Zero Repeat Forever

by G. S. Prendergast

  I know how hard Nahx armor is, how it burns to touch. How fast they are. Our disarming tactics, our disabling and neutralizing techniques, are more likely to be useful on one another as our sense of community starts to fray.

  Almost no one turns up for the increasingly meager dinners in the cafeteria. There is certainly no music or dancing afterward. Liam and some of his friends run NKVs sometimes on the big screen, gasping and hooting their approval. One evening Emily finds me there, facing away from the screen, working on a list of things we’ll need if we’re to make the mission to Calgary. She leans over, perusing the list before sitting.

  “So. You know, huh?” she says, toying with her small plate of food. I stare at the space between us. “I didn’t realize how serious you and Tucker were until . . .”

  “It was too late?” I ask. But I find I can’t muster up much emotion. I should hate her, but what would be the point of that? “It’s not your fault. You weren’t the first.” Saying it out loud makes it true.

  Emily loads her spoon with a pea, pulls it back, and flicks it precisely, across half the room, right into the back of Liam’s head. I can’t help but smile as Liam turns and glares back.

  “Xander told me Topher says your name in his sleep,” Emily says, now loading her spoon with a carefully coiled noodle.

  “He’s just confused. It doesn’t mean anything.” I wonder whether she plans to flick the noodle at me. “You’re welcome to him, if that’s what you’re thinking.”

  She shrugs.

  “Aren’t you and Liam a thing?”

  “Apparently not anymore.”

  Her tone is casual, but I can see it’s more than that. And I actually feel sorry for her. I suppose when Tucker died she was grieving too, but she couldn’t tell anyone. And now she’s been dumped by a douche bag in the winter palace of the damned. I shake my head as I watch her aim her spoon. My capacity for empathy and forgiveness surprises even myself sometimes. Tucker used to call it my superpower.

  Emily flicks the coiled noodle so expertly that it lands in the hood of Liam’s sweatshirt. He doesn’t even notice. Emily smirks at me.

  “What are we doing?” I ask her.

  “Making peace,” she says, standing. I notice she hasn’t actually eaten any of the food she’s been flicking around. “No sense in dying with bitterness in your heart. Your soul should go back to the universe as clean and naked as when you arrived here.” She doesn’t take her plate with her as I watch her leave. She’s just a girl like me, I think. She has a family too, all the way in Australia, which might as well be on another planet now. God.

  I look back to see Liam approaching, a fierce expression on his face. Turning to a fresh page in my notebook, I pretend to start a drawing.

  “What do you want?” he snaps as he reaches me. His friends turn and trail toward us, drawn by his tone. Disturbingly, I see Topher and Xander among them.

  “Nothing,” I say.

  “Why are you throwing food at me?”

  “I wasn’t.”

  “Who was, then?”

  I could pin it on Emily, but since she just tried to reconcile with me, that seems a bit cold. So I get up to leave. Something tells me it’s time to exit this situation. I’m irritated with Topher and Xander for being part of Liam’s testosterone party. And I need to think. Maybe I’ll find Sawyer and we can do some proper planning.

  “It was just a noodle.” I tuck my notebook under my arm. “Don’t be so sensitive.”

  Liam, astonishingly, simply steps forward and shoves me hard on the shoulders. I step back, keeping my balance easily and feel my body go into a defensive stance, legs apart, knees slightly bent, arms hanging loose but engaged at my sides, like I’m about to start a seriously competitive spar.

  Behind Liam, Xander chuckles. “Wow, dude, you really don’t want to get into it with her.”

  “I’m not scared of you,” Liam says. He’s drunk, I can tell. I could drop him and gut him like a fish, but I want to find Sawyer. So I turn to leave, and he charges. I see Topher dive forward in my defense at the same time as my instinct kicks in. Both my arms shoot back and take Liam by the neck. I curve one leg back around his knees. With a quick twist, he crashes down on the floor.

  “Bitch!” Liam yells. “Fucking half-breed!” My fist shoots forward and cracks into his mouth. He doesn’t have the protective reflexes that Topher does. Blood spurts from his lip.

  This would be the moment to step back. I’ve won this bout, but I’m on fire now. I have him pinned down on the floor, bloodied and dazed. My arm is drawn back to hit him again. I could beat him unconscious and barely raise a sweat, and I want to. Badly. I haven’t heard that word he called me in years, not since I smacked a kid who slung it at my little stepcousin. It’s like a curse from an ancient fairy tale that awakens a monster. I could kill Liam.

  Someone grabs me from behind, pulling me off him, pinning my arms to my sides as I struggle to get free.

  “Enough, Raven.” Topher’s voice vibrates in my ear. “Enough. Stop.”

  I exhale, going limp in his arms.

  We’re now surrounded by Liam’s friends, as well as a few spectators. It is one of those scenes that make me look really cool and Liam look really dumb. I feel a twang of regret, not for his pain—I couldn’t care less about that—but that I let him get to me. I have a feeling I’m going to have to pay for this one day.

  Liam’s friends drag him off to the bathroom to clean up. Xander trails after them, chuckling. The rest of the crowd drifts away—the entertainment over.

  As I tug at Topher’s arms, he releases me, and I catch my balance on the back of a chair.

  “You okay?”

  I flex the fingers of my right hand. They’re a bit tender, but I’ve felt worse. “Fine.”

  “I didn’t mean your hand.” He lets a few seconds tick past. “No one else thinks of you like that.”

  I just shake my head. Like a “half-breed,” he means, as though that’s such a terrible thing. The word is pretty offensive—that much I know about my stepdad’s history—but what’s so wrong with being half this and half that anyway? Topher means most people think of me as white. I don’t think that’s true, but that doesn’t matter either. What matters is that he thinks it’s a compliment. I don’t look white. Is he saying I act white?

  You’d think at the end of the world I could get away from this crap, but I guess not. As for Liam, he doesn’t know the first thing about me. And I don’t care either, if he thinks I’m Métis, or Native, or Black. He can kiss my round, brown ass.

  “I’m going to bed,” I say. Topher lets me go without another word.

  Mandy is not in her bunk when I get to our quarters, which means she’s probably in the infirmary—maybe holding an ice pack on Liam’s nose.

  Looking over at the small desk, I realize I don’t have my notebook. I must have dropped it when Liam jumped me. Now I’ll have to go back for it, and I was so looking forward to maybe getting some sleep.

  When I get back to the cafeteria, it’s deserted. I search under the tables for my notebook, but it’s not there. Maybe Topher grabbed it. I can’t really be bothered looking for him now. I’ll ask him in the morning.

  Standing in the dim empty hall, I can hear the humming of the air circulators and the faint creaking of the walls and floors in response to the lower night temperatures. A shiver passes over me, from cold, and possibility. There are large sentry parties assigned to patrol the base entrances and perimeter fences, but internal security is limited to one or two civilians doing a turn of the corridors once an hour. If I’m careful, I could wander the base all night. Maybe I was longing for sleep less than I thought. I’m wide awake suddenly.

  I figure if Liam and his gang can skulk around at night when we’re supposed to be in our own quarters or the communal areas, then so can I. There are parts of the base that seem to be off-limits, and if there’s one thing I remember from my old life, it’s that sometimes the nighttime concept of “off-limits” is
as indistinct as the shadows. At least, that’s what I count on as I tiptoe through the door marked RESTRICTED AREA.

  The weapons store would be the obvious place to start—we’re going to need weapons for our mission back to Calgary—but it’s the command level that beckons me. I know only certain things are shared widely among the inhabitants of our refuge. Topher has speculated that this is about morale, but I think it’s about control. We see what Kim needs us to see—the NKVs, the announcement of the surrender. But surely there are other things Kim and her inner circle have discovered from the transmissions. Maybe I can learn something about conditions on the coast or in Calgary. Maybe there’s some database of survivors. I could look for my parents’ names.

  Above all, what we need to find out is where exactly we are. We can’t navigate over unmarked roads in high mountains without that. I suppose if we follow the sunrise due east we’d eventually find the foothills, then the plains, and could make our way to Calgary from there. But we could wander in the mountains for days trying to find a way out. And that would use up all our fuel.

  The location is classified, Liam told us when we arrived. I should have realized at the time that this would keep us all in, as well as keeping any invaders out. There were maps on the table when Topher and I first spoke to Kim in the command center. Maybe one of them had our location marked. That’s a thin hope, but all hopes are these days.

  I’m halfway up the long climb to the command level when I hear footsteps behind me. Cursing silently, I stop, pressing myself into the corner of the landing between stairways. There are emergency exits every five levels, but they’re alarmed. If I tried ducking out of one, the whole base would know about it. And anyway, they go outside onto rocky plateaus. There’s a spindly ladder down to the main entrance level, and up to command, but I don’t fancy being chased up it in the dark and freezing night. Probably easier to face whoever this creeper is.

  I step forward, calling down the stairs.

  “Who’s there?”

  I hear a low chuckle. “I thought it would be you.”

  I should have known. Liam.

  He appears on the landing below me, looking swollen and vaguely menacing. I could outrun him maybe. He’s pretty tall compared to me, but he has recently had his face punched in. Maybe that will slow him down. But where would I run? Out into the snow?

  “What do you want?”

  “Nothing,” he says calmly. “I was going up to find my m—Kim. I have something to show her.” He lifts his hand, and I see he’s holding my notebook. “Maybe you should come with me. You can discuss why you’re in a restricted area after hours.”

  “Or . . . I could finish beating the shit out of you.”

  He smiles and with his free hand nudges back his hoodie, revealing a pistol in a holster.

  “Jesus, Liam,” I say, taking a step backward. “Chill.”

  “Walk.”

  I turn and head up the stairs as he follows. We trudge in silence as I get used to having someone with a gun behind me. Apart from the time the police briefly chased us across the park, it’s never happened to me before. I can’t say that I’m enjoying it.

  When we reach the command level, Liam points me to a chair by one of the wide windows.

  “Watch her,” he says to a couple of uniformed lookouts. Liam disappears into central command, closing the door behind him.

  “You’re in the shit now, Rave,” one of the guards says. I recognize him as one of Liam’s friends. It’s then I remember something else I jotted down in my notebook: a list of everyone who has committed to going to Calgary. Before I even complete this thought, Emily, Mandy, and Topher emerge from the stairway, huffing with the effort of their climb. Sawyer and Xander trail in behind them.

  “Anyone know the way to Mordor?” Xander says, grinning at all of us.

  Sawyer is less amused. He glares at me. “Why did I know one day you would be the cause of me being hauled out of bed in the middle of the night?”

  I shrug. What can they do to us? We haven’t done anything but make a tentative plan to get out of this rattrap.

  Kim doesn’t waste time when she calls us into the command center. I note that the long table has been cleared of maps.

  “A rescue mission to Calgary?” she asks, a cool tone to her voice. Liam smirks in the corner like the stinking snitch that he is. Kim opens my notebook and reads. “A Humvee, half our weapons, and a weeks’ rations? A Humvee!” Kim shouts. “And enough fuel to get you there and back, I suppose, too. Or were you going to push it?”

  “We will find fuel on the way,” I say. “We can recon a lot of ground that you haven’t set foot in for months. There are towns and farms along the way. We might find survivors. We’ll certainly find supplies.”

  Kim falls silent for a moment, so I forge ahead. Nothing to lose, I remind myself. “You know as well as I do that we will likely run out of medical supplies before the winter is out. There are drugstores in each town. We can raid medicine cabinets. We can give you a complete rundown on where to look when we come back.”

  Topher glances at me. I know that he knows what I know. We’re not all that likely to make it back.

  “And if you don’t make it back?” Kim says. “The Nahx are still out there.”

  “We haven’t sighted them in weeks,” Sawyer points out. “Not even transports. I’ve seen the lookout logs.”

  “A million other things could go wrong.”

  Surprisingly, Liam pipes in. “We could take a few of the drones with us. They don’t take up much space. We could send them back with data before we get to Calgary. At least that way . . . well, we would make it worth it.”

  I blink and shake my head. Did he just say “we”?

  Kim considers her son thoughtfully. “Do you want to go with them?” she says. There is something in her voice, a tinge of pride? It turns my blood cold. She must know it’s a death march too.

  “I want more than to go,” Liam says. “I want to command the mission.”

  Sawyer hangs his head and sighs.

  EIGHTH

  The transport leaves me at the compound. Out on the flat land, outside the city, I linger in the yard, looking at the western sky, the foothills, and the mountains beyond. Someone shoves me so hard I fall forward onto my knees.

  Inside, they sign.

  I hide inside all day. They lock us inside all night. I hate being inside. I ache to climb back up into the mountains, as though I may have left something there, something important to me.

  Important.

  We are locked in the dark, unable to sleep, with no light to see one another by, so we can’t even speak. In the morning when the light streams in, I see someone else has had their neck broken in the night.

  Tenth, a girl signs as she steps over the body, like that makes it acceptable.

  One night, after two days and nights locked inside, I curl up, squatting with my arms wrapped around my knees, facing into a corner. Normally, I might face out, not that it makes much difference since it is too dark to see most of the time. But it’s safer to face out, easier to crawl away from any trouble that approaches in the dark. Lately, the nightmarish silence is frequently marred with the sounds of violence and the threatening or desperate growls and hisses that accompany it.

  I’ve crawled away from an attack more than once. Someone broke the smallest finger on my left hand, for no good reason that I could discern. They simply snatched my hand and snapped my finger back. I hissed at them and shoved with my other hand. Then I heard them scuttle away. The pain wore off by morning, but I was left hurting anyway. Hurt feelings. So stupid. I don’t know what I did to get my finger broken.

  I keep thinking that maybe Sixth will find me here. My Sixth, I mean. There are other Sixths here, but they are not very friendly. Neither was my Sixth, of course, but . . .

  Ah, but she’s dead. I saw her die. She died and flew away on wings of blood.

  Dead. Dead. The shape of that word doesn’t seem right anymore. It’
s similar to our sign for “stop.”

  Dead. Stop. Stopped.

  I press my forehead into the corner and try to focus my mind on something else. I wish I could sleep. I might dream. I might dream of . . . someone, a girl, not Sixth. . . . My brain is turning to mush. It takes all the mental strength I have to hang on to one thing.

  Eighth. Will. NOT. Obey.

  Defective. I make the shapes in the dark. Disobedient.

  Dandelion.

  A human girl. I know that when I lose hold of that thought, I might as well stop crawling away from danger in the night. Sometimes there is no noise at all, yet still when the light returns there is a dead one beside me. Do they just die, or do they not resist when someone comes to kill them? Perhaps they have forgotten the one thing that makes them a separate being.

  The wall is cold. I can feel that through the sensory inputs in my armor. I stand and press my hands onto it, on either side of my head. Maybe I drift too far into a thought, or an attempt at a thought anyway, because I don’t notice anyone beside me until I feel another hand press down on mine. I try to jerk it away, but the fingers intertwine with mine and grip tightly. I’m about to get another broken bone, I think.

  But my finger isn’t broken. The one beside me grips my hand tightly, but not painfully. It’s so dark I can’t tell if it’s a boy or a girl. I don’t even care. I squeeze back. It feels nice to hold hands. Sixth let me hold her hand sometimes, begrudgingly, when she grew tired of teasing me.

  I feel a head drop down and rest on my shoulder, hear a little sigh of rattling breath. It’s a boy, I now realize. His head is level with mine, and none of the girls are as tall as me. He rests his head there on my shoulder, clinging to my hand, breathing. In between breaths it’s so quiet I can hear his heart. After a few minutes he moves but doesn’t let go of my hand. I could easily yank it away, maybe even shove him so hard that he falls down, but I don’t. As he walks away, I let him lead me.