The Whisper (13 page)

“We almost turned the natural world into one gigantic junk pile,” Helen said. “By the time every home owned a chocolate fountain, there were almost no trees left. And,” she went on, “one of the most painful things I realized was that it wasn’t the fault of the poor, like your parents, who were forced to pay for this mistake. It was the fault of the rich who ran the corporations like Unistore. Because these corporations understood human instincts and took advantage of them. We actually encouraged people to buy things they didn’t need. I felt so guilty when I realized that. I can’t tell you how sorry I am.”

Helen sighed deeply and hung her head.

“Most humans,” she said after a long pause, “live only for love. To love and be loved. That’s what novels taught me. All the rest, all the food processors and leaf blowers and chocolate fountains, are just the scenery for love.”

Their eyes met. Hers were searching; his were calm and steady.

“Can you forgive me for what I once was?” she asked.

“Yes,” he replied. He could understand now how her life of privilege had shielded her from the truth. But she had learned to think for herself, and she had changed her ways. He felt immensely relieved.

“And can you forgive me for leaving you in Barford North?” Helen continued. “I didn’t want to. I wanted to stay and help.”

“I know you did,” Mika said. “I saw Gorman’s men in your apartment. It was too dangerous for you to stay. But what happened when you came back here, to the other side of The Wall?”

“My son locked me up in his house,” she said. “And hired dementia nurses to look after me. He thinks I’m senile because
I refuse to take Everlife-9 or live in this mansion. Can you believe it? It’s not easy being different in this world, as you know …”

“At least you weren’t born with webbed feet,” Mika said.

“So we’re still friends?” she ventured.

“Yes,” he replied.

She smiled. It made her happy to see him in her library, looking at her books. Somehow he had survived all the training and mind games without losing his independent thought.

“You mutants are different from us, aren’t you?” she said. “Us old, broken humans.”

“I think so,” Mika replied. “We know what we are.”

“So what now? What next?”

“Take over the North,” Mika stated. “Negotiate freedom with the South. Help people fix themselves so they can live in a natural world without destroying it.”

She gulped. These children weren’t messing about.

“We hear things you can’t hear,” he told her. “We call them The Roar and The Whisper. The Roar is the sound of emotion and The Whisper is the sound of thought. We mutants see a light too. I see what you’re feeling in your light. And I see what the forests mean. We see us all, atom-deep, as one being, connected. Your answer makes perfect sense to me.”

“Does it?” Helen said.

“Yes,” he replied. “Can I use you for an experiment?”

“Of course,” she said, a little nervously.

“It won’t hurt,” Mika told her.

He opened a window and helped her climb out into the garden.

“Well, this is interesting,” she said, her yellow wellies deep in the green uncut grass. “What do you want me to do?”

“Touch one of the vines covering the house,” Mika said.

There were plenty to choose from. They could hear the birds nesting in them, tweeting and rustling among the leaves. Helen grasped a length of wisteria and looked at him.

Mika stood behind her and put his hand on her arm.

“Your eyes have gone weird,” she said. “They’re all black and oily.”

“Don’t look at me,” Mika said. “Look at the house. And relax.”

“I can see the swallows have come back this year,” Helen said. “That’s their nest up there in the eaves.”

“Stop thinking about swallows and concentrate,” Mika said. “Or it won’t work. Let your mind relax.”

Another minute passed.

“I think I feel something,” she said tentatively. “But I’m not sure. My fingers are a bit tingly.”

“That’s it,” Mika said. “Relax.”

The feeling intensified. Soon her fingertips buzzed where they touched the bark of the wisteria.

“I can see it,” she whispered. “Yes, I can see it!”

Gold light grew in her fingertips and coursed into the bark. It ran like fluid up the vine and into all the other vines, until the whole house was covered in a twisted mass of golden light.

“Look at your feet,” Mika said.

Helen looked down and saw the light running through the grass. It was coursing through her like electricity. Showing her that she was connected to all living things.

“What does it feel like?” he asked.

“Amazing!” she said, almost crying. “Absolutely amazing!”

T
he boy Luc breathed steadily.

His face was calm.

His arms were out of the blankets, hands open and relaxed at his sides.

Oliver sat on the chair by the lamp, and Kobi sat at the end of the bed. He tilted his chair back so he could lean against the wall and huddled down in his coat with his hands in his pockets. They were both silent. Oliver stared at the implant, as if he was trying to understand the adults who’d done such a thing. Kobi listened to The Whisper, which now flowed through his mind like a story. After sitting with the boy for a couple of hours, he knew everything the army knew: where they were, why they were taken, and what they were trying to do.

Then he had to pass through all the emotions they’d felt while he sat there in silence, with Oliver. The shocking truth
about The Wall hit him like ice. The outrage that followed made him want to punch something.

His mother had been killed by the rich living on the other side of The Wall, and by a corrupt government that knew the truth but still left them to rot in darkness!

Kobi burned in his black coat, waiting for his anger to pass. For that implanted boy wasn’t sleeping so peacefully for nothing. The army of children was about to rise and set this mess straight.

When his rage passed, he began to feel the more subtle emotions, the wonderment that forests still existed and the fear that they would burn before he saw them. And he felt a sense of alignment too. He’d come from a similar mold to Mika’s; he’d always felt there was something wrong with his world, and now he knew he was right. That he could trust his instincts and stop wondering if there was something wrong with him. Beyond The Wall were forests and rich people.

It made sense. Perfect sense.

Then something else occurred to him. This boy was waiting to wake up in the wrong place.

In the
worst
place.

If he woke up here, in The Shadows, alone, the adults would pounce on him and pump him for information.

He must not wake up here
, Kobi thought.

Now he was desperate to speak to Mika.

He felt in his pocket and realized he’d left his companion upstairs on his bed.

“Oliver?” he said.

“Yeah?”

“I’ve got to go back to my room for a minute. Will you stay here and watch the boy?”

“OK,” Oliver replied.

“If he wakes up, run as fast as you can and find me. But don’t tell any grown-ups, just me. Do you understand? It’s really important.”

“OK,” Oliver said gravely. “I won’t tell anyone, I promise.”

Kobi sprinted up the stairs to his room and grabbed his companion.

“Call Mika again,” he told her. “It’s really urgent now, Anais. I have to speak to him.”

He paced up and down while he waited.

“I still can’t get through,” she said. “I’m sorry.”

“Frag it!” Kobi cursed.

M
ika stared thoughtfully at the screen of his companion. Lilian’s battery had gone flat. She’d been lying in Gorman’s desk for several days and he didn’t have her charger.

Now he wished The Whisper was a more precise form of communication, that he could connect with individuals, like through a com network, but it didn’t work like that. All those thoughts and feelings were woven together with no names or places attached. He sensed he and Ellie had the strongest threads, but all the rest were as fine as gossamer. And he was stuck with the unsettling feeling that something was happening they needed to know about. He heard it in The Whisper, but he couldn’t grasp it and didn’t know where it was coming from.

It was dark now.

They’d left Ralph at the mansion to keep an eye on Mal Gorman and returned to Helen’s hut to eat before they left.

Their mood had changed. Their thoughts had shifted. Now that Gorman was out of the way, they had to take over the fortress. Helen busied around them, lighting a fire and making tea, but the children were quiet. They would eat one meal together and then … they wouldn’t see Helen again unless they succeeded. And if anything went wrong, they might return to find a wasteland of blackened bones and trees. Or never return …

After pacing the cabin for a few minutes, Colette and Santos went out to check on the Stealth Carrier. Leo and Iman sat by the fire and stared into the flames as if they were making them. Ellie, Mika, and Audrey sat at the table with Puck clambering between them. The monkey was behaving badly, grabbing things and running around the hut.

“It’s like having a toddler around again,” Helen said, as Puck stuck his fingers in the sugar bowl.

“Sorry,” Ellie said. “He senses my mood.”

“I’m not complaining,” Helen replied, placing it out of reach. “I feel sorry for him. It’s not surprising he wants to stretch his legs and fiddle with things after being locked up for most of his life. What do you fancy eating? You could do with packing a feast if you’re going to take over a fortress tonight.”

“What have you got?” Mika asked, putting Lilian down.

“Not much in the hut,” she replied. “But you can order anything and it’ll arrive in ten minutes. It’s good like that over here.”

When Colette and Santos returned, she opened a cupboard in the kitchen. There was a screen on the inside of the door. The children told her what they wanted and she ordered it.

While they waited for the food to arrive, Audrey helped set
the table. Helen noticed how she looked at the plates, as if she’d never seen them before. They were different, of course, from those used by people in the North. They were bone china with a gold rim and had been in Helen’s family for a hundred years. But Audrey’s fascination seemed to go beyond that. When she’d laid the plates on the table, she stared at them.

“What can you see?” Helen asked.

They were decorated with a leaf pattern.

“I was just noticing,” Audrey replied, “that when humans copy nature, they get the pattern wrong. Real leaves don’t look like this. Every leaf on a tree is different, but these are all the same.”

Helen looked at the plates. Audrey was right. All the leaves were the same size and shape and placed at regular intervals. “I see what you mean,” she said.

“I think humans want nature’s pattern to be the same,” Audrey said. “So they can understand it.”

“That sounds about right,” Helen replied. “Humans spent a long time trying to survive nature and it wasn’t easy.”

“And now they’ve forgotten they’re part of a pattern.”

“Yes.” Helen looked at Audrey shrewdly. “Gosh,” she said. “I can’t remember what I was doing when I was twelve, but it wasn’t observing chaos theory on dinner plates.”

“What’s chaos theory?” Audrey asked.

“Never mind,” Helen replied. “Don’t worry about it now. You’ve got enough to think about.”

“Tell me another day,” Audrey said. “I want to know.”

“OK,” Helen agreed. “I get the feeling you do already, but I will tell you.”

The food arrived in a small, unmanned pod. It settled on
the porch like a wingless bee and beeped to announce its arrival. The children had asked for bread, cheese, grapes, and apples. They helped set it out and ate quietly. It was a necessary meal. They’d eaten ones like this before. Puck walked on all fours across the table, pinching food from their plates, but they hardly noticed.

“Do your parents know where you are?” Helen asked.

“No,” Mika replied. “We can’t tell them the truth yet or they’ll start the war themselves.”

“Oh yes,” Helen said. “Of course. I must admit I am a bit worried about you. This is all very precarious.”

“I know,” Mika said. “But don’t worry.”

When they’d eaten as much as they could, they cut more bread and cheese to take with them. As they left, Mika promised to call Helen soon. She watched him walk down the path into the forest, with a tight feeling in her heart, and closed the door with a sigh.

The hut was not so warm without them. She sat in her chair by the fire, put a blanket over her knees, and called Ralph to make sure he was comfortable in the mansion, and that Gorman had settled in the boar house. Then she began the long, worrying wait for the children’s return. She’d read about wars and she’d read about stopping wars. Stopping a war could be like trying to stop a boulder rolling down a mountain. However smart or strong these children were, they still ran the risk of being flattened by it.

Kobi returned to the sick room and sat with Oliver. He now felt as if he was guarding the boy, rather than watching him. Oliver left for a few minutes and returned with coloring pens and paper.
They were not like Grace Mose’s. The paper was gray and rough because it was made of recycled food packing. The pens were the cheapest kind and he had to scrub to make a mark. Kobi listened to this sound and to The Whisper. Oliver drew a Pod Fighter. It was good, Kobi thought, and told him so.

They spent an hour like this. The child focused on impressing Kobi, and Kobi focused on learning more. He picked quietly through the threads of The Whisper, listening as hard as he could. The more he learned, the more afraid he became that this boy would wake up. No amount of strategy or skill would stop the war if their parents found out.

When the door opened, both boys startled. Suddenly, the small room was full of adults and noise. A woman waved Oliver off his chair.

“Come on, Oliver, your mum wants you to go back to your room and do your homework.”

“But I’ve done all my homework,” Oliver told her. “I want to stay here.”

“No, that’s enough now. The doctor’s going to give the boy a drug to wake him up. He’s not going to want a crowd of strangers around him when he opens his eyes.”

“I’m not a stranger,” Oliver argued. “I’m his friend.”

“Don’t be silly, Oliver,” she said. “You can’t make friends with someone who’s fast asleep.”

“Well, I did,” Oliver argued.

“Out,” the woman said, pushing him toward the door. “And no more of that sass or I’ll tell your mum.”

When Oliver had bumped furiously past the adults, the woman turned to Kobi.

He was sitting at the end of the bed, panicking.

They were trying to wake the boy up.

He tried to think of a way to stop this happening, but couldn’t.

“Hi, Kobi,” she said in a more respectful tone. “You’d better go as well. We’ve got a job for you and your father that will utilize your engineering skills. He’ll explain.”

“What’s the drug you’re giving the boy?” Kobi asked.

“It’s a drug used in hospitals to bring people out of comas,” the woman replied.

“But he’s not in a coma,” Kobi said.

“We know. Don’t worry. The doctor knows what she’s doing. You go and find your dad. Go on.”

She waved him out. For a moment, Kobi considered refusing to leave. Then he looked at the boy in the bed and remembered he was sleeping because he wanted to; that he wouldn’t wake up until his friends in the fortress did. And, if he was strong enough to defy a government implant, that coma drug wouldn’t touch him.

Kobi clung to this hope and left, determined to get back in that room as soon as possible.