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Eli expected some sort of punishment for his antics. Yet no one stopped him when he entered the building, and no one bothered him as he made his way back to Ward Three. He passed technicians, orderlies, even an Enforcer.
They all just let him pass.
He made his way back upstairs to Ward Three. The doors did not require codes when coming from the opposite direction, which was nice, since Eli’s exhaustion was such that he might have fallen asleep in the stairwell rather than go and find someone to help him regain entry to his dormitory.
Mabel, Linus and Shane were all waiting for him when he returned. He’d expected it, but had also hoped to sneak in undetected. He did not wish to relive the night’s events. But they had just as much right to know what had transpired as he did, and so he comforted his sister as she broke down in sobs over Reggie’s loss.
Eli did not tell them about his odd encounter with The Mask. He was too tired.
Morning greeted him with the voice of an orderly calling out his designation. When they had passed by every lab with which he was familiar, he began to wonder if he was being brought to face the reckoning for his actions. As they drew close to an unfamiliar door, he heard voices within.
“...never gotten this far before, how exciting!”
“Never mind that, let’s worry about the here and now. Have you looked over these numbers?”
“They aren’t great.”
“Well that’s the understatement of the century.”
So this was it, then. Eli had made it to the seventh step. He would be the first. He found his gait slowing and felt the urge to make a break for it. His heart quickened, and he began to sweat. The orderly took no notice, opening the door and motioning for him to enter.
“W3V3-12?” one of the technicians asked. This was now what Eli considered a standard greeting.
“Yes, but—”
“No buts. We are in for a long haul here today, and we’re very eager to get started.”
“I understand,” Eli said, a wave of nausea rising up, “but—”
“Tsk, tsk,” the technician said, putting his hand on the small of Eli’s back and urging him forward. A long metal tube lay across the floor on four stout legs. It was covered in an array of buttons and panels, lights blinking. A retractable glass top peeked out from one side, and inside a thick, black sludge gave off a faint but unpleasant odor.
“Strip down, please,” the technician told him.
“Please,” Eli said, even while he found himself obeying the command. He had never imagined that he would greet his end with such politeness, such calm. No one had ever made it this far. Perhaps this was the destiny of which The Mask had spoken.
This was the final resting place of Eli Harper, corporate orphan turned lab rat. In a pool of black sludge, his epitaph little more than a printout of data points for future trials.
“Please.” He swallowed hard, trying not to break down all together. “I only want to...I just want to say...goodbye. To my sister.”
The technician gave him a quizzical look. “Goodbye?”
Eli gestured, defeated, to the tube. “No one’s ever made it this far, have they?” he said. “I heard you. I know the odds.”
The technician raised a surprised eyebrow. “We mustn’t have such a defeatist attitude,” he reprimanded. “W3V3-12—”
“Eli,” Eli said firmly. “If I’m going to die here, I’d like to at least die as Eli, and not as some stupid, arbitrary number.”
The second technician stepped forward. He was an older man. His hair was white and thinning, and his face held a grandfatherly expression that might have been comforting under different circumstances. “Eli,” he said, not unkindly, “you’ve made it this far because you are quite remarkable. If anyone can finish the treatment protocol, it’s you.”
Eli was quiet for a moment. “Finish?”
“Yes,” the older tech said with a nod. “This is the final stage. After this, it’s all over.”
“And then what happens?” Eli asked.
The man smiled and shrugged. “I guess we’ll see, won’t we?”
“Now,” said the first technician. “Enough talk. In you go. And the mask. There we are!”
Eli submerged himself in the thick, sticky liquid, which barely moved to acknowledge his jostling. His heart was racing now, and he felt tears burning in his eyes. He wanted to get out, to run. But that was foolish. He had run yesterday, hadn’t he? There was nowhere to go. There was nowhere to hide. If he were to meet his end here, he would not do it kicking and screaming. He would go with quiet dignity. He pulled the mask down, hiding the hot tears as they escaped his eyes and streamed down to meet the edges of the rubber lenses and pool against his cheeks. He felt guiding hands urging him to lay back, felt the breeze of the closing glass, felt panic at the liquid beginning to rise over his head.
And then the torment began. Compared to this, the fire chamber had been a walk in the park on a hot day. Eli felt as if the very atoms that made up his body were being ripped asunder. He knew, beyond a shadow of a doubt, that this was, indeed, the day that Eli Harper died.
Thoughts of Mabel, of Shane, of all else were wiped from his mind as the pain consumed him.
And Eli did scream.
* * *
THE AFTERLIFE, HE DECIDED, was not so terrible. A bit dark, perhaps. But it was peaceful, and he felt no pain.
Eli.
He was floating. Whether in the air or in the sea, it did not seem to matter. He drifted along, his body warm, his mind empty of all worries.
“Eli!”
Jolted from the warmth of his dream, he was jettisoned into a world that was too bright, too cold. He felt himself shaking uncontrollably and looked up at the faces surrounding him—blurry, unfamiliar faces. He shrunk away from them, scooting backward until he hit a wall and could go no further.
“Eli, what’s the matter?” said one of blurry faces. Then, “What have they done to him?”
“He’s suffering,” said a different voice.
“I’ll get him another blanket,” offered a third.
“L-leave me alone,” he whispered, his chattering teeth causing his words to come out in a stammer.
“Eli—”
“Stop calling me that!” he screamed, curling his head down into his knees, his wide eyes staring at nothing. “Stop calling me that,” he repeated in a sob.
So confusing. Nothing was as it should be. Who were these people? Why were they here? He wanted to go back to the quiet place. The floating place. Where no one bothered him.
He felt something brush against his ear. The touch was gentle but caused him to recoil in fear nonetheless. “Oh, Eli. What did they do to you?”
He pulled the blankets higher up around him as he felt the weight of the others leave the bed. They moved away, but he could hear them as clear as ever. He wanted to yell at them to stop shouting, but he also didn’t want to draw their attention again.
“This can’t go on,” one of them was saying. “Someone has to do something.”
Do something about what?
“Mabel, you know I’m on your side. But what can any of us do?”
“Shane’s right. There aren’t enough of us to make a difference. Look what they did to me.” There was a rustling of fabric and a low gasp.
Either the voices dropped or he tuned them out. He was staring at the underside of his blanket, fascinated by a strand of thread that had come loose. It was swaying back and forth, and it took a few moments for him to realize it was due to his own breathing.
“How many more of us have to die before they realize this isn’t sustainable?”
People are dying? That’s sad, I suppose. But it’s not so bad. I died, once.
They continued arguing, and the thread continued swaying.
“Look at your brother. He’s made it farther than anyone. That’s going to encourage them to ramp things up, not ease back.”
“I agree with Linus.”
There was a frustrated sigh and the sound of someone stomping around the room. “If you won’t help me, I’ll do it myself.”
“Mabel, you have three days left on your sentence. You are so close! I can’t let you do anything to jeopardize that.”
“I don’t care about that. I never intended to leave. I left him behind once, I won’t do it again. Look what they did to him, Shane! He’s my brother. My twin brother, and he doesn’t even know who I am!”
“And you think he’d want you to do something rash, if he were in a position to say so?”
There was a long pause. He reached up, grasping the thread between his forefinger and thumb and yanked it loose. It hung limply in his grip and he stared at it in alarm.
“Eli’s always taken care of me. I think, this time...it’s my turn to step up.”
* * *
THE NEXT HOURS WERE painful. Not physically—besides the insatiable chill, Eli felt fine. Rather, they were painful emotionally. His memory cleared, the fog lifting, but it came in fits and spurts, all jumbled up. Eli could not yet decipher what was real, and what was a dream. He could not be certain which memories had actually taken place, and which were made up. Some were abstract, while others were so vivid they might have been taking place at that very moment. In one such burst, Mabel appeared, squeezing his hand between both of hers. She had tears in her eyes as she tucked his blanket up under his chin, giving him a tender kiss on the forehead as their mother used to do when they were children. At least, he thought she had. He still couldn’t be quite sure. Mabel faded from view as he sank into this new train of thought, trying hard to determine if he had ever even had parents at all.
* * *
ELI’S EYES FLEW OPEN as he sat bolt upright in bed, the thin cover falling away. The room was empty, but there was some kind of commotion in the hall. He didn’t bother to put his shoes on before racing to the door, the soft slap of his soles against the cold tiles trailing behind him.
Opening it, he found himself immersed in chaos. One orderly lay on the ground, unconscious, and several of his dormitory mates were holding the double doors to his left shut as more people hollered on the other side, banging and shouting, demanding to be let through. Eli caught a glimpse of black through the glass door pane; an Enforcer. Whatever was happening, he’d slept through a good deal of it already.
“Eli!” shouted Simon, one of the boys with his back to the door, “help with the beds, and hurry!”
Eli rushed into the dormitory, but a quick glance showed no sign of his sister. He grabbed the cast-iron bed frame that several of them were struggling with, mindlessly flipping it onto its side and dragging it, single-handed, into the hall. He helped prop it against the double doors, and Simon wiped his forehead as he gave a grateful sigh. “Thanks! That should hold them, for a bit.”
“Simon,” Eli said, “what the hell is going on? What happened?”
Simon shrugged wearily. “We’re staging a coup,” he answered with a little wink that caused Eli’s frown to deepen.
“No, seriously. What’s happening? Where’s Mabel?”
“Well,” Simon said, glancing over his shoulder at the angry face of an orderly smooshed against the glass, “now’s not really the time to explain. If you wanted in on the action, you shouldn’t have slept for three days.”
“For...” Eli couldn’t believe his ears. He’d been asleep for three days? It had felt like mere hours. “Simon, you need to tell me where Mabel is. Right now.”
Simon gave Eli one more exasperated look. “She’s farther down,” he said, pointing in the opposite direction. “With Linus.”
Eli did not ask any more questions, turning and heading down the hall, stepping over the orderly’s prone form. He found the next set of doors wide open, one torn from its hinges, no doubt Linus’ work. Despite that many of them were at least somewhere in the transformation procedure, none had progressed far enough for this kind of brute strength but the two of them.
The halls were quieter in this direction. As Eli passed the rooms in which he had been subjected to every sort of test imaginable, he peered into the open doorways. Several of the rooms contained technicians or orderlies, tied to chairs or shoved into experimental chambers. Others were deserted. The one thing they all had in common was the destruction; everywhere he went, computer monitors were smashed, glass shattered across the ground. Eli crushed it underfoot, barely conscious of the pain as the tiny shards bit into his flesh. Bins full of papers burned unattended, and soon an alarm began to wail, no doubt signaling the perceived danger from the billowing smoke. A familiar flash of blond caught his eye.
“Shane!”
He called after the young man, who was dashing down a connecting hallway. Shane stopped, looking back. He was holding his rifle, something Eli had never seen him do inside the ward.
“Eli?” Shane asked, looking surprised. “You’re awake! And...you’re feeling...all right?”
“I feel fine, never mind me. What the hell is going on?”
Shane grimaced, glancing back in the direction he’d been heading. “Come with me,” he said, “I’ll explain on the way.”
Soaked with sweat and panting, Shane looked more scared than Eli had ever seen him. “Today was supposed to be Mabel’s transfer day.” As if Eli wasn’t already aware. “A whole new set of volunteers were arriving on the same transport that would have taken her back to Gables.”
Eli had a vague recollection of the conversation he’d overheard that first day back from his last treatment. “But she didn’t plan to leave,” he said. Shane nodded.
“The transports only come every three months. Security is lightest in the entire building during that time, because so many of them are called out to escort the new recruits. The military presence, myself included, was supposed to be guarding Belenus. Because, you know, all of the volunteers are hardened criminals, hell-bent on stealing Next Level tech.” He scowled. “I can’t believe I followed them so blindly for so long.”
“Now is not the time for introspection. You still haven’t explained what’s happened here.”
“Oh. Right. I was able to lift a few key cards over the last few days and get the necessary codes for Ward Three access. One of the guys in your dorm was a programmer’s apprentice. He used them to lock down the whole floor. Only there were still employees up here, but we’re dealing with them as we come to them. I was just on my way to check the entry points again. I wasn’t able to get any other weapons, so it’s down to me.”
“Then they might need you back by the dorms,” Eli told him. “There’s an Enforcer trying to get in.”
“Damn!” Shane stopped short and turned to Eli. “Listen, Eli, Mabel and Linus can tell you more. I’ve got to go help.” And with that, Shane sped off down the hall.
“Wait!” Eli called, too late.
This was madness. Suicide. How long could a programmer’s apprentice and a bunch of random kids hope to hold onto the floor? What purpose could it possibly serve? He quickened his pace, a trail of blood marking his passage through the shrapnel-strewn hallways.
“Eli!” Mabel called to him. “In here!”
They’d reached the stage seven laboratory, and Linus was grunting as he tried to force the cylindrical holding pod from its place, the black liquid sloshing back and forth reluctantly. He released his grip and turned to offer Eli a roguish grin. “About time you woke up,” he said. “I could use a bit of help here.”
Eli looked to Mabel, who urged him forward with a gesture of her hands. He stood beside Linus and, with a great heave, the machine began to come away. It groaned as it broke free of the bolts holding it to the wall, and both of them leapt backward to avoid the slow-moving sludge as it tipped out onto the floor.
“Mabel,” Eli said, grasping his sister by the shoulders, “what were you thinking? What have you done?”
“They’re going to have to start over,” she said, her voice betraying a hint of pride. “They’re going to have to think twice about doing this to anyone else, ever again.”
Eli shook his head. “The machines are nothing to them, Mabel. The computer programs, the software—with that, they can start again.”
Linus crossed his arms and shrugged, side-stepping away from the black puddle that was making its way toward him. “I wouldn’t worry about that.”
“We’ve erased everything,” Mabel told him excitedly. “We captured the head technician and made him do it. We watched.”
Eli felt his eyes widen in surprise. “How’d you convince him to do that?”
Linus grinned. “Took him to the fire chamber room. Told him if he didn’t help, I’d stuff him in and start pressing buttons. Turns out, he wasn’t much of a hero. Definitely didn’t think it was worth dying for.”
But Eli found it hard to share their enthusiasm at the chaos they’d caused. “And you think that guy is the only smart one here? You think you can outwit all of Cedar Grove’s greatest minds with a little trick like locking the doors? It’s just a matter of time before they regain access, Mabel. And then what?”
Her golden eyes flashed in defiance, and she raised her chin higher. “They won’t harm us,” she said confidently. “We’re all that’s left of their work.”
“They won’t kill us, maybe,” Eli agreed. “But they’re more than willing to harm us. They’ve proven that every day here.”
But Mabel was unconvinced. “We had to do something, Eli. This was the only idea we had. And everyone agreed to it. Everyone wanted to help. Even Shane.”
“Well, I didn’t agree to it.” Eli’s mind raced as he paced back and forth. “What are we going to do now?” he muttered, more to himself than anyone else. “What are we going to do...there’s no getting out of this now. But there has to be a way.”
An explosion rocked them, causing Mabel to fall back against Linus. He landed on his backside in the slick black film that had by now covered half the room.
“What was that?” Mabel asked, no longer sounding confident, but instead frightened. She barely seemed to notice the muck around her as she clambered to her feet, dripping with the slimy concoction.
“What is this?” Linus held up his black hands to stare at them in disgust. “It’s vile.”
Eli was at the door, watching the hall. “Try bathing in it.” Everything had gone quiet. “I’m going to see what happened.”
Mabel squeezed his arm, smearing black goo across his sleeve. “Be careful.”
Eli took off down the hall at a jog, instinctually keeping to the side and as quiet as possible, even though there was nowhere to hide. He peered around the corner that would lead him back to the dormitories and saw a billowing cloud of smoke rolling lazily along the ceiling. Below it, walking casually down the corridor, was The Mask.
Eli stepped out into the open. “What’s happened to my friends?” he called out, sounding bolder than he felt.
The Mask didn’t answer. He stood still, staring at Eli.
“It worked,” The Mask whispered, his voice full of awe. He approached slowly and Eli stood his ground. The Mask reached out and, to Eli’s further confusion, traced a finger along his ear. “At last,” The Mask continued. “I am no longer alone.”
Eli had no patience for flowery, enigmatic conversation with this madman just now. “What’s happened to my friends? Are they all right?”
The Mask nodded, his hand no longer touching Eli, but still outstretched, as if forgotten. “They’ll be fine,” he said dismissively. “Minor injuries. None will be harmed, I have instructed my men to treat them with dignity and respect.”
Eli could not stop a bark of skeptical laughter from escaping his lips. “Is that what you call what we’ve been forced to endure here? Dignity? Respect?”
The Mask turned left and right and sighed. “Eli, what have you done to my beautiful facility?”
“We’ve destroyed it,” Eli told him, glaring in defiance. “And good luck starting over.”
“Starting...over. Yes. That will take some doing, won’t it?” The Mask was nodding thoughtfully. “But the die has been cast. It has begun. There’s no stopping it now, no matter how much havoc you wreak upon the tools we use to get there. This is only one of many such facilities, Eli. Did you truly believe that I would put all of my hope, all of my dreams, into a single effort? When all of Values International is at my disposal? If so, you were mistaken. You and your friends have stopped nothing, accomplished nothing, with this petty act of vengeance.”
Eli’s heart sank. He did not trust The Mask, how could he? Yet the words had an air of truth to them. He did not feel as if this man were trying to deceive or mock him. He seemed to simply be stating a fact.
Mabel’s scream rang out behind them, tearing down the hallway like a specter and chilling Eli to the bone. The Mask snapped up, looking past him.
“Where is your sister?” he demanded, even as Eli had begun running back in the direction of the black sludge room.
There was a second scream, and then Linus called out, “Eli! Help!”
Eli skidded to a halt in the doorway where Linus was cradling Mabel in his arms. Her eyes rolled wildly and her body thrashed as she let out another blood curdling wail. “I don’t know what happened,” Linus said, his eyes wide and desperate. “She just...collapsed.”
The Mask pushed Eli aside. “She’s not far enough in the transformation process to come in contact with the solution,” he told Eli quickly, scooping the writhing form of Mabel out of Linus’ arms as effortlessly as though she were made of air. “We need to decontaminate her, now. It may already be irreversible.”
“Everything is destroyed.” Eli was panicking, unable to look away from Mabel’s convulsing form. “There’s nowhere—”
“Downstairs,” The Mask commanded, and then they were flying down the hallway, The Mask keeping several steps ahead. The nearest stairwell exit was still locked. “Eli!” The Mask barked.
Eli stepped in front of him, slamming into the door with such force that the single blow forced it open, the base of the door bent so that it screeched as it dragged across the floor. The Mask rushed down the stairs, Eli and Linus close on his heels. Eli found himself unable to think, unable to breathe.
They reached a glass enclosure and The Mask handed Mabel, who had gone limp, to Linus. “Quickly, now. Inside.”
Eli moved along the side of the enclosure, finding a panel full of buttons and levers. He tried to make sense of the words, but his mind was frozen. The Mask, however, had no such difficulty. He worked the controls with a calm decisiveness that made Eli angry. His sister’s life was at stake, yet the man showed no sign of nervousness or worry.
There was a loud hissing sound as the chamber began to fill with a thick haze. Nozzles on the ceiling began spraying some sort of yellow foam, and a temperature gauge on the control panel began ticking upward.
“Is that normal?” Linus called out, “It’s getting pretty hot in here.” Eli’s eyes wandered to the controls, but The Mask raised a hand.
“Leave it,” he commanded.
An eternity passed between the time Linus stepped into the enclosure with Mabel and the time that the haze began to dissipate. It was so thick that Eli could not see what was happening inside. He stood, pressing his hands against the hot, clear glass door, waiting...all he could do was wait.
The form of the two people inside slowly appeared, and The Mask released the door lock. Eli pulled it open, reaching out and taking his sister gently in his arms. Her form was limp, but she was still breathing. Linus was breathing in quick, panting breaths.
The Mask looked Mabel over with a quick, expert touch, looking at her pupils, her hands, feeling her pulse. At last he let out a deep sigh.
“It’s too late.” he said, his voice flat and heavy. “I’m afraid she isn’t going to make it.”
Eli shook his head. “No,” he said stubbornly. “You’re wrong.”
“These experiments...” The Mask explained, “they are exceedingly delicate. They cause disruptions and changes on a cellular level, they manipulate...DNA.” He pointed to Mabel’s hands, taking one in his own and turning the palm up. They were clean, but Eli could see deep scratches there, inflicted during the chaos upstairs. “Linus was ready for the next stage. His brief exposure was easily mitigated. Your sister, on the other hand...perhaps if it had only touched her...but those wounds gave it a clear path to her bloodstream. She is being changed from the inside in a way her body cannot sustain. Eli, Mabel is dying.”
Eli moved away, stepping into the nearest room and placing his sister on an empty cot. Mabel opened her eyes and hope flooded Eli. But they weren’t as brilliant gold as he remembered them to be. They seemed dull, faded.
“Eli,” she whispered, “I just wanted to...protect you.”
Eli nodded, forcing back tears and biting the inside of his lip until he tasted blood. “I know,” he managed.
“Don’t cry,” she told him weakly. “If you cry, I’ll cry.”
“I’m not.”
Mabel smiled, but it was faint. A shadow of her familiar, exuberant one. “Yes, you are.” Her frown came next, just as feeble. “I feel...strange.”
With some difficulty, she reached down into her pocket, carefully drawing something out. “It’s not finished.” She took a deep breath that seemed to cause her a great deal of discomfort. Her face twisted into a grimace.
“Don’t talk so much,” Eli chastised. “You need to rest.”
“I will rest...soon.” She held the little square up, just a few inches above the cot. Eli took it. It was small, the fabrics subtly different shades of white, strips interwoven into a delicate, simple pattern. “A strand from each of our tunics,” she said. “To bind us all together. I was weaving it for you. It was supposed to be a surprise, so I was going to...to add yours last.” She sighed. “You’re going to have to add your own, now, I suppose.”
Eli’s tears streamed down his face, cresting on the tip of his nose and falling hard and fast onto Mabel’s chest as it rose and fell with every increasingly labored breath.
“I don’t know anything about weaving,” he said. “I’d rather you finish it.”
Mabel offered another, smaller, smile. “I don’t think that I can,” she said. “I’m...too sleepy.”
Mabel’s eyes closed. Her breathing slowed.
And then she was gone.
“Someone’s coming!” Linus shouted from the hall.
Eli ignored him. He stared down at Mabel, waiting for her chest to rise again. She could not be gone, not really.
“Eli?”
He picked up Mabel’s limp hand in his own. So warm, still.
The sounds of boots approaching grew louder, and Eli knew he needed to go. It was the right thing to do, help his friends. Mabel had taught him that. She’d taught him everything.
Eli stepped out of the room in time to see Miles and company burst through the nearest door. Eli charged at him. He felt hollow, as if everything good in him had perished with Mabel. He didn’t want to go on living if she could not. She had always been the better person, always been a light for those in darkness. A world without his sister was a world he wanted no part in.
He leapt at Miles, a guttural snarl on his lips as he watched the recruit’s eyes widen, saw the barrel of his rifle rising up as if in slow motion.
“No!”
The Mask appeared out of nowhere, shoving Eli aside as a crack like thunder echoed through the room. An instant later the glass enclosure exploded, and Eli hit the ground hard as the tinkling glass hit the floor like a million tiny raindrops.
The Mask had Miles by the throat, high in the air. His rifle lay on the ground, his men watching the scene unfold in stunned silence.
“You and your contingent will leave,” The Mask said, his words heavy. “You will join the transport team, return to Next Level, and resign. Immediately.”
He threw Miles down and the boy scrambled backward on all fours, gasping. “But, but I—”
“GO!”
Miles did not argue further. He flipped over, pulling himself to his feet, and shoved past his men, who followed without a second glance.
The three who remained stood in silence for a long moment. “An interesting sensation,” The Mask said, reaching up to touch his shoulder, “dying.” His hand came away red.
Linus moved toward him to look closer and then scowled.
“You aren’t dying,” Linus growled. “It went straight through.”
Eli was not paying attention. He had turned back toward the still form of Mabel.
She looked smaller in death. So fragile, though she’d been the furthest thing from fragile in life. She’d been strong. Stronger than he was, that much was certain. Where he had looked inward for strength, she had gathered it from all around her.
The Mask came up behind him without a sound. “You should return to your ward, now.”
Eli shook his head furiously. “I won’t leave her,” he announced, louder than necessary.
“You are not abandoning her here, Eli. She is already gone.” The Mask let this sink in for a moment before adding, “You and your companions in Ward Three will not be punished for this insurrection. I think this loss will be punishment enough. But you will return to your dormitory. You will stay there until instructed. I will send word to have you brought down when Mabel is laid to rest.”
Eli looked at Linus, who shrugged. His expression was sympathetic, and tired. “Come on,” his friend said. “I don’t think we have much of a choice.”
Eli hesitated. “What about Shane?” he asked, knowing that Mabel would have wanted him to ask.
“That is a Next Level matter. His punishment is out of my hands.”
Eli’s hands balled into fists at his sides, and his words were defiant. “You said you run Values International. Next Level belongs to you, doesn’t it? Prove it. Make sure Shane isn’t sent back with Miles and the rest of the Next Level contingent. Reassign him here, make him a janitor, I don’t care. Just don’t let them do to him what was done to us.”
The Mask turned toward Eli, presumably studying him. “You are bold, I’ll give you that. To make such outlandish requests after having a hand in the destruction of my facility is quite audacious. However,” he said, turning away again. “I have learned that often, grave error is the necessary precursor to wisdom. Very well. I will see what can be done about Mr. Stokes. Now go.”
Eli moved mechanically to the dorm, following Linus without thought. An eerie silence had taken over the ward as the Cedar Grove security personnel worked to subdue the last of the rebellious subjects.
The dorm was a mess, but Eli’s bed had escaped the brief uprising unscathed. He sat, and Linus stood watching him. All of the inhabitants of Room 12 stood watching him. Battered and bruised and exhausted, they seemed to be looking for guidance.
He didn’t care. Eli ignored them, grasping the hem of his filthy sleeve. Tearing it, he rolled the resulting strip of fabric into a rope. He studied the square for a few quiet minutes, and then began his attempt to attach his strand to the others. Mabel’s knots were small and neat, whereas his were large and unwieldy.
“What are we going to do now?” Linus asked at last, sounding uncertain and afraid.
Eli did not look up from his work. He felt no need to do anything except focus on this one small task. Mabel had wanted him to finish it, and he would. And then he would honor her other wishes. No matter how hard it was, Eli would make sure her light did not vanish from the world. He was determined to keep his oath. The experiments would continue despite Mabel’s efforts, and he refused to believe she had died in vain.
He would take care of the others. He would teach them to rely on each other, to protect each other. He had failed Mabel, but he would not fail her memory.
“I’m going to finish what she started.”
Eli tied another knot.