by J. R. Harber
“No one survives long in the Waste. You know that.”
“But that’s not justice.”
“Our allegiance is not to justice—it’s to the State. If the State says we can’t keep going, then we shouldn’t. They are no longer a danger to law-abiding citizens. Gabriel, if we go into the Waste, we can never come back!” Joan spread her hands in a helpless gesture. “I can’t stop you,” she said quietly. “But I won’t go with you.”
Gabriel sighed. Joan was outraged, her face tight and eyes wide.
“Then I won’t ask you to,” he said with a hint of kindness. “Will you be okay taking the drone back yourself?”
“Of course. All I have to do is press a button and sit there. But, Gabriel—”
“I’m going,” he interrupted. “You won’t change my mind. Just leave.”
“I’m sorry, I just can’t …”
“I should never have assumed that you would,” he said shortly. He looked at her appraisingly. “You’re good at this, Joan. Someday, you’ll be great.”
She swallowed, looking away. “Thanks.”
Joan sighed and walked with purpose toward the drone. He pressed a button, and the door slid open for her. She got inside and keyed in the course back to Horizon but didn’t close the door.
“You know how to start it?” Gabriel asked.
“Yes,” she said flatly, meeting his eyes. “What am I supposed to tell Hiram?” she asked, a pleading note in her voice.
Gabriel smiled wretchedly. Joan bit her lip.
“Tell him I’m doing exactly what they taught me to do.”
Before she could respond, he hit the close door button and stepped away from the drone, watching as it sealed itself. It lifted into the air without a sound as Joan gazed down at him, unanswered questions written across her face.
Gabriel stopped the car he’d taken from the Rosewood garage and got out. He’d come to the last fork in the road—the bridge and checkpoint stood to his right, and the road continued straight ahead, running alongside the river. At the bend in the road, there was a streak of black on the pavement, and he knelt beside it and pressed his finger there.
Someone swerved—going too fast, unfamiliar with the road, almost missed the turn. Gabriel turned in a circle, taking a last look at the silent forest. Into the Waste, then.
He got back into the car.
Crossing into the Waste was anticlimactic. He had expected some kind of scan, perhaps, or at least to be given a final warning, but Gabriel simply drove across the bridge, through the gap in the wall, and out on the other side.
The terrain was the same, for a little while at least—a lush forest, broken only by the increasingly ill-paved road. As he drove on, though, the trees grew farther apart; the dirt becoming cracked and parched. Small scrubby bushes appeared, low to the ground with only a thin covering of leaves.
It’s a little like traveling through time, Gabriel thought.
Asa and Eve had done little to cover their tracks—or perhaps they were unaware of just how much evidence they left behind. The paved road narrowed, then turned to dirt, and Gabriel spotted a clutch of broken branches where their car had swerved too close to a low-lying bush. As he left the last of the trees behind, the road vanished altogether into the arid landscape, and Gabriel stopped the car again and got out.
Before him lay a vast emptiness—more open space than he had ever seen, stretching into what looked like forever. The sun was sinking in the sky, streaking it gold and pink, and the air in his lungs was cold and dry. A little breeze scuffed up dust around his ankles, and far off in the distance, silhouetted by the setting sun, a jagged horizon hinted at mountains. Gabriel inhaled deeply, taking in the unaccustomed air, and felt a sudden, aching hollowness in his chest.
How can I be here to see this when you are not?
He closed his eyes, and for a moment he could feel her in his arms, the warmth of her body soft beside him. Longing jolted through him, and he gasped at the shock of it, covering his face with his hands.
Stop. Focus.
He suddenly opened his eyes, casting them in every direction for a sign of where his quarry had run. It took only moments—deep tire tracks showed their route, scored into the scorched earth like a beacon for him to follow.
Runners always leave a trail. Gabriel drove on.
CHAPTER ELEVEN
ASA’S FINGERS WERE BEGINNING TO CRAMP. He took one hand off the wheel and flexed it. Eve gave him a nervous look.
“What’s wrong?” she asked. Her voice was tense; for the last hour she had been staring straight ahead, her lips pressed into a straight line.
Asa forced a smile, switching hands. “Nothing. Just holding on too tight,” he said, but she was staring again, as if she’d forgotten the question as soon as she’d asked it. “Eve?” he prodded gently, and she looked out the window, away from him.
“It’s like everything out here is dead,” she said quietly.
Asa didn’t reply. He had been trying not to think the same thing, gazing ahead as the forest vanished around them, giving way to this dry, cracked earth. The few plants around them were strangely shaped and low to the ground, as if the air itself weighed on them. From time to time, small creatures darted by, too fast for him to see what they were or whether they resembled animals he had seen before.
“Nothing is dead,” Asa said firmly. “It’s just a desert. There’s a microclimate in the plaza in Horizon. I remember it.”
Eve smiled weakly, then straightened her posture and gave him a sharp look. “I haven’t been paying attention,” she said. “How much time have we got?”
“Depends,” Asa said grimly. “The car’s eating up charge slower since the ground flattened out, but I’d say less than an hour.”
Eve nodded, expressionless.
“I guess I assumed there would be … something out here,” he went on. “People. A town. Something by now.”
“Maybe there’s nothing,” Eve said. “Maybe everyone out here really is dead. Maybe all those stories about the Waste are made up. Maybe everyone just dies.”
Asa laughed suddenly, caught by surprise.
“What?” Eve asked, looking annoyed.
“I don’t know,” he said. “You know, all I ever wanted was to get away from Rosewood and have some excitement. Now we’re on the run, out in the Waste. I’m with the most beautiful girl I’ve ever met. And I feel like the world is ending.” His heart sank, the brief moment of ironic mirth passing quickly. “I guess it’s not that funny,” he finished quietly.
Eve was smiling.
“What?” he said.
“You said I was beautiful.”
Asa felt himself blush, but he kept his eyes fixed on the desert ahead. “I can’t be the first person to mention it,” he said stiffly.
“Stop!” Eve shouted, and he braked reflexively. The car jerked to a halt, and Asa’s stomach lurched.
“What happened?”
“Sorry,” Eve said breathlessly. “Look.”
She gestured to her own window, and Asa leaned across the seat to look. In the distance lay a flat rectangular block, too neat to be a rock formation.
“It’s a building,” Asa said, hearing the doubt in his own voice.
“It has to be,” Eve said firmly. “And where there’s a building, there are people.”
“Yeah, but what kind of people?”
Asa met Eve’s eyes, looking for reassurance. They were tossing hope back and forth between them, each one holding on until overcome with fear again.
Eve gave him a quick smile. “I don’t know. But you’re out here, and I’m out here. Maybe the rest of the people out here are more like us than we think.”
Asa shook his head. “No one survives out here but wasters—violent, antisocial criminals,” he said with more vehemence than he had intended. Eve’s face froze. “I’m sorry. I’m sorry, Eve, I didn’t mean your brother.” He scrambled to apologize, and she raised an eyebrow.
“Look, it doesn�
��t matter who’s out here,” he said. “There’s two of us. And we’ve got to charge the car or find another way to get across the Waste. We’ve got to go there.” He nodded decisively and moved to start the car again.
“Actually, I don’t think we do,” Eve said slowly.
She was looking out the window again, and Asa followed her gaze. Something was moving toward them. He squinted and saw that it was a small group of people rapidly approaching from the direction of the building. They were running, and as they neared the car, Asa could see there were six of them, four men and two women.
Eve touched his arm. “Do you think we should get out?” she asked softly, and Asa hesitated.
“No,” he said. “Not yet.”
The group slowed to a walk, one man taking up the lead as the others fell back. Asa took them all in, aware that he was staring openly but unable to stop. The one who seemed to be the leader and one of the women were Panafrican. The three other men were dark-skinned, without markers for any one ethnicity. Only one of the women was Europan like Asa, her hair bleached pale white and her skin pink from the desert sun.
It was precisely the opposite mix of people that he was accustomed to, at least back in Rosewood. The strangers were all dressed in lightweight clothing—sleeveless shirts and long dark pants—except for the Panafrican woman, who was wearing pink shorts with ragged hems. All of them were muscular and hollow-cheeked, and they all had long black objects in their hands.
The group stopped, and the leader stepped forward alone, bending forward to see into the car. His eyes were dark brown and long-lashed, slightly incongruous with his sharply angular face and day-old beard. Asa shrank back instinctively, then steeled himself, straightening his spine.
The man came around to his door and stopped, hefting the stick in his hands as if he was testing its weight. Up close, Asa could see that it was not a stick but an oddly shaped object made of hard plastic, ending in a long tube. The man was holding it as if it were important. He bent over again and looked curiously at Asa, narrowing his eyes, then straightened and rapped the window with the butt of the object. Asa jumped. Beside him, he heard Eve’s sharp intake of breath.
The man hit the window again, and Eve put a hand on his arm.
“They want us to get out,” she said.
“Yeah, I got that.” He glanced at her. “Wait here. Let me get out first,” he said, summoning courage.
She nodded. “Okay.”
Before he could respond, she opened the door and was out of the car. Asa rushed to follow her, shielding his eyes as he stepped out into the afternoon sunlight.
“Hi?” he said.
The leader flicked his eyes up and down, appraising. “Turn around,” he said. “Lilith, search the girl.”
The woman in the pink shorts stepped forward and took hold of Eve’s shoulders. “Face the car,” she said.
“Hey!” Asa protested, too late.
“Asa, it’s okay,” Eve called as Lilith began to methodically pat her body.
“You too,” the leader said.
Asa complied warily, his face flushing as the stranger frisked him thoroughly, checking all of his clothing until there was no doubt that he wasn’t hiding anything.
When the man stepped back, Asa spun around. “Look, we didn’t do anything wrong!” he said, barely restraining himself from shouting.
The man didn’t blink, turning to his cohort as if Asa had not spoken. “Aquila and Simon, search the car and drive it back.”
The second woman strode forward, followed by a short, slim man. Forgetting himself for a moment, Asa stared at the man called Simon. His head was bald, and his face was half-hidden by a bushy gray beard, but there was no mistaking it from his face: he was old—far older than sixty, his skin wrinkled and thin as tissue paper.
Asa tried catching Eve’s eye, but she was biting her lip, anxiously watching Aquila as she pulled a backpack out from under the passenger seat, slung it onto the car’s hood, and unzipped it. Asa stiffened as she unpacked it, laying the contraband technology out on the hood carefully, as if she were decorating.
“That’s yours?” the leader demanded, and Asa nodded.
“It’s mine,” Eve said.
“Cyrus, come look at this,” Aquila said sharply.
The leader gave Asa a level look and signaled to Simon, who came trotting back from the trunk of the car, where he had been rooting through the emergency supplies.
“That’s a nice water purifier,” Simon said cheerfully.
Asa gave him a sidelong glance. “Thanks,” he said.
His eyes fixed on Cyrus as he took the black rectangular thing Eve had packed out of Aquila’s hands and examined it. He set it on the hood of the car and opened it.
The box, Asa thought, though he could not see inside.
Cyrus’s face grew thoughtful. “It’s ancient,” he said to Aquila, again acting as if Eve and Asa were not present. “I don’t even think we’ve got anything to scrap it for. The parts will be worthless.”
“Ancient, yes,” Aquila said patiently. “But who in there even has access to this kind of thing?”
She gave Eve a penetrating look. Eve stood her ground, staring back at her calmly.
“Are you with the State?” Aquila demanded.
“No, we’re running from the State,” Eve said.
“So, what’s this?” Cyrus asked, closing the box.
“It’s mine,” Eve said. Cyrus and Aquila exchanged a glance.
“We have to take them back with us now,” Cyrus said.
Asa kept his face carefully neutral. Does that mean they were going to leave us here?
Cyrus prodded Asa with the wide end of his stick and started walking. “Come on,” he said shortly and gestured to the others.
Lilith touched Eve’s arm, and Eve gave her a flat, deadly stare. But she complied as she was guided away from the car.
The two remaining members of the group took up the rear as they set off across the desert, heading toward the single building in the distance. Asa glanced back once; Simon and Aquila were patiently cataloging the last of his few possessions, laying his shirts out along the hood beside Eve’s tech and the emergency rations, as if everything were of equal importance.
The walk took longer than Asa expected.
Cyrus strode ahead of him, and he kept his eyes on the man’s feet, his heavy black boots kicking up the dust carelessly as they made their way through the arid heat. He glanced at Eve every few minutes; her expression was blank and immobile. She was staring at the back of Lilith’s head as if she was trying to memorize it, and she never turned to look at Asa.
I’ve let you down, he thought.
As they approached the building, Asa saw people outside; two men were shouting, talking over each other so that the argument was unintelligible. He glanced at Eve, who was still staring straight ahead, but she seemed to feel his eyes on her, because she turned her head for the first time since they had been accosted. She grinned quickly, but the smile did not touch her eyes.
“I’ll kill you!” someone shouted, and Asa spun around, bracing himself.
The threat had not been directed at him. One of the men arguing lunged at the other, but before he could make contact, the second man reared back with a closed fist and punched him in the face. The first man stumbled back, then hurled himself at the other, knocking him to the ground. Something jabbed Asa in the back, and he jumped.
“Keep moving.” The man behind him nudged him again with the wide end of the stick.
Cyrus was already at the wide metal door of the building, speaking with two large men who had been standing outside, either guarding the entrance or simply waiting.
“But …” Asa glanced around incredulously.
The two men were still fighting, struggling viciously in the dirt, and he could see that one was already bleeding from the nose. A woman and two men were standing a few feet away, shouting encouragement to one or the other—or both—while Cyrus and the others ig
nored the outburst. No one was rushing in to stop the fight. Asa looked to Eve, and he nodded toward their captors.
“Wasters,” he said under his breath. “What do you expect?” But Eve still looked a little shaken.
“Come on.” The butt of the stick jabbed him again, and Asa kept walking.
The hulking guard looked Asa up and down as they approached the door, then did the same to Eve. “The big man wants to see these two,” he said.
“Big man?” Asa repeated.
Cyrus grinned for an instant, then his face turned stony again. “First among equals. He wants to see you,” he said, starting forward, but one of the guards shook his head. “We already searched them,” Cyrus said, but the guard eyed them skeptically.
“What about the girl?” he asked.
“I searched the woman,” Lilith said, irritation in her voice. “They’re clean. They had some tech on them but nothing dangerous.”
“Anything’s dangerous if you use it correctly,” the guard muttered.
He stepped back, and his oversized companion heaved open the door. Asa and Eve stepped inside, flanked by their captors, and the door swung shut behind them immediately, closing with a loud bang and a rush of air.
The building was a single immense room, the ceiling high enough for a two-story house to fit under. It was empty except for two enormous rusting machines in the center; they looked a little like oversized tractors, though Asa knew that could not be their purpose.
Relics from the days before the Founding, he thought with a sudden jolt of excitement, and he nearly took a step toward them. Eve touched his arm, stopping him.
He heard a metal door creak open before he saw it—it was on the far side of the building, blocked by the machines. It clanked shut as three people strode briskly across the concrete floor, and Asa’s stomach fluttered. This has to be the third time today someone’s going to decide whether or not to kill us.
The small company passed between the machines, and as they emerged into the light, Eve screamed.
