Cold Falling White

by G. S. Prendergast

  I wish all that was real. It feels wrong to enjoy stolen memories.

  “You look tired, August.” She looks down at her hands, and the glittering spiderweb on her neck and chest darkens a little against the glossy copper skin behind it. It is as though she is made of precious metal and jewels, like a magical idol brought to life. “I’m tired too, though I think I’ve forgotten how to sleep.”

  Sleep on there, I say, pointing to the bed. I will look at you.

  When she makes a face, I realize what I’ve said.

  Guard you! I clarify, though the signs are very similar. Keep you safe.

  “Just like old times, huh?”

  Yes, I sign, and think how much I would like to revisit those times and live there forever. Not when she was sick; that was terrifying. And not when she was angry or scared, because I was so helpless to change that and it felt awful. But when she was fed and warm and asleep and safe, I became calm enough for the gray sludge to stop swirling around inside me. I could think.

  That was when I woke up properly for the first time and started to understand who I was, what my purpose was, and how this happened to me. Little pictures would float into my head and hover there for seconds before popping like bubbles. If I put the pictures together in the right way, it almost makes sense, but it is not a nice story. It is a story of monsters, manufactured monsters filled with danger and malice.

  “What if you went to sleep and I watched over you?” Dandelion says.

  We could sleep together.

  She laughs behind her hand. I have to hold my head for a moment to keep the dizziness from rattling my brain. Her laughter puts different pictures in my head.

  I didn’t mean to say that.

  “It’s okay. You’re right, anyway. It’s a big bed. Why don’t you lie down and I’ll sit next to you and keep watch?”

  I don’t normally sleep on beds. At least this version of me doesn’t. I do remember beds and other normal human things, but they are faded, almost transparent memories, like twilight shadows. I’ve been sleeping on the floor in front of the fire here in the hut. I don’t know why. It seemed wrong to sleep in the bed, but surely, if Dandelion wants to, if she gives her permission, it would be acceptable.

  Yes, I sign. I am tired.

  Dandelion digs in the humans’ packs and comes up with some blankets, which she tucks around the bed, while I put more wood into the fire, blowing on it until it blazes up. The bed is too short, but if I curl up on my side, I fit. Dandelion sits cross-legged next to me. We stay like that, quiet, as I listen to her breathing and her steady heartbeat. If I close my eyes, I know I’ll be asleep in seconds, but I don’t want to leave her yet.

  “It’s strange,” she says after a while. “Seeing you like this, without your armor. I thought it might feel like you were a different person from the one I know, but it doesn’t.”

  I roll back to look at her and to free my hands so I can talk.

  I thought you would be a different person too. But you’re not.

  “I’ve changed.”

  Not very much. Not to me.

  She strokes my hair, gently untangling it strand by strand. I try to keep my eyes open so I can stay with her, but sleep stalks me like a persistent, hungry wolf and finally takes me.

  XANDER

  I sleep at last. Topher’s trembling got so bad that I pulled him into my lap and cradled him there, buried under blankets that Aurora piled on top of us. One of the other Rogues warmed smooth stones they took from the outdoor fireplace, wrapped them in dish towels, and tucked them around us until it was like sitting in a cramped, private sauna. But Topher settled finally, exhausted by his grief, and while he slept, I must have nodded off too.

  I dream of the drone web. It crackles with electricity and my family stands behind it, stepping forward one by one to be vaporized by bolts of lightning. When my sister takes her turn I wake up, looking down at Topher. He’s awake too, frowning, his hand on my face.

  “Are you okay?” he asks.

  I almost feel like laughing, because of course I’m not and neither is he, but laughing about it is probably not the right response either. Instead I bend down and kiss him on the lips.

  “Your breath smells,” he says. Then he closes his eyes for a few seconds, his body tensing. “It wasn’t a nightmare, was it?”

  Wriggling out from under him, I slide down so we can lie face-to-face, tangling our arms and legs together, as I wonder where exactly his nightmare started. Was it losing Tucker yesterday? Or does it go back to the invasion, that night by the lake when we thought we were watching a meteor shower? Or somewhere in the middle? When Tucker got darted? When August ran off with Raven? When Raven came back and that spelled the end for us?

  “It wasn’t a nightmare,” I whisper. “But it’s over now.”

  We hold each other for a few minutes before a low hiss makes me tunnel from under the blankets and poke my head out. The room is lit by candles and the glowing coals in the fire. Aurora stands in the doorway, in armor, her helmet under her arm as she signs with one hand.

  Time to go.

  “Now? It’s the middle of the night.”

  Long walk, she says.

  I don’t see the point in arguing. The truth is the nightmare is not quite over. We still have to get back to Prince George somehow. If we have to walk, it will take two weeks at least. The closest a transport could safely get us would be maybe fifty miles out. That’s a two- or three-day hike, probably more like a week in these snowy conditions.

  Topher groans as he eases himself up, swinging his feet down to put on his boots. We dress in our layers of winter gear in silence, because the things that need to be said will have to wait until we’ve both recovered our strength. Somehow we’re going to have to figure out a way to be enough for each other. In the meantime, I have to decide what to do with the volcano building up inside me. I hope they have therapists on the coast.

  Some of the Rogues emerge into the moonlit clearing to see us off. Part of me wishes I could stay here to study them, like an anthropologist discovering a new tribe. Their peculiarities give me a strange feeling. It’s almost as though they offer a peek into a lost branch of humanity, a direction we could have gone in a million years ago, or maybe one we’ll take in the future.

  Gender doesn’t seem to matter to them, or sexuality, and certainly not race, though their unusual prejudices about rank still linger, even though that kind of thinking is discouraged here. They’re not possessive of the few objects they keep around, but they can be very possessive of each other. The bonds they form are deep and all-encompassing, and though they can be coolish with the rest of their kind, their attachment to their mates and partners is profound. They know themselves. They accept themselves. I admire them for that.

  Mostly I admire the way they have broken free of the expectations of their kind. I’ve encountered enough Nahx now to know how rigidly programmed they are. However they came to be, whether they were made or evolved or adapted themselves from some other form, the Nahx’s single-mindedness is the reason their conquest of humanity was so successful. And yet these Rogues shook off that role as easily as washing away a smudge of dirt or blood. They are literally programmed to be killers of humans, but they seem to love and cherish Topher and me. It’s almost like they see us as pets.

  Ash embraces us in turn, as do a few of the others, before they wander back into the forest. The path down from the cabin is dark, and when I turn back for one last look at the Rogues who saved our lives, all I see in the moonlight are trees and rocks and the silent cabin with a thin wisp of smoke trailing up from its chimney.

  Aurora and Nova stay close by us as we descend through the glacier. We hope to reach the highway before dawn and flag down one of the trucks or buses now rumbling slowly along the deep ruts in the snow. Nova has very sensibly filled a large pack with the rest of the canned food from the cabin—the Rogues eat only fresh meat, we’ve learned, mainly unfortunate raccoons or squirrels, so the canned pe
aches and applesauce are of no use to them. But they will prove invaluable to us as trade, maybe even ensure a place on one of the buses heading west. If I learned anything as a refugee for all those months, it’s that human charity has strict limits, and everything has a price, even things that should be fundamental rights.

  Topher is silent as we navigate the steep path. I don’t think he actually believes what I’ve told him about life outside the occupation zones. I know conditions in the refugee camps were pretty dire, but for him what I described must have seemed idyllic. And the idea of us catching a bus and going to live with Raven’s parents? He didn’t argue with me, but he must have thought it pretty ludicrous. That’s the thing about privation. You get used to it. And anything else seems implausible. Hot water? Out of a tap? Doesn’t seem real. Bananas? Are they even a thing? Did we really all walk around with video screens in our pockets?

  Once the invasion seemed like it might be a nightmare. Now the world before seems like it was the dream.

  It’s still dark when we reach the road. Nova and Aurora draw us to a stop out of sight in the dense trees while they shrug off the heavy packs. We can see quite far down the road in either direction, so we’ll have some time to get down there and make our presence known. Hopefully they will stop. Hopefully they won’t shoot at us.

  Topher and I rehearse our story.

  “We’ve been holed up in a climber’s refuge this whole time,” Topher recites.

  “Uh-huh? And why didn’t the Nahx find us?”

  “We were hidden in a gully. Cut off by a glacier.”

  “And what did you eat?”

  “Squirrels and applesauce.”

  We both burst out laughing. Aurora and Nova have their helmets on, but when they turn to look at us I can tell that they are frowning disapprovingly. Our story is just as implausible as the fact that we used to eat bananas that were flown in from Guatemala.

  “We’re humans, Xander,” Topher says. “They have to help us.”

  I just nod, staring at the road. Topher will learn as well as I did that the social contracts we once lived by have been torn up and used as kindling in the fires that stave off death. Maybe he’ll fare a bit better than I did, being a white boy, but who knows?

  We fall quiet, waiting as the sky begins to lighten. Nova and Aurora kneel on either side of us, radiating warmth. I’ll actually miss them. It’s nice to think that I might come back to visit one day, maybe when humans and the remaining Nahx have learned to get along better. But I know that’s a fantasy. I only hope the Rogues at least can remain undetected.

  As for me, Topher and his broken heart are a big enough task, but I also have to figure out how to explain to Raven’s parents that she’s actually still alive. I imagine word of what has happened to everyone who got darted will travel pretty fast in the human zones. And, knowing humans, terrible suspicion and hate will spread soon enough. Raven, Mandy, and the rest have some kind of battle looming, and lord only knows what that means for us mere humans. And lord knows whether Raven will even survive that. I wonder if I should just wait until she can tell them in person that she made it through.

  Nova makes a noise and we all four turn to the east, where a faint light appears on the road. It’s moving slowly, but Topher and I need to get down to the highway. Nova leaps to her feet and hauls him up, helping him sling one of the packs over his shoulder.

  “Well,” he says. “Bye Nova, bye Aurora.” He gets their names mixed up and directs his farewell in the wrong directions. Neither of them seems to mind. They reach out and touch his shoulder gruffly.

  “I’ll catch up to you,” I say, and he heads down the path out of the trees. Nova follows him, keeping her distance warily. For some reason this is the moment my brain decides to put it together that Nova was the one who darted Dylan. Of course—she came to Garvin’s enclave looking for Aurora. I don’t know why I haven’t thought of it before. But as I watch her tall shadow following Topher through the trees, I realize it doesn’t make any difference. I would have done the same, and worse probably, if our situations had been reversed.

  Aurora tilts her head to the side and huffs when I turn back to her.

  “I can never thank you enough,” I say. It sounds like a line from a movie, but it fits so I go with it. “I would have died a hundred times if it wasn’t for you.”

  Repeat me, she signs, putting one hand on my shoulder. That lasts only a second before she tugs me forward and hugs me properly.

  Me. Want. Explain. You, she signs, leaning back.

  “You want to explain something to me?” I’m getting much better with their language. I think the Rogues use a simplified version when they speak to humans. When they speak among themselves it’s much too fast for me to understand.

  Yes, Aurora says. Look. Listen. She sighs before she goes on, signing slowly as I roughly translate the grammar in my head. When you try to make a human into a machine, you get a monster.

  “Oh. You’re not a monster, Aurora.”

  Not me. Angry Boy.

  “Topher’s a monster?”

  He will try to become a machine. Don’t let him. It will make him a monster. Like the Nahx.

  Her insight takes my breath away. Most of my anxiety about Topher comes from this very issue. How do I keep him away from the edge after everything he’s seen? I’m not sure I have the strength to be human enough for both of us.

  Aurora rumbles her breath in a low purr as she touches my shoulder again. I can only imagine the kind of monstrousness she has witnessed, among humans, among Nahx, maybe even in herself. I made a point of never asking her or August or any of the Rogues about the bad things they might have done in the course of their duties. I don’t want to know.

  The last few steps to the edge of the trees are slippery, and as I lose my footing, Aurora takes my hand, steadying me. Topher has already left Nova and is plowing through the thigh-high snow in the ditch up to the highway shoulder. Nova takes my other hand as we reach her, and the three of us stand in a circle for a few seconds.

  Stay safe, Aurora says when we part. Take care of your Offside.

  “You too.” I shrug the pack on and turn a little abruptly so they won’t see the look on my face. Nahx can be very perceptive about human facial expressions. I wouldn’t mind them seeing my sadness so much, but I don’t want them to see the equal measures of relief. As charming as the Rogues are, the forsaken world of the Nahx has fueled my nightmares for long enough. I’m going to spend the rest of my life trying to forget it.

  Topher waves his arms madly as the headlights approach. The vehicle slows, and when it gets closer we see that it’s an army truck, its large wheels fitted with snow chains. I glance back to the trees, but Aurora and Nova are doing that thing the Nahx do in the dark, letting their armor conceal them, turning them into shadows.

  They drift backward until they are indistinguishable from the branches and trunks. Down on the road, the heavy truck rumbles to a stop, crunching over the drifted snow.

  When the passenger-side window rolls down I’m surprised to see two middle-aged women in the cab. They don’t look military—they’re not in uniform, at least, but I suppose in these circumstances, who would be?

  “Where the hell did you come from?” the passenger says.

  “We’ve been hiding in a refuge cabin this whole time,” Topher recites. I join him by the side of the road, resisting the urge to look backward for one more glimpse of Aurora and Nova. I didn’t think I’d feel this torn. I didn’t think I’d feel torn at all, but seeing other humans again has reminded me of life in the refugee camp and how callous our species can be. The women in the truck seem suspicious of us.

  “We’ve only got women and children,” the driver says, as though to reinforce my impression of her and her passenger.

  “We have food,” Topher says. It’s then that I notice the rifle propped between them. I have a handgun, buried under layers of clothing. So does Topher, I think, but we left the rifles with the Rogues. Aurora a
nd Nova have one each, but I can’t look back at them. And anyway, would I really have a shoot-out with two middle-aged ladies and their truck full of women and children? I’m more likely to just let them kill me, though I doubt Aurora would allow that.

  “Let’s see,” the passenger says.

  Topher slips off his pack and opens it, revealing cans of peaches and beans, crackers, dried noodles—the usual survival food, the kind of thing I saw people beaten unconscious for back in Prince George.

  “Weapons?”

  Topher and I exchange a look.

  “I don’t want weapons in the back,” the woman clarifies. “There are kids back there, and it’s a long ride.”

  She opens the door and slides out, sinking in snow up to her knees. Her partner, the driver, curls her fingers around the rifle, as though to warn us.

  “Julia,” the passenger says, holding out her hand. We shake without bothering to remove our mittens. I notice that under her open coat she’s packing a gun in a holster too.

  “I’m Xander,” I say. “This is Topher.”

  Julia leads us around the back of the truck before pulling down the step board and popping open the canvas flaps.

  “Shove your bags in,” she says.

  It’s dark inside the truck but I can almost make out some small faces turning to us as we load our packs. Someone flicks on a flashlight for a few seconds and the rest come into view.

  The truck is already way overloaded. Crammed into seating for twenty and splayed out on the floor, there must be forty women and kids in here, all of them looking like they are wearing every item of clothing they own.

  “I meant it about the weapons,” Julia says. Her smile is friendly but firm, like a schoolteacher who is not taking any more of your crap.

  Topher and I dig into our layers of clothes and hand over our guns. Julia unloads them expertly, also checking the chambers. She pockets the clips and tucks the pistols under her arm.

  “It’s a long ride yet. Try to get comfortable. If I hear a whisper of any macho bullshit, I will dump you in a gully and keep your food and guns. Got it?”