by Rebecca Rode
“So you see, drainage duty is simply out of my capabilities.”
I held a hand up for silence, and they cut off midsentence. Striding toward the trail, I called out softly behind me. “I’m heading up top for some breakfast. You have until we arrive to voice your concerns.” I motioned to the older woman, an upper settler who’d spent her entire life here. This was the third morning in a row she’d sought me out, and I knew exactly what she’d say. “Danielle, you first.”
She shot a smug smile at her companions, who frowned as they fell in step next to me. “Very well. You see, I drew drainage duty today. You haven’t been around long, so you don’t know this, but my back is dreadfully pained these days. So you can see that hauling a shovel full of mud will be impossible . . .”
As she continued, we headed for the trail that wound upward in our deep, round valley. Before I’d come, the settlers were responsible for preparing their own meals. Problem was, the food was distributed to the rich settlers up top, and by the time the lower ones got anything, nothing was edible. So we’d created a cafeteria of sorts out of the highest tunnels. Certain settlers were responsible for hunting or harvesting food while others prepared it.
The biggest change was the food allowance, an idea my father—leader of our now-nonexistent Hawking Clan—had experimented with months before his death. Each settler received an allowance for their work assignment each day. The lower settlers were relieved to have a steady stream of food and a place to sleep, while the upper settlers—well, at the very least, pretended to cooperate.
We’d also moved the swamp-dwellers into the homes of others until the bottomland could be drained and rendered habitable. Some of them had even begun to build new homes.
The physical line that had once divided us had vanished. Of course, that didn’t stop the settlers from fighting with each other. Everyone still had something to prove. I couldn’t exactly blame them for that.
“. . . and the physician said I should get a pardon. He recommended a job that didn’t involve bending or twisting. I was thinking maybe the cafeteria or guard duty?”
I gritted my teeth. Nobody wanted drainage duty, but it was one of our highest priorities. My patience was wearing thin these days. “I’m willing to transfer you, but here’s something to think about. A drainage shift is only three hours. The cafeteria shift is easier, but you have to work two meals. Are you sure you want to trade three hours for eight? I doubt your back will hold up to that.”
Her stride slowed, and she looked uncertainly at the others. “Uh . . . how about if I become a guard?”
“You have to pass training first, which takes two days. Then you take twelve-hour shifts, three per four-day period. If your back hurts that bad, you probably won’t enjoy training much, and shifts are night and day.” I’d trained the first round of guards myself before turning it over to a man who had achieved captain in NORA’s military. Sometimes I regretted that decision—I’d grown soft since my time in EPIC, my old military unit. Besides, the physical exercise was far better than this. “But, like I told you yesterday, if you can find someone to trade you jobs, I’ll let Selia know.”
Selia Dunstrep, a former leader in Iron Belt Hawking’s clan—my father’s clan—had seamlessly slipped into leadership here. People respected and listened to her. She had been the obvious choice to distribute the food allowances.
The woman’s shoulders slumped. “Fair enough.”
I nodded as we rounded the last switchback, passing the pole that displayed our red flag. The settlers had presented it when I took my leadership oath to protect them. I inspected it as we walked by. In the center, a white hawk stood with its wings spread, a belt circling the image. The symbolism had Selia’s name all over it.
I only wished my dad could have seen it.
The cafeteria entrance, a makeshift wooden building with several chimneys already pumping smoke into the sky, was finally within sight. It was one of the few buildings on the west end that hadn’t been destroyed in the battle weeks before. Evidence of the Eastern Continental Alliance’s attack was everywhere—the splintered piles of rubble, the dark remains of their giant hovercraft still visible in our murky lake. In the small prison that had once served as my home and now contained my mother’s murderer. In the hollow faces of those who who’d lost loved ones.
“Better eat breakfast first, Danielle,” I told her. “Work is harder on an empty stomach.”
The group behind me began talking over each other again.
“Marlene,” I interrupted, forcing a patient smile at the next woman. “Tell me what’s going on.”
An hour later, I made it back to my hut only to find my sisters’ bed empty. They’d probably sneaked over to Ruby’s again. The silver-haired woman had stepped in as a motherly figure for them the past few weeks, and they loved playing at her hut while I was busy.
I tossed the muffins I’d grabbed for the girls onto the bed for them to find later. Then I fell onto my own bed and leaned against the wall and looked at the door. So tired.
Thousands of people lived outside that door, people who needed an alarming amount of food and water—both of which we were dangerously low on. The drought had hit us hard this summer. We wouldn’t last the winter at this rate.
Even though our crop down by the lake was taking well, it wouldn’t be enough to get us through the winter. I’d even sent scouts to find farmable land outside the valley, but everything was peppered with trees. It would take them two more weeks to clear a section large enough to plant. And even if the seeds took and yielded a fall harvest, it wouldn’t be enough.
The people were already fighting with each other. What would happen when starvation set in?
I closed my eyes and exhaled, long and slow. Father would have known what to do, but he’d died in an unsuccessful attempt to save our people from NORA soldiers. Mother had fallen to Ju-Long’s stunner right in front of me, something I should never have allowed to happen. That terrible moment flashed through my mind often these days. The stunner raised at me, my mother throwing herself in the way. Her body arching, then hitting the ground. Convulsing. Her eyes wide and horrified as the voltage passed through her body, stealing away what remained of our years together.
We’d finally found each other—just in time to say good-bye.
I was a poor substitute for both parents. I could barely manage to keep track of my sisters’ whereabouts, much less be everything they needed. And how I’d become the leader of such a huge group of people was beyond me.
Voices again, coming down the trail. They’d found me. More complaints, more problems. More disasters to deal with, keeping me from the true problems our people faced.
How had Father done it? Carried this burden day after day with a smile and a pat on the back? He’d kept his settlement happy and thriving for years. Less than three months and my settlement was already falling apart.
A gentle knock sounded on the door. The visitors whispered to one another.
“Be right there,” I called out. I stood and cleared my throat, then made my way to the door.
It opened before I reached it, and Laura, the older twin, came bounding inside.
“Vance!” She wrapped her arms around my leg.
Lucy followed with a shy smile, her face turned down. My youngest sister had stopped talking when Mom died, and hadn’t spoken a word since. The smile was a recent addition, more common now that Ruby had taken them in. I reached for Lucy as well, but she took a step backward and curled herself around Ruby’s waist. Lucy wasn’t afraid of me anymore, thankfully, but she’d never grown accustomed to having her mother replaced by a busy and stressed-out older brother.
“They wanted to play at my house,” Ruby said, “but I figured they needed some clothes first.”
The twins grinned sheepishly at their pajamas and then ran for the plastic chest that contained their belongings. Laura swiped one of the muffins off the bed and shoved the entire thing in her mouth at once.
“Thank you,” I told
Ruby, turning my back to the girls so they could dress. “I thought I could be back before they woke up, but I got sidetracked.”
“It’s a wonder you get meals at all the way these people demand your time,” Ruby said. “You didn’t eat dinner yesterday. You’re wearing yourself right out.”
This woman didn’t miss much. “I’m fine.”
“You don’t say.” She positioned herself carefully in front of my bed and sank slowly onto the folded blanket. Then she sighed and pounded a palm onto the bed. “Can’t believe you actually sleep on this thing.”
“Too hard?”
“No. Too soft.” She grunted. “Don’t know if I’ll ever get these bones back up.”
I chuckled. Ruby and the other underground refugees seemed accustomed to a rough life. They were some of my hardest workers here, a welcome addition to our settlement. Something told me Mom would have liked Ruby in particular.
The twins raced over and leaped onto the bed, nearly unseating Ruby. She gave a startled laugh. I began to chide them for their bad manners, but Ruby jumped in.
“No, no. What delightful children. All you need is a mother figure and you’ll have a sweet little family here.”
“You’re like our mommy, Ruby,” Laura said shyly, placing herself at Ruby’s side.
“Oh, dear me, no. Your brother Vance has someone quite a bit younger in mind for the role, if I’m not mistaken. A girl with brown hair and a habit of getting into trouble.”
I looked away, fighting a smile. “You bring this up every time I talk to you.”
“Well, Treena needs you. I’m trying to figure out why you’re still here.” She crossed her legs as if settling in for a long discussion.
“I’m needed here, Ruby. These people—”
“—would do just fine without you if you’d give them the chance. You’ve built a fine foundation here, and it’ll run with or without you if you can step away long enough to let others pick up the slack.”
“It’s not the best time for a vacation.”
Ruby leaned forward. “Things are running smoothly now, and the girls feel comfortable enough to stay with me for a few days. I know you miss Treena. I can see it. And you’d better believe she’s missing you.”
Treena’s face, upturned and hopeful, seemed a permanent part of my thoughts. Just as my heart beat on its own and my lungs took in air, my mind insisted on holding her front and center, whether I wanted it to or not. Everything reminded me of Treena. I saw her face every time I spoke to a crowd, heard her voice in the silence of night. Felt the softness of her lips on mine as I dreamed.
The word miss was an understatement. It all felt wrong without her here.
But she had an important part to play in NORA, one even I couldn’t deny her, however much I wanted to. Treena couldn’t betray her people any more than I could betray mine. I just wished we actually saw each other once in a while. “I talked to her just a few days ago. She’s doing great.”
Ruby snickered. “You weren’t listening, then, because I talked to her too. Didn’t you hear the sadness in her voice? The pain? The loneliness? The longing? That girl thinks she doesn’t have a soul nearby who cares for her. At least you have your sisters. Go visit her. We’ll be just fine here until you return.”
I folded my arms. “Treena knows she can come back here anytime.”
“But she won’t, will she?” Ruby cocked her head. “The two of you are quite the pair. There is such a thing as being too noble, you know.”
Laura, who had finished dressing, grabbed for the second muffin. Lucy gasped and swiped it out of her hand. The muffin flew across the hut and fell onto the dirt ground. Laura smirked. Lucy shot her twin a dirty look and picked up the food, then peeled off the dirty portion and dropped it back onto the floor.
Mother would have scolded them both. I wasn’t her.
Ruby grunted and tried to stand. I offered an arm, which she took gratefully. She rose to her feet and sighed, turning to the girls. “Now that you’re dressed and fed, shall we go for a walk?”
She looked paler today, her white skin appearing almost translucent. I felt a stab of guilt for putting so much responsibility on her lately. The woman looked like she would fall over any moment.
“I’ll find someone else to take the girls today,” I told her. “You should go rest.”
“And be forced to work in the cafeteria? Nonsense.” She winked and turned toward the door. “Besides, the moment I stop walking, the pain will set in and I won’t be able to move again. Must keep a step ahead of death, you know.”
I stifled a grim smile. The ECA was coming to annihilate us and take our land, and even if they somehow failed, the winter would finish us off. I knew better than anyone what it meant to stay one step ahead of death.
“You know,” Ruby said thoughtfully as she followed the girls, “NORA’s water treatment plant has a huge storage facility. If you’re that worried about our water stores, perhaps an exchange or treaty of some kind is in order. I know Treena hoped our two groups would come together and fight this war. Maybe you can initiate that by talking that stubborn emperor of theirs into loaning us some water.”
“You’re a sneaky one, Ruby.”
“I nearly always get my way.” The silver-haired woman shot me a pointed look, then disappeared through the door after the twins.
I pondered Ruby’s words as I headed for the lab. The moment I’d put Coltrane in charge of defensive operations, he’d chosen the deepest corner of the inner mountain tunnels for his laboratory. Not exactly the most practical place for a department that required a generator, but we made it work.
As always, the strange baglights the underground settlers had brought felt out of place as I strode down the dark tunnel. Why these people seemed to like confined places so much was beyond me. I was just glad they were happy to work far from the concentration of people in the valley. If any of their experiments went wrong, few people would be hurt. A cruel thought, perhaps, but a practical one.
I pushed aside the cloth divider and stepped in. Nothing had changed since yesterday. Well, perhaps one thing had. The six specialists who stood around the wooden tables looked slightly more disheveled and worn, their shirts unbuttoned at the collar and their expressions bleary. They’d been taking shifts, and no matter how early I visited, a full shift was always up and working.
Coltrane looked up and scowled. “There he is now. Better late than never.”
I stared at the contraption in front of the pale boy, a metal square that looked remarkably like a large battery. “I didn’t realize you were expecting me. I hope you have something to report.”
“Even better. I have something to show you.” He gestured to the battery box. “May I present the new and improved Trane 2.0.”
I cocked an eyebrow. “Trane 2.0, huh?”
“Well, I didn’t want to call it Coltrane. Might get confusing. Besides, it has double meaning. You know what a train is, right?”
“Indeed.” I moved closer and held my palm above the metal box. No vibration, no sound. Nothing to indicate it held enough power to shut down an army’s technology. “You say this one is long-range?”
“Yep. Four times more powerful. It could probably reach from one end of NORA to the other. It’s not like I can test it to find out, of course, but the math is sound.”
“Hawking,” a man said from behind Coltrane. He stepped forward with a frown. “I feel we should mention one very important concern about this plan of yours. There were some stragglers who escaped and most likely returned to China, correct?”
I nodded, feeling another brick place itself on the weight in my mind. “You’re worried the ECA will adapt their tech in response to the last device.”
“Exactly.”
I pulled my hand away and crossed my arms. “To be honest, I’d guess that’s exactly right. It would take weeks to redesign and manufacture new weapons. It’s the only explanation why they’re taking so long to attack.”
The men sobe
red.
“If not for Coltrane here,” I told the group, “we’d have been decimated weeks ago. He’s bought us precious time, and you’ve used it well. There’s just no way to predict what they’ll do. We’ll just have to prepare every way we can.” I clapped a friendly hand on Coltrane’s shoulder. The boy’s frown deepened.
“Some of the valley settlers are saying disturbing things,” the first man continued, concern still etched into the aged lines of his face. “Like how they want to join NORA and fight. And others say we should retrieve those settlers you’ve got digging tunnels out there and get as far away from here as possible.”
Truthfully, that was the choice I would have made a few years ago. If I hadn’t spent time in NORA, if I hadn’t met Treena, I’d be perfectly fine abandoning the people there and heading east. That had been Anton’s suggestion as well, before I put him in charge of the secret tunnel-digging operation just outside NORA’s border wall. But the line that had once divided clan member from citizen was fading. Treena was spreading the word in NORA about our settlers and what had happened these past months, preparing them for the alliance to come. And many of my settlers had ties to their citizens. We were in this together now.
“No,” Coltrane shot back. “This is our land, and we have to protect it. We drove them away once, and we’ll do it as many times as we need to.”
“Those folks wanted us all dead,” the man said. “We got lucky. If they decided to, they’d wipe us all off this earth. I can’t help but agree with those who say staying is all foolishness. Why not focus on saving lives ’stead of preparing for round two?”
“You want to run,” a younger man said.
“I want to negotiate, Rob, which ain’t the same thing. And I think it’s worth discussin’.”
Worth discussing? As if we hadn’t spent the past weeks doing just that, day and night. I spent every waking moment discussing and pondering and planning and worrying. It was time for action. The circle all agreed—for now, we would stand our ground. We simply had nowhere else to go. “Fair enough. That’s why we’ve set things up the way we have. As your settlement representative, Ruby needs to know how you feel. She’ll bring your concerns to our next meeting.”
