“Oh my god, she’s right!” Holden gasped. He took a mouthful too, spitting it in an arc toward Dana. She flinched back and it splashed her shoulder. “It tastes like… vitamins. And hope.”
“C’mon Jules,” Dana called. “Life is risk!”
“Yeah, I might just risk lying out in the sun for a while.” She paused a few steps back from the edge, uncertain.
Curt stepped to the edge of the dock, face falling as he looked down.
“What is that?” he asked, almost to himself.
Dana, treading water, edged back from the dock and further into the lake. She could sense the depth increasing beneath her as she moved, and it was thrilling.
“What?” she asked, a hint of concern tickling the back of her neck.
“In the lake,” Curt said. “I swear to god I…” “Yeah, right,” Dana said, not willing to admit that he had her spooked. He looked so damn serious, and— But then she glanced sidelong at Holden, saw his smile, and knew that it was a game.
“No, seriously!” Curt said dramatically. Jules edged forward and stood beside him, looking nervously down at the rippling surface. “Right there. Don’t you see it? There. It looks just like—” He put his hands firmly on Jules’s back, and as he pushed and she squealed in terror, he said, “My girlfriend!”
Jules flailed at the air as if trying to hold herself back to the dock, and she went in that way, arms and legs thrashing and mouth open to scream. She surfaced quickly, spluttering and turning so that she faced the dock.
“Oh! Oh my god! I’m gonna kill you!”
His expression not breaking for an instant, Curt pointed just between where Jules had landed and Dana was still treading water, trying not to laugh out loud at her splashing, angry friend. She’ll never be angry at him for long, Dana thought, and realized how these two suited each other so well.
“Look—there’s something else in the lake—” Curt said, launching himself straight at where he was pointing, and splashing Dana and Holden as he landed. He surfaced and raised his arms, treading water just with his strong legs. “It’s a gorgeous man!” he shouted, and at the far side of the lake a small flock of birds took flight from the trees.
“You are so dead!” Jules said, still gasping against the cold. She swam to him with three powerful strokes and tried dunking him.
“Don’t kill the gorgeous man!” Curt cried. “They’re endangered!”
Dana laughed, and looked up at Marty standing alone on the end of the dock. He eyed them all warily, holding the towel splayed around his neck.
“Marty, get in here!” she said.
“Nah, man. I’m cool. Just seeing the sights.” He sat on the edge of the dock and dangled his feet, his bare toes just reaching the water. He leaned back with a joint smoking gently in the corner of his mouth, and Dana wondered how he managed to live on a permanent high. Some people chose that way, she guessed. But for her, life was a high.
Especially today
She glanced at Holden, caught his eye and smiled, turning in the water and swimming out for the lake’s center. And for a while before he followed she was all alone, and this beautiful place was her own.
FOUR
And now, it was time for the betting to begin. Sitterson loved this part. The play had begun, and tens of thousands of man hours’ preparation had led to a single moment. Everything had gone smooth as clockwork up to now, and it looked as if they were going to pull through well.
There were some who had doubted his own seemingly lax approach to the job; they questioned his flippant manner, and the way he seemed to make light of the darkest things. But those doubters were here now with everyone else. Ready to bet. Gambling on souls. It was, as he and Hadley had discussed during many evenings over many beers, their own particular version of gallows humor.
Take this too seriously and you became withdrawn and traumatized, and that could only lead to mistakes.
Sitterson never made mistakes, and his naysayers had seen that soon enough. He might joke and bet, laugh and use sarcasm or innuendo as a defense, but when it came to holding down his end of the project, there were none who could be trusted more. Hence his position in Control.
“Last chance to post!” he called, stepping up onto the console. All eyes were on him and the wads of cash he held, and this was about the only time he liked being the centre of so much attention. “C’mon people, dig deep. Betting windows are about to close!”
The control room was bustling. Truman had fussed to begin with, hassled at having so many people entering the room. But they’d all passed muster with his card reader, so there was really little he could say. He’d refused to place a bet, peering at Sitterson with veiled disgust and shock when he’d been asked. And now he stood and scanned the room with cold eyes.
Hadley remained in his wheeled chair, but there were several people clustered around him, as well, holding out betting slips and cash for him to pluck away and enter into his notebook.
“Who’s still out?” Hadley called to Sitterson. Sitterson looked at his clipboard.
“I got Engineering, I got R&D, I got Electrical—” “Ha!” Hadley called. “Did you see who they picked? They’re practically giving their money away.”
“Yeah, you’re one to talk, Aquaman.”
A guy from the Chem department handed his form to Sitterson. He wore a lab coat that was stained a rainbow of colors across the stomach and up the sleeves, and Sitterson wondered what fumes the guy was leaving in his wake.
He looked at the form and frowned.
“I’m not even sure we have one of these.”
“Zoology swears we do,” the Chem guy said. Sitterson shrugged and took his money “Well, they’d know.” A few feet away he noticed a bit of a scene developing where a young man he didn’t recognize—a guy with ‘Ronald’ stitched onto the breast of his lab coat, though that made Sitterson none the wiser—was protesting loudly to Hadley
“No, no, I told you, they’ve already been picked,” Hadley said, slowly and patiently.
“What?” Ronald asked angrily. “Who took ’em?” “Maintenance.”
“Maintenance! They pick the same thing every year.” Hadley sighed theatrically and stood from his chair. “What do you want from me? If they were creative, they wouldn’t be in Maintenance. If you win, you’re gonna have to split it. You wanna switch?”
Ronald’s anger brewed, peaked, and then seemed to filter away as he looked past Hadley at the giant viewing screens and the blurred action they displayed. “Nah,” he said. “Leave it. I got a feeling on this one.” Hadley raised an eyebrow at Sitterson, who laughed in reply and jumped down from the console. With all of the bets placed, he wandered over to where Lin stood talking with the still-glowering soldier, Truman.
“Not betting?” she asked Truman just as Sitterson approached. “Not for me, thanks.” It was obvious from his expression that he didn’t approve of the idea. Strangely enough, she seemed to disagree.
“Seems a little harsh, doesn’t it? It’s just people letting off steam.” She nodded at Sitterson, then past him at Hadley. “This job isn’t easy, however those clowns may behave.”
“You should listen to her,” Sitterson said grave-faced. “She is wise.”
“Does The Director… do they know about it downstairs?” Truman inquired.
Hadley joined them, expertly shuffling a wad of cash into a neat pile in his left hand while his right folded a slew of betting slips. “The Director isn’t concerned with stuff like this,” he said. “Long as everything goes smoothly upstairs and the kids do… what they’re told…” “But then it’s fixed?” he asked. “How can you take wagers on this when you control the outcome?”