Elites

by Natasha Ngan

  28

  The Ghost City

  Silver had got so used to walking through the forest on her own that when Butterfly landed in front of her, she felt strangely angry at him. The forest had become her place.

  ‘Good fly?’ she said casually, glancing once at him before striding past.

  He jogged to catch up with her. ‘Are you angry with me?’

  She ignored him.

  He grabbed her arm. ‘Will you talk to me –’

  ‘Now you want to talk?’ Silver hissed, wrenching herself out of his grip. ‘Well, I don’t want to. Go back to the air, fly boy.’

  It sounded so ridiculous they both laughed, but that only made Silver angrier. She stomped away from Butterfly, pushing on through the forest. The light was starting to fade, filling the tree-columned landscape with washed-out pink. It would almost be time to make camp before nightfall, but she felt too restless to stop.

  Butterfly caught up with her again. ‘Silver, come on.’

  She veered away. Down below, the river roared past. He dashed after her and tried to take her hand, but she jerked away from him, swerving to the right, and misjudged her step. There was little room up on the rocky lip of the gorge. Silver only had time to feel her mouth drop open in surprise when the muddy ground beneath her slid away and she fell down into the river below.

  She dropped hard into the water. She went to scream from the shock of it and the cold water filled her mouth and nose, making her choke. The river raged around her. It tossed her so hard she couldn’t tell which way was up. She scrabbled at the water, trying to follow the patches of light that glowed in places along the river. I’m not going to die like this! she thought, thinking how much she wanted – needed – to kill one more Neo-Babel soldier. Just one more to make right what they had done to Butterfly. To Yasir. And as though some river god had heard her plea, her face suddenly broke the water’s surface.

  Silver gulped in air. She tried to tread water to stay afloat, but the river was too strong. It swerved round a corner, swinging her near the side of the channel, and she spotted a large flat rock sticking out from the cliff-face. She reached out to grab it, her hand just inches away, and she realised at the last moment she wasn’t going to make it –

  Something slammed into Silver from behind, propelling her forward, and her fingers clasped the rock. Gasping with relief, she pulled herself up. The rock was just big enough to hold her. She hugged the muddy cliff-face. Above, the side of the gorge rose in a vertical ascent. She couldn’t climb it; she’d fall.

  ‘Here, Silver! Look!’

  Butterfly stood at the top of the gorge, pointing to where the cliff-face rose less steeply. Rocks and tree roots jutted out at different angles, promising hand- and footholds. Silver dug a foot into the mud. She pushed herself up and started making her slow ascent. It was hard work. Now she was out of immediate danger, her body seemed to have realised how cold it was, and she shivered so badly her hands slipped. Finally, she made it to the top of the gorge.

  Butterfly was at her side immediately, touching a hand to her back. His wings were spread wide behind him. ‘I’m sorry,’ he said. ‘I didn’t mean for you to fall. And then after pushing you, the tip of one of my wings got pulled under and I had to get away from the water before –’

  Silver scrambled to her feet. ‘You helped me?’

  He looked confused. ‘Yes. You were drowning –’

  ‘You think I’m useless!’ she shouted, slamming her hand into his chest and pushing him back. ‘Poor little Silver, can’t do anything right. Can’t even stop an assassin when he’s right there in front of her. Can’t even be trusted to find her parents on her own. You’re right – this was all my fault. None of this would’ve happened if it weren’t for me.’

  Butterfly stared at her, saying nothing.

  Silver felt tears sliding down her face now. This realisation made her angrier. ‘How dare you stop me?’ she cried, beating her fists against his chest. ‘How dare you stun me so I couldn’t kill the soldiers? I wasn’t afraid! I wasn’t scared of getting killed!’

  ‘No,’ said Butterfly. His voice was quiet but strong, and he took her fists in his hands, holding them away from him. ‘I didn’t think any of that. I was the one that was afraid – of you getting killed.’

  His words angered Silver even more. She swung her backpack off – throwing Butterfly’s at him – and reached into it, pulling out a gun. It was the pistol Butterfly had taken from the soldier. She had found it when checking for something in his backpack earlier.

  ‘Go on, fly away,’ she said, jerking the gun at him, her hands shaking. ‘That’s what you always want to do. So do it. I don’t need you. I don’t need you to protect me. I can find my parents by myself just fine. Go on. Go.’

  ‘You’re not going to shoot me,’ Butterfly said quietly.

  ‘Oh, I’m not?’

  Silver flicked the gun to the side and pulled the trigger, the shot ringing loud in the forest.

  He didn’t even flinch. ‘Silver, put it down –’

  ‘Your mother and sister died!’ she shouted, swinging the gun back to him. ‘The Council killed them, and Yasir, and every other person in that village. Just for surviving. Just for living! How can you not want to kill them? How can you be so calm? Don’t just stand there. Come on, do something, do something, show me that it hurts –’

  Butterfly flew forward, letting out a cry. He grabbed the gun out of her hand so quickly she didn’t have time to react. He raised it, aiming at her heart. ‘You think it doesn’t kill me?’ he said hoarsely. ‘It kills me, Silver. They were my family. I wanted to kill every last one of those soldiers. Every last one. But if I kill them, then why shouldn’t I kill you? We’re all the same. We’ve all been trapped inside Neo, trapped by what the Council choose to tell us. Do you think those soldiers knew what they were doing? Why they were doing it? What about all the things we’ve done as Elites. Did we ever question our orders? Did we ever take the time to find out why we were doing those things, what the other side of it all might be? I wanted to hurt those soldiers so badly. Trust me, I did. But we had no right, because up until now we’ve both been one of them.’ His voice lowered to a whisper. ‘So tell me to shoot. Tell me to shoot the soldiers, Silver. And I’ll start with you.’

  Silver dropped her head, tears falling fast down her face.

  ‘Thought so,’ said Butterfly, though not unkindly. A moment later, he wrapped his arms round her.

  ‘I’m sorry,’ she choked through her tears, her face pressed against his chest. ‘I thought I could make it right. I wanted to get them back for what they’d done.’

  Butterfly kissed the top of her head. ‘I know,’ he said gently, stroking her back. ‘But they’re not the ones to blame. You were only hurting yourself more.’

  Silver closed her eyes. He was right. She pulled back and Butterfly cupped a hand round her chin, pulling her face up. His thumb brushed her lips. They kissed gently then, slowly, deeply, losing themselves in each other’s embrace. For a few moments, they were able to put aside everything that had happened. Not forget; Silver knew they’d never be able to forget yesterday’s events. But just hide for a little while from the truth of it all.

  They found a cluster of large trees in which to make camp for the night. It felt safe and quiet here, amid the thick-leafed canopy and gnarled trunks, the distant rush of the river like a lullaby. Silver made a fire while Butterfly strung their hammocks between two of the trees. After eating the curried flatbreads Yasir had given Silver before she left – one of her favourite foods usually, but tonight she could barely taste it – they settled themselves in the hammocks. It was completely black in the forest without the flickering light of the fire, but Silver felt strangely safe. She curled up in the blanket and looked over at Butterfly.

  ‘About today,’ she said. ‘I wasn’t angry at you.’

  ‘I know,’ he said after a moment’s silence. ‘I know it had nothing to do with me. You just needed to get i
t out of your system.’

  Silver clenched her hands into fists. ‘It’s my fault this happened. If we hadn’t left Neo to find my parents, we wouldn’t have gone to Yasir’s village, and the Council wouldn’t have come and –’

  ‘You don’t know that.’

  ‘No,’ she agreed. ‘But I feel that way. Yasir told me about the rumours of the Council destroying other settlements outside Neo, but I can’t help but think it was our birthchips that led them there. You know, I didn’t really worry about them tracking us before.

  Butterfly’s eyes were glassy in the moonlight. ‘It’s because we didn’t know what they were capable of, then,’ he said quietly, and they fell silent, Silver thinking just how true that statement was.

  Early the next day, they cleared the campsite and set off, following Yasir’s directions to the settlement nearby. The forest was quiet that morning, the air dull with a clinging fog. They progressed faster than yesterday as the forest had thinned, the ground was not as uneven or steep, and by late afternoon, the trees were so sparse Silver and Butterfly could see open land beyond. It stretched out before them under a low sky heavy with clouds.

  As the fog shifted, Silver saw that across the plain was a blocky cluster of grey buildings. It stood out amid all the green like an ugly forest. Even from this distance, she could see that the city was dilapidated. The concrete exteriors of the buildings were crumbling and worn. There were piles of rubble where houses had been demolished. Though this city was nowhere near the size of Neo-Babel, it still looked fairly large.

  ‘The settlement,’ she breathed, feeling a thrill of anticipation.

  Butterfly nudged her shoulder with his. ‘You sure about this? Your parents might not even be there.’

  ‘I know,’ she said. ‘But you know what? I’ve got this strange feeling they are.’

  It took them half an hour to reach the outskirts of the city. By this time, a light drizzle had begun to fall. It pattered quietly on the metallic skins of the vehicles that sat in the street and the low buildings on either side, their insides hollowed out and empty. Unlike Neo-Babel, the streets of this city were wide. The buildings were much lower too, most just a few storeys high. And whereas Neo-Babel’s streets and buildings were awash with colour – city flags hanging from balconies, lights and advertisements strung across streets – this city was colourless, the whole place wreathed in a dull grey. The only colour came from flashes of green, where weeds and straggly plants pushed their way up between cracks in the pavement.

  Silver and Butterfly walked in the shallow path the street carved, their feet half hidden by the low fog. The city was eerily quiet. The only sounds were debris crunching underfoot as they moved, wind moaning through the desolate streets.

  ‘I don’t like this,’ whispered Silver. Even though the place was clearly deserted, she still felt like she had to keep her voice soft. Now she understood why the magic men called these places ghost cities. The air shivered with their whispers.

  ‘Yasir said there might be an anti-birthchip resistance here?’ Butterfly asked.

  She nodded. ‘He thinks …’ She caught herself and stopped, swallowing. ‘He thought they were linked somehow with the Pigeons back in Neo.’

  ‘Then where are they? This place is pretty large. They could be anywhere.’

  ‘He said they’d be somewhere in the centre.’ Silver nodded at the cluster of tall buildings in the distance that stood a few storeys higher than the structures around them. ‘They’d have a good viewpoint from there. Maybe that’s what’s helped them stay out of trouble with the Council for so long.’

  They continued towards the city centre. Silver’s entire body felt on edge, and she kept thinking she saw movement out of the corner of her eyes. But when she turned, there was nothing. Only the silent, empty husks of the buildings and broken things scattered across the ground. After walking for half an hour, they reached a cross-junction. A wide building blocked their way.

  ‘Left or right?’ asked Butterfly.

  Silver shrugged. ‘I don’t think it really –’

  ‘STOP WHERE YOU ARE.’

  A voice, magnified as though it was speaking through a megaphone, boomed out of the eerie silence.

  Silver and Butterfly dropped to their knees, pulling out their stunguns. Silver swung round, trying to pinpoint the location of the speaker, but the fog had shifted again, and it wreathed the buildings and ground in a hazy grey cloud.

  ‘LOWER YOUR WEAPONS.’

  ‘We’re from Neo-Babel!’ Silver called as she threw her stungun to the floor, still looking round for the speaker. ‘We’re searching for my parents who left last week. We don’t mean any harm.’

  There was a barking laugh, so loud it made her flinch. ‘THAT’S WHAT THEY ALL SAY. OUR GUARDS ARE COMING TO GET YOU NOW. IF YOU HURT THEM, THEY WILL USE THEIR WEAPONS AGAINST YOU. UNDERSTAND?’

  Without waiting for Silver and Butterfly’s reply, four people dressed in clothes very similar to Elite uniforms ran out suddenly from the building in front of them, guns in their hands. One grabbed Silver. He yanked her upright and ran his hands roughly over her body while another stood by, his gun levelled at her head. After the guard searching her seemed satisfied she was not carrying anything dangerous, he locked Silver’s arms behind her back. She saw that one of the other guards had done the same to Butterfly. The other two still held guns at their heads.

  There was a sudden rushing sound as a man sailed down the face of the building in front of them. A rope tautened behind him and the next instant he landed on the floor with a thud, lifted a megaphone to his mouth and said –

  ‘BOO.’

  Silver’s eyes widened as she saw who it was. The man was a Red, like her. He had a weather-beaten face, skin darkened by the sun and etched with lines and scars. There was a shadow of stubble on the lower half of his face, and more shadows under his small eyes, as though he hadn’t slept in days. Though she’d only seen it once before, she would have recognised that face anywhere –

  The assassin.

  Here he is, she thought savagely, hatred bursting through her. The man who had started it all. Her world had turned upside down in just a few weeks. Her parents abducted. Her life as an Elite over, Butterfly’s mother and sister dead. And this man was where it had all began.

  With a growl, Silver threw herself forward, managing to wrench her arms out from the guard’s grip. She ran straight for the assassin, her fingers curled into claws –

  Crack!

  Something struck the back of her head. She fell to the floor, darkness clenching round her like a fist.

  29

  An Unfortunate Encounter

  Getting to the Council District was more difficult than Akhezo had anticipated. Not only was it hard to sneak away under Domino’s beady gaze – ‘Where are you going now, lazy boy? Come here and rub my back. You may as well be of some use while we’re stuck here’ – but without any money, he and Neve had to travel through the inner city on foot.

  After a failed first attempt the morning before, they finally managed to slip away from the Limpets unseen the next day. They set off just before dawn. That was the best time to evade Domino, since he liked to sleep in late.

  ‘Who’s the lazy one now, eh?’ muttered Akhezo as he passed Domino’s sleeping body.

  The old man was lying atop one of the few mattresses the Pigeons had brought to their temporary Limpets home. Akhezo resisted the urge to draw on his face. Pigeon members were already busying themselves with the day’s tasks, and he didn’t want to be reprimanded by them. He did, however, manage to flick something he’d picked from his nose in Domino’s direction.

  ‘Akhezo!’ Neve giggled as the ball of snot landed in Domino’s tangled white hair.

  At first, their journey was easy. They left the Limpets, crossed the Industrial District on foot, and followed a bridge over the river’s Outer Circle. Once they got deeper into Neo-Babel however, Akehzo was lost. The city felt much bigger down here on the ground, a
nd the only time he’d been this far in was for the information exchange on the floating shisha boat, and he and Domino had taken a rickshaw there from the Limpets. Akhezo and Neve didn’t have any money for one.

  ‘So, which way now?’ asked Neve.

  They stood by a river-junction where a small waterway busy with wind-boats led off the wider channel of Circle Twelve into a pretty residential area of Chinatown. Akhezo’s eyes travelled over the latticed window covers and lanterns strung across the streets.

  ‘It’s definitely not that way.’ He turned and leant against the railing, looking out over the busy waters of Circle Twelve. An idea struck him. ‘Hey, Neve. Fancy a boat ride?’

  ‘Huh?’

  Akhezo grinned. ‘Follow me.’

  He darted down the riverside street, squeezing between the morning crowds. He’d spotted a large commuter ferry up ahead. From what little he knew about Neo-Babel’s boat services, these ferries usually led into the heart of the city.

  As they drew closer, Neve grabbed his arm. ‘The sign says it’s going to the Council District!’ she said excitedly. ‘But we don’t have any money …’

  ‘We don’t need any. Come on.’

  They snaked through the riverside crowd until they neared the platform the ferry was waiting beside. A couple of crew members stood at the end of a short bridge leading onto the boat, checking tickets as people boarded.

  Akhezo pointed to a place along the ferry’s open deck where its natural curvature brought it close to the street. ‘We can jump into the boat there.’ The drizzle that clung to the air meant the deck was empty. As long as the crew didn’t see them, they’d be able to slip inside once on the deck.

  ‘That’s a big jump,’ said Neve.

  ‘Scared?’ he taunted.

  ‘No way.’

  A horn sounded, blasting through the morning noise of the busy streets, and the ferry began pulling away from the dock. They pushed through the crowd, running towards it. The boat moved surprisingly fast for its size. When they had caught up with it, the gap between its side and the street was wider than before.