Blackout (Darkness Trilogy)

by Madeleine Henry

  PART II: THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA

  8

  I cup the phone in one hand. Pink grooves run across my palm and fingers where I have gripped the edges too hard. I hold it lightly now. The rest of my hand is specked brown with dirt, and I can see every detail through the transparent screen. The phone is almost invisible against my flesh, except of course for black print across the top.

  I check it again.

  1 JANUARY 2082

  11:44 a.m.

  I grunt, frustrated, and run one hand through my hair. This has gone on for hours: I check the time, then I get riled. The numbers just don’t move fast enough. Like they’re slow drops off a goddamn icicle. I remember the last time I saw one drip back home and, then, too, I was waiting for Star. I stood outside Silk and stared at a long frozen spike over her door. Cold drops lagged down to the sharp end, then lingered. Released.

  I check again.

  1 JANUARY 2082

  11:44 a.m.

  I slam my phone down and look away for a moment of peace, at anything but the time. I glance at my tattoo peeking out above my sleeve and stare at that. Better. I trace an index finger around the crest, where a light-blue vein crosses over the T. Looking at this symbol used to make me feel so conflicted, but that’s faded from my mind. I’m an unusual type of Troublefield, but I do feel like one of them now. I’m different, but I’m still noble like they are. Honorable. And fighting for something good.

  I check one more time.

  1 JANUARY 2082

  11:45 a.m.

  It vibrates in my hand, and I drop it like a hot ember. The phone falls into my lap, displaying new text across the screen. Surprised, I pick it up and stare.

  SCHEDULE

  **ALERT: 15 Minute Warning before Next Event**

  12:00 p.m.–12:30 p.m. LUNCH.

  Location: Your suite on floor 33. Description: Dine with your three roommates.

  Three roommates?

  The truck is slowing now almost to a stop. I sit up and grab my backpack, ready to bolt if I can. Noise grows outside, and I freeze with pricked ears. It sounds like muffled shouting. I inch sideways over the seats and press my ear against the window. Hundreds of faint whoops and calls cheer on the other side of the door, and I imagine a mob of Easies pulsing with excitement. Some kind of celebration. I furrow my eyebrows and press closer to the window. Someone may have just shouted my name.

  The car stops, and all of its doors click to unlock. Before I can feel for a handle, the door beside me opens on its own and lets in a flash of white light. It’s blinding. I cover my eyes fast with both hands, but little white dots still color the backs of my eyelids. I wriggle both wrists and try to rub them away.

  “Phoenix!”

  “Phoenix!”

  “Phoenix!”

  The blare rocks me back like an ocean wave. There must be thousands of voices out there, louder than anything I’ve ever heard. I keep my eyes closed and jerk my hands back to cover my ears. They’re still calling my name. My name.

  I imagine how I must look through their eyes: cowering, weak. But I’m stronger than that, and I’m here to work. Relaxing my hands, I let the noise in and cringe, but I won’t hide from it anymore. I swing one arm to rest across my forehead like a visor and gaze out at the horde. Hundreds of small white bulbs flash on cameras scattered through a crowd. People are taking pictures. Of me. My eyes slam shut involuntarily.

  “Phoenix!”

  “Phoenix!”

  “Phoenix!”

  I turn sideways and let my feet dangle over the edge of the seat. There’s no way I can run away now, not with this many Easy eyes on me. I look down, heart pounding, and see a red carpet six feet below me, brighter than anything left in the Dark Zone. I lean forward, ignore the hanging ladder, and let myself drop onto the rug. Bending my knees, I land smoothly on the sea of endless red.

  Slowly, deliberately, I raise my head to gaze at what lies before me. I’m on one end of a wide road of carpet. On either side of the rug, thick rope dips between golden pickets to contain the screaming crowd. The Easies look like DZs might, if we were ever that flushed with mania. If we were ever that clean. They wear plush jackets in colors I’ve never even seen: vivid reds, royal purples, and others I don’t know how to name. The Easies swarm behind the rope reaching their arms frenetically toward me. They should see what a real Frontier looks like.

  At the other end of the carpet is an all-glass skyscraper beaming yellow light through every window. Its name—The New York— glistens in giant golden letters above a row of three front doors. An above-ground transparent tunnel juts out from the side of this building, connecting to an identical tower next door. The surrounding city glows. Just glows. Luminous skyscrapers stand with overwhelming power for as far as I can see. They gleam unnaturally bright, impossibly bright—but the sky is still dark as ash.

  I smirk and notice small snowflakes drift gently through the frigid air. So they share the black sky and the weather with us, after all. They might have all the power, but they can’t escape the state of the earth. Looking around the city, I see: the United States is not a magical place. It’s stunning and extraordinary, but—it’s exactly what the Dark Zone would have looked like with power. This is just a city. The Easies are the people we might have been, and these are the buildings we might have had. They’re no better than we are, they just got lucky. Incredibly goddamn lucky.

  From behind me, a black glove points forward toward The New York. I look over my shoulder and see the hand belongs to someone as big as a Frontman. He wears an austere black suit jacket and crisp white shirt. Also like the Frontmen, he carries a gun. Two, actually. One pistol on each hip, which means for now I do what he says. I stand and step forward, gleaning a bit of pleasure from stomping on the Easy rug.

  “Phoenix!” an Easy man calls from the sides. “Will you marry me?”

  I stop short. “What?” I ask, bewildered.

  “Marry me!” another shouts. “Marry me, big strong Phoenix!”

  They’re taunting me. I turn toward the rope barrier and squint hard, scrunching the rest of my face in a rage. The crowd is massive. I search for the hecklers, but it’s impossible to find them among the throng of strangers.

  “Stop it!” I roar blindly.

  Their cameras keep flashing, and there’s more shouting now. My heart races, pumping bitterness to every corner of my body. The Easies have taken almost everything from me, and now they won’t shut up. I might be here for love, but I can still hate them. Without thinking, I reach for Magic’s barrel sticking out of my bag—right as a mammoth hand clamps down on my shoulder.

  “Phoenix!” the Suit barks. “This way.”

  He spins me back toward The New York before I have a chance to say no. Fine, I think. Fine. I walk behind him rubbing the Easy out of my eyes and trying to find some sense in any of this. I’ve never heard anyone I don’t know say my name. I’m confused. DZs are used to solitude and darkness, not scrutiny and the glare of lights. I want to know what these Easies are planning to do to me, and I want Star, but I can’t let my desires make me weak. I’m here to fight, not to nurse my every pain.

  A man outfitted in red opens an unbroken glass door for me. He looks too happy. I scowl at his smile and stumble inside a hotel lobby. Around me now, every surface gleams a different shade of yellow. Too bright. A grand desk manned by two smug Easies sits in the center. The rest of the lobby crawls with DZs—DZs! My heart lifts into my throat as I take in every last one. They’re easy to spot: dirty, unshaven, and anxious. Like me. And like Star. And we’re all looking over our shoulders, because not one of us knows what’s going on.

  The Suit shoves me toward Elevator VII, where three DZs are already waiting. Two eye me up and down, but the third doesn’t even look. She wears tight leather pants and a dark jacket cut above her belly button. Shoulder pads. Black charcoal runs from her eyes to her temple, and it hits me suddenly. She must be a Shadow.

  A Shadow.

  I s
tiffen with fear. The doors to our elevator part, and she dashes inside before the rest of us even take a step. She situates herself in the back left corner, arms crossed. After a shocked pause, I go for the back right corner. Following a Shadow’s example can’t hurt. I stare at her out of the corner of my eye, fascinated, and see thick bronze-colored hair shine down her back. She is tall for a girl with thin legs that look hard with muscle. Her features are small—straight nose, tiny mouth—and her brown, almost black eyes focus vigilantly. I turn away before she catches me staring.

  A nervous, skinny boy shuffles onto the elevator after me, followed by a short girl with big eyes. They waver in the center, looking weak and frightened. Skinny is about my age, but each of his arms is the width of my wrist. His ragged long-sleeve shirt is torn twice over his puny bicep, and I cringe for him. If the Carnival gets rough, he won’t stand a chance. Big Eyes looks plumper, but much more afraid. Her bottom lip quivers, and she wrings her hands together nervously. The last one on is the Suit. Other men like him—other Suits—wander around the lobby ushering us into elevators. This Easy pushes his hulking frame inside right before the doors close. He presses button 33 and makes his way to the back. Big Eyes steps aside to let him through, only to push the button 21 with her elbow. He glares at her.

  “Sorry,” she mumbles.

  I’ve never been more alert in my life. The atmosphere is thick with tension. No one moves except for the Shadow, who taps one of her fur-trimmed boots impatiently—when suddenly all of our phones buzz twice. Everyone but the Shadow jumps. She pulls her phone out of the tight space between her chest and jacket a second ahead of us. I yank my phone out clumsily from my pants pocket and check the screen: NEW VOICEMAIL. The Shadow already has her phone pressed against her ear. I thumb to the voicemail and listen.

  “Congratulations, Phoenix!” welcomes the same male voice from before. “You have been assigned three roommates. This week, the four of you will stay in The New York, an exquisite hotel built specially for the Carnival. Again, I must remind you that you are not bound by or subject to any laws. Instead, there is a different and critical rule you must follow: Do not touch any Americans. I repeat: Do not touch any Americans. If you make skin-to-skin contact with one of us, you will automatically be disqualified and thrown into isolation quarters. The electricity will be shut off in your residence on the other side of the Frontier.”

  The message ends as our doors open to floor 21. Just two feet away, a blonde Easy stands before the elevator. She wears light jeans and a white tee shirt. It’s so warm in The New York, I guess that’s all she needs. Her blonde hair falls in loose curls below her shoulders, and when she sees us, her blue eyes widen. The Suit jams a DOOR CLOSE button hard with his index-finger knuckle just as she weasels her way inside. The doors shut, locking all of us in together.

  “Oh my God,” she gasps. “Are you in the Carnival? I have to get a picture!”

  “Step away from the DZs,” the Suit orders.

  “Oh, I’m not going to touch them,” she says dismissively. Clearly, the public must know about the No Touching rule, but that doesn’t put me at ease. I press into the elevator corner with all of my strength, sucking my stomach in as far as possible. If she touches me, I’m headed for the isolation quarters—and whatever that means, it can’t be good. The Shadow crouches in her corner with arms clutching her knees. The other two DZs stand paralyzed with fear. They haven’t budged since the Easy stepped onto the elevator. Move, I want to yell at them. Move!

  The Shadow darts forward with catlike quickness to swipe her hand across the two columns of elevator buttons. All illuminate. Doors open to floor 26.

  “Step outside immediately,” the Suit orders.

  The Easy waves his words out of the air, accidentally hitting Big Eyes on the cheek. Big Eyes ricochets backward in horror, grasping the patch of tainted skin. The Suit shoves the Easy outside, and my arms flex as if I did it myself. The Easy lands on her back in a long hallway lined with beige doors. Her expression is confused and pale beneath ceiling lights, but I have no sympathy left. Elevator doors shut in her face.

  I slink up the corner to stand again and stare at poor Big Eyes quivering like a trapped rabbit. My heart softens as her eyes drip quick tears. I want to help, but there’s nothing I can say or do. She turns toward the wall and bangs her fist vehemently against the side. Her balled hands look tiny at the ends of puffy parka sleeves. Her chest heaves thicker and thicker sobs.

  “Sweetie,” the Shadow says. She flips a wave of hair casually over a shoulder pad. It ripples like dark water down her back. “Would you mind shutting up?”

  I gape in shock. The Shadow’s apathy feels like a betrayal. Big Eyes is another DZ—we’re all DZs. And now she’s left her home only to wind up in the ambiguous isolation quarters. For God’s sake, she’s lost everything.

  “What did you say?” Big Eyes asks. She swivels to glare at the Shadow, suddenly fierce. Skinny drops to his knees, his fingers interlaced over the crown of his head. He rocks hopelessly on the floor, desperate to avoid whatever is about to happen.

  “I said, ‘Sweetie, would you mind shutting up?’” the Shadow repeats blandly.

  Big Eyes lunges forward just as the doors open to the next floor. The Suit grabs her before she touches the Shadow and wrestles her into the hallway. He grabs her wrists and yanks both of them behind her back as she kicks to free herself. Her face is livid, and saliva pools at the corners of her mouth. The elevator doors close. The Shadow, Skinny, and I are left alone. Skinny pants loudly in the silence, and the doors open again to an empty floor 30. I stand rigidly as they close. We breathe. It happened to Big Eyes, but that could have been me.

  Floors 31 and 32 look different. Each has only two white doors. In between them, THE CARNIVAL is written in familiar black print. Floor 33, our destination, is the same, and on this floor I exit slowly to stand beneath the massive text. I replay the image of Big Eyes clutching her cheek. One white door is wide open, and the Shadow bolts inside. Dammit, Phoenix. Focus. I follow close behind. There’s no more time to think about the DZ who just got disqualified. I hope she didn’t need the electricity too badly, but my stomach wrenches. Of course she did.

  Forget it, Phoenix.

  We enter a monstrous white foyer. Even on someone’s shoulders, I couldn’t touch the ceiling. A chandelier dangles from above, spraying light across the pristine walls that curve around the circular space. White columns stand proudly in front of us, and through them I can see the living room where lamps beam brightly on every table. The last room I surveyed was my kitchen, and comparing that shabby space to this—the Easy excess makes me sick.

  “It’s a miracle,” Skinny says behind me. He grabs at the air as if he’s trying to hold the light. I swat his hand down.

  “That’s Easy light,” I snap. “And don’t you forget it.”

  “Sorry,” he mumbles, embarrassed.

  But I know how he feels. We learn in the Dark Zone that there’s no such thing as perfect shelter. You have to balance safety with proximity to water, forests, and other people. It’s impossible to find a place with everything, but this is the closest to perfect I’ve ever seen. The only thing wrong with it is I’ve never felt less safe.

  The Shadow sniffs the air and takes off down the left hallway. She already has a plan. I should make one. I bring my scavenger mind alive and start thinking about how I could use every object in sight. The glass could be shattered into arrowheads. The tables could be burned in a fire. And I should find water. Maybe that’s what the Shadow was chasing. I turn left to stride down the narrow hallway and find a polished kitchen on my right. My eyes bulge at the sight of a shining silver sink, and I run toward it. Oh, I’ve found water all right. For the first time in my life, I’m about to have running water.

  I twist a few wrong parts before I get to the right knob. Water shoots down on command as if I’m God making a waterfall. I run my hand slowly beneath the stream and feel how cool it is. At home, I’d have to
boil the water first, but I know this stuff is clean. I cup my hands and let the water pool inside. A guilty nag tugs at my heart as I raise the precious water to my mouth. Something my parents will never feel. I feel the delicious water lap against my dry lips, and I know I won’t reject it. I swallow my pride with the water and suck my fingers. Survival matters more than virtue sometimes.

  Noises.

  My ears perk at sounds coming from across the hall. I stand completely alert and wait for the silence to break again. It sounded like metal on metal. Skinny walks fast past the kitchen. I peer around the doorway after him.

  He turns into the room right across from me. I creep toward him and stare at the end of a long wooden table. My fingertips press the door the rest of the way open, and tension builds in my shoulders as I watch the room reveal itself—but it’s just a dining room, and the table is covered in food. This is what the Shadow smelled in the foyer, and I can smell it now. Plates of pink meat, steaming vegetables, and exotic sweet treats I’d only seen in faded magazine pictures wait for us, all in perfect rows. My body drifts toward the aromas, and I grip the table in hungry anticipation.

  The Shadow sits at the head of the table with a whole fish on her plate. Skinny rips a loaf of bread in half and chomps it. His cheek bulges as he chews. In Dark DC, we never eat anything we don’t recognize, but this is different. Easy food must be safe—after all, the Shadow’s eating it. I grab a platter of meat as my own. It looks like a rack of venison. The most familiar thing all goddamn morning.

  “Can you pass the potatoes?” Skinny asks the Shadow. I stop chewing and wait to see how she’ll react. She just continues to eat.

  “Can you pass the potatoes, please?” he repeats. His sincerity is heartbreaking. She crunches a fish bone between her teeth and swallows it. I try to meet his eyes from across the table to tell him to stop. It’s not a matter of saying please. Shadows are survivors. They don’t care about us.

  He goes on eating without potatoes. We smack and chew without meeting each other’s eyes until all of our phones buzz at once. I’ve figured out now that two vibrations means a new voicemail, and one means a schedule alert. I pull out my phone and check.