She stops so abruptly I feel like I’ve lost my hearing. I open my eyes. All the nearest sleep shells have red lights above them now. The soft whirring of the fan in the oculus is the only sound. Another red light goes on nearby, and another.
The dreamers know I’m here. I’ve disturbed them. We’ve disturbed them. A dull thump comes from my left, and when I look over, a hand is pressed to the glass lid of a nearby sleep shell, one with a red light. I step over to look inside just as the hand slips down, leaving a sweaty smudge. Inside, the dreamer’s face is slack. He’s a young man, not much older than me. He has the same gelled eyes and blank expression as all the rest, but I have to believe he was signaling to me.
“We have to help them, Arself,” I say. “What can we do? Tell me.”
Her anxiety buzzes inside me like a subterranean swarm of bees, but I can’t decipher a clear train of thought.
Then I hear a popping noise, and a sharp pinch stings my neck.
My head whips toward the sound, and near the nine o’clock arch, Berg is lowering a small tranquilizer gun. My fear skyrockets. I touch my fingers to the sting and pull a small dart out of my skin, along with a smear of blood. I duck behind the nearest sleep shell, but it’s already too late. A fizzing slowness is invading my blood.
No! Arself says. Not this. Run, Rosie! Don’t let him get us!
A rush of jacked-up adrenaline courses through my veins. For a moment, it seems to negate the effects of the tranquilizer, but when I try to take a step away, I sag to the floor, landing on my hands and knees. A fluff of purple mist drifts away from my hands.
“She’s over here,” Berg calls.
His footsteps grow louder, and then he’s standing above me, a grim, loathsome man. His sandy blond hair is haloed in blue by the light from the nearest sleep shell. His glassy, piggish eyes seem paler than ever, and the fine ridges of his lips and nose stand out in sharp detail.
“You should have answered my calls,” he says.
I cringe, trying to crawl away from him under the sleep shell, but he moves nearer, planting his shoe in front of my face. I am not going to be in Berg’s power again. I can’t let this happen. I’d rather die.
As my cheek slumps against the floor, I breathe in the vinegary taste of the mist.
Help me! I say to Arself, pleading.
Whatever you do, don’t tell him we’re here, she says.
I can barely answer her. I might not have a choice.
We’ll have a choice. Be strong.
27
FEAR
HEAVY AND LIMP, I’m unable to resist as Berg picks me up, but I muster the last of my strength and swipe my fingernails at his face.
He reels back. “Stop that,” he says, and crushes my arm down.
I wince at the pain, but I’m pleased to see a narrow stripe of blood rising on his left cheek, marring his ruddy complexion. He carries me in his arms like a giant baby, and I manage to turn my face away from his chest. This is exactly what I didn’t want to have happen. Why was I so stupid?
Berg stalks toward the nine o’clock arch, and with my last glimpse of the vault of dreamers, I notice that more of the lights have turned red. When Berg carries me around the corner into the operating room, I see Linus stretched out on one of the operating tables. His eyes are closed and he’s not moving. My heart sinks. Berg lowers me onto the neighboring table and ties my wrists down, but not before I see the three other doctors busy with prep. Anna, beside Linus, is putting on surgical gloves. Jules taps the computer. Kiri closes an incubator at the back of the room with a soft thud and turns toward us. The only one missing is Whistler.
“Tell Ian we found her,” Berg says. “He can come down and join us.”
“He’s having fun with the special effects,” Jules says.
“He’ll want to see her. Tell him to come down,” Berg says.
Jules reaches for a phone and speaks quietly into it.
“You need to let me go,” I say. “Linus, too. You can’t keep us down here.” I turn to Kiri. “Shouldn’t you be helping the other dreamers? Are you just going to let them all die out there?”
“It’s too late for them,” Kiri says softly. “We’ll get others.”
“Knock her out,” Anna says. “Let’s be done with it.”
“No. I want you to see what I can do,” Berg says. “She’s better conscious, and since this is going to be the last time, we have to make it count.”
Fear runs through me. “Don’t listen to him,” I say. “He’s a monster. You don’t have to do what he says. Let me go!”
“Work yourself up,” Berg says. “Go on.”
I grit my teeth and pull against my restraints. “He’s going to ruin all of this for the rest of you,” I say to Anna and Kiri. “All of your work. The police are going to come.”
“The police don’t care,” Anna says.
“Anna? The helmet, please,” Berg says.
I wrench my head to the side, but Berg firmly tips my head up and Anna settles a helmet around my skull. It’s the same kind of helmet Berg has used on me before, and my stomach rolls with nausea. The rubber nubs are settled into my ears, and I hear the winch as he tightens the padding. Each small, fidgety adjustment heightens my panic.
You have to me help me! I say to Arself.
She doesn’t reply.
Berg turns to his computer console and touches the keypad. A dozen different prongs extend in from the helmet until they touch my scalp and prickle into my skin. I don’t remember them from before, and they hurt. The glare of white lights from above makes me squint.
“Too tight?” Anna asks.
“No, that’s just right,” Berg says. Then he turns to me. “I want you to think of something that frightens you. Like the fact that I have your parents hidden away here at Grisly. They’re not doing well.”
My heart leaps in terror.
“Very good,” Berg says.
“You’re despicable,” I say.
He lifts a thin wire before his face and inspects the end. With gloved fingers, he screws a tiny, flexible needle onto the wire. “Now I want you to think about Linus. Our very own Linus, right here beside you.”
My heart pricks again.
“See this?” Berg says, nodding toward his computer.
“Impressive response,” Jules says. “You should attach.”
“Soon,” Berg says, turning the wire slowly where I can see it. Then he sets it aside and holds up a small jar that contains a shimmering substance, a thick, viscous liquid that seems to flash with miniature lightning. “Guess what this is.”
“I have no idea,” I say.
Berg smiles. “This,” he says, “is a failure. A very special failure. It’s a dream seed that I donated myself, but it isn’t purely mine. It’s been mixed with some of your dreams. In other words, it’s a hybrid, with your special kind of resilience. I brought it with me all the way from Iceland.”
“Why is it a failure?” I ask.
“Because I’ve tried it already,” he says. “I’ve been seeded with this hybrid to see if it can arrest and repair my Huntington’s, and it didn’t work. Apparently, the damage is already too great.”