Across the Universe

24 ELDER

“COME,” ELDEST DEMANDS, AND I KNOW BY THE WAY HE SAYS it, as if he’s a master speaking to a slave, that he means me and not Doc. I tear my gaze away from the closed hatch door and follow Eldest. Doc comes, too, but his steps are measured, an ominous drum beat on the floor.

When Eldest gets to the table against the wall at the end of the rows of cryo chambers, he stops and looks at me expectantly. My eyes are on that table, remembering how Amy huddled on its cold metal top, and how there was nothing I could do to help her.

“Well?” Eldest demands, his voice a short bark.

“What?”

“As leader, what would you do in this situation?”

“Um…” I say, wrong-footed. Typical Eldest. Just like him to throw a lesson at me when I’m least ready for it.

“Um, um!” Eldest mocks. “Be a leader! What should we do?”

“Uh — we need to see the vid records. And!”—I add when Eldest shows signs of derision—“we could check the wi-com locators, too.”

Eldest harrumphs, but does not insult my plan, just hands me a floppy. I press my thumb against the access login, and the floppy flashes into life. I tap in a few commands, searching for the video recordings of the cryo level. But when I find them, they show nothing but black.

“Something’s wrong with the vid screens,” I say, trying again and getting nothing but black.

Eldest grunts. “The vids were out the first time, too. I thought I’d taken care of that, but clearly he’s found a way around it. Try the wi-com locator.”

I tap more commands, this time accessing the map of Godspeed. Hundreds of blinking dots shine up at me: one dot for each person, each traced through the locator in the wi-com. I’ve done this before — it’s a good way to cheat at hide-and-seek, and it took Harley a full six months before he realized how I was so good — but I’ve never tried to use it for anything else. Now that I know what I’m looking for, I see an access dot on the fourth floor of the Hospital, and when I tap the screen there, the map shifts to the cryo level. Three dots blink on the cryo level now: one for my wi-com, one for Doc’s, one for Eldest’s. I press the time slider and move it back an hour. The wi-com map shows no one except—

“Doc,” I say, handing the floppy to Eldest for his inspection. “It was only Doc down here.”

“Some of the scientists have been in the secondary lab with me. They could have come out here, too. It would be easy. It’s not like I escorted them out. Any of the scientists could have been here earlier today.” Doc’s voice is emotionless and analytical. “I know what you’re thinking, Eldest, but you’re jaded. It could be any of them. They all have access to this floor; they all know about the cryo chambers and how they work.”

“Or it could be him,” Eldest says.

Doc’s face is like carved ice. “He’s dead,” he says, with such finality that whoever Doc is talking about, I’m convinced he’s not alive.

“Yes, he is,” Eldest growls, staring at Doc, hard. “But I’m not sure his influence is.”

Doc’s jaw juts forward, biting back whatever chutzy thing he was going to mouth off to Eldest.

“Either way,” Eldest says, “we’re going to have to figure out a way to fix the vids. And as for the wi-com locators—” He pauses mid-sentence, cocking his head as he listens to his wi-com.

He keeps his voice low, but I can still hear him say in a low growl, “She’s doing what?”