Children of Eden
Page 52

A pleasant-looking young man with bottle-green second child eyes comes in with a syringe, and Lark holds out her arm obligingly. “See you on the other side,” she says, and it is only as the clear liquid plunges into her vein that the thought occurs to me.
I whirl to Lachlan in a panic. “It’s just to make her unconscious, right? Not the lethal syringe?”
“Rowan, what do you take me for?” He looks genuinely hurt.
“Swear it!” I cry, grabbing him by the shirtfront.
He takes hold of my hands. “Rowan, I swear it. Trust me.”
Why does everyone keep saying that to me?
It isn’t long before Lark starts to drift off. As her eyes grow heavy, I give her a kiss on the cheek. On the periphery of my vision I see Lachlan avert his eyes. A little while later a large man comes in and scoops Lark up like a limp doll. I feel an emptiness when he takes her away.
“He’ll bring her to her house. She should be reviving at that point. She can let herself in, and with luck, forget about her little adventure in the Underground.”
“But remember enough to help us.”
He looks at me for a long moment. “I think that girl would do anything for you.”
I bite my lip, and don’t know what to say.
“How did you convince Flint?” I ask instead, changing the subject in what I hope isn’t a too-obvious way.
Lachlan laughs, and it is such a relief to see. I like the smiling, joking Lachlan. He makes me so comfortable, so . . . happy. I just don’t know how to react to the other Lachlans: the fighter, the leader . . . the man.
Lachlan drops his voice to a low confidential murmur. “I think what got him was the very real possibility that I might die in this raid on the Center. We’ve always butted heads, and you know he thinks he should be the one to get the implants, and alter our plan. So he’s letting me help you. Me, alone. His reasoning is this: When I don’t come back, when I’ve failed in the rescue, our part of the bargain will be done. We tried, and now you’ll have to take him to the cybersurgeon.”
What a merciless man Flint is. The fight to save second children shouldn’t be a power struggle between its two most charismatic leaders. “I wouldn’t give him the lenses if you . . . didn’t make it.”
He touches my shoulder, then seems to realize what he’s doing and jerks his hand away. “You held out admirably before, but make no mistake—he would have made you talk. His ways are . . . not my ways. I don’t believe that causing pain can ever bring about a better society. Death, perhaps, under certain circumstances. But there’s enough cruelty and suffering in the world. I won’t add more if I can help it.”
I feel such a warmth for him, filling my chest, spreading along my limbs, making my fingertips tingle. Why is my body reacting in such a visceral way? Why is it reacting to two different people? Is it only that I’ve never met anyone before? Maybe I’m enamored of the idea of people . . .
“Isn’t there something you can do to get the better of Flint?” I ask.
“A girl after my own heart,” he says with a wink. I feel my cheeks flush. “There’s no convincing Flint to help you—or help me, for that matter. But there is certainly a way to force the issue, with your help.” He leans close and whispers in my ear. So—if you’re agreeable—we’re going to turn the tables on Flint. Tonight, we go to the cybersurgeon and get my lenses.”
I have a flash of suspicion. If I help him, and then afterward he refuses to help me save Ash . . .
But no. I trust him.
“And then not only will it be too late for Flint to get the lenses for himself, but I’ll be so valuable to the Underground that they won’t dare risk letting me break into the Center alone. He’ll have to commit a few more people to help me. I’ll have a much better chance of success with a little backup.”
It was brilliant, and I beamed at him. But one thing was wrong.
“Not just help you,” I say. “Us. I’m going, too.”
And though he tries for a long time, nothing he says can dissuade me. I won’t let him go alone into danger.
 
 
SO MANY THINGS, so fast. I stultified for sixteen years, and now a lifetime of danger and grief and wonder and emotion are all compressed within a few days.
We set out shortly afterward by a different passageway than the one I’d entered through. We enter a labyrinth of winding, confusing tunnels that double back on themselves. Once we come to what looks like a dead end, but Lachlan shifts a rock and a low stone door slides open on silent pneumatic hinges. We crawl for a while, then come to a place we can stand again. I’m utterly lost, but Lachlan knows the way unerringly.
I’m supposed to be snug in my bed while Lachlan takes the risk for me. I can’t quite believe that Flint hoped (or nearly hoped) Lachlan would fail. Lachlan, though, seems perfectly confident as he sneaks me out of the Underground by a series of twisting, gradually rising passages. Excited, bouncy even.
“You just don’t know what this means to us,” he must say a dozen times as we make our way to the surface. “Having real lenses will change everything.”
I want to know how, exactly, but whenever I ask, he’s vague, or changes the subject. I know he wants to infiltrate the highest levels as an elite student, but what else? What next? I feel a swell of resentment. I’ve trusted him so many times—with Lark’s life, with the secret of my lenses. I understand the danger of confiding in someone—look what happened when Lark told people she trusted about me—but when I’m the one shut out of secrets, it hurts.
“The next to last circle,” I tell him definitively as we step out into the blackness. Eden doesn’t respond to him any more than it does to me, and the ground at our feet stays dark.
He looks at me, apparently amused. “So you remember now?”
I don’t know whether to pretend anymore or not, so I only look at him sidelong. “It’s all coming back to me. Slowly.”
He laughs, a low chuckle that warms me. “As long as you’re on my side, I don’t mind if you take your time telling the truth. Believe me, I get it.”
It’s strange how walking around Eden feels almost natural now. True, we sneak and skulk in the shadows, avoiding the few souls abroad tonight. But to be out, to move, to be part of the city now feels normal. The danger exists . . . but that feels normal, too, somehow. My body feels alive, eager, tingling with excitement. I feel ready.