My heart thumping now that I’m close, I drift past the opening, glancing casually into the cul de sac as I do. Judging by one open door, the steam coming from a laundry vent, and another house’s sparkling windows, three of the five homes, at least, are occupied. Since I don’t know if 2241 is supposed to be lived in or not, that doesn’t help much. My palms are sweaty on the ACV’s throttle as I think about what to do. I was hoping there’d be cover of some kind, so I could approach unnoticed and scope out the situation, but aside from the dead shrubs and the shell of a house on the corner, there is no cover. I had foreseen the possibility, though, and come prepared with a datapad, vials, water testing chemicals and a story about contamination concerns due to a fertilizer facility leak upstream. The bombed out facility and river water near the Chattahoochee Belle had given me the idea.
I rehearse my story as I nervously approach the first house. I knock. No one comes. I tap my foot, as if impatient, for the benefit of anyone watching. Finally, I leave the door and walk around the house, peering in the windows as I go. Nothing seems out of place. Coming to an above-ground cistern in the rear, I remove the cover and scoop water into one of my vials, adding a reagent which turns the liquid orange. I enter my pretend findings on my datapad. Agitating the vial, I glance casually into the back window and spot an IPF helmet on the table. I almost drop the test tube.
I shouldn’t be surprised there are IPF soldiers living in the area; it’s less than a mile from the base and married soldiers are allowed to live in the community. Still, the realization ratchets my tension level a notch. I return to the front and ostentatiously pour out the orange water before moving to the next house. This time, a woman answers my knock, a questioning look on her doughy face. I reel off my spiel about a leak and contaminated water, hold up my testing supplies, and ask for permission to test their water.
She opens the door wider in invitation. “It looks normal to me,” she says.
I feed her blather about microbes, not visible to the naked eye, can’t be too careful, and test the water from their kitchen faucet and backyard tank. I don’t spot anyone or anything out of place or confusing. Maybe someone sent me on a wild goose chase with that note.
A little boy, maybe three, appears and leans against his mother, thumb in mouth, eyes wide with curiosity.
“We have a license for him,” she says hurriedly when I smile at the boy.
“Of course you do,” I say soothingly. It strikes me as sad that so many people spend their lives worried about having or not having children, applying for procreation licenses, being able to keep them, having them repoed by the government. Not my parents, though, nosiree . . . they dumped me on the government’s doorstep.
“What does it mean when it turns blue like that?” the mother asks, worried, when I add dye to the water.
“It means it’s safe to drink. Congratulations.”
Acting as if she’s won a prize, the woman escorts me to the door.
I cross to the next house, a bit more confident since my ruse was accepted so easily. A metal “2” hangs crookedly beside the door and a ghostly “241” shows where the other numerals used to hang. This is the place. A baby’s wails penetrate the door. I take a deep breath. I have no idea what to expect, and I’m tensed and ready to run if necessary.
Tap-tap-tap.
The screen door rattles with each knock. The door swings inward. The foyer is dark and I can’t make out the features of the person standing half-hidden by the door. The baby’s fussing almost drowns the nervous “Yes?”
The single word knocks me back a step. It can’t be. My head spins like I’ve been twirling around as fast as I can go. I reach out a hand to steady myself and my palm scrapes against flaking wood. She’s dead, my brain says, even as my senses tell me my friend Halla is very much alive. My skin flushes hot, but just as quickly the heat recedes, leaving me chilled.
The implications drop on me like shells lobbed by long-range artillery. Halla, alive. Little Loudon screaming his lungs out. The IPF neighborhood. It was Halla. Halla betrayed Bulrush to get her baby back, to marry Loudon. Halla got Cas and Milo and Gunther killed, put me in prison, sent Alexander into exile and cost Fiere her memory. Not Saben. My best friend. I shake so hard my teeth chatter and I double over, sure I’m going to vomit.
“What is it?” Halla asks. “Are you ill?” She pushes the screen door open. “Come in and I’ll get you a glass of water. Don’t mind the baby—the teething’s been hard on all of us.” She looks the same, her loam-colored skin smooth, black hair spiraling almost to her shoulders, a little longer than it used to be, plump bosom straining her tunic. Concern for me purses her mouth and pulls her brows together.
She doesn’t recognize me. Of course she doesn’t. Not as long as I don’t say anything.
She puts a hand on my shoulder—Halla was always kind, except, apparently when condemning her friends to death and torture—and I flinch away.
“Water . . . testing,” I manage in a gruff voice. “I’ll . . . later.”
I turn and flee, stumbling down the step and across the dirt patch that was a yard many locust lifetimes ago, along the cul de sac’s edge to the scooter. I hang onto it like I’ll be swept away if I let go, drowned by the memories and regrets smashing into me, emotional debris hurled downstream by a broken dam. A broken friendship. I wish she were really dead. I wish it fiercely, every muscle tensing so I shake like a malaria victim. If she were really dead, I’d still have the memories, seventeen years of friendship. This way, I have nothing.
Mounting the scooter, I almost over-balance it. I pause, trying to suck air into my tight lungs, trying to control myself. I manage to ignite the scooter and get on without keeling over. I glide away, the scooter wobbling a bit before I straighten it out and point it back toward the train station.
The ride back to downtown Atlanta seems twice as long with the weight of Halla’s treachery pushing on me. Once the initial shock wears off, I work out what happened. She’d been hysterical about leaving the RESCO without Little Loudon, and she told me she hated me for rescuing her when it meant she’d never see him again. No amount of logic, of telling her unlicensed babies belonged to the government anyway—which she well knew—made a dent in her hatred. She must have contacted Loudon, the baby’s father and an IPF soldier, and he helped her work out the deal with the Prag forces: her freedom and her baby in return for betraying Bulrush. I don’t know if they put a locator on her or if she was able to draw them a map to the brothel . . . the details don’t matter. The end results—the deaths, the disillusion, the pain—are the same.
Never once in my four months of imprisonment had I considered the possibility that Halla was the traitor. Not once. Am I stupid, or blindly loyal? Maybe they’re the same thing. I trudge from the central train station to my billet like a zombie, my boots seemingly filled with ten pounds of sand that make it almost impossible to raise a foot and step forward. I’m halfway there when the realization hits me: I’m to blame, too. If I hadn’t detoured to Dr. Malabar’s office in hopes of finding out who my parents are, if I’d gone straight to Halla’s room, I could have gotten her out before they extracted the baby. Bulrush would have smuggled her and Little Loudon to an outpost, and the raid would never have happened. I’m not foolish enough to think it’s all my fault—Halla chose to trade her comrades for her baby—but I’m culpable. The deaths and misery are partly down to me.
I stumble upstairs and into my billet, thinking about unintended consequences. It’s futile. The thought of food nauseates me, so I crawl into my loft bed, curl into a ball, and sob.
Chapter Twenty One
Several people comment on my wan appearance the next day, but I dodge conversation and then bury myself in my work. On some level, I know I’m working for redemption, thinking that if I can contribute to eradicating the locusts, I’ll have made up for my role in destroying Bulrush. Despite Keegan’s reservations, I find Dr. Allaway’s work promising and I initiate two separate experiments u
sing the virus he’s identified. I spend long hours hunched over a microscope and injecting locusts in the animal lab the next several days. Even though my encounter with Halla weighs me down, I’m excited by the potential of my new approach.
I’m there late Thursday night, long after everyone else has gone, entering data when I begin to transpose numbers and realize I need a break. Rubbing my eyes, I wander down to the lounge area shared by our division and a weapons lab, and help myself to some of the Alert beverage in the refrigerator. Feeling more energized, I return to the lab, glass in hand, and pass Torina’s workstation. She has left her computer on, processing some gargantuan task. After a moment’s hesitation, I sit at her desk and activate the display.
I’m not interested in the numbers clicking past in patterns too rapid to absorb, so after a moment’s hesitation, I flick to the genome registry. I’m interested in Halla’s DNA. Is there a gene for betrayal, a gene that makes it more likely person A will be a traitor than person B, like there are genes for leadership ability and beauty and strength? Is it dominant or recessive? Has Little Loudon inherited the tendency? I’m familiar with the huge body of research related to isolating genes that control positive behaviors and abilities that our leaders want to perpetuate and increase, but there’s been less investigation of the negatives like cowardice, laziness, and traitorism. Not a word, but I don’t care.
Nothing comes up when I say “Halla Westin.” Not too surprising, I guess. She’s living under a new name, just like I am. Without a DNA sample, I won’t be able to locate her. Names are changeable; DNA is not. If I had a sample to enter, the database would give me her new name. The system is amazingly fast considering the total number of genomic records it holds—listed at the bottom of the display—an accumulation of hundreds of millions of DNA samples since registration was mandated fifty years ago. The database only keeps growing since files are never eliminated; at least, that’s the theory. The fact that I couldn’t locate my parents’ records makes me doubt the total accuracy of the database. As I watch, the total ticks up by two: new births. Wow.
On a whim, I say Wyck’s name and his genomic record flickers onto the display. It’s a gross invasion of privacy, and against the law, but I peek anyway. Not surprisingly, he shows the characteristic genotypic polymorphisms that code for strong impulsiveness and inventiveness. I’m astonished to see that he also has twice as many copies of the nurturing gene complex, FosB, as normal. Huh. Who’d’ve guessed? I’m tempted to enter Saben’s name, or Fiere’s or Alexander’s but I can’t afford to demonstrate any knowledge of Bulrush or Defiance members. Derrika’s never met them. I wish I could look up Keegan’s genomic print and analyze what combination of genes resulted in his warped personality, but it wouldn’t surprise me if he’s got the system rigged to alert him when someone searches for his name in any context, so I don't. I pull up my new name and look at the print, wondering whose DNA is credited to Everly Jax now that mine is associated with Derrika Ealy. Maybe Minister Fonner and Minister Alden constructed a false print, splicing bits and pieces of various people’s DNA records. I’ll ask, if there’s ever an opportunity.
After fifteen minutes of distracting myself this way, when I’ve finished my drink, I diminish the display and return to my data entry. It takes another two hours and it’s well after midnight when I secure the lab and leave. A half-moon lights the sky and I can see clearly enough when I exit the MSFP building. The streets are empty, except for an IPF vehicle patrolling a block away, and they’re slowly releasing the day’s heat. I walk quickly, a bit unnerved by the silence and emptiness. No people, no ACVs, none of the hustle and bustle of daytime.
A tink sounds behind me, and I glance around. No one. The wind might have rolled a piece of trash against a pole or metal railing. I pick up my pace. My building looms ahead, shedding its aqueous light on the street and I relax. Then, the scuff of a footstep—I’m sure it’s a footstep—comes from my left. I study the shadows but can discern nothing unusual or threatening. Still . . . Keegan’s story about Notelmo’s murder on his own doorstep zips through my mind. Uncaring if I look paranoid or foolish, I break into a run. The doorway of my building beckons, promising safety.
Footsteps pound behind me. I push myself faster.
I am two steps away from the door when a hand grabs my shoulder. Its grip is iron, tilting me to the right, slowing me. I twist into it and rip free, ending up facing my attacker. He’s on me, too close for me to see his face, and he gets both arms around my torso, pinning my arms to my sides, before I can react. His momentum pushes me backwards and my back thuds against the cool wall. The assailant’s weight smashes into me and drives the air from my lungs. “Unh.”
I don’t have air to scream, but I wiggle and kick, trying to drive my knee into his groin. He’s ready for the move, though, and my knee lands on his thigh.
“Everly. Everly.”
His voice, his smell, sift into my consciousness. I know them. My panic abates a little but my heart still hammers in my chest.
“It’s okay. It’s me.”
He leans back enough for me to see his face to confirm what my other senses have already told me.
“Saben?” My voice trembles.
“In the flesh.” He smiles his lovely smile, his gold eyes warm, and suddenly I’m smiling, too, happiness cascading through me like cataracts of sunshine.
He looses his hold and I punch his upper arm, hard. “You scared me to death.”
Rubbing the spot, he says, “I’m sorry. I didn’t want you to go in.” He jerks his head, his hair much shorter than I remember, toward the lighted doorway. “Too many imagers and recorders."
I frown and shrink away. “How did you find me?” The memory of him in IPF uniform at my trial comes howling back. “You’re IPF.” Despite that and the way he almost tackled me, I don’t really feel threatened by him. But then, I never felt threatened by Halla, either. The smart move would be to launch a punch into his solar plexus and dash for the door which is only ten feet away. I stay put.
“I can explain, but not here.” He takes my arm and urges me back the way we came. “I know a place.”
Grabbing my hand, he leads me through the dark streets, turning time and again with confidence until we come to a large, bowl shaped structure. A stadium, I realize. There’s an electrified fence, but he deactivates the charge with the sweep of a disc hung around his neck.
“One of the benefits of being IPF, I suppose.”
He lets my sarcasm slide and waits for me to sidle through the narrow opening before re-arming the fence. “I have no taste for soldiering or the military life, but there are benefits.” He draws me toward a dark archway and we traverse a short tunnel before coming out on a field. Saben illuminates a powerful torch and sweeps it so I can see the dusty green of fake turf and the ghostly outline of a diamond.
“My father played baseball here,” Saben says, using the beam to light our way up into the stands. We climb concrete steps and settle on folding metal seats about a third of the way up. The metal has cooled enough that it chills my butt and thighs through my intelli-textile jumpsuit which quickly compensates. “In college, for two years before the first wave hit and schools began closing down. He had digital recordings of all his games, even some from high school, and we used to sit and watch them together. He narrated all of them, and by the time I was ten I could talk pop flies, sacrifice bunts, curve balls, and designated hitters like I’d actually played the game. He always said that one of the worst effects of the pandemic was the decline of ‘America’s game,’ the death of baseball.
“He used to bring me down here when I was little and we’d play catch on the infield.” He gives a wry smile. “I wasn’t much better at throwing a baseball than I was at physics, but I sure loved that time with my dad. I come here sometimes.”
We sit side by side, thighs touching lightly. I have so many questions. I start with, “How did you find me? How did you know I’m me. I mean—” I gesture to my new hair and
altered face.
“I was part of the Premier’s protection detail a week ago and you crossed the street in front of me. There was something about the way you walked. It felt so familiar. Then, you put your chin in the air”—he demonstrates by thrusting his square chin upwards—“and I knew.”
Betrayed by my chin. “Huh,” is all I can say, hoping no one else can identify me that easily.
“I saw you go into the MSFP building and waited outside that afternoon. I followed you back to the apartment building and was able to access records telling me who the newest occupants were. Derrika, huh? I like Everly better.” His voice is soft, intimate.
I look around. The stadium remains deserted. “Ssh. I have to be Derrika. You know what will happen if anyone finds out—you were at the trial.”
“The trial. The way you looked at me—”
“You were in an IPF uniform! How was I supposed to look? I thought you betrayed Bulrush, that you gave away our location. Now I know—”
“It was Halla.”
I stare at him astonished. Then, my brain sorts the puzzle pieces into a coherent whole. “You. You gave me that address. You knew.”
He nods, golden hair gleaming in the moonlight. “I knew you thought it was me, that I was the traitor. The look on your face when you spotted me—glad at first, then confused, and finally furious, hurt . . . I don’t know how to describe it. But I could read your face, and I knew. You never made any secret of your distrust of me, of a geneborn hooked up with ‘outlaws.’ I set out to find the truth. When I did . . . I knew you wouldn’t believe me if I told you it was Halla. You needed to see for yourself. Did you talk to her?”
Incineration (The Incubation Trilogy Book 2) Page 15
