Cracks (12 page)

A
faint snapping of branches is coming from somewhere behind us.

Without saying another word, Nathan runs to the back of the van and I hear the clang of the doors slamming closed after he clambers inside. Tom grabs the evidence of our lunch and stuffs it into
a carrier bag.

‘Quickly, Cal, get in,’ he says sharply.

The back of my neck prickles with anxiety. We clamber in and Tom starts the engine before I’ve even closed my door. The tyres screech as we pull away from the lay-by.

‘What was it?’ I say.

Tom checks the rear-view mirror. ‘I’m not sure, but could be cats,’ he says grimly.

Somehow I’m guessing this isn’t the kind of moggies I’m familiar with.

I open my mouth to ask more and then something flashes in front of the car. Tom swears and we brake suddenly. I’m violently jerked forwards and the seatbelt bites into my shoulder.
Something slams into my side window and I gasp, looking into the face of a young Indian man, his eyes bulging with terror and his face bloody and scratched. His clothes are ripped and purple
bruises and small red scabs spot his arms.

He seems to mouth the word ‘help’ and tries to open my door but I hear Tom clunk the central locking.

I spin to look at him and see a hard set to his face.

‘He needs our help!’ I yell but Tom just pulls away in a screech of tyres. I look in the wing mirror and see a pack of dogs emerging from the bushes with several men in black
uniforms. The man crouches in the road and the dogs set upon him like he’s a juicy bone.

‘Why didn’t you help him?’ I shout.

Tom stares stonily at the road ahead. ‘I couldn’t, Cal,’ he says quietly. ‘He was beyond help. We’d only have drawn attention to ourselves. It might have meant you
being captured again. Do you understand?’

I nod, reluctantly. I’m shaking all over and can’t get the image of the man’s terrified face out of my head.

‘Who are those people? Are they police?’ I clench my good hand and try to breathe. The lunch I just bolted down feels like it might come right back up again.

‘More powerful than the police,’ says Tom. ‘They’re known as Counterinsurgency and Anti-Terrorism Squads, or CATS. It’s difficult to monitor some rural areas, so
they send in these CATS to sniff out terrorists. Or at least that’s what they say. Really they like to bully and intimidate residents. Black and Asian residents usually get it
worst.’

‘Why?’ I say and Tom gives a heavy sigh.

‘Because the whole regime is based on a fear of terrorism. There are regular attacks in the major cities and no one knows for sure who’s responsible. Torch thinks the regime is
actually behind many of them. It’s their reason for identity chipping and it’s why they invented the Revealer Chip. It’s all about control.’

I look ahead, the man’s terrified face still superimposed on my retinas.

‘Help.’
That’s what he was trying to say. And we just drove away and left him there. I don’t know what they’ll do to him. Maybe he’ll be killed. Or
maybe he’s going to end up in the Facility. Deep in some rotten part of me, I’m relieved it’s happening to him and not me.

We drive in silence for ages. The sky has clouded over again and a thin drizzle is falling now. The windscreen wipers swish and thump rhythmically.

After a while we reach a motorway that has about ten lanes each way. It makes me a bit nervy and my back prickles with sweat. Tom closes all the windows and I can hear the low hum of
air-con.

We stop at a service station to fill the van with petrol. Tom’s face is serious now. All the banter has gone. Nervousness ripples in my belly. It somehow felt safer when we were in the
middle of nowhere. I can’t help worrying that every car overtaking us is filled with CATS or whatever they’re called, all hunting me down.

Coming off the motorway at last, the traffic slows and thickens, no longer moving easily. We’re at the top of a giant hill and below us, Tom tells me, is Sheffield. But it’s hard to
make out buildings because the whole thing has a kind of yellow fog hanging over it.

‘What’s that?’ I say.

‘Just rush hour pollution,’ says Tom. ‘It’s known as the miasma. Car use has gone off the scale because no one feels safe on public transport these days.’

I stare at him, confused.

‘Terrorist attacks,’ he says wearily, making air quotes with his fingers.

We crawl through the suburbs of the city. The houses look pretty much like any houses, although some of the better-tended gardens have all sorts of colourful plants splashed
over them. They’re a weird contrast to the toxic yellow air outside the car. I swivel in my seat to look at some massive palm trees taking over one front garden. They look weird. Sort of
tropical.

‘The one upside to climate change,’ he says with a wry smile. ‘We get a few exotic plants. Unfortunately, that also means exotic insects so, if you see any mozzies, make sure
you kill them quickly. Malaria is a big problem here now, and there was an epidemic of dengue fever a couple of years ago.’

‘What the hell is dengue fever?’ I ask.

‘Believe me,’ says Tom grimly, ‘you don’t want to know.’

As we crawl through the streets I can’t stop staring at the strange plants. Someone in a black 4x4 alongside us mouths something and a black screen instantly covers the window.

Tom notices. ‘Try not to draw attention to yourself, Cal,’ he says sharply. I turn away, stung. ‘People get jumpy about being stared at.’

We stop at traffic lights. And then an alien creature suddenly appears at the window next to me and I just about lose my entire skin in fright.

It’s staring in at me, its long flesh-coloured snout flat at one end and dotted with tiny holes. Its eyes are black and round. Even more bizarrely, it seems to be wearing a suit. And
riding a bike.

‘What is that?’
I point a shaking finger at the window. That’s when I notice lots of other creatures with the same face.

Tom smiles. ‘Don’t freak out, it’s only people wearing their miasma masks. They keep out the worst of the pollution. You only have to wear them during rush hour. Look in the
glove compartment.’

I reach forward and open it up and see two slippery pinkish things pooled in the bottom. I pull one of them out. It’s soft and light and only takes on its proper shape when I give it a
shake.

‘What is it made from?’ I ask Tom.

‘Skin,’ he says, matter-of-factly.

I drop it in my lap like it’s burning.

Tom gives another easy laugh. ‘Don’t worry, it hasn’t been sliced off anyone! It’s synthetically engineered.’

I slip the mask on and, with a sucking noise, it clings to my face. It gives me the creeps so I quickly whip it off again.

‘Why don’t you stick it in your rucksack for now? I’ve got several.’

I stuff the mask into the front of my backpack. Maybe 2024 is a bit more different than I realised.

Tom’s phone rings and he brings it to his ear, eyes on the rear-view mirror. ‘Yup?’ he says and then goes quiet, listening to the person on the other end. He glances sharply at
me and his face colours. He’s frowning and then he looks furious. ‘No,’ he says. ‘This isn’t —’

The other voice seems to cut him off. He swears and then slowly lowers the phone.

‘So who was that?’ I say.

There’s a pause big enough to park a bus in before he speaks again. ‘We have to make a detour into the city,’ he says tightly.

‘Where to?’

He pauses again. ‘To the university,’ he says. ‘There’s someone there who wants to meet you.’

‘Oh yeah?’ I say, suspicion spiking my guts. ‘Who?’

Tom looks at me and his eyes are strange. ‘It’s nothing to worry about, Cal. We have someone there – someone on our side – who wants to . . . examine you.’

I don’t know why I’m suddenly prickling all over. Maybe it’s the way Tom is looking dead straight ahead now and gripping the steering wheel, even though we aren’t
moving.

‘What do you mean
examine me
?’ I say, slowly.

Tom gives a heavy sigh. ‘Look, there’s no need to freak out about this, OK? But there’s an expert at the university who works for Torch. He wants to carry out some tests
– with your permission, naturally. Tests that may help us understand the Revealer Chip a bit better.’

‘Tests? What tests?’ It’s possible that I’m shouting a bit now. I feel like sirens are going off in my ears and red traffic lights are flashing STOP STOP STOP in front of
my eyes. It’s that word
. . . tests.

‘Calm down, Cal!’ says Tom loudly. ‘It’s nothing bad. A couple of brain scans at most. But you can say no. You don’t have to do it.’

Brain scans, tests, brain scans, tests, chips in my brain . . . no, no . . .

‘No! I won’t do it! No one’s going near my brain! Not after what they did to me at the Facility!’

Tom slaps the steering wheel. ‘I knew it was too soon,’ he mutters, ‘I bloody told them . . .’

I’ve got that feeling again, that the walls are all pulsing and coming in at me. I can’t breathe . . .

‘Look,’ says Tom desperately, ‘it’s only so we can properly understand what we’re up against, Cal, that’s all.’

‘You’re just using me!’ Blood pounds inside my head and I’m panting. ‘I heard you and Nathan talking about this before! You only got me out of there so I could be
your
lab rat instead!’

‘Cal! It’s not like that, buddy, I —’

‘I’m
not
your
buddy
,’ I shout and in one movement I’ve grabbed the backpack and pressed buttons on the car door, praying one of them is what I want it to
be. I tumble out just as the traffic starts to move again but somehow I’ve managed to stay on my feet. Then I’m running. I can hear Tom shouting behind me. I run between houses and past
shops and just keep going, changing direction and ducking down any alleys I see.

I don’t know where I’m heading but I don’t stop running until each breath feels like it’s being ripped from my chest. My nose and throat are coated in something thick and
bleachy smelling. I lean against a wall. Dots dance about in front of my eyes. Is this the miasma Tom talked about? I rummage for the mask in my rucksack. I find the slippery material and pull it
over my head. The snout part snaps into position and it quickly moulds to my face again.

I instantly feel better, although I can hear my breath going in and out in a creepy way. Yellow tendrils of fog are snaking around my body, like it’s alive and trying to feel me all over.
I force myself to breathe slowly and not panic as images of wires wrapping themselves around me pulse inside my head.

I feel a stupid urge to cry too and my belly hurts just like I really have been kicked there. I liked Tom. Trusted him. I thought he cared about me but all he wants – all
they
want
– is to poke about inside my head and turn me into their good little lab rat.

I jump as a couple walking a dog pass by but they don’t look at me. The fact that even the dog was wearing a mask should be funny but it’s too sick and strange for that. It does at
least help calm me a little bit and I walk down the nearest alleyway and find myself in a square, with benches arranged around a fountain that’s all covered in slimy green algae and black
stains.

There’s no one about and I go and sit on a bench, leaning forward to put my head in my hands until I remember the mask is in the way. I try to think about what to do next, despite the fear
and confusion swirling in my head.

What can I do? Where can I go? Maybe I can find a way to get to Brinkley Cross? But I don’t even know where it is.

I sigh in frustration and the sound echoes inside the mask.

My hand is throbbing now too. I’m wallowing in an Olympic-swimming-pool-sized vat of self pity when I’m suddenly yanked back hard against the bench, a vice-like grip around my
neck.

‘Just keep your trap shut and I won’t hurt you,’ says a low voice in my ear.

A
long-handled knife is centimetres from my throat. ‘Get up slowly,’ says the voice, and I obey, adrenaline throbbing in my belly.

‘Now turn round.’

I’m looking at a black boy a couple of years older than me, with big, dark eyes and a baseball cap pulled low over his face. He also has a dirty white cloth tied around his nose and mouth
and it ripples gently as he breathes.

‘Give me the mask,’ he says.

Trembling, I take off the mask and pass it over. He pulls it on and it instantly changes colour to match his skin. Fear is suddenly replaced by a rush of fury that he’s taking away my air.
If he didn’t have that blade, I’d fight him for it, even though my hand is throbbing like a git and my chest feels like it’s being squeezed by a boa constrictor. I’ve got
nothing to lose. I’m not going to let myself be controlled by anyone. I pick up the rucksack and sling it over my shoulder, meeting his eye. I walk straight past him and he grabs my arm,
raising the knife higher towards my face so I can see the blade glinting up close.

‘What’s in there?’ he says, nodding at my rucksack.

‘You can have the mask, but I’m keeping this,’ I say in a bold voice. ‘If you want to mess me up just for some socks and a toothbrush, that’s up to you. But
you’ll have to kill me.’