Alliance: The Complete Series (A Dystopian YA Box Set Books 1-5): Dystopian Sci Fi Thriller

by Inna Hardison

  He walked to the cave, needing to just lie down for a bit, and when he got there, he saw Laurel crouching by where Brody was sitting against that wall, whispering at him. Brody’s eyes were closed, but his face seemed relaxed for the first time, and his hands weren’t making fists. He was intruding, so he quietly grabbed his blanket and walked to the birch tree that Brody chose last night, smelling its mild sweetness, slumped down next to it, and finally let himself sleep.

  5

  Birch

  Laurel, May 7, 2236 Woods Outside of Reston

  Laurel was surprised Riley didn’t get it. Looking at this boy, Brody, she could tell from the first that he was broken, that something happened to him, something unfixable. Riley, of all people, should have seen it. This boy had that same look to him that Riley had when Ams stopped talking to him for days before they ran. The waiting to die look. Ams being the way she was with this boy she got, couldn’t blame her for it. She must have been scared out of her mind, tied up to a tree and watching that other boy punching Riley like that. She must have thought they would kill her Riley. But Riley not getting it surprised her…

  She couldn’t bear to look at the boy sitting there alone by that tree, as if waiting for himself to just stop breathing, so when he went inside, she followed him, because somebody had to talk some sense into him, and because she really wanted to help him get his girl back, this Trina. It’s not like they had someplace to be or plans of any kind, and this trudging through woods from one city to the next was already getting old. She didn’t run away from the compound to do this.

  He was sitting against the wall, his eyes closed.

  “Brody.”

  He didn’t even look at her.

  “You have to let me help you. I know you promised Riley, but Riley would let me go. He has to. I am not Ams, or Ella. I’m not his to keep safe. I want to help you, and I need you to let me.” She crouched in front of him, watching his face. There were streaks of gold in his hair, catching what little light was coming into the cave, from all the sun she guessed. He looked about Riley’s age, but there was no carelessness about him. She couldn’t picture him as a little kid, like she could Riley, or Ams. Couldn’t even picture him smiling.

  She heard Riley come in then, fumble for his blankets, and leave. He must have thought they were talking. She wished she could make this boy talk to her, felt he needed to talk to somebody and nobody seemed to want to be around him.

  She moved to his side and sat next to him by the wall. “Tell me about her. About Trina, from before they took her.”

  He looked at her then, for the first time, surprised gray-blue eyes with sparkles of yellow and gold in them, and nodded. And finally, he talked.

  His voice cracked when he got to the part where she broke up with him, and she could picture them from his words, the girl leaning against the aged brick wall of the school, him hurting so much he threw the necklace he’d gifted her away just to not have it near him. She could picture him kissing the girl’s head and it made sense to her, him doing it even then, could almost hear him whisper something to her, only she didn’t know what it was, and him walking away for the last time. But she couldn’t picture being that girl, couldn’t imagine ever doing something like that to a boy who loved her. She didn’t think she could.

  She put her hand on top of his, and he froze.

  “Please, don’t,” he said so very quietly, barely a whisper, as if it hurt him just to have her hand on his like that.

  Every instinct in her told her to let go, to not hurt him, but she felt she had to let him know that she didn’t think he was as horrible as all that, so she pressed harder on his hand, not moving, hoping he understood that she didn’t mean him any harm by it, and he let her. They stayed like that for a long time, not saying anything.

  He looked at her finally, sparkles all gone now, his hand in a fist under hers. “I would have given you up to the Alliance to save her, if I could. You need to know that. That’s who you are trying to comfort. You see the sadness, but nothing else, because that’s how you are. But I am not like Riley. I am not”–he lowered his head, and whispered after a beat–“I tried to get him to shoot me last night to save her, because I thought it might work. I tried to force my best friend to kill me in exchange for getting you and Ella back. I don’t know how he would have lived with himself if he had, but I didn’t care about that.” He looked up at her again. “That’s how I am,” he said, and he seemed sorry he said it, or sorry that it’s how he was.

  “I think I might have let you take me to the Alliance, if I knew why you were doing it. I don’t have anybody, so it doesn’t matter where I end up to anyone but Ams, and she has Riley now. She’ll be alright. I might have let you walk me right in if it could get you Trina back, if I knew. I still would, if you’d just ask. And that boy wouldn’t have beat up Riley like that, and you wouldn’t have felt the need to do what you did last night, and you wouldn’t feel so bad now,” she said softly. She didn’t know why she said all of it now, didn’t think about it beforehand, but she believed she meant it. She was tired of running through these woods, and she certainly didn’t want to see any more cities with no life in them. She never wanted to see that again. And all the sadness on everyone’s faces all the time…. She didn’t want it in her, didn’t want to become hard like Ams or sad and lifeless like this boy.

  He stood, breathing hard, staring at her, the light in his strange eyes back now. “I can’t take you with me, Laurel. Even if Riley lets you go. I can’t. I won’t.” His voice was full of anger when he said it.

  She didn’t understand why he wouldn’t at least talk to the rest of them about it. This could be the only chance they had to make it okay for all of them, okay for Riley and Brody, and it would be okay for her too, she knew that. This would be different than her just doing the thing she was made for because before she had no choice about it. Her choosing to go back wouldn’t feel so bad at all, not if it would make it alright for her friends.

  She stood. She would give him some time, and she would talk to Riley about it. Ams she couldn’t talk to, not about this, not yet. “I wouldn’t be doing it out of pity for you, Brody, if that’s what you think… I don’t know you enough to feel that, and I hope that if I ever do know you enough, it still wouldn’t be pity. This, I would be doing it for me,” she whispered and walked out, hoping Riley was close by.

  She found Riley dead asleep by one of the strange black and white trees. Nobody seemed to be by the almost dead fire anymore. She shook him gently by the shoulders, until his eyes flew open at her and he sat up, fully awake now.

  “What is it, Laurel? What happened?” He sounded worried.

  She needed to do this just right, she knew, needed to find the right words to tell him. “I know how we can get Trina back. I figured it out, but you have to promise me that you would let me do what I want to do if I tell you.”

  He shook his head. “No. Not unless I know what it is, Laurel.”

  She just had to tell him then. She couldn’t see how he could keep her from doing what she wanted to do. She wasn’t a prisoner here. That was it, that’s what she had to tell him. “Am I your ward, Riley? Yours or Ams’? Or am I free to do what I want to do? Because if I am not, this is no better than the compound for me, just a different kind of prison with better company and much more sadness…” She waited, crouching by him, Riley looking at her strangely now.

  “You are not a prisoner. But you are my friend and I swore to keep you safe. I intend to do that. I have to do that,” he said sharply.

  “I told Brody that I want to go back, and I meant it. I am not Ams, or you. I am not cut out for this. Ever since that field in the city, I’ve been dreading what I’ll see next, and I don’t want to. If Brody takes me back and they let Trina go, I will have at least done something that I could feel good about. I don’t have anybody waiting for me anywhere, Riley. I will never know what happened to my parents, I know that now. That was my initial plan, to find our parents, mine
and Ams’, but I can’t find them, none of us can. Our names aren’t even our own. So I want to do one good thing for somebody, while I am still free to do it. And you have to let me,” she said softly, so he knew she wasn’t angry at him, and walked away from him, leaving him be.

  She found Ams sitting by herself on the other side of the clearing from where Riley was. She was angry at him again for something, only she couldn’t think of anything he’d done this time.

  “Hey, Ams.” She dropped down on the grass next to her, hoping she’d tell her whatever it was that was bothering her, before she had to tell her what she planned to do. She knew it would make her angry, and sad, maybe. She couldn’t help that. Sooner or later she felt she would end up back at one of the Alliance places. Someplace clean, and safe, and not so full of people pointing guns at each other’s heads all the time or breaking each other’s ribs.

  “I hate him, this Brody. I really, really hate him. And Riley seems to think there is something wrong with me for it, but I can’t help it, not after watching him put that gun right to Riley’s head like that, and making him get on his knees… Not after he hit him so hard Riley couldn’t breathe. I could see it from where I was. He couldn’t breathe for the longest time after that, and then he let that other kid almost kill him, and he just turned away from it. But there was no place I could turn away to, so I had to watch it, all of it, and there wasn’t a damn thing I could do to stop it.

  “I was screaming at him, begging him to stop it, but he didn’t even say anything to me, just stared at me as if I was crazy for screaming. Did you see how he made Riley get on his knees? He shot at me in front of him, Laurel, right by where my feet were, and then threatened to shoot me for real. What kind of a friend does that to somebody? Riley thinks I am some kind of monster again, for still being angry at the boy, but I can’t turn it off like he can. I want to kill him for what he did to Riley. I am serious. I think I could.” She looked up at her then, eyes sad and serious.

  She hugged her close, whispering to her, “I don’t think you are a monster, Ams. I wasn’t there for most of it, but I can’t imagine watching him do any of those things. He felt he had to, so the crew believed it, but I don’t know if he had to do it that way. I never loved anybody but you, Ams, so I don’t know what I would do for someone I loved. I don’t know if I could do what he did to keep you safe, Ams, but that’s me. I see how broken he is, and ashamed. I don’t think he would have killed Riley or you. Don’t think he has it in him. But I am sorry he hurt Riley, I really am.” She got up and walked to the fire, getting it started again, because she couldn’t tell Ams what she wanted to tell her after all, at least not tonight. Riley wasn’t in his spot by the tree anymore. It was just her then, her and Ams, maybe for the last time.

  “Feel like helping me get this thing roaring, Ams? Nobody else seems interested in eating today. I need some sticks, and dry leaves. And a bit of laughter or I am going to go crazy with all the silences.” And she watched Ams running through the woods around the edge of the clearing after a little while, collecting anything dry enough to burn, and dropping large piles of it by the fire, and finally, they had it going, as big as they wanted it, big enough to light up this whole clearing, and for the first time since they got here, she noticed how pretty it was.

  The white of the trees, catching the light and glowing, in a way the insides of white candles glow, but not trees, never trees. It was as if every one of these slender trunks was filled with snow on the inside, and someone set the snow on fire, only it didn’t melt the snow, it just made it glow softly, whitely from the inside. She watched, fascinated, making a mental note to ask someone what these trees were called, and to remember it, so she could take it with her. This memory she wouldn’t mind keeping.

  6

  Stories

  Brody, May 7, 2236, Woods Outside of Reston

  Brody caught the way Riley was looking at the stream, the water sparkling like melting icicles when the sun hits them just right, throwing glitter across the tiny waves. Riley seemed to want to turn into the stream, but then didn’t, and he felt it had something to do with the girl, the little one at the cave, the one who was unapologetic about wanting to shoot him. He liked her for that. There was honestly to her, and she didn’t seem to care what anyone else thought of her. She was pretty, too. He noted that much. Those impossibly large, liquid gray eyes staring right at you. Nothing timid in her look, too, as if she had no secrets. He was glad for Riley that he had her, and he really did seem in love with her, begging for her like that. Riley, who never begged for anything in all the years he’d known him. Not even when his father took that belt to his back for something stupid he got him into at school. He just took it, never screaming or pleading.

  His father did it in front of him once, probably to make him stop getting Riley in trouble, and he did for a long time after that. He couldn’t take it, watching him swing the narrow belt at the kid’s back like that, and Riley standing there with his eyes closed, not making a sound. He remembered begging his father to stop, swearing he’d never get Riley to do anything bad again, but he just wouldn’t stop hitting him for anything. He ran up to that big man finally and begged him to hit him instead, because it was his fault in the first place, and he knew how unfair it was that Riley was getting punished for it. He stopped then, and threw him out of the house, slamming the door in his face.

  He felt like he was intruding on everyone when they got back to the fire. These people had every right to hate him, and they seemed to – all but the other girl, Laurel. She looked at him with softness in her eyes, and he couldn’t understand why she would look at him like that, not after what he would have so easily done to her. So when she came into the cave and called him by name like that, all soft, he wanted her gone, but she wouldn’t leave, and after a while, if felt good to have someone leaning against the wall next to him. It felt good to not feel so alone, even if he didn’t deserve it.

  He didn’t mind telling her about Trina, needed to tell somebody, and so he did, telling her almost everything, except for what he said to her that last time. He didn’t want this girl to feel pity for him. And afterward, when she put her hand on his, he thought she did anyway, and he didn’t want that warm touch, didn’t think he had any right to let her comfort him. He would have so easily given her up to save Trina, without even thinking about it. He would have done it before, would have done almost anything before. It felt right that she should know that about him.

  He expected her to scream at him or hit him. He would have been okay with any of it. But her telling him that she would have let him take her to the Alliance, that she still would, if it helped him get Trina back, he couldn’t take that. It didn’t make sense for this girl to offer to do this for him, not after all that she saw him do and all the other things that she knew now. And when she was gone he was grateful for the silence again. He sat there, trying to think of a way out of it for himself, for Trina, sat thinking for a long time, and finally his eyes closed and he slept.

  Too much light coming into the cave woke him up. Something was going on outside that made an awful lot of it, as if the whole clearing was on fire. He poked his head out, timidly, not wanting to scare anyone, and there it was, a roaring fire much too large for so few of them, much too large for this tiny clearing. Laurel and Ams were running around it, holding hands, giggling, looking very much like little kids who’d never seen a fire before. They were lost to whatever game this was and didn’t see him, so he leaned on the wall of the cave and watched, trying to remember the last time he giggled or ran around like that, without a care in the world. Trying to remember the last time he was as happy as these two girls looked now.

  And he had it, the last time he laughed. It was Riley’s sixteenth birthday, only Riley didn’t ever remember it anymore, or if he did, he never wanted to do anything. Trina made him a surprise supper, and it was just the three of them, at Andy’s warehouse. He remembered trying to save all the candy they could for months, and Tri
na stealing candles and soft pillows from her house. He caught a bunch of fish the night before, and he hoped they could cook them just right on the little camp stove at Andy’s.

  Janet gave them nice plates for this, and cloth napkins, and silverware, and when Riley walked in, because Brody asked him to come by to help him with something, the whole warehouse was full of candlelight, and it smelled like food, and Trina’s perfume, and candles, instead of old rusty machines and motor oil like it always did.

  Riley opened the door and just stood there, looking uncomfortable at first, and he had tears in his eyes and then suddenly, a huge grin on his face. They ate the fish and potatoes out of nice plates with flowers on them, sitting on the soft, embroidered pillows on the floor. And every piece of candy they had stashed away for this after that. They took sips of Andy’s moonshine out of a bottle, not a thermos, and they didn’t have to steal any of it. Andy left it for them in the middle of a table, with a Happy Birthday note to Riley under it. And afterward, they ran around the warehouse with bags of milk and salt, trying to make ice-cream, hitting each other with them, spilling the milk onto each other’s faces, and laughing. They learned how to do it this way from the old crazy woman who always talked to them when they walked to school in the mornings. Nobody in Waller seemed to know who she was, not even a name. She had told them people in the old days used to make ice-cream just like that, only it didn’t work for them, but they didn’t care that it didn’t work that night.