ears that stood tall off their heads.

“Bunny sheep?”

He smiled. “Shabbits. They were a fluke. I stitched some bits together, wondering if it would affect the wool they produced.”

“Did it?”

“Yes. They are also the only stitched I've made that breed. So there's quite a few of them now.”

“And does their wool, um . . . hold bits of time?”

He frowned. “No. Why would you even assume. . . . Wait. Did they before?”

“I don't know how it worked. Grandma could do it. She knitted up spare bits of time in their wool somehow—the tiny-sheep wool; she didn't have shabbits. She never told me how, and I've only used it twice.”

“She knits,” he said. “But she's never mentioned she's knitting time. Not even when she was of a clearer mind. It isn't something I think is possible.”

“There's a lot of impossible going around these days.” Maybe the wool did hold time. More likely, it didn't. When I saw Grandma again, I'd ask her.

The fields rolled past, and I caught a glimpse of more lizards, trundling along the edges of trees and slinking through tall grasses. They were built like patchwork dragons made of crocodiles and a hodgepodge of iguana, monitor, and turtle.

“Did you try to make any of them the same?” I asked.

“Why bother?” he said. “Better to use what I have on hand and try to make the most viable creature. Reptiles are particularly hearty in all their shapes and forms.”

“And they don't eat the sheep—I mean, shabbits?”

“They don't have a taste for stitched things.”

“Well, I, for one, am happy to hear that,” I said.

His eyes strayed to Abraham, who was slouched back in his seat, his arms crossed over his chest, looking as relaxed and unconcerned as a man could be.

“Most of them, anyway,” Quinten said.

I could have asked him why he hated galvanized. Over the rumble and jostle of the vehicle, I doubted Abraham or Foster would have heard his answer. But this conversation between us about the sheep had been the first time he hadn't been looking at me like I was an unwelcome stranger behind his sister's eyes. And my questions—things Evelyn already knew—didn't seem to make him angry.

I liked the hint of trust that might be growing between us. We'd need it if we were going to take on Slater. So instead of pushing him for answers, I contented myself with watching the sunlight warm the edges of the world, happy here in the small peace of this moment before the storm I knew was coming.

I think something went terribly wrong for you, Matilda, back in our time. I am running out of time to find you. Are you alive?

—W.Y.

A
fter all the talk about ferals, I expected the countryside to be filled with teeth and claws. Instead, it was a serene landscape made mostly of the occasional walled farm separated by wide, hilly fields and forests.

The road we'd been rumbling along for a couple hours took us up past Pock cabin, and on past the small outcropping of House Brown families that used to live in what was now an empty field.

We made it up a rise that offered a horizon-to-horizon view of the valley, roads, and hills beyond. Neds pulled to a stop just off the side of the road, where a little brook glittered a few yards away.

“Good enough place to fill up,” Neds said, “and pick our trail into Compound Five.”

Quinten took a deep breath and nodded. “Let's stretch our legs.”

“How much farther to the compound?” I stood. My legs were still vibrating from the miles we'd put in so far today.

“Depends on which route looks open,” Quinten said.

Abraham and Neds had already exited the vehicle. Quinten was next, and I glanced behind me to make sure Foster was coming.

He was already on his feet, ducking a little for the ceiling height. He offered me a small smile and a wink.

“You're enjoying this, aren't you?”

“I am happy. You were lost. We found you.”

From his perspective, he'd lost me back in 1910. Three hundred years thinking a child you'd only just met was missing was a long time to hold out hope of finding her.

“I'm happy you found me too,” I said.

“I never lost you,” he said quietly.

I wondered what he meant by that, but we stepped out of the bus thing and into clean, cool air, with sunlight slipping between clouds. He walked past me and down the road without another word.

There were no sounds of distant engines, no airplane rumbles or whistle of trains. It was as silent as I'd ever heard it be. Only the birdsong, broken by the rattling of grasshopper wings, and the burble of a nearby brook filled the air.

Near enough I could hit it with a rock rose a two-hundred-foot radio tower built on the other side of the road. It speared through the view across the low hills and fields ahead of us.

If Abraham was right and everyone out here in the scratch communicated by shortwave radio, then this tower was a good bounce station that probably serviced a hundred-mile radius.

“I thought you said ferals were out here.” I scanned the landscape separated by only a few two-lane roads, and with a disturbing lack of speed tubes to be found. From here, I couldn't even make out any of the small, walled-off farms we'd come across as we'd traveled.

“Only at night,” Quinten said.

“What do they eat?” I asked.

“Other nocturnal beasts and each other. Farm animals, if they can get them.”

“I don't see any farms.”

“Not in this valley. Too many ferals to risk it,” Quinten said. “They move in packs of ten or twelve, but the scent of blood will set them into a feeding frenzy. They give off a pheromone, and then all the other ferals in a hundred miles will come for the feed.

“House Brown does some planting and harvesting out here. If it's in a day's driving distance, they'll work the land. Sometimes a little farther if there's a bolt cabin. Orchards and such.”

“Where did the ferals come from?” I asked. “Are they stitched?”

“You said you had crocboar back in your time?”

“Yes.”

“Was it stitched?”

“No. Just a mash-up of critters that evolved or mutated, I suppose.”

“Ferals are the same,” he said. “Never have gotten the straight story, but when all the power grids and communication systems went down, a lot of things collapsed. Things in cages and science labs broke out. Escaped to the wild. Thrived in a lot of zones too contaminated for humans. And eventually they bred. A lot.”

“So there's a lot of them?”

He stared at me a moment. “Far, far too many. But since they are all nocturnal, we won't have to worry about them until sunset. We should be at the compound by then.”

Neds swung back into the bus and walked out with something that looked suspiciously like a picnic basket.

“Jacinta made sure we had a lunch,” Left Ned said. “Since you're the girl here . . .” He handed me the basket.

I gave him a withering glare. “What? Only a girl knows how to unpack food?”

“No,” Left Ned said. “I meant, since you're the girl here, you should have first choice.”

The wicked twinkle in his innocent eyes told me otherwise.

“Don't give me those doe eyes, Harris,” I said. “I have matches, and I know where you keep your porn.”

He inhaled, shocked by my response. Probably Evelyn wouldn't have said something like that. Then he laughed so hard, both of him were howling.

Quinten just shook his head and sighed at me.

“Good God, Matilda,” Right Ned said, catching his breath, “remind me not to get your dander up.”

“Here's an idea,” I said. “Try being nice, and your smut might survive the week.” I gave him a sweet grin, then started unpacking the basket onto the grass.

“Think I'll fill the tanks,” Left Ned said. “Try not to spit in my sandwich.”

“Too late,” I said without looking up.

He was still chuckling as he walked over to the back of the vehicle. He pulled a long hose out of a small door in the back and dragged it behind him as he trudged down to the creek.

Abraham and Foster were out of hearing range, walking down both directions of the road, guns in their hands.

“Where do you suppose they're going?” I asked Quinten.

“To see if the mercs who have been following us are going to start a fight.” He pulled out a pair of binoculars and scanned the horizon.

“Mercs? We've been followed?” I glanced around, looking for any sign of movement in the grasses or trees.

“Since just after we left our property.”

“I didn't see them.”

“They stayed a good distance behind us.”

“How?”

“Motorcycles.”

“I didn't hear engines.”

“Like I said, they stayed a distance back.”

He pivoted north, his eyes still behind the binoculars.

The basket contained sliced bread, plump green apples, cheese, and cured meat.

“Hungry?” I asked him.

He
hmm
ed
,
still scanning the horizons. I cut a hunk of cheese with my pocket knife, pressed it and an apple into his hand. “Eat something.”

Then I cut up the rest of the cheese—a pale, buttery yellow—and split it five ways. Jacinta had included cloth napkins in the basket, so I spread out five and filled each one with a serving of everything.

I held one of the napkins in my hand and paced a bit while I bit into the tart, juicy apple. “Did you bring everything you needed for the cure?” I asked.

“Of course I did. Why would you even ask me that?”

He finally pulled the binoculars away from his eyes and noticed he had a hunk of cheese in his hand. He took a bite. “Why are you pacing?”

I shrugged. “Other than there are mercenaries after us and ferals in the shadows and we're out in the open like sitting ducks for flybys?”

“Flybys?”

“Aircraft? Jet, helios?”

“Airplanes?” he said. “Trust me—no one is going to waste fuel flying over the countryside, looking for us.”

“I should be comforted by the fact that they'll just put mercenaries after us instead?”

“No, but you can stop pacing. We're safe here. We'll see them coming if they make a move.”

Three quick blasts of gunshot rang out. A flock of birds rattled up out of the trees.

I grabbed the gun at my thigh, drew it.

Quinten and Ned had done the same, though they didn't look nearly as twitchy as I felt.

Abraham came walking up the road. I half expected to see him dragging a dead body behind him.

“Did you talk them out of following us?” Quinten asked.

“For now.” Abraham scanned us and the space around us, his eyes flicking down the opposite end of the road, where Foster had disappeared.

“Were there more?” Quinten asked.

Foster strode up the road, his pace steady, looking like a tank that could break through any barrier set in front of it.

Abraham flicked a few fingers his way, and Foster responded with a gesture.

“There was one other,” Abraham said. “He has been encouraged to report to Coal and Ice and tell them that killing us is not a job worth the pay.”

Quinten made the
hmm
sound again.

“Coal and Ice?” I handed Neds his portion of the meal and then gave Abraham his share.

“It's the center of criminal activity and information,” Left Ned said. “Abraham and Foster here probably frequent the place quite a lot.”

“We do,” Abraham said, not rising to Ned's taunt. “All jobs come and go through Coal and Ice; all information is gathered there.”

“So it's like a House?”

“No,” Quinten said.

“House of villainy,” Right Ned said.

“It is efficient,” Abraham took a bite of the meat and bread together. “And if it were not exactly what it was, Quinten would not be interested in either Foster or me.”

“Why?” I asked.

“They're my ticket in,” Quinten admitted.

Abraham nodded.

If they had come to some kind of an agreement, it must have been when I wasn't around.

“Into Coal and Ice?”

“Exactly,” Quinten said.

“I thought we were going to House Brown. I mean Earth. House Earth.”

“We are,” Quinten said. “Then we are going to Coal and Ice. For information. And to hire a few people.”

So, Coal and Ice was a hub of mercs and spies. Killer central. “To take out Slater?” I asked. “I mean, telling people you want to storm House Fire sounds a little crazy, don't you think?”

“Crazy doesn't matter,” Abraham said. “All that matters is what it pays.” He was giving Quinten a look, studying him while they both ate. Foster stepped up beside us, and Abraham handed him the remaining share of food.

“I am curious as to what you will be paying for the job,” Abraham said.

“Do not concern yourself with that,” Quinten said. “Concern yourself with the business at hand.”

“It's all the same business,” Abraham said.

Neds scoffed. “All you care about is getting paid,” Left Ned said. “Stitch.”

Abraham finished his bread and cheese. “Mostly. But if that was all I cared about, shortlife, I would have dragged Quinten and Matilda in for the reward.”

“Like Sallyo would let you do that,” Left Ned said.

“Sallyo couldn't stop me.”

That resonated with the Neds. It was true, after all. Galvanized were built stronger than humans, even mutants like Sallyo and Neds. If Abraham, Foster, or, hell, I got it in our heads that we should make a stand or take someone down, those who stood against us would be quickly stopped or killed.

Which reminded me.

“What kind of bomb?” I asked.

Quinten brushed the crumbs off his fingertips. “What kind of a bomb what?”

“Slater said he'd begin bombing House Earth compounds in ten days . . . well, nine days now. You told me he had the weaponry and technology to do that. So, what kind of bombs can he lob at the compounds?”

“It depends on which compound he targets,” he said.

“Are they all on this continent, or are they around the world?”

“Most are on this continent.” Quinten settled into the history-teacher tone he always used when he knew more about a subject than I did. “After the cataclysm, cities and countries fell as the power complexes fell. The disasters that followed made many places untenable, though a few roughs and stragglers scratch out a sort of living even in those zones.

“The richest soil, the cleanest water, drew the major cities of House Fire and House Water. Between those cities, where the water isn't always as plentiful or the soil as sweet—”

“Don't forget the ferals roaming free,” Left Ned added.

“—and the ferals are out killing every night is where House Earth built their strongholds.”

“How many?”

“Twenty-three.”

Twenty-three was an awful lot of targets; nearly a month's worth of killing, if Slater wasn't stopped.

“The other thing I don't understand,” I said, “is why the Houses are at war with House Earth. Self-sufficient people shouldn't have any reason to get in the way of the more powerful Houses.”

“Who said the Houses were at war with Earth?” Right Ned asked.

“Aren't they?”

Quinten shook his head, then went back to peering through the binoculars. “There are disagreements, skirmishes, fights, and accusations. So far there haven't been any wars.”

“Except for fifty years ago,” Abraham said quietly.

Every muscle in Quinten's body tensed.

“What happened fifty years ago?” I asked.

“The One-one plague hit,” Abraham said.

They were quiet, as if expecting me to pick up on some important detail.

“And?” I asked.

“It brought new scarcity and disagreements between Houses,” Abraham said. “There were raids on House Earth. A lot of people were angry.”

“A lot of people were killed,” Quinten said flatly. “And not just fifty years ago. Much more recently. Much more.”

“Unintentionally.”

Quinten shook his head. “You will never convince me of that.”

“Who did the killing?” I asked. But just as I said it, it came to me. “Galvanized?”

“It was a time of upheaval,” Abraham said. “Galvanized were the only people who weren't falling to the disease. Some made regrettable choices.”