Rebel Born by Amy A. Bartol

Author:Amy A. Bartol [Bartol, Amy A.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781503936935
Published: 2019-06-04T04:00:00+00:00

Chapter 10

Intrinsic Memory

The chaotic bustle aboard the underwater vessel, the Sozo One, feels strange.

Unlike Spectrum, there’s very little unity to the movements of the soldiers I encounter as I follow Reykin. No complex rhythm or synchronicity rules these people. The lack of uniformity comforts and annoys me at the same time. The commotion feels disjointed, multidirectional, and confusing. In many ways, I’m an alien here. And they view me like one. Suspicion and outright fear burn brighter than any silver light.

Reykin doesn’t notice, or if he does, he doesn’t let on that anything is amiss. He gives me a tour of the vessel with Cherno by my side. Every so often, Reykin’s hand accidentally brushes mine. His finger strokes a column of skin, sending quivering jolts of slow-burn desire through me. It makes it hard for me to concentrate on anything other than the myriad sublime half smiles and side-eyed glances he bestows on me.

With Reykin as our escort, we cross the threshold to the command center of the vessel. The firstborn’s large palm touches the small of my back. Holographic instruments throb from glass walls at workstations. Although the diagnostics are advanced—nothing I’ve ever studied in flight school—they somehow come across to me as elementary. As we stroll, charts flash with readouts of life-support systems. At a glance, I notice the CO2 level in a forward compartment rises above an acceptable level for respiration.

I pause. “Your carbon dioxide level is high.”

“What was that?” Reykin asks, leaning nearer to hear me over the conversations from the sailors around us.

“I said your CO2 level is high in this compartment.” I point to the tiny line of the offending readout. “It’s one of the greenhouses.”

Reykin squints at it. “How can you even read that?” A moment later, the line flashes red and the system corrects the imbalance by adjusting a few valves automatically. The levels drop, and the red line returns to a soft blue.

“Ah,” I say, “all fixed.”

Confusion etches lines in Reykin’s brow. He knows I don’t have training in this area.

Maybe I shouldn’t point those things out.

I stroll onto the thick, transparent panels that give us a panoramic view of the underwater terrain. We skim along the bottom of the sea, in a rocky canyon. Its walls rise to skyscraper heights around us as an ancient civilization reveals itself, a kingdom fallen into the sea. Some of it has crumbled to sand. Clinging to the rock are bioluminescent coral, their gentle lights like stars in the night sky.

It could be a city on a distant planet for how different it appears from everything I know. Enormous warrior sculptures lie in broken pieces on the sandy floor. Others still hold their weapons aloft from arching niches in the stone.

“What is this place?” I whisper, watching whorls of sand kick up at the edges of exotic rocks we pass. The ambition of the structures that remain rivals the cutting-edge architecture on dry land.

“We don’t know,” Reykin replies.

“It’s Gildenzear,” Cherno says. “You claimed dominion over all this, Roselle.

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