Toxic Dust (The Deviant Future Book 1) Read online

  “Know? Because it’s my job to know. But you are unexpected.” Merr settled in her chair and didn’t say anything for a moment. When she did, it took Laura by surprise. “Have you been outside the dome?”

  “Not since I was transported here.”

  “Perhaps you came in contact with something from the outside.”

  “No.”

  “When was the last time you had a full screening? Blood, scans, everything.”

  Laura blinked. “At my last physical, Merr.”

  “Which is yearly?”

  “Every three now since I hit twenty-five.”

  “And you are twenty-seven now. More than two years since your last exam.” Merr’s lips clamped tight. “You will submit another sample. Today.”

  “Is something wrong with me?”

  “No one gave you leave to question.” Merr slapped something onto her desk and spoke to the surface. “Bring her to the lab. I want a full screening done. Tissue, blood, hair, full scan.”

  “Full? What for?”

  Laura didn’t react as Tawnt Odelle’s voice emerged from a speaker, but she did listen. Why was Merr so interested in her health?

  “Yes, full. And then test the rest of the sawrs. Could be she’s a fluke, a late bloomer. Maybe we’ve been getting false negatives. I want to know by the end of today.” Merr took a pen and began to write as the door swung open.

  “Let’s go.” The tawnt signaled, but as Laura rose, she couldn’t help but ask.

  “What’s wrong with me? Am I sick?”

  “Do we have to gag you?” Merr snapped. “Sawrs should reply only when spoken to.”

  “We’ll remind her of her manners, Merr,” Tawnt growled. “Come along.” The sharp grip of her arm and the yank snapped her jaw shut.

  There would be no answers forthcoming, but the questions brimmed within. Did they think she had the Toxic Wasting Disease? Didn’t it start with the mind? Followed by the lungs. No one actually knew for sure.

  She was brought to an infirmary much larger than the one in her dorm. She was placed on a bed, the privacy panels drawn around her area. Machine arms emerged from the walls to draw samples, meaning she had no one to ask questions as they took her blood. They even took samples of hair and nails. Embarrassment came at the urine sample she had to produce in front of Tawnt Odelle in a provided cup.

  Then she was placed in a solitary room with only a thin mattress for a bed to provide comfort. A scratchy blanket and no light. In the darkness her fearful imaginings multiplied.

  She’d be whipped for sure. Flogged until her back resembled raw meat.

  And it was utterly unfair. The Creche would punish her as if she’d failed somehow. Yet she’d only sought to protect the other children The Merr knew she told the truth.

  Knew what had happened in that room. Not been surprised one bit. Because she knew Horatio had a strange power.

  It was that realization that made her suddenly grasp why no one ever returned to the nurseries once they left. So they couldn’t tell the others.

  I’m going to die.

  That thought like no other finally turned her religious. She prayed all that night. On her knees, eyes shut, and hands clasped.

  “The Creche is life. Life is good. Serving the Creche makes a good life better.”

  But no one answered. Her meals arrived through a slot in the door with no warning or kind word. She didn’t dare disdain the bounty given her. She ate the slop, drank the chalky water, and prayed some more.

  By the time someone finally came to visit Laura, she had sobbed herself hoarse, rubbed her knees raw, and resigned herself to whatever fate was in store. She felt as if she were in a fog, all her senses dull.

  The Merr herself stood in the doorway, towering over Laura where she cowered on the floor. “Sniveling and weak.” The disdain appeared in the sniff. “And yet the blood doesn’t lie. At least not this time it didn’t.”

  “I’m sick?” she asked hoarsely.

  “Far from it. And because of our mistake, there is a lot of scrambling to track certain possibilities down.”

  The enigmatic words didn’t make anything any clearer. “What’s going to happen to me?”

  “Get up and you’ll find out. You’re leaving.”

  “Leaving?” she repeated, pushing herself to her feet. “Are you banishing me from the Creche? Please, don’t. I am sorry for whatever I did.”

  The snort came from Tawnt Odelle who waited outside the cell. “You’re not being punished, more like promoted with a relocation.”

  The news made little sense. “Where?”

  “You will be taking up a position within the Incubaii Dome,” Merr announced.

  The statement brought a frown. “Isn’t that where babies are made?”

  A nebulous concept only whispered about. Some said it involved machines and fluids and some weird mix of ingredients to create a child. More science than she understood. Why send her there?

  “It is not your place to question why you’ve been deemed worthy to become a Madre,” the tawnt declared, and yet she wore a sneer.

  Laura frowned and, despite being warned, couldn’t keep her mouth shut. Not with her life being turned upside down. “I don’t understand. Why am I being given another position?”

  The Academy chose the rank of its students as they graduated. It didn’t change. The best Laura could have hoped for was to work hard and maybe one day prove herself wise enough to become a ptmerr. Now, instead, she’d have to start over.

  “Your circumstances have changed.”

  “This is because of what happened with Horatio. What about him?” Laura asked. “Is he being sent away, too?”

  Merr’s smile didn’t reach her eyes. “Another late bloomer, he will be moving to a new location as well.”

  “You can’t send him to the Academy. He’s dangerous,” Laura exclaimed.

  “There are special schools for the gifted. And he’s not your concern, at any rate.” Merr walked ahead and didn’t look back as Laura trailed behind her, Odelle bringing up the rear.

  “I don’t want to leave. This is my home.” Which she hated and yet preferred it over the unknown.

  “You act as if you have a choice.” The smile over her shoulder held a sneer. “You will do as you’re told.”

  “Yes, Merr.” Laura bowed her head and pretended to understand, yet she didn’t.

  No one got relocated at her age. It happened young, or not at all. The oldest she’d ever seen leave was Marie at twenty-one. Rumor had it she’d done something bad. Having seen her before her departure, Laura often wondered what evil resided inside Marie’s swelling belly. Perhaps she’d inhaled some toxic dust before the goods brought in by truck could be decontaminated.

  “Clean her up and put her in the robes. I’ve got transportation waiting to take her,” Merr ordered.

  Laura was led from to a bathing chamber, where she was cleansed head to toe. Her long hair was brushed until it shone then tied back into a tight braid.

  The ptmerr in charge of her grooming sighed. “If only they’d waited a few more days. She was due to be shorn. Think they’d mind if we kept it?”

  Kept it for what? Laura wondered. She’d often wondered why they allowed the sawrs to grow out their hair past their shoulders only to then cut it close to the scalp when it reached a certain length.

  “Leave the hair alone,” Tawnt Odelle barked. “Get her dressed. They’re waiting for her to move out.”

  So quick. She wouldn’t even get a chance to say goodbye to the only home she knew. Or gather the tiny treasures she’d tucked under the clothes in her chest. Not much really. A picture book given by a ptmerr who used to be kind to her. An extra pair of socks for the times the chill ran through and the heat couldn’t keep up.

  A pair of underpants was handed to her, along with long socks and thin slippers. A white gown was dragged over her head.

  The ptmerr shoved Laura toward Tawnt Odelle. “She’s ready.”

  “Let�
�s go.”

  Brought forth into daylight, Laura squinted as she walked in the unfamiliar skirts, the bulky white fabric getting caught in her legs. The arms had long, tight sleeves that ended in wide tapers. A white belt somehow hung below her waist but above her hips, drawing attention to her shape. A revealing outfit, but one she wasn’t given a choice about.

  A pair of armored guards, their metal parts creaking, flanked her on the moving walkway, taking her even farther from the nurseries.

  The soaring edge of the dome appeared closer and closer, rippling as the panels shifted with an outside breeze. Sizzling, too, because of the energy coursing through it that would zap anything that tried to penetrate. From a young age, they were taught to never touch the dome’s shielding. It would shear flesh and not leave any ash.

  She eyed the dome, and the wall that supported it, with trepidation as they approached, the closest she’d been to the outside since her arrival so long ago. Her mouth went dry. Her fingers clenched, as she knew that past its sheltering protection, the Wasteland waited. Despite their claim she was going to another dome, another safe place, she had her doubts.

  As the walkway neared the exiting arch, she balked. “I can’t. I can’t be outside the dome.”

  The guards on either side gripped her by the arm. It only increased her panic.

  “Behave and you won’t be out in the open for long,” the flat voice of one of the guards claimed.

  That more than anything sucked the fight out of her.

  The first arch led to a door, which opened as they rolled past. It shut right behind them. Another door opened, and the moment it did, she could smell it. Dry dust. Not the clean cycled air of the Creche.

  Her breathing came in shallow pants, as she feared taking in a deep one. The armored soldiers obviously didn’t fear the air outside with their helmets protecting them. Must be nice. They dragged her toward a truck with more of the armored people milling around it.

  One of the guards, tossing armfuls of empty bags into the vehicle, turned and barked, “What’s this?”

  “The cargo you were told to wait for.”

  A hand thick with a glove slashed through the air. “We don’t transport live things.”

  “You do today. Order of the Merr.”

  “The Merr can suck it,” grumbled the guard.

  “She also says to tell you that if you refuse, don’t bother coming back.”

  The threat worked. Pity. Laura was shoved from one set of armored guards to another. The new pair being even bigger, their armor dented and motley compared to the Creche ones.

  “We’ll expect extra in our account,” the guard stated as he pushed her toward the opening of the truck.

  The rumble of its engine filled the air. She’d not been close to one since her arrival. In the Creche, walking was the preferred method of transport, with moving sidewalks aiding with the farthermost locations. In the close confines of the nursery, there wasn’t even any need for those.

  “Move it.” They shoved her toward the gaping maw in the back of the truck. The mouth of a beast ready to swallow her and carry her away from home.

  For a second, panic suffused her. She jerked free and ran back to the door leading into the dome, even as she knew it was hopeless. The portal remained shut, and she banged on it, only to whirl when a guard reached for her.

  “No!” Laura screamed. “Don’t touch me!” The demand pulsed from her, pushing past the numbness.

  To her surprise, the guard recoiled. He recovered quickly. He reached for her and began to drag her back to the truck, not daunted at all by her flailing and yells.

  The blow to her head knocked her into unconsciousness, and when she woke, it was in darkness, lying atop a pile of rough fabric.

  The truck rumbled and rocked as it took her away from the Creche. Her home.

  Three

  The bright sun in the sky did them no favors. It pounded the hard-packed dirt, the heat baking it into a solid clay while illuminating every shadow. It made it harder to hide, yet Axel would deal with it because it would lull those watching into thinking nothing could possibly be concealed out here.

  They’d be wrong.

  Body flat to the ground, his bulk covered in a netting meant to camouflage, he watched the road, little more than a rutted dirt track. So long as he didn’t move, the drones flying zigzag ahead of the truck would never notice him. The patience required didn’t come easily.

  He would have wagered—and probably won—that, across from him, Gunner fought to not fidget. The man hated being still. Called it pretending to be a corpse, which went against his motto of living life to the fullest.

  Speaking of living, how many times would Axel wager his life? He’d been lucky with his raids thus far. It would eventually run out. Especially as he got more and more brazen. Attacking this close to a dome could be dangerous.

  The guards had no sympathy for what they called the Wasteland Rats. An apt name, given that, like the hardy rodents, Axel and his crew knew how to survive. How to scrounge. Eke out an existence. And hide.

  He and his ilk long ago had learned how to scurry and became friends with the darkness. The art of stillness to blind their enemies. The lessons that said strike without mercy. Compassion could get a rat killed.

  He cast out with his other sense, the kernel within that barely reacted out on the barren plains. It preferred the shade of looming trees where things could go.

  Farther up the road, the twins, Casey and Camden—although he preferred Cam for short—waited for their turn. They’d proven to be steady companions when it came to missions such as this one.

  Like many of the rats, the twins were Wasteland smart but not born. About twenty years ago they were discovered in the Wasteland, a pair children abandoned, injured, half starving, but alive. No one knew where they’d come from. How they’d managed to survive the Wasteland. Given the haunted look in their eyes, no one ever pried.

  Casey and Cam had the most important and dangerous part to play: the triggering of the trap and the removal of the drones.

  Couldn’t have any eyes in the sky recording what happened and relaying it. As it was, single vehicle supply trucks between the domes were becoming rarer. Most had begun hiring mercenaries to accompany them, making the acquisition of goods more dangerous.

  Good thing he liked a challenge.

  The truck rumbled, the noise rising in the distance, as did belching smoke. One of the rare fuel engines, more powerful than the electric ones.

  The vehicle spewed noise and evidence of its passing unlike the drones. The sleek aerial machines glided ahead of the truck and its cloud of dust.

  No eyes could be seen on the devices, yet Axel knew they existed. Lenses recording everything they saw. Did they see him and his crew waiting? He was tempted to give them the finger.

  Not yet.

  Patience.

  Out here in the flatlands, camouflaging body temperature proved easy. The sun beat down hard even through the dusty haze in the sky, making everything boil. But it wasn’t heat that would give them away. Motion was more dangerous.

  The moving shadows of the drones approached. He could see them on the ground, black mobile smudges. He peeked through the netting. They zipped and swerved ahead of the truck, kept aloft by whirring blades. If they saw anything, a signal would be sent and the truck would stop, immediately going into lockdown mode until the threat was handled. Also known as kill the rats.

  It was too hot a day to die.

  He and Gunner just had to remain still until the drones swept past. Their task in this operation revolved around the truck. Each of them would play their predetermined role.

  …Eight. Nine. Ten. Axel counted after the drone swept past and knew Gunner did as well. They were probably safe from detection, but they still waited a tad longer as the armored vehicle rumbled into view, the hood boasting a machine gun, the entire body covered in bulletproof shielding. Even the clear windshield used a material that wouldn’t crack without e
ffort.

  But they didn’t want to destroy the truck. They wanted to steal it.

  Usually Axel and his crew didn’t bother with the ones coming from the Creche. Those going in had better goods. However, they’d gotten a tip. Something secret and valuable was being smuggled out. Important enough that the single truck had made a run for it rather than wait for an escort.

  The vehicle came level with Axel, and he finally sprang from the netting. He threw himself at the door of the truck and clung to the handle, his boots magnetized to stick to the running board. The helmeted driver didn’t even turn to look.

  Axel hadn’t given him reason to worry. Yet.

  The truck increased its the speed, sending it jostling over the uneven terrain. In between the domes, the attempt at real roads never lasted. Nature fought back against those who thought to make a permanent mark. Just look at how well it had buried the last generation that thought it would master it. Old Earth had only a few crumbled remains left to show it once existed.

  Axel held on with one hand and pulled his wand torch from a coat pocket with the other. The heated white blade emerged at the press of a button, immediately sucking at the power. His body jolted with each bump of the dirt path, jarring his teeth and his aim. He had to work fast.

  As he sliced through the mechanism holding the door shut, it shifted. The weight of it dragged, and he released the handle, leaning away, trusting his boots to hold him in place. For a moment, gravity sucked at him and he wondered if he’d fall.

  The door tore free, and he righted himself, reaching for the driver who happened to be armed. Not really a surprise. Only idiots traveled the Wasteland without protection.

  The gun fired just as a large bounce sent the truck soaring, throwing off the driver’s aim. Before he could sight again, Axel dove for the gun, wrapping his hands around it. It went off, the bullet embedding itself in the windshield. There was a similar struggle on the passenger side as Gunner wrestled with someone in another metal suit.

  Damn those things. They protected all too well and made their wearers stronger. So long as they had power.

  Axel let go of the gun hand to rummage quickly on his bandolier, snaring a fat disc. He slapped it against the driver’s suit and then activated it.