FOR WHAT SEEMED LIKE uncontained infinity, stars whirled and called out inside Nellie’s head, heat built inside her body and her vibratory rate continued to increase. Then the stars vanished and she saw what appeared to be level after level rapidly materializing and dematerializing around her. The first few resembled the laboratory scene she’d just left, with lab-coated men shouting at her from beyond birdlike machines. But before she could tell what was happening to her doubles, she’d passed through the nine fixed levels and entered what appeared to be a world of ancient broken-down buildings occupied by gargoyles. Next, a realm of darkness and fire materialized, inhabited by the looming figures of demons. This passed, and she was surrounded by humanoid reptilians that watched her through cold predatory eyes. Then they were gone, and she’d entered a landscape filled with vivid, strange-singing birds.
On and on Nellie traveled, her vibratory rate continuing to increase as she passed through levels as exotic as they were different. One moment she faced figures of blue spiraling smoke, the next she was surrounded by entities that leapt and danced with the jagged radiance of lightning. Finally she jerked to a halt, teetering in the rush and whirl of her own mind, and tumbled forward. Sobbing, she pressed against the ground beneath her, holding onto it with her body, begging it to remain in place. When nothing changed and her vibratory rate remained constant for several minutes, she opened her eyes and sat up.
She was immediately conscious of heat and a mild thrumming sensation. Squinting against a brightness that seemed to come from everywhere, Nellie gaped at the surrounding landscape. In the distance a row of high white cliffs hemmed a gleaming lake, and an abundance of glittering transparent vegetation grew everywhere, giving off flashes of prismatic light. Trees stretched into impossibly delicate shapes and flowers were patterned like snowflakes. Under her feet was something that looked and felt like sand, but glowed like tiny crystals.
Reaching down to scoop some of it into her palm, Nellie gasped and lifted both hands to her face. Glittery and transparent, they glowed like the surrounding landscape, as did the rest of her body. Sticking out her foot, she watched it give off a flash of brilliant multi-colored light. Upon entering this level, her entire body appeared to have been transformed into a crystalline substance that matched the landscape. Just like, Nellie thought, excitement catching in her throat, when I’m shapeshifting and I turn into a crystal girl.
As she turned her hands, watching them sparkle, she became aware of a mild thrumming sensation that seemed to be coming from her body. Kneeling, she pressed her hands to the sand and felt it emitting the same quick pulse. This was obviously a level vibrating at a very high rate—even the air seemed to shimmer and hum. Touching her throat, Nellie felt her pulse racing at three times the normal rate and yet she didn’t feel tired or overwhelmed.
Turning, she saw Deller and his mother lying nearby, their eyes closed. Though their bodies had also been transformed into a crystalline state, their limbs were dull, without the gleaming luminescence of her own. Gently Nellie patted their faces. When neither stirred, she pressed the inside of their wrists and felt their pulses also racing at three times the normal rate, but harsh-edged and erratic.
“Deller,” she shouted. Taking him by the shoulders, she gave him a good shake, but his eyes remained closed, his mouth slack and open.
“They’ll be dead in a couple of hours,” said a voice behind her, and Nellie whirled to see her crystalline double standing several feet away. As with everything in this place, the girl’s transparent body glimmered and thrummed. Dressed in a short white tunic and sandals, she cocked her head to one side and observed Nellie curiously.
“No, they won’t,” Nellie snapped back, surging to her feet. “I won’t let them.”
Her double shrugged and tossed her long glowing hair, then turned and pointed a short ways off to several humps in the ground. “That’s where we buried the others,” she said nonchalantly. “They show up every now and then; we don’t know from where. Never even wake up, just lie there and die.”
Nellie’s eyes f licked desperately over the row of humps, counting. Nine. Had they all been children sent here by the birdlike machines? “Deller can’t die,” she stammered. “Or his mom. They’re my friends.”
“We’re all friends here,” her double shrugged. “You’ll see.”
“What if I give them some water?” Frantically Nellie pointed to the far-off gleam at the base of the cliffs.
“They can’t drink it,” her double said carelessly. “We’ve tried, but it won’t go into them. They’re not made for it. I think you’re okay though,” she added. “If you weren’t, you’d be out of it like them. Besides, you look like me, so you’re probably someone who was supposed to be with us but got lost. I bet it won’t take long for you to learn oneness.”
“Oneness?” Nellie asked warily, but instead of answering, her double reached out and touched her arm.
“Come,” she said, and instantly Deller, his mother and the glittering landscape vanished. Before Nellie could even blink, she found herself standing inside a large room. Clear crystalline walls arced upward into a single point and thrummed quietly. Through them she could see the white cliffs, shrunk to pinpoint size and decidedly further off. With a flash of panic she pivoted, seeking her double, and found herself facing a crowd of crystalline children and adults, all dressed in white tunics. And, Nellie realized, all giving off the same quick thrum she felt coming from everything else.
“Yes,” said her double, stepping out of the luminescent crowd and nodding to her. “What you’re feeling is the oneness of this place. We’re all one here—the air, the sea, the land, the animals and the people. When one of us has a thought, we all have it. When I wish for something, we all receive it. There’s no discord here, we understand each other completely and we share everything.”
Startled, Nellie stepped back. “You read my mind,” she whispered.
“When you have a thought, we all have it,” her double repeated. “You’ll learn to receive our thoughts too, you’ll see.”
Behind her the glimmering crowd shifted and thrummed excitedly. A scowl crossed Nellie’s face and she slitted her eyes at them, wondering if they were in the process of sharing one of their thoughts. If so, it was probably about her. Uneasily she took another step back. “That’s very interesting,” she said, scavenging her mind for something polite to say. “But I have to get back to my friends and help them. If you don’t mind—”
“They’ll die,” her double said dismissively, “and we’ll bury them. Forget them. We’re your friends now. You’re one with—”
“Yes,” Nellie snapped, her panic getting the better of her. “Fine, you’re my friends, that’s just fine. Now will you please tell me how we got here, so I can get back—”
“I thought us here,” said her double with a look of surprise. “How else do you travel?”
“You thought ...” Nellie stared around herself in bewilderment. “You mean you had a thought and it happened, just like that?”
“Of course.” Her double stared back with equal bewilderment as a confused-sounding thrum rose from the glimmering crowd behind her.
“So if I thought—,” began Nellie eagerly, but her double cut her off with a wave of the hand.
“You can’t think someone alive when he’s dead,” she said. “It has to be something that can happen. Your friends can’t carry the vibrations of this place. It’s too fast for them.”
“But they can’t die,” Nellie shouted, her fear splitting wide open. “They took care of me, they loved me, they’re the only ones who even looked at me after my mom died. What about the rest of you?” she demanded, turning to the crowd that pressed close, listening anxiously. “Why don’t you say something? Will you help?”
“They don’t talk,” her double said quickly. “We don’t need to. We communicate through thoughts, like I told you. I’m only talking to you now because you haven’t learned oneness with us yet. When you do—”
“I don’t want to learn oneness!” Eyes slitted, Nellie backed away from her double. “I’m not one with you, I’m one with myself.”
Hey, don’t get uptight. The voice spoke inside Nellie’s head, shimmering like light. Startled, she glanced around, seeking its source, and saw the crowd part to let a second girl through. Coming to a halt beside Nellie’s double, the new girl watched in amusement as Nellie’s eyes darted between the two figures standing before her. With their long blond hair and sarpa eyes they were almost identical, but a closer inspection showed the second girl’s face to be narrower, her lips fuller and as well a tiny mole that sat on the right side of her neck—all in all, she was a mirror image of the photograph of Nellie Joanne that had been in the Breeding Program file folder.
“Are you another double?” Nellie asked hoarsely.
I’m Nellie Joanne, said the voice inside her head. What’s a double?
“But aren’t you in the Black—?” Nellie faltered, then stopped. No, that question didn’t make sense. This wasn’t a fixed level, so there wasn’t any Black Core Program here, and neither of these girls had scars on their scalps. Hungrily she watched them. They stood so naturally together, as if nothing would ever change it. Almost angry, she blurted, “Where’s your mother?”
“Dead,” said her double easily. “But we have many mothers here. What does one matter?”
A giant ache blew through Nellie and she swallowed hard. “How did she die?” she asked finally.
“She was standing beside me about a year and a half ago, and she just fell down,” said her double casually. “Then her body disinte-grated into the sand crystals from which we all come.”
Nellie closed her eyes and stood for a moment, just letting her pain be. So, it looked as if Lydia Stella Kinnan had died simultaneously in every level. Dead was dead was dead, there was no getting around it. Deller, she thought in renewed panic, coming back to herself. I’ve got to get back to him.
“Will you help me?” she asked, ignoring her double and appealing to Nellie Joanne’s. “Deller’s heartbeat is way too fast, and his mother was hurt before we got here. I’m scared they’re going to die. If you could just think me back—”
They’re not one of us, her twin’s double shrugged. Let them die and become one with—”
Shock swept through Nellie and she staggered backward. “How can you say that?” she screamed. “They love me, they’re the best people in my whole level—”
“Level?” interrupted her double with a frown. “What’s a level?”
“It’s another place,” faltered Nellie. “Different from this one. It’s where I come from. You all live there too, except your lives are very different there. In that level ...” She looked directly at her double. “... you’re like me. I’m you.”
Her double scowled in open confusion, and then her face cleared and she shrugged. “Of course,” she said. “We’re one.”
“No,” said Nellie. “Not like that. We’re the same person, but—”
She stopped and stared at the two girls. They looked happy and had no scars. Their world seemed peaceful and safe and was filled with such beauty. Turning, Nellie gazed through the crystalline walls toward the white cliffs that shimmered in the distance. She could feel the thrum deepening in her body, pulsing through her blood. What her double said was true—she was adapting, she could stay here if she wanted. Deller and his mother would die, but it would be like going to sleep. They probably wouldn’t even wake up and she would finally be safe, free of the Interior, with somewhere to sleep and food to eat. Sure, it was kind of a dumb place. The whole level was like a mindjoy, with that trancelike thrum going on all the time. But maybe she could handle it. She might even learn to like being a bunch of thrumming crystals and becoming one, whatever that meant.
But hadn’t her mother died fighting the oneness of the Interior? Hadn’t she been killed for thinking differently than the people around her?
Nellie turned back to the glimmering crowd and stared at them. They returned her stare, their eyes fixed on her like a single pair of eyes, the same expression of detached curiosity sharing every face. But it wasn’t their obvious sameness that had the warnings running lightfooted up the back of Nellie’s neck. It was something entirely different—an invisible presence that hovered over the group and seemed to be reaching toward her, though not a single person could be seen raising their arms.
Tuning into the molecular field, she saw it—a mass of bright prismatic light that glowed in the floor and the walls and reached up into the crowd, completely engulfing it. Though she squinted fiercely, not a single individual figure could be seen within it. As her double had said, the crowd standing before her was one—not only with each other, but with the walls, the floor and the entire landscape that surrounded them. And even, Nellie realized in horror, glancing at her own body, with herself. No matter how she squinted and peered, all she could see where her arms and legs should have been was more of the all-pervasive brilliant light. With a shudder, she tuned back into solid reality and watched the crowd take on the illusion of separate bodies.
“You’re ... not me,” she stammered, turning to her double. “And you’re not my twin,” she said to Nellie Joanne’s double. “And somehow you’re putting me into a trance, stopping me from thinking normal, so I’ll forget about Deller and let him and his mom die. That’s not oneness. Real oneness is listening to everything around you and loving it—the people, the air, even the dirt in the ground. You don’t forget about people and let them die, and you let them think different from you if they want to. You don’t have oneness, you have sameness. And sameness is evil. This whole place is evil.”
As Nellie spoke she stepped back, and the crowd surged after her as if drawn by an invisible string. The thrumming sensation deepened within her body, and she thought she heard a delicate chorus of voices speaking deep within her mind. Be one with us,they singsonged. Come and be happy with us. We feel nothing but joy and peace. We’ll lift you up—
Focusing on her fear, Nellie picked it up and threw it directly at the gleaming crowd. A startled hum rose from them and they drew back, scattering. Instantly Nellie felt herself released from an invisible hold. Think, she told herself fiercely. Think of Deller and his mom. Closing her eyes, she pictured their sprawled forms and took a running step forward. A rushing sensation filled her head, and then it faded and she was standing in the crystalline sand, staring at the far-off cliffs. At her feet lay Deller and his mother, stretched out and motionless.
With a sob she fell to her knees and felt their wrists. A faint, barely discernible rhythm pulsed against her fingertips, and she almost swooned with relief. Gripping their hands, she whispered, “It’s all vibrations. This place is just a different pack of vibes from home. And what we passed through to get here—that’s all vibrations too. I just have to find the trail.”
Desperately Nellie scanned the surrounding molecular field, squinting at its brilliance. There had to be a seam in it somewhere, some kind of gate to mark their entry point. Sending her mind back and forth, she probed the radiant play of energy. Abruptly her mind snagged on something and she sent her thoughts back over the area, scanning it. Yes, she could feel some kind of seam, and when she probed the vibes along it she picked up traces of Deller, his mother and even a slight whiff of the Temple of the Blessed Heart.
Swiftly Nellie sent her mind into the seam and drew it open, then grunted and ducked as a scream of pain hit her. Her mind reeled, swimming in the aftershock, and she realized she’d just opened a freshly created gate. At their entry into this level, they must have unwittingly torn open part of this skin’s soul.
Well, there was nothing she could do about it now. Wrapping her arms tightly around Deller and his mother, Nellie closed her eyes and pictured the three of them passing through the gate. Again a rushing sensation filled her head and then she was passing directly into the gate’s pain. Briefly her mind buckled and every molecule in her body seemed to cry out in fear, and then the gate and its torment were behind her and the levels were once again flashing past. Ignoring panoramas of angels and lightning like beings, Nellie tightened her arms around Deller and his mother and hung on. “Please, blessed Goddess, Mother of us all,” she whispered as strange exotic animals took shape about her, then humanoid reptilians and demons. Hear my prayer, Ivana, hear my prayer.
Finally the fixed levels appeared, laboratory after laboratory zooming by, and then a completely familiar range of frequencies surrounded her. Jerking to a halt, she felt the floor solidify beneath her knees and looked up to see several men staring at her from the other side of a birdlike machine. Along the far wall, four small children could be seen standing listlessly, watching their own feet.
The kids in the van, Nellie thought quickly. The men must have brought them inside to wait while they stood guard, hoping for her return.
Abruptly, one of the gaping men was shoved aside and a green-robed figure reached around the stem of the nearest birdlike machine and flicked the on-off switch. The machines’ dense hum shut off and a brief silence descended on the laboratory.
“Gotcha,” said the high priest of the Temple of the Blessed Heart, a grin twisting his face.