Persistence of Vision

  Chapter 32: The Canyons of Time

  The first awareness Maggie had was that she was being carried. Just as when B had attacked her using Lila’s body, Maggie was aware of noises around her and sensations, but she couldn’t make her body respond to her commands. She tried, as before, to focus on the voices around her, hoping they would bring her toward recovery.

  “What happened?” It was Doc’s voice.

  “Is she all right?” Karl asked. “David what are you doing here?”

  David’s response was calm and came from directly over Maggie’s face. He was the one carrying her. “Questions for another time. We have to get out of here. The entire place is on alert. Reinforcements are being awakened and given orders to find and kill us. If they catch us, we won’t get out of here at all.”

  “How do you know all that?” Marcus’s voice, from Maggie’s right, sounded suspicious.

  “Because I know how the collectives think. I know their protocols, the way they react to threats. They’re very efficient. We don’t have time to be standing here. I know another way out—it’s how I got in. If we hurry we can make it.”

  “But how can we trust—” Marcus began, but Karl cut him off.

  “I know you don’t like it, Marcus, but deal with it. The collective drones are converging on us. We don’t have any other choice.”

  Maggie heard an exaggerated sigh, which she assumed was Marcus, though there was no more argument.

  “Let me take Maggie, David,” Karl said. “You’ve been carrying her for a while now, and you need to lead the way.”

  Maggie was handed from one pair of arms to another.

  Maggie was carried what felt like a long way in silence. She tried to force her eyelids up, but they wouldn’t budge. At one point, she thought she’d moved her finger, but when she tried, she couldn’t do it again. She wished someone would speak so she’d know what was going on. Then, David did.

  “Come on,” he said. “We’ve got to go down to the basement level.”

  “Wait,” Karl said. “What about Joan and Clay?”

  “Where are they?”

  “Outside.”

  Maggie hadn’t thought about Joan and Clay since she’d become conscious again. Now, as she focused on them, their energies felt strained. They were both exhausted and expending more energy than their bodies could replace. Based on the types of energy they were pulling to them, Maggie could tell they were fighting off an assault, using everything they had to defend themselves.

  David sounded annoyed. “If we go out into the courtyard, we’ll all get caught.”

  “They’re under attack.” Marcus snapped. “We have to help them.”

  “How? Maggie’s unconscious and Nat is still under the influence of the neurological sedative. I have power, but I’m not skilled enough to take out an onslaught of drones all at once.”

  “I am,” Marcus said, “but they gave me the sedative, too. I can’t touch my abilities.”

  “Then what?” David asked.

  “I don’t know,” Marcus said, “but we aren’t leaving without them. We have to figure something out and fast.”

  There were several seconds of silence before David spoke again.

  “Okay. I’ll help you, but there’s no guarantee it will work.”

  “What?”

  “I can supply the energy you need since you’re still cut off from it, but you have to let me into your head.”

  “How will that work?” Doc sounded worried.

  “I’ve seen it done before,” David answered. “It’s forbidden in the collectives, but I know how. The neurological sedatives they use make the part of the brain that draws energy to you fuzzy, so you can’t use it. It’s like putting a limb to sleep. It doesn’t cut you off from the part of your brain that directs that energy once you have it. We have to link our minds together. I’ll be the conduit. You’ll direct the energy.”

  “And why wouldn’t it work?” Karl asked.

  David shrugged. “Because he’s never done it before. Just like anything else, it takes skill and practice. You have your staff, and that’s the only reason I’m willing to try this. You’re used to focusing energy through it, so you’ll have a lot more control than you would without it. But you have to let me into your mind.”

  Silence followed, and Maggie wondered why Marcus didn’t want to try.

  “Look, Marcus.” David sounded annoyed again. “We’re trapped here. The plan’s gone to hell. If you want to help them, if you want to save her, this is the only way.”

  Maggie still couldn’t move and her eyes were shut, but she had a sneaking hunch that she was the her David was referring to.

  After a short silence, Karl’s voice came from directly overhead. “Marcus, come here.”

  Maggie felt Karl walk a few feet from the rest of the group. A moment later there was a second presence. Marcus.

  “What’s the matter,” Karl whispered. “Why does this freak you out? You can feel as well as I can how desperate Clay and Joan are growing.”

  “Of course I can. It’s not that I don’t want to help them, Karl. It’s just…”

  “What?”

  “I’ve been fighting the collectives my entire life. I swore an oath to myself a long time ago that I’d never willingly let anything invade my mind. Our minds are the only frontier of individuality we have left. It’s the most absolute law I have for myself, and now he’s asking me to break it. I don’t trust him. He betrayed me once before. You’re asking me to give him the chance to do it again.”

  Maggie wished she could talk. She wished she could say something to help Marcus.

  After a short silence, Karl spoke, still in a whisper. “I understand, Marcus. I do, but you are the only one capable of doing this. It’s your choice, but the alternative may be losing Clay or Joan. Or Maggie.”

  Maggie wanted to shout that she was okay, or would be, and Marcus shouldn’t use worry over her to make his decision, but she couldn’t.

  Marcus cursed softly. “When did life become so contradictory,” he muttered, and when he spoke again, Maggie could tell he’d turned away. “All right.”

  There was a sound of footsteps crossing toward Marcus. “You have to trust me,” David said.

  The team was quiet for a time, but Maggie felt the tension spike, like static electricity. She wished she could see what was happening. She could move her eyeballs around, and she thought the lids were coming up a bit—just enough to let some light in, but not enough to see what was going on.

  Then someone was grunting and gasping. It had to be Marcus. He cried out in pain and Maggie wanted to scream. What was David doing to him?

  A commotion followed and Doc’s voice reached her ears. “We’ve got you, Marcus. We’ve got you.”

  “Marcus.” It was David’s voice again. “I’m done. Can you still do this?”

  “Yes.” He gasped. “Yes. Just get me out there.”

  Then Maggie felt it. It came through the bracelet. She could even tell who it was: Clay. White-hot energy burned into his brain, and then there was nothing. No energy, no emotion, only a void, where before the power of Clay’s life had pulsed. Maggie felt sick.

  The other team members must have reacted because David asked, “What is it?”

  “Clay,” Karl said. “He just went down.”

  “He’s hurt badly,” Doc said. “We have to get out there.”

  The air went from cool to humid as they left the building. Maggie could hear the commotion of footsteps in the courtyard. She wondered how many drones the team would be fighting off tonight. Dozens, by the sound of them.

  “What do I do?” Marcus shouted.

  “The pathway I made through your brain,” David answered, “I know you can feel it. Feel your way along that pathway until you cross over the connection into my mind. Only then will you feel the energy.”

  The team was silent, and Maggie fought against her paralysis while hundreds of feet stomped nearer. When the wave of energy hit her, s
he knew exactly what had happened. It was just like what she’d felt that day at Interchron when the Trepids attacked them. Marcus had obviously found David’s energy and directed it through his staff. She could almost see him taking a knee and obliterating the oncoming drones.

  A few moments later, Marcus was screaming. Then, there was only silence. Maggie panicked, but what she felt from Marcus wasn’t what she felt from Clay. Marcus’s life signs were still pulsing, just more faintly, as though he’d gone to sleep. Clay’s couldn’t be felt at all.

  “Pick him up,” Doc’s voice commanded. “If more drones show up, he won’t be able to do that again. We have to get back to the ship. Nat, can you carry Clay?”

  Then they were moving again. The only indication Maggie had that they’d reached the ship was David’s voice.

  “Careful as you get in. Don’t touch the water.”

  “Why not?” Joan’s voice was more subdued than normal, as though she’d been crying.

  “When Maggie called that lava up, it fountained into the ocean. Can’t you feel the heat coming off the water? Look down by the hull. It’s boiling.”

  Karl set Maggie down on what she recognized as one of the cots in the ship. She could hear several people crying, but couldn’t identify them. A presence hovered over her, but she couldn’t identify it, either.

  With no way to know what was happening, no idea if Marcus was okay, and no way to deny that Clay wasn’t, the gravity of what had just happened crashed in on Maggie. She wished she could cry; it would have been a relief.

  Her body was exhausted. It wanted to sleep and, not knowing what else to do, she stopped fighting it. The dark, warm oblivion was a welcome respite.