I sit with Thorne on one side and the little boy on the other. He has deep dark eyes that seem lost. His father’s eyes are similar. He smiles at his son reassuringly, and we take off into the sea. I close my eyes when the boat sways and listen to the waves. The sound reminds me of home; I miss it.
Thorne’s hand squeezes mine, and I wonder if he misses the sound, too. We sit that way for the rest of the ride, with his hand in mine and our bodies moving with the ocean. I keep my eyes shut and listen to the sound of the water on the side of the boat. I try not to hum along with it, even though it calls to me. I just listen. It’s a good sound.
DEADLINE: 8D, 16H, 59M
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA
I TAKE IT ALL IN as we walk up the street. Everywhere I look are hills and ocean, an endless supply of rolling beauty. The sky is a light shade of gray, the color before the sun breaks loose on the day. I can smell the newness in the air, holding me captive to the illusion that everything will be easy and will work out.
We walk the empty streets, passing only a few people on their way to somewhere else. It’s so quiet here, so safe. I’m not sure where I’m supposed to go.
“Let’s go to the Mavericks,” Thorne says. “We’ll wait for them.”
“Where are they?” I ask.
Thorne pauses. “They can’t be that far away.”
2 HOURS BEFORE ESCAPE
A HUNDRED YARDS IS FAR AWAY. Farther than it seems. The lack of light and the waves that sound farther away than ever before don’t help with the distance. We cross through a line of trees. It’s odd that there are so many trees, so perfectly formed. But then, it’s not odd; it’s manufactured, here to hide something no one wanted any of us to see. Ever. The space between them is small, so we have to climb up a couple branches and go over them. The other side is truly another world.
Small buildings rest everywhere. They’re an ugly shade of gray, the color paper gets when it’s waterlogged. Bodies of cars, tires, wire, metal slabs, and piles of wood are strewn across the open area. There are more items-large metal pieces that we use for housing roofs, barrows, large cargo crates, tractors. I wonder why they are here and what’s inside of them, but as curious as it makes me, I don’t want to know. I imagine men in those little buildings and metal cargo crates. Men that sit at screens and watch us. That pull strings, directing people where to move. Men that build things to keep us under control and things to kill us when they lose it. A shiver runs down my spine as I glance at the gray shacks one more time.
Xenith puts a finger to his lips. Was I making noises? Maybe I was breathing too loudly. He points to his eyes and his fingers make a V shape toward the other side of the junk. I don’t notice it at first, not until we take a few more steps. Then the large fence that trails toward the sky comes into view. The barrier. No one could ever go over it.
I step on something. It cracks underneath my foot, and Xenith looks up at me like a hunter who’s found its prey. I’m frozen, staring at him. He puts his hands toward me, making sure I stay still, before placing one finger over his lips again. He sinks toward the ground, lies flat on it, and puts his ear against it. I don’t know what he’s listening for or why his ear is on the ground, but I don’t move. I try not to even breathe.
He gets up and pulls me toward him and whispers in my ear, “Run now!”
DEADLINE: 8D, 14H, 9M
MAVERICKS HEADQUARTERS: SAN FRANCISO
WE RUN INSIDE the Mavericks’ headquarters as soon as the doors open. The building is large, with floors made out of shiny tile. The entrance is blocked off by glass doors, and beyond that is a lady in a black dress suit sitting at a single round desk. The image is jarring, not a real portrayal of the Old World. The Old World is out there where there’s desert and abandoned buildings and people hiding underground, trying to live. Not here, at a desk with technology in a city where people are free to do more of what they want.
“You’re here before I’ve even sat!” Her hair bounces around her. It’s the color of the sunset in the summer, trapped on a head. “Good morning. How can we be of service?” Her eyes are on me, patient and waiting for me to speak. Can I just blurt all this out?
“I-we need to meet with someone.”
“That’s what we tend to do here. What’s the purpose?” She smiles one of those fake smiles that I’ve only really seen in people like my father.
“I’m here to see Agent Handler,” I say. I memorized the name a long time ago. “Salvation,” Xenith had called him.
“He’s unavailable unless it’s an appointment or an emergency.”
“I’m sure he’d have time for us,” I say. I lower my voice to a whisper. “We’re here about the Compound.”
The woman’s features shift into surprise, confusion, awe. I’m not sure why. She stares at us like we’re aliens, and maybe we are. “Why would you need to meet with someone about that?” She’s trying us, searching and waiting for a slip-up. Her gaze is threatening. I smile back, hoping it looks more innocent than it could ever be.
“I have some information and some questions. He’ll want to talk with us.”
She shuffles some papers around on her desk, and the keys clack under her fingernails. The noise echoes past us. She flashes her smile again, and her hair moves after her.
“Agent Handler isn’t free until this afternoon.”
“Is there anyone else we can talk with?”
“I’m sorry. He’s the only one who takes meetings for that…issue.”
“Fine,” I say. “Put us down.”
2 HOURS BEFORE ESCAPE
XENITH PULLS ME DOWN to the ground behind one of the cargo crates. He’s lying on top of me, and I’m about to ask him what’s going on when I hear a boom that makes the crate and the ground shake. I can’t see, but I can imagine the image. Tearing apart, splintering, sticking pieces into the ground. Collisions happen all around me, items hitting the ground with booms and thuds, as if it was raining rocks.
A shout rings in my ears, along with the blast, until there’s nothing but a high-pitched screeching in my head.
And then I hear the man again. “What the hell? See anything, Tom?”
“Nothing,” another, probably Tom, replies. There are two of them. I hold my breath, willing them not to hear us. I’m so close I can taste the freedom.
“Better look around. If the director wakes up because of the call, there will be hell to pay,” the first guy says.
I hear them as they move. I think it’s because my ear is planted against the dirt. Their feet crunch the earth, and the flashlights skirt us, near my head. I’m sure they’ve seen us. I’m holding my breath, trying not to move.
“Dave, look what I found.”
Us. My heart races, pounds against my chest. This man has found us; he’ll report us, and my father will come, and all this would be for nothing. I’m this close- this close-and now it’s over. It’s hard to breathe with the light shining near us. One inch closer and they’ll see us, and then they’ll take me to my father and he’ll be relentless. He’ll torture Xenith and me. He can’t find us. Not when I’m this close to getting out.
The light moves away from us. “Must’ve been a bird,” Tom says.
“It’s always a bird. Stupid birds oughta know better by now,” Dave says back.
My heart finally slows down, and the sound of their feet disappears. Xenith pulls me up and looks as relieved as I do. I whisper I’m sorry, and he nods back. It was a stick I stepped on. Just a stick. They really don’t want people here.
Xenith leads me to the right along the fence. There’s a piece of concrete about twenty feet wide, and it stretches underneath the fence to one of the little buildings and has a large door that rolls up and down that’s open right now. Waiting.
“This is it?” I whisper.
“This is it.”
“What is it?” I ask.
We stand a few feet away, ducked near the ground. I don’t hear or see anyone.
“This is the shipmen
t zone. The freighter trucks bring all the supplies here, put them in the building, close it, and leave. Those men from earlier? They move it all from here to headquarters. When we need it, it’s delivered to us,” he says.
“How do you know that?”
He shrugs and avoids my gaze. “My family’s been around for a long time.”
I don’t respond to his statement.
“See those boxes over there?” he asks. He points to a stack lined up by the side of the cement. “We need to get you in one of those.”
I shoot him a look.
“Those are the empty ones. They take them away, refill them, bring them back. Guess where they go from here?” I shake my head. “The Old World.”
My throat is dry. “What time does it come?”
“1:50. It takes three men exactly twenty-five minutes to unload and reload the truck. It leaves promptly at 2:18.”
I look down at my watch. It’s 1:45. Five minutes.
“Won’t they notice if one of those empty wooden crates is heavy?”
His eyes light up. “I told you, Neely, my family’s been around for a long time. No one will question anything. Come on.”
It’s not easy getting into a wooden crate. My knees are bent in an awkward shape against my chest, and for what feels like an eternity I doubt I’m going to fit. But then I do. Xenith hands me my pack. There’s hardly enough room for it to squeeze in, too. It’s shoved between the box and my shins, half in my face as I hunch low.
“Are you okay?” Xenith asks as he stares at me.
I want to say no, of course I’m not okay. I’m running away in a box. I don’t say that though. I say yes. He leans in, kisses my lips softly. I don’t kiss him back-as much as one can not-kiss someone back, anyway. At least, I tell myself that I’m not going to, but then my body leans into him as I realize he’s the last taste of something familiar. There’s a slight smile on his face when he pulls away, and I know that I shouldn’t have done that.
“It’s a day or so in the truck, then you’ll be at the Burrows. You’ll be safe with them.” Xenith’s words rush out quickly, stumbling over each other. He pauses and looks at me. “Forty days from now, Neely, it happens.”
His face is the last thing I see before he closes the lid and leaves me in the darkness. His scent fills up my box, the intoxicating smell of mint and earth and ocean. I can still feel his lips on me as I disappear.
DEADLINE: 8D, 11H, 2M
SAN FRANCISCO, CALIFORNIA
THORNE AND I COULD DISAPPEAR in this park. We walk around like it’s normal because that’s all we can do. It’s what Caleb and Amy would do. Thorne and Neely would be fighting, but they are gone. They were lost somewhere across the country in different spots on different days. Wherever I am-the real me-I hope she is fighting to find her way back.
Amy is too fake for me to be happy.
The park is beautiful, trailing the edges of the ocean, full of trees here and sand there. Pieces of a bridge, one larger than I’ve ever seen before, stand in the water. It’s not fully intact anymore, but the remains make me small. Tiny. As if this structure was the most powerful thing created. What was it like to stand down here under it when it was one piece? Thorne stares up at it, and I know he feels the same way. Miniscule in this large world.
I like this part of the city. We’ve spent the last few hours wandering through shops and stores filled with old books. We’ve been scrambling to fill our time with life. Neither of us is willing to say that we both feel it slipping away. I can sense it on him like cologne. He carries the fear with him. Sometimes he slips up and his worries flow into me through the connection.
I watch the people as move past them. An elderly man watching the birds. A woman running with a baby stroller. A man with a dog. An old couple holding hands. Another man staring out into the ocean. They seem so carefree, so vibrant. I know it’s this place, this freedom. I know it’s changed them. And I’m on the cusp of it but as someone else. If I was here as me, longer, I know it could change me, too. This place takes away the darkness.
I bite my lip as Thorne stops walking and sits on a bench. It’s got a good view of the ocean and the pieces from the bridge, and the trees shield us from the sun. Light shines onto my back and my head through the openings in the leaves. My eyes drift out to the ocean. In the distance, barely noticeable, I can make out the boats. Some have sails; some don’t. All of them glisten and sparkle under the sun. It sends that soft memory of home rushing through me. I want to hate it back there. I want to hate it and hate them, but I can’t.
They are all innocents, blinded and manipulated. They aren’t at fault. They are fishermen and teachers and mothers and friends. They are pawns. The Elders are the problem, the game masters. I watch the boats moving on the water. They are moving toward something, and everyone at home deserves that.
Thorne holds my hand in his, and I hold him close. I can’t see his branding, which is still covered on his neck, and it’s weird not seeing the mark on his skin. Even though it’s gone, it still haunts me, and I wish I didn’t hate it as much as I do.
“It’s forever,” Thorne says, staring up at the bridge pieces. “Like we’re supposed to be.”
I’m not sure how long we sit there, me looking at people and him being silent,, starting up, but then he’s pulling me up from the bench. The wind is still. The sky is alive with color. The rhythm of the waves sounds like the song at home. I hum along with it in my head. Even if I had thirty more years, nothing would ever compare to this place and the freedom of it all. This place is good. Amy likes it here; maybe Neely could, too.
Shadows suddenly block the sunlight.
“This is a security check. Present your verification and security papers.”
Two people dressed in black like the Troopers stare down at us, hands outstretched. They are in black, but they aren’t Troopers. They don’t look heartless.
“We got word of some undocumented visitors. You understand,” the second one says.
My racing heart slows down half a beat because they’re not Troopers. They’re not working for the Elders. It should calm me, but I can still feel my heart pounding within me. It’s the first time I’m glad there’s a cage there to hold it in. Without the cage, it would be roaming around the air and the world, ready to kill everything that endangers it. I imagine it, a roaring lion, hungry and ready to devour, its only purpose to escape and capture and protect the thing that keeps it alive. The world knows no fury like a heart on the prowl. I can feel the pounding in my head, reverberating there and shaking my memories into each other.
“Amy,” Thorne says loudly.
All three of them are looking at me, a sea of eyes. Right, I’m Amy. I hold out my papers to the officers. Time stands still, and the lion trapped in the cage is ready to pounce. But nothing happens. They hand everything back to me and to Thorne.
“How are things in number eleven?” the second one asks.
I blink. Eleven. That’s the camp where we live.
“Fine. It’s all the usual really. Kids getting antsy, daytime restriction problems, lack of security measures,” Thorne says.
The officer offers. “I get it. Grew up in number forty-five.”
Thorne nods like he completely understands the whole thing.
“Good luck with your visit, Ms. Williams, Mr. Redding,” the first one adds. They move past us. I count to twenty, willing things to slow to a normal speed.
“What was that?” I ask.
“Sorry, you panicked. I didn’t think you knew,” he says.
“I didn’t.”
Thorne shrugs. “I talked a lot with Joe in El Paso. He said those were three of their biggest issues.”
I had no idea that Thorne had asked about the camps or how they work. When he told Asher he wanted to help, he’d already been gathering information the whole time. He’s a sponge when he wants to understand something. If he hadn’t come, I wouldn’t have been able to answer that question. I wouldn’t have been able
to do so many things because of him. He saved me again.
“We should go,” I say.
DEADLINE: 8D, 10H, 14M
MAVERICKS HEADQUARTERS
AGENT NICHOLAS HANDLER’S crystal-blue eyes stare at me behind his dark-framed glasses. Even sitting, I can tell he’s tall. Muscles bulge under his blazer, and he’s younger than I expected.
“What was your question?” I ask, completely sidetracked.
He leans back, and his chair makes this squeaking noise. He crosses his fingers in the shape of a triangle, tip to tip, and stares at me over his glasses.
“I asked, Miss Ambrose, what your plan was to save everyone?”
I swallow. “I don’t have one.”
He nods slowly. “And you, Mr. Bishop? Do you have a plan?”
Thorne shakes his head. Agent Handler nods slowly and rises to his feet. He moves in quick steps around his office, where every object is perfectly stacked and organized by size and color. “The thing is, it’s only nine days before the Elders transfer your people. That’s not a lot of time to make this happen.”
He’s right. It’s not a lot of time. “Xenith said this is what you do, so I need you to do it. Whatever it takes,” I say.
Agent Handler looks at me. His eyes meet mine for a second too long, and then, “What are you willing to lose to see this accomplished?”
I don’t look away from him, even though I feel Thorne’s eyes on me, too. I’d give up everything except him. But haven’t I already done that just by saying yes to Xenith? Wasn’t me coming here a risk of losing him? And me wanting something more than what we have? But he’s still here.
“Everything,” Thorne answers for me. I look at him. “She’d risk everything.”
Handler’s eyebrows raise, and he glances between us. I speak quickly. “Agent Handler, I don’t want to be like my father. I don’t want me or anyone else to be changed by the Elders or used by them. Surely, you can understand what this transfer would mean for me.”
Follow Me Through Darkness Page 24
