by Mark Tufo
“Pretty philosophical for this late at night, isn’t it?” Cedar asked.
“I’ve had many nights huddled in cold mud to think about it.”
Brody had us tie burlap over our blades. It was to be the first time we would actually square off against each other. “During the day we’re going to do the exercises and at night I’ll be showing you moves. It’s not the way I want to teach you, but time is of the essence. We are running out of that precious commodity. Princess, Cedar, you two will pair off. I’ll take Sweetheart here.” Tallow groaned. “Relax, I’ll take it easy on you.”
“I’ve known you long enough to know you’re lying about that,” Tallow replied.
“Bring your blades up and wrap both hands around the hilt. Then I want you to swing with all your might so that your blades clash into each other.” As we did so, pain vibrated up my hands, through my arms and into my skull; it felt like I’d run full tilt into a brick wall. Cedar didn’t fare any better, but I at least held on to my blade. Hers flew to the ground and she was shaking her hands furiously trying to get that pins and needles feeling out of them.
“Finish her,” Brody told me.
I didn’t hesitate as I brought the blade up and lightly touched her neck.
“Not going to learn anything that way.” Brody leaned over and smacked Cedar’s arm with his blade. She nearly cried out. “When you’re fighting you are continuously clashing blades. You have to prepare for it and be expecting it. Again.”
By the time Brody left that night I was fairly convinced I’d never be able to feel my fingers again. I knew Tallow was feeling it worse; after a few strikes, Cedar and I had silently agreed to take it easy. Brody felt no such compunction and had mercilessly beat Tallow’s hands. Tallow had scored sort of a moral victory. He had dropped his blade only once after Brody had smacked his arm. After that he had vowed, and kept that vow, to not lose it again.
“Not half-bad, Sweetheart,” Brody had told him before leaving. It was the most praise I’d ever heard him give.
“I think my hands are going to fall off.” Tallow complained as soon as the door shut. He held them up; they were bright red and as fat as blood sausages.
We continued this way for a couple of months. Time began to blur as we went from one training session to the next, but there was no doubt we were improving steadily. My sword felt as light as a practice stick to me, and I began to think of it as part of my body. Brody never stopped. I don’t know when or if he slept, but he always looked as fresh as summer daisies. We, on the other hand, had to nearly pull ourselves off of whatever piece of furniture we had collapsed on the previous evening.
“I am releasing you from arrest,” Brody told us after a particularly difficult training session. I’d had the unfortunate luck of the draw to get assigned to him. “This is going to make it somewhat more difficult to get to you in the daytime.”
“Why release us then? I thought we needed as much time together as possible.” I said.
“Overseers are coming. If I have prisoners they’ll want to know why. There are questions I’d just rather not be asked. Plus, there are some books I want you three to read. I stacked them on the bench and marked the chapters.”
“You’ve been back to the library?”
“Almost every day, Princess.”
“When do you sleep?”
“Only those with a soul need to sleep.”
“What did that mean?” Tallow asked when Brody left.
Cedar shrugged her shoulders.
“Don’t look at me, I don’t know either,” I told him.
“Is it already Mid-Season?” Cedar shivered.
“Six more months to The War,” I said aloud. “It’s not too late, Cedar. You can still back out before Brody turns in the rosters.”
“Are you backing out?” she asked me.
I shook my head.
“Well, then, there’s my answer.”
“Is it too late for me to leave?” Tallow asked. Of the three of us he was the only one who had to go. He was joking and he wasn’t. Brody was hard on him with the sword and he had reason to be. Tallow was easily the weakest link as Cedar’s abilities had been a huge surprise. My friend, who used to stumble while just walking, was turning into a graceful killing machine. Brody had said finesse-wise she was the best of us all. He thought I had the rawest talent of the three, and something else, something I could see he envied. But Tallow, he said, would be better off throwing rocks from a distance. It was funny now, but in six months we would be facing a real opponent who would exploit any weakness they could find to end our lives.
I stood outside the apartment building, arms outstretched, trying to catch as much sunlight as I could. It felt strange being out in the open. At first I’d been claustrophobic, being in Tallow’s apartment all day. Now the outdoors was having the same affect–whatever the opposite is called. I felt exposed and vulnerable outside. I wondered if there was a book in the library I could look up what I was feeling.
“Whoa,” Cedar said as she got her first peek into the book building. “And you kept this a secret from me?”
Brody had been busy; he’d built a ladder that went down into the building. The hole was now concealed by a trap door covered with a thick layer of moss; anyone who didn’t already know the entrance was there would walk right past it. Inside he’d left a bunch of lanterns and some of the flint, along with three rifles and three swords.
“When you said there were a million books, I thought you were exaggerating.” Cedar was running her hands along one of the shelves, a healthy layer of dust wafting into the air in her wake.
“Brody left us a note.” I was staring at a stack of books neatly placed on a table by the bench.
“He has nice handwriting.” Cedar was now staring over my shoulder.
“Oh my gosh, Cedar. Do you like Brody?” I asked my friend.
Cedar’s face flushed.
“He’s handsome,” she said.
“In a Neanderthal type of way,” Tallow added.
Neither of us knew what that meant and when I looked it up later I made sure not to tell Cedar the meaning.
I read the note aloud.
“Princess, defend this place at all costs. If anyone discovers it, there is a high probability it will be destroyed, and with it the proof we need. That’s what the rifles are for. You know what the swords are for. I want you to read the book sections I’ve outlined and practice what they teach.”
“More practice? I think I’d rather just take my chances. How mad are you going to be at me if I die during the first battle?” Tallow asked morosely.
“Don’t you talk like that, Tallow. We’re going to make it.”
“You and Cedar will. Your swords almost seem like natural extensions of your bodies. For me, I think it will always be a clumsy foreign object.”
“Don’t start getting defeatist on me. There’s nothing wrong with you that more hard work won’t fix. Besides, you can’t leave me with Cedar–all she does is talk.”
“I heard that!” Cedar’s voice came from down one of the aisles. “Hey, I found a “Romance Section.” Do you know what that means?”
“I have no idea,” I told her truthfully. “Why?”
“A lot of the covers have men with long hair and some sort of plaid skirt on…I find myself strangely drawn to them,” her voice trailed off.
I thumbed through the Dictionary until I found the word. I smiled as I read the definition. “Read it, Cedar, I think you’ll like it. Tallow and I are going to practice.”
Tallow bested me once while we sparred and that was only because I was beginning to feel sorry for him; still, it seemed to add some energy to his work.
Cedar suddenly shrieked. Tallow and I had looked at each other and ran toward her. I got there first. I found her sitting on the floor, her back against the wall, a closed book in her lap, and a look of pure anguish on her face.
“Cedar! Cedar–are you alright?” I asked with concern, getting down
on a knee next to her.
“He...he died,” she hiccuped. “He...he told her he would always love her…and…and watch over her. It was so...so beautiful,” she sniffed.
“What is she talking about?” Tallow asked, looking around for a threat. “Who died?”
“Ce...Cedrick Barrow!” Cedar blurted out. “He died saving her!” She was wailing.
“It’s a book, Cedar, just a story.” I consoled her as I grabbed the book to look at the spine.
“Ju...just a story?” She wiped her sleeve across her running nose.
“Fiction.” I showed her the small print on the binding.
“Fiction? Someone made that up? It didn’t really happen?”
“Someone made it up.”
“It...it was incredible, Winter. They loved each other. He traveled forward in time to save her; then when he became trapped in the present, he died. I didn’t know people could feel that way about one another. She is going to have his child–and it wasn’t created in a Bio Building, either. They were together. I didn’t think that was possible.”
“There’s a whole world we need to relearn here,” I told her. I handed her book back. I had to admit the man in the skirt did look rather appealing.
“Can we get back to practicing?” Tallow rolled his eyes. “And why is he wearing a dress?”
Chapter 9
Time Marches On - Whether We Want it to or Not
THE DAY THE Overseers came, the skies threatened to open up. It was cold enough that it could easily be snow that came down. I’d never paid much attention to the Overseers before; in fact, most citizens hadn’t. Only those that were required to attend the ceremony did so, and that would be all seventeen-year-olds either heading to the Bio Buildings or the battlefields, and of course, the Brokers. To the rest of the populace, the Overseers meant the end, like a visible representation of death on Earth. They were to be avoided at all costs.
From all the rumors spread about them, I expected sallow, yellowish looking men devoid of all substance; monsters of a sort. Instead, they looked exceedingly hale of health; the majority of the twelve of them appeared to have eaten their fill on more occasions than naught.
“I didn’t expect them to be fat,” Tallow whispered next to me.
“You’d better be quiet if you even want to make it to The War,” I told him.
Brody and his men were up on the stage, behind and to the side of the Overseers. Those of us going to war were standing, not in formation like I’d seen in the books, but rather in pockets, some held together by friendships or merely the need to share heat.
“…and it is a great and honorable thing upon which you embark...”
The thinnest of the group droned on. Brody looked bored, but my peers around me were rapt by every word the man spoke. And why wouldn’t they? They still believed us to be fighting for a higher cause, each probably thinking they could be the one that finally turned the tide and would come home a hero. The speech was most likely the same every year, but only Brody and his men would know.
“…though some of you may not return. Do not fear; your sacrifice will not go unnoticed.”
“Dammit,” Cedar said from behind me just as the first of the snowflakes swirled down. “This is going to get my pages wet.”
“What?” I turned in alarm. Cedar had a small book in her hands. “You can’t bring that here! You get caught with that and we’re all dead.”
“I had to know what was going to happen between Derrick and Susannah. Relax. No one is paying any attention to us. Look at these sheep all ogling the Overseers. I could probably be naked right now and no one would notice.” Her eyes immediately went back to the pages.
She was right. Every face in the crowd was riveted on the stage, and eleven of the Overseers were sitting down talking amongst themselves. I wondered if it was only tradition that made them still attend these assemblies. My feet were nearly covered in snow by the time we were allowed to leave. Each man had taken a turn to speak. Some wished us nothing more than “luck” and had sat back down. Others went on and on about the privilege of fighting for the greater good. Cedar was crying again, some of those closest to us patted her on the shoulder as if in commiseration of how deeply affected they had been by the Overseers’ stirring speeches. I knew better. She hadn’t heard more than a handful of words; she’d just finished another Romance novel.
“I can’t believe it,” Cedar cried as we headed to Tallow’s apartment and some heat.
“Wait, let me figure it out,” Tallow said. “Did Derrick die saving Susannah? And, oh yeah, she’s pregnant with his child so that a little piece of him will live on.”
“How...how did you know? Did you read this book, too?” Cedar asked.
Tallow was about to tell her that nearly every book she’d read in the Romance Section had ended in the same, tragically beautiful way. I smacked him on the arm. Who were we to take that dream from her?
“WHAT’D YOU LEARN from yesterday’s Overseers’ gathering?” Brody asked as he came into the apartment. His collar and hat were covered in a thick layer of snow. “It’s really coming down.”
“I learned they’re full of themselves,” I replied. “I got the distinct impression we meant nothing to them.”
“I learned that Derrick, or maybe it was Conrad, possibly could have been Gregor, died for Susannah, or maybe it was Hannah or Havana,” Tallow said.
“What is he talking about? Did you hit him too hard in the head again?”
“Hi Brody,” Cedar said, running out from the bedroom.
“What’s going on? Why are you blinking like that? Something in your eye?” Brody asked her.
“Maybe we should just get started,” I interjected.
“Not today. I want to talk to you guys–it’s time to start strategizing. Last night I was able to eavesdrop on the Overseers. What they said was not good; that they were laughing about it only makes it worse. So yeah, Princess, you were right. You and your fellow Dystancians mean nothing to them.”
“Tell us,” Cedar said, cutting to the meat of it.
“I don’t really even know where to start.”
“Start with the truth, Brody,” I told him. I could tell by his downtrodden features that whatever the news was, it weighed him down.
“They said that all five Sectors will be in The War this year.”
“Is that even possible?” Tallow asked. “That’s never happened before!”
“Oh, it’s possible. Considering they decide who goes in and who doesn’t.”
“I don’t think I’m understanding,” I said.
“Your Overseers? Well, they don’t just oversee Dystance. These twelve men have control over every Sector.”
“What?” came out of all three of us.
“I first suspected something when I saw them on the stage this morning. Our plans had me really listening to them this year; these were the same men that came to my town when I was preparing to go to The War–I’m certain of it.”
“But that would mean...” Tallow said, almost to himself.
“How could you not have noticed this before?” I was angry.
“What difference does it make?” he defended. “This is the hard proof we’ve been looking for. The War is wrong. Our entire existence is a lie, and they’re a part of it.”
I wanted to yell at him, throw something at him. I didn’t believe he hadn’t known this before. How dare he withhold information from us! I turned away from him. Cedar had collapsed into a chair, her face held in her hands. Tallow stared out through the dark window at his own reflection. I knew he was wishing we had run when we’d had the chance. I looked back at our own personal Broker. I knew he was essentially right. What difference did it make? If anything, it made our mission easier. Unlikely as it was, if we somehow survived the clashing of five Sectors we would have a clear end game.
“Ah, look at the Princess putting it all together. It’s almost like I can hear the little voices in her head whispering in unison.”
“Winter, he’s doing that thing again,” Tallow said.
“I’m glad the men in my books aren’t as thick-headed as you Tallow, although I guess some of them are,” Cedar said as she placed her index finger on her chin, thinking.
“Winter, please.” Tallow wanted to be let in on the secret that wasn’t really a secret. Not to us anyway; not anymore at least.
“Now we know that it remains to be seen whether the Overseers run everything. They may or may not. What we do know is that they are not only Overseers to Dystance, but to every sector.”
“But, they know about The War–they just told us why we need to fight it. Do they make the same speeches to everyone? Why wouldn’t they just make everyone stop fighting?”
“Those are the big questions, Sweetheart; those are the answers we need,” Brody said.
“We’ve always been told that the Overseers are looking out for us, that they are the only line of defense against those that would attack us here, in our homes. Now we’re finding out they are the reason we fight at all? How am I supposed to react to this?” Tallow was incensed.
“I had no idea boys could be so dramatic,” Cedar whispered to me.
“You reconcile this on your own time okay, Sweetheart? My advice to you was to stick with your fellow citizens until the end–but now that’s changed.”
“Why? How can safety in numbers suddenly become a liability?” I asked. “You’ve been drilling it in our heads for months.”
“Yeah, but that was until I found out the other Sectors are involved. If it was one on one, we would still stick with what I said.”
“Wait, you said the Hillians are the strongest followed by the Klondikes, the Ferals then the Brutons...and then us. Wouldn’t the Hillians just forget about us and concentrate on the tougher opponent first?”
