Dissident

by Lisa Beeson

  Soren sat alone at the little table in his room.

  Under the pale beam of light shining down from a small circular skylight, he methodically creased and folded the colorful craft paper in front of him.

  The feel of the crisp, stiff paper in his fingers calmed him. Each movement became part of a comforting rhythm. Straight lines and angles compositing together to make a paper creation made sense to him. It gave him a sense of order and control.

  He finished the last fold of his origami turtle. Holding it up in the beam of sunlight, he inspected the multi-colored paper animal from every angle. He nodded in appraisal of the final product. Skylar would like this one.

  He had felt his sister’s intense fear and grief, and he was frightened that the bad men had taken her too. Though he missed his twin sister with a physical ache in his heart, he didn’t want her to end up here with him. He wanted her to be safe and happy. No matter how bad things got, he would be brave so she wouldn’t have to feel his fear and worry on top of her own.

  Placing the turtle to the side, he absently touched the small scar on the back of his neck. The newly acquired habit reminded him of why he shouldn’t try to use his ability to escape. Dr. Nayar had told him that if he did, the chip they had put there would give him an extremely painful shock throughout his whole body. Though he didn’t trust Dr. Nayar, or anyone else in this place, he was scared to test whether it would work or not. The scar was proof enough that they had done something to him.

  Back when he had finally stopped being so sleepy and his head had stopped feeling like it was stuffed with buzzing cotton balls, he had awoken in this box of a room. It was windowless, except for the small circular skylight in the ceiling. It only ever showed a small patch of sky – nothing to tell him where he was. The room had a bed, its own bathroom, a small table and chair, and reams of colorful origami paper.

  Though it was unsettling that his kidnappers had provided him with his favorite thing, the paper had been too tempting to ignore. He spent his free hours making creation after creation. Filling the drab room with a colorful menagerie that he knew Skylar would have loved.

  He chose a bright yellow piece of paper to use next, and started making the first folds for a star. Reminding himself of the bright ball of light that Ari had put in his chest. He knew that it had only been a dream, but he also knew that she had really been there with him – giving him a part of herself to keep with him forever. The light had helped her get through the darkness, and it would help him now.

  Ari will come and save me… She will.

  The sound of two high-pitched beeps signaled that someone had just unlocked the door to his room. He stopped mid-fold and glanced up to see Dr. Nayar push her way in with a metal rolling cart carrying his breakfast, a pile of clothes, and a brand new pair of slip-on shoes.

  Soren’s brow furrowed – usually, it was one of the gruff orderlies who brought him his breakfast in the morning. It wasn’t until he was finished eating and dressed in a clean pair of gray sweats and a white t-shirt, that Dr. Nayar would come. She came every day to ask questions and make him do exercises to strengthen his muscles after having slept for so long. He would usually ignore Dr. Nayar’s questions, which were mostly about Ari and why he had run away from Scion’s Keep. He didn’t know how she knew about that stuff or why they were keeping him here, but he did know that he’d never say anything about Ari to these people. She was family – he had to protect her. Instead of answering Dr. Nayar, he would retreat to that safe place in his mind that protected him from other people until she’d give up and move on to the exercises.

  “We’re doing things differently today, Soren,” Dr. Nayar said, noting his confusion. “It’s been determined that you are ready to leave the room.” She placed his breakfast on the table, right on top of the star he had been making. “Eat up. Then get dressed. Make it quick.”

  Soren stared down at the tray, as he tried to control his breathing. He didn’t like change – especially here. Leave the room…to where? He didn’t like being a prisoner, but the room had become a constant, it had a routine. Outside of it was unknown – unsafe.

  He closed his eyes and took a deep breath, trying to visualize Ari’s light glowing brightly in his chest. Ari is with me. I can be brave.

  “Eat,” Dr. Nayar demanded in a tight voice.

  He felt her rising frustration and impatience like a hammer against his skull, and he didn’t want to find out what would happen if she got really angry. Picking up the spoon, he began shoveling the oatmeal into his mouth as quickly as he could, then he gulped down the glass of chocolate vitamin drink. When he was finished, he pushed back from the table with a screech of his chair against the linoleum floor and stood up. Without making eye contact, he swiped the clothes and shoes from the cart and took them into the bathroom so he could get dressed in private.

  He didn’t like the way Dr. Nayar always looked at him like a toy she wanted to take apart to see how it worked. In fact, he didn’t like Dr. Nayar at all.

  At first, her tan skin and thick, straight, black hair had reminded him of Ari. However, he quickly concluded that Dr. Nayar’s perpetually sour face and distant demeanor ruined the comparison. Also, Ari’s hair had a silky sheen full of hidden colors that came out in different kinds of light and always smelled like flowers. Dr. Nayar’s hair was dull and smelled like strong chemicals that tickled his nose.

  Soren put on the shorts and t-shirt Dr. Nayar brought and was surprised to see that they were the same kind of clothes he had back home. The shorts were his favorite shade of blue with a bunch of pockets, just how he liked, and the shirt had his favorite superheroes on it.

  How would they know stuff like that about him? He never told them about any of that stuff.

  Uneasy, he opened the door of the bathroom and his heart did an excited little flip in his chest. Marin? It’s Marin!

  In spite of his initial excitement, he stopped himself from running to her. His brain couldn’t reconcile what he was seeing with how he knew things should be.

  Marin should be saving him, fighting tooth and nail to get him out of here and away from these people. But there she was, standing there talking to Dr. Nayar, who was reviewing something on her tablet with her, perfectly content and unconcerned about the situation. She didn’t seem to be a prisoner or his rescuer.

  His confusion quickly turned into distrust.

  When Marin noticed him standing inside the bathroom doorway, she smiled and got down on her knees. “Hey, buddy,” she said brightly, beckoning him to her with open arms.

  Soren stayed where he was, his hands twisting the bottom of his new shirt. Marin had always been caring and kind to Soren and Skylar. She was their teacher and someone to go to if they needed something. She was their friend. She wasn’t a bad guy. This wasn’t right.

  When he didn’t move, her smile fell with a shadow of sadness and disappointment. “Come here, Soren. I know things have been scary and confusing for you, but it’s okay. You’re safe. I swear it.”

  “Are you here to take me home?” he asked in a small voice.

  “You are home,” his Grandma Mara proclaimed as she stepped into the room – her oppressive presence eclipsing everything else. “Come, boy.” She held out her thin hand towards him in demand more than invitation. “It’s time for you to prove useful.”

  Soren’s feet began to move forward. He had no control over them. No one defied Grandma Mara’s commands.

  Soren followed the women through the hallways and down the gray, cement stairways that led to even more hallways. There were many closed doors, just like there had been in his recent nightmares. He had a million questions swimming around in his head, but Grandma Mara didn’t tolerate being pestered, so he kept silent as they walked.

  When they approached a set of elevator doors, they finally stopped. Grandma Mara held her hand over a screen on the wall beside the doors. When the screen turned blue, she dropped her hand and said in a loud clear voice, “Access requested.”
The screen turned green and the doors opened, then the four of them stepped in.

  Soren’s stomach dipped uncomfortably as the elevator began its ascent. His head was starting to hurt from his teeth clenching so hard. Forcing his jaw to relax, he began rubbing the spot on his chest where Ari had placed the light. He was desperately trying to understand what was going on, but nothing made sense. Why were Marin and his grandmother here? Why did it seem like they were in charge? Where was here?

  Marin noticed his discomfort and reached out her hand for him to hold, but he stubbornly stuffed his hands into his pockets and ignored her. Things weren’t right, and until he figured it out he wouldn’t trust anyone.

  Marin let her hand fall with a pained sigh and a sad shake of her head. He could feel her hurt and worry, but he didn’t care. He was hurt and worried too.

  There was a chime as the elevator finally stopped. The doors opened to a wood paneled, marble-floored little room. His uncle Gregory was awaiting them in front of a set of massive doors, like a sentry to a fortress.

  “Mother,” Gregory said in greeting, and then held the double doors open for them.

  Soren stood frozen as his grandmother and Marin strode forward, until Dr. Nayar forced him out of the elevator with a firm hand on his back.

  “Keep up, boy,” Grandma Mara commanded as she walked through the double doors, causing his reluctant feet to move forward after her.

  Soren wondered where his uncle Blake was. It was strange to see Gregory without him, though he wasn’t sorry for his other uncle’s absence. Especially after he and Skylar had locked him in the garage back at Scion’s Keep. Soren knew Blake would want payback for that stunt and he dreaded it.

  They entered a large, long hallway that reminded him of a museum, or more accurately, like a cluttered antique shop. There were bookcases and shelves lining the walls, crammed with very old leather-bound books and assorted antique curios, with a patchwork of paintings of ancient civilizations, old portraits, and maps hanging between them. They walked past statues of mythical creatures and strange people on pedestals in alcoves. There were also pedestals holding stone and clay tablets, brittle-looking scrolls, and parchments under glass cases. It reminded Soren of the type of stuff Hugo would love.

  Soren missed Hugo. He would have saved me.

  Just as Soren was wondering what the spiral staircase going up to a closed door led to, Gregory walked swiftly past them to open a set of doors at the end of the hall.

  The room beyond was completely different from the hallway. It looked to Soren like a high-tech war room. Like the kind from the movies that the older boys at Scion’s Keep liked to watch. The abrupt change in style and purpose was jarring.

  A multitude of screens filled the walls, showing various live camera feeds and news channels from around the world. There were people walking around, busy talking on cell phones or having video chats on their tablets. Something important was happening. The room was buzzing with high emotions, making Soren feel dizzy and disoriented after having been mostly alone for so long. …It’s too much. Too much.

  Swaying and hugging himself tightly, he tried to keep calm for Skylar’s sake. So instead, he focused his attention on Gregory, who was now walking over to an old man on the other side of a giant circular smart table. It was showing a three-dimensional map of a small island. Gregory gently placed a hand on the old man’s shoulder and said something into his ear. The old man turned from the map and immediately zeroed in on Soren, making Soren’s stomach tighten uncomfortably. The old man’s intense scrutiny felt like pins and needles in Soren’s brain.

  The old man excused himself from the person he’d been talking with as he stood up straighter, then came around the table towards them. He had a strange, slightly halting gait. Soren realized why when he saw the man’s torso, waist, and legs encased in a sleek robotic brace that seemed to help him stand up straight and walk.

  The man was the oldest person Soren had ever seen. He looked almost as ancient as the stuff in the hallway. His skin was pale, thin, and marbled with blue ropey veins. Fine wisps of colorless hair covered his shiny, age-spotted scalp. It seemed that he had once been tall, but he was now shrunken and withered. He reminded Soren of the pictures he had seen of vultures and condors when they had been studying birds of prey. The man’s sharp, hooded eyes in combination with his stilted, robotic movements made Soren’s teeth clench even tighter and his hands start to tremble.

  When he saw the effect he was having on the Soren, the old man smirked with a knowing glare. He welcomed the boy’s fear.

  Soren wanted to run away screaming, but before he could move, his grandmother’s hand clamped down painfully onto his shoulder. “Soren,” she said in a clipped tone. “Meet your great-grandfather, Markus Reinhold.”

  “Hello, Soren,” Markus said with a dry, husky voice, and an attempt at a charming smile. His teeth were too white and straight to be real, and looked unsettling in his narrow, wilted face. “It is time for you to take your place in the family, and help us make the world as it should be.” He held out his gnarled hand, beckoning Soren to come towards him.

  The longer he looked into the old man’s piercing blue eyes, the more Soren felt compelled to take the proffered hand. It felt easy and right like puzzle pieces settling into place. But the light in Soren cringed away from the old man, and he finally allowed himself to admit that his family were the bad guys. They kidnapped people and locked them up. He wanted nothing to do with Markus Reinhold – nothing to do with any of the Reinholds. He and Skylar would be different. Ari had said that they were good. So he would be good and he would be brave. He would not help these people do anything. He had to get away.

  At his hesitance, Markus scowled in annoyance then flicked his eyes to Mara. “Samara,” he said in an implicit demand. Soren had never heard anyone use her full first name before. It was strange to think of Grandma Mara having a parent.

  Mara squeezed Soren’s shoulder tighter, making him squirm in discomfort. “Don’t embarrass me, boy. Go and take your great-grandfather’s hand. Now.”

  Soren felt his feet start to move, but he fought the compulsion with everything he had. He imagined the light in his chest burning with a fiery brilliance, giving him the courage to fight whatever forced him to obey his grandmother. But the more he fought the compulsion, the more it felt like an overwhelming itch throughout his body. He couldn’t make himself turn and run, but he managed to stop himself from moving forward. “Never,” he grated out. “I’ll never help you! You’re all bad!”

  Markus’s eyes flashed with anger before he lifted his outstretched hand to summon someone else with a flick of his fingers. “Helena, dear,” he called. “Please come here.”

  Soren peered past the old man to see a redheaded woman immediately drop what she was doing to stalk towards them from across the room. Her movements were as smooth and calculated as a jungle cat, but her eyes held nothing but a strange emptiness.

  “I see that you have the same defiant and disobedient spark as your mother,” Markus said, bringing Soren’s attention back to him. “She was too blind to see what was best for her. Too small-minded and selfish to see what was best for all of us. She corrupted some of our most talented people, taking them down the path of dissidence with her.” His eyes glanced over Soren’s head towards the women behind him, and Soren felt Grandma Mara’s shame and Marin’s fear and sadness. “Marin’s own siblings, whom we raised in comfort and privilege, have turned against us. All because of the cancerous influence of your mother.” He pointed a gnarled, accusing finger right at Soren, as if it was his fault. Soren gasped at the intensity of the old man’s rage at his mother’s betrayal. Markus quickly recovered his composure however, and Soren was able to breathe again.

  “I tried,” he said, almost pleading with Soren to understand. “I tried to find a way to prevent her pain, but she insisted on the most ugly and violent ways to keep her on the right path… But this, between us, doesn’t have to get ugly.”

/>   Helena came up behind him, placing her youthful hand on his withered shoulder.

  Markus patted Helena’s hand. “Please, help my great-grandson see that we’re not bad people. And convince him of the great importance of the Cause.”

  Helena nodded, and when she smiled down at Soren, the most amazingly pleasant feelings flooded his senses. A strange giddiness filled his head and his feet felt like they were floating on air.

  How could he not have noticed that Helena was the most beautiful woman in the whole entire world? She was like a real live angel, all shining and soft around the edges. His heart swelled at the thought of someone as important and special as her actually smiling and paying attention to him.

  She demurely crouched down, her skirt flowing out around her like silky flower petals. She reached out to him, and he ran to her, resting his head on her shoulder as she wrapped her arms around him. Soren thought she smelled like sweetness and sunlight.

  “You are such an intelligent and talented little boy,” Helena purred into his ear. “It would make me very happy if you would help us. You’d like to make me happy, wouldn’t you?”

  Soren nodded emphatically. Making her happy felt like the most important thing ever. He drew back so that she could see the seriousness on his face. He absolutely had to let her know, “I would do anything for you.”

  A dry cackle rattled in the old man’s chest. “That’s my boy,” Markus said with a triumphant grin.

  Chapter 8

  Alvaro feverishly sketched out the last part of his vision before the details vanished from his mind.

  Jack had graciously started helping him with his art skills and techniques soon after they had arrived, so Alvaro was able to draw Val’s face without immediately wanting to tear it up and burn it. Though it wasn’t perfect, it was recognizable enough, and that would have to do.

  He finished the last bit of shading, dated it, then placed the pencil on the glass-topped wicker table. Leaning forward in the rocking chair, he rested his elbows on his knees and held his head in his hands. Oh God… Tears stung his eyes as a sob rose up to stick in his throat. Guilt and despair raked at his heart. The last exchange he’d had with Val had been a bitter argument. He had essentially told her that she was a self-centered bitch that wasn’t worth his time and effort.