“Wow! Really, that’s impressive,” Cy beams. “Are you sure you’ve never shot before?” I look the part dressed in hunter’s camouflage. More items that Crewe and Cy have mustered together while off-duty during their years of seeking. Surprisingly, I shot about eight for ten. I don’t let on that my arm is tired, that my shoulder is bruised, and that my recently operated-on wrists are screaming with pain.
“Come on, you know the laws on weaponry,” I play. I’ve never even seen a gun in person before.
“I don’t take you for much of a rule follower, knife bearer.” By no fault of Cy’s, I’m feeling unsettled again. His remark reminds me that he and his brother have been watching me for years. They’ve also been through the contents of my pack. I keep teetering between hatred toward the both of them for their invasiveness and for creating our current situation and admiration for what they’re doing. As the seeksmen and their doctoral team see it, they’re using whatever means they can to rescue confined souls and bring them to true freedom in Sheridan.
Cy, for one, clearly means well, and I accept him more readily, probably simply because it wasn’t his arms that first arrested me. Also, although I have no need to, I do feel a little sorry for kicking the overly-friendly Cy square in the face.
Crewe on the other hand, I have less sympathy for. I see him as my abductor and the facilitator of my untimely separation from my sister. He abrasively accused me of being a spy while his neighborly brother kindly tried to help me figure out who I was. Even now, Cy stands at my side, teaching and praising me as I prepare to shoot dead any threat to my sister, should she emerge from Miles tonight.
The leader of this mission, Crewe, stands aloof and takes no notice of us. He tenses with frustration for every soup can that he misses. I notice that his cans are scattered with more distance than Cy’s, but still he angers over any missed target. His arm doesn’t seem to tire from holding the relic rifle, nor does his shoulder mourn the beating it takes from the gun’s backfire.
Cy sports a less outdated, semi-automatic rifle with a box magazine. He admitted that he uses this firearm because it can shoot multiple rounds, giving him a higher hitting percentage than he would have with a weapon like Crewe’s that requires more accuracy.
Galv helps Della handle a lighter, twelve-gauge shotgun. She hasn’t hit a target yet, and I worry about arming her tonight.
“Can we talk?” Crewe unexpectedly approaches me.
“Yeah, sure,” I answer when I realize he’s talking to me and not his brother. Cy carefully helps disarm me and begins reloading in order for him to practice again.
Crewe and I walk around to the side of the house and sit against the yellowed siding.
“I’ve been thinking about some things and I have some questions for you,” he states. I feel as though I’m about to undergo another interrogation like Judge Sutton’s. “You’re important,” he says, looking me directly in the eyes. “I don’t know why,” he says as his gaze turns to nothing particular ahead. “I hope that you’re not keeping anything from me.” He’s relaxed around me, but there’s more than a hint of distrust vexing him.
“I’m not,” I defend. “I’m as perplexed about the mike as you are.”
“It obviously wasn’t implanted when you were born. The technology is too new, the newest model we’ve seen.”
“I was the first baby in Miles County to have a chip implanted at birth. I don’t understand how I could have had such an advanced chip then.”
“Did you ever have surgery for something?” Crewe inquires, thinking that he may have hit something of importance.
“This morning was my first,” I state. Then suddenly, I think of it.
“What is it?” Crewe asks as he recognizes my change in disposition.
“I was in the hospital for a few days when I was my sister’s age, fourteen.”
“What happened?” Crewe asks. I decide I’m okay with answering him honestly. He won’t smother me with sympathy the way Merideth would, or maybe even Cy.
“I got beaten by my foster,” I say, looking down at my lap. I shouldn’t feel embarrassed by the times when I’ve been vulnerable, but I can’t help feeling that way. Crewe doesn’t react at all to my confession. He just continues to stare ahead. “I had alcohol poisoning too. I was out a long while. It could have happened then.”
“I suppose law enforcement knew about the incident?” he quietly questions.
I nod. All this time, I had thought the police had come to my rescue. Really, they only came to take me to their superiors who planned to seize the opportunity to infiltrate me. When it was done, they discarded me. Evvie and I went right back to Trista’s incapable hands. At least there were no more beatings after that.
“I’m sure you were heavily drugged in the hospital. They would have worked it to where you couldn’t notice. Can you remember which arm had the IV?”
Wow. I’m astounded. I do remember because of the ploy that was played. This time I’m not disgusted, I almost find humor in my failure to recognize what had happened.
The IV had been inserted into the wrist of my right hand. They told me I had a slight infection spreading, and that I had to have some antibodies inserted into the surrounding area. After two or three shots a day, my wrist was quite sore in an isolated area. The shots were probably nothing but fluids, same as the IV. It was the new chip that was causing the pain.
I had the same nurse throughout my stay too. She always kindly blocked my view as she undid the wrapping and administered the antibodies. Her false objective was to prevent a weak-stomached girl from fainting. The bandage was changed at the end of my stay, and I wasn’t allowed to remove it for three additional days. That gave the single stitch time to dissolve and eliminate the evidence of a chip-replacement operation. Chip scars are so slight that I thought it came from the injections. Given the pretenses, why wouldn’t I have thought exactly that?
“That was it,” I finally answer Crewe. “The IV was in my right wrist. They told me I had an infection.”
“Why was a fourteen-year-old in foster care such a threat that a secret team had to come in and update your chip?”
“I wasn’t,” I answer. I was no threat then. I had nothing. My general disgust for the government didn’t develop until later. Even now, my dissention wouldn’t have been significant enough to permanently mike me, would it?
“What about people close to you? Do you think this could have anything to do with them?”
“Evvie is my only family,” I turn to Crewe to say. Our hardened, empty eyes meet. This time it’s mine that break away. “She’s all I have.”
“I’m sorry, Sydney. I want you to know that,” he says, his gaze still fixed on me. “For my mistake, for scaring you, for yelling at you when I thought you were a spy, and most of all for telling you that I wouldn’t go back with you. I thought I was doing my job, but I was being a coward.”
“You were doing your job, Crewe,” I call him by his name for the first time. “You were protecting your brother. I know that job.”
Crewe’s expression grows graver. “I suppose you do. So I hope you’ll understand why I’m not willing to put my brother on the front lines with us. This is my fault, not his. I don’t want to lead him to his death, Sydney. I can’t do that.” My eyes are welling with the pain we’re both experiencing. I want as many people fighting for my sister as possible, but it would be unbearable to live knowing that I cost someone else’s life for hers, unless that life was my own. I accept Crewe’s plan.
“Della and Galv have even less to do with what we seeksmen do,” Crewe goes on. “And a good doctor and nurse are always needed back home.”
“I understand,” my delicate voice cracks. “All of it,” I assure him, meaning I agree about Cy’s responsibility being severed too.
“If whatever threat you pose to the county is significant, then I expect they’ve been tracking us through thermal and satellite imaging. They’ll have no problem taking us out as soon as we
cross the line and enter sniper range.”
Crewe sure doesn’t sugarcoat the eminent danger we face. So it is just the two of us. Two young lives crossed in an unfortunate circumstance. Tonight, we pursue a potentially lost cause though it might mean the end of our not-yet-lived lives. But it’s a fight that has to be undertaken. I’m not sure whether he’s trying, but he can’t talk me out of the commitment I’ve made to safeguard my sister.
“If my sister is in any danger now, or could come into it if she breaches, then I will be there to do whatever I can to protect her.”
“I know. I just wanted to be honest with you. I want to ensure that you know all that’s in jeopardy, for preparation’s sake as much as anything else. If you’re all in, then I am too,” Crewe says bravely. “Let’s hope for the best,” he says as he stands and offers his hand to me. I hesitate to take it in the gravity of what this gesture means. Trust. Do I trust this man with my life and with my sister’s? Will I go with him to whatever end awaits us? I break down a layer of the barricade that’s kept me distant from people. I allow Crewe’s firm grasp to help bring me to my feet. Our eyes meet in understanding for a moment and I’m not embarrassed when a tear leaks.
“We’re disengaged and the ammunition is packed,” Cy says as he comes around the corner. Somehow, I hadn’t even noticed the gunfire during my conversation with Crewe. “You okay?” he asks me as I wipe away the tear with my baggy sleeve.
“Yeah. I’m fine,” I say, willing my answer to be genuine as I dab at my eyes.
“Hey,” Cy encourages as he takes hold of my shoulder, “it’s going to be okay.” I know he won’t be there with me, but somehow the courage coming from this endearing young man comforts me. I nod and allow a little smile to escape me.
“Will you fuel up and stock the car?” Crewe asks his faithful brother. “It has to be ready in case we need a quick getaway when we make it back.”
Minutes later, the five of us are gathered around the now barren kitchen counter. The knives have been pushed into a pile toward the sink and the guns now lay in the garage, awaiting their pending use.
Before us lies a piece of paper, which Crewe uses to lay out our plan. The accuracy and artistry in his strokes impress me. Assuming we make it that far without facing gunfire, he and I will be stationed behind neighboring trees a short distance south of the pond. Cy will be a good distance behind us, instructed to provide us with cover if an attack ensues.
Galvesten is next, but clearly out of a sniper’s precision range. He’ll be armed with a high-powered, long-distance rifle that will reach us, but no further. Finally, Della will wait unarmed, safely out of gunfire range, but not protected from any kinds of heavy artillery. Crewe doesn’t think anything like that will be used. Miles County wouldn’t want its inhabitants to know there are others out there who are being fought. They won’t want their people to know that there is another way of living.
A cellular phone rings. I’m not sure if it belongs to any one person, but Crewe answers it.
“This is wrong,” Cy asserts once Crewe is engaged in conversation. “I should be on the front line. You have no business being there,” he says to me.
“I have more business there than you,” I state calmly. “She’s my sister.”
“You only learned to shoot today!” he flares. “Galv, you know I’m right. She shouldn’t be in the ranks.” So it’s not about where he should be—it’s about where I shouldn’t be. “And his campaign about you being farther back in case anyone gets hit, you know that’s crap!” he says to the doctor. “If they hit us, we won’t be wounded. We’ll be dead. There’s no two ways about that. I should be on the front line and you should be covering,” Cy riles the doctor.
“I’ll back you, Cy. You’re right,” Galv confirms.
“Who was that?” Della asks before I’m able to weigh in on the argument.
“Merick. He can’t trace her,” Crewe answers.
“Crewe,” Cy starts, but I overtake him before he has a chance to negate Crewe’s lineup.
“What does that mean? He can’t trace her?”
“It means they’ve blocked your sister. Merick had our main tech searching for your sister. He can infiltrate the county’s system to see some of the same things they can see: where she is, and if she has a mike, what she’s said and who she’s spoken to. But apparently she’s undetectable right now. If they’ve made the effort to reroute her movements and communications so that we can’t see her, we can guess that wherever she is, whatever she does, they’re watching,” Crewe says hopelessly. Cy curses under his breath.
“What else did Merick say?” Galvesten asks, alluding to something other than the information about Evvie being blocked from view.
“He said we’re a go.” That means the order is we go in anyhow, even if our chance of meeting hostility, which has been equated with clear-cut death, has just increased. “He pulled the other teams. They’re coming prepared for full assault. They’re well on their way, but they won’t make it in time to be back up.”
In other words, the leader of Sheridan and the other teams of seeksmen are coming to avenge our deaths. Well, not mine, or my sister’s. These people don’t even know us. Yet they’re coming headstrong to meet whatever battle lies in waiting.
“No. This isn’t their fight,” I plead with Crewe. We just talked about this. Why doesn’t he stop Merick from risking more peoples’ lives?
“It’s been their fight forever. Since each of them was captive in whatever county. No, their fight isn’t about your sister—it’s about the county governments denying anyone the freedom they seek. It’s time to go.”
“I’m switching with Sydney,” Cy declares.
“You’re staying right where you’ve been told,” Crewe counters.
“She doesn’t belong there!”
“Neither do you!” Crewe fires, turning on his brother.
“You just said it, Crewe! It’s all of our fight too. So why do you—” Crewe cuts his brother off when he grabs fistfuls of his jacket collar. Crewe pulls Cy’s nose close to his. “You’ll follow your orders and you won’t do anything stupid while we’re out there. You got that?” Cy’s nostrils flare and he clenches his teeth in silence, refusing to respond to his stubborn brother. “Cy, I swear—”
“I got it!” he bellows over Crewe. “I got it,” he repeats, glaring straight into the eyes of his superior. Crewe holds his brother hostage for another moment before he loosens his grip.
“We’re leaving!” Crewe commands the rest of us. He brushes past his brother through the living room.
Cy clued me in on this term while we were practicing our aims. Back in his town, they don’t call them media rooms. They are not meant to gather people together for the purpose of viewing media. People are the focal point of the rooms. People are enough. In Cy’s town, they are called living rooms. I guess they always were; I have just never heard it before.
At first I wonder whether I’m supposed to follow Crewe. I think that maybe we’re headed out through a part of the house I haven’t seen yet. Since no one else moves, I stay too, hoping I haven’t joined in some defiant demonstration. Crewe returns with a box. He dumps the contents onto the rest of the rubble that litters the living room floor. He throws the empty box aimlessly into the corner, and picks up one of the black, padded vests.
Cy waits for his brother to exit into the garage before he straightens his collar and moves toward the vests. Against his desire, which is visible to all of us, Cy continues to bite his tongue as he passes out the vests. All of us strap or zip our vests while we walk in silence into the garage.
Galvesten lifts two of the guns, his and mine, and scrapes past Crewe without words. Crewe shakes his head and mumbles, irritated that Galvesten supports Cy’s position.
Della pulls the two medical bags from the car, and tries to juggle them along with her gun. I take one of the bags off her hands, since all I’m carrying is my pack.
I take advantage of t
he men’s egos and brisk walking to hang back and discreetly ask Della for some pain medication. “Hey Della,” I whisper. “Before we get going, can I take something to help with pain? Something light maybe?” I need something powerful enough to take the edge off so that I can sturdily hold my weapon, but something light enough that I will be able to handle it coherently.
“Sure. What’s aching?” The sweetness in Della has been swept away by the arguing men and the perils ahead. I feel terrible for the situation that’s befallen her. I’m glad she’s been positioned as far back and as much out of reach as possible.
“I’m most worried about my wrist, but my head aches too.” I don’t find pain to be an inspiration and propellant like I did when I ran about carefree through the forest we walk to tonight.
“Can you see clearly? Probably shouldn’t have been shooting those guns,” she says in the same breath. Della hands me two large, blue pills.
“Yeah, I can see fine,” I say as I remove the water bottle from my pack.
“Everything okay?” Crewe calls over his shoulder to us. Cy turns back too. He looks a little dejected, but has seemed to accept his order.
“Fine,” I answer. “We’re coming.” I gulp down the pills and follow the seeksmen outside. Heavyhearted, the five of us walk to Miles in silence.
Concealed in the Shadows Page 17
