Spirits of the Earth: The Complete Series: (A Post-Apocalyptic Series Box Set: Books 1-3) by Milo Fowler (paper ebook reader .TXT) 📕

someday. Maybe all parents feel that way at times, but this was a constant, deep-seated sadness that festered behind every smile.

Could I really read their minds? Is that what's happening now? If it has nothing to do with a glitch in my augments, then maybe this is an ability I was born with. And once my neural implants were installed, they kept me from being able to fully access my—

"Stop." I grit my teeth, clench my hands into fists and pound them against my mattress. "Get a grip!"

I have to silence the voices. Somehow. I can't go through another minute of this.

"Shut up!"

My voice hangs in the silence, sounding like it belongs to a crazy person. Good thing these cubes are soundproof, or my neighbors would have reason to worry. I can hear their thoughts, but they can't hear me scream. That's not fair at all.

Growling, I get up and stomp over to the window. With a swipe of my hand, the black tinting fades, allowing the morning light inside. It's a sunny day in Dome 1, and the air traffic outside is already on the move, aerocars casting brief shadows across me as they glide past. I glance down at the street, twenty floors below. Plenty of ground traffic as well.

I pull the single chair out from my dinner table and sit. The faux-wood seat is cool against my bare legs, giving me goosebumps. But the sun is warm here by the window, and I close my eyes as I bask in it. The voices haven't diminished any, but they haven't gotten worse. So that's something.

It's easy to dismiss them as garbled gibberish. But if I really focus...I can make out individual thoughts:

Can't be late...What will she think?...I don't remember that being there before...What's the point?...I am so happy...This pain will never end...They're never going to forget this...I don't know what to do…

On and on, narrowed down from hundreds of thoughts to dozens, then to only a few, then—

It's working. They're quieting down.

How am I doing this? It feels like I've activated a dormant skill; I must have had to do this before, a long time ago, just to be able to function. I cull the stampeding herd until all I'm left with are my own thoughts. The voice in my head is the welcome traveling companion I know best. The interior monologue of one Sera Chen, Law Enforcer.

I take in a deep breath and let it out slowly. The tight muscles in my neck and shoulders start to relax.

The console on my dinner table bleeps. The search is complete.

If my augments were working, I wouldn't have to use this outdated device. These clunkers are usually reserved for senior citizens with no desire for implanted tech but who still want to access the Linkstream on occasion and ride the current.

My DNA search found multiple results, citizens located in just about every Eurasian dome. I have quite a few relatives, apparently.

But my parents are not listed among them.

Not sure how I feel about that. Am I surprised? I've had an inkling for a while; I just chose to stuff it in a deep, dark recess of my mind that I refused to visit. Now I understand their unspoken heartache, and it hurts me, too. They were my parents; they will always be my parents. Even though we're not related by blood.

I don't feel lied to, not by them. I could never blame them for this. They were allowed to adopt me because they've always been model citizens. But someone deceived me.

Squinting at the sunlit screen, I scan the rows of faces. These people share my DNA, but I have no idea who they are. I dig a little deeper into the search results. Nine of them are my age. Exactly my age. The rest…

Are children.

Dozens and dozens of children, ranging in age from a few months old to a few years. My birth parents have been busy, it would appear. And they must still be out there, whoever they are. Somewhere in the Domes, reproducing like nobody's business.

I frown at the results. No, that can't be right. The nine citizens my age—they're the oldest in the search results. There's no one listed who's old enough to be my birth parents.

I'm beginning to recognize some of these faces. Sort of. As if the children I grew up with had their images age-progressed to adulthood. Are these nine members of the Twenty? I haven't seen them in so long—

A sudden alert flashes across the screen. My first thought: one of the analysts has caught me snooping around where I shouldn't be, using my enforcer retrieval code for data I have no business retrieving, since it's not work-related. But that's not it at all.

This is a dome-wide emergency alert. Hawthorne Tower has been attacked. A massive EMP burst has knocked out the power on all 150 floors. Every Dome 1 enforcer, even the lowly curfew-type, is to report for duty on the double.

I swipe my hand across the console screen, clearing its history, and launch out of my chair, kicking it over accidentally. As it clatters across the faux-wood floor, I grab my uniform off the wall hook and pull it on.

My neighbors have seen the civilian version of the emergency alert via their neural implants. How do I know? That's right. I can hear their thoughts spiraling out of control.

In a situation like this, your average citizen is to remain indoors, either at work or home, to avoid clogging the streets and air with traffic, leaving those transit zones free for enforcers to patrol. Except there has never been a situation like this. Not in reality. We've trained for it, working through various scenarios in VR, but it's never happened. No one has ever attacked a government building in Eurasia.

Patriots.

That word keeps cropping up in my neighbors' thoughts. Many of them are happy they won't have to go to work today and can wile away the hours in virtual reality instead. But