Broken Pixels (The Chronicles of Mara Lantern, Book 4) (17 page)

Mara shook her head. “No point in going to all the trouble of locating my counterpart and doing this just to serve as a momentary distraction. This was a warning—and a threat.”

Sam’s eyes welled up, and his face reddened as he looked at the body on the ground. “Why didn’t she defend herself? She a progenitor for God’s sake!”

Ping wrapped an arm around his shoulder and said, “Perhaps in this realm she had never learned how to tap into those abilities. Even a progenitor cannot use powers she doesn’t know she possesses.”

“Maybe she isn’t a progenitor at all in this realm,” Mara said.

“Unlikely,” Ping said. “You may be unique in each realm in which you reside, but fundamentally you are a progenitor in all them. That I’m sure of.”

“You weren’t so sure when we first met,” Mara said offhandedly, almost absentmindedly, as she stepped forward, getting ready to kneel next to the girl on the ground.

Ping held up a hand to stop her. “No, don’t touch her. There might be enough of you in her—metaphysically—to set off a reaction and force you from this realm—or worse.”

Mara pulled back and said, “What can we do for her?”

“Nothing now,” Cam said from the crook of Sam’s arm. “I can’t detect any sign of life at all. She’s just like the people at the church, except her limbs are still intact.”

Without taking her gaze from the girl, Mara asked, “So what’ll happen to her?”

“She’s young enough. They will repair her artificial body and extract new engrams from her biological one,” Cam said. “That’s all to be done at this point.”

“But she will have lost some of what she was, how her life has shaped her thus far,” Mara said.

“That’s true, but she’ll be able to adjust and have a complete life. That’s what matters,” Cam said.

“Will someone come and get her?”

“I’ve already reported her location to the authorities as well as those at the church. However, with all the disruptions in the city, it may be awhile before her body is retrieved,” Cam said.

Sam turned Cam upward to look at him and said, “We are not just going to leave her here. We can take her with us to the repository. That’s where she needs to go anyway, isn’t it?”

“It’s unlikely that her original body is stored at the same repository as mine. She would just have to be retransported again later,” Cam said.

“I don’t care. I’m not leaving without her,” Sam said.

“Sam, she’s gone. I don’t really like the idea of leaving her here either, but we need to get Cam to the repository—he’s someone we can help. She isn’t,” Mara said. “We really should leave before more trouble shows up.”

Sam shoved Cam’s head into Mara’s hands and said, “We can take Cam
and her
with us. Ping, grab her shoulders, and I’ll get her feet. I’m not leaving without her.”

“Sam, it’s not like this Mara is your sister.”

Her brother glared at her and, through gritted teeth, said, “She’s as much my sister as you are.”

Mara flinched.

Ping straightened and stood between them. “Taking her with us will not slow us down much. We just carry her to the elevator, to the railcar and then from the other stop to the repository. Actually it will be a few hundred feet total. Most of our walking is behind us. Why don’t you and Cam open the door, and we’ll get started?”

* * *

Inside the pill-shaped railcar that hurtled toward the repository in northwest Portland, Mara—still holding Cam’s head—and Ping sat at the front of the compartment while Sam sat at the back next to the body of Mara’s counterpart, which they had lain across several seats.

Leaning sideways and softly pressing her shoulder into Ping’s, Mara whispered, “Where did all that ‘I’m not leaving her’ stuff come from? I mean, that was a little intense, wasn’t it?”

“Sam’s perspective on his relationship with you is a bit different than your relationship with him,” Ping said.

“Meaning what?”

“You’ve only had one younger brother—this version of Sam. I would assume that, if you encountered Sam in another realm, you most likely would not consider him your brother. Look how long it took you to accept him in the first place.”

“Well, I never had my own version of Sam, but I eventually came around. What’s your point?”

“Sam had a relationship with his Mara before he met you, and he developed a relationship with you after arriving in your realm. To him, you are both his sister, just two different versions of the same person. He accepts the metaphysical truth in that, whereas you persistent in thinking that your counterparts are someone different.” Pointing a thumb toward the rear of the compartment, Ping said, “He could no more leave her body on the street than he could leave yours.”

Mara nodded toward the prone body next to Sam. “So, from his perspective, that’s his sister too.”

“That
is
his sister.
That is you
,” Ping said. “And you know something? He’s not really wrong about that.”

“I know. I know. It’s just sometimes I have trouble internalizing all these metaphysical concepts, and he seems to take it as second nature.”

“Like I said, it’s just a matter of perspective. You’ll get there. Considering it has been less than four months since the plane crash and all this started, you’re doing remarkably well.”

“Less than four months? Sheesh.”

Ping nodded. “It’s been a wild ride.” He stood and said, “I think I’ll see how Sam is doing.”

Mara’s gaze followed Ping as he walked the few feet to Sam and her counterpart.

It was almost incomprehensible to think of what they had been through in such a short time: Flight 559 going down into the Columbia River, creatures crossing over from other realms, learning about her abilities, living through the night of the zombie virus, Abby being taken by the Aphotis, flying on and fighting the dragon, meeting her niece from the future, and now understanding the realm of the robots. If all that couldn’t get these metaphysical concepts to sink in, what would it take?

“You felt her pain, didn’t you?”

Mara snapped from her reverie. Her eyes focused on the face that sat balanced on her knees. She had forgotten that she was holding Cam’s head there. “I’m sorry. What did you say?”

She unconsciously reached out and rubbed Cam’s cheek with a thumb, a charred spot he’d gotten in a burning car when the dragon had attacked in her own realm.
So much has happened
.

His face reddened, and his cheek twitched. “I heard Ping talking about you feeling pain earlier. You felt it when the other Mara was attacked, didn’t you?” he asked.

She looked at the body across the compartment, her open wounds in her head and chest. Turning to Cam, she rubbed her own forehead with a finger and said, “What makes you say that?”

“When we access the Sig-net, each of us has a unique frequency and identifier. It’s how we are recognizable as we interact on the network. Does that make sense to you?” Cam asked.

“Yeah, sort of like an IP address on the Internet in my realm, except here people have them instead of their devices,” Mara said.

“Somewhat of an oversimplification but yes. Anyway I did a little backtracking. When you accessed the Sig-net, you used the same frequency and identifier as your counterpart. For all intents and purposes, on Sig-net, you were the same person.”

“So, when she was attacked, I felt the pain in my head and my chest.”

“Exactly.”

“It felt so real. Just like the pain you would feel in a flesh-and-blood body. If I had had an artificial body, I’d put some kind of limit in place so people wouldn’t suffer in extreme circumstances.”

“Then you wouldn’t be human, would you?”

Thanks to Cam signaling ahead, two attendants met them when the railcar arrived at the repository. They loaded Mara’s counterpart onto a stretcher and rolled her from the platform, through the tunnel and to the repository’s diagnostics lab. As one of them paused to open the doors leading inside, he glanced at the patient on the stretcher and happened to look up at Mara. His eyes bugged out, and his mouth dropped open. He stood frozen in shock long enough for someone to push out the doors from the other side, striking the lead end of the stretcher and causing the attendant to jump.

Dr. Canfield walked through the entryway and glanced at the patient. Her gaze shifted to Mara, and she said, “I take it you’ve had an interesting evening.” She held a stubby cylinder over Mara’s counterpart’s body, emitting a blue light that swept over her body. Lifting a pad in her other hand, she glanced at it and said, “Mara Lantern, Repository 97045. Why did you bring her here?”

“We found her like this in an alley nearby and didn’t want to leave her on the street,” Mara said. “We brought her here because we were on our way to give you this.” She held out Cam’s head.

“Hello, Dr. Canfield,” he said.

The doctor smiled and took the head. “Nice to see you, the rest of you, Cameron.” Turning to Mara, she said, “Given the circumstances downtown, I’m surprised the three of you got back here safely, much less being able to locate Cam’s head and return it to us.”

She handed the head to the startled attendant and said, “Take this to the diagnostics laboratory and tell them to repair that burned dermis. Give it a full checkup before reattaching it to his body.” Pointing to the gurney, she said, “Place her in holding until we can arrange transport to her repository in Oregon City.”

“Your repository numbers are zip codes,” Mara said absently.

The attendants rolled through the doors with the gurney and the head. The doctor did not follow and said, “I beg your pardon?”

“Nothing. Just something I noticed,” Mara said. Pointing to the doors swinging closed, she asked, “Is there anything you can do for her?”

Looking at her pad again, Dr. Canfield said, “It appears the engrams were removed from her cranium, and her core—in her chest—has been completely depolarized. This facility has everything to make repairs except the engrams, which will be harvested from her biological brain. The most efficient thing to do is simply transport her to the appropriate repository and let them complete all the repairs there.”

“So you’ll just stick her in a closet somewhere?” Sam asked.

“I assure you that she is in no pain whatsoever, and we will treat her with the utmost respect. Helping traumatized people is what we do here. She’ll get the care she needs.” Waving a hand forward, Dr. Canfield said, “Why don’t you wait for me in the conference room while I attend to some pressing matters. I need to check on Cameron and a few other patients. With all the trouble outside, we’re a little backed up at the moment. The authorities can’t ascertain the cause of this so-called disease influencing everyone to run amok. The casualties are piling up faster than we can address them.”

“We might be able to help you identify the cause of the affliction,” Ping said.

Dr. Canfield gave him a doubtful look, and eyed Mara and Sam suspiciously. Mara was about to explain when the doctor held up a hand. “I really must get to the lab. Wait for me in the conference room, and I’ll be with you as soon as possible.” She pushed through the doors with her backside and disappeared.

To Ping, Mara said, “She still thinks we’re off our rockers. Maybe it wasn’t such a good idea to get into the whole ‘we’re from another realm’ thing. Now we don’t have any credibility at all.”

She stepped ahead, pushed open the door, and waved for Ping and Sam to enter.

Passing through the door frame, Ping gave her an encouraging pat on the shoulder and said, “She’s a scientist. If we appeal to her with logic and reason, she’ll come around eventually—assuming she has the time and patience to listen.” Shifting his gaze from Mara to the direction in which he walked, he felt the hallway spin. He reached out to steady himself against the wall, lost his balance and staggered forward, crumpling to one knee, where he suddenly found his equilibrium again.

Sam had been directly behind him and reached out. “Are you all right? What happened?”

Ping took Sam’s hand and stood up. “I’m not sure. I got a little disoriented for a moment, but it appears to have passed. Probably just tired from all the excitement and running around.”

Mara gave him a concerned look, but he proceeded down the hall. Pulling her phone from her pocket and scanning the screen, she said, “It’s almost midnight, assuming the time on this thing is correct.”

* * *

Two hours later, Mara felt someone tapping her on the shoulder. Blinking away the sleep she didn’t even remember coming, she found herself staring into the murky grayness of the Plexiglas table in the repository conference room. It took effort to lift her head off her crossed arms atop the table.

“Sorry I didn’t get back to you sooner. We had a rather bad burn victim delivered shortly after we last talked,” Dr. Canfield said.

Still bleary headed, Mara said, “They are setting each other on fire intentionally.”

“I beg your pardon?” the doctor asked. “How could you know that?”

The alarmed tone in her voice caused Mara to awaken and sit up straight. On either side of her, Ping and Sam sat slumped over the table, fast asleep. Rubbing her face, she said, “Sorry, that was probably a tad abrupt. After we retrieved Cam’s head, we ran into a group of people in a park who were attempting to light a woman on fire with torches. We tried to stop them, but I think they did it anyway after we left.”

The doctor had a haunted look on her face. “It’s happening all over the city. Some people are even setting themselves on fire, screaming something about ‘being the light.’ It makes no sense. No disease could cause a person to do something like that.”

Mara reached down to the floor next to her chair and lifted the book bag into her lap and said, “I don’t think it’s a disease, and I don’t think it is something transmitted through Sig-net.”

“What makes you say that?”

“Earlier in the day, when Cam showed me the news streams, we came across a report that referenced an illicit substance called Euphoria. I thought some kind of drug was being distributed and causing people to go nuts, but later we saw people carrying these tiny crystals and chanting, ‘See the light. Shine the light. Be the light.’ They all acted like they were high on some kind of drug, but it wasn’t a drug. It’s the crystals.”