The Third Body
THEIR VIEW WAS blocked, so she couldn’t see what—who—was in that third bag right away. But boy, she had a hunch, and before that policeman stepped back, Emma shot a glance at Elizabeth. Their eyes locked and Emma just knew the other girl was thinking the same thing. Emma turned to Rima. “You were right,” she said.
“What?” Rima’s brows folded. Her arms tightened around Tony, who was more awake now, so maybe Rima had drawn enough from him after all. “What do you mean?”
“When you looked through the glasses at Meme,” Emma said, “and saw noth—”
That was when Meme started screaming, the sound like a spike. It was that loud. Beyond the cell, everyone was focused on that third body, and Meme. Bode kept trying to pull her back, but she fought, biting and kicking until he backed off.
“It is not right, it is not fair!” she shrieked. “This cannot be right! I am not a monster, I am not!”
The others jostled, like seagulls squabbling over a dead fish, and then Emma could see why Meme was freaking out.
The third body was Emma.
The third body was Meme.
“MEME, I’M S-SORRY, so sorry!” Doyle, the policeman, was blubbering like a kid who knew he’d done something he couldn’t take back, while, beyond, in the far cell, Meredith was shouting at McDermott: “You couldn’t let her go, you couldn’t let this die, could you? What were you thinking? A world built just for her? Your grand experiment? They’re things, they’re creations; you can’t set them loose.”
“And what are you?” McDermott roared. Snatching Meredith by the arms, he shook her hard. “I have been trying to set you free for years, across times, and still it’s never enough! I can’t save our daughter, and I can’t save you from yourself!”
“Meme!” Doyle held out his arms as if he expected a hug and a kiss would make everything all better. “You’re the last person I wish to harm!”
“But I am not a person! Can you not see?” Raging, mouth hanging open, she rounded on the creepy doctor. “What did you do, Kramer? Steal me from McDermott to see if you could breathe life into the clay of my body? Do better with me than you have accomplished with those … those things?”
Kramer said something, but Emma couldn’t hear what. It was chaos; except for those android-like things and the guy with the lumpy head, everything was a swirl, the perfect gambit for an escape except for the stupid iron bars, and Emma was thinking, If there was ever a time for Lara Croft. Then there was a flicker, way off to her left, and she turned.
Elizabeth was moving, darting for a table. No one except her saw; they were all clustered around the tables and Meme, with their backs turned, and the blanks and messed-up Weber … well, they didn’t count, probably couldn’t think. Elizabeth made a running grab for the glass pendant. As soon as she touched it, the glass began to glister and glow, and Emma’s heart gave a leap. It works for her, it works for her!
She scrambled to her feet. By her side, Rima started, called her name, but Emma was already flying across the cell. She dropped to her knees as the older girl dashed up. “What, what?” she asked.
“Here,” the other girl said, though her voice had a weird hum that reminded Emma of when Superior really got going right before a big storm and the wind grabbed the windows and made them brrrr. Elizabeth thrust the necklace through the bars. “Put this on, and don’t take it off!”
“Okay?” It came out as a question. This was not what she expected. Keys to unlock the cell—that would be good. Or a gun, a knife, something. But a necklace? Still, she slipped it on. To her, the chain looked like something soldiers used for dog tags, and those scraps of metal … was there writing on them? “But I don’t know …,” she began, and then realized that the glass hadn’t stopped glowing. There was something else happening, too, right between her eyes, under her lacy skull plate: the thump and throb of a new, fresh headache. Like I had right before crazy London Meredith showed up in my window at home. The same she’d felt when the secret door opened down cellar.
“Listen to me. There’s only time to say this once.” Elizabeth was talking low and fast. “When I say go, you go, understand?”
“G-go?” Emma felt Rima come up and drop alongside. “Go where?” she asked.
“It’ll be obvious.” Elizabeth flicked a quick glance over her shoulder. Following her gaze, Emma saw that none of the adults were paying any attention. Meme was shrieking; the McDermotts were shouting at each other; Doyle was screaming again. Lots of noise and plenty to distract them. By now, Chad had scurried over, half-dragging the other Tony. “But if this works,” Elizabeth said, “you have to go right away. Don’t look back, don’t hesitate.”
“If what works? What are you going to do?” Chad asked.
“Get you out.” The older girl drilled Emma with a look. “When the time comes, you grab only the other Tony and Chad, you hear me?”
“What?” She heard the high squeak in her voice. “I can’t leave Rima and—”
“No,” Rima said. “She’s right, Emma. We have to stay, Tony and I. This is where we belong, but not you.” To Elizabeth: “You’re Emma now?”
“Mostly, but we’re all here,” the other girl said. “Elizabeth, too, and she’ll still be here when this is done.”
“Done.” Emma stared. “What do you mean, done? Why aren’t you coming? Where am I going?”
“Don’t let her scream, Rima.” Elizabeth grabbed Emma’s wrist. “Honey,” Elizabeth said as, a second too late, Emma saw a flash of steel, “you’re going home.”
IF RIMA HADN’T slapped a hand over her mouth, Emma would’ve yelled plenty good and loud. The scalpel sliced a bright red ribbon on her palm, the pain like the thin line of a hot laser. Cheeks ballooning, she was still blowing the trapped ball of a scream when that steel flashed again as Elizabeth—the other Emma—cut herself, then slammed their bleeding palms together.
The sensation was an explosion, a black, icy rocket blasting through her body, racing from her toes to shatter through the top of her skull. Emma’s vision reddened. Orange spangles bloomed, and there was a rushing, almost metallic clatter in her ears, like hundreds of birds snapping their beaks at once. Her body went limp. She might even have passed out a split second.
“Hurry.” It was Rima, bracing her up. “Hurry, Elizabeth, now!”
“Blood of My Blood,” Elizabeth said. A dark red rivulet was threading from one nostril. “I bind you. Breath of My Breath, I invite you, I take you …”
Emma was having trouble breathing. There was a cold hand in her chest, working its fingers up her throat and down into her lungs, reaching around to cup and squeeze her heart. Another, very thin, slipped into her head; she could feel it walking her brain, picking its way across crevices and crooks before finding one very dark, very deep slit and worming its way in.
“Together, we are one and there are the Dark Passages and … and … that’s enough, Emma!” Grimacing, Elizabeth threw her head back as her face glimmered, the features rippling and shifting, now a boy, now a half-girl, now a scaled creature with a silver swirl for an eye. “That’s enough, Emma,” Elizabeth growled, her voice a good octave lower. “Don’t hang on too long. She only needs a suggestion. Now, let her go, let her go, let her …”
“Stop!” Rima wrenched their hands apart. “That’s enough!”
The icy fist gripping her heart melted away in an instant. That weird sense of a finger stirring and poking the meat of her brain eased, though it wasn’t quite … gone. It stuck there, the way a shred of pot roast got between her teeth, and she could feel a mental tongue sneak to worry it. In Elizabeth’s eyes, Emma saw the gold birthmark flare with rage and hunger, and Emma had the sick feeling she was the bunny and that was the wild animal out there ready to eat her alive.
“Sorry. Right.” Elizabeth glanced askance and Emma wasn’t sure the other girl was even talking to them. When she looked back, her eyes had cleared. She reached through the bars. “Rima, let me …” As the other girl hesitated, she said, “You saw Weber. My blood heals. It will help.”
“All right. Do it … ah!” Rima stiffened as Elizabeth pressed her bleeding hand against an open wound on Rima’s forearm. The contact was brief, no more than a second, but Emma saw Rima’s head rock back and then her eyes widen. “God, what …”
“Save Tony.” Elizabeth surged to her feet. “And make sure Emma goes, Rima.”
FIFTEEN SECONDS GONE.
Fifteen before Meme.