by Trisha Leigh
Fear slices into my heart, splitting it into neat little chunks that tumble into my belly. Something’s wrong, but I don’t know what it is or whether to treat it like a threat. It’s too quiet, that’s all I know, and the tense concern crackling between the three of us says I’m not the only one who feels it.
After several minutes of standing as still as statues in the kitchen, I take a hesitant step forward. Nothing jumps from the shadows, so I lead the way up the stairs to Leah’s room. No sounds slip under her parents’ door and into the hallway, not a squeaky mattress or a light snore. My steps quicken, desperate to get to Leah and reassure myself that she’s okay, and worried more than ever now about how Pax and I left her five days ago.
It’s not okay. The room smells stale, like dust and old spit and dirty clothes. Her bed’s been made, not slept in since at least last night. No homework or textbooks sit on her desk. It’s been less than a week since Pax and I were here, so it can’t have sat empty for long, but Leah hasn’t been here today. A cursory glance reveals nothing of use, so I turn and sprint back down the stairs, throwing open the door to her parents’ room, knowing I’m going to find nothing but empty space.
“Where are they?” I ask no one in particular.
“The Wardens took them.” Pax stares into the closet, clothes hanging in perfect, color-coded rows. He looks ill, his normally olive skin tinged green, reminding me he’s as responsible for Leah as I am. A familiar pallor of guilt drapes an arm over him like an old friend. “It doesn’t look like they took anything.”
A clink and a rattle from the dark bathroom pluck my frayed nerves, but Lucas emerges a moment later, wiping his hands on his jeans. “Yeah. Nothing’s missing from the bathroom, either. I don’t think they planned on leaving.”
Dread slicks my stomach, climbing into my throat. The certainty that Pax and I somehow caused this throbs in my brain, aching down the back of my neck. The need to know if it’s true overwhelms everything else, and I turn to leave the house, the boys on my heels. Out the back door, instead of going left and to the park, I turn right.
“Where are we going?” Lucas whispers.
“To find out what happened.”
My teeth clench together so hard my jaw aches, and anger boils in my palms. Sweat breaks out on my forehead and droplets form on my back. I swear they must be sizzling.
I don’t know if I’m angry at the Wardens or at us for leaving Leah to deal with what happened to her mother on her own. We should have at least made sure her veil went back up properly.
The identical two-story next door belongs to Brittany, if memory serves, and a step inside the door reveals a more natural quiet. As we pass the master bedroom at the foot of the stairs, a loud snort emanates. It would be funny on any night but this one.
Brittany’s room, decorated in a nauseating array of pinks, announces itself with a cloud of fruity perfume. The sight of her under the covers, white-blond hair spilling onto her fuchsia pillowcase, offers a knee-weakening amount of relief. It almost cools the overheated anger I’m barely controlling under my skin.
I motion to the boys to wait by the door and cross to her bed. In a scene that reminds me so much of Leah it hurts, I reach out, shaking her slightly, then clamp my hand over her mouth until she wakes up and recognizes me.
“What are you guys doing here?” She sits up quickly, pulling her petal-soft comforter against her chest when the boys step out of the shadows.
At least she’s alive, and still unveiled.
“We were looking for Leah,” I manage to get out. The words stick to the sides of my throat, a little unenthusiastic about being answered.
Her face crumbles, lower lip quivering as tears fill her eyes. I wait out the storm, and after a moment she bites her full lower lip hard, putting her emotions back on the familiar tether. “They took her. Wardens. They said she Broke, but they lied.”
“When?”
Brittany jerks her gaze to Pax, her cheeks deepening to a pretty pink that matches her bedspread. “The day after you left.”
None of us speaks for a moment. Blood pools in her cheeks, and Brittany continues in a contrite tone of voice I’ve never heard pass her lips before tonight. “I didn’t know what to do. They came after Cell. I was supposed to meet her in the park but I forgot my bag in my locker and had to go back. By the time I arrived at the park entrance, they were shoving her in a rider. At dinner, my parents were talking about the Wardens coming and taking the Olsens away earlier that same afternoon.”
My knees tremble and I sink down next to her on the bed, letting her presence reassure me a little. We still have Brittany.
I study her from the corner of my eye while Pax runs his fingers through his dark brown mop and Lucas watches us, silent and serious. Brittany is one of the more beautiful girls at any of my Cells, with corn-silk blond hair that reaches to the middle of her back, some of the palest blue eyes I’ve ever seen, and a perfect peaches-and-cream complexion that’s never blemished.
It’s always irritated me a bit, as did her assumption that she led the girls in our year here in Danbury, but right now, she’s who we’ve got. And if I’m being completely fair, I’ve never really known her.
I’m not sure I want to learn what happened, but we owe it to Leah. “Did they take her because of us? Because of what happened to Mrs. Olsen?” I stop, holding my breath when Brittany shakes her head, hard.
“No. It was because of the research she was doing for you guys. The day they took her, the astronomy Monitor told her something maybe useful, and she spent all of lunch reading reference books on solar systems and planetary makeup.” She gets up off the bed, tugging the bedspread out from underneath me so she can keep it wrapped around her. Brittany’s more modest than I would have expected, or perhaps her pajamas are more flimsy that any that my human stand-in parents ever bought for me.
Pax catches my eye, and after a moment he gives a tiny shake of his head. I can’t decipher its meaning, whether he wants to give this up since 50 percent of the people we’ve let out of the Others’ control have been taken, or if he isn’t sure what we should do right now.
Lucas’s steady blue gaze reflects concern but also interest, and I know he’s curious about what Brittany has gone to retrieve. She returns from the attached bathroom, unfolding a piece of paper that has a thousand creases in it.
“Here. I folded it up small and trapped it inside my curling iron.” She gives us a wry smile, even though her heart isn’t in it. “I figured if there’s one thing the Wardens don’t know about, it’s fixing hair.”
I take it from her, smoothing out the creases against the bed. My heart jerks at the tight, neat handwriting, missing Leah’s black curls and spunk even though we really didn’t know each other all that well. Something about her attitude had given me hope.
On the top of the page, underlined like a title, are the words Primordial Elements, with Primordial Nuclides in parentheses right behind them. The rest of the page is scrawled in frantic, halting handwriting, as though she had to stop in the middle of each word to check the spelling. Which makes sense, given that I’ve never seen most of these words before and they’re complicated.
“She told us she thought researching primordial nuclides would help, but what’s the rest of this?” I wonder aloud.
“It’s what she asked about that last day in Astronomy—what’s a primordial element. The Monitor answered in a vague way about how some elements were formed by these nuclides before the solar system came into being, but then Leah found a partial list and puzzled more of them out from the textbooks. She slipped this to me after lunch, all excited, and wanted me to look it over so we could talk about the potential after school.” Brittany gets back into bed, absently winds her hair into her trademark single braid.
“Leah was trying to figure out if the Others’ host planets shared a common primordial nuclide or element. Is that what’s on the list?” Lucas queries softly.
Brittany looks up, her eyes a little baff
led like she can’t believe he hasn’t figured it out on his own. She’s brighter than I gave her credit for, I’ll admit. So far, not nicer, though. “Yes. It’s the radioactive primordial elements their previous habitats have in common.”
The list is of the potential substances the Others could be mining from Earth. If Leah’s right, one of these primordial elements is how they choose a planet to invade.
“Forgive us, Brit, but we’re trying to catch up here. Why in ten years of science courses have we never heard about these things?” Pax flops onto her window seat, pushing his hair away from his face.
The moonlight catches his bronze skin, flashing across his cheekbones and lighting his sharp gaze. I can almost feel Brittany’s heart speeding up next to me on the bed, and I do hear her swallow. Hard.
It brings to mind the memory of Leah, also clearly smitten with my friend.
Brittany manages to form words, eventually. “Because they’ve never taught us about them. After you all left last winter, Leah started nabbing the reference books the Astronomy teachers keep on that shelf—the ones they make us copy from if we do poorly on an exam?” We all nod. “We read all of them and memorized the specifics about the previous host planets. It quickly became clear that it couldn’t be the planet’s inhabitants that shared a similarity—several of them were uninhabited—so we decided pretty early that it must have something to do with the planet’s actual makeup. It makes the most sense too, with what you guys said about the Others needing a resource. Inhabitants can be a resource, I suppose, but not a very reliable one.”
She pauses and I think about how she’s right, but also how she said it so matter-of-factly. Brittany’s been trained by these Others to think critically and use reason above all else. The veiled humans don’t have access to anything but reason and routine, but all the same, the Others might have created a generation of kids with the ability to think the way they do—cold, calculated, smart.
“Once we started looking for commonalities there, in the geological foundations,” she continues, “the phrase primordial elements came up a few times, like the head of a category. So she wrote them down. This last list is the ones that all of the previous planets have in common with Earth. One of those primordial elements must be what the Others need to survive.”
Leah told us some of this before, but the refresher clears the concept in my head.
“And you think she’s right?” Lucas’s eyes bore holes in Brittany’s.
She shrugs. “I think it’s the most probable theory we’ve happened on. And yes, I think it’s solid.”
“What does primordial mean?” Leah never really told us that, and I want to know. Now that I’ve been reading more for enjoyment, I’ve started to love the words as well as the sentences and stories they build.
“It’s not defined anywhere. But based on the description of these primordial elements and nuclides, and what the Monitor said, it probably just means they’ve existed in the universe since before the planets were even formed. They’re what came together to create this planet, and lots of others, too.”
There’s something so appropriate about the explanation. The Others have always felt so ancient, as though they’ve existed forever before I was born and will continue to march forward, unchanging, until long after I die. Or they kill me, whichever comes first. It makes sense that the substance that sustains their life is equally timeless.
Lucas pulls the list out from under my hand and studies it. “So we have to figure out which of these is pink, I guess.”
Brittany raises her eyebrows but doesn’t ask the obvious question. All I can think is that Leah gave up her freedom for this list. And we don’t even know how to use it to our advantage.
I curl my hands around the flowery sheets, pushing heat into my core so I won’t burn holes in them. We’re going to figure it out. Leah’s sacrifice can’t be for nothing. As soon as we rescue Deshi, we’re going to search this giant planet for books that haven’t been destroyed, and we’re going to learn exactly what the Others need, where it’s kept, and how to get it. Then we’re going to rip it from their cruel fingers.
Pax stands and stretches his arms above his head, shoulders popping. “If we’re going to do this, let’s figure out what to do tomorrow. She’s pretty smart. She can probably handle it.”
“She can hear you, rude attractive boy. And she will do anything to help you three if it means Leah didn’t get busted for nothing.” Despite the anger embedded deep in her throat, Brittany’s almost begging to help.
A pained look skitters across Pax’s face, revealing that he’s trying his best not to be horrified that Leah was taken by the Others and that no matter what Brittany knows or the Wardens told people in town, we probably caused it by coming here.
After Leah, I might have rethought this whole plan to involve more of the humans, but looking at Brittany, her pretty cheeks flushed, eyes determined and flashing ire, I’m sure we’re doing the right thing.
Sadly, it doesn’t mean people aren’t going to get hurt in the process.
Once Pax, Lucas, and I walk into that mountain, we may never see any of these kids again. What they do will be their choice, but at least they’ll have a chance to try. “Okay, Brittany. This is why we’re here…”
I tell her we’re planning to unveil about ten kids in each of the Sanctioned Cities, and while she listens she picks at the skin on her lower lip. There are raw spots there, now that she’s drawn attention to them. The outward sign of nerves could be enough to get her hauled away, too, if a Monitor or her parents notice and call a Healer. I force myself not to say anything because she’s been through a bad couple of weeks.
“But what do we do if you never come back? Leah said that without the Elements keeping the planet’s ecosystems in balance, we’ll die within days of their departure. Unless you guys are able to figure out how to set us back on an even keel. So why would it matter if we put up a fight or not?”
We look to one another, trying to decide what the best explanation is or who should be the one to admit we don’t know, but once again, Brittany surprises me.
“I guess the Others don’t seem like fighters, do they? I mean, they’re used to getting what they want in a sneaky way, not battling.” She’s thinking aloud, picking at her lip and sucking drops of blood off her fingers.
“I know it seems that way, but if they’re not ready to go, I think they’ll fight.” Pax’s hand slides to the healed wound on his side. I wonder if he even realizes it. “But we were hoping maybe with more of you aware of the problem, you could work on a solution that didn’t involve the four of us. If…well, you know.”
He swallows hard, and Brittany sits up straighter. “If what? The four of you die? Decide to abandon us for your real people? What are we talking about here?”
Lucas steps forward, sinking onto the bed on Brittany’s opposite side and making her look at him. “We’re not abandoning anyone. It’s always better to have a backup plan, is all.”
Her narrowed eyes swing around to face me. “Althea, tell me the truth. Why have you decided to do this now?”
I take a deep breath, scared she’ll panic if she knows but also sure she deserves to. Plus, she hasn’t shown much inclination to panic up until now, calmly hiding the list in case we came back and carrying on in the wake of Leah’s capture. “We have to get our fourth if we’re going to have any chance of helping Earth. The Others have him, but we’re planning a rescue effort. We didn’t want to walk into an Other lair without leaving the humans some kind of hope.”
Emotions march across her face—fear, despair, gratitude, and finally determination—before she finds her voice. “So you know who he is? The fourth?”
Pax speaks up. “I knew him in Portland, and initially the Others had us both. I escaped but he didn’t.”
If Brittany hears the oily guilt in his statement, she’s kind enough not to comment. Which makes me think perhaps she didn’t recognize it for what it is, since kindness doesn’t a
ppear to be one of her many positive qualities.
“Remember the Barbarus who was here last autumn? Deshi?” Lucas asks.
She nods, her lips pressing into a thin line. “Yeah. He Broke Greg. It’s not like I could forget. Whatever happened to him?”
How strange that I almost forgot that she and Greg had been courting when he died on the exercise field. Maybe because the veiled Brittany hadn’t seemed all that upset afterward, and it hadn’t occurred to me that any feelings she’d had for Greg had been real or remembered.
“He wasn’t Deshi. The real Deshi is our fourth. The Other that was here copied what he looked like so he could try to find out more about me and Althea,” Lucas supplies.
“So they can change their appearance?” She wrinkles her nose, seeming to shake off her anger and sorrow over Greg. Part of me wonders if she’s just averse to showing emotion in front of anyone. “Gross. Well, I hope the real one is cooler than that guy.”
I snort, unable to help myself, and Pax grins. “He is. Was, at least.”
“So, how do we gather and unveil nine more kids?”
Wheels turn in my brain. It’s not going to be all that easy, if one or more of them don’t take to the unveiling. Then I remember how we traveled here, how much simpler it was with three of us instead of two, and hope our combined power makes unveiling easier, too.
Before I can decide what to tell her, Lucas stands and stretches, then faces me and Pax, careful not to turn his back and leave Brittany out of the conversation. “How did you do it last time?”
“Leah brought Brittany out to the boundary and we took her beyond the fence in case anything happened,” I reply, wanting badly to reach out and take his hand.
“But that’s not going to be feasible with so many,” Pax interjects. “I mean, we could do it in a quiet corner of the park, but I still say only one at a time.”
Lucas shakes his head. “No. I think it’s important that we figure out how much we’re capable of together. I mean, we know we can affect a lot of people on accident, after what happened in Portland, but we don’t know how to control it. I say we try at least three at once, and if that works, add more.” He glances at Brittany. “Do you think you’ll be able to help us control anyone who gets too confused?”
