by Eden Wolfe
“Alright,” Carole said, “I’ll take care of floors twelve and below since I assume you want to oversee the senior floors.”
“Where’s Roman?”
“Roman? You trust Roman with this?”
“He has a legacy to protect. Believe me, I know him well enough. He may have different motives, but he will serve us just the same. Send me Roman.”
Carole gave a single nod and marched out of the office.
Uma ran through in her mind the most critical next steps before the assembly. There was nothing she had to do in her own office; the Great Geneticist’s office never held the Tower’s secrets. That policy had long been in place. No, her role needed to be both ceremonial and political. Pragmatic and protectionist.
“Uma?” Roman stood in the doorway.
“Roman, get in here and lock the door behind you.”
Roman locked it and took two steps further into the office. He clasped his hands in front of him.
“Come, sit down.”
“I’d rather stand,” he said.
“You’ll sit.”
Roman blinked, then clearly thought better of it, and sat in the chair across the desk from Uma.
“Have you heard?”
“There’s a flurry of activity, I’m assuming you’re about to tell me why.”
“The Sisters are coming. Daphna and a thousand more of them.” She watched Roman’s reaction. His eyes narrowed, but he gave nothing more away. “It’s fair to believe they’re coming here.”
“Yes, that seems most likely.”
“Do you need me to spell out what needs to be done in preparation? Or do you know what you need to do?”
“I know. I’ll make it happen.”
“I want you to oversee floors thirteen through seventeen.”
“Don’t you want to do that yourself?”
I intend to keep you busy, Uma thought. No time for any foul play.
She sat back in her chair. “Can’t I trust you with that?”
“Of course you can.”
“Then make it happen.”
Roman stood from the chair and walked more slowly than she would have liked.
“Roman, what are you thinking?”
He turned and shrugged. “This is quite a development,” he replied.
“Quite a development?”
There was a long pause. Roman looked out the window as Uma’s patience wore thin.
“Yes, quite a development indeed.”
He walked out of the office, leaving Uma less sure she’d made the right decision.
17
Roman
The Sisters were coming, and all Roman could think about was the child. Security would be tightening and he had to do something to get the child safe.
Ever since he’d seen Arin, Roman couldn’t shake the feeling that he was being followed by a ghost.
Those eyes. I know those eyes.
Lucius had designed the child, he knew that without question. Even the eyes, the eyes that flashed color with emotion… just like Adam.
Adam.
Roman had always thought Adam would go far. He had physically lasted better than almost all of them.
But then he’d vanished, as though he’d never existed at all. The Queen spoke of treachery, and Roman could believe it. Adam lived on another plane, acted as though he were immune to the rules that governed them all. While it exasperated Roman, he also admired it. Adam must have known there was some kind of timeline on his life too, but he lived it as he wanted.
The child definitely had his eyes… the colors inverted. Adam’s had been brown with blue that shone with fear or excitement. Roman only knew it from witnessing him as a child in the park, at a time when boys were not such a rare sight.
So much had happened in his lifetime.
Roman coughed. A taste rose in the back of his throat. Something odd, something acrid.
Lucius is gone. Adam is gone. This child is our last chance.
18
Trudith
Trudith heard pounding on the door.
She knew it was coming; Anna was to arrive at any moment. Given the changes in the past couple of days, Trudith knew they weren’t safe staying in the twenty-ninth alleyway apartment anymore. The Guard had congregated even more strongly in that area and word was out that the Sisters could be coming from that direction. Maybe the old town, maybe through the very ruins in which they had played just a few days before.
One week ago, and Arin was running around in those ruins. We had to be careful then, but we couldn’t have imagined it would turn like this. So much can change within a week.
She rushed to the door of her apartment, throwing it open, ready to embrace Anna and Arin.
Instead, it was Roman.
Trudy stumbled back a couple of steps and blinked. “I wasn’t expecting you.”
“I don’t suppose you were.”
“This place is going mad, you can’t be here now.”
“I had to come...”
“You’re drawing attention to us!” she hissed.
“Listen, things are going to get really bad for a while. You and Anna and the child - you’ve all got to lay low for a while.”
“You think I don’t know that? I’ve been living in Cork Town my whole life, I’ve seen a lot of things. I know how to manage myself.”
“This is bigger than you, bigger than Cork Town.”
“But it has nothing to do with me. We’ll stay in the shadows. Now you get out of here before someone sees you.”
“Wait, I have this for you. He pushed a small stack of tightly folded papers at her. “Keep them safe. I can’t do anything more than this for now, and it may not be enough, but it’s the best I could do for now. Read them, understand them, and when all of this calms down, maybe then we can talk about plans. If...” Roman looked up, over her head, “If this whole place hasn’t gone up in flames before then.”
“Right to Mobility,” she read on the top of the first page, and she understood.
“There’s one for each of you,” Roman said, wringing his hands. “You’d have to find your way out of the city, and likely on foot for the first piece of it, but if things head the direction that I think they are, then that won’t be the greatest of your worries.”
“Thank you.”
“Nothing to thank me for yet. I can’t give you any credits or else they will be tracked. The last thing we want is for you to be wrapped up with me.”
Trudith cocked her head, realizing. “This is putting you at risk.”
“I was at risk long before this. Now I’m just trying to set something right. Listen, you’re going to have to use your judgment. I can’t tell you when the right moment is going to be. If things really go bad, then we may reach a point where even these papers don’t help you anymore. So you have to watch and listen and not be afraid when the time comes. Do you understand what I mean?”
Trudith was using all her faculties to follow. But she couldn’t imagine what could happen such that she wouldn’t even be able to use these papers. What was coming for them exactly? They had other crackdowns by the Guard before, even if this one was somehow different, with their attention focused on the far west end of Cork Town.
But she would figure it out.
“Yes,” she said. “I understand what you mean.”
“Good, good. In that case, goodbye. It would be best for you if you never mention that I was here to anyone.”
“I understand.”
He turned and began walking away, Trudith started to close the door when she saw him turn back around.
“Trudith, how’s the child?”
“Safe. I’ll make sure of it.”
“No, I mean, is he normal? Is he growing the way that we would expect the child to grow? Does he have all of his faculties?”
Trudy looked at him dead on; his face was tense, as though he feared hearing what she would say next. “Yes, everything about him is just fine.”
Roman nodded
for a few moments, then turned and ran down the stairs.
Trudith shut the door. Everything Roman had said clicked into place and her mind went dull with it. She tried to read the papers Roman had given her, but her eyes wouldn’t focus. She moved to her small salon and sat on the sofa, letting her head fall into her hands.
19
Daphna
How much I never wanted to come back here.
Daphna crested the hill as the groups of Sisters behind gave enough space for her to consider their next steps. This was the last hill before they would enter the city. A part of her expected to be intercepted before they reached the old city gates, as by now all of Lower Earth Direction based in Geb would know of their coming. She wondered whether it had been wise to send scouts ahead of them. The other Sisters had insisted on it, though Daphna had doubted the approach. She’d thought an element of surprise might serve them.
In the end, she understood she’d been well-counseled. Moving in as individuals and not a marching army would serve them well. By the time Daphna arrived with her senior group, a few hundred Sisters would already be settled in the city. Then the rest would follow behind. A quiet occupation.
“Night is falling, Daphna,” one of the women spoke quietly behind her. “Do we set up camp here?”
“Yes, yes…”
She couldn’t speak more than that. She was transfixed by the image of the sunset against Central Tower. The reds, oranges, and yellows were intensified against the mirror image in the Tower’s glass walls.
How she had loved that Tower. How her childhood had been consumed with dreams of changing the face of their planet. She hadn’t been more than ten years old when she decided she would be the one to conquer crop killers. She knew it was in her blood. She knew it was in her design. And every ounce of her body trembled with excitement at the thought of a station on the seventeenth floor.
If only.
If only the Tower had been in reality the same as it had been in my dreams. If only commitment to truth were enough.
Daphna turned around, shaking away the memories and the image of the glowing sunset. “Yes, we camp here. Except for the designated communication group. We go into the city tonight.”
“Tonight?” one of the women stepped forward. “You think they’ll take kindly to us arriving tonight?”
“If this Queen is anything like I’ve heard,” Daphna replied, turning back to the city, the fortress coming into view, “then she expects it.”
Daphna waited until most of the camp was set up before gathering together her inner circle. Nine women plus her made ten for the mission. Women from the Dark Counties, women from the Lakes District. Women from Geb. They came from everywhere, together now as Sisters.
“We have one single goal tonight,” Daphna started. “And that is to be the least offensive possible.”
The women looked around at each other.
“What?”
“Inoffensive? After everything that we’ve gone through, you want us to be inoffensive?”
“Yes,” Daphna continued, “We need to be here not with our normal single-mindedness, but with a bigger goal in mind. I selected each of you because you have shown restraint, and because you don’t have the same history with the Tower as many of us do.”
“Unbelievable,” one woman muttered under her breath. “Come all this way, and with everything we’ve gone through, you want us to be inoffensive when we have in front of us the only person who could have and should have done something to stop our Sisters from dying?”
Daphna saw the woman’s hands in fists at her sides, the tensed muscles in her neck, and her lips pulled together.
I am asking a lot of them.
She scanned the others who were standing more relaxed, their arms crossed and their shoulders down.
“You are right to be angry, Adel,” Daphna replied. “What I’m asking of you is unfair. So you shall stay behind while the rest of us go tonight.”
“What? No!” The woman’s face and body changed immediately, but it didn’t matter. Daphna knew she couldn’t withstand the stress of it.
“Yes. You will have a chance to make your opinion known. But tonight is not the night. You must stay behind, stay with the camp. Otherwise, you put the rest of us at risk, and I can’t have that. You will come with the others, you’ll blend and you’ll keep your ear to the ground. I have no doubt you will have an important role to play. Just not tonight.”
The woman took in a deep inhale and as she hissed the air out she said, “Fine. I get it.” She walked away from the small group, rejoining the rest of the camp.
“Anyone else?” Daphna asked. “There is nothing to be ashamed of. Shame will only come to you if we reach the city gates and then you lose your cool. Then it will be unforgivable. So decide now.”
“I’m coming with you.”
“Me, too.”
A Sister stepped forward, putting a hand on Daphna’s shoulder. “The path you lay before us is the right one. I will follow you.”
Daphna nodded her head slowly offering a small, contemplative smile to each of the women. “You have thirty minutes to make sure your provisions are managed by someone in your camp group. Then we descend on the city.”
The autumn air was crisp and the scent of dying leaves was stronger in this part of the country, she noticed. The Strangelands had a constant smell of moss and musk. The moistness always more pervasive than any other sensation. But in Geb county and its surroundings, Daphna felt a sort of romanticism in the air, mingling among the trees and hills that surrounded the west side of the city.
I’m projecting. There’s nothing here but the city. Oh, but how I miss the city.
She paused.
The city that I had wished it had been. Those dreams were made of dust.
Her stomach hardened.
And now it’s the city that is letting my people die.
Remember that, Daphna.
This is not the city I wanted it to be.
“Come,” she whispered to the women.
They descended, finding themselves amongst the waist-high ruins of the old city gate. It was marked on every map, the old entry, so it said, though taking it in under the rising light of the moon, Daphna found it much more beautiful than a simple entry. She could make out the markings of what seemed to be a series of stone houses; their arrangement seemed to be residential, creating small avenues between them. Simple geometry and yet the history seeped from them, like an ancient hand running along her arms. Her skin rippled, each little hair standing on end.
She closed her eyes and heard the canal in the distance. It was the canal she knew from its arrival in the city proper, but she’d never seen it outside. By the time it reached the center of Geb, it was well underground in a maze of waterways that had been improved in the eighth generation. She had been charged with developing the revised treatment since the water always gathered bacteria, organisms, and disease on its way to the city. That had been her first big project in the Tower, her test.
It had gone brilliantly well. Not only was her molecule effective, but it was scalable, too. It wasn’t much more than basic chemistry from her post-levels course in offsetting strategies, but the key was selecting the right molecule. And that’s where Daphna stood out from other researchers.
The nighttime grew darker, but Daphna couldn’t enter Geb without seeing the canal that had been her passion, her best friend, the code that spent whole nights in her bed, on her table, in her cubicle. Two years she’d been dedicated to it.
Her feet took her there without her ever making a conscious decision.
The sound of the canal grew, a constant, gentle whir of movement as the flow down the hills ran, a consistent murmur.
Two years she’d worked on the canal molecule – though she’d had it solved in a night.
Two years to prove what she’d known from the start.
She hadn’t trusted her own instinct. It had taken more than twenty years for her to realize instinc
t hadn’t had anything to do with it. Twenty years for Lucius’ words to finally ring true in her mind.
She wasn’t just born to be a scientist, she’d been explicitly designed for it.
She was Lucius’ own design.
He’d never told her himself, but she’d felt his eyes on her during those days before he first left the Tower, just before he’d moved out to Cork Town for good. He’d watched her moving from elevator to office. She looked him back, in the eye, curious more than confrontational.
And he’d raised his eyebrows at her, smiled, and winked. That had been the beginning of their relationship.
Lucius before he’d degraded.
Lucius before he’d been executed.
When it had happened, Daphna had already been long out of Geb, but the story reached them within a couple of days. The horror of his flogging, as though they were living in pre-Mist days. The violence of it. Daphna had felt even sadder than she thought she would.
“Daphna?” a voice snapped her back into the present night. “Are you alright? You’ve gone pale, and honestly, I’m not sure where you’re leading us. The city appears to be toward the left, not the right.”
“Being in this place takes me back,” Daphna blinked. “You are correct. We could go around to the north. That’s the primary entry into the city, and that’s where they’ll be expecting us. But I have another idea. A hypothesis that I need to prove first. And one that allows us a quiet entry.”
She carried on toward the canal as they reached its edge she turned back to the Sisters. “There’s another way into the city this way. We’ll be able to make a more subtle entrance here.”
She took them through the winding canal, surprised at how much she remembered. The curves and forks hadn’t changed in decades. She was grateful for it. If they reached an impasse, they’d have to turn around and go back around to the north.
