Cloud Rebel (R-D #3)(75)
*
James
We knew something was wrong. Katya was on edge all the time, which unsettled Sergei. Dr. Shaw did his best to calm both down, but he felt it, too.
Nathan said everything was under pressure—as if we were locked inside an airless space in which the breaths we drew felt like our last.
I couldn't disagree with him—I wanted to talk in whispers, like someone was listening that shouldn't be.
We hadn't seen Cori or Val for more than two days. I didn't know what to make of that, either, and wished for the trick she had of speaking mind-to-mind.
Bekzi—normally he and Gerrett were smiling or cheering up the rest of us. Both had succumbed to whatever this was. Neither could explain it, either. Whatever conversation they had, it was done mentally and the rest of us weren't included.
*
Corinne
As a Larentii, I had a talent for making lists in my head—I could even visualize each list and add to or subtract from it. The lists I worked on now—were morbid in nature.
They held the names of the dead.
One list held the names of those who'd have died, regardless. Some of those names shocked and saddened me—to the point of depression.
The other held the list of names that shouldn't be dead. Their continued existence would have held the future together and helped keep chaos from becoming triumphant.
Norian and Lendill were on that list.
I hesitated before adding Ilya's name to that one. This was something I had to do quickly, before the histories recorded for the Archives shifted.
Yes, it could happen. Had happened—in lesser circumstances—already. I'm sure Nefrigar would have been happy to discuss it with me.
I didn't have time.
Nobody did. Not really.
I'd compared the lists so many times the names were burned on the cells of my eyes.
One name was missing from both lists.
One name could resolve nearly everything, when combined with the proper actions.
Holding out my arm, I studied it for a moment. As a Larentii, I had perfect, blue, flawless skin. Reaching out with my other hand, I Pulled away the tiny chip that Kalenegar had placed inside a wrist bone. This allowed them to track me, wherever I went. They'd said it in the beginning—I was an unreadable and impossible to track unless I sent mindspeech or expended certain types of power.
I intended to expend that power.
I merely didn't intend to wait this time for them to show up afterward.
Forming a replica of myself, similar to those of the Three in the Archives, I placed the chip in the wrist of my doppelganger and bent time.
Chapter 16
Notes—Colonel Hunter
"James, stop worrying—the President is overreacting," I said over the phone. "Yes, I know the President has declared a state of emergency and ordered that D.C. be evacuated, but I'm pretty sure we're safe, here. He's doing the same thing to New York City, when there's really no evidence to support his claim that they'll be attacked with sarin."
"Colonel Hunter," Leo was now on the phone, "I hope you take all warnings seriously. I am becoming quite concerned over the state of affairs across the globe."
"Shaw? What the hell are you talking about?" I demanded.
"Don't you feel it?" he asked. "That you're in a pressure cooker that's about to blow?"
"Hell, I'm up to my eyebrows in worry that the President will send nukes into every nook and cranny, to take revenge on anybody who's ever looked at him wrong," I exploded. "You're safe where you are—or at least that's how it looks from where I'm sitting," I added.
"Do you want me to schedule a flight home?" he asked.
"No. Hell no," I shouted. "Just stay the hell away, and keep the others with you."
"Katya wants to know what has happened to her father and Corinne," he said.
That settled my hash in a blink. "Damn," I muttered and pinched the bridge of my nose.
"What happened?"
"Rafe—he's, well, he may as well be dead," I mumbled. "The enemy has him and he's—been obsessed again. Only this time, it's much, much worse. Corinne is in mourning. Val says that to the rest of us, Rafe is dead. Phillips is using him as a weapon, for who knows how much death and destruction."
"Fucking hell," Shaw cursed.
*
Corinne
There was one person I wanted to tell about my plan, and he was currently obsessed so deeply there was no reaching him. It involved him, after all, in addition to many, many others.
I sat at a small table at the coffee shop in Vancouver—the one Ilya and I had chosen during our search for Baikov. For us, that may as well have been a lifetime ago. Ilya probably didn't have the memory any longer—in my estimation, the obsession the Phillips clone placed was similar to those I'd seen in others the original had taken for slaves—they had no will of their own. Only Phillips' will mattered, and it consumed them.
Sure, I could pick a time to go back—to find Ilya and explain matters to him. There were several problems with that option. First, I'd be crying and holding onto him so hard, he'd know something was wrong right away.
Second, I'd be tempted—too tempted—to blow everybody else off and just disappear with him. I could fix it so we'd never be found, after all. That, of course, would leave everybody else in the cesspit that Earth had become, and the future would crumble just as surely as it was crumbling now.