Night Betrayed (8 page)

Theo was conscious of holding his breath when he entered the space, and it took long moments before he expelled it.

Holy gearhead’s wet dream, Batman.

It was like the Bat Cave meets Tony Stark’s lab meets
NASA
.

The space was long and open, running the entire length of the ranch. Tinted transom windows kept the glare of the sun from messing with computer or video screens. The left half looked like something from an old ’80s movie: it was lined with old arcade video games—Pac-Man, Centipede, Galaga—along with some from Theo’s generation, as well as pinball machines. But on the right, the large room was a fantasy. Massive computer touch screens built into the walls, clear acrylic countertops and keyboards, a clear glass electronic whiteboard, and projector screens and webcams. Theo saw a data glove and headgear for AI work. He could hardly form words to thank Frank—for he’d learned that the man had kept the space clean, dry, and powered up.

And yet . . . the stairway to the arcade was kept boarded up and inaccessible.

“Keeps the damned snoot outta here,” Frank said, eyeing Theo sharply.

“The snoot?”

“Bounty hunters. They take this stuff. Take anyone who’s got it too. No one knows it’s here, so you shut your goddamn can about it to anyone.”

And that was all Frank would say on the subject . . . but Theo didn’t care. He just wanted to get to work. He didn’t even spend much time wondering why Frank trusted him enough to give him access to the secret room.

The first thing he did was set up an access point, or
NAP
, to link into the Internet that he and Lou had been trying to create. Despite the fact that Envy, which of course was the cornerstone of the network, might be as far as a hundred miles away, Theo figured he could find the equipment here to build a receiver strong enough to tap into it. Aside of that, he, Lou, Sage, and Jade had spent the last two or three years setting up NAPs in a roughly fifty mile radius around Envy, and hopefully there would be one close enough that he could link into.

It took him only a few hours to rig an
NAP
, and he sent off an actual message back to Lou, who would be in the Resistance’s Command Center, hidden two stories below the ground of New York-New York. Later, he might even be able to send him webcam pictures of the place. Lou would be fucking insane to get here, get his hands on this stuff.

By the time he finished that and sent off a message to Lou, Sam was calling up the stairs that it was time to leave for Yellow Mountain. And, mindful of Frank’s warning that the place must be kept secret, Theo had no choice but to leave the Bat Cave before everyone came looking for him.

“Once upon a time there was a magical place with castles and princesses, and a little, winding river. A bright red-and-yellow train trundled along on a track that surrounded the land, stopping at three different stations. There was a busy place called Main Street, filled with families and couples walking along. Shops lined a street where people could buy ice cream or chocolates or wonderful sandwiches called hot dogs . . .”

As Vonnie’s sure, easy voice lulled the audience, Theo found himself alternately sliding into the story and watching everyone and everything around him. And fantasizing about getting his fingers back on those sleek, dust-free touch screens.

The audience sat on an expanse of grass, safely inside the walls of the settlement of Yellow Mountain, with a fervent fire blazing in a stone-lined pit in the center of the group. He estimated about eighty people of all ages had either settled on the lawn on blankets or on portable chairs similar to those he’d taken to picnics or sporting events fifty years ago, except these chairs had seats made from curtain remnants and supports from broken pieces of wood or reformed plastic. A few dogs settled near their masters and mistresses, and off to the left, a man had just put his guitar aside.

The fire gave off a bit too much heat for a warm July evening, so there was a ring of empty grass around it. The sun was just sitting on the horizon, and its disappearance would plunge the world into dangerous darkness in an hour or two. In the air lingered the remnants of barbeque smoke; and behind the crowd, the carcass from the roasted pig still hung on its spit. A few yards away were the scattered buildings that made up the settlement, the largest of which was an old McDonald’s.

“Hot dogs weren’t made from puppy dogs, of course! Who would want to eat a sweet little puppy?” Vonnie said with a little laugh after one of the girls squealed in horror and clutched her own dog closer. “They were meats, long and skinny, these hot dogs,” she explained to a group of youngsters who sat in the front row and gazed up at her with wide eyes. “And you’d put them in a special long bread called a bun, which sort of hugged them. They tasted sooooo good, especially with ketchup on them. Princesses loved to eat them, and there were lots of little shops in this magical world where you could buy them or other tasty things called corn dogs.”

A little pang flipped inside Theo’s belly. Every so often that happened—a sharp reminder of what he’d lived through, what it had been like before. How many hot dogs had he had by the time he was the age of those kids there—eight, maybe nine or so? And none of them would have seen or tasted one in this world.

Not that the lack of processed food was anything to be upset about.

“And there was something called cotton candy,” Vonnie went on, her own eyes growing wide and a big smile rounding her cheeks. Her voice dropped into a tantalizing whisper as she bent forward to the young audience. Theo smiled. Here, for the first time, her enthusiasm was channeled into something more deliberate, more controlled than when she was in the kitchen or caring for Selena’s patients.

Selena.

Theo shifted his attention to the so-called Death Lady, who was sitting on a small rise of ground above and behind Vonnie. It put her in his vision without him having to move to look at Selena. He could sneak peeks without even turning his head. Convenient.

And interesting that I should care.

He turned that thought over in his mind for few moments, considering.

Something bumped Theo gently in the ribs and the warmth of a body sliding next to him pulled him back to his grassy seat. Jen had walked away from their little group a few moments before the story began, and now she’d returned to take her place between Theo and another young woman.

Jen’s long bare leg slid along his calf as she settled on the grass next to him. Bare toes, ringless and painted pale pink, burrowed into the cool green blades. She carried the scent of some flower that he couldn’t identify and didn’t really care to—he just knew it was a nice, girly smell. Then she giggled and whispered something to her girlfriend, bumping her arm against Scarlett as she did so.

About two hours before, Theo and Jen, along with Sam and Frank, had ridden in a horse-drawn wagon to Yellow Mountain. They’d arrived early enough for dinner and to join a collection of about twenty young people. Theo assumed he fit right in, at least visually, with the twenty-somethings, two of whom were pregnant and all of whom were looking forward to tonight’s social activities. Several bottles of wine and beer had passed around while they ate, and now all had the makings of a good, warm buzz.

Life was pretty good, considering the fact that he’d been dead days ago.

“Cotton candy was like pink or blue clouds,” Vonnie was saying, spreading her hands to demonstrate. “And it melted in the princess’s mouth, so sweet and sticky! In the hot sun, it colored their fingers so that they turned pink and blue, and when she gave her mama a kiss, she left a sticky blue lip-print on her cheek.”

Jen whispered something about her hair to the friend next to her, smoothing her hand along its blondish brown length. She lifted it in a bunch, twisting it high at the crown of her head, then draping it over her shoulder as she laughed softly. Then she leaned back to say something to the young man behind her, something about his “bang” jeans, which were torn over one knee and stitched with bold black at the hems. A little bit of knot work hung from the edges of the tear in the denim.

She bumped against Theo again; and, whether by accident or design, she managed to slide her arm along him too. Her long hair, now loose, cascaded over her shoulder and gleamed in the sunlight as it slithered briefly over Theo’s arm.

Subtle, she is not.

But she was young and lithe and she smelled good. She might be able to make him forget about Sage.

In fact, Jen reminded him more than a little of Sage, although Jen wasn’t as quiet as the redhead. Perhaps it was her young age that did it. He noticed the same youth and ingenuity in Jen’s eyes, the free smiles and laughter that came easily. The giggles, the talk about clothes and hair . . . Simple things.

While the things that were on his mind were always so much bigger and broader.

“And so, the princess climbed into a large teacup,” Vonnie said, lifting a palm-sized china cup and saucer that had somehow remained intact through the violence that had ravaged the earth. “It looked much like this, but it was wayyyy larger. In fact, it was so big, six people could fit inside it! It was pink with red swirling designs painted on the outside.”

“Was it made of glass?” piped up a tiny voice. “Or plastic?”

Vonnie pursed her lips, pretending to think, and then she looked at the cup in her hand and leaned forward to respond. “It was made of something magic,” she said. Then she lifted her face to look around the entire crowd, and repeated: “Magic.”

“What did the magic do?”

“It made the cup fly, around and around and around . . . so fast that the princess giggled and laughed. The wind brushed her face and tickled it, and tossed her hair. And inside her tummy she felt it curl and flutter like a thousand butterflies were inside!”

Jen shivered next to Theo—or at least, she hugged herself and rubbed her arms, whispering brrr. Hiding a smile, Theo shifted so that she could tuck under his arm, and he thought about how smooth her skin was, and how pretty she was when she smiled.

And how young. So, so young. So young that wisdom and experience had yet to cloud her gaze and imprint her skin. Gay and carefree, enjoying life.

While he felt old and used.

Theo looked over at Selena again. Alone, sitting high above and away from everyone else with her arms clasped loosely around bent knees. Despite the fact that he was in the midst of people, even hugging a lovely young woman, he felt just as separate as Selena seemed to be.

And, it struck him at that moment, he’d felt this way for a long time. Longer than he’d realized. For decades: distant, separated, outcast. Despite the awesomeness of his superpower, despite the fact that he looked like a young, buff athlete at the top of his game, he was separated. Because of it.

Distant even from Lou in many ways, despite their brotherly connection. For at least Lou looked like who he was: an old man. At least people understood who Lou was merely by looking at him.

That was not true for Theo. His whole person was a lie.

And although he and Lou were close, connected so intimately, they were still so very separate. Alone.

The sun had begun to dip into the horizon, which flattened its curving bottom and sent pink and gold beams of light shooting through distant trees. He noticed the rosy-bronze nimbus touching one side of Selena’s hair, for she sat perpendicular to the horizon. Half of her face would soon be shadowed as the other half of her head captured the last rays of sunlight.

The woman who’d saved his life.

No, the woman who’d brought him back to life. Literally. It still blew his mind.

How long had she been living while people died around her? How long had she lived a life filled with the pain and anguish of others . . . and why did she separate herself from the living? How did she go on when she saw death every day and still be fresh and upbeat and optimistic? He wanted to know more. He wanted to know the secrets of this woman, who looked nothing like who she really was.

Just like himself.

Something unfurled inside him, like a little shudder of awareness. A soft, slow understanding that settled into a question that would not be dislodged: But who am I?

As if feeling his attention on her, Selena glanced in Theo’s direction. Perhaps their eyes me; perhaps she merely skimmed her gaze over him. Regardless, she stood, easily, suddenly, looking away from him and the audience.

Not so very tall, but deliberate and curvy in those lean blue jeans and loose tunic. With long, thick dark-brown hair that was now sun-tipped with pink and bronze. And even from here, he could see bare feet.

“When the princess climbed out of the teacup, she found herself in a world of bright-colored houses. Blue and yellow, pink-shuttered and green-roofed houses. Everything was a splash of color, as if it had been painted with the happiest rainbow. And the houses were sweet, big and bright cottages with heart shapes cut from the shutters and plate-sized poppies and daisies springing up along the walkway. Everything was bigger than life, and so happy that the princess couldn’t help but smile as she walked along the street.”

Theo’s attention was drawn to Vonnie and something tickled the back of his mind. Why does this sound familiar? What story is she telling?

“There was a place where she could play, with a little airplane that swooped through the air on a track so she didn’t need to be scared. It soared and dipped and whizzed around, through a happy red barn and back out into the sunshine. The princess sat in the front seat behind the blue propeller and looked down at large, bright rows of corn as she flew above them.”

Jen leaned away to whisper something to a friend, and Theo saw them pass something between them. A twine bracelet with beads, followed by the bottle of wine. Jen drank and with sparkling, laughing eyes, offered it to Theo with a little huff of vintage-scented breath.

He drank, too, and by the time he lowered the bottle to pass it on, he saw that Selena had disappeared from her spot on the hill. And that the sun had sunk more than halfway. Shadows were lengthening. He had more than a mild attack of disappointment that he wasn’t going to get back to Blizek Beach tonight; he’d had visions of spending all night in the arcade, playing Bruce Wayne.