Fallen Firsts

by Jillian Torassa

  Despite a decent night’s sleep, Gideon had been on edge all morning. “But we don’t need them!” he responded with obviously thinning patience. “We can talk—”

  “I’m really beginning to think you’re a First in disguise.”

  “It’ll be chancy,” Christa said, speaking over the budding dispute. “I’m sure security will be tight around Erroris, even if they’re not in lockdown like Liminis is.”

  “Worth the risk if you ask me.”

  A shrill whistle filled the cave as a gust of wind entered the small hole at the top.

  “I wouldn’t mind a rain jacket, either,” Christa said solemnly.

  Malek laughed and she smirked, a mad glint in her eye.

  “So you’re with me then, Third?”

  “Don’t ever call me that again.”

  Gideon opened his mouth to protest, but Christa and Malek both rose from the dirty floor, wiping off their backsides like we didn’t even exist.

  “After you,” Christa motioned with her good arm.

  “Wait, are you serious?” Gideon stood, too, but neither of them spared him a glance.

  “With pleasure,” Malek said.

  And with that, Gideon and I were left alone in the mostly dark cavern.

  He spun toward me, glowering down into my face. “What the hell just happened?” he demanded.

  I sighed. “Look, Gideon, they don’t want to go into this unarmed. I don’t see why you can’t understand that.”

  “But if they get caught, they’ll put the rest of us in danger.”

  “I guess that’s true.”

  Growling, he sunk down next to me again. “I hope we don’t end up with another Cameron on our hands.”

  “Stop snapping at me,” I replied. The stress in my stomach was corroding the strength of my tolerance. “There’s nothing wrong with having force, even if we don’t use it.”

  Gideon’s stubborn insistence that we could do this without violence was starting to get on my nerves. He was being naive and obstinate, and if he didn’t stop popping his hawking knuckles, I would rip his fingernails off.

  “Would you knock it off?”

  “What?”

  “Stop cracking your knuckles.”

  “It keeps me busy.”

  “Well, it makes me crazy.”

  He responded with a slow, pop. pop.

  I narrowed my eyes, dangerously close to socking him in the nose.

  “Are you sure you know how to get to the rendezvous point?” he asked me for the fiftieth time that morning. “To the Outram?”

  “Oh. My. Adam. For the last time, yes! I know how to get to the rendezvous point.”

  “Fine.”

  “Fine.”

  I had started the day in a decently happy mood, but that had quickly slipped away with Gideon’s persistently poor attitude. It’s not like this was the first time we were putting our lives in danger, and I didn’t understand why he was so tense.

  We sat in silence for the rest of the hour or so we were supposed to wait after Malek and Christa left, each of us stewing in our own annoyance.

  “Is it time to go yet?” he spat, a million years later.

  “I don’t know,” I snarled back. “Aren’t Seconds supposed to carry watches?”

  “When was the last time you saw me with a watch?”

  I breathed heavily through my nose before standing up abruptly. “Fine. I think it’s been long enough. Let’s go.”

  He didn’t argue, and I followed him as he climbed back up the stone shaft ahead of me.

  Before I reached the storm that raged outside, however, I heard something that made my heart plummet into my stomach.

  “Stop! Put your hands up!”

  I flattened my chest against the rock as my pulse pumped into my head.

  “Wow, wow, okay, okay!” Gideon said. “Don’t shoot.”

  “What are you doing out here?”

  “I’m just—”

  “You better not lie to me, kid. I’m getting Adam-damned tired of people lying to me.”

  “I was just—”

  “Wait, Nelson, look at this,” a third voice added.

  The wind howled around the remains of the railroad tunnel as I held my breath, waiting to hear more.

  “He’s that wanted Second from Liminis!”

  I was frozen, memories of popping knuckles and stubborn peaceful protest quickly vanishing in the face of Gideon’s impending doom. What was I supposed to do? My mind raced as it tried to focus on a viable course of action, but it was coming up blank. I was weaponless—all I had in my backpack were camping supplies—and if I showed my face, they’d catch me, too. But I couldn’t let them take him. Not after everything—

  “Where’s that girl you’re supposed to be with. She in there?”

  I shrunk a little deeper into the shadows.

  “No. She’s dead.”

  My heart corkscrewed into my spine.

  “You expect me to believe that?”

  “I swear to you, I’m alone.”

  I need a plan. A plan, a plan, a plan . . .

  “Check it out, Perez.”

  A hundred curse words sprinted frantically through my head as I slid back into the cavern, barely escaping the bright beam that lit up the space I had just evacuated.

  “I don’t see anything,” Perez called.

  “Make sure.”

  My lungs screamed for oxygen as I pressed my body up against the wall, making myself as small as physically possible. The reach of the flashlight slowly grew bigger as its source neared me, and as though in slow motion, I waited for it to find me. To devour me. To—

  The light disappeared.

  “What are you doing?”

  “Trying to get into the hawking hole.”

  “Are you crazy? You won’t fit, you fat ass!”

  The miniscule amount of light that filtered in through the entrance disappeared as Perez presumably tried to climb into it, and I was shrouded in pitch.

  “I told you, she’s dead. I’m alone.” Gideon’s voice was more muffled than it had been before, but it was impressively calm and convincing.

  “A little help here?”

  “I’m not taking my gun off him. Get out yourself.”

  “I—can’t—”

  And then the natural light of the cloudy day filtered in once more. As the fresh air came whistling toward me, I exhaled shakily.

  A plan, a plan, my brain resumed, dammit, come on . . .

  “Well, I didn’t see anything. As far as I can tell, it’s just a narrow shaft, barely big enough for one person.”

  “Like I said.”

  “Shut up, Second. You better keep your mouth shut.”

  And then, before I could breathe or blink or figure out what the hell I was going to do next, their voices began to fade, replaced instead by the insistent, howling wind.

  No.

  They couldn’t just take him.

  Gideon!

  It was as though my muscles were paralyzed. No matter how hard I tried, I couldn’t will them to move. I couldn’t breathe. I couldn’t think.

  And then it was too late.

  He was gone.

  ---

  “Do you think that’s what happened to Christa and Malek?”

  Didn’t you hear me? If the voice in my head had been audible, it would have deafened all of them. They took Gideon! Who the hawk cares about Christa and Malek! The only reason I had forced myself to reach this damned rendezvous point in the first place was so they could help me get him back. “I don’t know,” I said after a deep, steadying breath. “Maybe.” Did they have any idea how close I was to snapping? Cece, surely, had guessed by now.

  We were crouched in the ruins of a pre-apocalyptic building—Cece, Marsh, Jaron, and me. The two remaining walls of the “Outram Hotel” created a right angle, and we hid in the corner, covered by the thick overgrowth that had taken over the wreckage.

  And it took everything I had not to call attention to o
ur hiding place. Loudly, and with resounding fury. Hello! They. Took. Gideon!

  “There haven’t been heavy patrols in the area for several days,” Jaron said, studying a piece of paper that must have contained some kind of reconnaissance. “I figured we would be relatively safe.”

  I scrunched up my face and my fists, breathing deeply again. You’ve been keeping track of patrols, and you didn’t warn us? Or fill us in?

  Cece avoided making eye contact with me.

  That was wise.

  “But I can’t believe they went back inside the wall.” He shook his head, rubbing the back of his neck. “Those two are crazy, if you ask me.”

  I couldn’t believe they were still talking about Malek and Christa. Those two deserved to be caught for being so glutty! Gideon and I had kept to the plan, and this should have never happened. I narrowed my eyes at Cece, waiting for her to slip. Just one glance in my direction, just one, and I would break. Oh, how I wanted to break . . .

  Instead, she sighed, wiping her eyes tiredly. “We’re all crazy, and capture was always a possibility.”

  “So, what do we do now?” Marsh’s voice was timid and scared.

  Cece, LOOK AT ME. I cleared my throat.

  She didn’t acquiesce.

  With a growl, I spoke, barely opening my lips for the words to pass through. “We have to go after Gideon.” I couldn’t believe they needed me to spell it out for them. “Before they kill him?”

  Because I was one-hundred and a billion percent sure that was what they were going to do to him.

  Finally, her eyes met mine. They were hard and unfamiliar, not filled with the concern they should have been. “We can’t risk calling unwarranted attention to ourselves. We will continue onward to Liminis, cautiously, but we can’t risk a rescue attempt once we are there. I’m sure Gideon would agree.”

  My eyebrows shot up and I opened my mouth to retort, but before I could, Marsh hissed at us to be quiet.

  My stomach turned to stone.

  “What?” Jaron asked in a panicked whisper.

  But I had heard it, too, and my vehemence quickly switched to fear, a pattern that was becoming all too familiar to me.

  Though the wind still persisted, this was more than rustling leaves; it sounded like a person (maybe two) huffing through the underbrush, dragging something heavy behind them. I could only tell because of the muttered curse words that reached my ears on labored breath, and curiosity naturally mingled with my panic.

  Jaron jumped to his feet and went to investigate, peering beyond the crumbling wall and then disappearing behind it. I pulled myself up to my knees and turned to peep through the hole that had once been a window, but I couldn’t see anything.

  “What in the name of holy ignorance are you doing?”

  I looked at Cece with my eyebrows raised as Jaron’s harsh voice reached our hiding spot, but my heart still pumped frantically.

  “We found her skulking around about a mile away.” Though I had only just met her, I recognized Christa’s voice and I sighed in relief. Fatigue started to replace every other emotion that my body had recently experienced.

  I desperately needed a vacation.

  “Hurry up, get out of the open!”

  My weary relief was fleeting, however, as the magnitude of her words finally struck me. We found her skulking around? Had they kidnapped someone?

  Straightening my stiff legs, I hurried around the corner to help, because if there was one thing that could get us in even more trouble, it was this.

  Sure enough, Christa and Malek held the limp body of a female patrolman by the armpits as they lugged her through the bushes.

  “What the hell were you thinking?” Jaron hissed as he grabbed the woman’s feet, which dragged uselessly behind her.

  “Roke,” I whispered, lunging forward to rescue her sagging torso.

  Through his haggard breath, Malek attempted an explanation. “We snuck up on her about forty-five minutes ago. She was on patrol, talking to someone on some sort of hand-held device, and we couldn’t help but hear snatches of the conversation.”

  We reached the side of the wall where we had been hiding, and I helped lean the unconscious woman against it.

  Christa straightened up, stretching out her back. “It sounded like she was listing off places where other rebel survivors could be hiding.”

  “What?”

  The woman groaned.

  “What are we supposed to do with her?” Marsh demanded in an uncharacteristically harsh whisper.

  In lieu of a response, Christa’s fist swung through the air, making contact with the woman’s temple and causing her to collapse again.

  “What did you do that for?” Cece snapped.

  “Are you serious?” Christa responded. “You’re lucky I didn’t kill her.”

  The group was clearly not as close-knit as I had originally hypothesized. They continued to argue, but I just stood there with my hands on my hips, trying to process this new information. My chest was filled with pressure, and I couldn’t focus on any one thought, even though there were at least 50 spinning around in my head.

  Gideon. Abducted Second. Rebels. Gideon. Abducted Second. Survivors . . .

  Survivors.

  “Hey!” I whisper-yelled.

  The other five turned to stare at me.

  “What did you say about other survivors?”

  “Ah, yes.” Malek held up one finger excitedly with an almost-smile as he reached into his pocket with the other hand. He pulled out a crinkled pair of papers.

  “What is that?”

  “A list and a map.” Unfolding the first piece gingerly, he cleared his throat and read: “‘Based on intelligence provided by Doctor Mata MacLeod, we have reason to believe that some of the rebels may have survived the blitz.’”

  Rage mingled with excitement and curiosity as the awful verbiage assaulted my ears.

  Mata.

  “‘We have patrols throughout the colonies, but these are the areas that should receive the most attention.’ It goes on to list about twenty different places for them to check thoroughly, with instructions to report back once the areas have been combed.”

  “I’m assuming you found it after you knocked her out?” Marsh asked, inspecting the unconscious woman’s head gingerly.

  “She had information about other survivors. Don’t you think that’s something we should possess if we’re going to storm Liminis?”

  “Why did you bring her back with you?”

  I turned my back on the bickering, my brain finally filling with more concrete thoughts.

  Gideon needed my help. It was possible that they would execute him the moment he returned to Liminis, but it was likely they’d question him first. That bought me some time. I couldn’t realistically expect to rescue him unless I could destroy the Doctors, and the only way I could do that was to gather more support. However, I couldn’t just leave him.

  Gideon. Abducted Second. Rebels. Gideon. Abducted Second. Survivors.

  I knew what needed to be done. The tricky part would be convincing everyone else to agree. “We have to go looking for them.”

  Once again, silence fell upon our hiding spot, and I felt five sets of eyes drill into my shoulder blades.

  Taking a deep breath, I turned to address them. “Well, you have to go looking for them.” More accurately, it would be tricky to get just one of them to agree. “We all know we can’t do this alone. And we can’t give up, either. Right?”

  Malek and Christa both murmured in assent. Jaron nodded, but Cece and Marsh looked unconvinced. It was likely that Marsh was spooked by the recent developments and crimes committed, but I knew Cece was concerned with one specific pronoun.

  I continued, hoping she would forget about it. “So, in order to maximize our success, we need to find as many survivors as we can. Agreed?”

  More mumbled concurrence. It sounded like Christa said something suspiciously akin to “no roke, Sherlock.”

  Ignoring the prof
anity, I turned instead to Malek. “Were you able to steal weapons?”

  He quickly took a heavy-looking backpack off his shoulders. “Yes. We barely escaped, but both Christa and I have backpacks full.”

  “We need a militia.”

  “Yes. We.” Cece broke her silence, forcing me to look at her. Her eyebrows were arched and her thin arms were crossed grumpily over her chest.

  “I can’t leave him.”

  “They’ll kill you if you go back alone.”

  “They’ll kill him if I don’t try.”

  Christa cleared her throat with unnecessary force. “Um, excuse me. This is a lot bigger than just one Second. We don’t have time to worry about him. What are we going to do about these people?” She crossed quickly to Malek and snatched the paper out of his hand, shaking it angrily in the air.

  The others gathered around her, forming a barrier between Cece and me. As they talked and schemed, she glared at me. But I wasn’t about to argue with her.

  Spinning around abruptly, I pushed my back against one of the crumbling walls of the old hotel and sunk to the ground, keeping my eyes averted. I knew I wouldn’t be able to do anything for him by myself. She knew that, too. But I couldn’t go gallivanting around the colonies, even to gather back-up, while he sat alone in a government prison. Probably tortured. Definitely sentenced to death. The others would catch up with me soon enough, but until then, I would have to risk everything to get him back.

  “Is it time to go yet?” he spat, a million years later.

  “I don’t know,” I snarled. “Aren’t Seconds supposed to carry watches?”

  “When was the last time you saw me with a watch?”

  “Fine,” I spat. “I think it’s been long enough. Let’s go.”

  Those were the last words we had said to each other. Burning tears filled my eyes, and a few of them dribbled down my face as I forced my lids to close. I needed to sleep now. But as soon as the sun rose, I was gone.

  On my own.

  To do what I could until back-up arrived.

  “We probably can’t win,” I heard Jaron say. Though I didn’t look, I guessed he was talking to Marsh. “We’ll probably all die. But the chances of that decrease slightly, the more support we garner.”

  “I know.” Sure enough, it was Marsh who responded. “I know. It’s just . . . we can’t win. We can’t. It’s hard to commit to a suicide mission, especially when we just barely escaped the Factory . . .”