by K. Makansi
We’ve been spending every free moment exploring the greenhouse trying to identify the plants. I recognized one right away my mother used—a tamarind tree growing in a corner of the room that’s since exploded to the point of pushing up against the ceiling.
“Maybe it can help relieve the symptoms from Corine’s parasite,” Saara said, taking notes frantically as I explained it has antipyretic properties. “If it’s a fever reducer, I can try it out on a couple of the workers I’ve met while going with Zeke on his supply runs.”
With high hopes for what else we might find, we kept looking. Some of the plants have neat handwritten identification signs stuck in the soil at their roots, but not all of them. And Kanaan’s computers have a wealth of information on them, but some is written in a code we have yet to figure out. With Demeter’s help, we’ve been able to identify many we’d never seen before, but some remain complete mysteries, and Demeter can’t find anything that resembles them in her database. It’s a strange feeling, realizing we’ve discovered—or rather, rediscovered—what is essentially a whole new dimension of botany. A dimension we barely understand. And everything we learn—or as Chan-Yu says, everything we think we know—seems so bizarre it’s hard to believe. Take the acorn pendants. Chan-Yu disappeared for a full day, taking all the pendants and Osprey’s astrolabe with him. When he returned, he walked around the garden, studied the tree, spent hours in the greenhouse, and then disappeared into the woods only to come back shaking his head, a look of wonderment written across his face. He’d been visiting his sister, Soo-Sun, and together they’d come to a conclusion. The Outsiders had long known that the astrolabes acted as tracking devices with the pendants as beacons signaling their location. The Wayfarers had been using them that way for years. But how did they work? No one knew. No one except my grandfather and maybe Gold. And now Chan-Yu and Soo-Sun. I can’t begin to understand it; the idea of plants using chemical signals transmitted through the common mycorrhizal networks to communicate just seems too other worldly.
“Anyone found anything interesting?” Vale calls out from several rows over.
“Plenty,” Soren replies from the other side of the greenhouse.
“I’ve got a weird one here,” I say. “Where’s Rhinehouse and Osprey when you need them?”
“Rhinehouse is still with Moriana and Miah,” Soren says. “And Osprey will be down soon.”
“Still wish Demeter could magically ID the whole lot of ’em,” Vale says, coming into view from behind a large palm frond. My heart pauses, lagging for a moment behind its regular beat. He stops and touches his hand to his cheek. “Where did those come from?”
“What?”
He steps close and draws his thumb over my cheek bone. “You’ve got purple smudged on your cheek.”
“Oh, that. I found some purple berries over there that stained my fingers when I crushed them.” He slips a hand around my back to pull me to him and instead fishes the paintbrush out of my back pocket.
He holds it up. “Where’d you find this?”
“I used to paint here, when I was little. So I did a little searching and found a box with old brushes.”
“And you painted something with the purple berries?”
“Do you want to see?”
He nods. “Of course.”
Hand in hand, we duck through the rows to near the far end of the greenhouse, where, on the polished white wall, I painted a rough but distinct watercolor-style portrait of Tai. “Purple was always her favorite color,” I say softly.
“You did this with a few berries?” He sounds astonished.
“With a few brushstrokes. It didn’t take much.”
“This is amazing.”
I nudge him with my shoulder. “You say that every time you see my work.”
“And it’s true every time.” He pulls me to him, closing the space between us. His body feels as if it was cut out of the contours of my own.
“That’s how I used to feel listening to you play the piano,” I whisper.
He opens his mouth to respond, but pauses and looks away. “I try not to think about how much I miss my music.”
“One day,” I say. “One day this will be over, and you can play all day long if you want.” He looks down at me.
“That’s the first time you’ve talked about what happens after this is behind us.”
I put my hands on his chest, stand on tiptoes, and brush my lips against his. He wraps his arms around me and I feel his heart thud against my palms. A moment later, my body is pressed between his and the wall, and—
“Where are—?” Soren interrupts, rounding the corner. I push Vale away, embarrassed, but Soren waves dismissively. “I’ve found something I want Rhinehouse and Osprey to look at. You want to see?”
We follow him down one of the long corridors.
Soren points to a series of strange plants growing in a shallow pool of water. “Watch this.” He pokes at one of them and it opens up like a mouth with long spiny teeth. “Ever seen anything like that?” He pokes at another and the same thing happens. “I brushed against it and it opened wide like it was going to bite me.”
“A plant with teeth? Is it carnivorous?” I stick my finger toward it, but Vale grabs my wrist.
“Watch it. I don’t want to pull one of those teeth from the end of your finger.”
“And how about this one?” Soren points to a short tree in a separate pot with small, bright green oval fruits hanging on its slim branches. Ever seen one of these?
“It’s a lime,” Osprey says, appearing out of nowhere. “They grow in the southwest, where it’s drier. Okarians don’t cultivate them, but Chan-Yu goes wild over them. Squeezes them over his food and puts slices in his drinks.”
“Where is Chan-Yu?” I ask.
“Disappeared again. He’ll be back.” Osprey waves her hand as if Chan-Yu’s sudden appearances and disappearances are no big deal. But I feel much better when he’s around.
“You know all about rosemary, of course?” she says to us, moving down the row of plants. Soren and Vale nod dutifully—rosemary is not my favorite herb, but Rhinehouse seems to think it’s a seasoning on par with salt and pepper. “This is a cousin of rosemary. It’s called salvia. You might know it as sage.”
Soren nods. “I’ve seen it growing wild. And I think I remember it in the urban farms in Okaria.”
Osprey gives him an appreciative smile. “This is desert sage, though. More fragrant than its woodland cousins.” She cocks her head my way. “Your granddad was apparently very interested in plants from climates outside of Okaria. Many of these don’t grow naturally at this latitude.”
“Do you know what this one is?” I ask, back at the plant I was studying earlier.
Osprey bends down for a closer look. She runs her fingers over the fuzzy hairs, and looks up. “I don’t believe it. I wonder if Kanaan and Gold used this.”
“What is it?” Vale asks.
“It’s called peyote,” she responds.
“What it’s for?” I ask, intrigued.
“Magic.”
“Vale?” I say. Stretched out on the bed reading one of the books he found on twenty-first century composers, he looks up. “You know when you used to play the piano, and everything else faded away and it was just you and the music?”
“Yeah. I miss that.”
“It’s like me and my art. When I’m in the zone creating, it’s only me and the colors, the forms, the shapes. It’s like nothing else exists but the flow.”
“I know exactly what you mean.”
“I told you Soren taught me some breathing and relaxation techniques after my mom died. I want to use those with you to create that same kind of flow.”
“What are you thinking?” he asks, setting the book down and leaning forward.
“We’ve got all these plants in the greenhouse, and we don’t know what to do with any of them. Like the peyote. Osprey says it’s supposed to open the inner eye to the truth, or to new dimensions of
the truth. How can we use that? How can it help us? Meditation is supposed to help you empty your mind so you can be open to the universe, open to new ideas.”
I sit cross-legged on the floor and hold my hand out to him. The moonlight filters in through the windows, and the low light from our biolantern creates an undeniably romantic glow, but I set those thoughts aside. We’ve got all night for that.
“Corine has outmaneuvered us repeatedly. We’re boxed in, so we need to think outside the box.” I take his hands in mine and rub my fingertips over his knuckles. He sighs. “We’re going to breathe together.”
I get comfortable and glance out the window. “Now, we need to take in the energy from the moonlight. Let’s channel Tai, my mom, Soren’s parents, Meera, Professor Hawthorne, all the teachers and mentors and friends we’ve known and lost. And those who are still with us.” I close my eyes and pause, thinking of everyone I’ve ever loved, everyone I’ve ever cared about. “Let’s imagine we can gather all their energy and intelligence right here between us. Breathe in, breathe out. Empty our minds of everything we know about our situation. Just feel their energy. Imagine they are connected to us, sharing their gifts.” I pause and breathe in and out slowly for several minutes. Then I go on. “Now, let’s consider our goals. How do we want all this to end?”
Vale’s breathing is steady, comforting.
“I picture you and me together.” Vale’s voice is soft but firm. “I imagine us surrounded by friends, with music and art and laughter filling our days. How do we get there?”
“No more violence.” I close my eyes.
I remember something from my days at the Academy. Professor Lark, Architectural Foundations: A building is nothing without its foundation. Remove the support beams and the building topples. A strong building is resilient to many types of pressures, but every one has its weak spots.
“You know your parents best, Vale. You know our strengths and weaknesses and you know theirs.”
“Their strength lies in controlling the reins of government, their ability to speak directly to the citizens, their willingness to violate the law and wield military power against us.”
“And their weaknesses?”
There’s a long silence. I can feel him thinking. His fingers tighten against mine, his breath thrums in the quiet air, and his index finger involuntarily twitches, as if a thought is preparing to spring forth. Finally he croaks. “Me. They love me.”
What would Meera say if she were here with me now? There are few people in this world immune to love, Remy.
I squeeze Vale’s hand, imagining the pain he’s suffered all these months since discovering the truth about his parents. “Loving you is no weakness, Vale. But it is a vulnerability.”
The Director: We must analyze their weak spots, hit them where it hurts.
“This might be a reach, but—” Vale begins, hesitance in the small quaver of his voice.
“Go on.”
“You’re right that we need to think outside the box. We also can’t win with one strategy alone. We need to combine the full force of our power, not just yours and mine, but everyone in the Resistance, in a way they would never expect.”
“Bear’s march,” I whisper. “It’s the perfect moment.”
“We can use it. We can use their energy, their momentum.” He sighs, shifting gears. “However much I repress it now, there’s still a part of me that loves my mother. I’ve been denying that feeling to convince myself—and others—that I am fully with the Resistance. But she’s my mother. She’s lost touch with the things that used to motivate her, the things she taught me to believe in so fervently, but they must still be there. Buried.” He pauses. “Osprey said the peyote was ‘magic.’ Rhinehouse said its hallucinogenic effects have been used for thousands of years to enhance spiritual rituals.”
I don’t know where he’s going yet, but I can sense his excitement. “He said ancient peoples used to go on Ghost Dances where they’d use it to go into a trance. They thought they were reuniting the living with the dead, and before a battle, they’d ask the spirits to join them or to fight on their behalf.”
I think back to when Bear and I traveled to the Farms. When we used the dreamweed to trick that guard into opening the doors to the Dietician’s lab so that I could disable the MealPak formulas. You’ve got stars in your eyes, he’d said to me.
I let several more deep breaths flow through my body.
Vale’s voice is low, urgent. “I need to get back to my parents. No games. No pretending I’m on their side. I have to confront them. Somehow I feel there’s hope for my father, but my mother’s turned her back on her humanity. If we can use the hallucinogen to hold up a mirror so she can see the corruption that has hardened her, the ways it has masked her true self, we may be able to break her.”
Break her. What a terrible thing for a son to have to do. An image blooms in front of me. For a brief moment, a flash of the synesthesia I used to experience as commonplace comes back. The image is intense, glowing and shimmering in saturated colors. In one hand, Corine, eyes bloodshot and bulging, features contorted in pain, holds a bloodied knife to Vale’s throat. His expression is serene, like a pale mist floating over Lake Okaria. In Corine’s other hand, she grips her own neck with elongated fingers and enlarged knuckles. Behind them, the landscape is littered with bodies with thin wisps of bluish smoke trailing from each one, gathering above to form a single word in the charred, blackened sky: Atone.
I open my eyes and break free from Vale’s grasp. I pull myself to my feet, and Vale follows suit.
“What’s wrong?”
I shake my head, alarmed at the ferocity of my own thoughts. “Just an image. I’m okay. I need to take a break.” I head over to the window. He joins me, rubbing comforting patterns on my back. I lean into him. “The darkness of my thoughts sometimes terrifies me.”
“You’ve seen a lot of dark things,” he whispers.
After a while, I ask, “Do you really think this could work? How could you get her to take the peyote?” The doubts flood in, filling me just as surely as the hope and light filled me during our brief meditation session.
Vale nuzzles my neck and whispers, “I don’t know. But I am sure of one thing: we can’t win with force alone. Even with our largest full-frontal attack, they’ll take us down in an instant. Unless we dig out the root of the problem, we have no hope of preventing her from putting her plan in place. Moriana says everything is almost ready and that they hope to start inoculating citizens with her ‘cure’ by next week at the latest. We have no time and no other options.”
I turn to face him, my body aligning with his, his words still hot on my neck. “I want this nightmare to end. I want to start over. I want—”
Vale’s hands are firm on my waist, and it’s suddenly hard to think about anything at all. I reach for the spot where his neck meets his shoulders and pull him down to me.
“—you,” I say, and stand up on tiptoes to press lips against lips, limbs against limbs. Vale’s hands spread like two fans against my back, like he wants to touch as much of me as possible at once. The need to touch all of him fills me like fire. Like flames dancing in shards of moonlight, we swirl higher, faster, growing wild and hungry for that white hot zenith emerging between us.
“Wait,” Vale rasps, pulling away. I frame his face with my hands, sending him that voiceless question, and he smiles so I know that everything is still okay. The flame abates and he kisses my lips, my jaw, my forehead, my ears, whispering between touches: “I want to savor this.”
And so we savor it. Every delicious touch, every searing word we share, every awkward tangle and the light, easy laughter that follows. After, we lie together in the moonlight and name our greatest fears, laying them to rest for the night. Mine: that everyone I love will die, one by one, until I am just a graveyard clinging to what once was beautiful. His: that everything he believes in will be proven impossible, dream stuff best left tucked so far away you forget it even exists. Mine:
that Evander Sun Zi will burn us all to the ground and my last memory will be the smell of bodies burning. His: that his parents will hurt him in the name of a sacrifice of love for power. Mine: that Kenzie’s baby will know a world of betrayal and corruption. His: that the nightmare will never end, and we’ll never have a family of our own.
“The one thing that I feel sure of more than anything else,” he says with a devastating moonlit grin, “is that your freckles are adorable.” His fingers trace a pattern across my nose and cheeks, his smile turning serious. “And by that I mean that I love you more than anything I’ve ever loved before. You are my music.”
This morning, everything about my grandfather’s house feels alive, electrifying. After getting up early yesterday, we discovered that Chan-Yu had mysteriously reappeared, to my great relief. With Moriana still under lock and key upstairs, the rest of us gathered for breakfast and Vale told everyone his ideas about using the peyote. We brainstormed for hours, coming up with some ideas that are terrible, that would surely get us all killed. And some that might actually work. Finally, we all squeezed into the comm room, and Eli and Zoe managed to get Zeke, the Director, and Bear patched in so we could outline a final plan. We then spent the day reviewing and fine-tuning logistics. Of course, the best plan is the most flexible one, and the best warrior is the most adaptable. So there is no saying exactly how everything will turn out. But one thing is certain: the time has come to pull the corruption up from the roots and plant the Okarian Sector anew.
