Burn (Pure #3)(113)

Somewhere inside of his father’s elaborate locks, his words meet some criteria. Was it just his words? Was it the ache in his voice that activated something? He’ll never know.

The clicking begins. The door finally gives. Its seal is broken. Cold seeps from the chilled room. Fog rolls into the hallway.

Partridge puts his hand on the door and slowly pushes it open.

An overhead light flickers to life, illuminating four small capsules.

Partridge walks up and sees infants in each of the capsules. They lie on their sides. They have tubes in their mouths. Their skins are all lightly crystallized and tinged blue, the way Jarv Hollenback’s was when Partridge first saw him down here. The room also has one table in the corner with a metal box sitting on top of it.

“Four little babies,” Iralene says, walking into the room and leaning in close to one of them.

“My God,” Beckley says as he steps through the door. “My God.”

Partridge doesn’t understand. He looks at Beckley who blanches and backs away.

Beckley grips the doorframe and looks at Partridge, wide-eyed. “Jesus, Partridge. Don’t you know?”

Partridge shakes his head and looks at Iralene. He watches the realization wash over her face too. He looks at the capsules again. This time he searches the edges of them for nameplates. He finds a small silver tag on the front of each capsule with initials: RCW, SWW, ACW, ELW.

RCW—his initials: Ripkard, his real name; Crick, his middle name; and Willux.

SWW—his brother’s initials: Sedge Watson Willux.

He grips this second capsule, and then moves quickly to the third nameplate: ACW. Aribelle Cording Willux, his mother.

He says, “No, no,” as his eyes dart to the final nameplate: ELW. His father. Ellery Lawton Willux.

Could this be his family—rebuilt?

He thinks of the premature babies behind the bank of windows in the nursery. Clones—made from the genetic coding of Pures and wretches.

Is he looking at his mother and father—as infants? Is he looking at Sedge and himself? Is this what his father has given him? His family, returned?

One of his knees buckles. He grabs the edge of a capsule and walks to the metal box on the lone table. He stares at it for a moment. His ears are rushed with blood. His eyes blur. He blinks, and the box clicks back into focus.

He has to open the lid.

“Don’t,” Iralene says. “Leave it.”

But he can’t. He pushes the lid off with his thumbs. It clatters against the table.

Inside, there are medical instructions—a schedule for aging the specimens so that they will eventually have the correct age differences to be a family again. ACW and ELW have to be brought out and aged for twenty-five years, and then SWW can be brought out. Partridge’s mother and father had Sedge when they were twenty-five years old. RCW can be brought out two years later.

And then…what did his father have in mind? They would be a family? A normal family? Reunited and whole?

Maybe his father didn’t regret killing his wife and his oldest son because they were still alive.

Partridge walks back to the capsules—the tiny infants. What will he do with them? This is his inheritance.

Beckley’s radio squawks. Has Partridge’s sister set her plan in motion? Are the survivors invading? Is this the beginning of another bloody war? He says, “Iralene, tell me something in this world matters. Tell me something is sacred.”

“You matter,” she whispers. But this isn’t what he needed to hear.

Beckley walks back into the room. “Lyda and Pressia have been found.”

“Do you think it’s started?” Partridge asks.

“A group has formed not far from the Dome,” Beckley says. “According to reports, they seem to be moving.”

Iralene and Beckley step into the hall, and for a moment, it’s only Partridge and the infants. His father thought he was doing the right thing too. But now Partridge knows he isn’t his father. His father will always be foreign to him. Partridge is going to try to save the Dome, not because of what it stands for or what it aspires to be but because each person matters. He can try to save lives.

Iralene tries again. “Home is sacred, Partridge.”

“We have to bring Lyda and Pressia into the war room. Odwald Belze too.”

“Family is sacred,” Iralene whispers. “A home filled with family.”

He walks into the hall. The lights in the room flicker out. The door automatically closes. The only noise is the sound of the locks clicking into place.





EL CAPITAN





FITTING




Our lives aren’t accidents. This is the beginning, not an end. Do what you have to do.



Bradwell reads it over and over, aloud, his fingers pinching the edges of the small strip of paper. His hands are shaking so badly that the hand-drawn swan looks like it’s shivering. “How the hell are we going to take it down with no bacterium?” Bradwell says.

“Hell if I know,” El Capitan says.

“Hell!” Helmud says angrily.

Outside, the people have started buzzing with noise—there have been a few shouts and unclear chants.

From his bed, El Capitan finds a view of the gathering crowds through the blackened bookshelves and the crumbling wall.