Resist

by Sarah Crossan

  “I haven’t seen him.” He wouldn’t have thought a RAT was worth the journey, so I lied when I radioed in: I told him I’d found Quinn.

  “Then why the hell . . .” He stops, steps forward, and peers at Jazz. He sweeps her hair away from her face. “What am I meant to do with her?”

  “She needs a doctor.”

  “This wasn’t part of the deal.” He wheels around.

  “I’m close to finding Quinn. And I want to take you up on your offer. I’ll become an auxiliary if it means I don’t have to kill anymore innocent people.”

  Jude turns. “They weren’t all innocent,” he says, looking at Jazz, who he almost killed. “And anyway, why should I believe you?”

  “I only lied about Quinn to help her. And I doubt I’ll find anyone else who needs saving,” I say, thinking of Bea.

  He opens his arms. “Hand her over,” he says coolly, and without flinching, studies her leg.

  “Is Niamh okay?” I ask.

  “She’s still angry. Your sister has a good deal of your father in her,” he says. “You, though . . . you didn’t catch it.”

  “Nope, and Quinn didn’t catch much of you either,” I say, in case he thinks that this spell of conscience and unexpected concern for his own son makes him some sort of hero. Jude stares, and Jazz squirms.

  I step out of the glare of the headlights and into the shadows. “The drifters are vicious. Watch out for them,” Jude says on his way back to the buggy.

  Carefully, he places Jazz in the rear seat and climbs behind the wheel. He reverses roughly over the rubble, and is off.

  I return to the station. “Bea!” I call out. Within minutes she appears. She’s shivering. My heart lightens. I was worried she would have run off, and I don’t think I want to be alone out here anymore.

  “Do you think she’ll live?” she asks.

  “She has a chance,” I say.

  The top buttons of her coat and shirt are open, exposing pointy collarbones and pale skin. I go to her, and she holds out her hand. “Thank you,” she says. I take her hand and shake it, and finally one corner of her mouth curls into a faint smile.

  “I am glad you found us,” she says.

  “Me, too,” I say.

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  ..................................................................

  20

  ALINA

  Vanya orders us to finish eating our dinners—the troopers have everything under control. “But what if it’s the Ministry? They nuked The Grove. They could do the same here,” I say. Is it possible that the chatter in the room is masking the sound of zips and tank treads?

  “I’m sure it’s nothing Maks can’t handle,” Terry says. He takes a spoonful of white powder from a bowl and sprinkles it over his steaming dessert, then pushes the platter towards my plate, but I’m too nervous to eat. Is nowhere safe? I’m exhausted, and I don’t want to run anymore; I want to stay in Sequoia and have it be home. Is that too much to ask?

  I rub my face vigorously, to wake myself from pointless daydreaming, when the room stirs. Vanya stands and Terry climbs up onto the bench to get a better look. Then he hoots and dashes toward a growing crowd.

  All at once, the hall is a volcano of cheers.

  “Can’t I eat my grub in peace?” Maude complains, disinterestedly chomping.

  “Come up on stage!” Vanya calls. The crowd edges forward and the first person to appear on the platform is Maks. He’s holding his pistol in one hand, a balaclava in the other. Vanya puts her hand to his chest.

  A girl climbs up onto the stage after him, and when she turns to the side, it’s clear she’s at least six months pregnant. Yet she’s no older than fifteen. Her hair is lank and her clothes torn. She is still wearing a face mask, which Vanya rips off and throws aside.

  “Jo!” someone at our table shouts.

  “Welcome back!” Vanya says, and everyone claps. “And someone new. Welcome to you also.” Another figure, taller, mounts the stage. But it can’t be. I glance at Silas who, without even looking at me, nods. “Who are you?” Vanya asks.

  “Quinn,” he says aloud. Everything around me goes fuzzy. Why is he here? And where’s Bea?

  “And one more,” Vanya says, pulling the last visitor onto the stage. Is it Bea? I close my eyes. I can’t look.

  I reach for the table as the room erupts in a round of riotous cheering.

  “Open your damn eyes,” Silas says, shaking me. “He’s alive.” And when I see what he sees, I gasp.

  Bea is missing, but Abel stands on stage. Abel is alive. He scans the room and our eyes meet. His mouth drops open. I hold up my hand in a half-wave and he shakes his head in disbelief. His face has the mottled yellow-and-purple look of someone who’s been beaten up, but he’s here. The Ministry didn’t kill him after all.

  “I can’t believe it. He’s goddamn, bloody-well alive,” Silas says through his teeth.

  “Yes,” I say. I’m smiling. For the first time in a long time, I’m happy, and I don’t care how ridiculous I seem.

  And then I realize Maks is following Abel’s gaze. He looks at Abel, then at me. Abel and me. And although every one else in the room is cheering, Maks is frowning.

  He is not very happy with Abel’s homecoming at all.

  Without saying so, Silas and I decide to keep what we know about Abel to ourselves. Dorian, who I’d mentioned Abel to back at The Grove, doesn’t remember the connection. “At least he’s alive,” I whisper when we’re back in the cabin. Silas splashes his face with cold water.

  “You say it like it’s a good thing,” he throws back. He’s right: we already knew Abel wasn’t Resistance and that he duped us, but we still don’t know why. “And you shouldn’t get your hopes up,” he adds.

  “What do you mean?” I say.

  “Just because he went missing and has turned up doesn’t mean he’s here because of you. You’re not to let your guard down again, Alina.”

  I nod, embarrassed, and Silas pats me on the back awkwardly, lies down in his bunk, and pulls a blanket over himself. But Maude’s frantic. “If Quinn’s here, then where’s Bea?” she wants to know.

  “We’ll find out in the morning,” I tell her, and reluctantly, she goes to bed.

  My mind is racing; I can’t sleep. Not until I know what Abel’s up to, why Quinn’s here, or where Bea is. I lie awake listening to Maude and Bruce snore in unison. Dorian is in the bunk next to me. He turns over, mutters something, and restlessly kicks and coughs. Silas and Song are silent.

  I throw my legs over the side of my bunk. The stone floor is biting cold. I put on my socks, my pants, and within seconds, I’m dressed and out the door.

  The cabins, outbuildings, and main house are dark, but no sooner have I stepped onto the graveled pathway than a floodlight illuminates the area.

  A girl carrying a gun confronts me. She doesn’t point the weapon, just blocks my way. “Where are you going?” she asks. She steps closer. “Oh, you’re one of the new ones. Someone should’ve told you that you’re supposed to stay in at night.”

  “I didn’t know,” I say, trying to sound dense.

  “Well, you do now,” she says.

  “Where are Abel and Quinn?” I ask.

  She glances at the main house. “Abel’s probably in his old room. I don’t know Quinn,” she says, and gestures at my cabin with her gun.

  I walk back slowly, and when she heads in the opposite direction, I sprint toward the main house and slam my body against it. The floodlights go out, and I am in darkness.

  I skirt along the edge of the house feeling for a way in, but every door is locked. I turn a corner and the guard is there, sitting on a bench reading an old paper book by torchlight. She looks up briefly, waves the torch this way and that, then returns to her reading. Another guard appears from a door behind her.

  “That time already?” she says, slipping the book into her jacket and stretching.

&n
bsp; “You can do my shift if you like,” the other one says. They laugh. “Any probs?”

  “Pretty quiet. I found one of the newbies wandering around, but she went back to bed.”

  “Which one?”

  “The one Maks has his eye on. I wouldn’t like to be her.”

  “Really? Oh, I would.” They laugh again and saunter toward the annex chatting. They activate the floodlight and the whole area is awash in light. I watch them go and try not to think about what it means that I’ve caught Maks’s notice.

  The door the guard came through is open, and the guards are less than fifty feet away and making their way back. I hurry across the courtyard and almost break my neck tumbling through the open door and down a couple of uneven steps.

  I scramble to my feet and scamper along a hallway to another door. It opens with a warning creak. I duck as I go through. Beyond it is a wider hallway with a series of doors on either side, and I creep along, examining the signs above them: Dispensary—Research Lab 4—Research Lab 5—Screening—Library. I scurry up a flight of stairs and find several doors with no signs. Surely these are the bedrooms.

  I kneel and press my ear against the keyhole waiting for the sound of movement or a recognizable voice. The house remains wrapped in silence. I check the next door. Nothing. So I keep going, trying each door and waiting a few moments before moving on. By the time I’ve reached the end of the hallway, I’ve tried twenty doors. I stand with my back against the wall, feeling suddenly foolish. How did I think I’d find anyone?

  I pick my way back down the hallway when I hear glass shattering. I stand rigid, waiting for lights to flash and an alarm to ring, then think better of it and sprint down the hallway and away. I round a corner and before I can stop, I yelp and clatter into someone running in the opposite direction. We both end up on the floor, but I jump up first and hold my fists ready. The person looks up and repositions his face mask.

  “Quinn?”

  “Alina?”

  I pull him to his feet. “What are you doing in Sequoia?”

  “Looking for you,” he whispers. He looks like he’s about to hug me, but changes his mind. “Jazz had a bad fall. We have to go and help her.”

  “Jazz?” I can’t believe it. The Grove was falling in on itself when we left it, and Jazz had climbed into the trees covered in toxic foam.

  “Yes,” he says hurriedly. Someone coughs in a room near us, and Quinn gestures with his hand for me to follow him. We tiptoe down the hallway and slink into a room.

  He points to the floor where shards of glass glisten. “Be careful. I knocked the stool over and the water glass went flying.” The curtains have been drawn and the moon is barely illuminating the room through the clouds. A bed is tucked into the corner and next to it a stool is lying on its side. The window is wide open and a raking breeze makes the curtains flap and smack against the wall.

  “But what are you doing now?” I point at the open window.

  “Searching for a way out. Thought I’d be less likely to be seen this way. Turns out I might die, though.” I follow him to the window. We look over the ledge. The room is three floors above a stone path. “We have to leave,” he says. He looks like he hasn’t slept or eaten in a long time, nothing like the person I met in the vaccination line not so long ago. How can so much have changed so quickly? It hardly seems possible.

  “Where’s Bea?”

  “She’s keeping Jazz safe. Is Silas here? Do you think he’d come with us? We’ll need him.”

  My throat relaxes. “I knew Bea would make it,” I say.

  “Well, she’ll be a goner if we don’t get to her soon. So will Jazz.” He looks out the window like he’s considering jumping. I lead him to the bed, where I make him sit and tell me everything, from the moment he left The Grove until he arrived in Sequoia. He speaks quickly, skipping important details, so I have to keep making him go back and explain more.

  “So can we go now?” he says finally.

  “Maybe Vanya will help,” I say.

  He scratches his head. “I tried to tell her earlier and she just smiled. There’s something rotten behind that smile, Alina. After the way Petra treated me, I’m not taking any chances.”

  I try to reassure him. “We’ll speak to her again tomorrow.”

  “What is this place? I haven’t seen one tree,” he says. A few weeks ago he never would have noticed. If Quinn can change, maybe anyone can.

  “We aren’t sure what’s going on, but the pod’s looking like an option,” I say, and laugh.

  Quinn stares at me. “Is that a joke?” he asks.

  I shake my head, because actually, it isn’t. “I promise we’ll convince Vanya to do something,” I repeat.

  “What about Bea?”

  “Does she have air and water?” I ask.

  “Yes,” he says, “but—”

  “It’s just one night,” I tell him, even though one night is all it would take for everything to turn into a catastrophe.

  I go to the door. “How did you meet Abel?” I ask, turning the handle.

  “By chance. Do you know him?”

  “Kind of. Is he the baby’s father?”

  “Jo said he wasn’t. Why?” A wave of relief rushes over me, followed by shame for even caring when there are so many other, more important things to worry about.

  The lights are still out in the main house. I inch along the hallway and as I am about to descend a level, there’s a scuffling.

  “You’re hurting me,” a voice says. Cautiously, I lean over the banister and make out the tops of two heads. It’s Maks and Jo. She’s trying to break free of his grip. “Vanya put me in another room. Why can’t you leave me alone?”

  “You humiliated me,” he snarls. Jo shrinks into herself.

  “Please let me sleep on my own, Maks,” she says.

  “And how can I be sure you won’t have run off by morning? You think I’m gonna let you out of my sight again? You’re coming with me.”

  “I’m not your property,” she says, wrenching her arm from him and backing away. She’s barefoot and wearing only a light, white nightshirt.

  Without another word, Maks smacks Jo hard across the face. She crumples into a heavy heap. “You’re carrying something that belongs to Vanya and that means you belong to Sequoia and to me. You think I don’t know why you ran away?” She looks up at him and before I can duck, sees me. But she doesn’t give me away; she holds out her hands and lets Maks help her to her feet.

  “I’m sorry,” she says. She puts her free hand to his chest and then, standing on her tiptoes, kisses his lips. “I’ve been so scared. Are the trials working? Are the babies okay?”

  “He doesn’t want you, you know,” he says, pinching her chin between his thumb and forefinger. “It’s me or no one, Jo.”

  He takes her arm and leads her away, but not before Jo manages to flash me a warning look. Like she has to.

  When I open the back door, I can’t see any guard—just an empty chair with a mug next to it on the ground. I creep into the night and scamper back to the cabin.

  “Where the hell were you?” Silas asks as I climb back into bed in my clothes. Maude and Bruce are still snoring. Song is lying like a corpse, his mouth open. Dorian has his back to me.

  “Quinn says Bea and Jazz are in trouble,” I say.

  “Jazz is alive?” Silas asks.

  “She was—days ago,” I say.

  UNCORRECTED E-PROOF—NOT FOR SALE

  HarperCollins Publishers

  ..................................................................

  21

  BEA

  Ronan and I are sitting in cracked green leather chairs under layers of blankets, scarves, and coats on the balcony of what was once a restaurant in the station. The sunrise is obstructed by decrepit buildings. Ronan shows me a blurred image on his pad. “Don’t you want a clear image?” I say. I fiddle with the gauge on my air tank. It would be wiser to keep myself plugged into the solar respirator and save t
he air, but it was too big to fit through the narrow balcony doors.

  “I just want the color. I’ll mix it when I get back.” He pauses. “Can I have a one of you?”

  “What for?”

  “So I can ping it through to the Ministry and pick up my reward. Your capture is very valuable.” He laughs, but that there could be a fraction of truth in what he’s said makes me turn away. Not before he’s managed to take a picture of me.

  “Delete it!” I try to snatch the pad.

  “No,” he says.

  “What if someone sees it and recognizes me?”

  “It’s as smudged as the other one. And anyway, no one’s interested in the photos artists take.” He studies the picture and then looks at the real me. “Why are you out here, Bea?” he asks.

  “Because your father wanted my head on a plate,” I remind him.

  “But why did you join the Resistance in the first place? Are things really so bad in the pod for auxiliaries?” he asks. Can Premiums really be so self-involved they completely fail to notice how ninety-five percent of us live?

  “Have you ever even been to Zone Three?”

  “A couple of times,” he says sheepishly.

  “If I could have changed things from inside, I would have,” I tell him.

  He is silent for a long time, looking through the few pictures he’s just taken. “There has to be a way to make things fair. Nothing’s impossible,” he says finally.

  “You can try working on things in the pod. I’m never going back. Anyway, I’m waiting for someone.” I still haven’t mentioned Quinn. As far as the Ministry knows, he’s dead, and no one should think otherwise.

  Ronan gazes into the distance, then closes his eyes. His eyelids twitch and the lashes flicker as sleep comes for him. And then he opens one eye and peers at me. “Are you going to get some rest or just watch me?”

  My cheeks get hot. “Out here? It’s below zero.”

  He reaches down and pulls a lightweight blanket from his backpack, which he throws at me. “Try that,” he says. I pull it over my chin and tuck my feet under my butt. “Better?” he asks. I nod and close my eyes.