The Secret Citizen (Freedom/Hate Series, Book 3)

by Kyle Andrews

  There was pressure in his chest as he stood there. He felt like he couldn't breath as easily as normal, but he wasn't going to be the person who had a panic attack every time things got hard. He refused to let an empty room defeat him, so he forced himself to take a step. Then another. And another.

  Each of those steps was a challenge, as was each breath that he took. Finally, Justin was standing outside of Libby's room, staring at Libby's door. His heart was pounding in his chest. Part of him was still expecting to find Ammo dead inside of that room, and how perfect would that have been? Because simple pain would be too easy.

  Then he heard something. A familiar sound. A sound that actually made him smile. It was the sound of Ammo snoring.

  When Justin pushed the door open, he found Ammo sleeping on Libby's bed. His head was resting on Libby's pillow, in the exact spot where the dog had been sleeping the last time Justin and Libby left that room.

  He was waiting for her to come home.

  21

  Every so often, there would be a need for the Garden to communicate with one of the other bases. They would have information to share or a trade to set up. There were different ways of arranging a meeting. Hanging clothes of specific colors near the window in the laundromat, or opening specific windows of an abandoned building. If people were very desperate, they could pass a note to one of the men who worked at one of the food stores and he would pass it to a runner who lived in his neighborhood.

  Ever since the night that the Mayor called for Libby in exchange for Collin Powers, Rose had been wondering if any of the other bases had tried to communicate with them before setting up the attack on the HAND building. There seemed to be some level of coordination between different bases when all hell broke loose and Powers was rescued. It was possible that nobody knew where Libby was, but she kept wondering why the Garden hadn't been included in the rescue plan. They were one of the central bases in the city. They should have been told that something was going to happen. Everything could have turned out differently, if only someone had told the Garden.

  Not long after she saw Justin, Rose was approached by Tully James, who was one of the communications coordinators at the Garden. He was responsible for arranging meetings between bases. He was a middle-aged man who was just about as pale as she could imagine someone being, causing her to wonder when he had last seen sunlight or breathed fresh air.

  “Rose,” he said politely with a nod as he approached.

  “Tully,” she nodded back.

  “We have a job for you, if you're available.”

  “I'll tell you if I'm available when you tell me what kind of job we're talking about.”

  “Intelligence. I'm trying to figure out how many of our people from the different bases were taken into custody on the night of the riot.”

  “We're still missing Mrs. Edgar, right?”

  Tully fell silent and looked down at the ground. He didn't have to tell Rose that Mrs. Edgar was still missing. His posture did that for him.

  A wave of guilt washed over Rose. With everything that had happened over the previous week, with her attack and the media fallout, and with Libby, she hadn't even stopped to think about the other member of her own base who hadn't come home that night. Not that she knew Mrs. Edgar well, but they were part of the same team. In the chaos of the riot, Rose lost track of everyone else, expecting them to show up at the Garden. But they didn't. Justin only just returned, and Mrs. Edgar... well, who knew about her? Rose felt horrible for giving the matter so little thought.

  “But there were others, from other bases,” Tully explained.

  “Was Powers recovered?” Rose asked.

  The press has spent so much time focusing on the success of the Mayor's plan to get Libby Jacobs that they hadn't gone into great detail about Collin Powers, and Rose wasn't sure that she could trust what little they did say.

  “He was. I can't say much more than that right now. The people who have him are being unusually tight-lipped about his presence.”

  “Understandable.”

  “But frustrating nonetheless,” Tully replied, bobbing his head from side to side. “I just expected... more.”

  “The man's been in HAND custody for a month. Give him a little slack.”

  “I suppose. Anyway, we need you to go meet with a runner from one of the other bases. She's supposed to be on Branch Street, under the bridge, in three hours.”

  “Three hours?” Rose replied, thinking about how long it would take her to get to the meeting location from the Garden. Finally, she nodded and said, “If I catch a ride, I can make that. No problem.”

  “Great. She'll be the one with the white scarf.”

  “Got it.”

  “Here,” Tully said, holding out an old hair pin, made of some type of metal that had lost its shine. “Put this in your hair. It's how she'll spot you.”

  Rose took the pin and nodded at Tully. She said, “I'll find you when I get back. Do you know where Aaron is right now?”

  Tully shook his head but said, “Check the basement. He's usually down there about this time.”

  With a quick nod and a smile goodbye, Rose left Tully in search of Aaron. She had some time to spare, assuming that she could find a car to borrow before the meeting, and she needed to get something from Aaron before she left.

  As Tully suspected, Aaron was in the basement, sitting at one of the tables. He didn't have a plate of food in front of him, but there was a glass of iced tea.

  Rose sat down at the table with him and said, “I have to make a run. I need my gun back.”

  “Your gun?” Aaron replied.

  “The one you guys took from me when I came back here that night. It's mine. I want it.”

  “It is yours. But if you're planning on taking it out to the streets, I'd advise against it.”

  “Noted. Now, where is it?”

  “In my office. My desk, top left drawer. I'm not trying to keep it from you,” Aaron told her, taking a sip of his tea. “I just want you to be sure that you don't do anything foolish. If you're caught with a gun on the street, you won't just be arrested. You'll probably be shot on the spot. Possession of any firearm is—”

  “I know,” Rose cut in. “I won't flash it around. I just want it.”

  “Possession of a HAND firearm, which you stole from an officer just before you shot her? That is an even bigger issue, Rose.”

  “There is no possession of a firearm except the possession of a HAND firearm. How can it be a bigger thing?”

  Aaron didn't respond. He looked off to the side, trying to figure out some way of explaining to Rose what a bad idea this whole thing was, but she didn't need Aaron to tell her how much trouble she might get into. The thing was, she didn't care.

  Leaning across the table and lowering her voice, Rose told Aaron, “Guns are a dangerous thing to have, I know. But you know what would have been more dangerous? If I didn't have that gun the other night. If I'd been forced to try to fight off an attacker twice my size, with three times the amount of stupid in his head. That guy wasn't thinking about how much trouble he could get into. He was thinking about right then and right there, and that makes people like him more of a threat than whatever the law says.”

  Aaron looked at Rose, studying her expression for a few moments, getting a read on her before he said, “If you need to talk to someone...”

  “This isn't PTSD, Aaron. I don't need to talk to anyone. This is called 'logic'. We are fighting a war, yeah?”

  Aaron nodded.

  “Then I'm putting my ass on the line every time I go out on one of these runs. And I'm fine with that. Whatever I can do, I'll do. But if I'm found out, the other side isn't going to be telling me to get on the ground while pointing flowers and lollipops at my head. They have guns. They use them all the time. I'm just trying to save myself from being another Uly.”

  After saying his name, Rose flinched. She hated the idea of her friend being the poster child for stupid, useless death. It felt wro
ng to use him that way. It disgusted her. But it was also fair.

  Aaron thought about what she was saying. After kicking it around in his head for a few seconds, he said, “Official city protocol suggests that if you're attacked in a dark alley, you're supposed to find a call box or a safe zone.”

  When the sentence was out of his mouth, Aaron's expression changed from deadly serious to something much lighter. Rose couldn't help but start laughing.

  “I should have thought of that!” she said.

  “Seriously,” Aaron joked. “What is wrong with you?”

  “I know. I know.”

  Aaron nodded and finished up with his iced tea. He then stood up and said, “Let's get you a gun.”

  22

  It was out there in the world now. Out of Collin's hands. Free for anyone who wanted to read it. It was a direct line between him and any citizen who had so much as a hint of interest in what Freedom had to say. It was also a line to HAND, who were sure to get ahold of a copy. He couldn't forget that. It was a responsibility that didn't weigh lightly on him.

  Even though people around the Campus were talking and going about their normal routine, the place sounded quiet to Collin. It was as though he were waiting for something to happen, and everything else was just background noise.

  What if he said the wrong thing? What if his words came across as whiny, rather than commanding? What if his bold contradiction to the official news reports was seen as off-putting, rather than enlightening?

  He wanted a reaction. He wanted to know what the people thought of his newspaper right then and right there. But at the same time, he knew that no such reviews would come in. Nobody was going to openly praise his work. There would be no fan mail. If he was looking for validation of some sort, he would be waiting for a long time. He knew that. But he couldn't stop pacing. He couldn't stop waiting for... something.

  Collin stood outside of the office where the papers were still being produced and he listened to the sound of the printers shooting out sheet after sheet. At this rate, they would run out of resources before they even produced their second issue, but it wasn't Collin's job to worry about the production. Luckily, Mig was seeing to that. She had connections, the specifics of which Collin neither knew nor cared to know. As long as he had his soap box to speak from, he would go along with whatever they could manage to produce.

  As he leaned against the wall, Collin thought about what he wanted to say next. He considered talking about the truth of Uly Jacobs. He knew that Mig could get him in touch with the people who actually knew Jacobs. Maybe they would be willing to tell the world what type of person he really was.

  Then there was the story of Libby Jacobs and whatever she had inside of her that allowed her to carry all of those documents. There were important documents out in the world because of her, which never would have been seen by civilian eyes if she hadn't made it possible. Who knew what else she possessed?

  Whatever else there was inside of her was gone now. HAND killed her. Probably destroyed her body. Made sure that the threat was gone, once and for all.

  He wouldn't write about Libby Jacobs. The more he thought about what happened to her, the more guilty he felt. Here he was putting his own words out into the world, because he had been rescued and given the opportunity. And what about her? He was the bait that was meant to lure her in for the kill, and it worked. If he had just died on the street a month earlier, as he expected to, whatever other documents she had inside of her would still be available. More than that, she would still be alive.

  Should he really feel guilty about circumstances that were entirely outside of his control? Before he was rescued, he'd never even heard of Libby Jacobs. There was nothing he could have done differently. It wasn't his fault. He knew that. But he still felt a sense of responsibility toward her. To make sure that his life meant something, so her death hadn't been for nothing.

  Dor leaned against the wall beside Collin and stood there, looking down at her feet. She was not a girl of many words, but she had slowly been coming out of her shell. Hopefully she was beginning to realize that Freedom was a safer place for her.

  She stood there for several minutes, saying nothing. Collin thought that she was probably lonely. She probably wanted a familiar face. Maybe she was missing home. Maybe she needed comfort. He wanted to do whatever he could for the girl, but he couldn't think of what to say, so he stood silently as well.

  Finally Dor said, “I had to write a paper for school once. It was a report on a play about the community of people who were assigned to build a bridge.”

  After saying that, she fell silent again for quite some time. Collin wasn't sure how to respond. Was she trying to relate to him by telling him that she'd written something before as well? What was he supposed to say to that? So, he just nodded and went back to standing.

  After a minute or so passed, Dor leaned toward him just slightly and said, “I spent two weeks on it. Reading the play over and over, even though bridges make me...”

  She trailed off for a moment. In her eyes, Collin could see Dor floating through a fog of memories. Then, as quickly as she could, she pulled herself back to the present and said, “I made sure that it was perfect—Just what my teacher wanted me to say about the play. I even stood there, watching her read the report, so I could see what grade she'd give me.”

  “It's hard not knowing what people think,” Collin replied.

  Dor nodded. She seemed to understand just what he was going through. He never thought that she was so observant before, but she got it. Collin felt just like a kid, waiting to get his paper graded by the teacher. Only in his case, the teacher was the entire population of the city. Would they think that his words were as valuable as he thought they were? Or would Sophia's story mean nothing to them?

  After another minute or two, Dor pushed off of the wall and started to walk away. Before she could get far, Collin said, “Hey.”

  She turned around.

  “How did you do on the report?” he asked.

  With a shrug, she replied, “I failed.”

  She then resumed her walk away from Collin, leaving him to second guess everything that he'd written in that paper. What if everything he thought the people needed to hear was stupid? Who was he to try to speak to the people on behalf of Freedom? He was the guy who got caught. How was that supposed to motivate anyone?

  Logically he knew that if his message were bad or he were not as intelligent as people had first assumed, someone in the Campus would have told him by now. They'd all read his article. They were dumping resources into publishing it. It couldn't be all that bad.

  But logic had nothing to do with how he was feeling. He wanted to know what the rest of the world thought. He wanted to see the reaction of not just the citizens, but of the authorities, once they realized that Freedom was making its presence known in ways that it never had before. He wanted to see if he could change the world with the power of words.

  'It starts with an idea,' he told himself, quoting his own letter. But then what? What happens after the start? What does someone do once they get themselves into the middle of something?

  Collin managed to kick around his doubts and his worries for hours, until the Freedom members who had been sent out into the world with stacks of papers began to come back empty-handed. It was an exciting time, but Collin couldn't focus on that. All he could think about as he heard the stories of enthusiastic citizens, grabbing copies of his paper, were the other Campus members who had been sent out with stacks of papers—The ones who hadn't came back yet.

  The campus was full of energy. People were celebrating the way that the public had soaked up this new source of information. They talked about the way that Collin had finally brought a public voice to Freedom. They slapped him on the back and laughed heartily, but Collin just stood staring at the door, waiting for each of those delivery people to walk though.

  Mig walked to Collin's side and said, “Four.”

  Collin looked over
at her, wondering what she was talking about. Had he entirely missed another chunk of a conversation while he was distracted?

  “Four of them aren't back yet. Sar Hunter. Ly Crisswell. Tom Powell. Gin Wright.”

  “It's getting late.”

  “They have time.”

  “You're not worried?”

  “I'm in a constant state of worry. Second guessing. Was it too much, too soon? How far do we take this before the losses are too great?”

  Collin turned toward Mig and he wanted to say something to her about how he'd never considered this part of his plan. He never thought about the lives that would be put on the line for the sake of passing his messages to the rest of the citizens.

  This was only the first issue. If even one of those people didn't return this time, that would be on his shoulders forever. And what would happen the next time? What would happen when the authorities knew that these papers were being distributed and they were looking for the people passing them around? What would happen if they tracked one of those delivery people back to the Campus and killed everyone?

  Was it worth it? Could Collin justify the risk?

  Mig shook her head and told him, “Every time someone walks through that door, I feel the way you look right now. If I send them out there, is it my fault when something happens?”

  “Isn't it?”

  “Absolutely. But do you think the people in here are idiots? Do you think they just happened to wander into the Campus and have no idea of the risks that are involved in being here, or going on whatever mission they're asked to go on?” Mig asked. When Collin didn't immediately respond, she further asked, “Did you know the risk when you went on that book run, before you were taken?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Everyone here is fighting for a cause. It does those people a disservice when we refuse to acknowledge how much they are willing to give.”

  “You tell this to yourself every time someone walks through that door?”

  Mig smiled and said, “Every time.”

  “Does it ever make you feel better?”