Awakening on Orbis (35 page)

“Max!”

Still no answer.

“Max!”

In the hole, about twenty meters below me, I could see the purple stream of a light chute, untethered and flailing about like a broken gas line. The stream crackled and hissed across the black void. Another uprooted chute intersected with the first one, igniting a light storm whenever they touched.

“Max!”

“JT,” my sister called out.

“Ketheria! Where are you?”

“Down here,” she cried. “I have Max.”

I fell on my belly and peered over the edge. Ketheria’s crimson hands clung to a utility pipe sprouting from the rubble and over the hole in the ring. Max, her hair matted with blood, was lying unconscious on a chunk of concrete just above Ketheria’s head and slightly to my right.

“Ketheria! Are you all right? Is Max alive?”

“I don’t know. Be careful. I think everything is really loose.”

“Hold on!”

I jumped to the far side of the hole so I could get a better look. Max was barely on the rock, and there was no way to jump to Ketheria.
Where was Switzer?

I refocused on a small metal girder just above the girls. I struggled to keep my footing as the girder tilted severely toward my sister. My right arm was now switching between functioning and useless as I looked for a way to secure myself. I jammed my legs between the girder and a slab of concrete. As I reached over the edge, another explosion set the world in motion yet again.

“Ketheria!”

The blast heaved Max into the air while the rock underneath her tumbled into the void. The busted light chute gobbled it up. Ketheria reached out and caught hold of Max’s shirt while my left hand clamped onto Ketheria’s right wrist. My other hand, the bad one, snagged Max’s shirt. It wasn’t much, but it was holding.

“JT, help me!” Ketheria begged.

Ketheria’s plea for help ignited some part of me that found strength I never knew I had. My mind focused on my contact with Ketheria while I shifted my weight to help Max. She was heavy.

“Max!” I pleaded.

“I have to let go of her, JT!” Ketheria said. A red trail grew on Max’s shirt as she slipped through Ketheria’s bloody fingers.

“Wait! I don’t have her!”

I concentrated hard to maintain what little hold I had. I interfaced with my arm, but there was only a patchwork of controls at my disposal now, and most of those were unresponsive. I only managed to squeeze a little more strength out from it.

“JT!”

“All right! I have her.”

Ketheria grabbed the pole again as Max’s shirt ripped.

“You don’t have her, JT. Use both hands!”

Ketheria was holding on to the metal pipe sticking out of the concrete, but my hand would not release her wrist.

“I can’t!”

“Yes, you can. I’m fine!”

“No. I can’t.” I stared at my left hand clamped around Ketheria’s wrist. “My mind won’t let me.”

As much as I wanted to let go of Ketheria and use both hands to pull Max to safety, something inside of me refused to let go of my sister, to let go of the Scion.

“That’s not you, JT! That’s what they did to you! That’s the coding working. The coding the Trust put inside of you. You love her, JT. Fight it! Let go of me!”

Max’s shirt ripped again.

“JT!” Ketheria screamed.

I tried. I tried so hard to let go of Ketheria, but my mind refused the logic.

“Max, wake up, please,” I whispered.

Everything in my vision now began to swim together in the purple light. Tears fell from my face and sparked against the chute.

“JT, it’s not you! Let go of me and grab Max, please!”

I thought of every moment I’d ever had with Max. The first time she helped me with the hidden files on the
Renaissance,
the first time she held my hand, even our first kiss. My hand wriggled on Ketheria’s wrist, but it was not enough. I could not let go.

Max’s shirt ripped again — a final time.

Ketheria grabbed at Max as she fell, and I like to think I tried as well. My left hand stayed on Ketheria while my right hand scratched at the air.

I didn’t scream. I didn’t cry out. Instead, I told Max I loved her as her body plunged into the purple light chute.

“I’m so sorry, JT,” Ketheria whispered through her sobs. “I’m so sorry for this.”

I stared at the purple chute for a while.
This couldn’t be happening. Max? Max! This isn’t real,
I tried to tell myself, but I knew Max was gone. I could hear Ketheria sobbing, and I could hear the war raging over my head, but I could also hear my breathing over it all, for some weird reason.

As I stared at the purple light chute, waiting for time to reverse itself, I felt my hate for the Rings of Orbis burn my insides. I hated everything they had done to me. I hated them for everything I had lost and everything I’d never had.

“It’s not your fault, JT.”

“Yes, it is,” I whispered.

“It’s not. It’s this place, these people.”

“I know that, but it won’t bring Max back.”

“I’m so sorry,” Ketheria whispered again as she stood up. I was still staring down the hole where Max fell. “They did this to you, JT, and they’ll do it again. I have to stop them.”

Without looking, I said, “What do you mean?”

“It’s my destiny.”

“What is?”

“To save them.”

“Save who?”

“Save everyone.”

I finally turned toward my sister and away from where Max had fallen. In the back of my mind, I was aware that my life was still moving forward. “Ketheria, what are you talking about? Here, grab on to me. Can you pull yourself up at all?”

“JT?” It was Switzer.

“Where were you?” I screamed. “I needed you! You could have helped me.”

Switzer was kneeling on the far side of the hole. I could see blood gushing from a nasty cut over his right eye, and his left arm was clearly busted.

“Switzer!” my sister cried, trying to look over her shoulder. “Is that you? I’m ready.”

“Ready for what?” I said.

Max is gone.

“JT, I must suffer this,” she said. “It will not happen if I do not do this. It is the last thing I must do before I can truly awaken.”

“Ketheria, tell me what you are going to do,” I demanded.

“I have to do this, and I have to do it without you. I see that now. I’m sorry.”

Then Ketheria bit down on my hand. “Ow!” My fingers loosened just enough for her to slip from my grip, and she let go of the bar.

She tumbled into the hole.

“Ketheria!”

Switzer was next to her in an instant and plucked her out of the purple air. He refocused on the far side of the hole, just as he had practiced at the Hollow. I did the same, surfacing in the center of the battle. Preservation Forces were fighting hand to hand with knudniks and Citizens alike. I couldn’t help but think that Switzer, with Ketheria in his arms, was a far better Space Jumper than me.

Max is gone.

“What are you doing, Switzer?” I said.

“Getting a little payback. Something you should have done a long time ago.”

“Put her down!”

“No. I’m not like you, buddy. Things are black or white for me. You spend too much time in here,” he said, pointing at his head. “
This
is a good deal, and I’m going to take it.”

“Deal? What deal?”

“It was my idea,” Ketheria said. “Don’t blame him.”

“What are you doing?”

“Put me down, Switzer, but don’t let go until I say.”

“Ketheria. I don’t understand. Tell me, please,” I pleaded with her.

Max is gone.

Ketheria did not reply. She stood perfectly still with her feet together and lifted her arms to the side. Then the glow within her eyes seemed to expand. The golden luminescence flowed from her eyes and formed a radiant coronet around her head before dropping to her feet. When the light hit the ground, it exploded outward like the birth of a new galaxy. The circle of light engulfed everyone in its path. Citizen, knudnik, and soldier alike dropped their weapons and bathed in the stream of light now flooding Murat. I could not tell how far the light was going, but soon it flowed as far as I could see.

Everyone just stood there and stared at the people next to them with this perplexed look on their faces, as if they were trying to understand how they had gotten here. Soon some people were tending to the fallen and no one was fighting anymore. I gawked as Preservation Forces stepped down from their tanks and pulled knudniks from the rubble. Was Ketheria doing this? I turned toward my sister as the stream of light faded and eventually stopped flowing. Then she turned toward me slowly. There was something different about her. I didn’t know if it was her eyes or her smile. She looked as if she was capable of understanding anything.

Then she smiled at me and said, “Good-bye, JT.”

“Are you sure you want to do this?” I asked Charlie.

“I have a few debts to repay,” he replied.

Charlie and I were seated in the spaceport on Orbis 4. His shuttle was about to leave, and he had asked me to visit him before he left.

“Your real name isn’t Charlie, is it?”

He shook his head and said, “Harlan. Harlan Admunsen.”

“I like
Charlie
better.”

“Then let’s leave it like that.”

“I’m going to mi —” I started to say, but he interrupted me.

“Don’t get me crying. Something might start to rust. You never did turn down those emotion levels, either,” he complained. “But thanks for making me feel like myself again. You know, with the . . .” Charlie pointed at the metal around the back of his skull.

“No problem,” I said.

I stared at the floor, swallowing the lump in my throat.

Then he said, “They still might find her.”

I shook my head, unable to talk.

“The shuttle for Orbis 2 is now boarding.”

Finally, I croaked out, “No.” I looked up at him. “I wish I could feel what everyone has been feeling since the awakening. Theylor said I was designed to not experience it. The enlightenment had no effect on me. Just another gift from the Trust to ensure that their fighting machine stays true to its mission. I don’t mind, though. . . .”

“I’m sorry.”

“No, I think it’s helped a little, with Max, you know, to fill that hole up a little bit.”

“You’re going to be all right,” he said, and clamped his hand on my shoulder. It was a painful blow.

“Ouch! You may act like the old Charlie, but you have superhuman strength now.”

“Sorry.”

“The shuttle for Orbis 2 is now boarding.”

“I gotta go,” he said, standing up. “Give me a hug and then go and get on with your life.”

I laughed.

“Hey! None of that. You know what you have to do. You are a Space Jumper. They’re going to write stories about you one cycle, JT.”

I stood and smiled. Then I gave Charlie a hug. “Come find me,” I whispered.

“I will,” he croaked.

“The shuttle for Orbis 2 is now boarding.”

Charlie broke away. “Go on, go say good-bye to Theodore,” he ordered.

“Good-bye. Charlie.”

“Good luck, kid.”

Charlie picked up his bag and joined the line for the shuttle. He didn’t turn back to look at me again, but I waited until he disappeared through the loading door. Even after everything that had happened, Charlie still managed to avoid most of my questions. I wondered where he was off to. I wondered if I would ever know.

I set out to find the New Arrival Processing Center, to say good-bye to Theodore. Theodore was now helping the new knudniks arriving on the Rings of Orbis. He had wanted to take this cycle off work, but I told him not to. I figured it would be easier to say good-bye that way.

No one referred to the new arrivals on the rings as knudniks anymore, and they were no longer indentured to the Citizens, either. Ketheria’s enlightenment had spread fast through the rings, even reaching the Trading Council, who structured a new power deal with the Keepers.

Watching everyone file through the spaceport, I couldn’t help but feel that they looked a little happier in their home. But the Rings of Orbis were no longer home for me. For so long I had thought that this is where my life would end up, but now I realized that it was only the starting point. My home was always where my friends were. I had had a home on the
Renaissance,
and I had had a home on the rings when we were all together, despite the conditions. I just didn’t see it.

I missed Max terribly. I hoped for so long that the light chute had transported her to another place on the ring, but after a long and fruitless search, the Keepers were unable to locate her. Phase after phase, I blamed myself for that moment. I was unable to turn off the creature inside of me long enough to help the girl I loved. I could still get angry thinking about it, but at least the awakening had created enough space for me to move on with my life.

I stopped outside the entrance to the New Arrival Processing Center. I watched Theodore talking with each alien, directing them to the R5s and then helping them uplink information for their adjustment period on the rings. He moved from alien to alien, more confident than I had ever seen him. Theylor said it was from the enlightenment, but I couldn’t get a sense of that. In fact, I think Theodore’s change had nothing to do with Ketheria. I think he’d simply found his passion.