by Natalie Reid
Jessie was only a few houses away from them when someone called her name. Her shoulders fell, and she glanced behind her to see who it was. The front door of the largest house on the street was opening, and Jason was hurrying out towards her.
“Did you sleep well?” he asked, smiling expectantly.
She could see that he was proud of his city and wanted her to share in the same respect that he held for it. She figured that her best way of maintaining relations with him was to let him believe she loved his city as well. If she appeared to enjoy her time with them, then they would trust her more.
“Best sleep I’ve had in a long time,” she answered.
“You just…taking a walk?” he asked, motioning up the street with a wave of his finger.
She turned away from him to look up the street once more. Ritter’s daughter was now facing them. She had probably heard Jason calling Jessie’s name, and now seemed fixed on watching their interaction.
“Do you have many children down here?” she asked.
He followed her gaze and then glanced back at her, as if trying to gage her intentions. No doubt Jason considered Ritter’s daughter a very precious asset to the Resistance, even if she wasn’t their prisoner. Anyone showing curiosity in her might raise a red flag. Before he could get suspicious, Jessie drew her hand inside her pocket and pulled out Ben’s drawing of the finch. She told him of her friendship with Ben, and of how Task Force used it to get what they wanted.
“They knew exactly how to manipulate me,” she confessed. “They knew I would lose it once they terminated him. And I gave them all the evidence they needed to declare me a Bandit.”
Her eyes stared blankly forward, and Jason’s hand fell on her shoulder.
“I know what it feels like to be pushed around by the government. All of us down here are striving to reach a day when people like Ward can no longer pull our strings and yank us around like we’re puppets.”
Somehow this shared experience must have endeared her in some small way, for he motioned over to Ritter’s daughter and began to explain about the children of Aero City. There weren’t many of them, he said. They didn’t even have enough to form a school. But their parents and guardians made sure to act as their teachers, educating them several hours a day. Some had come down with their families to get away from the government, and a few were strays that they had taken in. However, his eyes darkened as he added that a handful of the kids needed to be separated from their families, for their quality of life up in Aero City was appalling.
“Take little Nel over there,” he said, gesturing to Ritter’s daughter. “She was brought down here soon after she evolved. She was saved from what would have been a very hard life, but I’m pleased to say, has been happy ever since she came here.”
Nel, who had by now realized that they were both staring at her, raised her hand and waved to them, hoping to be called over. However, Jason turned his eyes away and angled his body in front of Jessie.
“I can introduce you to the children of Bunker City some other time. Right now we need to get over to our Operation’s Building. Something happened overnight, and we need to move quickly to understand it.”
Jason led her briskly away from the neighborhood and steered them towards the front of the city, to the building she had seen him and Benny enter the night before. When they stepped inside, she found that the place was covered in computer screens. It was hard to tell that this was a room deep underground in a cave. It looked like a room that could be found inside of Task Force or even BLES.
There were a few people already inside, waiting for them. Benny was one of them. He was sitting at a table in the center of the room, tapping a finger on the metal surface. He immediately rose to his feet when Jason entered. A young man stood in the corner of the room near the door, as if attempting invisibility. He wore a knit cap close to his eyes and had a thick line of freckles over the bridge of his nose. At the far end of the room, a young woman typed into a computer. She had short blonde hair that fell just below her chin, and cool, clear blue eyes. When Jason gave the introductions, she learned that this girl was the Teresa that Benny had mentioned last night, and that the man with the knit cap was called Red.
Scanning the room, she noticed that a rather large, black object was mixed in with their computers. It was a metal box with a series of clear protruding domes that looked as if they had lit up at one point. There was nothing terribly remarkable about the box, only that the members in the room seemed to treat it with a sort of disgusted respect, like it was once the cherished possession of someone they hated.
The woman named Teresa caught her staring at the box and asked, “Are you sure we can trust her so soon?”
She hadn’t directed the question at anybody, but it was silently understood that she was speaking to Jason.
“Well she can’t exactly run and go tell Task Force where we are,” he commented, the lines of humor playing at his mouth. Then, growing more serious, he added, “And, with everything that’s going on, and everything she can do for us, we don’t really have the luxury of doubting her.”
Teresa nodded, and moved to stand next to Jason. Jessie caught the slight movement of her hand brushing over his, before returning to the surface of the table. For a moment, Jessie had a vision of long fingers running through messy brown hair, but she immediately cleared her mind of it.
“Chance,” Jason said, addressing her. “You were there the day of our attack on Division Bank. You saw the smoke, the explosion…”
“Don’t forget the fireworks,” Red added.
“…And the carefully crafted fireworks,” he said, with a motion to the young man in the corner. “But what you didn’t see was this.” He walked over to the black box and stood behind it. “This was the reason we did it. To get this little black box from the top of Division Bank and take a peek inside. However, until last night, we were unable to learn anything from it, let alone what it even does.”
Jessie remained silent, figuring they would continue with their explanation without having to ask questions.
“That’s when I realized,” Teresa spoke up, “that we were looking at this box the wrong way. We thought it was a means of filming the city and sending that information back somewhere. But it wasn’t. Whatever this thing does, it doesn’t transmit data; it receives it.”
“So do four other buildings in the business sector,” Red pointed out. “But the only information we’ve been able to get out of it is a short series of numbers.” He pointed over to a computer screen in the corner that displayed the number sequence. “The question is,” Red continued, “why are these numbers so important, and where are they coming from if not from the five most powerful buildings in Aero City? I mean, are they really just shooting this code back and forth between buildings a few blocks away from each other?”
Teresa shook her head. “The range capacity would be vastly under-used if that was the case. This thing was designed to receive transmissions from a great distance away, not just a few blocks down the street. I think they’re receiving messages from outside the city.”
“Which would be huge,” Red asserted, waving his arms. “If that was the case, it would mean that either Ward has some sort of separate colonization or base he’s running, or…there are more people out there.”
The room was silent as they considered the possibility.
“I’m sorry,” Jessie said, breaking their quiet reverie. “Why are you telling me this? I don’t see what good I can do.”
“My thoughts exactly,” Teresa muttered.
“Technically this has nothing to do with you,” Jason explained, placing his palms on the table and looming over her a little. “But it’s a piece of information I feel you should know if you’re going to help us find and rescue The Thirty.” He took his hands from the table and stood up straight. “I’m placing you on a reconnaissance detail. It’s headed by the man you’re rooming with.”
Jessie felt a sinking feeling in the pit of her stomach. She clasped he
r hands in front of her, saying, “I should warn you, he and I don’t exactly get along.”
From behind her, Red gave out a short laugh. Jason shot him a glare to silence him, and then stared down sternly at Jessie.
“It’s not your job to get along with him. While you’re here in Bunker City, you’ll earn your keep, and this is how I say you’ll do it. We don’t give anyone free rides here. Now there’s too much hype going on about you up in the city, so we’ll keep you down here for a few days until it dies down a little.”
Her head shot up at that. A few days? She couldn’t stay underground for that long. She needed to get to Ritter’s bird by tomorrow night, otherwise Tom would be in danger. Though he had hurt her bitterly in lying to her, she couldn’t deny that she would still give her life if it meant saving him. She would just have to find some way to sneak out.
“What am I supposed to do until then?” she asked.
Jason flicked his head to the boy in the cap. “You can work in the junkyard with Red.”
She glanced behind her at the young man who immediately cleared his throat and tugged down at the beanie on his head. She was quiet for a moment before addressing Jason.
“It’s seems to me you’re saying find The Thirty or get kicked out.”
“Like I said, you have to earn your keep.”
“Yeah, well I think I’m getting a bit more ‘keep’ than I bargained for.”
“It’s not just a job,” he said with an angry shake of his head. “Thirty people will be saved. They’ll be forever grateful to you.” He paused before adding, “I will be forever grateful to you.”
Teresa glanced over at him when he said this, her eyes wrinkling at the edges. It was obvious to Jessie that the young woman was feeling a bit jealous, and that certainly wasn’t incentive to jump into this thing anymore. But if this was what they wanted her to do, she might be able to play along for a little while until she figured her head around the situation with Nel.
Jessie stood up finally and offered her hand to him, saying, “I can’t guarantee results, but I can promise you’ll get the best from me. Consider me part of the team.”
With her on board, Jason began ordering people to their different jobs, and Jessie soon found herself exiting the room with Red. He looked excited as he led her to a part of Bunker City she hadn’t been to before. In fact, they started away from the city, on a road that led towards another tunnel. This tunnel was lit up by strips of purple light, and the end was visible a few yards up ahead.
As they were walking through the corridor, heading towards the brighter light and open space at the end, Red blurted out, “I heard that you died.”
She glanced over at him, and he quickly looked down at his shoes and turned red in the purple light.
“Are you afraid of dying?” she asked. Her voice came out friendly, without a hint of reproach at him for mentioning such a delicate subject so abruptly.
Instead of answering her, he took her response as permission to continue on with his line of questioning. “What was it like? Did you know you had died?”
“Well,” she began, scratching a spot on her head, “After I had a two inch hole blasted into my chest, I didn’t really take the time to say, Hey, I’m probably dead now.”
“But you remember getting hit?”
She shook her head. “Quite honestly, I don’t know what I remember. It was bright; I remember that. And I think…”
She stopped, and Red ceased walking as well to look back at her. In the new light, she was able to see the pattern on his hat. The base knit was a dark blue, like the night sky, and within it were a handful of white stars. What caught her attention was the way in which the stars were stitched. Instead of the normal five pointed star, these were done with four small lines intersecting in the middle. The only other place she had seen this was on the Sakana her mother left her. It had been a long time since she had thought about her mother’s message, her invitation to discover the secrets of the Aero Complex, and that strange, short phrase written on the bottom. Which night?
“Yeah…?” Red prodded her.
She shook her head and gave him a casual smile to let him know she was changing the conversation. “Hey, where did you get your hat?”
He reached a protective hand up to it, flattening it firmly against his head. “I found it at an Expedition Depot when I still lived up top.”
She nodded. “Are those stars on it?”
“Think so.” He eyed her curiously, wondering what she was getting at.
“Has anyone ever asked you the question: which night?”
He blinked in confusion and straightened his hat once more. “No. That isn’t much of a question, though. You’d at least need some sort of background context to answer it. I mean, you can’t—”
“It was just a question,” she cut in, continuing down the tunnel. “Someone asked it to me once. I was only wondering if you had heard it as well.”
When they reached the end of the tunnel, they entered what looked to be a yard full of scrap metal and junk. Amid the rubble, she could make out a few discernible objects. A few of them resembled cars, others large appliances, and off to the side, cleared away from the rest of the junk, was the makings of a large bunker. Red explained that it was supposed to protect the people of Bunker City in case of an earthquake and possible cave collapse. However, his progress was slow because he needed to build it off of the irregular shaped metal scraps they had on hand.
They walked over to one of the objects that looked like a car, and Red suggested that they pry the door loose to use it as fortification for the bunker’s roof. Jessie reached out and tested the car’s handle, but found it locked.
“Ah, no problem,” Red said, crouching down in front of the door. He stuck his hand in his pocket and took out an ID card. There was a scanner underneath the handle, and with one swipe of the card, the door clicked open.
“How’d you do that?” Jessie asked.
He smirked. “One of the few benefits of Task Force ambition. An agent’s ID will open up just about any lock in the city. The sergeant’s cards will open up more, but theirs are trickier to duplicate. Still…” He flicked the card up and down on his palm in pride. “Kinda makes you think of picking up burglarism as a career.”
He handed her the card, and she turned it over in her hands. “I’m impressed,” she said with a smile. The card looked just like anyone else’s, except there was no name up at the top.
She tried to give it back to him, but he shook his head. “I can make another one. Why don’t you keep that?” He closed her fingers around the thin card. “You never know when it could save your life.”
Chapter 8
The Harebell
It was a little before dinner when Jessie finally gave up on Red’s bunker for the day. Red had quit an hour before, complaining of a simultaneous headache and toe-ache, and she had been glad of the silence that his absence offered. She was walking back through the tunnel, downing her fifth bottle of water, when she heard something echoing through the cave walls.
Music.
She closed her eyes and listened harder. Someone was playing the piano. Her mother used to play her piano music from her tablet, and on a few rare occasions, a pilot would also blast a piano song out in the hangar before they were due to take off. To her, the piano seemed like such a melancholy instrument, especially now as she was hearing it resonating off the cave walls and spiraling around in this forgotten city.
Exiting the cave, she looked out to Bunker City. It didn’t seem as if the music was coming from there. She turned her head to the right. It was a little louder in that direction. Walking along the cave wall, she used the drifting music as a guide. At some points the melody from the piano was so light that it was nearly lost in the air, and at others the music felt so loud that she was sure all of Aero City could hear it on their way home from work, filling up empty apartments and charging the air with a sense of emotion that could compel every person to look up and sto
p like she had.
Up ahead, she found another tunnel leading away from the city. The purple light that filled this one felt less like a light of practical purpose, and more like a light of somber sympathy. These lights weren’t there to illuminate, they were there to comfort. As she walked down the tunnel, the music grew louder and louder. When she came to the end, she found a smaller cave than the one Bunker City was located in, but by no means less magnificent.
This cave was still large enough that several buildings could have comfortably fit inside. But the shape of it was what was really spectacular. It had a rim going around its perimeter, and from there the floor dropped, sloping down to the bottom. The roof of the cave was a dome with more purple lights hanging down from the ceiling. These were smaller and less clustered than the ones over Bunker City, looking more like the natural pattern of stars.
At the top and center of it all was a grand piano. She had only ever seen pictures of them before. She knew people on the west end probably had them brought in from expedition trips. The fact that the Resistance managed to bring one all the way down here was just another display of their cunning.
Trying not to make any noise, she began to follow the path on the high ridge over to the piano. When she had reached far enough around the curve of the cave, she saw who it was that was playing. Her long dark hair hung down her back, swaying just above the bench, and her unwavering blue eyes stared at a spot in the distance. Nel seemed almost in a trance as she played, giving the impression that, if Jessie were to stop her now, she would wake up and never have remembered playing.
When she drew closer, she realized that there was something different about Nel’s eyes. She had barely noticed it in her picture, but now she saw. They were a strange shade of blue, clouded over by a silver film almost. It reminded her of Ual’s eyes. They had been the same way. He had once admitted to her that it was because his Protector had gone too often for drinks at Mercury’s while he was still a Potentian. The silver cloud of lost youth, he had called it.
