He nodded and thought about this for a moment. “I’m sure it wasn’t as bad as they made it out to be.”
“A little girl died. She starved, or maybe she was just malnourished. Either way, people blamed the Project. That’s why they started protesting.”
Jared looked at her, head tilted to one side. “That wasn’t in the news.”
“A lot of things aren’t in the news.” They walked in silence for a few more minutes before she dared to say the thing she’d been thinking ever since Mei died. “Maybe the radicals are right in trying to get away from all this. We control so much of their lives, and then when something bad happens, we try to erase it.” She thought of something Tripp had said, his reasons for leaving the Project. Too many lies. Too many secrets. Open your eyes.
“If we control them, it’s only to keep them safe,” Jared said. “Before the war, there wasn’t enough control, and look what happened. Our grandparents and great-grandparents nearly destroyed the world.”
“It just seems excessive sometimes. Ryku asked me to kill those radicals, but they didn’t even seem like a real threat. Not like Feng or Li or even the ones we saw at the factory. They were just trying to survive. Two of them were just kids.”
“The kids weren’t supposed to be there.”
“Yeah, but why were any of them targets at all?”
Jared stopped walking and gently pulled her around to face him. His eyes darted across hers, trying to understand. “Where is all of this coming from?”
“I don’t know.” She shook her head. “Never mind. Just forget about it.”
She didn’t mention her doubts to him any more after that. Instead, she made an effort to open up to Dr. James during their bi-weekly meetings. The man was surprisingly helpful, though Zira would never admit that to him. They talked about Zira’s frustrations over her slow recovery, and eventually, about Mei’s death. It was a sort of test Zira had devised to determine how much she could really confide in him. He’d done well so far, and though she still wasn’t sure she could trust him completely, she decided it was time to tell him what was troubling her most.
She blurted it out one afternoon like a lighting strike, sudden and sharp. “I don’t trust the PEACE Project anymore.”
Dr. James hadn’t even settled into his chair yet. He paused, then sat down and adjusted his tie. Zira backed up to the day she’d received her assignment to kill the radicals. She wasn’t sure how much he knew already, but she told him everything. He listened in silence, not even bothering to jot notes on his CL as he usually did. When Zira had finished, he just said, “That’s quite a story.”
“It’s not just a story.”
“I know; sorry. But you do realize the seriousness of your accusations, don’t you? The PEACE Project can’t be trusted. Chairman Ryku sent you to kill people who weren’t really a threat. Unit C’s mismanagement of the distribution center caused a child to starve to death. Unit P opened fire on a group of unarmed civilians. It all goes against everything the Project is supposed to stand for.”
“I know. That’s why it bothers me so much.”
“Have you talked to anyone else about this? Besides Jared?”
“No. Just him, and now you.”
“From what I understand, Jared is close to the Chairman.”
“He is.”
“And you haven’t told Ryku any of this?” Zira shook her head, and Dr. James leaned forward with his elbows on his knees. “If I were you, I would talk to Ryku before he hears about this from someone else.”
Sensing a threat, Zira glared at him. “What about that client confidentiality you’re always talking about?”
Dr. James shook his head. “I promise you, he won’t hear it from me. But one thing I’ve learned about chairmen’s dogs over the years is that they’re always more loyal to their masters than they are to anything else.”
Zira clenched her fists. “Jared wouldn’t say anything. He loves me.”
“That may be, but if it came down to duty or love, do you know which one would he choose?”
As much as Zira wanted to say that nothing would make Jared betray her trust, she couldn’t. He was ambitious. That was how he’d earned so much of Ryku’s esteem in the first place. She didn’t think he would tell the chairman anything without being prompted, but she suspected that Ryku didn’t fully trust her. If he wanted information about her, Jared would be the obvious first choice for questioning.
“Zira,” Dr. James said, “I’m only here to try and help you see all of your options. I can’t make the choice for you, and I can’t pretend to know Jared any better than you do. But Ryku is a dangerous man. He doesn’t like secrets and half-truths from his people. Just think about what I said. If you won’t confront him to protect yourself, at least do it so you can move on with your life. You’ve been through hell, and you deserve an answer. You’ll always wonder if you don’t ask.”
Zira sighed. She hated the idea of confronting Ryku about the Project’s questionable methods. There was no way to say it without it sounding like an accusation. But Dr. James was right; she wasn’t getting anywhere by keeping her doubts bottled up inside. “Thanks for the advice.”
He shook her hand as she stood up to leave. “You’re welcome. I’ll see you next week.”
She walked out of the building and, before she could talk herself out of it, went straight to Chairman Ryku’s office. He didn’t answer right away. She almost lost her nerve and left, but forced herself to knock again. Ryku opened the door, looking mildly surprised to see her. “Zira—to what do I owe the pleasure?”
She had never hated his stiff formalities and false politeness more than she did now. “I need to talk to you about something.”
“Unfortunately, I’m rather busy right now. Can it wait until tomorrow?”
Zira almost agreed to the suggestion, but she would only be doing so out of fear, and she wasn’t about to let her fear control her actions any more than it already had. “It’s important.”
Ryku’s frown deepened. “Very well, then. Come in.” He led the way in to his office and gestured to the couch, but Zira stood firmly in front of him. “Well, what is it?”
“I wanted to talk to you about what happened in Grayridge,” Zira said.
Something like a smile crossed Ryku’s face for a moment. “I was wondering when you might get around to this. I knew you must have seen things there that raised some questions.”
It was uncanny, sometimes, just how much the chairman seemed to know. Zira felt a chill in her spine, and a muscle in her face twitched. She didn’t dare ask him about the food shortages or why unit P had put down the protests so forcibly. It would be too accusatory, bordering on treasonous, and Ryku would just tell her it was none of her concern how the other units chose to handle their responsibilities. She could ask him about her targets, though—the reason all of this had happened to her in the first place. “You sent me to kill three people over there. Radicals, we call them. People who oppose what the Project’s doing.”
“Yes.” Ryku looked at Zira in a way that reminded her of a tiger she’d seen on an old educational program as a child. Predatory. Dangerous.
She chose her next words carefully. “They didn’t really seem like a threat. I guess I just don’t understand why you wanted me to kill them.”
“You don’t trust my judgment.”
Zira didn’t respond, afraid that any misstep would push her further into some kind of trap.
Ryku crossed his arms. “Zira, I am the chairman of this unit, which means I have access to information the rest of you do not. What you know about a target is not the same as what I know, and I disclose information to you at my own discretion. It’s not your place to question my authority or your orders. You do what you’re told—that’s it.”
A surge of hot anger replaced Zira’s fear. It flew out of her mouth before she had time to curb it. “That’s not good enough! You have no idea what I lost on that assignment. I almost died, and I want to kn
ow what for. You owe me an explanation.”
“I owe you nothing,” Ryku hissed, drawing himself up to his full height. For an instant, Zira saw the formidable young operative he must have been years before. She’d never felt smaller in her life, but she held her ground. She wouldn’t leave until she had answers.
Ryku waited a few seconds before speaking again, searching her face for something, perhaps some sign of weakness. Zira refused to give him any such sign. “Since you asked,” he said, all traces of anger vanishing from his voice, “and since the matter is obviously important to you, I’ll tell you. It’s true that the radicals you failed to kill were not as dangerous as most of our targets. Some might even call them innocent. However, their very existence undermines everything this Project stands for. They oppose our laws and refuse to contribute to society, yet they expect the Project to give them the rights and resources they’re not entitled to. One or two or even a dozen of them might not be a threat, but a hundred or a thousand could cause significant damage to everything we’ve worked so hard to build. If they had their way, this country would dissolve into complete anarchy. They’re as much a threat to our peace and security as any other target you’ve eliminated.”
Zira could hardly believe what she was hearing. She had expected the chairman to produce evidence that showed the radicals were planning some kind of attack on the Project or trying to recruit the masses to their cause and start a rebellion. Instead, he was admitting that he’d orchestrated their deaths not because they were a threat, but because they had the mere potential to become one.
“Not what you were hoping to hear, is it?” Ryku asked.
“Not what I was expecting,” she said. “Not after all the years we spent learning that a life should only be taken as a last resort, when the person would harm others if they were allowed to live.”
“But they would have harmed others,” Ryku said. “Perhaps not directly, but their extremist ideas might have become a problem had they been allowed to spread.”
“And they deserved to die for that?”
Ryku sighed and rubbed a hand over his eyes. He spoke with the tone of an adult explaining a difficult truth to a young child, condescending, impatient. “I know this is hard for you to understand, Zira. You’re young, and you have a lot to learn and experience before you can begin to see the world clearly. Things aren’t always black and white. Sometimes the choices we have to make seem wrong, but in the long run, they are the only right choice.”
Nothing Ryku was saying convinced her that his decisions had been any less wrong, and his patronizing tone only upset her even more. “You could have just had the E-1s arrest them.”
He shook his head. “It’s not that simple. I’m not happy with all of the choices I have to make as the chairman of this unit, but they are my choices. At the end of the day, I can hold my head high knowing I made the best possible decision that I could for the peace and safety of this country. I hope you can understand that.”
Zira swallowed her anger, realizing how unwise it would be to let Ryku see her true emotions. She tried to pretend that she accepted what he was telling her, but she would never understand how a person could justify taking a life on those terms. With a dry throat and a heart made of lead, she thanked the chairman for his time and walked out of the office.
She had almost reached her apartment when Jared put his hands on her shoulders from behind. “There you are,” he said. “I’ve been looking for you.” Zira didn’t respond; she was in no mood for company. Jared took her hand gently and asked, “What’s the matter?”
“Nothing,” Zira said. She managed a small smile and kept walking.
“It’s a beautiful day, and I’m free the rest of the afternoon. I was thinking we could go for a hike.”
Zira shook her head. “Maybe another day.”
She wished he would just go. She couldn’t talk to him about this even if she had wanted to. Dr. James had been right when he’d suggested that Jared’s first loyalty was to Chairman Ryku and his unit, not to her. The truth of it irritated her so much that she could hardly tolerate his presence right now.
Jared didn’t say anything else until they had reached Zira’s apartment. “What’s wrong?”
“I’m just tired, I guess.”
“That’s a lie.”
Zira flung the door open and stepped inside, whirling around to block him from following her. “Just let it go! I’m fine.”
“Sure had me fooled,” he muttered.
Zira slammed the door and flung herself on the couch. She shouldn’t have been so snappy with him. None of this was his fault, but he worked so closely with Ryku these days that it was hard to separate Jared her friend from Jared the chairman’s dog. It felt like a betrayal somehow, though Jared hadn’t really done anything wrong. If anything, she was the one who was wrong here. Hot tears pricked at her eyes, but she blinked them away before they could fall. Nothing made sense anymore, and she tossed and turned for hours that night, trying—and failing—to make sense of everything Ryku had told her.
CHAPTER TWENTY-ONE
Jared had an assignment, and Zira didn’t have the opportunity to talk to him again before he left. Aubreigh was also gone, but Zira knew she couldn’t tell her friend any of this even if she’d been around. Instead, she confided in Dr. James once more.
“Did you talk to Chairman Ryku?” he asked at their next meeting.
Zira told him about their conversation and what she had learned. She was still so conflicted about everything that her head spun just thinking about it. She hated that she felt this way. She had killed people before and never had any major qualms about it. In many ways, Ryku’s justification for targeting radicals even made sense. “Do you think he’s right?” she asked Dr. James. “Maybe I’m just being too sensitive about it.”
“A moral question,” he said. “Which of course means that there are countless answers, and none of them are completely right or wrong. I understand his reasoning, but I can also understand your misgivings about it. It might take some time for you to come to terms with what you’ve learned. The important thing is that at least you’ve put it out in the open. That’s a good start.”
“I guess so.”
“You don’t sound very relieved.”
“I’m just confused.” All this time, she had believed that she and her fellow operatives were doing the right thing. It was awful and harsh, and as Ryku had said, things weren’t always black and white. But ultimately, they were doing the right thing. They were protecting people, preventing catastrophe before it happened. Maybe that was still true, and she just needed to shift her focus in order to see it. But it seemed that every time she tried, she remembered the look in Mei’s eyes when she’d returned to the house after killing Hartman, when she’d shot that officer in the Grayridge protest.
“Confusion is a natural response,” said Dr. James, “but you need to ask yourself if you’re prepared to accept what you’ve learned. Can you live with it?”
Zira let out a short, humorless laugh. “Of course I can. What other choice do I have?”
“There’s always a choice, Zira.”
As much as she would have liked to believe him, she couldn’t. She had nothing else but the PEACE Project. She couldn’t run from it, couldn’t simply choose another life. Once you were in the Project, you were in it for life. The walls of the compound had been built to keep people in as much as they were intended to keep people out. The few who had dared to desert the Project over the years had been hunted down and captured or killed by members of units E-1 and E-2. Even Tripp, who’d managed to survive fifteen years on the outside, would spend his entire life on the run, wondering when Ryku’s assassins would finally catch up to him. Unless she wanted to share that fate, Zira had about as much choice in the matter as she’d had to be born with blonde hair.
Aubreigh came home later that week. They were eating lunch together in the cafeteria when she said, “Seth’s been looking for you. He was trying to talk
to me this morning about what you’d been doing when you, well, you know, died.”
“What did you tell him?”
“Nothing,” Aubreigh said. “Actually, I told him to shove off and mind his own business. It’s not like I could tell him anything even if I wanted to. I barely know anything myself.”
“Aubreigh, I’m sorry. You know I can’t—”
She waved a hand. “No, no. I get it—really. Besides, I’m not sure I want to know anymore.” She looked past Zira and jerked her chin forward. “Speak of the devil.”
Seth plunked his lunch tray on the table next to Zira before she had time to make a hasty retreat. “Hello,” he said cheerfully.
Zira said nothing. Aubreigh smiled at Seth, but it was perhaps a less friendly smile than it might have been a few months ago.
“How have you been, Zira?” Seth asked. “I heard you’ve been training with some of the E-2 recruits since you’ve been back.”
“I’m fine,” she said.
“Good. You’re adjusting back to life here?”
“Yes.”
“Glad to hear it. Look, I’ve really been wanting to talk to you about what happened while you were gone. I know you’re busy, but it would mean a lot to me if you could just give me a few minutes.”
“Why do you think it’s any of your business what happened to me?”
“I’m just doing my job. Investigating. The whole thing was a little suspicious. Did you know there was some kind of explosion in the North Pacific Region around the same time you were pronounced dead? It happened in the same area, too.”
“You don’t know where I was. You don’t know anything.”
A clever smile spread across Seth’s lips, and Zira realized too late that by reacting so defensively, she’d given him the information he wanted. “Your chairman abandoned you over there. He barely even bothered with a search party, and he certainly didn’t try to recover your body for the funeral.”
“Shut up, Seth!” said Aubreigh.
Secrets of PEACE Page 18
