A Single Light

by Tosca Lee

  Chase shakes his head, looking lost. “I don’t know. Unless something happened and it wasn’t safe, or . . .”

  “The colony in Sidney,” I say. “That doctor figured out where I’d been!”

  But they aren’t here and the place hasn’t been looted.

  I follow Chase up to the dorms again, shell-shocked. Feeling as though some vital organ has been torn from my gut, not knowing how I’ll get it back or get past the pain.

  We search each level again, looking not for people this time, but for answers.

  We find them in a kitchen devoid of food, the dishes left out, but not enough of them.

  Which means some people left before the ones who used these plates.

  But they knew we were out there, that we’d have no idea what was going on. How could Micah, Delaney, Irwin—everyone who’d been in contact with us—just pick up and go without a word? They knew we’d come back!

  Unless they thought we wouldn’t.

  Empty dresser drawers in the dorms. They don’t explain Lauren’s earbuds, or the fact that her clothes—and Truly’s, and Julie’s as well—are still here.

  I don’t like to think what that may mean.

  “Maybe Julie . . .” Chase hesitates, lowers his head a moment, and then just says it. “If Julie died and Irwin and Nelise felt they had to leave sooner for some reason—”

  “No. They’d have taken their things. They would have needed their things!” I say angrily. I pick up an empty water glass from a dresser and throw it. “They would have had to take their things!” I grab the comforter from the bed beside it and tear it off, and then hold it to me, lower my head, and start crying.

  Chase wraps his arms around me, head bowed against mine.

  “We’ll find them,” he whispers.

  But I know what the world has become. How quickly a person can disappear—in it, or in themselves because of it—and never return.

  A little while later, after we’ve spent an hour sitting in a stupor, he extricates himself, saying something about checking outside.

  He’s going to look for the graves.

  To see if Julie’s name is on one of them.

  I drift upstairs after him. Not wanting to stay in the dorm. It feels eerie, like an abandoned asylum.

  Up in the library, I take in the table where I held school. It hurts to look at it. I wander back out through the tunnel to the atrium, with its pixelated wall I used to think of as a wonder until its predictable utopia made me long for the imperfect, real world.

  “Wynter!” Chase shouts from the exit stairwell as I hear him run back down the stairs.

  I look at him blankly when he comes striding in with a paper in his hand, piece of tape stuck to the top, which I’ve come to associate with only one thing.

  “Where was it?” I say, already assuming it’s an infection warning about Ezra.

  “On the back of the silo door.”

  The back of the door? “That’s not a very helpful place to—”

  “Look!” he says, holding it up.

  I do, and then snatch it from him.

  It isn’t a sign. It’s a note.

  __________ and __________ (you know who you are ),

  Came for Open Day to collect you and T. Some wild rumors recently in the news. Worried about your safety—__________’s especially, because of J’s ex.

  Would have waited, but found (the other) J in a bad way. We have the medicine she needs (a lot has changed). Don’t know if she’ll make it—only chance was to leave right away.

  “Ann”

  I look up in wonder. Exhale a short breath of relief that might be a laugh. Relief such a foreign emotion that it practically feels like ecstasy.

  “They’re safe. She has medicine,” I say, looking up at him. And then: “How—why—do they have medicine?”

  “So this is a note to us,” Chase says.

  “Yes!” I translate: “ ‘Wynter and Chase. Came for Open Day to collect you and Truly. Some wild rumors recently in the news. Worried about your safety—Truly’s especially, because of who her dad is.’ ” I don’t have to explain his ties to the original disease samples or work on the vaccine; Chase nearly died helping me get them to Ashley.

  “ ‘Would have waited, but found Julie in a bad way. We have what she needs . . .’ You get the rest.” I lower the note. “All we have to do is go. Did you see if they left us any fuel? Because we could be there by—”

  “Wynter!” Chase says. “Who’s Ann?”

  I stop, realizing I never told him about the alias she used in an online exposé about Magnus.

  “Kestral,” I say. “She’s taking Julie and the girls to the Enclave.”

  3:41 A.M.

  * * *

  The ark has changed in the space of an hour, this place that has been my shelter and my prison.

  The beds, so eerie before, now seem thanklessly rumpled. The dishes forgotten on the dining hall tables no longer ominous, but discarded. The books on the library shelves left to gather dust now that their spines have been cracked so many times.

  Each book, each dish, each bedsheet the last effects of the man who provided them. Dying in an asylum and prison of his own.

  There’s no fresh water except in the yard; a shower will have to wait. I’ve changed out of the stinky and bloodstained clothes and now stand in front of the open drawers of my dresser, trying to decide what to take.

  I stack clean jeans, T-shirts, and underwear in a backpack on top of Otto’s sketchbook. Women aren’t allowed to wear pants in the Enclave, but I don’t own any skirts. Have been allergic to them ever since being cast out.

  I’ll just have to borrow one of Kestral’s, as my mom did fifteen years ago.

  I grab Truly’s coloring book, Julie’s purse, and Lauren’s earbuds, my comb, toothbrush, and whatever toothpaste and toiletries are left. Add the last of the OCD prescription, the box of dicloxacillin, and the meds that survived the Warden’s crash—only one bottle of vancomycin among them, the bottom of the carrier a pharmaceutical Molotov cocktail of drugs and glass.

  Last, I slip into a fresh pair of sneakers.

  And think of Otto.

  Shoeless and lying in a creek bed.

  I’m ready—desperate, even—to leave. To rejoin Truly, Lauren, and Julie and see Kestral again.

  For the first time in my life, I miss the Enclave. Not for its oppressive routine and endless precepts or the rules that regularly landed me in Penitence, but for the false sense of security they gave me. That we were safe and somehow set apart from a world bent on devouring us.

  I even miss the walls.

  Because I have been—devoured. By the very world Magnus cast me out into when he branded me a heretic and delivered me to Satan.

  I find Chase in the mechanical room trying to siphon fuel from the generator.

  “They didn’t leave any in the tank?” I ask, incredulous.

  “They didn’t leave any in the generators, either,” he says, shaking his head.

  Despite the fact that we weren’t exactly friends, I didn’t quite expect them to screw us over.

  I turn and kick the open door of the empty weapons locker. Scream every obscenity I’ve ever heard. And then scream again, this time at God, for sending the same solutionless problems over and over again like some obsessive loop from Hell.

  I stop when I notice Chase holding his head in his hands.

  “Sorry,” I say.

  He finally looks up, lips pursed. And then bursts out laughing.

  “This isn’t funny,” I say, but can’t help the laugh that escapes me like a hiccup—not at the situation, but at him.

  “That is . . . not how you use those words.”

  I roll my eyes and lean back heavily against the wall, just now realizing how exhausted I am.

  He shrugs. “I’m just saying, if you’re going to shoot people with AR-15s from the hip or roll them off the road—which, that was my move, by the way—you should probably . . .” He pauses, fig
hting to keep a straight face. And then his expression smoothes.

  “I love you,” he says simply, stormy eyes fixed on me. “There isn’t anyone I’d rather be locked in a silo with, stealing stuff, getting shot at, or committing grand arson with.”

  I look away, wanting to ask what happens when that’s all over. Because it will be, one day—if not this year, or the next.

  “Wynter,” he says.

  “I know. I just—” I stop, startled, as his head snaps toward the mechanical room entrance. He straightens as he turns off his flashlight, mine still illuminating the room as he picks up his rifle.

  He moves to the side of the door, weapon trained on the staircase below where my rifle rests on the library table.

  “What?” I whisper. He points to my flashlight, still lit.

  “Put that out,” he says, low.

  I do, as the atrium door bursts open with a boom.

  4:35 A.M.

  * * *

  The door crashes back against the wall, the sound echoing through the tunnel.

  I close my eyes and strain in the silence until someone says: “Clear.”

  There’s only one group—one person—who has enough reason to track us all the way here with the means to do it.

  I wait for the voice. The intonation like an evil clown from a bad horror movie.

  Gold-i-locks . . .

  Glow of light from below. Whoever it is moves with unsettling quiet.

  I can just make out the line of Chase’s jaw, his shoulder, as he peers around the jamb. There’s no way anyone’s coming up those stairs without getting shot. Strategically speaking, there’s no better room to be holed up in; Chase can defend this eagle’s nest all day.

  Which is why I wonder which one of us has finally caught the crazy when I see him lower his rifle.

  He steps back, turns the flashlight on, stands it on the HVAC unit with a soft metallic thud, illuminating the room.

  “What are you doing?” I hiss.

  Shouts issue from below.

  “Move where I can see you! Drop your weapon!”

  I stare as he lays aside the rifle.

  “Chase!”

  “It’s okay,” he says, looking at me as he moves into the doorway, hands in the air.

  It’s not okay. I’m not ready to surrender.

  But the fact that he’s laying down his rifle tells me it’s hopeless. That whether I’m ready or not, it’s time.

  I’ve never told him I love him.

  “Semper Fi, brothers,” he says with a nod.

  A hesitation, and then: “Semper Fi. Name?”

  “Chase Miller. 0321.”

  “Are you alone?”

  “There’s someone up here with me,” Chase says.

  “Their name?”

  Chase turns and looks at me, eyes asking me to trust him.

  “Wynter Roth.”

  I shake my head, not understanding what he’s doing.

  “Roth is with you,” the man says, as though making sure he heard right.

  “Yes,” Chase says.

  “She’s here,” someone says into a radio.

  The first man says: “Where are the others?”

  “Gone,” Chase says.

  “You’re alone.”

  Chase nods and glances at me.

  I look away.

  A voice calls up from below.

  “Wynter? Are you there? Where’s Truly?”

  I look up with a start. Because I know that voice.

  Ashley.

  4:45 A.M.

  * * *

  The change in Truly’s biological father is so dramatic, I’m glad I heard his voice before I saw him or I might have mistaken him for a stranger.

  The long hair’s gone. He’s thinner, something sharper about his eyes, which are still Truly’s though there’s a fresh scar across his nose he didn’t have before.

  He’s here with four men in camouflage—and not the salvage store wannabe variety, either—whom Chase immediately shook hands with like they were old friends even as he learned their names.

  I’m so confused.

  Ashley pulls me into a tight hug and then steps back and tugs his mask off as he looks around.

  “Where is she?” he asks, and there’s only one person he can mean.

  I glance at the others at the mention of Truly. Suddenly protective of my niece, even if she is his biological daughter. Wondering why he’s come with these men. Why would he, if not to take her away?

  “She’s not here,” I say. Not sure if I should muster a lie, or if Truly will be safer in these men’s hands.

  “Oh.” He glances down, his brows working. He looks crestfallen.

  “But she’s fine,” I say quickly, realizing how that might have sounded. “She’s with friends.”

  His head snaps up. “Where? Why aren’t you with her?”

  “We were on our way to her. Maybe you can help us.”

  “ ‘We’?”

  “Ashley, this is Chase,” I say.

  Chase comes to shake his hand.

  “The Chase?” he says, glancing at me, and then taking Chase’s hand. “You survived!” The last time Ashley saw me, I was mourning Chase, thinking I’d lost him.

  “That’s the rumor,” Chase says with a slight smile.

  “How can you be the only ones here? The silo just opened a few hours ago,” Ashley says, looking as confused as I feel.

  “There was a mechanical failure. It’s been open for three days.” I glance around at the Marines clearly deferring to one of their own, that man—whichever one he is—seeming to wait for Ashley to say something, Ashley obviously wanting answers about Truly first.

  “Ashley, what are you doing here?” I say. “Is Truly in danger? Does someone know who she is?” After all I’ve done and Noah’s done to keep it quiet?

  “No,” he says. “Only these men and another team prepared to get her somewhere safe.”

  “Why does she need two teams of Marines?” I say.

  “She doesn’t,” he says quietly. “These men are here for you.”

  A chill crab-walks down my spine.

  I stare at him.

  I’ve expected betrayal from many sides. But I did not expect it from him.

  “What do you mean?” Chase says, coming at him. One of the Marines grabs him by the shoulder and he jerks away, his expression as betrayed as mine must have been in the mechanical room, and twice as desperate. “You know she didn’t do the things she’s accused of! She didn’t put the nation at risk—she put her life on the line to save it!”

  Panic washes over me. If they take me away now, I may never see Truly again.

  But Truly’s safe. Which is all that matters.

  As long as that’s true, I won’t even resist. Because there’s no chance I’ll fight my way out of this one, even with Chase.

  “I know,” Ashley says, shaking his head slightly as he turns to me. And I wait for him to say that it doesn’t matter—for whatever reason.

  “Which is why I’m sorry,” he says, “to ask you to do it again.”

  I pause. “What?”

  “You wouldn’t have heard yet, but right now there is no vaccine.”

  “I’m aware,” I say, and glance at the other men, wondering what they’re here for if not to take me to prison.

  “There will be a widespread vaccine very soon. Just not here in the United States.”

  “I don’t understand. I saw you fly right over me with the National Guard as I was driving your Camaro down I-80 to go get Truly.”

  “No, you didn’t.”

  “Ashley—” I snap.

  “That was me,” he says slowly. “I flew over you—saw you, even—but that wasn’t the National Guard. The last thing I actually remember is waving at you from the sky. Two days later, I woke up in a prison cell.”

  “What? Where?”

  “For the first two months, I had no idea. They were very careful not to talk in front of me. The third month, I learned
I was in Russia. As far as we can tell, the message I sent to the CDC about the samples was intercepted. It had just been attacked, remember?”

  Of course I remember.

  “The Russians have the samples,” Chase says slowly.

  I turn away with a bitter laugh. “Which was always the plan, at least as far as Magnus was concerned.” He’d been in the process of trying to exchange the samples for some three-million-year-old life-extending bacteria a Russian scientist had found frozen in Siberia. An exchange that involved my sister, Jackie, who brought them to me, instead.

  Which got her killed.

  “And now they’re manufacturing a vaccine,” Ashley says. “With which they can hold the rest of the world hostage.”

  “They just let you go?”

  “No,” he says. “I befriended one of my guards. He helped me escape. I made my way to Ukraine, where I spent days finding someone who would listen to me, more days proving I wasn’t crazy, and even more trying to contact someone in the American government.”

  He sounds worn, tired, and not a little bitter.

  “I got back two weeks ago. Spent ten days in Alaska trying to find remnants of the animal the samples were taken from. Doing everything—and anything—I could to keep from having to come here and force the silo open or in any way publicly acknowledge my ties to you. Not for your sake, but for Truly’s. Because I know we want the same thing: for her to be safe. And that means no one can ever know who she is to me, what makes her special.”

  He looks intently at me. I understand his meaning.

  “What do you need me to do?” I ask.

  “We can’t sequence the virus from someone who’s sick,” he says. “The antigens, which are like puzzle pieces, aren’t all there. It’s why the original samples were so valuable. Without the samples or the original carcasses, there’s only one . . .” he says, his eyes begging me not to correct him, “other source.”

  “Me,” I say.

  He nods. “I gave them all to you before you left Colorado so you could keep Truly safe. The best and only way I could take care of her.”

  “Where do we go so I can give them back?”

  “The only place in the U.S. with power other than Hawaii,” he says. “Puerto Rico.”