by S. J Woods
“Shall we try again?” Dane asked.
She nodded and took the oar. The same thing happened, but they tried several more times before Dane dropped his oar in frustration.
“It must be the raft.” He said. “There must be some power-source or chip on here. What do we do?”
“I’ll try to go through.” Teonie said, and without waiting for a response, she tightened the lifejacket around her and slid onto the side of the raft.
“I’ll do it.” Dane said quickly, looking down at the ocean around them.
There could be anything beneath the dark surface. They hadn’t seen any creatures bigger than shoals of hand-sized fish on their journey, but Dane wasn’t willing to let Teonie risk her life.
He slipped from the raft before she had chance to stop him. The water was cold but not icy and he bobbed with the waves for a moment as he let his body acclimatise. He pushed off against the raft lightly, moving his arms and legs together towards the barrier. He braced himself to feel something, but there was not so much as a tingle as he passed effortlessly through the impenetrable defence.
He turned back to look at his family behind him, and he almost smiled as he realised that he had been expecting the raft to disappear from his own view once he was safely through. He swam back to the raft, glad of the jacket as the waves pushed and pulled at him.
“We’ll have to wait here until daylight.” Teonie said, looking concerned. “The water isn’t freezing, but it’s cold and there’s a good chance they’ll miss us in the dark.”
Rico extended a hand, pulling Dane aboard and he felt the breeze cold and uncomfortable on his soaking wet body. He shivered and looked around the inflatable before realisation dawned that they had no change of clothes, no blankets or towels.
“Are you going to be ok?” Rose asked concerned, as Dane slid away from the rest of the group conscious of the water he was dripping into the raft.
“I’ll be fine.” He assured her, trying to disguise the involuntary spasms of his body has it struggled to warm up.
Teonie opened her mouth to reply, but a low hum in the distance stopped her before she could share her thoughts.
“What’s that?” Dane’s heart jumped against his ribs, his coldness forgotten.
The night was upon them now, but the stars lit up the sky enough to make out a shape moving effortlessly towards them from the direction they had just travelled. There was a flash in the distance at sea-level and a muffled whoosh before a flame burned briefly on top of the water. The fire lit up the scene brightly, before the ocean reclaimed the burning wreckage, but those few seconds were all the group needed to see that an air-craft had torched the boat that they had vacated.
They cried out in terror. The raft rocked unsteadily at their movements and Dane tore his eyes away from the wreckage, forgetting his soaking wet clothes and reaching for the children.
“Do you think they can get this close?” Rose asked, her voice trembling with fright.
“I don’t know.” Teonie admitted. “This barrier is different, more advanced than the Tech-shield.”
The discs danced closer and Dane knew they needed to act.
“Everyone in the water.” He commanded.
They slipped in without hesitation, and Dane and Rose clung to Tommy and Norah desperately. The disc was almost upon them now. He looped the string of Tommy’s life-jacket around his fist and kicked through the barrier. He had the advantage of not only strength but already being acclimatised to the cold, and he waited, breathlessly, for the others to catch him up, counting them through the shimmering border to safety.
Rose and Norah were next, and Dane knew that Rico and Teonie had purposely waited, putting themselves at risk yet again for the young children. They splashed through together and Alyssa drew up to the barrier. Dane felt his pounding heart start to relax, as Alyssa raised an arm above her head to swim into the sanctuary of De Sierto’s territory. Her arm came down against the curtain and she bounced backwards, bobbing on the spot before a wave pushed her further back. She repeated the gesture, confused, and Dane felt the hazy sensation of déjà vu. On the third attempt, he knew with a certainty.
“We couldn’t find her chip!” Teonie exclaimed and before Dane could stop her she was swimming back through the barrier to Alyssa and the danger.
“Get back in the raft.” Teonie instructed the older woman. “There’s a chip somewhere. I’ll find it.”
Dane watched helplessly; Tommy’s arms around his neck as the waves washed over them and the threat of the aircraft hovered threateningly close now.
“Hurry!”
Teonie dragged Alyssa back onto the inflatable and was pushing her damp hair to the side within seconds. She fumbled for the knife, still sheathed at her hip and slit the barely-healed incision. Dane heard Teonie’s frustrated cry as she rooted uselessly at the base of her neck for the chip she could have missed.
“Do you remember them chipping you?” Teonie asked in desperation to the woman.
“I don’t remember.” Alyssa pulled away from Teonie. “Please, just go back.”
“Anywhere?” Teonie ignored her plea. “Any scars? They might have put it in when they hospitalised you?”
Alyssa shook her head, but there was a slight hesitation and Teonie didn’t miss it.
“Where?” She demanded, gripping the woman’s shoulders tightly.
Alyssa paused before admitting. “My foot.”
Dane felt a sickening sense of dread as he predicted her next words.
“My left foot.”
He could feel Teonie’s shock, in sync with his own, but she recovered instantly and wrenched Alyssa’s boot and sock from her foot. She raised her bare foot to the night sky and slit across the sole with the knife. She didn’t have to search for it. Immediately, she found what she was looking for.
“Dane,” She called, her voice chillingly calm. “Give Tommy to Rico. I need you to take a look at this.”
“Teonie, there’s no time.” Alyssa warned her. “I’m wired up, aren’t I? Like an Artificial. Get to safety, all of you. As long as I know you’re all safe, I’m fine.”
Dane was free of the child and back at the side of the raft in seconds. He ignored Alyssa’s pleas and bent his head to look at what Teonie was showing him.
A small black rectangle was attached to a wire that disappeared beyond a mass of bloody muscle and tissue.
“Can you cut it out?” Dane asked, glancing up to the approaching aircraft.
“I think there’s more.” Teonie met his eyes and he could see the horror and the heartache behind her calm tone. “The chip must be connected to her nervous system. Most likely her spine. This is a surgical procedure. I can’t cut it out safely.”
“Get out.” Alyssa suddenly climbed to her feet, ignoring the blood pooling around her from the incision. The raft wobbled and Teonie fell backwards.
“We’re not leaving you.” Teonie snarled fiercely.
“You go!” Dane told Teonie. “I’ll stay with her.”
“No!” Alyssa cried. “All I ever wanted was for you to be safe. You leave now! The children need you.”
“They’ve got Rose.” Dane reached up to grip his mother’s hand and he heard the raw emotion in his voice as he begged her. “Please. Let me stay with you.”
“No!” She cried again, and she pulled him up onto the raft.
He slithered aboard ungraciously into a pool of sea-water tinged with blood. Teonie was struggling to stand and Alyssa pushed her roughly back down next to Dane.
“Don’t you see?” She urged them passionately. “They’ve turned me into whatever Arielle was. They’ve been in control of me this whole time! You’ve got your lives ahead of you and those children need you.”
“Mama, please!” Dane begged her, reaching for her hand. He was crying freely; tears running down his cheeks and mingling with the salt-water soaking his skin and clothes.
“I love you.” She said gently, and Dane could see a fierce determinati
on burning in her eyes. “I’m so proud of you all. You’ve saved us, and you’ll save Apatia.”
The aircraft were almost on top of them and the low hum echoed eerily across a silent ocean. There was a flash of light from above, illuminating the grey disc and blinding them temporarily. Dane braced himself for the impact. There was a gentle splash and the raft jerked him backwards. He felt a hand find his in the darkness and he opened his eyes, wanting to comfort Teonie as they died. His eyes found hers and he saw before he understood that the raft was not burning around them. He struggled to sit up, still clutching Teonie’s hand and his mother was gone. Hands reached into the raft, but it was Rico and Tommy, Rose and Norah. They climbed in and Dane realised that they were on the other side of the barrier.
“Ma!” Dane scrambled to the back of the inflatable, peering into the dark water for her.
“Dane! Dane!” Rose slipped across the wet surface as she rushed to his side. “She’s gone.”
“No!” His voice came out a desperate wail and he moved his head from side-to-side still searching.
“Dane, she’s gone.” Rose repeated, more gently this time and she wrapped her arms around him.
He struggled against her, feeling the pain of his heart shattering.
“They hit her.” She murmured as she pulled him into her arms. “She jumped from the raft and pushed you through the barrier. Dane, she’s gone.”
“She might not be.” He sobbed into his sister’s arms.
“She is.” Rose’s voice cracked, and she gave in to the tears. “I saw the flames take her. Dane, I’m sorry.”
When the aircraft retreated, they searched for her body in the inky-waters, and Teonie and Rico sat quietly, not trying to stop them. Instead, they comforted the younger children, hugging them close for protection against the cool night until they fell into an exhausted slumber.
Teonie gently laid Norah down and moved to the back of the raft.
“Dane.” She called gently. “That’s enough. She’s gone.”
He looked up from his blind search, making out only the shape of her in the darkness. He heard Rose splashing over to him and she found his hand underneath the water and squeezed it tightly. Together, they climbed back onto the raft, fatigued, cold and emotionally-numb. Rose sank down next to Rico and he held her tight against his chest as she sobbed heartbroken tears for the mother she had lost. Dane looked on, taking in the sleeping Coles children and wondered at how they would ever recover from the horrors that they had witnessed.
He didn’t think any of them could take any more pain.
Teonie reached out to him, holding him close and they sat in silence, wide awake long after Rose and Rico had fallen asleep. They said nothing. They didn’t need to. Whatever thoughts he was thinking, he knew she thought them too. They watched the sun come up together, their eyes stinging with the ache of fatigue.
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?” Dane said simply. “No matter how much we mess with the world, it’s still a bigger and better place than us.”
She slid closer to him, resting her head against his shoulder.
“So, what next?” He pressed his lips to the top of her head, tasting the salt on her hair.
She tilted her face softly to face him and he saw a question in her eyes. Her full mouth parted as if to speak.
“Dane! Teonie!”
Norah, still heavy-eyed with sleep, had woken and was staring out into the distance.
Through the colours of dawn, they made out the silhouette of land ahead of them and Teonie’s response died on her lips. They gently roused the others and, together, they watched as the shadow lifted, unveiling the land of safety and uncertainty ahead.
As the sky lightened, a sturdy boat came out to meet them. The coastguard team pulled them onboard, wrapping them in thick blankets and handing them warm drinks. They knew Teonie’s name. They had been expecting them, they said, and the captain turned the boat with ease, whisking them back to the harbour.
AFTER
Alyssa’s stories of the De Sierto of her childhood sprang to Dane’s mind as he took in the white sands lined with palm trees. The coastal town, where they were staying, was small and neat; pretty two-storey buildings in every shade of pastel with baskets brimming full of flowers at the windows. He wished she had been here to see it. It seemed like a perfect place to raise a family, alongside, not against, nature. They had more Officials to meet and interviews to give, but when they were finished, Dane knew he would need to consider what the future held for them. Teonie had intended to return, to avenge their families, and he knew that the idea had been growing inside him like a seed, watered by the losses he had suffered and given light by the knowledge that ordinary people, just like him, could make a difference. For now, though, the family that they had were the ones they needed to be with.
Despite its technological superiority, the island favoured the simple life. People worked from dawn until dusk. They worked on the land, and on the ocean. They moved goods with carts and they were strong and bronzed for their efforts. The people of the Island respected the Earth as if they were care-takers of their slice of paradise, not owners of the terrain. They took what they needed, and they replaced what they could.
“I love it here.” Rose told Dane, a few weeks later, as they stood on the edge of the ocean, watching the children splash in the warm, shallow water as evening started to fall.
Norah and Tommy had taken some time to adjust to the culture-shock of a land where Organics carrying out mundane tasks, long working days and the strange tastes of plant-based nutrition, rather than the artificially-flavoured pills they were raised on, but the trade-off of sun-drenched days playing and learning with the island children had gradually won them over.
“She should be here.” Rose continued, digging her bare feet into the sand as they spoke.
Dane looked up at her sharply at her words. The growing breeze had whipped her dark hair over her face, hiding her features. She had spoken the least about what had happened, but he sometimes heard her crying out in her dreams and knew they were all a long way from being healed. Grief was like the tide; coming and going, sometimes so strong that it knocked you from your feet, taking your breath, making you feel you’d never get up again. But, like the tide depositing its trinkets of shells and driftwood on the sand, it brought with it memories that were rich and beautiful; moving pictures and sounds that they had forgotten over time.
“As soon as I’m old enough,” She told Dane fiercely. “I’m going back to fight.”
He could hear the determination in her voice and he knew there was no point trying to talk her down. He’d seen that grit somewhere before and they were alive because of it. Before he could form a diplomatic response in his mind, he felt someone at his side. He looked down at the dark head of Teonie and she looked up at him, squinting against the last of the sun’s rays. She nodded her head towards Rose, and Dane watched his sister slip her hand discreetly into Rico’s and walk away without so much as a backward glance at him.
Teonie laughed as she watched Dane’s features moved through a whole range of emotions as he tried to grasp how he felt about his little sister’s rapid maturity.
“Let them be.” She slipped her own arm through Dane’s. “They’ll be fine. We all will.”
And he thought that she was probably right.
THE END.
ABOUT THE AUTHOR
Project Terra is S.J Woods’ debut Young Adult novel. She also writes contemporary fiction under the name Lily Hayden.
Born in South Wales, S.J Woods is passionate about conservation, animal rights and climate change.
For more information, new releases and news, follow Hayden Woods Creative on social media.
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