Steven Harper: Dreamer

“What the hell?” he asked.

And then a shuddering boom shook the lab.

THE DREAM

Kendi huddled on the flat gray ground. One of his wings was broken, and he was so cold he had stopped shivering. He lay there bleakly, waiting to die. The Dream was absolutely quiet. Not a sound disturbed the air.

And then, like the first hesitant birds calling after the storm has a passed, a whisper drifted by. It was followed by another, and another. They slowly swelled into a full chorus, but it somehow different from the one Kendi had been hearing for so many years.

Dull pain throbbed in Kendi’s wing and he couldn’t find the energy to raise his head. The darkness was gone, but he could still feel the life seeping slowly from him. It wouldn’t take him long to die now, and he just wished it would happen quickly. He closed his eyes.

Another strange whisper. Kendi felt something nudge him. He ignored it. Another nudge. Grudgingly Kendi opened his eyes. Astonishment widened them. People had encircled him. Men and women, all naked, their brown skins drawn smoothly over taut muscle. They had brown eyes and brown or black hair that flared outward in ropy kinks. They were all smiling.

You did well, Kendi, they said as one. The sound of their thoughts wrapped Kendi in kind warmth and a glorious sense of belonging, a feeling he barely remembered from childhood. Their presence gave him strength, and he struggled to his feet. The pain of his broken wing faded. He was whole again. These were the Real People.

“I’m glad to see you,” he said, and they smiled their acknowledgment. “What’s happened to the Dream?”

It has changed, they said. The minds of most mutants are weak, even among those who are Silent. This statement was made without rancor or judgement. It was a simple fact, one that a parent might make about a child who had much potential but many lessons to learn. They were unable to deal with such an abrupt merging and an equally abrupt release. A great many of them will never touch the Dream again. The few who can reach it will find their abilities severely curtailed.

“Including me?” Kendi asked.

You were trained by mutants, they said kindly. You will have to overcome that. There is still much for you to learn, Kendi Weaver.

The Real People were fading into transparency. Kendi felt their minds drifting away.

“Is my family still alive?” he asked frantically. “Can I find them?”

You have to look, they said. Start by returning to Rust. And then they were gone.

Kendi stared at the empty plain for a long time. Then he summoned his concentration.

If it is in my best interest and in the best interest of all life everywhere, let me leave the Dream.

Another boom rocked the Nursery. Alarms hooted, red lights flashed.

“What’s going on?” Prasad yelled above the noise.

All at once it came to Vidya. “The warship on the surface,” she shouted back. “It is dropping depth charges.”

Sejal grabbed one of the guard. “Tell them to stop!” he yelled.

“I can’t,” the guard replied, eyes wide with fright. “The Lieutenant was supposed to report in every ten minutes. If he doesn’t, the Captain will assume we’ve been killed and destroy the installation from above.”

Vidya yanked on the man’s arm. He was a brawny man, with close-cropped hair and fearful green eyes. His name tag read Jeren.

“Why can’t you tell them to stop?” she cried.

“That electric shock you used shorted out both comms.”

“What about your submersile?” Sejal screamed.

“They’d have hit that first thing to make sure the enemy couldn’t capture and use it,” Jeren snapped.

Vidya’s heart raced. They were at least twenty or thirty meters below the surface. No way to swim for it, not exhausted, bruised, and injured as they were. Another explosion rocked the floor.

“Attention! Attention!” boomed the computer. “Water breach in living sector A. Emergency doors will close in five seconds. Water breach in living sector A. Emergency doors will close in three seconds.”

“The base has a submersile,” Prasad shouted. “Come on! We have to get everyone aboard!”

“What about about the children?” Sejal said, waving at the cyro-units.

“Leave them!” Prasad replied. “We can’t transport them now.”

He strode for the door, but Jeren snagged him by the arm as he went past. “You’re a prisoner!”

“If you want to live,” Prasad retorted, “you had better come with us.” He turned to the other guard in various poses on the floor or on their knees. “That goes for all of you as well. We will not wait for you.”

Without looking back, Prasad ran from the Nursery. Vidya, Sejal, Katsu, and some of the guard followed. Several others, including Lieutenant Arsula, were either unconscious or too stunned to move. Their compatriots started lifting them firefighter style. Vidya ignored them. If they could follow, fine. She refused to risk her own life rescuing people who had tried to kill her.

Out in the main lab, Prasad came to a halt and, behind him, Vidya swore. They had completely forgotten about Kri, Say, Garinn, and the slaves. The guard had not taken the time to untape them. Say had apparently regained consciousness, for she was struggling against her bonds. Kri, Garinn, and the slaves pleaded with their eyes. Vidya considered leaving them, but only briefly. All of this might be easily blamed on Kri and Say, but the slaves, at least, were innocent. Katsu was already running over to them. The alarms continued to blare.

“No time for them!” Jeren cried. Vidya’s only reply was to snatch the knife from his belt and cut the first slave free. The lab rocked under another explosion, and water cascaded almost gently down one of the hallways into the main lab. Prasad and Sejal also set to work on the captives. Most of the guard, including Jeren, looked like they wanted to leave, but they didn’t know how to get to the submersile.

It only took a few moments to cut the slaves free, but they were already ankle-deep in warm seawater. Katsu started to work on Garinn, but Vidya stopped her.

“No time,” she shouted.

“We need him to operate the submersile,” Katsu shouted back without pausing in her work. “You may as well cut Kri and Say free as well.”

Swearing, Vidya did so, taking a malicious glee in ripping the tape painfully off Say’s face.

“If you do anything stupid, I will kill you without hesitation,” Vidya warned, hauling her roughly to her feet. Say’s hair was disheveled, her face pale.

“What about the experiment?” she demanded.

“They’re in cryo-sleep,” Vidya told her.

“We can’t leave them behind!” Say cried. “We can’t!”

Katsu slashed the last of Garinn’s tape just as Sejal finished with Kri. They got unsteadily to their feet.

“Stay with them, then,” Vidya retorted. “We are leaving.”

Say looked torn as the group sloshed their way out of the lab with Prasad in the lead. After several moment, Say sprinted after them.

The water deepened as they ran, a group of over thirty. All emergency doors had automatically slammed shut, and they had to spend precious moments cranking them open manually. People stumbled beneath another explosion, and once they opened a door on a wall of water. The released torrent swept half of them off their feet before Prasad and Sejal could get the door shut again. Prasad then hurried them down a side corridor. They couldn’t have traveled more than the length of a good-sized house, but it seemed to take forever. Say kept looking back over her shoulder. The hallways were a nightmare of noise and light and panicked bodies, and Vidya was sure any moment the ceiling would open up. She suspected that the only reason they hadn’t was because the rock used to camouflage the base provided additional protection from the depth charges.