The Bar Code Tattoo

by Suzanne Weyn

  “You’re not insane,” Eutonah said gently. “You are a person with strong energy flow. You’re a natural conductor of energy. It’s so strong in you that it can throw you forward in time and you get glimpses of the future. This extra energy flow might have driven you insane if you lived in the regular world, but you’ve come here, and now you’re learning to harness and control your energy.”

  Not insane. Kayla felt as though a huge weight had been lifted from her. Not insane. “How do I learn to use my energy?” Kayla asked.

  “There’s a lot of work to be done,” Eutonah said. “It still costs me. I feel spent afterward. This is all so new to our species, we’re just starting to develop this power. You must know how to get back the energy you expend or it will drain you until there is nothing left.”

  “How do you get it back?”

  “The earth gives it back to you. Trees do, too. Animals will share their primal energy if you are kind to them. You must stay in close contact with those things that are good and strong in your life. You must stay in touch with those people whom you love and who love you. That’s what returns energy to you.”

  “I need to contact someone I love,” Kayla said. “Mfumbe.”

  Eutonah gazed at Kayla, her strong, dark eyes concentrating. Then she nodded, as if she had decided something. “You begin by envisioning the person you want to contact. Focus on his image.”

  Kayla began to think of Mfumbe. She started with his beautiful eyes and then built his face around them. It wasn’t difficult. In all the time they’d spent together, she’d memorized every plane and curve of his face until he was part of her.

  The sound of footsteps broke her concentration and she saw a man hurrying down from the mountaintop. She recognized him as one of their group. He was breathless and appeared upset when he arrived. “Eutonah, I thought you should know that someone has been using the computer.” The man looked at Kayla.

  “Yes. It was me. I did,” she admitted quickly. “I wanted to write my friend.”

  Eutonah and the man looked at each other.

  “Did you tell your friend where you were?” Eutonah asked her.

  Kayla shook her head.

  “It doesn’t matter,” Eutonah said sadly. “They can still trace it. This location is compromised.”

  Eutonah called a meeting of the entire group that evening by the large stone fireplace in the main meeting room. “Our security has been accidentally breached. It’s not necessary for me to explain by whom or how. Be on alert for anything unusual. I want to use the patrol system we first set up to monitor the tree line. If anyone is coming up any face of the mountain, we want to know about it in time to either secure the building or get out.”

  Kayla listened, filled with guilt. Several group members turned to look at her, and Kayla was certain they knew she was to blame. She might as well confess, so she stood and spoke. “I’m so sorry.”

  “It’s my fault. I forgot to tell you,” Eutonah said. “I’m locking that room from now on. We’ll keep it for emergency use only. In the meantime, let’s all be extra alert and get the patrols up and running.”

  For the next five days, all lessons were suspended, since no one seemed able to concentrate. Kayla sat alone on her sleeping bag working on sewing together a jacket of animal pelts left over from when the group hunted its meals.

  The group often argued over whether they should eat meat or not. Kayla didn’t eat meat anymore, suddenly finding she preferred nuts, berries, greens, and eggs. But she was glad some of them did eat meat and knew how to prepare the skins. She’d been told that the winter would be bitterly cold, and she didn’t want to be caught without a coat or jacket.

  By August the patrol was dropped. The group felt that Kayla’s e-mail hadn’t put them in danger after all and was once again fully concentrated on perfecting their telepathic skills. Kayla kept her mind focused on Mfumbe, and each day her ability to “see” him increased.

  When she closed her eyes and concentrated on an image of his face now, it soon gave way to a picture of him that she suspected showed her what he was doing. Sometimes she saw him in a car, sometimes on the side of a road. Come to me, she said in her mind. I’m waiting for you. Keep coming toward me.

  It took all her strength to contact him. Each time she’d sleep for nearly twelve hours afterward. She was overjoyed each time she felt the deep exhaustion because it proved to her that she’d really made contact. Eutonah encouraged her to sleep outside, “where you can be replenished by earth energy.”

  Kayla was napping outside on the ground one August afternoon. She was right near the end of the forest just below the tree line, where large pines gave way to small ones. A branch snapped. Still caught in sleep, she turned groggily toward the sound. The sun shone in her eyes. Black silhouettes moved toward her.

  She came more fully awake and squinted into the sun. There were about six figures approaching and they were all dressed in the same style of jumpsuit.

  Maybe they’re from another resistance group, she thought, pulling forward to sitting. She repositioned herself out of the sun’s glare where she could see better. Her heart raced and she was suddenly energized by fear. The woman approaching her was Nedra Harris. She sprang to her feet and began to run, legs pumping hard.

  A loud cracking sound exploded in her ear seconds before searing pain exploded her shoulder and shot through her entire body, throwing her to the ground.

  Her shoulder!

  She’d been shot in her shoulder.

  Pressing her forehead to the ground, she waited for a second shot to finish her. But the group raced past, their footsteps pounding in her ears. They were running up toward the building on top of the mountain.

  Then she heard another man approaching from behind. The pain coursing through her body made it impossible to turn. Her entire body tensed as she waited for a final bullet. She pressed her cheek to the cool dirt, shut her eyes, and waited.

  The man put his hand on her waist, but with surprising gentleness. “Oh, my God,” he murmured.

  Opening her eyes, she faced Mfumbe.

  Her mouth opened with words of love and joy at seeing him. All that came out was a rush of air.

  “It’s okay. It’s okay,” he whispered, looking for a way to lift her.

  Shots rang out from the building above them; screams and shouting and more shots. Mfumbe slid his arms under her body and lifted. “Okay?” he asked.

  She nodded, grinding her teeth against the crushing pain.

  Someone in a jumpsuit scrambled down the mountaintop toward them. He held a rifle high. “Stop!” he ordered them.

  “It’s Zekeal,” Mfumbe told her in an undertone as he kept moving slowly backward toward the trees. Kayla guessed he was hoping to disappear into the forest behind them.

  Zekeal called to a suited figure up by the building. “I have them.” He turned back and aimed his gun at them. “Put her down, Mfumbe.”

  “She’s badly hurt,” Mfumbe told him.

  “Put her down and come with me. I’ll send some people down to get her.”

  Kayla tried to object, but her voice was too dry and low for them to hear. She dug her fingers into Mfumbe’s arm and shook her head.

  Mfumbe’s eyes darted between Kayla and Zekeal as he lowered her carefully to the ground. “What happened to you?” he asked Zekeal. “I thought Dave Young was your guy. I thought you were going to stand strong against this.”

  What was Mfumbe doing? Was he really letting Zekeal bring them in? He must think she was so injured it was his only choice. And he was probably right. What else could they do? But it seemed unreal that they had come this far only to be brought in by Tattoo Gen.

  Zekeal kept his rifle trained on Mfumbe. “Shut up,” he replied. “Dave Young is on his way down, just like the rest of you. I tried to help you both, but it’s too late for that now.”

  Up at the building, another gunshot fired. Someone screamed.

  Zekeal glanced up, distracted by the sounds.
In that moment, Mfumbe leaped at him, knocking Zekeal backward. His gun fell, bouncing once and discharging a shot as it hit the ground.

  Kayla recoiled at the sound. This was her chance to escape, but pain had made her helpless, too weak to get up and run.

  The rifle slid toward Kayla, stopping just out of her reach. She stretched toward it and the effort sent searing knifelike pain up her injured arm.

  Zekeal and Mfumbe were locked in their fight, both tumbling over and over toward trees at the edge of the forest. Zekeal landed on top and began to punch Mfumbe, smashing him hard in the face.

  Over them, a half-dead pine creaked in the breeze. A thick pine branch dropped brown needles on the fight below it. Kayla watched the branch dangle dangerously above the two of them.

  She shut her eyes and envisioned the tree branch. With every bit of her remaining strength she saw the branch in all its detail.

  She felt where it was weak, on the verge of splitting. She absorbed that image of weakness, made it a part of her.

  That’s where she focused her own energy.

  Her total energized being aimed itself at that weak spot in the branch — aimed at cracking it. Kayla tossed her head back with the effort of total focus. Her own power coursed through her as she concentrated the entire strength of her being on energy release.

  With her head thrown back, she didn’t see the branch sail through the air, tumbling down through the levels of branches, end over end. But she heard the sickening crunch of bones breaking as it landed.

  Fall came early to the Adirondacks. By the end of September, orange and yellow dotted the mountains and a chill swept through the pines, heightening their smell and making them sway majestically. Kayla was aware of the change as she made her way down the mountainside, holding a letter she hoped would reach Amber.

  She was running slightly behind schedule and quickened her pace. At the bottom of the mountain she still had to make her way along the narrow dirt path that led to the dock on the lake. There, a man in a speedboat would wait to take her letter and the twenty other letters she’d received from resisters in the mountains to their intended destinations.

  He was part of a secret organization called “the postmen” who collected mail and delivered it to other “postmen.” The mail was secretly passed until it reached the person it was intended for. It was a way of avoiding e-mail, which could be so easily tracked by Global-1. They came to the dock once a week, but always at different times. Kayla was the one designated to meet the postman this week and she didn’t want to miss him.

  She thought of Amber, isolated out west, with only her strung-out family and crazy cousin. In the weeks since she and Mfumbe had escaped the Tattoo Gen raid, the resistance groups had scattered, then slowly re-formed and made contact with one another. These days Mfumbe and Kayla lived in an abandoned hunting cabin. Her wound was slowly healing since a doctor from August’s group had removed the bullet, though her shoulder now ached horribly before every rainfall.

  Although they were on their own, Kayla felt part of a caring community in a way she had never experienced in her old neighborhood. People left messages under rocks and communicated in coded imitations of animal calls. Mostly, though, they contacted one another with their minds. Telepathy had become commonplace here in the mountains. There was no need to travel when a face could be mentally conjured and a message received.

  As she hiked, she felt a familiar surge of energy in her mind. Experience had taught her to stop and slow her breathing.

  Eutonah stepped out from behind a thick pine ahead of her. “Hello, my dear friend,” she greeted her.

  “You’re alive,” Kayla said in a voice thick with relief. She hadn’t known what had become of Eutonah after the raid.

  “I’m in a prison that Global-1 operates, but I’m also with you,” Eutonah told her. “My spirit can’t be imprisoned, so I go where I choose.”

  “We have to free you,” Kayla said.

  “David Young is organizing in Washington. We have to support him. It’s time to stop hiding up here in the mountains. He needs our help.”

  Kayla cringed when she heard Eutonah’s words. The idea of returning to the “civilized” world filled her with dread. Back there she’d known death, loneliness, lies, and betrayal. She was happier here than she’d ever been in her entire life. She looked away from Eutonah, trying to get hold of her emotions. She looked back in time to see the woman’s image fade.

  Kayla sat on the rickety narrow dock on a secluded inlet of the lake. She placed a rock on top of her letters to keep them from blowing away and waited for the postman. Sun bounced off the water, shimmering, throwing off glimmering light. She stared into it and the lights dazzled and danced before her eyes …

  They are inside the white city now. A man stands at a podium. She remembers his face from pictures. David Young speaks to the crowd. Thousands of people stand around a long, low pool and listen. She is with Mfumbe. David Young tells the crowd to focus on a world where people move freely. Unafraid. He tells them to envision a world of equality and justice where all are valued, regardless of their genetic code. “We will not use violence to achieve our ends,” he says. “But we can use the strength and energy of our minds to change our world.”

  She and Mfumbe join the crowd to envision this new world. The deeper they go, the tighter she and Mfumbe hold hands, determined to make their vision a reality.

  The sound of the boat’s engine woke her from her vision. She blinked hard to come fully back, then waved to the postman as he cut the engine and let the boat drift up to the dock. “Great day, isn’t it?” he said as she handed him the bundle of letters. He glanced at the letter to Amber right on top. “This one has a long journey ahead of it,” he commented.

  “Amber Thorn is my best friend. All I know is that she’s in Nevada, somewhere outside of Carson City.”

  “I bet this gets to her,” he said. “More than ever before, people are helping us. It’ll keep getting passed along until it reaches someone who knows her. All across the country, people are getting fed up with Global-1 and Loudon Waters.”

  “That’s encouraging,” she said.

  He smiled at her. “Yeah, it is.”

  He started his engine and waved as he headed back across the lake. She returned his wave, then began her hike home to the cabin.

  How could she go back to the regular world? Here in the mountains she’d been able to start sketching again, using burned wood from their fires. She was doing drawings of the wildlife all around and her work was the best she’d ever done. I’ve become myself here, she realized. If she went back, would she be able to hold on to that true self?

  When she returned home two hours later, Mfumbe and August sat outside the cabin, cross-legged, talking. Mfumbe held an open paper on his lap. From the way they kept glancing at it, she assumed they were talking about something written on it. “What’s that?” she asked.

  “Young is calling for a major rally,” August replied. “He wants everyone in the country opposed to the bar code to attend. I don’t see what he’s going to accomplish.”

  “People all over the country are changing,” Mfumbe argued. “Kayla and I barely speak out loud to each other anymore. We use our minds to communicate. I think it’s an evolutionary change that’s happened quickly because the bar code has changed our environment so dramatically that we’ve had to adapt.”

  “I see what you mean. Our group is the same,” August conceded. “We barely speak.”

  “Don’t you see, then?” Mfumbe insisted. “This — what we’re living here — this is the new world, not the Global-1 world. Young has a coalition of senators and other leaders behind him. They’ve laid out a whole package of new laws that would give back all sorts of rights and freedoms, including the freedom to live without the bar code tattooed on your wrist.”

  Kayla listened, thinking — remembering what Eutonah had said about going back, remembering her vision. “Global-1 is going to fight back with all it’s got,�
�� she commented. She thought of the aerial bombing she’d seen in her vision.

  Did they really have to go back to all that misery? She remembered the raid by Tattoo Gen. Global-1 and Tattoo Gen were powerful and ruthless.

  “We call ourselves the resisters,” Mfumbe continued. “But we should really call ourselves the hiders. That’s all we’re doing up here, hiding.”

  August got to his feet. “I disagree with you there,” he said. “We’ve grown strong up here. We know who we are now. Think about what we were, five people in a warehouse, and two of them were spies. Now we’re strong and united.”

  “But we’re hiding,” Mfumbe insisted. “And besides, there are bound to be more raids. We can’t just sit here and wait for them to come for us.”

  “We could go to Canada,” August suggested.

  “We could,” Kayla agreed. But more than anything, she wanted to stay here.

  “I have to go back for supper,” August said. “See you both.”

  When August disappeared into the trees, Mfumbe turned to Kayla. He switched into their wordless telepathic way of communicating mind-to-mind. It happened. I had a vision like the visions you have, Mfumbe told her with his mind. You and I were with lots of people from the mountains and other places. We were heading toward the capital to confront Loudon Waters and Global-1. They attacked us, even fired on us, but we kept going. We were all communicating with our minds and we were unstoppable. Dave Young was holding elections for freely elected people who weren’t controlled by Global-1.

  Kayla grabbed his arm. She was too unnerved by the thought of going back to speak with her mind. “I can’t do it,” she said desperately. “I’ve been so happy here. I was so miserable there.”

  He drew her to him and held her tenderly. “We’ll be together, always together. Now that our minds can touch, nothing can part us.”

  Being parted from him again was one of her fears. Was it true that they could always find each other now? Eutonah had found her. Maybe it was true.