Departure

  Why is it that we only appreciate things we’re at risk of losing?

  Here and now, I feel a strange mix of near euphoria and profound guilt—for surviving, for not having done more for the other passengers. At any turn, things could have gone differently, and they did for a whole lot of folks. My actions determined the fate of some, and for the past few hours I’ve replayed every event and decision, until I can’t take it anymore. I’m caught in a circular mental loop with no answer, no resolution.

  I have to get out of here, do something.

  Maybe it’s the turbulence in my mind, but I’m not that hungry. Or maybe those camouflaged figures fed me somehow, or gave me an appetite suppressant. Another mystery.

  I slowly rise from the wooden rocking chair, cringing as it cries out, but Nick doesn’t stir. In the kitchen, roughly two-fifths of the food waits on the table. Strange: for all the secrecy and mistrust between the five of us, there’s honor in the dining department. I take the remaining food back, place it on the bedside table, and leave the room again, closing the door behind me with care.

  I set about searching the small stone farmhouse. We definitely need more food, and that’s my goal, but I can’t help taking in each room, looking for clues to when or exactly where we might be. There’s dust everywhere, bugs here and there, but no animal tracks. The former owners locked it up tight.

  The bookshelves in the living room are almost bare, save for a few photo albums and a Bible. Not exactly bullish news for printed book sales. There’s no sign of a TV, although a large, slightly frosted clear plastic film on the wall, like a giant piece of tape, indicates that people still watch something.

  The kitchen cupboards contain no food, only mugs, utensils, and the like.

  I descend the steep, narrow wooden staircase to the cellar, the light from above growing weaker with each step. I start to go back up for a candle, but stop. Yellow light glows at the bottom of the stairs—a candle on a sconce. Someone’s down here. I hear banging in the distance, at the end of the cramped stone corridor.

  I step toward the noise. Cabinets slamming. Yes, maybe there is a pantry in the cellar—and one of the others had the same idea. I see a candle burning atop a shabby bar-height table in the room ahead, a black object lying beside it. I clear the threshold to the pantry and pause. Grayson straightens up. It’s hard to read his face in the flickering candlelight, but I see him glance quickly at the table, at what I can now see is a handgun.

  I open my mouth, hesitate for a moment. “I was just looking for food.”

  He turns back to the shelves, pushing jars around, peering behind them. “Haven’t seen any. Anything edible, at least, but I’m not looking for food.”

  I walk to the nearest shelf, which is filled with jars of fruit and jam that look as if they spoiled a long time ago. “What are you looking for?”

  “Something drinkable.”

  “They may have given up drinking in the future.”

  “Doubtful. Drinking’s the only solution to some problems.”

  “You think it’s the answer to your problems?”

  “It’s the only thing that’s ever worked.”

  “Is it the only thing you’ve ever tried?”

  Grayson finally faces me. “What do you know about my problems, Harper?”

  “Enough.”

  “You know what he told you. His side.”

  “True. But I’ve seen your situation countless times. I’ve been writing about families like yours my entire career.”

  “So I’m told. Did he tell you what I intend to do?”

  “He did.”

  He returns his focus to the shelves, rummages around, and finally finds a bottle. Scotch. “Wonder how old this is. A hundred years? Two hundred? A thousand? Can’t wait.” He uncorks it and inhales deeply, a smile spreading across his face. “The irony is that my book’ll be a boon for your career. My tell-all will probably send sales of your ‘officially authorized’ biography through the roof, make you a millionaire. You’ll never have to work again, thanks to me.”

  I hear footsteps on the stone floor behind me, and Nick appears in the narrow doorway, looking a good bit better. He’s still gaunt, but his color is back, and so is the calm intensity in his eyes.

  “You okay?”

  Grayson answers him before I can, the sneer returning to his voice. “Yes, Prince Charming, she’s okay. Her head won’t explode if she talks to me.”

  “We need your help,” Nick says flatly.

  “With what?” Grayson asks, his eyes returning to the bottle.

  “Yul and Sabrina. They know something about the crash. You and I have the only guns.”

  “No, we don’t. Yul found a hunting rifle upstairs,” Grayson says absently, still inhaling the aroma from the uncorked bottle.

  Nick’s eyes meet mine, then he focuses on Grayson again, his tone calm, matter-of-fact. “We need your help. We need you at your best.”

  Grayson’s eyes flash as he glances up. “You telling me not to drink, Dad?”

  “No. I’m just telling you that we need your help. And that’s all I’m going to say.”

  Nick walks out of the doorway, and I follow him down the hall. I’m about to ask him the plan when he pauses and nods to another narrow stairwell that lies at the end of the corridor, past the stairs I descended. Voices, faint, drift up. Yul and Sabrina.

  “Wait,” Grayson says as he closes the distance to us. “They’ve been down there the whole time, working on something.”

  I whisper quickly, telling both of them what I overheard back at the nose section—Sabrina and Yul’s hushed conversation behind the closed cockpit door, her accusations that Yul knew the plane would crash, that he had a hand in it, her theory that their actions before the flight had led to the plague that aged the survivors in the days after the crash.

  Both men listen in silence, nodding in the cramped, candlelit passageway.

  “How did the conversation end?” Nick asks.

  “It didn’t,” I whisper. “The camouflaged invaders showed up.”

  “Okay,” Nick says. “We don’t leave this house until we know what’s going on.” He turns and leads us down the stairwell, even deeper underground, into a large room with concrete walls. What I see shocks me.

  Yes, Yul and Sabrina know what’s going on here.

  CHAPTER TWENTY

  Harper

  THIS UNDERGROUND CHAMBER MUST HAVE BEEN BUILT LONG after the original farmhouse. It’s adjacent to the basement and deeper. Instead of rough stone walls, the room is lined with smooth concrete, painted white. There’s no need for candles here: a bright computer panel glows on the far wall just next to a large, arched alcove that holds what looks like a black tram car. But there are no wheels under it, only a steel platform. Does it sink into the ground and connect with a rail system?

  I bet it does. It’s like a single-car tube station, buried below this farmhouse.

  The black car’s long sliding door is open, revealing brown leather couches on three sides and a large wooden table in the center.

  Sabrina and Yul turn away from the panel to face Nick, Grayson, and me. The rifle leans against the wall, within Yul’s reach.

  Nick breaks the silence. “What is this?”

  “We’re not sure,” Sabrina says, her voice flat. Yep, she’s back to normal as well—her normal, anyway.

  “I doubt that,” Nick says, stepping closer, scrutinizing the car and the glowing panel.

  “Our theory is that it’s a mass transit apparatus.”

  “Connected to?”

  “Everywhere, it would seem.”

  Nick looks up. “You were going to leave us.”

  Yul just cuts his eyes away, but Sabrina says, “Yes.”

  “At least you’re honest.”

  “I’ve never been dishonest with you, Nick.”

  “That may be, but you also haven’t told us the full truth, have you? The two of you know what’s going on here, maybe what happened to the plane.
I think we’re entitled to answers.”

  Sabrina opens her mouth, but Yul speaks for the first time. “We don’t have them.”

  “I don’t believe you. What year is it?”

  “I don’t know,” Yul insists.

  “What year do you think it is?”

  Yul hesitates. “We believe we’re in the year 2147.”

  “Why?”

  Yul shakes his head and glances at Sabrina. “This is what I mean: we don’t have time for this. If we start answering questions, we’ll be here for three hours, and we still won’t know any more than we did before. And neither will you—you’ll just be more confused.”

  “So confuse me,” says Nick. “Start talking. I want answers.”

  “Our answers are mostly conjecture, based on incomplete information. That’s why we’re going to London.”

  “And leaving us here.”

  “For your own safety.” Yul gestures to his bag. “I believe they’re after Sabrina and me, and possibly what’s in my bag.”

  “Which is?”

  “Explaining that will take more time than we have.”

  Nick pauses, thinking. “What’s in London?”

  “We don’t know.”

  “Then why go?”

  “Because seeing London will give us some idea of what we’re dealing with. Look,” Yul says, “stay here. You’re safer. They may have placed a tracking device on the two of us, and it’s possible they can monitor activity on the Podway.”

  So that’s what they call this underground network.

  Nick shakes his head. “We’re not splitting up. And you’re wrong: we can’t stay here. We’re out of food. We’d have to venture out just to feed ourselves. It’s only a matter of time before they find us. Finding help is our only hope. You know that as well as we do. You’re looking for answers in London, but that’s not all, is it? You think you’ll find help there.”

  “Yes,” Sabrina says. “We have reason to believe we’ll find help in London. Our plan is predicated upon that assumption.”

  “If there’s help in London, then we are all going to London.” Nick steps closer to the panel. “Now how does this work?”

  “We’re not sure,” says Yul. “We’ve been trying to learn the system before we connect to the network, just in case they can track us.”

  “That’s the other advantage to London,” Sabrina says. “It’s a short trip. Hopefully we’ll be far away from this network by the time they’re aware we used it.”

  “Makes sense.”

  Yul taps the panel. “It keeps asking for a GP, which we assume is a universal identification device, possibly implanted. Its backup is fingerprint ID.” The panel switches to a screen that reads, STEP CLOSER TO THE TERMINAL TO SIGN IN. There’s a small box in the lower right-hand corner with text inside it: DON’T HAVE A GP? PRESS YOUR THUMB TO THE SCREEN HERE.

  Nick motions for me to step forward, and I press my thumb to the cold surface of the lighted panel. Red letters flash on the screen: NOT RECOGNIZED.

  “Try it again,” he says.

  Three tries later, the screen still blinks a rejection notice.

  Grayson tries his thumb next, with the same result. Not recognized.

  Nick glances at Yul and Sabrina suspiciously, then presses his own thumb to the panel.

  NICHOLAS STONE. ENTER YOUR DESTINATION.

  “So the three of us”—Nick motions to Yul, Sabrina, and himself—“can use the Podway, but neither of them?”

  “It seems so,” Yul says.

  “Why?”

  “I don’t know.”

  “Speculate.”

  Yul shakes his head. “Where do you want me to start? It could be any of a number of reasons.”

  “Give me a few, just for kicks.”

  “Okay, then: when this transit network was created, Harper and Grayson could have been living outside London and not been registered.”

  “Or we could have died long before this was even invented.” Grayson sounds mildly amused. “We’d all be dead by 2147.”

  “True,” says Yul. “The most likely scenario is that Harper and Grayson used alternative forms of transportation in the future. An automobile, an airship, or a teleportation booth. Who knows? Satisfied? Can we go?”

  “Not satisfied at all, but we should definitely go,” Nick says. “Will another empty car arrive after this one departs?”

  “Yes. Within a few minutes if the panel is correct.”

  “Good.” Nick nods at Yul and Sabrina. “Since only three of us can activate this thing, we’ll split up: Grayson and Sabrina in the first car, Yul in the second, and Harper and me in the third.”

  Yul smiles. “You’re splitting us up to keep an eye on us.”

  “That’s right. Because we don’t trust you. Because you’ve been keeping secrets from us. Because you were going to leave us. How’s that for full disclosure? Get used to it, because you’re going to do a lot of it when we get to London, no matter what we find.”

  Grayson moves closer to Nick, standing shoulder to shoulder with him. He stares at Yul, silently communicating our numbers and firepower advantage.

  Yul mutters to himself, but grabs his bag. He glances at the rifle but decides to leave it, which is a relief.

  Sabrina works the computer panel, entering the destination, then she and Grayson climb into the first car and pull the door shut. The floor below it parts with a barely audible hum, the car descends, and two minutes later an identical car rises into the alcove. Yul loads up and leaves without another glance at us, and Nick and I slip into the next car.

  Inside, the car feels almost like a train compartment. We sit across from each other on the brown leather couches, the glossy wood table between us. The imitation windows on each side simulate an idyllic English countryside flowing by peacefully. In fact, this is the first moment since the crash that Nick and I have had together without the immediate threat of death, starvation, or mutilation—either to ourselves or others.

  Nick speaks before I get a chance. “I heard you and Grayson talking in the cellar. What’s up with you two?”

  “He hates me.”

  “And you hate him?”

  “Not really. I don’t know him. His father is Oliver Norton Shaw.”

  “The billionaire.”

  “Yeah. You know him?”

  “I’ve met him.”

  “Me, too. Only once, a few days ago in New York. He flew me out—that’s actually the only reason I was in first class. It was a perk, a gift to try to convince me to write his officially authorized biography.”

  “And Grayson’s upset about that?”

  “Not per se. His father is planning something big. Shaw wants to give his fortune away in grand style, establishing a new kind of charity. He’s calling it the Titan Foundation. He wants the book to detail his life and his journey to a series of revelations about the human race, lay out his vision for the role his fortune and foundation will play in the future of humanity.”

  “Certainly thinks a lot of himself.”

  “He does. And not much of his son. Grayson will get nothing when the foundation is established. Shaw sees it as a way to force Grayson to finally forge his own path in the world. When I was waiting to meet with Shaw, Grayson was in with him. He was furious, shouting that he was being cheated out of his inheritance. Called his father a glory whore reaching for the spotlight one last time after his business career was over, among other even worse things. He stormed out, and that’s the first time I saw him. Shaw told me Grayson was threatening to sell his own tell-all book to a publisher in London. If he didn’t get the inheritance promised to him, he’d air the dirty laundry, as they say.”

  “Interesting.”

  “It’s funny, I’ve barely thought about my dilemma since the crash, but it was all I could think about on the flight.”

  “Dilemma?”

  “Whether to write Shaw’s biography.”

  “What’s the problem?”

  “The proble
m, more or less, is that I don’t know what I want to be when I grow up.”

  “Who does, these days?” Nick laughs quietly.

  “I was a journalist for a few years, then a ghostwriter, but Shaw’s biography would be my first chance to have something published with my name on it.”

  “Sounds great.”

  “It does. It’s what I thought I wanted. But I’ve also been working on a novel, what I hope will be the first in a series. That’s my real love, and I’m afraid that if I write Shaw’s biography, I’ll never finish it. My whole life will change. I just want to know if I could make it writing fiction. If I knew that, the decision would be so much easier.”

  Nick nods, and we sit in silence for a while.

  “What about you? Any career angst?”

  He laughs. “Yeah, I’m . . . at a bit of a crossroads, too.”

  “With work?”

  “With everything.”

  He leaves it at that, suddenly looking a lot more tired. He’s not very talkative—about his personal life, at least. It’s funny, I’ve heard his voice so much the last few days: His speech by the fire in the cold dark night that saved all those people. The way he organized the camp, keeping everyone fed and away from each other’s throats. His instincts and quick decisions. But in the face of a simple question about his own life, it’s like every word is an anvil in his bowels, yours truly trying to reel it up from the depths with a flimsy fishing line.

  “I meant it last night,” he says.

  “About what?”

  “That I was really glad when I got there this morning and saw that you were alive.”

  I take a deep breath, calming myself. “Yeah. Me, too. Wasn’t sure if I would make it another day. And seeing you when I opened my eyes . . . that was nice, but God, you looked a fright. Scared me half to death.”

  “Rough couple of days.”

  I move around the table to sit next to him and touch his forehead at the hairline, inspecting the wounds where I wiped the dried blood away. I smile. “But, hey, you cleaned up okay.”

  He reaches for my arm, closes his fingers around my wrist, and puts his thumb in my palm, half filling it.