“Earth is gone,” Mali said.
The ground fell out from under him. He collided with the grass, leaning against an apple tree, the smell of blossoms so thick around him he might choke. His head throbbed. He raked his fingers over his face and scalp, trying to ease the pain. Earth was gone, along with his dad in Afghanistan and his granddad and his mother’s grave with the faded plastic flowers and all the horses and the chicken houses he’d repaired last summer and everyone he had ever known, ever loved, ever said hello to as he crossed the street.
Nok crouched beside him. Her fingers were so soft against his head that he wanted to lean his head into her. His mother had had soft hands too.
He remembered her eyes meeting his as the car careened out of control.
Luciano.
And now even her grave was gone. But so was her murderer. Lucky might not have pulled the trigger that day on the airfield, but Senator Mason was dead.
Lucky lived. And Cora lived.
“Poor Lucky,” Nok said, brushing aside his hair. “I know it’s hard. I was upset too, but there’s nothing we can do but be thankful we weren’t there when it happened.”
Rolf crouched over them, casting a cold shadow. “She’s right, you know. You have to think about this logically, Lucky. Put aside your emotions. The Kindred knew what was going to happen to Earth and picked us, out of everyone, to survive. There’s only the six of us and a few thousand humans scattered throughout the Kindred world. The Kindred were telling the truth all along. The rules aren’t there to be cruel. They’re there to save humanity.” He rested a hand on Lucky’s back. “We have a duty to keep ourselves healthy and keep our species going.”
Lucky felt as though his head was splitting in two. The house in Roanoke he grew up in, with the patch of forest behind it. The strip mall where he used to skateboard. The school where he’d only had two months left to graduation. The army recruiting center. Everyone, and everything—gone.
“We were our own enemy,” Rolf pressed. “Humans. We were so cruel to each other, and to our planet. We didn’t deserve what we had. Look at Cora—she’s sabotaging us, and herself as well. That’s human nature.”
Lucky looked between Nok and Rolf. Neither had spoken much about their pasts, but he could see in their eyes that they had always been outsiders on Earth, just like him. Rolf’s twitching and Nok’s hiding behind her pink streak of hair. The same for Leon, who faced the entire world like it was out to get him. The same for Cora, who’d been wronged by her own father—and by him.
Maybe the Kindred were right to take me.
Maybe he belonged in a cage more than he ever did on Earth. Maybe they all did.
His face was wet, through from tears or sweat or spray from the creek, he wasn’t sure. He sat up. His knuckles popped from the old accident scars. He rubbed the aching joints.
Rolf’s fingers were twitching again. “The Kindred saved our lives. They fixed Nok’s asthma, and my poor vision. I bet they even healed that hand you keep saying gives you trouble. Try it. Nok, give him the guitar.”
“I told you, I can’t play anymore.”
“Just try. Let this be your proof. Earth ruined your hand and took away your music, and the Kindred gave them back to you.”
Lucky dragged a hand over his face. Now that he really thought about it, his joints didn’t actually feel that stiff. Had cracking his knuckles just been an old habit?
“Give me the guitar.”
“You aren’t still planning on attacking the Caretaker with the guitar strings, yeah?” Nok asked.
“Just give me the goddamn guitar.”
Nok handed it over. For a moment, Lucky cradled the wood in his hands. He’d missed the feel of wood. Everything in the cage, even if it looked real, had a synthetic quality. Nothing was quite the right weight or texture, but this was. The wood slipped into his hands like an old friend. The strings were taut.
For a brief second, everything hit him again: they were the only ones left.
He closed his eyes and gritted his teeth. He struck one note, then two. He hadn’t played at all since the accident. Punching the hospital wall had damaged his fingers too badly for fine dexterity. Now, though, the joints didn’t pop or grind. His tendons moved fluidly. Sound came out that tore his heart in two all over again. He played for the hand that the Kindred had miraculously fixed, and he played for a lost world, and he played for a girl who, wherever she was, didn’t even know that they would never go home again.
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33
Cora
AFTER LEAVING THE KINDRED marketplace, the hallway Cassian led Cora down was not glinting with starlight like the ones they had left behind. It was narrow, with a low ceiling and murky light coming from the hairline cracks in the floor. These wound like an animal den, twisting and dank and unpredictable. She grazed the walls with a hand that felt too heavy and came away with a chalky dust.
“We are in the deepest section of the aggregate station. These tunnels are dug out of rock. Kindred stations are never permanent; they last one or two hundred human years at the most. We are a transient species. We locate a sizable asteroid and build our stations around it, ship by ship, interlocking until we have an entire functioning system with residential, governmental, commercial, and recreational sectors. When it is time to move on, we merely reverse the interlocking and go our separate ways.”
They passed the shadows of more Kindred. Unlike the ones in the market, these weren’t stiff, but slinking, loose, skittering like animals. Uncloaked.
She inched closer to Cassian.
They rounded a corner. At the end of the next hallway, under an island of light, a Kindred girl with loose black hair down to her waist stood before a node of four doorways. She was dressed in a light green gown that was elegant and flowing, almost humanlike. So different from the Kindred in the market, who all wore cerulean uniforms or white robes. The girl leaned on the podium and gave an unexpected yawn. The movement was so jarringly fluid—so uncloaked--that Cora jumped.
“Uncloaking is necessary for our well-being,” Cassian explained as they approached. “We abhor the lesser emotions—jealousy, lust, fear—and yet to be alive is to experience such states. There is no escaping them, only delaying them until an appropriate time and place. That is why we have these menageries, where Kindred can go for emotional leave.”
“What happens in a menagerie?” She wasn’t sure she wanted the answer.
“Anything to express or enhance emotion. Games of chance. Intoxicants. Brothels—though not here. Some menageries allow Kindred to do virtually whatever they want with the lesser species, and humans are a particular favorite because, as you have noted, we are quite similar physically.”
His black eyes settled on her, and she looked away. “When you rescued Mali, was she in a brothel?”
“No. She was part of a fight ring with three other human girls and a chimpanzee.” He raised an eyebrow at her surprise. “Have you not seen her fight yet? Do not underestimate her.”
They reached the Kindred girl dressed in her flowing gown. An almost maniacal smile stretched across her face. She wore glasses with painted blue eyes that made her look more like a doll than a living creature.
Was this what uncloaked looked like up close?
Something about the way she tipped her head down coyly at Cassian was a little familiar, not to mention seductive. Cora threw him another look. What exactly did he get up to, in his uncloaked time? Did he come to see her?
The Kindred woman made a high-pitched hissing sound that might have been a laugh, almost as though she could read Cora’s thoughts. Cassian responded to her curtly and led Cora past the girl.
“I informed her I was here in an official capacity. It is rare to be cloaked here, particularly when escorting a lesser species. I do not want to draw more attention to ourselves than we
must. We will use a service passageway.”
He pushed open a doorway with his hand. It was the first time a door hadn’t opened automatically, and she wondered how exactly their telepathy worked. Her thoughts plunged into darkness as soon as they entered the hallway. Only faint light came from the small drill holes in the walls, but Cassian guided her forward as though he didn’t need light, or else knew the passageway by heart. It opened into a viewing room. Unlike the cage’s, there was nothing scientific feeling about this. It was simply a rock-hewn cave with a wide window overlooking a chamber below.
Cassian motioned to the window. “We can see out, but they cannot see us.”
Cora approached the window hesitantly. After passing through such dank corridors, she had expected something repugnant, but the chamber beyond was a complete contrast: well lit, with a gleaming limestone floor and stately columns at either end like a Greek temple. Cells were built into the temple facade opposite them. Each one was ten feet wide by ten feet deep, but stretched to create a visual illusion that made the cell appear much larger. More advanced Kindred technology.
Each cell was decorated in soft silks and columns; one was a bedroom, with a young human girl asleep in a gilded bed overlooked by statues of Athena and Zeus. Another cell contained a wooden table stacked with scrolls, and a human boy with very dark brown skin, dressed in a toga. His pupils were dilated. Drugged.
Cora drew in a tight breath. Their worn faces didn’t look so different from her own sleep-deprived one. “Why do you do this to them—just to entertain yourselves?”
The bright lights of the temple reflected on Cassian’s stoic metallic face. “There is some educational value, but yes. These children are primarily here to entertain the uncloaked. We enjoy viewing vignettes of what life on Earth must be like.”
“What about that oath you swore to protect lesser races?”
“No one is harming them.” Cassian’s voice was carefully devoid of emotion. “They are perfectly safe in their enclosures. They have ample food and a facsimile of their natural habitat.”
If her hands hadn’t been bound, she might have slapped him. Did he truly believe this was fulfilling their oath?
“Each menagerie adheres to a different theme,” he continued. “This one is called the Temple. It is modeled after humans’ early philosophical foundations. There is one on the third level of the aggregate station that is modeled after prehistoric Earth, called the Cave. There are seven menageries on this station alone.”
Mali had once mentioned the Kindred’s penchant for dressing like humans. Now Cora understood that the Kindred girl at the doorway was dressed so strangely because she was in costume.
“Why human places, human times?”
“When we uncloak, we crave experiences, and there is no society, nor habitat, better suited for the cultivation of experiences than the human world. Of all the species, intelligent and lesser, humans are the most vibrant.”
“What about your world?”
“The concept of a homeland fascinates us because we have not had one since the Gatherers elevated us to live among the stars. The environments on Earth, the weather, the shape of the land and the way you build your structures into it—the idea is quite foreign and quite . . . charming. Your kind is just as interesting. Like your planet, you are all so varied, so prone to warfare and destruction, but also beauty.” He paused. “Can you blame us for wanting to watch such fascinating creatures? To act like them, even?”
She could only stare at him. The Kindred had no homeland, so they wanted to experience humans’, and they’d kidnap kids and lock them up to get it.
She tested her shackles again. They held too tight.
“This menagerie, or one like it, is where I must take you if the Warden orders your removal—assuming he lets you live. These are all children who had to be removed from their enclosures or private owners for one reason or another.”
“Why are they all children?” Her voice was barely audible.
“We do not only take children. We prefer to take them, however, because of their malleable natures and heightened ability to adapt.”
“But what happens when they grow up?”
His face darkened. No longer a man of starlight, but of shadows. “If the adults are docile, they are kept in research facilities, or given light menial work. However, many grow unruly as they age. They are sent to unmanaged preserves; there they are free to be as savage as their true natures dictate.” He pointed through the window toward the last cage. “This girl is the one I wanted to show you.”
The last cell was a tableau of a Greek throne room, with a little girl of about ten years, with wheat-blond hair shorn close to her scalp. She sat on a leather stool, hands clasped in her lap, staring into a hearth that crackled with what must be simulated flames.
“That girl was relocated from Iceland four years ago,” Cassian said. “She was put in an enclosure like yours, though less advanced, with only two biomes. She refused to eat, which disobeys Rule Two. After several rotations she had to be removed, and was sold to a private owner, from whom she escaped. She escaped from her next two owners as well, but was caught each time. She will be here for the remainder of her life. We administer drugs to her to keep her docile. We must do that with the rebellious ones. For their own safety.”
Cora could only stare. The girl would be there—staring at the stone hearth, isolated, drugged—for the rest of her life?
“That could be you, Cora,” Cassian said.
It wasn’t hard to imagine—with her wheat-blond hair, the girl almost looked like a younger version of Cora. In the cell, the girl raised a sluggish hand to scratch her shorn scalp. She was missing two fingers, from the middle knuckle up. Cora’s own fingers started throbbing.
Cassian leaned in close. “Do you still intend on disobeying our rules?”
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34
Cora
CORA’S HEAD SPUN. THIS little girl. The boy in the scroll room. The other girl, asleep under the watch of statues. They were just a few of many who had been taken. A living display, a breathing museum, to satisfy the Kindred’s fascination.
Her stomach twisted.
“I am trying to keep you from this, Cora,” Cassian said quietly. “Do not make me bring you to a place like this. It would only—”
He stopped when the door below opened. They both leaned toward the window as two Kindred women entered the chamber below, wearing Grecian costume dresses, their hair loose, their faces plastered with the exaggerated emotion that meant they were uncloaked. They strode directly to the Icelandic girl’s cell.
Cassian’s cold gaze slowly slid to Cora, and she got the sense that whatever they were about to witness was going to be even worse than it already was.
Below, the taller Kindred woman reached through the bars and beckoned to the girl, who stood and approached slowly, walking like she was dizzy. The Kindred woman said a few words that Cora couldn’t hear through the viewing panel.
“She wants the girl to clap,” Cassian explained. “To perform a trick for her entertainment.”
The girl slowly brought her disfigured hands together like a wind-up toy, which made the Kindred women gasp in delight.
The Kindred woman’s lips moved again.
“Now she wishes for the girl to bow,” Cassian translated.
The girl bent at the waist, sweeping her arm with a slightly dizzy flourish, and the Kindred handed her a token. The token fell from the girl’s missing fingers, but she picked it up with her other hand and slipped it into her pocket.
“The humans in these exhibits collect the tokens and redeem them for prizes,” Cassian explained. “The more tricks they perform, the more rewards they earn.”
Disgust crept up Cora’s skin. This was what the Kindred though of humans? That, other than a handful of elite ones suitabl
e for breeding, they were no good for anything but performing cheap tricks?
The shorter Kindred handed the girl another token, then leaned forward with her lips pursed. Cassian explained, “She has asked for a kiss, this time.”
All the tension that had been knotted in Cora’s body unraveled all at once, plunging to her feet.
A kiss?
The shackles felt too tight. Her lungs constricted. Sweat broke out on her forehead and her vision started to blur as the horror of everything descended on her all at once.
The Kindred could do anything to them, she realized.
Kiss them.
Kill them.
The insanity of this place hit her like a blow to the chest. The world didn’t seem to move in real time. It jerked and jolted between slow motion and fast forward. Her balance keeled, just like it had that day in the bookstore. Her vision sharpened and blurred too, as the colors of the room pulsed too brightly.
Cora pressed a hand against the glass. Cassian said a few words that she couldn’t process. She couldn’t stop staring at the little girl below. The girl bent forward and met the woman’s lips through the bars of the cage, giving her a peck, chaste and sexless, like a deranged kissing booth. A small sound came from Cora’s throat. She realized she was swaying.
Strong hands shook her. The bright colors faded to normal. The sound of her own pulsing heart dialed down in volume. Cassian shook her again, hard.
“Cora. What is happening to you?”
She tried to speak, but her lips were too dry. Cassian checked her pulse, lifted each eyelid, even looked down her throat. Examining her, just as the Warden had done, like she was merely a problem to be solved, but Cora didn’t care.
Lucky was right. They’ll never let us go.
“Describe what is happening.” His voice came urgently in her ear. “Are you experiencing strange sensations? Visual disturbances?”
She shoved Cassian and his strange questions away and braced herself against her knees, but her hands were too sweaty and slipped off. She stumbled toward the floor. Cassian caught her. Her hands were still bound, but she grabbed the strap across his chest, holding tight. She pressed her face against his chest, eyes squeezed closed, as though to block out everything that was happening.