The Rogue World

  “But what does that mean for the plan?” Uncle Jack asked. “Is it safe to go ahead?”

  “I think it might be.” Badri read from the screen. “I just followed that last document to the results of several research experiments. It seems Watkins was very careful, and there’s a notation here. He writes, ‘Though it is possible that some individual humans have the ability to interface with the alien technology, they are only proximal zooids. They are not fully integrated with the alien organism, and though the human may feel some of the alien system’s warning signs, results do not suggest the human to be in the same danger as the alien system.’”

  “So it’s safe to shut them down,” Uncle Jack said.

  It did seem that way. But only if Watkins was right, and Eleanor knew Watkins had been wrong about a lot.

  “Let’s just get all this back to Dr. Von Albrecht and the others,” Eleanor said. “Then we can plan our next move.”

  “Good idea,” Uncle Jack said.

  “I’m copying the files right now,” Badri said. “Only take a moment to—”

  A distant alarm sounded.

  “Oh no,” Eleanor said.

  “Damn.” Uncle Jack looked over his shoulder. “He must’ve got the door open.”

  “We need to get out of here.” Badri yanked the cable to the portable drive and handed it to James. “Hurry!”

  The five of them raced from the room, back down the hallways, toward the building exit. As they neared the utility closet where they’d left the G.E.T. employee, they found the door open, the room empty.

  “Once we’re outside, we’re just going to have to run for it,” Badri said, already breathing hard.

  Eleanor readied herself. Uncle Jack shoved the exit open, letting in the wail of the alarm from all around the installation. The five of them bolted through, back out into the snow and the sunlight, and Eleanor ran.

  CHAPTER

  6

  SHE BLINKED IN THE BLINDING WHITE, RUNNING EVEN though she couldn’t yet see well, hoping she didn’t bump into a piece of equipment, or worse, a G.E.T. agent. A few steps on, shapes resolved themselves against the blank of the snow, buildings, towers, pipes. She fixed her eyes on the direction where she thought the others waited for them and plowed ahead, hoping they had heard the alarm and gotten themselves out of there.

  “Ell Bell!”

  She turned to her right, where Uncle Jack ran next to her.

  “Stay close to me!”

  She nodded, her sweat freezing along her hairline in the cold. With a backward glance, she saw G.E.T. agents chasing them, but so far none had flanked them or managed to get in front of them. It seemed Badri had been right about this part of the Yggdrasil Facility sitting unused.

  James and Cyrus led the charge, but Badri lagged behind them. Eleanor saw pain and strain across her face as she struggled to run and keep up.

  If they could get through the perimeter fence, back into the hills, they could hide. There were endless ravines and caves, too many for the G.E.T. to thoroughly search.

  “The rest of them got out!” James shouted back to them, holding a radio.

  That relieved a sliver of Eleanor’s fear, knowing that at least Luke, Finn, Betty, and Dr. Von Albrecht would be safe. Now she and the others just had to make it out and find them.

  A loud shot cracked and echoed behind them. Eleanor gasped and looked back in time to see something streaking through the air toward Badri, crackling and sparking.

  “Look out!” Eleanor shouted.

  But the projectile struck the older woman in the back, and she went down hard in the snow, convulsing.

  “Badri!” Eleanor skidded to a halt in the snow.

  Uncle Jack stopped, too. “What is it?”

  “They shot her with something electrical!” Eleanor said.

  Badri lay in a heap. “R—r—run!” she shouted at them through chattering teeth.

  “Eleanor.” Uncle Jack grabbed her arm. “We have to keep going.”

  The grimace on Badri’s face made Eleanor feel sick. “But—”

  “G—g—go!” Badri shouted.

  Eleanor just stared, unable to take the first step, but Uncle Jack half carried her forward, one arm around her waist, gripping her arm with his other hand, until she resumed running on her own.

  James and Cyrus hadn’t even slowed down. They were even farther ahead, as Eleanor and Uncle Jack dodged the pipes and conduit, covering the distance a lot faster now that they didn’t have to worry about surveillance. As they approached the first control room they’d entered, where the others had hidden, Eleanor knew they were almost there. Not much farther, and they’d be clear of the perimeter fence.

  They rounded the building, but a guard appeared, stepping into their path, and swung some kind of club that caught Uncle Jack in the chest. He went down on his back with a grunt.

  “No!” Eleanor lunged at the G.E.T. agent, pummeling him with her fists. He took a few steps away from her in retreat, but he seemed more surprised than afraid of her. “Get away from him!” she shouted.

  The agent recovered his footing and deflected the next few blows. He raised his club, and Eleanor closed her eyes.

  But then she heard a roar, and the G.E.T. agent cried out as Uncle Jack lifted him off his feet and ran with him toward the building. A few feet shy of the wall, Uncle Jack stopped and hurled the agent, practically overhand. The man struck the wall with a thud, shaking snow from the roof, and dropped to the ground in a pile.

  “Go!” Uncle Jack shouted, and together they raced past the building, toward the fence.

  Eleanor saw the gap now. James and Cyrus had just climbed through it. She couldn’t see Finn or the others anywhere. Hopefully that meant they were already safely hidden in the hills.

  Several loud cracks sounded behind them.

  Eleanor grabbed Uncle Jack by the sleeve and tugged him to the side, dodging out of the way as several more of the stun bullets struck the snow, popping and hissing.

  “Almost there!” Uncle Jack said. She heard a groan in his voice, and hoped that agent’s club hadn’t injured him too badly.

  Just a few yards left.

  Then they ducked through, and up the hill above them, James and Cyrus waved.

  “That way,” Uncle Jack said, gasping.

  “Are you okay?”

  “I’ll be fine. Just keep going.”

  They ran up the hill, but as they climbed, Eleanor felt her muscles failing. The cold adrenaline fire that had driven her burned out, leaving her exhausted. Beside her, Uncle Jack didn’t seem to be doing much better. Up ahead, James and Cyrus had apparently decided not to wait, and they’d already gone over the top of the hill.

  Down below, a few G.E.T. agents had reached the fence, while somewhere beyond them, deeper in the facility, the whine and whump of a helicopter could be heard. Uncle Jack looked sweaty and pale next to her.

  “I’m not going to make it,” he said. “I think that guy cracked a few of my ribs. You need to go on without me. I’ll try to hold them off—”

  “I am not leaving you.” Eleanor took his hand and gripped it hard. Then she looked around and noticed that if they crossed the hill sideways, rather than climbing over the top of it, they’d reach a little ravine. “Maybe we can hide in there.”

  She pulled him, and he winced, but he came with her, and they stumbled and hurried along the hill face. The helicopter was in the air now. She could hear it over her shoulders, but didn’t turn to look, keeping her gaze locked on their target. When they finally reached it, Eleanor helped Uncle Jack climb down into the shadows of the jagged crevice. There weren’t any opportunities for cover from the rocks, but there were several cave entrances like those they’d passed.

  “The Sky Caves,” she said. “Hurry.”

  Uncle Jack nodded, and they scrambled forward, the beating of the helicopter rotors growing louder and louder behind them. Just when Eleanor feared they’d surely be spotted, they entered the shadow of the cave and thre
w themselves deep inside it, stopping only when it grew almost too dark to see. A shadow flitted through the light shining through the entrance, and the helicopter grew gradually distant.

  Eleanor leaned against the side of the cave, her glove sliding against the sandy rock wall. The sounds of their breathing filled the narrow space.

  “I don’t think they could have seen us,” Uncle Jack said.

  “Let’s hope not.”

  “Those G.E.T. agents are still on foot, though. They’ll probably be here soon.”

  Eleanor looked into the darkness. “Then we need to hide deeper in.”

  Uncle Jack nodded. “I have a light.” But as he reached into his pocket, he let out another pained grunt.

  Eleanor reached toward him. “We need to get you help—”

  “I’m okay,” he said. “It hurts, but I’m pretty sure it’s not serious.”

  “Pretty sure?”

  “I’m sure.” He looked down at his side. “But the flashlight is in that second pocket. If you wouldn’t mind.”

  Eleanor reached into the pocket of his coat that he’d indicated, found the light, and pulled it out. “You tell me if you start feeling worse.”

  “I will.”

  She switched on the flashlight, sending a beam of cold blue light down the throat of the cave. Then she led the way forward, following the tunnel as it twisted and turned, taking them into the side of the hill, down inclines and back up again. Unlike the carved caverns back in Peru, these tunnels had a flowing, natural quality to them. As if they’d been sculpted by wind. When they reached the first intersection, they paused.

  Uncle Jack palmed sweat from his forehead. “We need to remember which way we go so we can find our way back.”

  “Left?”

  “Left.”

  So they turned, and when they reached the next intersection, they paused again, taking note, rehearsing the way back. Eleanor felt safer the deeper they went. Even if the G.E.T. agents entered the cave, they’d never find them.

  “This is a good place to hide,” she said.

  “We can’t stay in here forever, though. My flashlight will die eventually.” That was true, and it brought back unsettling memories of the seemingly endless Peruvian tunnels. “At least it’s warmer in here.”

  “You know, I always thought we could beat the Freeze if we went underground, below the frost line.” He paused. “But now that we know the Concentrators are bleeding the earth dry from the inside, I’m not sure that would do us any good.”

  “I can still feel it,” Eleanor said. Now that her fear had mostly retreated, she sensed the earth’s currents above and below her, surging toward the Master Concentrator. “Can you?”

  “Yes.”

  She stopped walking, the flashlight beam fixed ahead of them. “Wait a minute.”

  “What?”

  “The World Tree is underground, right?”

  “That’s what they said.”

  “What if we can get to it from here? We could follow the currents. Maybe the caves connect.”

  “Maybe they do. But what then? Do we try to shut it down?”

  That was a good question. They still hadn’t decided if it was truly safe or not, and the Grendel team had the portable drive with the files. But everything they had read before the alarm went off suggested that it was safe. Proximal zooids. That’s what Watkins had called Eleanor and the other people like her. According to his theory, humans weren’t truly a part of the freaky alien system. Eleanor might feel the alarm bells going off, but she wouldn’t die. Hopefully.

  “Isn’t it strange?” Uncle Jack said.

  “What?”

  “I’m just thinking about how different the aliens must be from us.”

  “That’s sort of what I was thinking about. . . .”

  “We evolved from mammals, right? The aliens evolved from . . . jellyfish or something. A completely different kind of brain. Or brains, I guess, all working together. A completely different kind of life-form.”

  “I think it’s weird how you can read my mind.”

  He chuckled, and then winced. “But now we know why you and I have always gotten along so well. In fact, maybe now we know why some people just seem to connect. Like you know them from somewhere, and they seem to get you right away. You’ve had that happen, right?”

  “Not really.”

  “You will. I have, and maybe now I know why.”

  “I don’t know if I like that idea.”

  “Why?”

  “I always thought I got along with you because you’re you. If it’s just our alien DNA, there isn’t anything . . . special about it.”

  He nodded. “Maybe it’s some of both. Maybe it’s something else even bigger than both of them.”

  She smiled. “So what do you think? Do we go try to find the World Tree?”

  “What does your gut tell you? Do you think it’s safe now?”

  Eleanor thought about the way she’d connected with the alien intelligences inside the Concentrators. They had felt alive, and unique, but not complete. Not whole. Maybe those had been zooids, part of the aliens left behind inside the machines. Maybe the Concentrators were actually part of the alien life-form, broken off and planted in the earth like seeds. She might never really know or understand, but one thing she did know was that she had killed those intelligences. Watkins had started the Concentrators back up, but the intelligences were gone. She didn’t think she could have done that if she was truly part of the alien system, and that conclusion supported what Watkins had found in his research.

  “I think it’s safe,” she said. “I think Watkins was lying to control me. He wanted me to be afraid so I would stop messing with his plan.”

  “You? Afraid? That doesn’t sound like the Ell Bell I know.”

  “I’m afraid,” Eleanor said. “But I’m not afraid of doing something. I’m afraid of not doing something.”

  “Then let’s do something.”

  Eleanor nodded. She closed her eyes and paid attention to the telluric currents, sensing their direction, leading away deeper into the earth. She opened her eyes and pointed down the corridor. “That way?”

  “Feels right to me.”

  So they set off. She hoped the others would be able to take care of themselves. They would worry about her and Uncle Jack, but if she succeeded in what she wanted to do, she would be able to explain what happened afterward.

  The tunnels grew more complex in their layout, like a honeycomb. Like a hive. It occurred to Eleanor that it was possible they weren’t human-made—but also not carved naturally. This thought nearly changed her mind about their plan. She did not belong in these tunnels. She was now convinced they had not been made for her, or for anyone from her world. But that led to a new, even more disturbing thought—

  “What if it really was an alien?” she whispered.

  “What?”

  “That thing outside the other night. Badri said it was an animal, but what if it wasn’t? I’ve felt something watching us. . . .”

  “I think we’d know,” Uncle Jack said. “Did the thing feel like the Concentrators?”

  Eleanor thought about that. “No.”

  “Then it must be an animal, like she said.”

  Eleanor decided to believe him. She mostly succeeded.

  The twisting tunnels carried them on and on. At each juncture, they would stop, take their bearings, and follow the currents. A few times they chose pathways that stopped in dead ends, but each time they retraced their steps and chose a different tunnel. Eventually, Eleanor’s instincts told her they had to be right underneath the main building of the Yggdrasil Facility. She could almost feel its weight bearing down on them from above, and she wondered if Watkins knew about the Sky Caves and tunnels. Probably not, or he would have guarded them, or at least closed them off.

  “We’re getting close,” Uncle Jack said.

  Eleanor sensed it, too. The currents had begun to swell, as if multiple streams were converging around
them into rivers, and the rivers raged ahead. It still felt to her as if the entire world’s telluric energy had been rerouted here, following that experience aboard the plane when something profound had changed. The unknowns surrounding that experience continued to disconcert her.

  They took a few more turnings, and then the silence of the tunnels, until now filled only with the echoes of their voices and footsteps, gave way to the grinding of machinery. The thrum of engines. Eleanor smelled them, too, like a slick of oil over the cool, old air in the tunnels. She turned off the flashlight, and they crept forward by way of a distant glow that grew stronger with each step.

  When they rounded a final bend, the tunnel narrowed to an opening perhaps two and a half feet wide, and through it Eleanor glimpsed what must have been an enormous room. The walls on the opposite side from them seemed hundreds of feet distant. Harsh light flooded the cavern, and when Eleanor reached the opening, she saw it.

  The Master Concentrator stood at the center of the space, twice as tall and wide as the others had been, its branches even more numerous, razor sharp and twisted with the same incomprehensible geometry, the same eye-defying shape and color, as if it could not and should not be there. Elevated coils of cable circled the World Tree, tightly packed, connected to large machines that looked like they belonged in a power plant.

  “This is it,” she whispered. “Here we go.”

  CHAPTER

  7

  FINN CROUCHED IN THE SNOW. THE GRENDEL TEAM HAD erected a camouflage snow blind similar to the ones Amarok and his people had used back in Alaska, only instead of being made of fur, these were made of a lightweight, white nylon fabric. The blinds covered them like small, partial dome tents, shielding them from detection but offering little shelter.

  The G.E.T. helicopter had circled several times before returning to the Yggdrasil Facility. Now they just had to wait out the agents who still searched the hills. The plan was to hold their position until nightfall, if they could, and then move to a safer distance.