Chapter 26
Chapter twenty-six
Cycle Complete
Soren sat in Embedded Systems Engineering class, trying to stay awake.
He didn’t find the material boring, but he had been up late with Neville the night before.
He wasn’t such a bad guy. A good sense of humor and the ability to converse intellectually played in his favor.
Still, he wasn’t Nathan. His skin was as pale as Soren’s, his chest flat, his hair dark and trim.
Neville wasn’t shy about his desires and enthusiastically set out to please him. Soren let him think he had.
At least somebody wants me, he thought, remembering Nathan’s hasty departure.
The professor’s dry lecture wound down. “Time for lab.” He opened the door behind his lectern. The lights blinked, then flashed on, washing the computer lab in white light. “You’ll be working with oscilloscopes and logic analyzers today. I expect precision.”
The students’ chairs scraped, accompanied by a low buzz of comments. A loud knock sounded at the door, causing them to stop moving and turn their heads in curiosity. Classes were almost never interrupted.
At the sight of Franko Jenner, Minister of Scholarly Pursuits, a jolt of alarm shot through Soren.
Why’s he here? The elder was a tall man, a hunch bending his reedy frame to normal height.
His gaze scanned the classroom, landing hard on Soren.
Jenner waved to the professor, who hurried to his side.
Soren swallowed a lump in his throat. Am I in trouble? Did they find out about my night with Neville? Dad said it was OK, that nobody cared. We were discreet. We never left the apartment together.
His teacher’s hand shot to his mouth, his eyes widening.
Then he nodded and turned toward Soren. Everyone else stared at him too.
Without waiting for verbal instructions, Soren shuffled past desks, chairs, and classmates toward the door, his bookbag in hand.
He stopped beside them, head down, and sighed, dread coursing through him.
“Soren,” Minister Jenner said, resting a hand on his shoulder. “I have bad news.”
I figured that, he thought. Steeling his nerves, Soren raised a sorrowful gaze, ready to accept his punishment.
“Your father has suffered a heart attack. He’s being transported to Clover Hollow Memorial Hospital. Minister Zhou has gone to inform your mother and sister. Adélard should have his family around him for support.”
Soren’s jaw dropped, the dread erupting into terror. “Thank you, sir. Let’s go.”
Clover Hollow Memorial rose from the hillside in layered concrete tiers, a pre-war skeleton reinforced with newer panels of solar glass and matte steel. Antenna arrays crowned the roof, angled toward the single satellite in orbit, while backup turbines hummed low behind vented housings.
Soren pushed through the doors ahead of Minister Jenner and rushed through the lobby, his gaze darting around.
The corridors were wide and spare—white composite walls, gray polymer floors, and ceiling panels of clean LED light that erased shadow.
A potted plant anchored the front seating area.
Soren’s heart still pounded, driven on by a host of fears and the unknown. He can’t die. I’m not ready.
“This way.” Minister Jenner touched his arm, motioning toward a hallway to the right.
Soren followed, numb, brain foggy, feet moving of their own accord. Two soldiers stood guard before a room labeled ICU. “Is he in there?” Soren asked, his mouth dry and voice shaky.
The guards didn’t blink, but a doctor in a white coat stepped up to him. “Minister Delacroix’s wife and daughter are with him now. Who are you?”
Jenner answered for him. “This is Soren, the minister’s son and oldest child.”
Nodding, the doctor said, “Let him in.” The soldiers stepped aside. Soren hesitated, inhaled a bracing breath, and entered the room.
Digital displays lined the walls. Old, stainless-steel rails framed the bed where his father lay, with transparent tubing snaking across the sheets and an oxygen mask over his face.
The air carried a sharp blend of antiseptic and filtered coolness, and beneath it all ran the steady, reassuring rhythm of machines—monitors chiming, oxygen hissing, infusion pumps ticking in quiet, measured intervals.
A nurse in aqua scrubs pumped a bulb to inflate the blood pressure cuff around his father’s arm. He didn’t appear to be conscious. The cardiac monitor traced jagged red peaks. Outside the window, Appalachia’s skyline rose in jagged green peaks.
“Soren!” His mother’s arms wrapped around his neck as she buried her face in his shoulder.
Instinctively, he held her, checking his emotions, determined to stay strong for his family.
His gray eyes glanced past her to Gabriella.
Sitting in a chair pulled up to the edge of their father’s bed, she clutched his limp hand tightly between hers.
Her red, wet eyes found Soren’s. For a few seconds, they held in silence.
“I don’t understand,” said his mother, Nadia. She pulled back enough to peer into his face. “Adélard didn’t have a heart condition. He’s never been diagnosed with anything … takes acid reflux medication, had the flu once or twice. That’s it. How could something like this happen?”
Soren cupped her cheek, felt a quiver run through her. “I don’t know, Mom, but he’s in good hands. The doctors here are the best. We’re all here with him.”
Nadia twisted in his arms toward the door, where Minister Jenner stood at a respectable distance. “Franko, can you call for Shepherd Dray? I want the First Shepherd here. Adélard needs prayers, and we need words of comfort.”
“I’ll send a bike messenger at once,” he said. “The primary unity house is nearby. He should be here soon.” He stepped away, and the door eased shut.
Soren slipped from his mother’s arms to take the spot on Adélard’s other side, vacated by the nurse.
He laid his hand atop his father’s, careful not to disturb the needle and tube taped there or the monitor clipped to his finger.
The man he’d always looked up to seemed suddenly small, the lines creasing his face deeper than he recalled.
He was pale—too pale. The machines beeped, soft and steady.
“Daddy, wake up,” Gabriella coaxed. She sniffed and shook her brunette hair out of her eyes.
She’s still wearing it too long, Soren thought of his teenage sister.
Seeing the influential man in such a weakened condition seemed unreal.
Surely Soren would awaken to discover it had only been a bad dream.
He wished he knew what his father had been doing out in the field, away from home for days.
Had something in the wilderness affected his heart?
A poisonous plant? Contact with something contaminated?
A doctor entered, and Soren stepped back, making room.
“Mrs. Delacroix, children,” he said. He pressed the bell of his stethoscope to Adélard’s chest, moving it around as he listened.
“We ran an EKG, drew blood to test troponin levels, and are administering anticoagulants intravenously. The indications thus far point to a singular cardiac event. Apparently, someone with immediate care experience was on scene to stabilize Minister Delacroix for transport, but, without instruments or medication, there was only so much he could do.”
“When will he regain consciousness?” Soren’s mother clutched her hands together over her heart. Her eyes darted to her husband and back to the doctor. He shook his head.
“I can’t say,” he answered, “but it’s only fair that I be honest with you. The prognosis isn’t promising. I’m going to check with the lab, then set up for an angiogram and X-rays.”
“Thank you,” Soren said. Nadia clasped his hand, squeezing hard as the doctor left.
“He can’t die,” his mother murmured. “He’s always been our rock, the head of our household, the one who had the answers.”
“Daddy,” Gabriella said sharply. “You stood up at Soren’s matching ceremony. You have to be there for mine too. It’s not fair if you aren’t.” He didn’t move, his breathing quiet and shallow.
Holding his mother’s hand, he stared at his father.
Soren had never been bold, but he’d always been obedient.
What would he do if his father died? Would that make him the head of the household?
Not only Krystal, but Nadia and Gabriella would depend on him—not financially, as his mom had a high-level job in the Ministry of Human Optimization—but emotionally.
I’m not ready. I can’t fill his shoes.
The beeping turned insistent. An alarm sounded, and a crew of medical professionals rushed in. “Code Blue, ICU,” rang through the air. Gabriella had to leave their father’s side. She grabbed Soren’s other hand.
The red line, peaking in an awkward rhythm earlier, flattened into a single, unbroken tone. A man performed chest compressions.
“No,” Nadia cried in a small voice. She glanced hopefully at the door as it opened.
First Shepherd Severin Dray glided in, his sigil pendant slapping against his white robes.
The harsh ICU lights gleamed off his bald head.
He was too late to help. Perhaps his words would comfort Soren’s mother and sister.
The room fell silent. The man stopped his efforts. “Time of death,” someone said.
Gabriella sniffed. Soren watched the nurses remove Adélard’s mask and IV. One lifted the white sheet over his face.
“First Shepherd Dray.” Nadia’s voice was small, touched with disbelief. Her haunted eyes searched his. “What now?”
He folded his hands before his pendant, the all-seeing eye encompassed by a radiant pyramid, steepling his fingers.
“His cycle is now complete, Lady Delacroix. Adélard will live on through his accomplishments, his contributions to science, and the stability he brought to the people. Rejoice, my child. His was a life not wasted.”
“Yes, quite so,” she answered solemnly.
Nathan’s unconventional beliefs crashed through, invading Soren’s thoughts like the Iron Army. He said there was no death, that souls continued their journey upon leaving the body behind. There is no proof for that, no experiment, no equation. Silently, he hoped it was true anyway.
“Soren.”
At the sound of his name, he looked up, setting aside his conflicting precepts. Minister Jenner waved to him from the door. Wiggling free of his mother and sister, Soren left the room. Whether traveling on or ceasing to exist, the man who was his father no longer lay in that bed.
“Minister Delacroix’s service has ended,” he reported emotionlessly.
“Yes, son,” Jenner said, steering him down the hallway. “He paved the way for many and administered his office with integrity. The Oracle will remember. First Cipher LeCun needs to speak with you at once.”
He ushered Soren into an examination room guarded by two soldiers.
Inside the small office stood the honorable first cipher, his heather-blue suit illuminated by gleaming fluorescents, snowy white, and bright steel.
He stood about Soren’s height, glasses tight to his face, silvery hair shining under the lights.
“Forgive my intrusion at this moment of reflection, but time is of the essence,” he said. The door closed, and the two were alone. “Did Adélard tell you about the project he was working on?”
Soren’s chest tightened. He swallowed. “No, sir. My father never revealed state secrets, even to his family. All I know is that it was important for national security.”
LeCun nodded. “Dr. Paval Halberg explained what happened leading up to your father’s heart attack. Understand that we do not blame him.”
Soren dropped into a chair, fearful his knees would not hold steady as the first cipher relayed classified information about a robot army and his father’s role in its development and programming.
Then he added details from the field tests, culminating in a series of glitches and a major malfunction.
“They just marched away?” Soren gaped.
“Something had gone dreadfully wrong with this valuable asset,” LeCun stated, “not to mention the potential danger to our citizens. We don’t know the cause of the malfunction, nor how to regain control of the army. That’s why we need you.”
“Me?” he squeaked. “I wasn’t privy to my father’s work. He showed me his office in Core Mountain, a computer console, the Core. If he kept notes, I don’t know where they are.”
“That might be, but we need our best minds on this, and it must be solved quickly. You’re too young to take your father’s place in the Council of Ministers, but you are brilliant enough to step into his scientific shoes.
Minister Jenner says you are the most accomplished student at the Institute, and Professor Sakamoto swears by your creative genius and problem-solving skills. ”
Soren was flattered, but overwhelmed. He gripped the chair arms to ground himself.
“You will begin work with Dr. Halberg and your father’s staff immediately,” LeCun directed. “You must discover what went wrong and fix it. Failure is not an option. Too much rides on this. Do you understand?”
Dazed by too much input, Soren stared blankly at their head of state …
who needed him to solve a crisis. No time to mourn.
No adjustment period. Only duty. It was impossible to process.
Recalling a cult teaching, he said, “From chaos comes order; from order comes life. I will not let the nation down.”
At least he hoped he wouldn’t.