by K. Makansi
“I already have. Their lives were in danger, so I asked one of the men in my command, a man I had just learned was ready to disappear as well, to help them escape.”
“And how did you know this man was ‘ready to disappear’?”
“Look, their lives were in immediate danger. I believed this man could help them. And I know he got them out of the building. That much I’m sure of.”
For several seconds Eli is silent. Then: “So you said you abandoned your airship because you were being tracked. Where did you leave it?”
“We landed close to the river, by that old power plant. We’ve been walking ever since. We thought we’d figured out how to disable any tracking capabilities, but someone in the Sector took control of the airship and started flying us home.” I glance at Jeremiah. “It wasn’t pretty.”
“Yeah. We watched you lose your cloaking and almost run in to a cliff.”
“You saw that?”
“That was when we started tracking you.”
“But we were able to reengage the cloaking.”
“Sure, you were. There’s this little thing called echolocation; you know, acoustic locators, sonar? Once we knew your general vicinity, we were able to follow you pretty easily.”
“So you saw what we were up against. You saw us trying to get control of the airship.”
“Or maybe you’re both just really shitty pilots,” the man with black curls pipes up.
“We’re telling the truth, Eli,” I insist. “Remy and Soren escaped with one of my men. And then we left. Now, we have no idea where they are. All I know is that they’re probably not in the Sector.”
“‘Probably’?”
“Probably. If they’ve been recaptured in the last eighteen hours, they could be back in Okaria. But I doubt that’s happened. I’ve trained with this soldier for the last two years, and I have no doubt he can take care of himself—and Remy and Soren, too. Besides, as much as the Sector will want to find the escaped prisoners, I’m willing to bet my parents are more focused on finding me.” But is that really true? If my mother was willing to kill Remy and Soren because of the information they had, I doubt she’s stopped looking for them just because I’ve disappeared.
Eli’s immobile for a few more minutes. Everyone is looking to him for some sort of decision—everyone, that is, except the man with the mop of black hair, who seems way more preoccupied with Jeremiah. He’s staring at him intently, scrutinizing him, as though trying to place him. Finally he speaks up.
“You related to Zeke Sayyid?” All eyes spin to the black-haired man, and then back to Jeremiah.
“I’m his son.”
“Who’s that?” Jahnu demands.
“He’s with us,” the dark-haired man responds. “Works at Waterloo. We’re from the same factory town. You’re Jeremiah, right?” Jeremiah nods. “You were a TREE scholar?” Miah nods again. I always forget that Jeremiah’s not from the capital—he took to the high-flying city life so easily you’d never know he was originally from a small town. “What’re you tagging along with an Orleán for?”
“He’s my best friend,” Miah says simply, and for some reason that admission makes me so happy I could float into the air on the bubble swelling in my chest. “We left together after we figured out what was going on.”
The black-haired man watches the two of us for a few seconds, and then addresses Jeremiah again:
“You tryin’ to find your dad?”
“I’d like to see him again, but that’s not why I’m here.”
“Well, he’s nary at our base, but we can take you to him,” the man says, and I wonder how Jeremiah managed to lose his country accent so thoroughly.
“We’re not doing anything of the sort until we find Remy and Soren,” Eli snaps at him. The black-haired man shrugs.
“Elijah, if you don’t report to the Director immediately that we’ve found Valerian Orleán running around in the woods, she’s gonna throw your ass in the lake.”
Jeremiah and I keep our mouths shut. I don’t know which option sounds less appealing—being stuck with Eli while he’s on the warpath, or facing down the Resistance’s infamous Director in a few hours.
Eli swears and tells Kenzie to go radio in that they’ve taken me hostage. Kenzie runs off into the woods somewhere, and I wonder if they’ve got an airship in the vicinity. What a surprising turn of events. Despite my best efforts to stay away from the Resistance, Jeremiah was right. Sooner or later, they’d find me. It just turned out to be a lot sooner than I expected.
After a few tense moments, Kenzie comes running back with instructions to return with the hostages immediately. Eli spits and swears at the black-haired man, who looks perfectly unperturbed. He and Eli grab our heavy packs and head through the woods. Jeremiah and I are instructed to follow them, and though I can no longer feel the cold gunmetal pressed against my head, Jahnu and Kenzie are right on our heels. They don’t trust us. I don’t blame them.
Half an hour later, we’re in their airship, a fat, clunky old thing that, from the smell of it, seems to run off of fossil fuel. It still has propellers! Jeremiah mouthed at me as it came into view. But once inside, I realize the ship is powered entirely by a micro fusion generator and that the control panel is almost as sophisticated as the Sarus’s. The propellers must just be for backup—like my dad’s archaic control system.
The black-haired man sits down opposite us. He throws his arm up over the back of the seat and leans back, obviously not nearly as threatened by us as everyone else seems to be.
“What’s your name?” Jeremiah asks.
“Firestone.”
“You worked in Ellas with my father?”
“True enough,” he says simply.
“Did you leave first, or did he?”
“I did. Tried to convince him to come with me, but he wasn’t for it at the time. He was one of the ones who thought about stuff, more than just the average person. I think something finally tipped him over the edge, but he never did tell me what. Just showed up at the Thermopylae base about six months ago.”
“What’s he do for the Resistance?” Jeremiah asks eagerly.
“Firestone,” Eli calls from the front, warningly. “Get up here and fly the damn ship.” Firestone winks at us.
“Guess you’ll just have to find out.”
Their ship isn’t nearly as smooth as the Sarus—maybe because of the drag from the old propellers— but we’re in the air without a hitch after a few minutes. They ignore us for the most part, though Jahnu steps into the holding area for a moment to ask me about his cousin.
“How’s Moriana?” He sits across from us.
“She’s …” I look at Jeremiah. “Well, she’s great. She’s working for Corine. With the OAC.” I know Jahnu won’t be proud of this. True to form, he sighs and looks up at the ceiling.
“We watched the graduation. I heard her placement announcement.” He looks at Jeremiah. “Have I been reading the broadcasts right? Were you going out with her?” Jeremiah looks flustered, which is unlike him. His cheeks are going red, and he’s determinedly ignoring Jahnu’s eyes.
“Yeah.”
“Is she … is she okay? Happy?”
“Yeah, she’s happy. She loves her research.” Jeremiah is now staring intently at a spot on the floor. I know how guilty he feels about leaving her without an explanation.
“Did she know you were leaving?” There’s a long pause before Miah responds.
“We didn’t tell her.” Jahnu nods, and there is a long, awkward silence before he stands to head up to the cockpit where his team members are sitting. Before he rejoins them, though, he turns back to us.
“Comfortable? Hungry? Thirsty?”
“You’re really concerned?” I ask.
“We’re not going to starve you,” he responds, and a pang of guilt throbs through me.
“I could eat.” Jeremiah perks up. “We’ve got Mealpaks in our bags.”
“Really?” A suspicious frown crosses Jahn
u’s face, and I remember Soren’s sneering comments about my ignorance of the Dieticians’ manipulations.
“Yeah, we took as much as we could carry,” Jeremiah responds nonchalantly, though suddenly everyone in the airship is looking at us. “Why? What’s so weird about that?”
But Kenzie and Jahnu have started opening our bags and going through them, pulling out our Mealpaks, opening them and dumping the contents into a compost hatch.
“What are you doing?!” Jeremiah shouts. “We need that!” I should have known they would do this. Soren’s anger should have clued me in to the fact that the Resistance wouldn’t let Sector food anywhere near them. At my side, Jeremiah is panic-stricken, but all I can think is, maybe it’s for the best.
“No, you don’t.” Eli’s voice is cold. “So long as you’re with us you won’t eat anything from the Sector.” He turns to us, unsmiling. “You might even get to find out who you really are after a few days.”
“What’s that supposed to mean?” Jeremiahs demand. Eli ignores him.
“They’ve been manipulating you,” Jahnu explains patiently. “Everything the Dieticians put into the food is designed to control you, to shape your brain and your body into whoever or whatever they want you to be.”
“Sounds pretty damn good to me,” Jeremiah interrupts. “I like that they feed me stuff that makes me better able to do my job. You don’t?”
“Maybe you’re just not naturally as intelligent as I am,” Jahnu responds with a smile, which shuts Jeremiah up for a while.
The rest of the trip passes in tense—and hungry—silence. The strangeness of meeting a group of people in the Wilds who used to be my classmates and friends, now as something like enemies, hangs over us all. I keep catching Jahnu and Kenzie sneaking glances at us, as though looking at an illusion they can’t quite figure out. I don’t mind—it gives me an opportunity to watch them, too. They’ve undoubtedly seen a fair few Sector broadcasts with my face plastered all over the displays, and Jeremiah has probably made an appearance or two as well. But aside from the raid under the cover of night, I haven’t seen any of them in three years.
When we finally touch down, Kenzie and Jahnu tie black kerchiefs around our eyes and then lead off the ship. I try to make use of my other senses while blind—the ground beneath my feet is paved, and the air crisp and moist. We suspect the Resistance base is located somewhere in one of the old world cities, but nothing around me gives any indication as to where the base is within the city. We start to descend, though, and I realize we’re going underground. Of course. They wouldn’t have built their facilities on the surface where our drones would be able to photograph them.
We make a few sharp turns and finally are sat down somewhere. Here the air is stale and recycled. It’s clammy and cold, and I’m sure Miah’s not happy about any of this. He’s claustrophobic. Someone pulls off my blindfold and I open my eyes, expecting to be blinded by bright lights. But the lights here are dim and luminescent, probably to save energy. I blink a few times, refocusing my eyes, and Eli’s face swims before me. I look around and see that I’m in a tiny holding room, and Jeremiah has disappeared.
“Where’s Miah?” I demand.
“You’re being separated so we can corroborate your stories independently.” Eli’s cutting the ties binding my hands behind me. When he’s finished, I rub my wrists together, trying to get rid of the red marks. Eli steps out of the tiny room without another word and closes the door behind him. I can hear a series of locks click into place.
I wait patiently, expecting something to happen soon. Surely they’ll want to talk to me immediately, right? I steel myself for the impending interrogation, and my mind flits anxiously back to the condition that Remy and Soren were in when I first saw them in the capital. I can only hope I won’t meet a similar fate. Karmic retribution, I think bitterly.
But even after half an hour, nothing has happened. I lie down on the wooden bench in the small room and try to relax. I’m expecting someone to walk in the door at any minute. But still no one does.
I realize it’s entirely possible they have more important things to do than talk to me immediately. After all, they’re a small group of people. Just because Valerian Orleán walks into their midst, I shouldn’t expect them to drop everything to hear my story or exact their revenge. Somehow that calms me.
With that in mind, I quickly relax and drop off into a light sleep.
****
Some time later, the sound of the metal locks clicking in the door wakes me. I stir and sit up, my spine stiff and sore from sleeping on the rough wooden bench. The door creaks open and Eli stares at me, incredulously, as I rub my eyes.
“Were you sleeping?” he asks.
“Maybe,” I respond defensively.
“Doctor Rhinehouse wants to talk to you.” He ties the kerchief around my eyes again and everything goes black. He walks me out blindly through the stuffy corridors and dumps me in a chair. This time when the blindfold is removed, bright purple lights shine down at me, the rays stabbing into my eyes, and for a moment I am almost as blind as I was before. After my pupils adjust, I see an old man with an eye patch sitting on the other side of the table, watching me cautiously. His face looks more like it is covered by a thick protective bark, rough and creased, than by skin. Only the slate-colored beard stubble and the glistening, attentive eye give him away as human rather than tree.
“Good evening, Valerian,” he says, somewhat cordially. “Eli—out.” Eli turns on his heel and stalks out, slamming the door behind him. He always did have a problem with authority. I’m sure he doesn’t like responding to Rhinehouse’s commands any more than I did to Aulion’s.
“Dr. Rhinehouse,” I nod in his direction. “Pleasure to finally meet you. Is Jeremiah all right?”
He stares at me stonily. “You’re not in a position to be asking questions like that, Valerian.”
“You can do whatever you want to me, but Jeremiah’s here in good faith. Is he okay?”
“He’s fine.” Rhinehouse’s good eye is deadly focused on me. “Firestone is feeding him some soup. He said he was hungry.” There’s a note of humor in his voice, but his face is blank, unsmiling, neutral.
“He’s always hungry, so I hope you have a lot of soup.” I was hoping for a trace of a smile, but the scowl doesn’t change.
“The Director wants to talk to you, but I told her I didn’t think you were trustworthy. Tell me why I’m wrong.” It’s a challenge.
“Because Remy and Soren are out in the Wilds somewhere, free, at my command.” Rhinehouse stares at me, expressionless. When he doesn’t speak, I continue. “Three nights ago, I overheard my mother command a soldier in my employ to kill Remy and Soren. When I confronted him, I discovered he had no intention of carrying out her orders. I asked him to help them escape. After that, I knew I couldn’t stay.”
“Tell me why Corine did this. And why that prompted such a sudden change of heart.”
I briefly explain, as simply as possible, what Remy told me during the interrogation about Tai’s death, and how I hacked into my mother’s computer to find out if what she said was true. I tell him about the conversation I overheard between my mother and Chan-Yu, and explain how I dashed back to Sector Headquarters only to find him preparing to spring them free anyway. I don’t mention my conversation with my parents. I tell him only that when I told Jeremiah the whole story, we agreed we couldn’t stay and decided to leave under the cover of the Solstice Celebration.
“And yet last night, for all the world to see, you were so eager to espouse the virtues of the Sector,” he states calmly.
“It’s easy to do when you’re not planning on sticking around.”
When I fall silent, he finally looks away, dropping his one-eyed gaze from my face. The room is so still I can hear him breathe. Finally, after several moments of heavy silence, he says, without looking at me:
“I would think your story was an elaborate construction if not for the fact that it’s so similar
to my own.” He stops here and takes in a laborious breath. “Your very identity makes it hard to believe you, but the transformation you claim to have undergone is the same one that brought everyone in the Resistance here.” There is a brief silence. He looks up at me as though contemplating a chess board. Maybe this is a game of chess to him, and I am a knight or a bishop, and he’s trying to decide where to move me. The game is made more complicated by the fact that I could be playing for either black or white, and he has to guess which side I take orders from.
“You say Remy and Soren are out of the Sector’s hands.” He raps his knuckles on the table in front of him. “But you don’t have any idea where they are?”
“Not a clue. I couldn’t have gotten personally involved without drawing attention to their escape. I left them in Chan-Yu’s hands.”
“And you trust this Chan-Yu?”
“I didn’t really have a choice.”
“That’s not helpful, Vale.”
“I would have trusted him with my own life. More helpful, now?”
“Maybe if you kept your sarcasm to yourself,” he snaps. I drop my eyes. I probably deserved that.
“Sorry.” There’s another pause as we both stare across the table, sizing each other up.
“So, do you know why your mother wanted to kill Remy and Soren?”
“She said they had some information that was a threat to the Sector. Something that could destroy the Sector and the OAC. I don’t see how anything could be so dangerous that it was worth murder.”
Rhinehouse muses over this for a minute. “Yes, we have that in common, Vale,” he says, almost absentmindedly. “I think I know what Corine was referring to, but how did Remy and Soren find the solution?” I can’t tell if he’s posing me the question or talking to himself.
Just then, the lights flicker overhead, and a red light in the corner of the room starts flashing.
“Orange alert. Orange alert. Sector airship detected entering radar space. Prepare for possible conflict. Raid teams on high alert.”
“Damn it,” Rhinehouse swears at me, slamming his fist down on the table. “Did you lead them here?” he shouts. On the defensive, I throw my hands up, palms out.
