Luca (45 page)

“None of that matters.” Mercer lifts the tip of the pulse rifle and points it squarely at Qaara. “If I can’t save the world on my terms, then I’ll watch it burn.” He eyes the rifle. “At least I’ll be able to kill myself before the killer molecule takes me.”

The sea of mist moves closer as the pods explode and spew acid. The hills melt away before their eyes.

“It’s not over yet.” Jedd looks at Qaara. “Luca might still be able to make contact with the Cloud. Isn’t that right, Luca?”

Luca stares back at Mercer.

Bursting out laughing, Mercer can hardly believe it’s true. “Your name is
Luca
? How ironic.”

He hears her words in his mind.

The Cloud is alive. I’m trying to make it listen to me.

The realization hits Mercer. This girl is precious. The last weapon he can wield against the Cloud and everyone else.

“Yes, I know, Luca.” Mercer takes a step forward. “And I want you to succeed. You are special. You can do things no one else can. I want you to talk to the Cloud. To find out what it’s looking for.” He scans the crowd. “Maybe we can tell it who to save. Save all your friends, all the good people in the world. Wouldn't that be wonderful, Luca? We can clean up the world. You and I. Make it the way it should be. The way you want it to be. Come to me, Luca. Let’s work together. I’ll give you anything you want."

Luca does not move.

Remembering what he read about the Fukushima orphans, Mercer drops to his knees and lays the pulse rifle in the mud. A smile lights up his face.

“I know you’re lonely, Luca. Has it been a long time since you saw your mother and father? I’m sure they loved you. I’m sure they wanted you to be happy.”

Luca takes a step forward.

They did love me. We were happy. It was so hard on Mother when Father died. She wasn’t the same. It wasn’t her fault she couldn’t take care of me anymore.

Suppressing his surprise, Mercer feels the words in his mind. Like soft kitten paws.

“And you want to see your mother again, don’t you Luca?”

Yes! Do you know where she is?

“We could find her. Search the world for her. You could be together again. Happy again.”

Luca runs forward through the rain, stopping an arm’s length from Mercer.

“We’ll find your mother together. I’ll buy her a house and food. I’ll take care of both of you. She’ll be so happy to see you.” He reaches for Luca with one hand and the pulse rifle with the other.

Smile disappearing, Luca jumps back.

You’re lying, aren’t you?

“No, Luca, I would never lie to you.”

But I can see it in your mind. You want to grab me, point the gun at me and make me and my friends do what you want.

“I’m giving you the chance to have whatever you want. Don’t throw it all away, Luca.” Mercer’s fingers curl around the rifle. He lifts it from the mud.

I’m not going to leave my friends.

Her eyes on Mercer, Luca takes a step back.

“I can see your devotion. You need some motivation. Maybe this will help.”

He points the gun at Jedd and pulls the trigger.

As his hand clutches his chest, Jedd drops to the ground.

“It’s not good to have friends, Luca. They only hold you back. I’m going to keep shooting them until you help me.” He trains the gun on Qaara and taps the trigger.

There’s a pop, and she goes down.

79

EFFORTLESS

Screams rise from the edge of the crowd as the mist draws close.

I’ll come to you. Please stop shooting them.

Luca walks through the rain toward Mercer.

“That’s a good girl.” Mercer points his gun at her forehead. “Now kneel down here, facing me. Close your eyes. Connect to the Cloud. Tell it to back off from us. You and I. Tell it to leave us alone.”

She drops to her knees, sinking into the mud, still feeling the familiar contours of the minds of Jedd and Qaara as their lives drain away.

Eyelids closing, she enters the world of voices, an ocean of fear. Millions cry out for help. With effort, she draws her mind through multiple layers of panic and chaos.

Down to the lowest level where she finds the Voice and sends out a message.

I’m Luca.

It’s different now. The Voice moves with purpose, a goal, like her father’s machine that harvested rice in the fall. The acid grinds and chews through tens of thousands of lives every second, cutting them down, snuffing them out, moving on to fresh fields of slaughter.

I can hear you.

The Voice moves over and past her, never stopping in its forward motion, never pausing to take notice.

Please listen to me.

No response.

What are you looking for?

Silence. The Voice has moved on.

Opening her eyes, Luca stares up at Mercer, his gun pressed into her forehead.

It won’t listen to me
, she thinks, sending the words into his mind
.

“Try again,” Mercer says.

This time, Luca nods and keeps her eyes open. She imagines Rika. Her best friend. The one she killed, the one she
had
to kill, by going into her Core.

It would be easy with Mercer.

She goes into his mind and finds the Core.

Starting with the outer rim of the crowd, a line of pods bursts. People draw back, some too late. Luca senses the fresh fear in their minds. More chaos and screams.

The Voice is far away.

And then, in that instant, the Voice stops, turns and comes back. As if to watch.

Through the crowd, a thin river of acid shoots toward her and Mercer, like the tongue of a chameleon, unrolling, cutting through anything in its path. In her mind’s eye, she sees it. Feels it.

Somehow, the crowd parts as the stream of acid rushes through.

The Voice hovers, as if over Luca’s shoulder, the massive weight of its presence light as a rose petal.

She stands over the Core in Mercer’s mind, a ribbon of light weaving through her fingers. It would be so easy to pull it apart and end Mercer’s life. Just like with Rika.

No
, Luca thinks
. Never again.

Letting go of Mercer’s mind, she returns to the Voice, exposing her own Core to it. As the tongue of acid comes closer, her gaze swings past the multitude of people.

Please don’t hurt them. Take me, but please, let them live.

On the distant horizon, a low-frequency moan rises from the hills, radiates into the sky, and ricochets to a point above Luca’s head.

Mercer steps behind her, trying to hide from the acid rushing in their direction.

But the ribbon of acid rears up like a liquid cobra in front of Luca’s face, twists around her and strikes Mercer in the center of his spine. Without a sound, his lips form an O. His arms and legs shoot out into a spread eagle as the acid coats his body. The soft parts, skin, tissue and muscles, go first, flashing into the mist. The last thing Luca sees is the outline of Mercer's skeleton and his blue eyes, like a fleeting afterimage.

Then he’s gone.

Luca opens her arms, palms up, knowing she is next. The wave of liquid death climbs above her and cascades into a transparent sphere that engulfs her like a bubble.

Her fear falls away.

Take me,
she thinks, stretching out to the Voice, reaching for it, opening to it.
Let the others live.

From deep below the turbulence in her mind, a reply emanates from the Voice.

At last. It is You.

The bubble slowly collapses inward, ripples running across its outer boundary. It takes on a light green color and descends down to engulf her. She braces herself, wondering if she will feel pain before death takes her.

The bubble makes contact with her head and face, moving down past her torso and legs, penetrating her clothes, touching her skin, a thin membrane, clinging to her body.

There is no pain. Only warmth.

The chaos in her mind vanishes, like smudges wiped clean from a window.

All that remains is the vast, calm ocean of the Voice. She floats in it like a speck on an infinite sea. Then her thoughts dissolve, becoming one with the ocean.

A three-dimensional map opens to her mind, an endless chain of spheres of blue and white orbiting stars within a boundless dark space. All of it teeming with life. All of it open to her thoughts.

My worlds,
the Voice says.

And for the first time in Luca’s life, she is whole and complete, wanting nothing, needing nothing.

Her mind reenters her body. She scans the crowd to see looks of horror mixed with wonder. Qaara and Jedd lie on the ground, blood flowing from the wounds in their chests.

What about them?
she asks the Voice.

Who?
comes the reply.

She looks past Qaara and Jedd to take in the mass of gathered humanity. In her mind, she sees images of multitudes, survivors gathered in every land across the planet. All of them filled with fear.

My people. All of them.

The Voice moves.
They do not hear. Like you.

Luca considers her reply. It tumbles out.
They could, if you changed them. Like me.

You will show them how to listen?
the Voice asks.

Luca smiles.
I will.

Watch
, comes the reply.

All through the crowd, pods explode, spewing liquid of the same light green color that coats Luca’s body. And, like her, the liquid forms a clear membrane on their skins.

Qaara and Jedd, clothed in the liquid, open their eyes and stand.

Staring down at her hands, the membrane disappears into Luca’s skin, absorbed like a sponge. As it enters her body, she feels the change. Lighter. A multitude of minds effortlessly at her fingertips.

They hear her. She hears them.

They are one.

80

THE WAY

What happened?
Jedd says.
We’re still alive?

The green liquid that clung to his body is gone. The pain is gone. His fingers try to find the holes in his chest from the pulse projectiles, but they are gone, too. He turns to Qaara and takes her hand.

She stares up at him.
It’s inside us, now. Part of us.

Her lips never move, but her voice flows through Jedd’s mind, a gentle river of sound and color. In the background, an ocean of voices move and float.

Ricky?
Jedd thinks.

Right here. Behind you. It’s incredible.

Jedd turns to find Ricky staring at a small flower blooming out of the mud. White petals open up out of a thin green stem. He bends to caress it.

What is it?
Jedd thinks.

Music.
Ricky’s voice is clear in Jedd’s mind.
From the flowers.

Across the field, the white plant blooms everywhere from the mud. Like Ricky, the people look down in wonder.

What’s going on?
Jedd thinks.
All these sounds in my mind. What are they?

The voices.
Qaara positions Jedd so he can stare at the crowd.
We can all hear the voices, now. Each other. Plants. All life. Just like Luca and her friends.
Her eyes meet Jedd’s.
Mercer was right.
It is a new world.

Jedd pulls Qaara closer.
How can we live in a world like this?

Isn’t it obvious?
Qaara points ahead.
We look to her. The first to make contact with the Cloud. The first to hear the Voice. She will show us the way. Take us where we need to go.

Luca walks across the open space to meet them.

81

EPILOGUE

Mercer opens his eyes.

The last thing he remembers is the flying tongue of acid. The intense realization of failure. All he could do was brace himself for excruciating pain, the sensation of dissolving flesh. Nerves and muscle burning away.

But when it came, it wasn’t like that at all. No pain. Only calm acceptance.

And now, warmth floods his senses. Like a speck of dust in a kaleidoscope, he floats in an ocean of music and color.

But it doesn’t last.

A presence hangs nearby, larger than the sun. Its arms reach out, its weight dragging on him, drawing him down into the black hole of its gravitational well. He tries to pull back, to reverse direction, but the forward momentum is too strong. At the moment of impact with the entity, blinding light and an infinitude of voices explode inside his mind, pressing, ripping and clawing at his thoughts, probing his memories, crawling across the inner membrane of his consciousness. One of the voices has a familiar, yet terrifying, sound.

In panic, Mercer recoils.

And the monster releases its grip.

Like a bubble suspended in water, Mercer floats in a delicate balance, poised between two worlds. On one side are the voices and color and music, prying at his mind, begging to get in. On the other side is only black emptiness.

He chooses the emptiness.

All sensation instantly ceases, as if sucked away into the vacuum of space.

He is left alone and silent.

And now, having fought off the beast that tried to destroy him, he is drifting in nothing, mind shut hard against the outside, protected in a shell, completely unconnected, in sole control of his own thoughts, safely away from the danger.

Is this Nirvana?

With nothing to do, time no longer matters. It requires a low level of constant effort to keep his mind shut against the outside, but at last, Mercer achieves victory. He has what he’s always wanted.

Total control of his own world.

*******

The man pauses.

In the midst of the symphony filling his thoughts, he picks out the sudden appearance of a familiar voice. One he has waited years to find. Instantly jumping closer, he reaches out for a warm embrace, the joy of contact and reunion.