I was wrong.
STAGE II: DIAKINESIS
Mankind has been forgetting this simple fact since the dawn of time: when we transgress, it is our children who must pay the price of those transgressions.
I didn’t do anything wrong. All I did was survive.
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Mom is sad all the time right now. She stays in her lab as much as we let her, looking at graphs and charts that show how the cousins are waking up, and sometimes she says bad words when she doesn’t know I’m there listening to her. It makes me feel funny when she does that, like she has a face I’ve never seen, because she’s always been so busy being my mother. She’s the smartest person I’ve ever met. She’s a super scientist and she’s going to find a way to save everybody, not just the humans. But she’s sad, and I can’t make her better.
Sal and Tansy are both still missing. I think that’s a lot of what makes Mom so sad. I miss them too. Tansy’s always been my best friend, and I like Sal a lot. She’s my sister, and that means I have to love her forever, but nobody gets to tell me who I have to like. I decided I would like her all on my own. Now I just miss her a lot.
Maybe I should go and find her. Mom would be happy again if I brought Sal home, and then Sal and I can go find Tansy, and we’ll finally be a family the way we should have been all along. I can do it. I’m smarter than anyone thinks I am.
I can bring my sisters home.
The subject has shown surprising resilience. I expected her to die when I introduced antiparasitics into her food supply, but she proved unexpectedly resistant. The subject reacted to the antiparasitics as if they were an infection, resulting in nothing more severe than a brief spike in the host body temperature, with no lasting damage to the subject.
Proglottids cultured from the subject have proven to be strong and healthy. Three have been introduced into the subject’s digestive system, to see whether the brain worm can tolerate the presence of competing parasites. Full documentation will continue.
All in all, this is an excellent way to test all current theories without endangering the life of any necessary or important personnel.
Chapter 9
OCTOBER 2027
The grate in the changing room wall opened onto a snug vent that was at most two feet across and a foot and a half tall. I squirmed my way inside, grateful that the phobia instilled in me by the psychologists at SymboGen had focused on car crashes instead of on tight spaces. This would have been enough to make even a mild claustrophobe lose their composure, and that was while I was still close enough to the opening for a small amount of light to filter in and allow me to see. It was going to be all about touch from here on out.
At least it was too narrow for Sherman or Kristoph to come after me. Ronnie would fit, but it would take a while for whoever was watching the monitors to realize that I wasn’t emerging from the dressing room. No matter what, I would have a lead before he came after me, and that meant that I might actually have a chance. Bracing my weight on my elbows, I began pulling myself inexorably forward into the dark.
The light faded within ten feet of the entrance. I was just starting to wonder how long this tunnel could go when my fingers hit the wall. I stopped where I was, feeling around for where the tunnel branched. There were openings to both my left and my right. They felt like they were roughly the same size, but there was more dirt and grit to the left, which implied that air normally flowed in that direction. Since air would flow from the outside, that meant I needed to go right. I shuffled back a foot or so, and then pulled myself cautiously around the corner, continuing my slow progress into the dark.
The slow pounding of my heart in my ears distracted me from the otherwise absolute silence in the vent: without the air conditioner or heater running, the only sounds were the ones that I made. That was good. It made it easier for me to listen for pursuit. I stopped every ten feet or so, cocking my head and trying to focus back through the dark for signs that I was being followed. There weren’t any, as yet. That didn’t mean that they weren’t coming. I needed to keep going as fast as I could.
The next section of the vent extended for what felt like about sixty feet before it dead-ended. I shuffled backward again, feeling the walls for turnoffs that I might have missed. There was nothing but solid, unyielding metal. I took a deep breath and held it until the panic that had been starting to writhe in my belly died down. If I had to go back, I’d go back. There were no pits between me and the last turn. It would be hard. It wasn’t impossible.
A faint breeze ruffled my hair as I prepared myself for backing up. I stopped. Then, cautiously, I lifted one hand above my head.
First it hit the metal roof of the vent. And then it hit nothing but empty air. I had found the ventilation shaft.
“Okay,” I whispered. “I can do this. I can do this. It’ll get me home.” I squirmed forward again, until I could roll onto my back and reach up into the open ventilation shaft with both hands. It was square, rather than rectangular, and slightly narrower than the main vent. I would still fit, but it was going to be a tight squeeze, and I was much more likely to find myself stuck. I could die in there.
It would still be better than staying here with Sherman. I dug my fingernails into the joins between pieces of metal and began pulling myself up, bracing my feet and knees against the sides of the shaft for traction. All those laps around the mall were really paying off. Now all I had to do was hope that I would reach the top before my strength gave out completely, and that whatever was between me and freedom would be something I could easily move aside.
I didn’t know how good security usually was on things like “roof vents,” which struck me as a bad target for thieves. I also didn’t know how I was going to get down from the roof once I managed to get there. That was a problem for later; that was a problem for someone who was already free, and that meant that it couldn’t be a problem for me. Until I was outside, I was still Sherman’s captive.
With no other way of marking time, I started counting off seconds in my head, chanting, “One Mississippi, two Mississippi,” as softly as I could. The minutes blurred into an infinite number of Mississippis, leaving me no more certain of how long I’d been climbing than I would have been without the count. At least the act of saying the numbers aloud made me feel like I was doing something, and kept me from focusing on the increasing weakness of my arms. I’d never done anything like this before. If my grip slipped even the slightest bit…
As if the thought had created the action, my sweat-soaked palms slipped on the slick tin walls of the vent, and I slid abruptly downward for what felt like a mile before I managed to jam my feet hard enough against the vent’s sides to stop my descent. My heart was hammering so hard that it felt like it was going to break clean out of my chest, and I could taste the bright copper penny burn of adrenaline on my tongue. What would have happened if I’d fallen all the way down to the bottom? It’s not like there was a pillow waiting there to soften my landing. I would have been lucky to get away with something as small as a broken ankle.
For one dizzying moment I hung there, suspended and afraid, and thought about climbing the rest of the way down before I could plummet. I would go back to the dressing room. I would crawl back through the grate before anyone noticed I was gone and came looking for me. I would go back to my bed and sleep off this headache, and when I woke up, I would be able to think of a better escape route. One that wasn’t so risky. One that didn’t carry so many consequences for failure.