David squatted and examined something on the floor.
“What is it?” Milo asked.
“Blood.”
David walked faster after that, and the blood on the floor increased from a few drops to long stretches.
At the double doors to Adaptive Research Lab 47, David worked his fingers in the green light of the wall panel. He entered the open command six times, and each time, the display flashed the same message:
Insufficient Access
“Alpha! Why can’t I open this door?”
“You have insufficient access—”
“How can I get inside this door?”
“You cannot,” Alpha’s voice echoed through the corridor with finality.
David and Milo stood for a moment.
David spoke quietly. “Alpha, show me Dr. Warner’s vital signs.”
The wall display transformed, and the numbers and charts appeared.
Blood Pressure: 87/43
Pulse: 30
Milo turned to David.
“Dropping,” David said.
“What now?”
“Now we wait.”
Milo sat cross-legged and closed his eyes. David knew he was seeking the stillness, and in that moment, David wished he could do the same, could put everything out of his mind. Fear clouded his thoughts. He desperately wanted that door to hiss open, but he dreaded it as well, dreaded finding out what had happened to Kate, what experiment she was running, what she was doing to herself.
David had almost fallen asleep when the alarm went off. Alpha’s voice thundered through the cramped corridor.
“Subject medical emergency. Condition critical. Access overrides executed.”
The wide double doors to the research lab slid open.
David rushed in and rubbed his eyes, trying to understand what he saw.
Behind him, Milo spoke in awe, “Whoa.”
CHAPTER 2
Alpha Lander
1,200 Feet Below Sea Level
Off the Northern Coast of Morocco
“What is this?” Milo asked.
David scanned the research lab. “No idea.”
The room was vast, at least one hundred feet long and fifty feet deep, but unlike the medical bay, there were no tables in the room. In fact, the only things on the floor were two glass vats, at least ten feet in diameter. Yellow light glowed inside, and sparkling white elements drifted from the bottom to the top. The vat on the right was empty. The other held Kate.
She floated a few feet off the ground, her arms held straight out. She wore the same plain clothes she had left their bedroom in this morning, but there was something new: a silver helmet. It covered her entire face, even the bottom of her chin. Her recently dyed brunette hair fell out of it and onto her shoulders. The small visor that covered her eyes was black, revealing no clues about what was happening to her. The only hint was a stream of blood that flowed out of the helmet, down her neck, and stained her gray t-shirt. The stain seemed to grow with each passing second.
“Alpha, what’s… going on here?” David asked.
“Specify.”
“What is this experiment? Procedure?”
“Resurrection memory simulation.”
What does that mean? Is the simulation what’s hurting her?
“How can I stop it?”
“You cannot.”
“Why not?” David asked, growing impatient.
“Interrupting a resurrection memory sequence would terminate the subject.”
Milo turned to David, fear in his eyes.
David searched the room. What to do? He needed some clue, somewhere to begin. He threw his head back, trying to think. On the ceiling, a single small dome of black glass stared down at him.
“Alpha, do you have video telemetry of this lab?”
“Affirmative.”
“Begin playback.”
“Specify date range.”
“Begin the second Dr. Warner entered today.”
A wave of light emanated from the left wall, slowly forming a hologram of the lab. The vats were empty. The double doors slid open, and Kate strode in. She marched to the right wall, which lit up and began flashing a series of screens full of text and symbols David couldn’t make out. Kate stood still, her eyes darting slightly left and right, reading, taking in the screens, each of which remained for less than a second.
“Cool,” Milo whispered.
David felt himself take a step back. In that moment, he realized some of what Kate had become, the growing gulf that existed between the power of her mind and his.
Two weeks ago, Kate had found a cure for the Atlantis Plague, a global pandemic that had claimed a billion lives in its initial outbreak and countless more during its final mutation. The plague had divided the world. The survival rate was low, but those who survived were changed at the genetic level. Some survivors benefited from the plague—they grew stronger and smarter. The remainder devolved, receding back to a primitive existence. The world’s population had rallied around two opposing factions: the Orchid Alliance, which sought to slow and cure the plague, and Immari International, which had unleashed the plague and advocated letting the genetic transformation run its course. Kate, David, and a team of soldiers and scientists had stopped the plague and the Immari plan by isolating the pieces of a cure: endogenous retroviruses left by past Atlantean interventions in human evolution. The retroviruses were essentially viral fossils, the genetic breadcrumbs from instances where Atlanteans had modified the human genome.
In the final hours of the plague, with millions dying each minute, Kate had found a way to reconcile all the viral fossils and cure the plague. Her therapy had created a stable, unified Atlantean-Human genome, but she had paid a high price for the breakthrough.
That knowledge came from repressed memories within Kate’s subconscious—memories from one of the Atlantean scientists who had conducted the genetic experiments on humanity over the course of thousands of years. The Atlantean memories enabled her to cure the plague, but they had also taken much of her own humanity—the part of Kate that was distinctly Kate and not the Atlantean scientist. As the clock had ticked down and the plague had spread around the globe, Kate had chosen to keep the Atlantean knowledge and cure the plague instead of ridding herself of the memories and protecting her own identity.
She had told David that she believed she could repair the damage the Atlantean memories had done, but as the days had passed, it became clear to David that Kate’s experiments weren’t working. She got sicker each day, and she refused to discuss her situation with David. He had felt her slipping away, and now, as he watched the playback, Kate reading the screens instantaneously, he knew that he had underestimated how drastic her transformation was.
“Is she reading that fast?” Milo asked.
“It’s more than that. I think she’s learning that fast,” David whispered.
David felt a different kind of fear rising inside him. Was it because Kate had changed so much or because he was realizing how far over his head he was?
Start with the simple stuff, he thought.
“Alpha, how can Dr. Warner operate you without voice or tactile input?”
“Dr. Warner received a neural implant nine local days ago.”
“Received? How?”
“Dr. Warner programmed me to perform the implant surgery.”
Just one more thing that hadn’t come up during their nightly Honey, what did you do at work today? discussion.
Milo cut his eyes at David, a slight grin forming on his lips. “I want one.”
“That makes one of us.” David focused on the holomovie. “Alpha, increase playback rate.”
“Interval?”
“Five minutes per second.”
The flashing screens of text morphed into solid waves, like white water sloshing back and forth in a black fish tank. Kate didn’t move a muscle.
Seconds ticked by. Then the screen was off, and Kate was floating in the glowing yellow
vat.
“Stop,” David said. “Replay telemetry just before Dr. Warner enters the round… whatever it is.”
David held his breath as he watched. The screen with text went out, and Kate walked to the rear of the room, just beside the vats. A wall slid open, she grabbed a silver helmet, and then walked to the vat, which slid open. She stepped inside, donned the helmet, and after the glass vat sealed, lifted off the ground.
“Alpha, resume accelerated playback.”
The room remained the same with a single exception: slowly, blood began trickling out of Kate’s helmet.
In the last second, David and Milo entered, and then three words flashed on the screen.
End of Telemetry
Milo turned to David. “Now what?”
David glanced between the screen and the vat that held Kate. Then he eyed the empty one.
“Alpha, can I join Dr. Warner’s experiment?”
The panel at the back of the room slid open, revealing a single silver helmet.
Milo’s eyes grew wide. “This is a bad idea, Mr. David.”
“Got any good ideas?”
“You don’t have to do this.”
“You know I do.”
The glass vat rotated, its glass opening. David stepped inside, pulled the helmet on, and the research lab disappeared.
CHAPTER 3
It took a few seconds for David’s eyes to adjust to the bright light beaming into the space. Directly ahead, a rectangular display flashed text he couldn’t make out yet. The place reminded him of a train station with its arrivals/departures board, except that there seemed to be no entrance or exit to the cavernous space, just a solid white floor and arched columns that let light shine through.
Alpha’s booming voice echoed. “Welcome to the Resurrection Archives. State your command.”
David stepped closer to the board and began reading.
Memory Date (Health) Replay
=========== ======== ======
12.37.40.13 (Corrupted) Complete
13.48.19.23 (Intact) Complete
13.56.64.15 (Corrupted) Complete
A dozen rows continued—all complete. The last entry was:
14.72.47.33 (Corrupted) In-progress
“Alpha, what are my options?”
“You may open an archived memory or join a simulation in-progress.”
In-progress. Kate would be there. If she was hurt… or under attack. David glanced around. He had no weapons, nothing to defend her with. It didn’t matter.
“Join simulation in progress.”
“Notify existing members?”
“No,” he said on instinct. The element of surprise might preserve some advantage.
The lighted train station and board faded and a much smaller, darker place took form. The bridge of a spaceship. David stood at the rear. Text, charts, and images scrolled across the walls of the oval room, covering them. At the front, two figures stood before a wide viewscreen, staring at a world that floated against the black of space. David instantly recognized both of them.
On the left stood Dr. Arthur Janus, the other member of the Atlantean research team. He had helped David save Kate from Dorian Sloane and Ares in the final hours of the Atlantis Plague, but David still had mixed feelings about Janus. The brilliant scientist had created a false cure for the Atlantis Plague that erased seventy thousand years of human evolution—reverting the human race to a point before the Atlantis Gene was administered. Janus had sworn that rolling back human evolution was the only way to save humanity from an unimaginable enemy.
David felt no such conflicting feelings for the scientist standing beside Janus. He felt only love. In the reflection of the black areas of space on the screen, David could just make out the small features of Kate’s beautiful face. She concentrated hard on the image of the world. David had seen that look many times. He was almost lost in it, but a sharp voice, calling out from overhead, snapped him back.
“This area is under a military quarantine. Evacuate immediately. Repeat: this area is under a military quarantine.”
Another voice interrupted. It was similar to Alpha’s tone. “Evacuation course configured. Execute?”
“Negative,” Kate said. “Sigma, silence notifications from military buoys and maintain geosynchronous orbit.”
“This is reckless,” Janus said.
“I have to know.”
David stepped closer to the screen. The world was similar to earth, but the colors were different. The oceans were too green, the clouds too yellow, the land only red, brown and light tan. There were no trees. Only round, black craters interrupted the barren landscape.
“It could have been a natural occurrence,” Janus said. “A series of comets or an asteroid field.”
“It wasn’t.”
“You don’t—”
“It wasn’t.” The viewscreen zoomed to one of the impact craters. “A series of roads lead to each crater. There were cities there. This was an attack. Maybe they carved up an asteroid field and used the pieces for the kinetic bombardment.” The viewscreen changed again. A ruined city in a desert landscape took shape, its skyscrapers crumbling. “They let the environmental fallout take care of anyone outside the major cities. There could be answers there.” Kate’s voice was final. David knew that voice. He had experienced it several times himself.
Apparently Janus had as well. He lowered his head. “Take the Beta Lander. It will give you better maneuverability without the arcs.”
He turned and walked toward the door at the rear of the bridge.
David braced. But Janus couldn’t see him. Can Kate?
Kate fell in behind Janus but stopped and stared at David. “You shouldn’t be here.”
“What is this, Kate? Something is happening to you outside. You’re dying.”
Kate took two more long steps toward the exit. “I can’t protect you here.”
“Protect me from what?”
She took another step. “Don’t follow me.” She lunged through the exit.
David charged after her.
He stood outside. On the planet. He spun, trying—
Kate. She was ahead of him, in an EVA suit, bounding for the crumbling city. Behind them, a small black ship sat on the red rocky terrain.
“Kate!” David called, running toward her.
She stopped.
The ground shook once, then again, throwing David off his feet. The sky opened, and a red object poured through, blinding David and smothering him with its heat. He felt as though an asteroid-sized fire poker were barreling toward him.
He tried to stand, but the shaking ground pulled him down again.
He crawled, feeling the heat from above and the sizzling rocks below melting him.
Kate seemed to float over the shaking ground. She loped forward, timing her landings to the quakes that shot her up and forward, toward David.
She covered him, and David wished he could see her face through the mirrored suit visor.
He felt himself falling. His feet touched a cold floor, and his head slammed into the glass. The vat. The research lab.
The glass swiveled open, and Milo rushed forward, his eyebrows high, his mouth open. “Mr. David…”
David looked down. His body wasn’t burned, but sweat covered him. Blood flowed from his nose.
Kate.
David’s muscles shook as he pushed himself up and staggered to her vat. The glass opened, and she fell straight down, like a contestant in a dunking booth.
David caught her, but he wasn’t strong enough to stand. They spilled onto the cold floor, her landing on his chest.
David grabbed her neck. The pulse was faint—but there.
“Alpha! Can you help her?”
“Unknown.”
“Unknown why?” David shouted.
“I have no current diagnosis.”
“What the hell’s it going to take to get one?”
A round panel opened, and a flat table extended into the room.
“A full diagnostic scan.”
Milo rushed to pick up Kate’s feet, and David gripped under her armpits, straining with every last ounce of strength to lift her onto the table.
David thought the table took its sweet time gliding back into the wall. A dark piece of glass covered the round hole, and he peered inside at a line of blue light that moved from Kate’s feet to her head.
The screen on the wall flickered to life, its only message:
DIAGNOSTIC SCAN IN PROGRESS…
“What happened?” Milo asked.
“I… We…” David shook his head. “I have no idea.”
The screen changed.
Primary Diagnosis:
Neurodegeneration due to Resurrection Syndrome
Prognosis:
Terminal
Predicted Survival:
4–7 local days
Immediate Concerns:
Subarachnoid hemorrhage
Cerebral thrombosis
Recommended action:
Surgical intervention
Estimated Surgical Success Rate:
39%
With each word David read, more of the room disappeared. Feeling faded. He felt his hand reach out and brace the glass vat. He stared at the screen.
Alpha’s words beat down upon him, smothering him like the heat from the fire poker on the ruined planet. “Perform recommended surgery?”
David heard himself say yes, and vaguely, he was aware of Milo putting his arm around him, though it barely reached the top of his shoulder.
CHAPTER 4
Two Miles Below the Surface of Antarctica
The screams served as Dorian’s only guide through the ship’s dark corridors. For days, he had searched for their source. They always stopped as he drew near, and Ares would appear, forcing Dorian to leave the Atlantean structure that covered two hundred fifty square miles under the ice cap of Antarctica, making him return to the surface, back to the preparations for the final assault—grunt work that was beneath him.
If Ares was here, spending every waking hour in the room with the screams, that’s where the action was. Dorian was sure of it.