Protecting Truth

by Michelle Warren

  “Does anything hurt?” I lean down to her and stroke her hair to keep her calm as I quickly try to assess her injuries.

  “Think I’m okay, but Quinn. His leg is stuck under a rock, over there somewhere.” She points.

  I jump over her and yell his name.

  A cracked voice croaks from behind a pile of debris.

  “Quinn?”

  I rush to him and lean into a rock that once lined the wall, pushing it off his leg with all my weight. Quinn screams in horrific pain. A Society medic arrives and immediately kneels down to help him. I step out of the way and turn to scan the room for others needing help.

  My heart races when I see Turner. He’s wounded, sitting propped up in the corner with Sam just arriving to help him. I rush to him and drop to my knees. There’s a bloody gash in his shirt, several inches long.

  “You weren’t even in this class. How did you get hurt?” When I lift his shirt, I see his skin is a gnarled, bloody mess.

  He and Sam exchange a look that I can’t make sense of. I gently touch the wounded area and Turner screams. “Sam, go find help,” I say. She nods and scampers away.

  “Well? Why are you here?” I shrug out of my vest, then bundle the fabric, pressing it firmly over his wound to stem the blood loss.

  “To protect,” he moans.

  Bishop appears. “Sera, go have the school nurse look at your arm. I’ll take care of Turner.” He lifts me up and pushes me aside.

  “I’m fine!” I glance down at my arm. It’s worse than before. Blood drains from my face, sending cold chills racing down my back. My body temperature drops, causing gray dots to multiply before my eyes. Finally, my world turns to dark silence.

  ::24::

  Aftermath

  I wake in a makeshift hospital. At least fifty temporary cots line a hallway of the Academy. I look down. My arm is clean and bandaged. Sam sits at the end of the cot, rolling her long braid between her fingers.

  “How are you feeling?”

  “I’m fine.” I sit up, still feeling woozy.

  “You blacked out, probably from shock.”

  I swing my legs over the side of the bed, feet skimming the floor.

  “Is everyone all right?” Visions of several injured students, Macey, Quinn, Atticus, and Turner, flash through my mind.

  “They’ll be fine,” she assures me. “You should lay back down and rest.”

  I look around, too angry to relax.

  Nearby, Terease stands at a hole in the wall the size of a small car. Stones crumble at its edges as though it were blasted through with explosives. The mound of debris behind it used to be someone’s apartment.

  Because I can’t contain my anger, I stand and stomp toward Terease. She’s speaking with a Society soldier. “Why did the Underground do this?” I interrupt.

  “That’s none of your concern,” Terease snaps.

  “Look around you! My friends are hurt. It concerns all of us! I think it’s time you really start explaining what’s going on!” I yell.

  She narrows her eyes, holding her usual air of superiority, giving herself several seconds before she responds. “Yes, you’re right. I suppose it’s time to stop sheltering all of you. We’ll make arrangements for an assembly as soon as we’re organized and secure.”

  Shocked at Terease’s willingness to agree, I only nod. I had prepared myself mentally for an argument. Disregarding me, she returns to her conversation with the soldier. Sam grabs my shoulders and guides me back to the cot.

  “Just rest a little longer,” she urges.

  I do as she says and rest with my eyes shut, pretending to sleep. When I sense Sam leave, I sit up again and scan the students sleeping on nearby cots. None of them are my close friends, and none are Turner.

  I stand and explore the halls, assessing the devastation. Most of it appears internal. The Underground ransacked the school looking for something. With the amount of damage, I realize the fighting must have gone on well before they found their way to the Relic Archives. We just never heard the commotion so deep underground.

  Society soldiers guard every exit. They’ve sent more since the attack. I manage to find a window to peek out. Hundreds of people mill around the courtyard. Most of them appear to be reporters, police officers, or emergency personnel.

  Mr. Evanston, the headmaster of the Academy, stands outside giving some kind of media conference—damage control. Who knows what lies he’s telling the Normals to cover up an attack of this magnitude. How will they keep the Feds from investigating? The Society probably has people on the inside there, too. Wanderer double agents, just to smooth over incidents like this—scary, but probably true.

  After a while, I find Bishop sitting on the floor, shoulders slumped, leaning heavily against the wall behind him. He’s staring blankly at a painting in the main atrium. I drop to the floor beside him, cuddling into his side, and he pulls me close. Students shuffle past, some covered in stone dust and with minor injuries that have been attended to; others are in better shape, but wear the same dazed expression. Like me, they’re probably struggling to find answers to the purpose of this chaos and destruction. Why? Why would the Underground do this? We’re just a school, nothing in the grand scheme of things. What were they looking for?

  “How are you feeling?” Bishop gently runs his fingers around the edge of my tangled hair.

  “Not great,” I admit with a sigh.

  “Sam told me you were resting.”

  “Too upset.”

  “Yeah, me too,” he mumbles.

  “How’s Turner?”

  He stiffens slightly at Turner’s name. “At the hospital, getting stitched up and pumped full of antibiotics, but he’ll be fine. Our father’s traveling from London to be with him.”

  “And everyone else?”

  “Quinn, Scarlett, and Atticus are at the Normals’ hospital, as well. Their injuries were too severe to treat here. But everyone will be okay. The Society soldiers fought off most of the attack until the Underground snuck into the archives. That’s where most of the students were hurt.” He pauses thoughtfully. “You fought very well,” he says softly and looks away.

  “Yeah,” I mumble. I hide my eyes in the curve of his neck. I hadn’t thought my actions through; I just jumped in to help. He knows now, finally, that I’m a good fighter. After all, he’s seen me in action.

  “I’m glad,” he says and kisses my forehead. He gives me a weary hug and says no more. But I know he’s hurt. Not in the way a Normal’s pride would be, but only in the way a Protector can be. Still, I always underestimate his selflessness. He just lets his troubled feelings go—for me. Everything he does is for me.

  He’s too good for me because, even now, I can’t bring myself to tell him about my mom, to tell him she’s alive, and that I want to go back and kick Cece’s butt to save her. With this attack, my resolve is even stronger.

  ::25::

  Two Hearts

  For the second night in a row, I’m thrust out of a restless sleep. A sheen of chilly sweat encases my body. The hair at the nape of my neck is soaked and coiled around my shoulder and onto my back. The contrapulator, sensing my elevated heart rate, turns off, and I remove the attached headphones from my ears.

  Sitting up, I squint at the antique clock—just past three in the morning. I press the heels of my palms into my eyes, trying as I have many times before to rub the thoughts of the attack and every other problem I’ve created for myself out of my head. But they’re lodged there, tormenting me.

  Before I can allow the memories to encroach further, I roll out of bed and change my clothes. Sam and Bishop are asleep in their rooms when I slip out the front door. There’s only one place that can alleviate the nightmares. The only place I feel stronger and in control—the defense training room.

  •

  I pace the room, lunging and swiping a sword through the air while the hologram machine counts down, starting from five. When the electrical current flutters, stimulating a solid mass into
being, I’m hoping to fight something mean and nasty to get my mind off things. But I quickly realize that Turner’s changed all my training holograms—not just the new ones. I should have expected it. I huff in annoyance and collapse to the floor, frustrated.

  Hologram Turner turns and smiles. He strolls forward and sits on the floor in front of me. In real life, he’s in the hospital, the gash in his abdomen too serious for him to be released yet.

  “I thought you might drop in here again.” He smirks.

  “Yes, but I didn’t know I’d be forced to face you every time. Where are my old training holograms?”

  “Gone. I needed to make sure I had a chance to apologize.” He plays with his cuff, acting more vulnerable than I’ve ever seen him. Maybe Hologram Turner is better than the real thing.

  “So I’m supposed to accept an apology from a hologram?” I snort.

  “It’s still me.” He looks up from under his dark lashes.

  “I can’t wait to hear this, go ahead.” I gesture to him, playing along.

  He pauses, considering his words. “How can you blame me—for wanting to be near you—for wanting to love you? Is that such a crime?” he asks seriously.

  I look around, uncomfortable. He’s so much freer with his emotions, so eager to get them off his chest. Unlike Bishop, who took months to tell me he loved me, Turner says the words easily but with the same conviction. “That’s a strange apology.”

  “Well, it’s the truth. I guess it’s not really an apology. How can I apologize for loving you?” he asks, holding my gaze with his.

  I sigh heavily and drop my shoulders, finding myself feeling sorry for him. “I’m sorry. It just can’t be.” Sam’s right. I need to stay away from him.

  “You realize,” he pauses, “it won’t change the way I feel. I can’t change it.”

  “Find someone else,” I blurt.

  “It would only mask the truth.”

  “So then, what? What do you suggest?”

  “I suggest nothing.” He smiles, but it doesn’t reach his eyes as he says softly, “I’m with you, or I’m nothing.”

  Just as I reach out to comfort him, he says, more firmly, “You win.”

  My fingers sizzle with the electricity of the fleeting hologram. His mass shimmers, sparkling in air, and Hologram Turner disappears.

  All alone, I scream from sadness and frustration. I’m hurting someone and there’s nothing I can do about it. In fact, Turner’s letting me hurt him, and I don’t even understand why.

  I clench my fists until my nails cut into my palms.

  “Volta Swift!” I scream.

  “Volta Swift,” the hologram machine repeats calmly. “Locating routines now.” The machine scrolls. “Hologram—number—fifty—requires no weapons—hologram starts in—thirty seconds. Safe words are—‘you win.’”

  I roll to a standing position, waiting for the next monster to appear—one of Ms. Swift’s training routines. I know Turner hasn’t messed with hers. I’m ready to rip out another hologram’s heart. It seems that’s what I do best.

  •

  The next morning, I awake to Sam shaking my bed.

  “Sera, wake up.”

  “Ugh. Leave me alone. Why won’t you let me sleep?” I tug the covers over my head and roll toward the wall. I hadn’t gotten into bed until six in the morning.

  “It’s your Dad. Um, he’s here.”

  “Here?” I sit up clutching the covers, and stare at her through sleepy eyes.

  She nods nervously.

  When I stumble out of my bedroom, blanket wrapped around my shoulders, Ray rushes from the front door where he’s been pacing and embraces me. “Oh, thank goodness you’re okay!” He hugs me tightly to his chest; I can feel his heart beating wildly and the slight tremor in his hand as he awkwardly strokes my hair.

  For a moment, I think I’m dreaming. This is obviously some parallel universe. Ray hugging me like this is stranger than Wandering. “Yes. I’m—I’m fine,” I stammer in shock and stiffen slightly in his arms, so unaccustomed to being there.

  He holds me away from his face, gripping my arms. I wince as he presses the wound beneath my shirt. “I saw the news. What happened? They’re saying it was an explosion. Why didn’t you call me?” He rushes his words in frantic bursts.

  I hadn’t prepared myself for this conversation. Never even dreamed it would happen. “Dad!” I pull myself from his grasp and walk away to plop on the couch, preparing to give him the speech we were instructed to tell our Normal parents about the Underground’s attack on the school. It never occurred to me that mine would even care. “It was nothing, just a student prank gone wrong. We’re perfectly safe.”

  He assesses me. “You weren’t involved were you?” And…now we’re back to the Ray I know and love.

  “No! Of course not!” I force out a huff of air in a grunt.

  “Well, whatever it was, I’ve decided I’m taking you home. I don’t like you being here anymore. Obviously, it’s not safe.” He looks around, eyeing Bishop and Sam, who are standing in their bedroom doorways wearing their pajamas, their faces impassive and arms crossed.

  “Dad, I’m fine. You’re totally overreacting.”

  “No, I’m not. Get your things together. We’re leaving today.”

  This can’t be happening. I’m too tired for this. I just stare at him, unable to budge. My annoyance and frustration skyrocket; I can feel my face tighten, unable to hide the emotions.

  “Seraphina, I said now!” He points to the floor for emphasis.

  “No!” I drop the blanket and jump to my feet, squaring up to face him with my fists clenched with determination.

  “I’m not going to say it again. I’m leaving, and you’re coming with me.”

  “There’s no way, Dad. I have friends here.”

  “You’ll make new friends.”

  “I have a family here!” I yell, going right for the jugular. “You couldn’t pay me to leave this life. They actually want to be around me—unlike you,” I snap, and then step back, shocked that I’ve actually said the words out loud. They hang in the air for several seconds, so honest and yet so ugly, as raw hurt assembles itself on Ray’s face.

  “So I’ve lost you forever, then? Just like your mom.” A single tear rolls down his cheek, and he swipes it away under the guise of adjusting his glasses.

  My brows furrow. He’s never shown any emotion like this before. Before I can react, he turns and storms out of the room. Speechless, I move to glance out the doorway and see him quickly stalking down the corridor. The truth is that I want to run after him, to explain everything, but I can’t. He wouldn’t understand, and this is my life now. The separation would have to be made at some point.

  I glance at Bishop and Sam, who are for once dazed into silence. The realization hits me full force: I just traded my Dad for my team. Traded the little family I have for Wandering. I run to my room and slam the door, then toss myself on my bed, crying.

  Two hearts ripped out in one day.

  ::26::

  The Truth

  The gala and Academy classes are canceled for a week and a half. The building must be put back together, the Relic Archives rebuilt, and some walls reconstructed. Students are nursed back to health. Overall, there’s a quiet sadness. Rumors of the Underground spread like wildfire. And finally, on Friday, we’re called to an assembly to learn the truth.

  •

  Over a loudspeaker, Gabe summons students to the main atrium. His voice is unusually solemn, but most of us have been since the attack.

  Bishop, Sam, and I crowd against the banister, looking down at the first floor. Macey shoves in with Xavier. Quinn hobbles on crutches next to them. Atticus has just been released from the hospital. Agnes and Scarlett, with her arm in a cast, settle nearby.

  Some students sit on the main stairs like a stadium. Collectively, there’s a low rumble of chatter. Whispers question what information the school administrators might reveal. I note that the noise would be
louder if many of the conversations weren’t taking place telepathically between some Protectors and Seers.

  I’m nervous, anticipating the worst, for I know that the information we’re about to hear can only be negative. I try to remain strong, but my anger has caused me many sleepless nights.

  To combat them, I’ve spent every allowable second in the training room. Now that Bishop knows of my abilities, I haven’t bothered to hide my training. Ms. Swift, thrilled with my eagerness to improve, works with me for hours on end.

  Bishop drapes his arm around my back and rubs my shoulder. He squeezes me closer, brushing his lips to my hair. “You need sleep, love. You’ve been working too hard.”

  “It’ll never be good enough.”

  He tenses at my response, so I know this new me upsets him. I sigh and lean into him, holding him tight. My affection is the only way I can assure him that I still need him, even if I probably don’t need him as a Protector.

  My eyes roam and notice Turner. He’s on the first floor with his arms crossed, staring at me. He refused to stay at the hospital beyond a few days. He winces when he rotates his torso in certain ways; his stitches pulling, I’d guess. I’ve yet to talk to him, even to check on him, since I’ve promised myself to stay away as Sam suggested.

  I wonder if he knows about the conversation I had with Hologram Turner. And I wonder if the conversation would have gone the same way with the real Turner. From the look on his face, I think so.

  Perpetua makes her way next to him and whispers in his ear. I tense, seeing them together. She’s been lying low since the attack, only appearing when she wants to remind me about the crystal. Everyone here knows about her team’s involvement with the Underground, which hasn’t made her very popular.