Brother to Dragons, Companion to Owls Part 20

Margarita nods and escorts me back to my cell. While she is helping me to change, a report comes over her radio. Much of the technical babble is meaningless to me, but I follow enough to understand that my "accident" is being explained as a result of corroded insulation on a power cable to the pump.

No mention is made of the sparkling lure, and Margarita has apparently forgotten it, her attention galvanized by her narrow escape from death and my part as her savior.

"You had no reason to do that, amiga amiga," she says, tucking Betwixt and Between in next to me. "I've not said a friendly word to you since you come here. I don't break my contract, but I'll keep a good eye on you now."

Later, when I wake from a deep, dreamless sleep, I find a bowl of cut flowers brightening my colorless room. I don't need to read the note to know who has brought them.

I am certain that Dr. Haas arranged my accident, but I have no proof beyond my growing knowledge of her duplicity and awareness of her malice. I decide to not even mention my latest suspicion to Jersey. I prefer that he continue to see me as an "angel" he wants to help.

The rest of the day pa.s.ses uneventfully. The shock has worn me out and I sleep much of the time.

When evening comes, I have a visit from Jersey. He has showered and is wearing a brightly colored s.h.i.+rt and cotton trousers. From somewhere he has even dredged up a tie.

"Hey, Sarey, I heard you had an accident today."

I smile demurely, choosing to emphasize my condition by not replying. I see the effect instantly. Jersey has grown accustomed to the chatterbox of the interchange. My silence hurts.

"Smile for me, honey"-he looks anxious-"big now."

I valiantly bare my teeth and Jersey's lip trembles just slightly. He leans to awkwardly pat my leg.

"Aw, really scared you, did it, baby?" He looks pensive. "Dr. Aldrich says no up-time today, but we'll go tomorrow. I'll let you show me that Jungle again."

I smile, too touched by his concern to refuse him the gratification of cheering me up. He stays for nearly two hours, playing chess. We are well-matched-his knowledge of strategy is excellent, but my memory is good and once I see a play I can use it for my own.

Oddly, I find myself comparing him to Abalone. An idea comes to me then, but under the dual impediments of language and the watchful videocams I restrain myself.

I am too exhausted not to sleep well, but I awaken early. As I am stripping to dress, my cell's door bursts open and Margarita races in. She tosses my robe to me.

"Wait, amiga amiga, just a minute. You not know, but those h.o.r.n.y b.a.s.t.a.r.ds in the vid room, they get up early jus' to watch you shower."

She stands on one of my oversoft chairs, bouncing slightly as she neatly duct tapes over the front lens. She does the same in the bathroom.

Jumping down, she says, "There. Now, I do my job and stay here while you shower and dress. You don't gotta be a skin flick star."

I hug her and, seizing Betwixt and Between, head into the bathroom. My shower, even with the door open so that Margarita can make certain I don't do anything drastic, is the most privacy I've had since I've come to the Inst.i.tute and I enjoy it immensely.

"You like the flowers?" she asks while I'm dressing.

"The flowers, they were radiant with glory and shed such perfume on the air," I answer, nodding.

"Good, I'm thinking, maybe I bring you a fish tank-a little one, since the big doctor says you not to go outside anymore." She grins. "Yeah, I think I do that."

Quotations for thanks seem insincere and so I hug her again. She escorts me to Comp-C and waves a cheery goodbye.

Fortified, I go in and don't even flinch when Dr. Haas hands me my beaker. A faint wink from Jersey warns me to be ready for the mule's kick but I find being spread out across a universe no easier despite his warning. Again, I come to myself sprawled on the floor of Jersey's sitting room.

"I'm not sure that whatever overdose she could concoct for me wouldn't be better than that, Jersey," I say, struggling up, finally accepting his hand.

"You're just saying that, Sarey," he a.s.sures me. "You like being in control of yourself. I can tell."

"Control?" I meet his eyes. "I wonder if I have ever been in control of my own life?"

"Not of your life, Sarey." Jersey doesn't smile. "Of you."

"Hmm." I am reluctant to admit that I see his point.

"Sarey, you never pressed for exactly why Dylan needed the 'services' of my machines, but you must remember that he wasn't..." Jersey blushes, aware that he's on a delicate topic.

"Crazy? Or at least autistic?"

I see that Betwixt and Between have found a bag of French fries and concentrate on helping Jersey to see my addition to our consensus reality.

"Yeah, that. You know he could talk normally."

"Yes, I seem to remember that." I look at him and shrug. "I was pretty small when I left the Inst.i.tute and they blocked my memories or something because I didn't remember him or them until I heard Betwixt and Between telling Conejito Moreno about Dylan."

"Conejito Moreno?" Jersey shakes himself. "Sarey, Dylan's 'accident' was probably pretty deliberate. You see, he drank some corrosive; I think it was a cleaner. It made a mess of his throat when he started throwing it up. He didn't die, but he couldn't talk."

I wince, wrapping a hand around my throat, understanding the silence and pain whenever I found Dylan's memories in the inanimate. Betwixt and Between have stopped eating and large tears are rolling from their bright ruby eyes.

"Dylan killed himself?" I ask, gathering my dragons close.

Athena lands near, cooing and hooting softly. Jersey seems to see, but does not allow himself to become distracted.

"Yeah"-he pauses-"He did. I don't know exactly why he did it when he did, but he hung himself. They didn't have cameras in his room like in yours."

Much makes sense now. I fight back my grief for the pale-eyed boy, for the man I would never know and soothe my wildly sobbing dragons. I wonder if he was permitted any other inanimate friends and if they weep for him in some dark closet or if they were tossed along with the rest of the trash.

Jersey's face goes blank and slack for a handful of heartbeats; I know he is getting some message from outside of the interchange. Then he refocuses, notices for the first time that a rope ladder again leads into the strung reaches.

"They want to know if we're ready," he says. "Shall I give the go-ahead?"

I nod and he fingers his screen. When he reaches into the chest this time, he extracts two plastic slips, much like cred slips except one is pink and the other a painful chartreuse.

"These," he explains, "are access cards for an account-more accurately, one is the access card and the other is a dummy. Your job is to figure which is which-only the man who carried them knew for sure and..."

"He's in no position to tell," I complete. "I get the picture. This shouldn't be too hard."

"Make it hard," Jersey suggests. "I mean, when you know don't tell right off. I'll signal that you're working and we can talk without making them suspicious."

"Okay."

I reach out with my inner hearing and almost instantly can tell. One card is dull and mute. The other chuckles steadily. A moment more confirms that the silence is indeed inertia and not a layer of concealment. The pink card is effectively "dead" the chartreuse is our target.

Without telling Jersey my discovery, I put the cards on the table. "Want to see the Jungle? I'll show you my hammock and tell you all about my Pack."

As his answer, Jersey stands and grasps the ladder. I go up in front to show him the ropes. He follows more slowly. When we get up to a Cub's platform in the lower reaches, I look down.

The sitting room is gone and Head Wolf's tent is pitched in its customary spot. Only the emptiness is atypical of the Jungle I knew, for even at the busiest parts of the night there would be someone around: sleeping, eating, s.c.r.e.w.i.n.g, singing softly.

I sigh with longing and spin tales for Jersey-carefully mentioning only those of the Pack the Inst.i.tute already knew. He listens with fascination.

"Sounds like a primitive paradise," he says when I pause, "a simple-if brutal-Law, a patriarch, survival of the fittest."

"We weren't primitive!" I object indignantly. "We had lights and running water and even computers."

"Computers." Jersey's interest banishes his doubt. "How odd!"

"Not really." I smile, remembering the soft, happy murmur of Abalone's tappety-tap under her fingers. "One of my friends was so good that she could find anything on the datanet-anything at all."

My words are a challenge and I know that Jersey hears it, but I let it sink without pursuit. This complex is a sealed world, just like the first place, and neither Abalone nor anyone else will be able to see in unless someone opens a window. I've let Jersey know that someone might hear if he called-what he will do is up to him.

Finally, we climb down and relay the information about the cards. Then we are drawn back. When I come to myself in Jersey's annex, I realize that I am still quite weak from the accident. Still, I have enough energy left to be touched that Margarita has somehow managed to trade duty s.h.i.+fts and is there to take me back to my cell.

Warning me to leave the lights off when I undress, she locks the door behind me.

Although I am bleary-eyed with exhaustion as I stumble into the cell, I do notice the small hexagonal aquarium on the table. A lovely silvery fish with a luxurious fantail is swimming lazily above gently s.h.i.+fting sapphire gla.s.s pebbles. She darts shyly into a green crystal castle when I put Betwixt and Between on the table, but peers coquettishly out almost before the trail of bubbles from her retreat has dispersed.

Betwixt gives a low wolf whistle and Between growls appreciatively. Chuckling sleepily, I settle the disgruntled owl on the headboard and go to sleep.

Morning comes and the chunky, brown-haired woman I remember from the day my head was shaved buzzes my door to wake me up.

"Hey. I'm Holly. Margarita asked me to guard in here so we can do without taping your shower."

She looks vaguely embarra.s.sed.

I smile and go off cheerfully. Holly doesn't get chatty, but I am still touched that Margarita was able to get her help-probably at some cost. Dylan must have made friends at the Inst.i.tute, too. I wonder where they are.

Comp-C is empty when I arrive, but both Dr. Haas and Dr. Aldrich come in almost immediately. They are tight-lipped and dismiss Holly without a word.

Voluntarily, I take my place on the fluid plastic chair, even bending to a.s.sist Dr. Aldrich with the hookup. Conversation has become a pleasure that I antic.i.p.ate and realize that I would miss if I left this place.

In my peripheral vision, I see motion from by Jersey's chair. Something troubles me, though, and I have just realized what it is when Dr. Aldrich stands back, giving me a clear line of sight.

Jersey is nowhere to be seen; Dr. Haas is linking herself into the computer interchange in his place. I want to ask, but can only gape. Dr. Haas appears to understand.

"Wondering where Jersey is?" she says with a sweet smile. "He won't be joining us-he was caught breaking one of the rules and isn't allowed out of his room."

Dr. Aldrich dismisses Jersey with a grunt. "No matter, we understand how this works. He isn't necessary."

The beaker is extended to me and I know that I do not dare to refuse to drink.

The mist curtain that envelopes me is a musky blue-layers of twilight sky that reach out and wrap me. I struggle through this, flailing my arms as if I am swimming. After floundering aimlessly, I let myself start to sink-although I am uncertain which way is up or down; nothing exists to give me a reference.

Then I see something white, framed in red. Eagerly, I direct myself toward it. Somehow I feel as if I am gaining velocity-a sensation like sliding down an icy sidewalk. The white resolves itself into separate blocks that at first I think are marble or ice. Then I realize that they are teeth and that the red that frames them is lips.

Too late to retreat or find a way to slow myself, I tumble out of the navy darkness into a golden void almost completely filled by the gigantic face of Dr. Haas.

She is already smiling, but the smile broadens when she sees me, slowly spinning as if weightless in the air before her.

"h.e.l.lo, Sarah."

I stretch out my arms and legs in a vain attempt to orient myself in an up and down now defined by Dr. Haas's face. Glancing down, I see that she extends, neatly garbed in her usual white lab coat over a tailored teal suit. My only comfort is that from what I can feel of myself, I am much as usual in the consensus reality-my hair is back, my clothes my usual, and my owl and dragon are perched one on each shoulder.

"I said 'h.e.l.lo, Sarah,'" Dr. Haas says in a voice that contains the rumble of distant thunder. "Don't you like talking?"

Still spinning, although more slowly now, I manage an angry, "Sure."

"Sure? That's it?"

She's enjoying my discomfort so much I can hardly bear it. Betwixt and Between hiss softly in one ear; Athena churrs and tightens her claw grip on my shoulder. Then, suddenly, I remember a single word.

Consensus.

She can't do this without my permission. My anger s.h.i.+fts from her to myself. It seems that I have been running from her, letting her order my life, since her first appearance at the Home.

"Yeah," I finally reply. "That's it and so's this."

I concentrate, just as I did with Jersey and as easily as wiping steam vapor from a bathroom mirror, the setting changes to the familiar rope-strung cylinder of the Jungle. There is almost no resistance. I wonder at this until I realize that if I could make my presence known to Jersey, who created the interchange, surely I have the advantage over Dr. Haas.

Dr. Haas and I are on the same scale and I sit at ease on the edge of my hammock. She is gripping the edges of one of the cubwalks.

Athena launches from my shoulder and her departure sets me swinging. The vibration must be felt on the cubwalk as well, for Dr. Haas's hands tighten on the guide ropes. Her smile fades.

"What is it you want me to check for you?" I ask, feeding a French fry to Betwixt, deftly dodging Between's snaps at my fingers.

"Check out?" Dr. Haas says, nervously edging towards a ladder.

"Yes, isn't that the reason for these visits? I check out something and then tell you about it."

"Yeah."

Dr. Haas stops and I feel her concentrating, see for a moment solid flooring and aluminum side rails transform the cubwalk into a st.u.r.dy bridge. I remember the Jungle as it was, my own fumbling first attempts at the Reaches, the joy of graduating from cubwalks to the lines. Her feeble reordering vanishes before my reality.

When she looks up at me, she is angry, her emerald eyes sparkling and hard. Maybe anger makes her say what she does next, maybe fear. Maybe just a desire to show me that she still has power over me.

"You're a b.i.t.c.h, Sarah. You always were, even when you were a little, sniveling, snot-nosed brat who couldn't even learn to finger sign."

Her hands are shaking so hard that the cubwalk trembles, but she doesn't seem to notice. Betwixt stops eating the French fry and Between doesn't even dive for it, transfixed as I by the next words of the tirade.

"I was important. I was the first! Then Dylan came along and he looked like he was going to be even better. But when you were tested, I hated you because even baby tests said you were good, that you just might be the best of all! How I laughed when they learned you were crazy-that you couldn't talk, couldn't read or write or spell. Now they'd have to come back to me, back to poor little Eleanora."

Now it is my time to shake. How had I not seen it before. Like me, blond hair, green eyes, but in her the colors were richer. We even had similar features, but the similarity was slight. Like stylized masks, our faces had been etched by our lives and hers had made her into a predator, a shark, lovely, graceful, and blood-hungry.

"Eleanora?" I push away disbelief. "Yes. But why have you treated me like this? We're sisters. We're alike."

Eleanora Haas sneers, but there is something pathetic in her disdain. "Alike? Oh, no. In what matters, I am your poor copy."