The Raising (The Torch Keeper Book 3)

  Sitting on the edge of the bed, I press my palm against his forehead, expecting it to be hot with fever. Instead it’s like ice. “I suppose being human isn’t all that it’s cracked up to be, considering all the messed up things we do.”

  “Humanity is quite complicated.”

  His rare smile is cut short by a severe bout of coughing. I move close, helping to prop him up. He leans forward, hacking up his lung by the sound of it.

  “Here, use this.”

  I grab a small, white towel from beside the bed and hand it to him. By the time his spasm has subsided, it’s covered in rust-colored spots. My heart sinks. I dab at the dark blood spattered on his chin. “Breck and her team will find out what’s wrong.”

  His icy hand covers mine. “Humanity’s proclivity for lies and delusion is truly remarkable.”

  “I’m sorry,” I whisper. My head slumps against the comforting mound of his shoulder.

  Digory shifts his head against mine. “Do not feel bad. The pain we are experiencing is nothing compared to the pain caused by Digory Tycho.”

  My cheek presses against his. “What do you mean?”

  “We have been unable to purge this vessel’s data from our collective. It is resurfacing. Fragment by Fragment.”

  I take his hand. “We can’t forget our past, Digory.”

  No matter how much we try.

  His fingers slowly wrap around mine. “The Tychos held deep affection for their son, Digory. They coddled him. Spoiled him. Digory was brought up in luxury, welcomed in all the grand homes of the Establishment’s elite. He never once knew hunger like you did. Like so many others. Yet it was never enough.”

  I lift my head. “I had no idea. How did your status change so drastically?”

  “This vessel was always desperate for the Tychos’ attention, always wanting to show how smart he was. He would always hear them…his parents…speaking in hushed voices. They didn’t think their children could really understand what was going on, what they were secretly up to.”

  I sit up straight. “What do you mean?”

  He’s staring past me, and it’s almost like I’m not even there. “It seems the Tychos, in addition to their wealth and prestige, possessed something else that began as an inconvenience and developed into something far more dangerous.”

  “Dangerous to whom, Digory?”

  Still avoiding my gaze, he shifts his position. “Dangerous to the Establishment, as well as themselves. You see, they had these troublesome little attributes humans refer to as consciences.”

  He attempts another smile but it dies before it can flourish. “Apparently performing charitable works, donating to the homeless, making sure children received proper nutrition and an education despite their social status just wasn’t enough for them.”

  Digory finally turns to me with a pleading look on his face that surprises me. “Why could they have not left well enough alone? Why did they want so much more? It makes no logical sense. That is when the clandestine visits started to happen. Strangers coming to the home late into the night. Digory’s father disappearing for days. His brother and sister were too young to understand, but he did. He would creep out of bed and listen in the shadows. He pieced together what they were up to, the risks they were taking, which could destroy the entire Tycho family.”

  My mind and heart are in a race. “The resistance. Your parents were involved, weren’t they?”

  “Yes. Digory was a child. He was not sure at the time what it all meant. All he knew from everything he had heard was that it was something terrible. That the entire family could all be punished, shelved, for what they were doing.”

  I nod. “That’s true. That’s exactly what would have happened.”

  He squeezes my hand. “That is when Digory became angry. So very angry. He thought if they cared so little about their children’s welfare, it was up to him to save the Tycho family.” His gaze drops to his lap. He begins to cough again, violently.

  I hold him, patting his back. “You have to take it easy and not exert yourself. Just lie down and get some sleep and we’ll finish this conversation later.” I grab the glass of ice cold water sitting on a nearby table and bring it to his lips.

  He takes a few gulps and pushes it away. “No. We need to purge this information from our system. We need to tell you.”

  He settles back onto the bed. “Lucian, Digory did something humans would consider terrible.”

  I bring the sheet up to his neck. “Don’t do this to yourself. You were only a child. What could you have possibly done that was so bad?”

  His eyes glisten. He flinches—from physical pain, emotional, or both, I’m not sure. “He told.”

  From the haunted expression on his face those two words seem like the most damning words ever uttered in human history. I’ve witnessed Digory in pain before. But this—this is something so much more devastating than physical suffering or fear of death. This is torment of the very core, the very soul if one believes in such things. Seeing him in such profound inner turmoil, shreds me.

  I hold him tight, trying in vain to absorb his anguish into my own being, my forehead pressed against his. “Please don’t do this to yourself.”

  “He told,” he repeats. His voice is hollow, as if every single emotion has been scooped out and trashed. “Digory told one of his instructors at the Instructional Facility, who then called him into his office and had him repeat it to an emissary from the Citadel. After that everything happened so fast.”

  We’re embracing each other fiercely now, as if we’re both afraid to let go, clinging to each other to hold onto one last scrap of sanity.

  My fingers trace concentric circles on the coldness of his bare skull. “Don’t think about any of it now. That all happened so long ago. It doesn’t matter now.”

  “But it does. These impulses, these feelings…it all seems as if it just happened. We are experiencing it as an observer and intricately involved with it simultaneously. We can feel all that dread rushing through our system like a highly toxic virus, compromising our harmony. Our unity.”

  “I’m so sorry.”

  Digory nods. “Once Digory realized that maybe he should have kept quiet, everything began to spiral out of control.” He clutches both my hands now. “He was very afraid. All he wanted was someone to talk some sense into his parents, set them back on the right path, stop them from being so selfish. It was only later, after it was all over, after there was no way to take any of it back, that Digory realized he was the one being utterly selfish.”

  “You were just a kid—”

  “A kid that prided himself on how intelligent he was. A kid that thought he was better than others and deserved all his material possessions. A kid too stupid to realize, or maybe just too blind with jealousy, to realize the consequences of his actions. After Digory betrayed his parents, he panicked. He pleaded with them not to hurt his family, and they assured him that his family’s reputation and legacy would not be harmed in any way. Behind closed doors, he was hailed a hero for coming forward and doing his patriotic duty.”

  “Digory. I’m so sorry.”

  “He never saw the Tychos again. Shortly thereafter, they were involved in one of the Establishment’s many ‘accidents,’ including the two younger children. Digory was spared. That was his reward. To have his family’s reputation remain intact publicly by keeping their involvement in the rebellion quiet, and not have the Tycho name besmirched by treason. Digory became the sole remaining heir to what little of their wealth was left after the bulk was appropriated by the Establishment, of course.”

  He turns and looks deep into my eyes, tears streaming freely down his face. He touches them and stares at his moist fingertips, as if beholding something alien, something long forgotten. “How do humans do it?”

  “How do we do what?”

  “Open your eyes each day, live your lives, despite the onslaught of memories, despite all the pain gnawing at you, tearing up your insides every second of your ex
istence. Being part of the Hive is so much more peaceful, so much more logical. This emptiness—this loneliness is unbearable.”

  I pause to collect my swirling thoughts. “You make a very good point. It seems I’ve been thinking about that for most of my life. But recently it’s becoming more like an obsession. Sometimes, I’m not sure if the only reason I get up in the morning is just out of habit, a routine that’s deeply ingrained, or if it’s because of my brother, you know? If I were gone what would happen to him? Maybe it’s kind of selfish, but I think if you can make a difference in just one other person’s life, touch them in even the most minute, positive way, then it kind of makes up for all the dark stuff. So in some ways, humanity is like a hive, too, people feeding off each other to justify their existence.” I shrug. “Or maybe I’m just rationalizing the irrational. Going crazy.”

  He shakes his head. “The fact that you are consciously worried about losing your mind makes it more than likely that you are not.”

  “Digory, I need you to promise me something.”

  “What is it?”

  Bowing my head, I press my palms against my forehead, slick with sweat. “If you notice anything—and I mean anything—that I do that may pose a danger to my brother, you have to take whatever action necessary to keep him safe.”

  I can tell he’s straining to keep his upper body upright. “What are you talking about? You would never inflict any harm on that child. We have seen how much you care about him, how far you are willing to go to protect him. It does not make any sense—”

  “Just promise me. Again. Please.”

  He nods. “Done.”

  A surge of relief washes over me. I slump back against him. “Thanks. And I’m sorry for the things I said earlier, the way I snapped at you.”

  “Do not worry. We have all been under intense pressure for quite some time now. It is a very human quality to vent frustrations on others. And we understand that reconciling this vessel’s current state with the person you used to know is probably very unsettling.”

  “That’s the thing. My anger was never about you or anything you did. Watching you struggling with your memories and coming to terms with who you used to be is like holding up a mirror to myself and not being able to deal with what I can see.”

  “And just what is it that you see, Lucian?”

  “Someone I don’t know anymore. Someone that absolutely terrifies me.”

  We lie next to each other in the darkness, not saying a word, just listening to each other breathe.

  TWENTY-FOUR

  The voice snaps me fully awake.

  “—your brother’s perusing the medical library, Spark. He’s got quite the aptitude. And the team’s been de-iced and briefed.”

  And instantly it feels like I must be dreaming.

  Breck, our mirror-image of Ophelia is standing over the bed—

  Along with two of my other dead friends and former recruits.

  Gideon and Cypress.

  I bolt up, my eyes straining against their sockets. “You can’t be them.”

  “I’m sorry about the confusion,” the one who could be Gideon’s older twin addresses me. “Breck mentioned the possibility of us resembling people that you know. If it’s any consolation, you look very much like someone we know, too.” He extends a hand. “Cephas Decatur here.” He drops it when I’m too stunned to shake it and turns to the Cypress doppelganger. “And this is my colleague, Saffron Clove.”

  She nods toward Breck. “Breck here’s told us quite the story. If it weren’t for reviewing the data logs and seeing your resemblance to Queran Embers for ourselves, we wouldn’t have believed it was possible.”

  I scramble out of bed and stare at them, making sure my mouth isn’t hanging wide open. “You’re…Saffron…and Cephas…and Breck. I’m sorry but this is going to take a little getting used to.”

  Gideon—Cephas—looks concerned as he approaches Digory’s bedside. “Are you feeling alright?” He turns to Breck. “This is the nano hybrid?”

  She nods.

  “That would be this vessel, formerly known as Tycho,” Digory mutters, propping himself up on the bed.

  I rest a hand on his shoulder. “Do you recognize them, too?”

  “Yes. We recall them quite vividly.” Despite the pain on his face, he manages to look amused.

  Breck sighs. “As I explained, both Lucian Spark, here, and his companion, Digory Tycho, seem to have encountered our Repros on the surface.”

  At those words, Cypress and Gideon—Saffron and Cephas, or whoever the hell they are—turn to each other, their eyes ready to burst. Then they fall into each other’s arms. Cephas grabs Saffron, lifts her, and spins her around.

  “It worked.” Tears stream from Cephas’s eyes. “The Sowing’s viable.”

  Saffron gives him a big kiss. “All our research wasn’t in vain. There’s still a chance.”

  He hugs her again. When they separate, they share a look, almost of embarrassment, as if they’d forgotten they weren’t alone.

  I squeeze Digory’s shoulder.

  Cephas clears his throat. “Our Repros—the people that you met who resemble us—how are they adjusting?”

  “Were they the ones that told you about our facility here?” Saffron interrupts.

  My throat locks up. I can’t speak. All I want to do is hang on to this moment for just a few seconds longer, this one sliver of what might have been. My old team of recruits back together again: Cypress, Gideon, Ophelia, Digory, and myself. Only in this magical, alternate reality, Gideon isn’t broken by abuse, he’s strong. Cypress’s eyes glow bright with hope, never having endured the scars of the Pleasure Emporiums, nor the experience of her children’s deaths. Even Ophelia hasn’t been wounded by a callous mother, groomed to survive, her mind fractured by a devotion to a poor, innocent sister that doesn’t even exist.

  But the illusion is shattered when I exchange looks with Digory. He’s deathly pale and barely recognizable, lying in his bed. I can’t even imagine how worn and jaded I must look, too. Ironically, it’s Digory and I that are the more damaged, unstable ones this time around.

  The players may change but the cycle never truly ends.

  I swallow hard. “No. Your Repros didn’t tell us how to find you.”

  “Lucian. We seem to be experiencing…another…glitch…” Digory’s fingers dig into my arm. His body’s wracked by a fresh wave of spasms.

  “Digory, hang on.” I grip his body, trying to hold him steady. But he’s bucking like a wild Caballus. “Somebody help me!”

  Cephas and Saffron move in, tightening the straps around Digory’s body.

  “I need ten ccs of Neuro-Sed,” Cephas mutters.

  Saffron throws open a shiny, steel box, grabs a hypo, and plunges it into an ampule of golden liquid. She thrusts the loaded needle at Cephas.

  He grabs it and mutters, “Hold him steady,” to me.

  It’s a struggle to keep Digory from moving. He coughs violently, spattering beads of blood on Cephas’s white smock. Then Cephas jabs Digory’s upper left arm with the hypo.

  Everyone’s quiet. Digory’s movements gradually subside. The only sounds are his raspy breathing. I’m shell-shocked, gaping at the sight of Saffron wiping away the blood oozing from Digory’s lips. His eyes are severely bloodshot. Looks like he’s burst the blood vessels during his violent seizures. He looks so different, so frail compared to the UltraImposer groomed to withstand any physical onslaught.

  “What’s happening to him?” My own voice sounds like a stranger’s to me. “Why isn’t he regenerating anymore?”

  Saffron and Cephas ignore my question, scurrying around Digory, attaching electrodes and I.V.’s to his body, hooking him up to monitors that fill the room with unnerving bleeps and pings.

  Saffron shoves a tube into one of the gauges and turns to her companion. “We need a complete blood culture and Nano work-up stat.”

  “Already on it.” Cephas spears another of Digory’s veins with a fresh
hypo, drawing dark blood into the plunger.

  My anger and fear bubble over. “What the hell you doing to him?”

  Cephas glances at me then shoots Breck a stern look. “Get him out of here now.”

  I shake my head. “I’m not going anywhere until—”

  Breck clutches my arm. “If you want Tycho to have a fighting shot, the team needs room to work. Let’s go.”

  I’m in a haze as Breck pulls me from the chamber and into an adjoining room, maneuvering me onto the examination bed. “He’s not going to make it, is he?” I mumble.

  “Hard to say.” She wraps a blood pressure cuff around my arm and activates it. “We’ll know better once the results of the battery of tests they’re performing are in. Those two are the best in their field. If Tycho has a chance, they’re definitely it.”

  The monitor bleeps and Breck removes the cuff and examines the readout. “A little on the high side but that’s to be expected considering your stress levels. What about your headaches? Getting worse?”

  I nod. “It seems the more I remember, the more intense they are.”

  She shakes her head. “Not surprising. The Sowing was never intended to be used to download a complete consciousness into a new body, only certain skill sets and knowledge to help rebuild the population. There’s supposed to be safeguards involved to filter the information into the brain. Looks like someone’s stripped those away those in your case, causing your physical symptoms. Your mind’s overwhelmed with processing too much too soon.”

  “The Fleshers…the nanotech race…removed some of the filters in my brain so I could remember enough to find this place. They thought you would have the answers that might allow them to function autonomously. They want freedom. They’re tired of their glorified slave status beholden to their masters. Can’t say I blame them.”

  Breck’s expression brightens. “So the nanotech’s becoming self-aware? That was always something we speculated about. It’s one of the complexities of developing new life.”