Dualed (4 page)

“Time,” I ask out loud.

Luc’s watch beeps out the answer:
23:15
already. Not long, but still too long.

Scenario after scenario plays out of my mind’s eye, none of them good. What are Luc and Chord doing in there? What’s taking them so long? Shouldn’t they be back by now?

To keep my hands busy, I strap on Luc’s watch, fiddle with the car’s mirrors, crank open the window for fresh air.

There’s a muffled echo of voices. I can’t make out any words, only the rhythms and beats of what sound like shouts.

They’re coming from Chord’s Alt’s house.

I don’t even give myself a chance to consider what I’m doing before I hurtle from the car, leaving the door swinging open behind me. No time to care.

In the moonlight, the prickly lanceweeds that make up the front lawn are a mottled gray and black. They catch on my sneakers, my ankles, little swords in their own right, trying to keep me
back. Panic is sharp and metallic in my mouth, and it chases me until I reach the back of the house. Where Luc and Chord went.

Through the filtered darkness, I see a patch of a yard, beaten down with neglect. A sad tire swing hangs from the low arm of a thin, scraggly tree; its branches are claws, its trunk a hunkered threat of a body. There is a tricycle in the far corner, half-buried in some stiff grass.

Kids. There are
kids
here.

Alarm floods me. In my head I see Chord’s tormented face again; I hear him tell us about what happened to Taje’s friends, how they were PKs.

Luc, Chord, did you see? Did you know, when you went inside?

The voices are louder here behind the house, an angry cacophony of sound. They flow out from the crack that separates the back door from its frame. It’s unlocked and open.

So I do the only thing I can do. I step up, nudge the door open a bit more, and slide right in.

Dark inside. The air is stuffy and smells like sleep. The scale of everything is too cramped, angles and corners and furniture wherever my eyes touch down. Only my ears tell me something is happening.

There. It’s coming from the room down the hall.

It takes me an eternity to cover the few feet that lie between where I came in and the bedroom doorway. When I get there, I see it all, a flash of a nightmare lit by cool moonlight streaming in through open blinds.

A threadbare carpet. Stale bedsheets dotted with cigarette burns and stains. A collection of dirty needles on the bedside table. And people—too many people stuffed into too small a space.

Luc is sprawled on the ground on his back, the handle of a blade sticking out of his side. He’s holding his gun in his hands. It’s pointed right at Chord’s Alt, who’s standing in the middle of the room. The Alt’s gun is pointed right back at Luc. And Chord, standing behind
him
, his arm clotheslined around his Alt’s neck. With his free hand, Chord’s pressing the tip of his switchblade into a face too much like his own. Except the eyes are harder, the body addict-thin and running on nothing but pure adrenaline and whatever was in those needles.

“Let me go, or he’s as good as dead!” The Alt’s voice is a smoker’s, rough and guttural … but still too much like Chord’s. His eyes don’t waver from Luc. His hands don’t shake. It’s the worst kind of courage, built on pills, powders, heated crystals. It doesn’t know fear or doubt.

Luc’s face is harsh and furious. “Don’t, Chord! Don’t listen to him!”

The Alt’s snarl of a laugh chills me to the bone. It’s horrible to hear nuances of Chord in there.

“Time’s running out for you, man,” Chord’s Alt says to Luc. “Look at you. You’re bleeding out.”

“I have more than enough time to kill you first.”

“And make this an AK? Nah, man. You won’t go there.” The Alt shakes his head in disgust. “Then your life would
really
be over.”

“Then I have nothing left to lose, do I?” Luc says. He sounds so calm. How is he so calm?

“So do it. What are you waiting for? Do it!”

“Shut up!” Chord’s yell booms throughout the room. With
a flick of his wrist, he slides the blade up to his Alt’s temple. “Put the gun down.
Now
.”

“I’ll get the first shot off before you can even think about it!” his Alt snaps.

Chord twists the blade, angles it just so. The gesture is almost elegant.
“Put it down.”

A sudden, soft swish against my hip shocks me into taking a breath.

It’s a little boy. No more than five or six. Clad in pajamas, his hair wild from sleep, something in his face pulls at the strings of familiarity. Then I realize what it is. He reminds me of Taje, Chord’s little brother. In fact, he resembles both Taje and Chord—which in a weird way makes perfect sense.

The next few seconds are chaos.

The boy takes a tentative step into the room.

Instinctively, I reach out to stop him. “No, don’t!” I shout. My voice is too thin, too high. The hysteria in it makes all of them turn to stare at me. The expressions on Luc’s and Chord’s faces are of stunned confusion.

“West?” Luc’s eyes widen, shining in the moonlight. His arms drop an inch, his gun now off its aim by a mere fraction. “What are you—
Get out of—
”

He’s not able to finish, the warning falling from his lips. Because that’s when Chord’s Alt squeezes the trigger.

The bullet lodges with dull finality inside Luc’s chest.

“Luc!” I hear myself scream. His name is the only thing in my head.
“Luc!”

In the half light, Chord’s face convulses. His eyes go hot
with a pain so great that they’re nearly crazed. He doesn’t even seem to be breathing as he pulls his Alt’s head up by the hair and, before his Alt can begin to bring his gun around, draws the blade across his neck.

A whistle of a scream followed by the sound of blood pouring down on the carpet like rain.

Chord drops his Alt’s body to the floor. And then together we’re at Luc’s side.

Luc’s gasps seem to be coming from the depths of him. Blood blooms on his chest, spreading wildly across the floor beneath him. His face is bleached to the color of bone.

“Luc,” I sob. This isn’t happening. It can’t be. We did everything right. It’s not supposed to end this way. I crush my palm on top of the wound, only knowing that I’m supposed to put pressure on it. But one look at Chord tells me it’s hopeless. The shot was too accurate, its path too destructive.

Luc pushes my hand from his chest. Presses his gun into my palm. Holds it there until I have no choice but to accept it.

“Be careful with it … West,” he gasps. A ghost of a grin. “You always did … move too fast.”

It feels too heavy to lift, the fit more cumbersome than I remember. When the time comes, will I be able to use it on my Alt? To not hesitate, even for a second?

“I was too late.” Chord’s eyes are hollow and dazed. No longer marked by his assignment number. They’re his own again. “Luc, I was too late.”

“No, man, you did good,” Luc whispers. “And you’re … safe now.” Red foam lines his mouth, and he coughs weakly.

The bullet must have hit his lung, too, I think. But the
thought is faint and unimportant and passes like it never was. It won’t help.

“Be there for her, okay?” Luc says to Chord. “When she needs you.” A hitch of breath.

Chord nods. “I won’t forget.”

“Love you, Luc,” I say. It’s all I can do to keep my voice steady. I swipe at the tears that make it hard to see, angry at their existence, their uselessness. “You hear me?”

He coughs again. More red froth. “Got it, West.” A huge gasp for air. “Love you, too.”

Then he dies.

Chord grabs me as I’m keeling over, wanting to absorb whatever pain of mine that he can take on top of his own. Whatever I’m willing to give up.

Time passes in meaningless chunks, blurs of nothing that makes sense. It might be seconds or minutes or hours. In a different city, a different world, it might not have happened at all.

Numb. A dim awareness that the little boy is still sitting over Chord’s Alt, his small hand covered in blood as he tries to wipe his brother’s neck clean.

I help Chord with Luc’s body. Drape him over Chord’s shoulder in a fireman’s carry. Except Luc can’t be saved now.

And then we’re leaving. Stumbling out from the shadow of the house and onto the street and into the car. Trying to leave behind everything that just happened and knowing there’s no way we can.

The house is empty. But their ghosts haunt the halls and fill the rooms, their voices echo in my ears.

It’s two days after Luc’s funeral and already I’m lost.

I’m still lying on the couch. I’ve slept, woken, slept again. I feel as drugged as Chord’s Alt must have been. Not that electric, strung-out high, but a kind of thick, grieving sluggishness. Which one’s more of an escape, I don’t know.

My cell buzzes. I know it’s Chord, but I answer it anyway. I can only avoid him for so long.

“Hello?” The word is dry, rusty. It’s so strange not having Luc around to talk to anymore.

“Hey, West.”

My throat clenches at the sound of Chord’s voice. “Hey.”

“I wanted to come by earlier, but I thought maybe you were still asleep.”

“I was.” A pause. “I kind of still am.”
Then I can pretend none of this is real. That I didn’t play a hand in his death … that it wasn’t your Alt that killed him
.

“How about I come pick you up, head out into the Grid
for a bit? Whatever you want to do. Lunch, maybe?” Chord’s voice is soft, careful not to say something that’ll send me away. He knows me too well, having seen both the best and worst of me over the years. I can’t help but think of Luc’s words from that day in the restaurant, when he made me promise to keep Chord in my life.

The sudden thought that they might have talked about this earlier makes my gut churn. Half of me is pissed off at them for thinking I’m that helpless; the other half wonders bleakly if maybe they’re right.

“No, I don’t think so, Chord,” I say evenly. “I’m just … cleaning the house now. Luc’s room.” A lie; his room hasn’t been touched at all. I haven’t been able to go in there yet. But it’s the first thing that comes to mind, and anything is better than telling Chord what I’ve really been doing. Namely, nothing. Haunting the house along with the others, here but not here.

“I can help you,” he says, sounding painfully hopeful. “Or just keep you company.”

“No, that’s okay.”

A pause. “You’ve got to eat, don’t you? I bet you’re living off … I don’t know, crackers or dry cereal or something like that.”

I can’t remember the last time I ate. My stomach still hurts, has ever since Chord began to haltingly deliver Luc’s eulogy. “I’m fine. I can cook, you know.” Barely, though. Not that I care much right now.

“West.” His worry for me is obvious, even through my cell, across the physical distance. “I’d like to see you, okay?”

I shut my eyes tight, and Chord’s face fills my mind. It’s
changed, somehow. From the one I’ve known forever to the one that now draws me in, calling me closer, telling me there’s more to uncover.

When did it change?

Then his face is his Alt’s, the face of Luc’s killer, and my eyes flare open.

“West?” Chord says my name again, more roughly this time. “C’mon, I can be there in five—”

“No, Chord, not now. I’ll talk to you tomorrow.”

He sighs. “You’re going to school, then.” Not a question but a confirmation. As if asking would make me realize it wasn’t necessarily a given. At fifteen, I could opt out. Co-op … somewhere. I haven’t given school any thought—work, even less. But what else would fill my hours now?

“Yeah, I’ll be there,” I tell him. “See you.” And with that I disconnect.

Silence in the house again, too loud with the fullness of the past. Chord was right, I do need to get out. But not with him, not yet. I’m scared that if I see him right now, it won’t be him I’ll be seeing.

I leave the house, shutting the front door behind me. I start walking, though I don’t exactly know where I’m going. But old habits die hard, and next thing I know I’m blocks and blocks away, back in the Grid.

Bodily, my family lived in our house in the western suburbs of Jethro Ward, but a part of our hearts always stayed behind in the streets of the Grid, holding our place for us, awaiting our return. As the ward’s ground zero, its true epicenter, it spreads
out over an area just shy of one square mile. The Grid has a life of its own. It has no patience with the slow or naïve. It makes no allowances and stops for no one. The four of us honed our instincts out here, as much our playground as our pretend battlefield. Preparing us.

I look up at the building in front of me.

Kersh’s public library, where the city’s largest collection of old paper books is stored. Half of the books are actually remnants from the Surround, the Board having claimed them as their own before permanently sealing the border’s iron barrier. There’s talk about moving them into private Board quarters before long. And even though the public still has access to them, most people don’t touch paper books—not when stores stock flexi-readers that can bend without breaking and fold down to the size of your palm. Besides, paper books smell like the past, an alien world.

A brass plate next to the front doors is etched with block letters that are discreet and tasteful, the authoritative voice behind them impossible to miss:
REMEMBER FOR YOUR SAFETY AND WELL-BEING DO NOT INTERFERE WITH ANY COMPLETION THAT IS NOT YOUR OWN THANK YOU THE BOARD
.

The scents of age and dust assail my nose as soon as I enter. As always, I’m both comforted and confused. The stories bound in paper and ink have always given me a sense of peace, and it’s jarring to realize they come from the war-torn Surround.

But I’m not here to lose myself in a story. Not today. That would be asking for the impossible.

By the time I’m upstairs in the Alternate History section,
deep in the stacks, I’m crying silently, blind with hot tears and sudden desperation. Trying to find an answer to a question already decided, a way to change what can’t be changed.