Across the Universe

Other than Elder’s sharp intake of breath, the Recorder Hall is silent. We are facing off, Eldest near the door, me near the clay planets, and Elder in the middle, our mark in a tug-of-war game for the truth.



“Come on, Elder.” Eldest turns again for the door.



“What happened in the Plague?!” I shout at him. “What are you not telling us? You know—I know you know! Why can’t you just tell us the truth?”



At this, Eldest crosses the hall in three long strides and faces me. “This ship is built on secrets; it runs on secrets,” he says, tiny droplets of spittle flying from his mouth to my face. “And if you keep asking about them, you’ll see how far I’m willing to go to keep mine. Go to your chamber; I’ll have Doc deal with you this time. Come, Elder!” he bellows. Elder jumps and follows Eldest out the door, shooting me an apologetic look just before the doors close, leaving me in the darkened hall with the dusty models.



I don’t realize that my fists are clenched until I relax my grip, letting my fingers stretch out. I am shaking with rage. There is one thing I know for sure: I will find out whatever secret it is that Eldest is so determined to keep, and when I do, I’m going to shout it from the rooftops.



60



ELDER



NO SURPRISE: ELDEST LEADS ME STRAIGHT TO THE GRAV TUBES and the Learning Center. I take a seat at the table as if I am waiting for my lesson, but my mind is racing.



I know Amy thinks that I just meekly followed Eldest, an obedient dog trailing after his master. I could see the disappointment in her eyes as I left her in the Recorder Hall. I will have to let Amy think me weak; I will have to sacrifice her image of me.



Because that is what a leader must do.



I must play this game a little longer. Rely on Eldest’s perception that I am stupid and ignorant, on his contempt for my weakness. Not forever. Just long enough to break down the wall he keeps up between me and my role as leader on board this ship.



Eldest is crumbling. The argument with Amy, the way he’s so quick to lose his temper now, the sudden bursts of shouting and violence that have surfaced since the Season—Eldest’s cool, grandfatherly exterior is cracking, and his true self, his petty, power-hungry self, is leaking through.



When he was arguing with Amy, he looked foolish in his anger. He is just an old man clutching his power as tightly as he can. And all I have to do is poke at those cracks, and I will be able to break through and discover what it is he’s kept hidden from me for so long, why he never felt that he could share the secrets of the ship with me.



Although I was born Elder, for the first time I finally feel as if I can one day be Eldest.



Across from me, Eldest pinches the bridge of his nose between his eyes. “Why are you looking for this kind of information?”



“What kind of information?”



“Sol-Earth history, engine schematics, the Plague—what are you looking for?” His voice is tight and controlled, but barely.



“Why does it matter?”



“IT MATTERS!” Eldest roars, slamming his fists onto the table. I do not jump.



I force myself into the picture of calm. If I have learned one thing from Eldest today, it is this: Losing my temper will make me look foolish and childish. Instead, I speak slowly, calmly, and clearly, as if I were explaining something very simple. “I have begun to look for the information that you have refused to teach me. I am supposed to be the Eldest one day. If you don’t tell me what to do or what I need to know to rule, then I’ll just figure it out another way. If you’re going to stand there and be mad at me for looking for answers to these questions, then you have only yourself to blame; it’s your job to teach me these things first.”



Eldest’s face flushes pale, then purples. “Have you never thought I had a very good reason for keeping information from you?”



“No,” I say simply. “I have known you since I was a kid; you had a hand in every part of my growing up; I have spent the last three years living with you. What possible reason could you have for not trusting me with any information at all about this ship?”



“You think you know everything,” Eldest sneers. “You’re still just a kid.”



“You’re losing it,” I say calmly, tilting my head up at him. “You’re not in control anymore. Look at you. You’re raving. You’re not fit to be Eldest.”



“And you are?” Eldest is practically screaming, his voice rising to a painfully high pitch.



I shrug. “There must have been something in what Amy and I were looking up to make you get so angry. I wonder what it is ....”



Eldest is seething. I think to myself, Orion was wrong. You don’t have to be sneaky to get around Eldest. You just have to make him really frexing mad.



“It can’t be the history floppies; you’ve shown me them before. It must be the Plague.”



Eldest raises his head and faces me. His anger now is deep inside him, a burning coal in his stomach, one that he’s swallowed so I can’t see it anymore. “I haven’t talked about this in a very long time.”



I suck in my breath. “The Elder before me?” Eldest nods. “Did he die? Or did you ...” I can’t bring myself to ask the question.



“You want to know about the Plague?” he says in a terrible monotone. “Fine. Let me tell you about the Plague.”



He jumps to his feet, then shifts his weight off his bad leg. With both fists on the table, he looms over me, and I can do nothing but look up at him with meek eyes, waiting.



“Let me start with this,” Eldest says. “There was never any Plague.”



61



AMY



AFTER ELDER ABANDONS ME IN THE RECORDER HALL, I STAND there, alone in the dark. I’m not sure why Elder went with Eldest—I trust Elder, but not Eldest, and I thought Elder agreed with me about Eldest.



Under it all, always, deep inside of me, is a pulsing worry for my parents, a constant desire to find the killer and to protect them, as ingrained in my being as my heartbeat. A wave of fear washes over me. My leg muscles tremble, but I can’t tell if it’s because they want to run, or because they want to collapse from under me.



“Amy?”



I bite back a shout of surprise.



“It’s Orion,” he says, striding from the shadows behind the model of Earth.



“Where were you before?” I ask. “I thought I saw you ...”



Orion smiles sheepishly at me. “I was looking at the wi-com locator, just for fun, you know. I saw Eldest was nearby. I ... I don’t get along well with Eldest. I thought it might be best for me to lie low until he was gone.”



“He hates you, too, huh?” I ask. Orion nods. “What’d you do?’



“It’s mostly just the problem of my existence.”



“Yeah, me too.”



Orion brushes his hair out of his face, and I see a flash of white: a scar trailing up the left side of his neck.



“I’ve been meaning to ask you,” Orion says, “I’ve seen you running and ... what are you running from?”



He’s the second person to ask this, but I think he means something different from the girl in the rabbit field.



“I’m not sure,” I say, “but I think I’m tired of running now.”



“Yeah.” Orion glances behind him, into the Recorder Hall. “Me too.”



“I better go,” I say, even though I don’t have anywhere to go. I just know I’m not going to stay here, stagnant, afraid to move, cowering in the shadows of unreachable planets.



“I’ll see you soon,” Orion calls after me.



I don’t run back to the Hospital. I walk. I won’t let myself enter the zone where my body’s movement drowns out my brain’s thoughts. I force my feet to go slowly so that my mind can race.



The air is humid in the Hospital garden. If I was on Earth, I would think that it was about to rain—but I’m not on Earth, and rain here is nothing but sprinklers in the sky.



“Leave off,” an elderly voice behind me says. “I can walk up the stairs on my own.” I turn, curious. This elderly voice has an inflection of knowledge and insight to it—and I recognize it. Steela. The woman who dispersed the crowd of Feeders in the City, on my first run after I woke up.



“Yes, Mother.” The younger woman speaking is not like her mother. She has the same dead monotone that Filomina used when I observed her examination by the doctor.



Steela catches my eyes with her cloudy ones, the color of milk mixed with mud. She looks warily at me for a moment more, then her wrinkled lips spread into an even wrinklier smile. Her teeth are stained and crooked, and I can smell onions on her breath, but still it’s a nice smile. It’s a true smile.



“Mother,” the woman says again.



“Shut up, you,” the old woman says pleasantly. “I’ll just be a moment.”



“All right, Mother.” The woman stands perfectly still, like a windup toy that has run out of windup. She’s not upset in the least with her mother’s rude words, and she seems perfectly at ease with merely standing.



“Nice to see you again,” I say, extending my hand.



Steela’s grip is firmer than I’d expected. “Wish I could say the same. I hate this place.”



“Mother,” Steela’s daughter says pleasantly. “We should get you to the Hospital now.”



Steela looks defeated and defiant at the same time.



“Mother.” The woman’s voice is needling, but pleasant. Perfectly pleasant. Perfectly creepy.



“I’m coming!” Steela sounds like an angry child, but she just looks like a sad old woman who is too aged to make decisions for herself.



“I’ll take her,” I say before I really think of what I’m saying. “I mean, I was going there anyway, no problem.”



The daughter blinks. “If it is amenable to you, Moth—”



“Yes, yes, it’s amenable. Now go.” Steela watches her daughter leave. “Frexing shame, watching your daughter become one of them.” I open my mouth to ask who they are, but Steela’s a step ahead of me. “One of them brainless twits. They labeled me crazy when I was twelve, trained me up to be an agriculturalist.” She gazes at the garden behind the Hospital as I lead her to the steps. “I made that garden. Weren’t nothing but shrubs and weeds till I came. I’ve been takin’ them little blue-’n’-white pills ever since. But I don’t mind. Rather be crazy taking drugs than empty like that. Kind of wish me daughter was crazy, too. Might like her more then.”



Empty. What a good way to describe them.



“Heard about you on the wi-com,” Steela says, taking my arm. Her grip on my elbow is strong, belying her gnarled fingers. “Don’t reckon you’re what they said you were.”



“I reckon you’re one of the smartest people on this ship.”



Steela snorts. “Not smart.” She looks up as we reach the doors. “Not smart at all. I’m just scared, is all.” She grips my elbow tighter, somehow finding the thinnest skin to dig her fingernails into. I want to pry her fingers from my arm, but when I look down at her, I can tell that she’s using me as a lifeline, and I’m not going to be the one to let her drown.