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  BETH GOOBIE

  Text copyright © 2005 Beth Goobie

  All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced or transmitted in

  any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying,

  recording or by any information storage and retrieval system now known or to be

  invented, without permission in writing from the publisher.

  National Library of Canada Cataloguing in Publication Data

  Goobie, Beth, 1959-

  Fixed / Beth Goobie.

  ISBN 1-55143-374-5

  I. Title.

  PS8563.O8326F49 2005 jC813’.54 C2005-900690-0

  First Published in the United States 2005

  Library of Congress Control Number: 2005921067

  Summary: In this sequel to Flux, Nellie Joanne Kinnan meets the twin sister

  she didn’t know she had. Together they discover that much of what they

  had been taught to believe is not true and that one of them is destined to

  play a crucial role in maintaining this deception.

  Orca Book Publishers gratefully acknowledges the support for its publishing programs

  provided by the following agencies: the Government of Canada through the

  Department of Canadian Heritage’s Book Publishing Industry Development Program

  (BPIDP), the Canada Council for the Arts, and the British Columbia Arts Council.

  Design and typesetting: Lynn O’Rourke

  Cover Image: First Light

  Lyrics from Amused to Death © Roger Waters Music Overseas Ltd.

  All rights reserved. Used with permission.

  Orca Book Publishers

  Box 5626, Stn. B

  Victoria, BC Canada

  V8R 6S4

  Orca Book Publishers

  PO Box 468

  Custer, WA USA

  98240-0468

  Printed and bound in Canada

  09 08 07 06 05 • 6 5 4 3 2 1

  for Helen

  What God wants God gets.

  — Roger Waters

  Amused to Death

  PART ONE

  One

  THE CHUTE OPENED and Nellie hit the threshold to the maze at a full run, body gliding like a snake, eyes alert for movement, any shadow that looked too dense or oddly shaped. Once inside the small entrance lobby she paused, pivoting side to side in the gloom, one hand hovering at the stun gun in her belt, but the maze’s opening section remained quiet, nothing to be seen or heard except the sledgehammer thud of her heart. Abruptly the wall opposite lit up with a floor-to-ceiling image of two half-moons, this month’s sky sign — the twin moons of Lulunar, symbol of the union of opposites. Here in the maze that could mean only the union of life and death. My life and someone else’s death, Nellie thought grimly, her eyes skimming the three star signs that surrounded the moons. A brief wave of exhilaration coursed through her as she saw the constellation of the cat in the upper left corner. Her birth sign, it could be taken as an omen of good fortune: the Goddess was looking favorably upon the Cat caste today. With a grim smile Nellie glanced to her left, scanning the dimly lit corridor that ran approximately twenty feet before angling around a corner into the unknown. Bringing her body to a moment of stillness, she sent her mind along the passageway and around the corner, probing for what lay beyond. Abruptly her head came up and she hissed. False lead. Dead end. Four seconds wasted on the clock.

  Directly opposite, the twin moons continued to glow amid the glimmer of distant stars. With one last glance, Nellie turned from them and took a cautious step toward the wall to her right. As she did, the wall lit up with a mind-searing light, seeming to detonate before her eyes, but she held her ground without flinching, sending her mind into the image and probing for what lay beyond it. There, at the center of the illusory explosion, she felt her thoughts hook on a half-foot gap hidden by an angle in the wall. Leaping toward it, she slipped through the opening, the image of the exploding wall already forgotten as she took off along the new corridor, scanning the floor for crevices and ankle-twisters.

  She’d seen experienced maze runners recoil before images like the exploding wall, their split-second hesitation sometimes costing them their lives, but it had been months since one had fazed her and today Nellie was really tuned, her mind questing well ahead of her body, scanning for what could not yet be seen. On her best days she could read the maze from beginning to end like a map of vibrations, and sometimes she felt herself actually lift out of her body so that she hovered above the maze, its entire pattern laid out before her, every mystery revealed. Over the past four years she’d been here so often the maze had come to feel like the inside of her mind, slipping past her like thought, and sometimes she almost considered it a friend, the kind bound by similar circumstances, shared pain. But it could turn without warning. Designed to delude, the maze was fickle as the wind. Before each run, drones were sent in with that day’s blueprint and every wall and floor was rearranged, all previously established patterns erased, everything known eliminated.

  So there was never anything to trip her up, no detail from past experiences to snag her emotions, cause her to hesitate or think twice. Everything slid past neutral and observed, nothing was intended or taken personally. How could it? There was nothing of her in this place — no familiar sights that could trigger a memory of life outside the maze. Here she was only movement snaking through endless dark corridors, a fierce narrow wind blowing itself on and on until it reached the end of itself and dissipated as if it had never been.

  Above the maze in the Masters’ Room, Nellie knew her superiors would be watching — Col. Jolsen, Head of Black Core Personnel; Lt. Neem, Weapons Supervisor; and the others — each keeping a score card and evaluating her every move. And today she would make them proud. She’d been lucky enough to pull fourth position and the adrenalin was pumping through her body like a high-singing drug. Already she’d been able to pick out the vibratory trails left by the three preceding runners. Entering and emerging from various forks in the maze, their vibrations lay thickest along the passageway each of the three had eventually concluded was the main trail. Knowing how to read these vibes could knock fifteen or more minutes off the clock, and as she ran, Nellie scanned them continually with her mind the way a dog sniffs out scent.

  From the data she was picking up, it looked as if this run would be an easy win. None of the preceding runners were Black Core cadets and they were all relatively new at this game, probably street kids picked up in the Interior or ruffians brought in from the Outbacks. Wily and wary but not trained, she gave them at most two more maze runs before the drones did them in. No one from the Black Core Program, Beginner or Advanced, had ever died in a maze — the patterns they ran here were just further training — but for an Outbacker or street kid it was just plain slaughter. To date, the standing record for a non-cadet runner was fifteen runs. The kid had been nine years old. Not bad, for an Outbacker.

  Already Nellie had pinpointed the place the first runner had gone down — two sharp turns ahead, where the floor slanted and grew rough. Whatever form the approaching trap was about to take, Nellie knew it was probably located at ground level because of a faint high-pitched whine she could hear near the ceiling. Experience had taught her that maze designers often used sound as a means of splitting focus. When the cue was high pitched, it drew part of a runner’s attention upward, leaving her more vulnerable to a ground-level attack. On the other hand, Nellie thought wryly to herself, if her superiors realized she’d figured out the sound code, they would change it. Nothing could be relied on in the maze, nothing but breath, heartbeat and fearfearfear.

  Rounding the first curve, she ignored a fork in the passageway that veered
to the right and deked after the trail of vibrations that led to her left. Immediately a deep throb started under her feet and a scattering of mid-range electronic notes came at her from all sides, further tricks to confuse her focus. At the same time, both walls began to flash images into the omnipresent gloom — scenes of asteroids, the Red Planet, and the Warrior constellation, sign of danger. Out of the corner of her left eye, Nellie saw the Cat constellation flicker on and off several times, but knew better than to pause and give the sign of obeisance. In the maze all bets were off, you didn’t stop for anything or anyone, even your own dying mother.

  The second curve was coming into view at the far end of the corridor. Cautiously Nellie approached, noting that the high-pitched overhead whine had grown noticeably louder. As she rounded the curve she found the passage had once again forked, both paths vibrating thickly with the trails of the previous runners. Sending her mind down the left fork, she probed until she came up against a dead end, then turned and took off along the right, watching for drones. Suddenly a thundering crash rocked the air and the floor split into a yawning abyss under her feet. An eerie glow lit the maze as lava erupted through the opening, but Nellie didn’t slacken her pace. Virtual reality wasn’t worth a skipped heartbeat, and though the graphics were worth a second look, she was running against the clock. Leaving the catastrophic image behind, she followed the slant of the corridor to the left, into a narrowing of walls. Abruptly, the high-pitched whine over her head began to pulse rapidly. There, just ahead, she could feel it — a cold patch of nothingness that hovered midair, the site of today’s first death.

  The body had already been removed, but a quick scan of the area’s vibrations told Nellie the story. The boy had been fourteen, red haired and scrawny, an Interior street kid making his fifth run. Just as she’d guessed, it had been the sound cue that had done him in. Coming into the narrow corridor he’d looked up, distracted by the high-pitched whine, and his eyes had fixed on a figure of light that had appeared on the ceiling. At that moment a door had opened in the wall to his left, and a drone had come at him with a knife. Above her now, Nellie could see the same figure of light taking shape, swirling to the pulse of the high-pitched whine — a deadly combination that could take hold of the mind and lock it into a trance. Biting her tongue for focus, she slipped her hand to her belt and pivoted, eyes scanning the wall to her left. When the hidden door swung open she was ready, stun gun raised, the shot fired before the drone could step through the doorway. She left it on its back, arms and legs waving helplessly. It would take several hours to get its circuitry going again.

  Drones were restricted to knives and projectile weapons, but they could be repaired. Humans who didn’t make it through the maze were dumped through trapdoors into subterranean tunnels that were patrolled by the Goddess’s guard dogs. Or so it was said. Eyes slitted, nostrils flared, Nellie blew on down the narrow corridor. She’d passed the first death. There were four more traps waiting within today’s maze — five snares for five runners, each carefully designed to match one of the runner’s personal weaknesses. But any one of the five could get you, Nellie reminded herself grimly. Black Core training was supposed to prepare a cadet for any eventuality but you never knew, you just never knew. The Cat caste was second to the bottom; there was always the chance the Advanced Program might decide to dump her and go looking for a cadet with a higher bloodline. Or a trap could be unexpectedly tricky, contain a little more than she’d bargained for.

  Swallowing acid, she veered around the next corner, then shouted in alarm as the floor split open ahead of her a second time. This time it was for real; she could hear frenzied snarls as the Goddess’s dogs leapt upward toward the opening, but there was no time to slacken her pace. Drawing in her body, she fixed her eyes on the floor beyond the gap and jumped. The hole wasn’t impossibly wide and she’d judged it well, but midway into her leap she realized it was growing. The bastards — they’d waited until she’d leapt, then widened the gap. Jerking and twisting, she tried to propel herself further and landed, feet scrabbling, on the far edge of the hole. Time stretched as she teetered over the void, snarls and the hot rank rush of dogs’ breath rising to meet her. Then she pitched forward onto solid floor, the gap closing like memory behind her.

  Safe for the moment, came the thought, followed by the instantaneous reply: Don’t count on it.

  Scrambling to her feet, Nellie bolted down the corridor. Two traps down, three to go. The last maze she’d run, all seven participants had survived. The pattern hadn’t been unusually easy, it had just been luck. When they’d seen the last participant arrive at the exit point safely, the entire group had hollered and whooped, giving each other congratulatory hugs. Five had been Outbackers, the sixth a Black Core cadet. Today Nellie couldn’t remember their faces, even the cadet’s. There had been more than one maze where she’d been the only survivor. It was better not to remember faces.

  She veered around another corner, slowing as a row of baseboard lights began to blink erratically. Quickly she scanned the walls. Never the obvious, she reminded herself. What’s it trying to distract you from? Her glance upward came just in time. There had been no sound cue, the three drones simply dropped from the ceiling wearing holographic shields that gave them huge bat wings and the pale ghoulish bodies of vampires. As Nellie ducked the first two, she felt the sharp dig of a knife into her upper left arm. A second later she’d pulled her stun gun and the drones were scattered, short-circuited, in the corridor. Running careful fingers over the cut in her arm, she winced. Not too deep. She should be able to manage until the end of the run when she could get to a Flesh Healer, as long as the blade hadn’t been laced with a sedative.

  Slipping the stun gun back into her belt, she continued on. Most runners ran with a gun in the hand, but floor traps could open quickly and she’d had to grab hold of the edge of a sudden hole and pull herself back out more often than she cared to remember. You needed both hands free for something like that. Going through the floor meant the end of everything. Even if you were able to shoot your way through the dogs below, how would you get back out? Fat chance the drones would show mercy, let down a rope and pull you up.

  A warm ooze of blood trickled down Nellie’s arm and she fingered it with a dismayed grunt. Pressing a button on her belt, she swallowed the capsule that was ejected from a tiny vial. It would count against her, adding thirty seconds to her final time, but in a few minutes her brain would be buzzing with adrenalin and the wound on her arm forgotten. Maze runners were allotted one capsule per run — one chemical second chance. After that, they were on their own. Except for the signs, of course, messages from the gods — like the Morning Star that glowed on the wall to her right and the Red Planet that loomed to her left. Sometimes she had dreams in which she hovered so close to the Red Planet, she could touch it. Red Planet, planet of the Gods, where all Black Core cadets hoped someday to be reborn. The color red was allowed only to those of the upper castes. Cats couldn’t wear it, eat it, even mention it aloud except in their prayers, but no one could stop them from bleeding it.

  Ahead, the corridor widened into a small chamber. Slowing her pace, Nellie approached the entrance and sent her mind into the room, probing for movement or the pulse of a drone’s circuitry, but found nothing. From the vibes she was picking up, it looked as if two of the preceding runners had survived this trap. The exit was a narrow door located on the far side. Cautiously, she entered.

  Immediately the room filled with an eerie white haze. Holograph, Nellie decided, trying to finger it. The haze had no texture or scent and wasn’t dense enough to impair vision, but was still creepy enough to get the hair up on the back of her neck. And that sound coming from her left — a low whimpering voice, pitched so that it crawled under the skin and sucked blood. Shifting to the nearest wall, Nellie began to work her way forward. Sound distraction, she told herself grimly. Just keep focused. Cold sweat poured down the inside of her arms. Something about this place had every nerve in her bo
dy hissing like a snake. Pivoting, she scanned the thickening haze. She’d never seen anything like this trap, and yet it felt so familiar. Like a dream, or what lay hidden on the other side of a dream ...

  The haze shifted and she saw a figure turn toward her. Squinting, Nellie tried to assess the dim outline, but the haze shifted again, partially concealing it. Human, the figure seemed to be human. A drone in disguise, Nellie told herself, raising the stun gun. Still, she hesitated, her finger pressed lightly against the trigger. What was it about this place? What was it?

  Abruptly the whimpering cut off. In the waiting silence, Nellie heard the bones creak in her own neck. Then the haze shifted again and the figure came into view a second time, a woman in her early thirties. A wave of panic hit Nellie and she took a step back. Suddenly she had the shakes — quick violent quivers that swamped her legs. SHOOT! her mind screamed, but still her finger curved protectively around the trigger.

  The woman lifted a pleading hand. “Nellie,” she whispered. Her voice had a bubbly quality, as if she was choking on her words. “Nellie Joanne, my darling.” The haze shifted again and the woman seemed to be several steps closer, yet Nellie could have sworn she hadn’t moved. Wisps of haze clung to her tangled blond hair, bruised face and wide-set blue eyes. “Nellie,” she whispered again from bloodied lips, and then Nellie saw it — the gushing wound in the woman’s throat, blood leaping from it in a steady pulse. But she was alive, she was clearly alive. Fear roared in Nellie’s ears. Whimpering, she backed away.

  “Nellie Joanne,” the woman whispered again, her hands reaching to touch the wound in her throat. “Don’t you remember me?”