Then he shoved his hands into his pockets and started walking.
“Wait,” she said, hurrying after him. “Let’s keep talking.”
Two glanced back at her once they reached the low stone wall that backed the main building. He pressed a hand against her face and caressed her cheek gently.
“I’m sorry, Nine, but I need to be alone right now. Elizabeth, I mean. I just…I need to think about this.” He leaned forward to lay a chaste kiss on her lips, with none of his usual passion. “We can talk later. At our usual time, in the meadow, like always.”
“I love you,” she said as he swung his body over the wall and landed lithely on the other side.
He showed no sign of having heard her and didn’t answer in return. He walked toward the tree line with a soldier’s rigid gait, his back held ramrod straight and his arms tucked tightly against his sides. As he stepped into the forest, he became a shadow restrained within the cage of spruces and aspens. Then he became just the suggestion of movement, his presence betrayed only by the rustling of leaves and the snap of twigs beneath his heavy boots.
Within seconds, the forest consumed him.
Case Notes 7: Subject Two of Subset A
The moment Nine was out of earshot, Two collapsed against a pine tree, clots of rough bark falling away as his shoulder scraped along the trunk.
He knew that one day she would leave, but he had never imagined it could be so soon. It was true that other subjects had left before, disappeared never to return, except this was different. Those subjects didn’t matter. Nine was the world.
How could she even think about leaving him? Was it possible that she didn’t love him as much as he loved her?
All of a sudden, she felt so far away, like a lifeboat straying from a sailor hurled overboard. He needed her. If he lost her, he would drown.
Shuddering violently, he gripped the tree with both hands. Nodules of crystallized brown sap broke under his clawing fingers, dusting his skin with sticky powder as dark as dried blood.
His body was no longer his to control; it belonged to the anguish that threatened to tear him apart. He felt like any moment now he would collapse into ashes. A light breeze might blow him away, scattering him.
Nine couldn’t leave. Not after everything he had done to ensure her safety and happiness.
Leaves crunched behind him. He turned quickly, hopeful that Nine had come to tell him it was all a mistake, she wasn’t leaving after all.
Instead, he found himself face-to-face with C-14, the mil on his team whose constant insubordination grated on his nerves.
“Hey, Two, what’s the matter?” C-14’s mouth cocked into a smile that bordered on being a smirk. “Seems like you and Nine were arguing.”
He hated how C-14 would always call him by his number instead of A-02, but upon hearing C-14 refer to Nine in a such a way, his annoyance boiled into anger.
“Don’t call her that,” Two said through gritted teeth. “She isn’t a part of your subset.”
“Everybody in our team thinks you’re batshit crazy, you know that? After what happened with D-12, we’ve been guessing how long it’ll take for you to lose it. And once you do, you think Nine’s going to stay with you?”
I’m leaving. I’m going tomorrow.
The same rage that had driven Two to bring the brick down again and again now rushed through him with all the strength of a lava surge, burning him from the inside out. He took a step toward C-14, his fingers curling as he imagined punching him, throttling him, turning some of his own hatred and anguish into something real.
Nine’s face flashed through his mind, and he froze. Just the memory of her smile cooled his rage. A sense of calmness passed over him like a soothing touch. Slowly, his fists loosened, and the tension drained from his muscles.
“Just leave me alone,” Two heard himself say, and turned and walked away. C-14 called out to him, but he didn’t look back.
As Two wandered to the mess hall, he tried envisioning a life here without Nine and found it inconceivable. He couldn’t imagine taking part in the daily roll calls without seeing her in the corner of his eye, marching with grace and pride. Meals would turn tasteless without her to enjoy them next to him.
How could he return to the meadow, knowing she would never be there? He wouldn’t be able to tolerate the place from now on. The fragrance of alpine forget-me-nots would haunt him more than the phantom odors of sewage and gore that assaulted him when he woke from nightmares, gasping and shuddering.
At the memory of his dreams, an idea suddenly occurred to him.
The sewer grate.
Maybe they would be able to leave together after all.
The day after he had murdered Reynard, he had returned to the water filtration plant to push the body deeper into the pipe, out of sight. As for the guard belt, a disobedient compulsion had led him to hide both the gun and the key ring in the woods to retrieve later if needed. Just months ago, the thought of keeping the gun would never have occurred to him, for escape itself had seemed inconceivable. Desertion went against who he was as a soldier, completely contradicting how he viewed himself.
In a way, it was D-12’s death that had triggered this change in him. Only after watching one of his comrades be killed right in front of him had Two realized that he was just as expendable as everyone else.
He refused to wait here all alone, hoping that she would come back for him, knowing she never would. He would determine his own worth and write his own future, with her by his side.
…
Later that day, as the sun dropped through the low clouds like a burning ember, he met Nine in the meadow. He greedily took in the sight of her flaxen hair and delicate face, a face he had looked at so many times before, he could draw it from memory. A face he might never see again.
“Are you just going to stare at me?” A little unease found its way into her laughter. She was scared of him, he realized. Or maybe just nervous. Maybe she thought he would get angry again.
The thought pained him. He hadn’t meant to scare her earlier. The drug had lowered his defenses and left him open to emotions he would have preferred to keep caged when in her presence. Even so, her fear was misplaced. He never would have touched her. He would die before he hurt her.
“Remember our first kiss?” Two asked and began gathering wildflowers from the area surrounding him. Forget-me-nots and evening primroses. At this hour, the sultry summer air was infused with their intoxicating aromas. For as long as he lived, he would never be able to smell those flowers without recalling the velvety softness of her lips or the warmth of her body beneath him.
“Of course I do,” she said with a small laugh. “We were just kids.”
That had been years ago, and in the time since then, they had shared many kisses in this clearing. And more. He thought about how at the beginning of summer they had come here, shivering and clinging to each other in the nippy breeze. One thing had led to another, and the distance beneath them had dissolved into a tangle of bare limbs and hot passion.
Now, he knew that if he failed in his planning, he would never know her touch again. Staring at her, he felt the sudden urge to seize her, kiss her, never let go of her. Instead, he sat down on the soft meadow grass. The long fronds stroked his skin as he laid the bouquet of wildflowers next to him.
Birds chirped from the trees, cicadas chirred, and the wind rustled the leaves.
“So, tell me about your new family.” Two began weaving the flowers together. He liked it when his hands were kept busy. He found that when he drew during lectures, he focused far more on what his instructors were saying than he would otherwise.
“I don’t know much,” she admitted. “Just that Senator Hawthorne’s going to be my father.”
“A senator?” Two said, surprised. He had always thought that they would be deposited in the foster system, not homes of power. Maybe it was different for political subjects, whose entire careers relied on their connections.
Sh
e nodded. “He has a wife, too. And he said he had a daughter, but she died.”
“Oh.” He felt nothing about the idea of death now. He had already accepted that he would kill again. It was only a matter of time.
“He showed me a picture of their house. It’s so big, Two. I’m even going to get my own room.” A beaming smile spread across Nine’s lips, and a part of him despised her for it. How could she be so happy about leaving when it meant leaving him?
Two pushed the thought from his head and focused on the task at hand. He knotted the stems together, twisting them into an elaborate braid. He used his thumbnail to make slits in the shorter stems of the evening primroses and weaved stray forget-me-nots through the holes.
She must have realized her words offended him, because she fell silent after that. She sat next to him, watching him work. Minutes passed in silence.
He glanced at the sky. They were going to call roll soon.
“We should be getting back,” Nine said, as if reading his mind. She was always good at that, knowing what he was thinking. She picked up on small cues that nobody else noticed.
“Just a few more minutes,” he said, shifting his attention back to the flower crown.
He turned his plan over in his head, constructing it with the same care and attention to detail that he used when weaving the flower stems into a single band. It helped to focus on such an irrelevant task. He felt so restless, he was just about ready to crawl out of his skin.
“Are you really leaving tomorrow?” he asked, looking back at her. “Like, for sure?”
“Yes, but don’t worry, I’ll visit.”
He smiled, hearing the uncertainty in her voice. She didn’t even believe the words that left her mouth, but for some reason she thought he would. They both knew better. No one ever visited, and there was no guarantee that they would end up in the same place.
If he had been a political subject, he might have been able to delude himself into believing her, but he was destined for a different future. He always had been, no matter the sweet experiences they had envisioned themselves sharing.
He realized that now. For the first time, he understood it completely.
I’ll visit? Yeah, right.
“No, you won’t,” he said, fastening the last forget-me-not in place. He had woven the flowers so that there were no empty spaces, just profusions of delicate petals and leaves. Looking at his hands, he thought about how strange it was that he could both destroy and create. He had always possessed two extremes inside of him.
“I will,” she insisted as he placed the flower crown on her head, her hair as soft as milkweed fluff beneath his fingers. He stroked a couple strands away from her clear blue eyes.
He didn’t believe her.
“I’ll come back for you, I promise,” she said, leaning into him. One of her breasts pressed against his arm. Normally, the warm weight of her would have been the only thing he could think about, but now his thoughts were elsewhere. He couldn’t appreciate her presence knowing that if he failed in his plan, he would know it no more.
“You won’t,” he said. “No one ever does.”
“I will, or like I said, I’ll make them get you. We’ll go together. I promise.”
Two grabbed her arms and kissed her. She eased against him, only to tense at his next words.
“We can run away,” he said.
She pulled away, her eyes wide and frightened. Her creamy complexion acquired a sickly tint. “That’s…that’s crazy! You’re crazy. We can’t run away!”
“You won’t come back and you know it.”
“Yes, I will!” She tried to pull her hands away from him, but he refused to let go. His fingers locked around her wrists, not tight enough to hurt her, just enough to keep her there.
“Bullshit,” he said, lifting her hands to his lips. He gently kissed each knuckle, and felt the tension leave her body as he kissed her lips. Knowing that she wouldn’t run now, he loosened his grip.
“I promise I will,” she said, as he released her.
“I’ve planned it all out.” He had spent the last several hours contemplating how he could divulge his plan to her, and this seemed like the best way. Straight to the point. No hesitation. “I took a gun from the armory.”
“You what?!”
Two chuckled at her expression. She stared at him like he had never fired a gun before. He wondered what her face would look like if he told her that he had actually stolen the pistol off Reynard’s body, but had the wisdom not to divulge that information just yet. Once they escaped, he might tell her about how he had protected her, but that could wait until later.
“You need to return it,” she whispered, gripping his arm. “You need to bring it back before anyone finds out.”
“Nobody will find out,” he assured her.
“Why do you need a gun, anyway?”
A soft smile touched his lips at her naive words. She did not realize how violence was necessary, because she had been taught to resolve every conflict with logic and diplomacy. No matter what happened, he wanted to preserve her innocence.
“We’ll leave tonight,” he said, deciding that it would be better not to answer her question. “After lights out.”
“I can’t,” she said, shaking her head. “Just put the gun back.”
“Nobody even knows I have it, Nine. They’ll never know it’s gone.”
“Forget about this. It’s not worth the risk.”
There it was again. Some good old pol rationality. She needed to realize that sometimes words didn’t cut it. Risks were necessary. Blood must be spilled. That was the way the world worked, even for political subjects.
The future was built on corpses.
“I promise I’ll come back for you,” she said, “so please, just return it. No matter what happens, I’ll never leave you.”
“My plan’s foolproof. We’ll be able to get past the fence, no problem.”
“I just can’t.”
“You can.”
She bit her lip and regarded him for a long, silent moment. Then she sighed. “You really mean it?”
He nodded.
“And you think it will work?”
“I know it will.”
“I understand,” she said, leaning into him. “Tell me your plan.”
Case Notes 8: Subject Nine of Subset A
Nine sat at the edge of her cot, turning the flower crown around in her hands. After just several hours, the flowers’ aroma was beginning to fade, lost beneath the familiar odors of floor wax and clean linen.
Two’s words echoed in her head over and over again. How could he even think about escaping when he would leave soon, too? He could be so impatient sometimes, not to mention reckless.
And stealing a gun? That was just so stupid! How could he do something like that?
She sighed, remembering how she had agreed to desert with him. She should have tried harder to convince him to abandon his foolish plan—which hadn’t been a plan at all, just a plea to meet him by the dumpsters behind the kitchen after lights out. Did he even know what he was doing?
She set the flower crown on her bed and rose to her feet, mulling over what she should do. If she went with him, all would be for naught. They would be captured before they even reached the gate, and then they would never be able to leave together.
Biting her lip, she paced back and forth in front of her bed. She restlessly racked her hands through her hair as she played out different scenarios in her head, trying to find a way that desertion would work.
Assuming that they made it past the fence, they would have to make it to civilization on foot. Likely, they would either die from exposure or be retrieved before they could reach civilization, which for all she knew might be many miles away. And if they did arrive at a town, what then? Although they had been taught for years how to acclimate into American society, it was one thing to watch videos of how an ordinary teen should act and another thing entirely to actually fit in. How could they sur
vive in the outside world alone, when they had only ever experienced it vicariously, through textbooks and the movies in their American society classes?
While she believed she might be able to acclimate, Two was a different story. He had been taught to approach situations with the ruthlessness of a soldier, not with a politician’s diplomacy. The moment something went wrong, it would put him on the offensive and all his training would come out. Blood would be spilled.
Besides, it wasn’t as though they could run forever. They would leave with no money and only the clothes on their backs, and how far would that get them? What kind of future was one spent in constant hiding?
No matter how she looked at it, she really only had one option. She needed to save him from himself, even if he would never forgive her for it. It was better for the both of them. Once he came to his senses, he would realize that desertion was crazy. He was working so hard to become a great military leader, why throw that away? In fact, she would be doing him a favor by stopping him.
Two was one of the Academy’s best subjects, and she was sure that the Leader would be lenient. He would understand that Two wasn’t in his right mind. Maybe Two was still under the effects of the drugs, unstable not by any fault of his own. That had to be it. A bad reaction to the medication. They wouldn’t punish him for that, right?
Still, dread hovered over her like an executioner’s ax as she walked down the hall. Instead of leaving through the barracks’ front entrance, she went through a side door, afraid that she might encounter Two along the way. If she saw his hopeful face, all her nerves would flee her.
Yesterday was the first time in her life that she had been inside the Leader’s office, but she found her way there easily enough. She knocked on the door and waited for a response.
“Come in.”
She opened the door and stepped inside. It made her nervous to be in enclosed quarters with the Leader, but she shut the door to give them some privacy. Then she noticed the armed guard standing next to him and realized that confidentiality was the last thing she would have here.
Hades Rising Page 7
