Meredith, sensing the unease within him, said, “You’re not here for your mother, are you?”
“Yes.”
“But that’s not all.”
Cray studied her face, her eyes, her expression, trying to see the intent behind them. He hesitated a beat too long. She opened her mouth, inhaled deeply. Cray clamped his hand across her lips before any sound could escape. Her threat worked.
“Don’t,” he said. “I’ll tell you. Just—just keep quiet.”
Eyes wide, she nodded as he slowly brought his hand away.
“You know what you said about these people not having a choice?”
She nodded again.
“I’m going to—gods—that’s what I’m here to do. I’m going to…”
“To what?”
“Create a diversion, so I can get my mother out, and maybe give all of these hopeless tripods something to live for.”
Meredith pounced toward him, excited, grabbing his arm with both hands, squeezing it. “Let me help.”
An emphatic “no” did nothing to dissuade her.
“Please.”
“No,” he repeated. “It’s too dangerous, and—and I shouldn’t have said anything.” Cray couldn’t help himself. He chuckled. The sheer ridiculousness of the situation was beyond rationality. He should’ve listened to Rowan. He should’ve thought it through, found another way. Or maybe he should’ve just forgotten the entire plan altogether.
Meredith said, “How were you going to create a diversion? Tell me, and maybe I can help.”
“I…” Cray released a defeated breath. He was trapped, with no means of escape, in too many different ways. “Can I trust you?”
Meredith let another mischievous grin pull at the corners of her mouth. “Do you have a choice?”
“I could just kill you.” His tone lacked the sincerity for a proper threat, and she knew it.
“You won’t do that.”
Exhausted, out of options, Cray relented. “I’m going to blow up the Consulate.”
Her reaction surprised him. Instead of fear, outrage, and disgust, she replied with a simple “Good. Somebody needs to.”
“You really think so.”
“Think so? Gods, I’ve dreamed about it.”
The moment of truth. The final bit of information that would allow her to pass full judgment on his actions. He said, “Inside my pack, there’s a small bomb, but it’s strong enough to level the whole building. My plan—if you could call it that, since it seems like it had more holes than a fishing net—the plan was to get it inside, hide it somewhere, and then get my mother out through the supply gate after the explosion. Whatever happened to the government after that was none of my concern.”
“Hmm,” Meredith mumbled, as if thinking it over, as if it were nothing more than an unassuming question of “Deer or trout for dinner?” She rolled onto her side, twisting a lock of hair around her finger. “You’ll never get inside the Consulate.”
“Why?”
“You need an access code, and even if you do manage to get inside, the facial scanners will mark you as unauthorized. You didn’t think you could walk right in there on your two legs and drop it behind some plant, did you? Gods, you adults and your flawed logic. That’s why this place is so horrible.”
A rat scurried across Cray’s hand. He shoved it to the side. “If it’s the only way… do you have the code?”
“No, it changes daily, but I know who does.”
Reluctantly, Cray allowed her to present a plan, never intending to agree with her.
There has to be another option—one without her involvement.
Meredith drew maps in the dirt with her finger. Talked about timing and patterns. Cray said no so many times he lost count. And, in the end, he understood that the girl, with her limited winters, was smarter than he cared to accept. It was dangerous, stupid, and total madness, but she was right.
Ten minutes later, after the nightwoman had led Sarlen, the deaf sentry, off into the shadows, Cray and Meredith crawled to the mouth of the hole. They glanced to either side, saw the empty street, and then scurried out.
They moved in a rush to the other side, where the shadows were longer and deeper. They backed up against a wall. While Meredith stood guard, cool sweat prickled Cray’s forehead as he pulled his right leg up, tied it to his upper thigh, and then wrapped the brightly colored merchant’s smock around his shoulders. To anyone that cared to give him more than a second glance, he looked like everyone else down at the docking bays.
“Lift the hood, too,” Meredith said. “People know people here. A strange face might get you more attention than you want.”
“Thank you.” Cray flipped it up, then pulled it low over his face.
“That’s better,” she said. “Now all you’re missing is a dancing monkey.”
Cray smiled. He liked her, and hoped that she would survive. “Last chance,” he said. “You can walk away now.”
“And miss changing history? Forget it. I’ll be fine.”
“I just want to be sure—”
Meredith put a finger on his lips, quieting him. “I’m not a child.”
Cray nodded.
“I’ll never be whole, like you, but doing this? Maybe nothing will change. Maybe somebody will rebuild that horrible place and we’ll still be a bunch of tripods hobbling around here living our lives with these awful crutches that hold us up every day. But, maybe, just maybe, if it works, we can all have a better future. I haven’t seen many winters—I understand that, look at me…I understand that—but hopefully I have a lot of them left, and all I’d like is to wake up every day knowing that I can make up my own mind.
“Why do you think my friends and I sneak out so much? There’s more out there, Cray. You’ve seen it. You’ve lived your life whole. Don’t you see? They took my right leg from me and all I want is to live my life as whole as I can. What I want, more than anything, is a choice, and leg or no leg, that’ll make me just as whole as you.”
Cray chewed on his bottom lip, and agreed. It had taken the words of a girl little more than half his winters for him to see it. Being whole wasn’t about being a physically complete human being—something he’d often seen as a burden rather than a blessing—it was about free will and options, like the people in his secluded village who’d escaped the bounds of Tritan.
All the travelers who had come to marvel at him as if he were a mythical creature hadn’t truly been envious of the skin, bones, and muscles that made his body complete.
Deep down, whether they completely realized it or not, what they envied most was his freedom.
They simply didn’t understand that by escaping, they already had it; and he hadn’t seen that until now, either.
Cray sighed. “Okay. Then all I have to say is…be careful, and—and the luck of the gods be with you.”
“Also with you.”
He rested a hand on Meredith’s shoulder. “Thank you for making me see.”
“And thanks for letting me choose, biped. Nobody’s ever done that before.”
“I’m still not sure it’s the best idea.”
Meredith smirked and shuffled down the dark alley, leaving Cray standing, watching her go. She glanced back at him. “Two hours. Get her out.”
“If this works,” he called after her, “I’ll remember this.”
“If this works,” she said, “maybe I’ll come find you one day and let you know what happened.”
* * *
Cray hid in the bushes outside Caran’s house, back where the murky light concealed him. He’d made it unhindered, the layout of the streets coming back to him like he’d only left the day before. So much had changed, so much remained the same. A single light burned inside, where he used to sit in the living room and play with his toys while his mother made dinner, on the rare nights she was home. It was on the opposite side of the house, the light pouring through a bedroom window above, too high for him to peek through.
He’d heard m
ovement and knew she was inside, but the wait, the timing, were important. He listened to the ticking of his internal clock. Soon, the two hours would have passed, and if Meredith managed to fulfill her side of the plan, a massive explosion would shake the ground. Chaos would follow.
Caran would be shocked to see him, he would explain as rapidly as possible, and then he would take her away from this place.
What if the bomb didn’t explode? What if Meredith got caught, or if she changed her mind, what then?
Then you run, he thought. Caran would want you to, because to stay means dismemberment, or death.
It’s close. Two hours will have passed soon.
Go. Go now. Go see her before, just in case.
Cray peeked between the branches, saw two tripods hobbling away from him, but far enough in the distance that he climbed out, unafraid of being noticed. He put two crutches in front of one leg, and swung down the sidewalk, around the front, and up to the door.
He knocked, and waited. His stomach wobbled, the nervous anticipation of seeing her after so long making his skin tingle.
Cray nearly tumbled backward when the door opened.
Rowan.
“Cray,” he said. “What took you so long?”
“Rowan? What—how—you’re here.”
“Come in, come in. We’ve been waiting for you.”
“But what—”
The smile disappeared from Rowan’s lips. “Inside. Now.”
Confused, stunned, and bewildered, Cray obeyed. The door slammed shut behind him.
In the living room, Caran sat in the same rocking chair that she’d brought home a week before he left. She was much, much older. Gray hair pulled into a bun, wrinkled skin. Hands folded neatly in her lap. Cheeks wet with tears.
Two armed soldiers stood at her sides. Tall and unmoving. Intimidating statues.
Cray wanted to look around, to remember his old home, but he could do nothing more than wonder why.
Why had Rowan betrayed him?
His mother whispered a soft “My boy,” and he moved toward her.
“Hold still,” Rowan said. He yanked the merchant’s smock from Cray’s shoulders and untied the rope. The guards shifted and lowered their eyes when his leg dropped to the floor.
Cray was so lost in the moment that he forgot he was leaning on the crutches.
“You won’t be needing these.” Rowan used a crutch to swipe at one, then the other, knocking them from Cray’s hands, almost sending him to the floor.
Cray fought for balance, regained it, and again stepped toward Caran. In one swift motion, the soldiers had their weapons aimed at his chest. Cray held up his hands and backed away. To Rowan, he said, “Why?”
Rowan waved a crutch leg around the room. “I hated it, living out there. Hated it with a level of disgust that you can never understand. I wanted to come back, to live here where I could hobble around like a tripod is meant to do. I wanted it so badly that I could see it in my dreams. I wanted a mindless life and a warm bed, never having to worry about where my next meal was coming from. These crutches, that giant wall around this place…that’s security, Cray, and that’s all I ever needed.”
“But you—you raised me. You were like—”
“A father? I was never your father.”
Anger flushed Cray’s cheeks. “You stayed out there with me for thirty years—thirty, Rowan—why didn’t you just come back on your own? Why put my mother in danger?”
“I waited, patiently, like a fool, for her,” he said, jutting his chin at Caran.
“What?”
“Isn’t that right, Caran?”
She turned her eyes away, bottom lip trembling.
“I loved her.” Rowan clenched his teeth. “I said a quiet prayer of thanks the day your father was crushed under that airboat. Finally, we could be together. She promised we would, as long as I took you away from here and saw to it that you were safe and had a good life. She was supposed to send word when she was ready for me to come back, after she’d mourned your father long enough. Tell him, Caran. Tell him the truth.”
Cray’s mother said nothing. She covered her mouth with a liver-spotted hand.
“I waited, all those gods-damn winters for her. Three long, long decades out in the wilderness. I made a promise, Cray. I promised to look after you until you’d grown into a man, until you were safe, and until she sent word that I could come back to her. And unlike some, I kept my promises.
“It occurred to me after a while that maybe it wasn’t going to happen, but I held on, because love blinds a man to the sad reality of his situation. It makes him do stupid, foolish things, like suffer in a cold hut, eating rancid meat for thirty years. Then I thought, maybe…maybe she’s dead, maybe that’s why I never heard from her, so when Arka said she was still alive, it was just as much of a surprise to me as it was you. Then, I knew—she never meant for me to come back. Isn’t that right, Caran? Answer me!”
Caran subtly, almost imperceptibly, shook her head.
Cray asked, “If you hated it so much, why didn’t you leave on your own? You wasted those years. You could’ve come back here and had your security.”
Rowan pointed a crutch at the two soldiers. “Would you come back, knowing there was a chance these bastard steelfeet would be waiting on you? I hoped I could slip back inside and just pick up where I left off like nothing had happened. I always knew the risk—there were ways around it—new identities from some underhanded merchant, but if that wasn’t possible and I was going to die, I wanted to see her one last time. But since I thought she was dead, what was the point?”
“Then why did you come back with me?”
“I told you, I’m old and tired. I was done with the forest and I couldn’t take another day. When I learned she was still alive, I thought—I thought that if I delivered you to the authorities here in Tritan, you and your stinking, rotting, betraying wench of a mother, they’d let me live the rest of my days here, where I should’ve been all along. Maybe it doesn’t make sense to you, but I’m back, and I’m alive, and I’m safely inside those walls,” he said, jamming a finger at the air, “right where I gods well wanted.” Rowan wiped spittle from his lips and readjusted himself on his crutches. He glared at Cray, nostrils flaring. “Now, we know you didn’t get inside the Consulate with the bomb. Those two freaks over there would’ve heard it over their comm systems. Where is it? Where, Cray?”
Cray checked the wall clock hanging behind Caran. Two hours and fifteen minutes had passed since Meredith left him in the alley. She was late. Did she succeed? “Right where it should be,” he said. He hoped.
“Where?”
Cray watched the seconds tick by.
“Where?”
A low rumbling started off in the distance. Beneath his feet, the floor vibrated softly at first, and then shook vigorously as the shockwaves traveled through the ground.
Cray smiled. Meredith had done it. He hoped she’d gotten out safely.
Frantic, Rowan steadied himself. “What’s that? What’s happening? What’s that noise?”
“That, Rowan, is the sound of freedom.”
Thin, electronic voices erupted from the soldiers’ headsets, some barking orders, others screaming for help. “The Consulate! A bomb went off in the Consulate! All hands, all hands, report and proceed with caution!”
The first soldier whipped his weapon around, hugged it tighter to his shoulder, and squeezed the trigger. The bang deadened Cray’s hearing, and he watched as Rowan fell to the ground.
Cray locked eyes with Caran, braced himself for what would come next. He remembered those green eyes from so long ago. Warm, caring. The way she looked at him with pride. Thirty winters later, it was one of only a few things that hadn’t changed about her.
The first soldier, who had dropped Rowan without a hint of emotion or hesitation, now stomped toward Cray. Pausing, inches away, he lifted his visor. The second one joined him and did the same. He hadn’t seen as many winters, but he was
rough and hardened like his partner.
“You killed him,” Cray said. “Why?”
The first soldier said, “I did him a favor. He’d lost hope, and no amount of the security he wished for would’ve made for a happy life.”
“I—I—”
“The Consulate’s destroyed?”
Cray nodded.
“And you’re responsible?”
Rather than indicating he had help, stone-faced, he said, “Yes.”
The response was unexpected. The first soldier turned up one corner of his mouth, lifted his chin and said, “I don’t know how you managed it, but it’s about time. You did a brave thing. Give it ten minutes and the supply gate should be unguarded.” He turned to his partner. “Move, Terras, to the Consulate! By the gods, I hope we’re the ones to catch the treacherous beast.” He winked at Cray, and they marched out the front door and into the night, brightened by flaming rubble in the distance.
* * *
Ten winters passed. Cray buried his mother beside Eryn on the hillside clearing, where they could watch the sun rise together.
Then, a traveler arrived one summer afternoon. Her palms were bruised and blistered, her left foot swollen. She had withered on her journey, but the sight of him brought a freshness to her face. “You’re the man with two legs,” she said. “I’ve heard stories about you.” Mock sincerity in her voice.
“Hi, Meredith.” Cray offered her some water. “Did the bomb…did it help?”
“I’m here, aren’t I?”
“So nothing changed?”
“Oh, everything changed,” she said, lifting her shirt, her sleeves, showing him old, faded scars. She pushed her hair back. The lower half of her left ear was missing. Her fingers were bent at odd angles—breaks that hadn’t healed correctly.
“Gods, is that from the bomb?”
“No.”
“No? What happened?”
She ignored his question and asked her own. “Do you want to know what I learned?
“Tell me.”
“Freedom is dangerous.”
A Word From Ernie Lindsey
When I first began writing fiction twenty years ago, I never imagined myself creating anything beyond the length of a short story. Novels were too big, too intimidating, and I didn’t think my imagination was capable of building entire worlds in so many pages.
From the Indie Side Page 11
