by Meli Raine
One hundred twenty minutes.
So much has changed.
The way Kina looks at me is unnerving, more Glen than softness in her eyes. The way the tweens look at her when she's intense tells me they see it, too.
The suit doesn't help.
“Why would Callum lead us out of the compound if he was working with the enemy?” she says, voice going low in a cadence reserved for teachers.
And, perhaps, parents.
The teens, fired up and ready to argue, seem to deflate.
Duff approaches, sorrow in his eyes. He looks at the older girls, then me, and finally Kina.
“No,” she gasps, sensing what he's about to say.
“Thomas is alive,” Duff says. “And Gentian's with the other two. Jay didn't seize and his blood sugar is fine. Sela has a cast–healing's going to hurt, but she'll be fine. No major veins or arteries hit.”
“Thomas?”
“The bleeding was bad,” he says, eyes jumping from kid to kid, words measured. “Not out of the woods yet, but stable. They had to remove a good-sized chunk of his intestine.”
“But he's alive?” Kina whispers, eyes hollow, her voice the hiss of a ghost.
“Yes.”
Wrapping her arms around her stomach, she staggers to the door, opens it–
And runs into the woods.
Chapter 5
Kina
Fleeing won't help.
Running away doesn’t solve anything.
Sprinting isn't going to make a difference, but for a few fleeting seconds, I don't think.
I act.
My body and mind are desperate for distraction.
Callum is behind me, his pace steady and sure, the crunch of twigs and leaves making me fly faster, the sounds a blur of the past catching up to my future. Our bodies are in the here and now, hearts beating, blood pumping to places that make me stop thinking.
When you're overwhelmed and panicked, you need to escape. You can take in details–a bird's call, the scrape of branches on your arms, the splash of cold from a breeze by a waterfall–but you don't have to think.
It's a blessing to move.
The scent of so much children's blood gives way to the smoke from a nearby campfire. The acrid taste of fear lessens as I breathe harder, opening my mouth, gulping clean air.
And still he follows.
I stop, so suddenly that he crashes into me. We tumble to the ground, a tree root unyielding against my kidney, my yelp of pain mingling with his grunt of surprise. In the fall, I half turn, and as we lay on the ground, he is on me, our breath blending, our lips so close.
Until I use my knee to shove, hard.
His hand slides between our bodies, blunting the blow, turning me until I'm pinned, trapped, a prisoner in his arms.
Eyes filled with more emotion than I can bear meet mine, blurring slightly. He's so close.
Too close.
“I can't believe you thought I was Glen.”
“I already tried to explain.”
“Not good enough.”
“When we have more time, I'll–”
“Time? You think I don't want time, too? Time with Thomas, who is alone in a hospital, a baby shot in the stomach by our own people! Time to think! Time to weed through everything going on inside me so I can stop feeling so much… time to go back and save Janice… time to find all the children! Every damn one of them, Callum! And Stateless killed… killed...”
I stop. Stop breathing, stop the Earth by halting, freezing in place under him, the weight of his body making me feel less connected, not more, to the only stable thing in my life.
The ground.
“Everything is happening so fast! How can our world change so quickly? How can all of these people and processes and structures I believed in so deeply turn out to be false?” I sputter, the words a mash-up, clear but confused.
“I'm going through it, too, Kina.” A gentle rotation of his hips allows me to sit up, scooch away, until he pulls me into his arms, curled into his chest as he straddles me from behind.
I should fight.
I should slap him for what he did in that car, pulling my pants down, looking me over as if my word wasn't good enough.
I should.
But I don't.
“Not the same! Not the same at all! You had nine years out here, Callum. Nine years to live and assimilate. To observe and analyze. I'm suddenly out in mass society with twenty stolen kids and I somehow have to mother them all! In a world I don't know, and everyone I thought was on my side is suddenly trying to kill me. It's like being the training body but now I have to protect myself and twenty other people. Don't you understand how destabilizing that is? How crazy it is?”
“Yes.”
“And then to have YOU not trust me? To question me?”
“What if I hadn't? And what if Glen had killed you and assumed your identity?” His chest rises and falls, breath hard against my hair. My head is down, so I can't see him.
I'm not sure I could argue if he looked into my eyes.
“Huh?”
“You heard me. I had to question it.”
“No, Callum. You didn't.”
His long, anguished sigh is like stabbing a stick at my raw heart. “You're right. I didn't. I freaked. I panicked. Something crawled into my head and turned me nuts in the heat of the moment. You looked exactly like Glen and up was down and day was night and damn it, Kina, I questioned everything, even my own sanity. Was I wrong to do that to you? Yes. Should I apologize? Yes. But all I want to do right now is this.”
Rough hands pull me to him as he twists, his mouth crashing into mine, the unbearable need to stop panicking, stop living in fear, stop thinking about the children's blood and Janice and the exploded compound and oh my, how every thought blurs to nothing when he kisses me.
It's the relief I crave, as much as the taste of him.
My hip hurts, ribs spasming as he pulls my head closer, the back of my neck scorched by his touch as the rest of me chills. He bites my lower lip, and I rise up on my knees, kissing back with a furor he welcomes with more strength. Our embrace is close to a wrestling clinch, his hands fast and insistent, my breasts, my ass, my shoulders, my lips touched by him until he fumbles for the clasp of my pants, his other hand guiding me to the long, hard lines of his need.
And then I go blank.
Just... drained of everything.
Not tired. Not confused. Not foggy.
Empty.
Elevated.
Jumping up, I tear myself out of his arms and plant my hands on my hips, his bemused look up at me registered only from the viewpoint of dominance. I have it, for a few seconds. I can do anything with him.
To him.
On him.
My emotions fold like origami into a neat package, an animal without a name, a flower that dies as it blooms, lost to the wind and never seen.
“Kina,” he says, standing, hands off me in a gesture that says he knows. He understands.
He cares.
And that, finally, is what makes me slap him. Hard, so hard, so damn hard, as if my shoulder will dislocate from the sheer force of hating everything in the world.
He is my everything, though.
And he knows it.
The blow doesn't faze him. I could strike Callum a thousand times and he would let me, his willingness to be a punching bag designed to make me snap. I know it, feel it, the training screaming inside my skull, warning me that he's letting me hurt him as an act of sabotage.
And still I do it.
Until I can't. I hit him twice and the current inside me that I turned off is suddenly on, my gut curled in, the sobs trapped inside my lungs, beneath breasts that have never nurtured a baby, but my hands–oh, my hands surely have.
The same hands that just hit him.
“Get it out,” he says awkwardly, the words unnatural given how we've been raised. No show of out-of-control emotion is permitted. There is nothing like this in our blueprint for how the worl
d works. People in mass society may become hysterical, but never us.
And now, us is me.
“Why am I d-d-doing this again?” I beg, needing an answer, an explanation, a reason for my madness as tears overcome me.
“Because you can. Out here, it's not weak. Out here, you're not punished.”
“Why didn't you come back, Callum? All those years. All those orders. You couldn't defy them? Not once?”
He tenses, knowing I'm lashing out to hurt him, knowing I am hurting him because it's safe to do so.
“I should have. But I didn't.”
Words aren't accessible as I drop to the ground, whirling dervishes made of small children's faces replaced by the blur of tweens and teens, the churning of everyone I've loved and raised against all odds turning to a sea of pain, hands outstretched in desperation. I'm being pulled down, down, down as they all cling to me.
I cannot save anyone.
Least of all myself.
In shame, I turn my face away from him, his hands on shoulders that carry mountains of grief, on bones that hum with lullabies.
And then Callum pulls me in, his embrace so simple, so transgressive.
He forgives me.
And lets me feel.
“I should be back at the nursery, tending to the little ones, teaching Philippa how to handle an arch-backed child who doesn't want a bath, or how to get the three-year-olds to sit still at a table to prepare for moving up to training. Jessie and Jaedy need more rhythmic movement and cross-crawl exercises to build up their reflexes. Cory's eye tracking is an issue. I should be doing laundry, washing faces, tracking eye movements, and assessing psychological strength. I should be back in my little apartment, wondering what happened to you, wishing I could see you again but feeling like such a failure for not getting a field assignment.”
“Kina–”
I cover his mouth with my hand. “Stop. Let me have my say.”
His hand moves mine to his chest, holding it over his heart.
“How am I supposed to take care of twenty children out here? In mass society? The cover story is flimsy and you know it. They know it. Stateless can eradicate us at any time, if they want to. I knew how to protect children at the compound. Not a single one was ever reassigned while I was there. I even tricked Sally into thinking Jericho could hear better out of his right ear than he could, and taught him how to compensate for it. I–I was good there.”
“Of course you were.”
“No, Callum. I was good there. Great, even. I figured out how to subvert the system for the sake of the children. Every day, I violated my training. Every single day. And they let me. Someone let me. And now they're trying to erase everything I ever did. Why me? Why are they targeting the children who were raised by me?”
“Because they can. You know how power works. It’s detached from emotion. Always.”
“Not me.”
He points toward the main cabin. “And that's why all those children are alive.”
“Not all of them.” Her name springs unbidden. “Debbie! Debbie is the one they took hostage. Held and–”
Five.
She was five.
And our own leaders ordered someone to take her life.
No. NO. I have to imagine she survived. Is alive somehow. I can't fathom the alternative.
Then again, I have to. Janice is dead. How unrealistic to assume we could get every single child out.
And yet, hope is a form of love.
“Kina. They wanted to kill all of them. I'm so sorry about Debbie.”
I know what he's saying–that we saved most of them. But when it comes to maternal attachment, most isn't good enough.
“Most” is abject failure.
We stand. I take a deep breath, the scent of pine infusing the sorrow in my lungs with a cold sense of dread. The thought of facing all the kids at the cabin makes me tense up, gut muscles hurting.
Sleep won't visit me tonight. My head is too cluttered with all that died today.
People.
Children.
Hope.
Callum finishes a series of texts, then searches the area as if looking for a lost dog.
“What are you doing?”
Dipping down, he picks up a rock. “Here,” he says, thrusting it toward me.
“What?”
“How angry are you?”
“What?”
“Smash this.”
“What does your phone have to do with anything?”
“It's from Stateless. I threw the sim card out of the helicopter earlier. We're destroying it. Duff is replacing it. Should have done it before we landed, but...”
“I don't want to bash your phone with a rock. That's an irrational act, and I've had my fill of those today.”
“It's cathartic.”
“Since when did you become an expert on catharsis?”
“Since a certain woman taught me it's okay to feel things.” He opens my right hand, the cold, irregular rock pressing into my palm. Solid and hard, it begs to be used.
So I do.
The first smash of granite against glass isn't very satisfying, the angle all wrong. I try again.
And again.
And again, until the glass is nearly a powder.
“That didn't help,” I inform him in a flat voice.
“Oh, I disagree. It was fun to watch.”
“How can you talk about fun in the middle of this horror?”
“Because someone I know told me we're complicated human beings who are allowed to hold two contradictory emotions at the same time.”
“Whoever taught you that was a fool.”
But the corners of my mouth rise.
“How are we going to do this, Callum? Really?”
He reaches for my hand. I drop the rock, my palm raw from the jagged edges. His warmth fills me, making my hand tingle.
“How? I don't know. One step at a time.”
“That's it? Nine years in the field and that's the best answer you have?”
“Yes. At least I'm honest.”
“Honesty isn't going to get us out of this alive.”
“No,” he says as we start back to camp. “But it’s all we’ve got.”
Silence is a comfort as we walk back to the children.
Chapter 6
Callum
Drew Foster approaches us at the edge of the clearing to the cabins, a first aid kit in hand. The big kind, a bright orange plastic molded case with a symbol on it.
“We need to remove your chips,” he declares.
Reflexively, we look down at our respective arms. He’s right. Kina’s shoulders tense, then drop. The jammers that were in my front pocket are long gone, lost in the battle for escape.
“Of course. And the children, too,” she declares.
This time, it’s Foster who relaxes. But only the tiniest bit.
“Yes. Right now.”
“The server farm at the compound, the one that was blown up — it’s where they store the chip data,” I start to explain, then realize it’s not enough. I’m sure there’s redundancy.
Foster’s face says he’s two steps ahead of me. I hold out my hand. “Never mind.”
“Let’s do it now,” he says, staring at my wrist.
“Not here,” Kina snaps. She juts her chin to the cabin. “We need to do it in front of the children.”
And then she jogs to the main door.
Frowning, Foster looks to me for an answer.
I give him none and just follow her.
By the time I catch up, we’re at the doorway looking in, the children in twos and threes, toddlers in the arms of older teen girls who look like they’re grateful to have a job of some kind.
Every face turns toward us.
“Everyone,” Kina says, leaving the door open as she strides in, shoulders back, voice firm. “We need to have our chips removed.”
Duff turns from a table at the edge, his body bent over an operative at a computer, spine t
wisting as if her words are a magnetic pull and his brain reacts before the rest of him can.
“What?” Tim squeaks, voice cracking. “Our chips? Why?”
“Because we’re being tracked,” Candace declares, looking at me with flames in her eyes. “Because of him.”
She points.
They all stare at me in fury.
“We’re being tracked because everyone with Stateless has the chip,” Kina replies before I can jump in. “Callum, too. We’ll all have our chips removed.”
“That means this is real,” one of the twins says. “This is — we’re really never, ever going back?”
“No, Jocelyn. We’re not.”
A gasp, a grunt, a sob, a choke — the sounds pile on top of each other like a funeral pyre being prepared for burning.
“And Drew is going to remove them,” Kina says, pulling up her sleeve, offering her arm to him, the pale, scratched skin covered with streaks of dirt.
She does not shake.
“No,” I say, loud and firm. “I will go first.”
She lifts her head higher, defiant. “That is not necessary.”
I look at Candace, who does not flinch, finger still pointed at me. “Yes, it is. I am their leader. They do not trust me.” My lack of elaboration works in my favor.
I’m challenging their challenge.
Foster opens the kit and I take an antiseptic swab packet, tear it open with my teeth, wipe my filthy skin, and use my left hand to hold the scalpel. Everyone knows exactly where their chips are located, so this is simple.
The pain of puncture is a relief.
The cut feels like redemption.
Foster steps in with gloved hands, his fingers stinging of alcohol as he finds the chip, plucks it out, and presses a piece of gauze against my forearm.
Done.
The angry tweens and teens dissolve before me, confusion replacing their stone-cold certainty.
“It’s so small,” Candace says, in awe. “You don’t even need stitches. The chip is the size of two grains of rice.”
She’s right. Something so small has controlled our every move.
I’m in awe as well, but I can’t show that.
“Do me next,” Kina orders Foster, who takes her words in stride, doing as told.
