Darkness Follows

by L. A. Weatherly

  “Sephy, will you marry me?” asked Mac in a low voice.

  She didn’t look up.

  “No,” she said.

  Mac smiled and pulled off his overcoat. He went over and dropped to his knees beside her. “I love you,” he said. “Please, Sephy. Marry me and make me the happiest man in the—”

  “Oh, get up.”

  Mac got up. He hefted himself onto the desk and Persephone gave him a pained look. “You’re sitting on my ephemeris,” she said.

  Mac raised himself up with his hands and Sephy rescued the book of planetary charts. “How many times now have I asked you to marry me?” he said as she flipped through its pages.

  “Seventeen. And we’ve only been together a year, and I only moved in eight weeks ago. It’s kind of impressive.”

  “We’ve known each other since we were fourteen, and you’ve practically lived here from the second we got together,” Mac countered. “Besides, you’re keeping track. That’s got to be good, right?”

  Sephy was working on an astrological chart. After the events of the past few months, she was one of the only official state astrologers the Resistance had left. Whenever possible, she doctored information to save people. Mac saw the corner of her mouth twitch.

  “It’s more a kind of morbid fascination,” she said as she carefully drew the symbol for Venus. “I ask myself, ‘How many times will this fool try?’”

  “That’s easy. Until you say yes.” Mac took the fountain pen from her fingers and laid it aside. He put his hands on her shoulders and kissed her. She smelled faintly of vanilla – her natural scent intoxicating to him.

  “Mac, I’m trying to work.”

  “Go ahead, work,” he murmured. “I’m not stopping you.”

  “I can’t. You stole my pen, you…you pen-thief.”

  She was kissing him back now, her long, slim fingers stroking through his dark hair. Mac let his lips slide down her neck, shutting out everything that had happened, losing himself in the silkiness of her skin.

  She pulled away and studied him carefully. Her brown eyes narrowed. “Something’s wrong,” she said, and laid her hand against his cheek.

  Mac started to answer and stopped. He slid off the desk, wondering how to word it. Sephy rose too; she stood slightly taller than him. Her face reminded him of a doe’s: long, narrow of chin, with softly angled cheekbones.

  Now dread had come over it. “It’s about the Day of Three Suns, isn’t it?” she whispered.

  Mac took a breath. “Yeah.”

  Mac had first been employed by Gunnison’s regime as a message boy. Quick and able, he’d gradually worked his way up to Cain’s assistant. It was all to benefit the Resistance – he’d been with them since he was sixteen. What had once been a fledgling, scattered movement had evolved into an organized network of thousands. They aided people found Discordant; produced underground newspapers; collected vital information.

  Assassinating Gunnison had been their goal for years. Cain had to be taken out simultaneously or he’d seize power. It had long remained frustratingly out of reach. The Day of Three Suns had been exactly what the Resistance needed: both men up on a stage together for an event so massive that infiltration of the tight security was possible. Everything had been coming together: the snipers, the way in, all of it.

  Then two months ago, a key man had been captured and their plan found out.

  Mac had been blindsided, unable to tip anyone off. Crucial Appalachian contacts had been wiped out – the Western Quarter Resistance left gutted and gasping. Dozens were deemed Discordant by Kay Pierce and sent to correction camps. Though still largely functional in the former Central States, the Resistance’s outer network was shattered.

  The Day of Three Suns – originally scheduled for a conference centre in Philadelphia – had been relocated. The new city and venue were classified; Mac knew only that they’d be somewhere else in Appalachia. Madeline Bark was coordinating the event.

  Mac didn’t have a single contact now who stretched to her. Moving in and out of Appalachia from the closed Can-Amer was difficult. The international Heat had been their only real hope for reforging their Resistance “chains”. And now, with Mac’s relocation, his contacts there would think “Vince Griffin” – Mac’s main Resistance alias – captured or dead.

  Everyone would be cast adrift. Appalachia would fall, and Gunnison and Cain would continue to flourish.

  Sephy’s black hair had tumbled down around her shoulders. As they lay in bed hours later, Mac stroked its wavy length. “So that’s how it is,” he said roughly. “If they didn’t search everyone who got close to the pair of them, I swear I’d assassinate them myself.”

  Sephy lay studying him, her dark eyes looking even larger than usual.

  “You’d never make it out alive if you did,” she said.

  “So?”

  She punched his arm, hard enough to hurt. “So I don’t want you to die, you fool! Mac, there must be some way that we can still find out where the new venue is and put the plan back in place.”

  “We’ll damn well try. But with half the Resistance wiped out…” Mac swiped a hand over his face. “No, the Harmony Treaty’s pretty certain to go ahead, all right. And then we’ll lose the eastern ports.”

  The Appalachian ports were vital, now that the Western Seaboard had fallen: they were the Resistance’s only remaining route to get people and information out to the rest of the world.

  Sephy swallowed and said nothing.

  Mac added, “And if anyone encounters me doing interrogations, they’ll think they were the ones I was double-crossing, not Gunnison.” He stared up at the ceiling. “Interrogations,” he murmured. His muscles were tight.

  Sephy stroked his arm. “This Miss Pierce must really have it in for you,” she said bitterly.

  Mac snorted. “Believe it or not, Kay Pierce likes me, as much as she likes anyone. I think she thought she was doing me a favour. Cain wants me to spy on her,” he added.

  Sephy straightened a little. “Really?”

  “He pulled me aside after the meeting. It’s why he didn’t push harder for me to keep travelling to the Western Quarter; he wants me to find out how far her influence with Gunnison goes. I can sum it up in three words: she’s screwing him.”

  Sephy frowned. “There must be more to it. Surely Gunnison’s not some yokel who goes slack-jawed over sex.”

  “Sex plus his chief astrologer? Who he thinks holds the direct key to Harmony? Ha.”

  “Be careful,” Sephy said. “I think our little Miss Kay is a dangerous woman. She’s got a lot to win or lose.”

  “Don’t we all?” Mac lay studying the ceiling’s whorls and swirls. “‘Interrogation’ means torturing people, you know,” he said, so softly Sephy hardly heard him. “I don’t think I can do it, Seph. Not even if it’s the only way I can stay close to Gunnison and Cain.”

  “Is it time to leave?” she said in a low voice.

  Mac turned his head on the pillow to study her. “Would you come with me?”

  She nodded, her eyes fixed on his face. Mac let out a breath and gripped her hand hard.

  “All right,” he said. “Just knowing that helps.”

  Sephy tugged playfully at his fingers. “Didn’t you already know it?”

  “You won’t marry me, woman. How the hell should I know what goes on in that head of yours?”

  She smiled.

  “Okay. Let me check it out first,” Mac said finally. “If I can manoeuvre myself into a role that I can deal with, I’ll have to stay. I’m the only person we’ve got left on the inside.”

  Sephy leaned over and kissed him; her hair brushing his bare shoulder. “Whatever you decide,” she said, “I’ll be right there with you.” She hesitated and touched his cheek. “And, Mac, listen – on a personal level…well, I’m pretty happy that you’ll be around more.”

  “Yeah,” he said in a soft voice. “Me too.”

  They lay in each other’s arms. Mac could hear the s
ound of traffic outside, a noise he found soothing. The growls of autos and buses had been his first lullabies as a child. He was a city boy, through and through. He was aware of the warmth of Persephone’s skin against his; the feel of the sheet against his legs.

  “I saw Collis today,” he said, remembering.

  “Really?” Sephy stirred; the case had interested them both. “Did he mention Vancour?”

  “I mentioned her,” said Mac. “I wanted to see how he reacted.”

  “And?”

  Mac shrugged, drifting off now. “I think he really cares about her,” he said drowsily. “Whatever it was that happened, I don’t think he planned it.”

  CHAPTER FIVE

  November, 1941

  In my mind I was flying.

  I lay stiffly under the thin covers with my eyes shut. The concrete hut was icy. Around me, I could hear ragged breathing – a few coughs. From outside, as always, came John Gunnison’s whisper and a distant, mechanical sound.

  Machine oil, I thought. Its scent had been so rich, like perfume, every time I climbed into the cockpit. I imagined the stick in my hand, watched a billowing cloud grow larger as I flew towards it. I pulled back, soared high – then went into a roll and the world spun.

  Sunshine. Clean, white clouds. The Dove, so responsive, like strapping on a pair of wings and stepping up into the sky.

  I jumped as a siren wailed and the cabin’s light came on. Gunnison’s voice started booming: “…Because Lady Harmony has spoken, my friends! The way forward is clear! We…”

  Five a.m.

  A pair of grimy, sock-clad feet was pressed against my head. Wearily, I pushed them away and sat up. You’d think I’d be used to the smell here by now, but it still made my head throb: unwashed bodies, the too-full chamber pot. One of the windows had a crack in it. I both cursed it for the cold and blessed it for the fresh air.

  At the other end of the bed, the owner of the grimy feet sat up too: a girl a little older than me named Fran, with hollow cheeks and dull hair. Every time I saw her, I wondered if I looked the same. My ribs had never been so prominent in my life.

  “You were tossing and turning all night,” she said. “I hardly slept.”

  I didn’t answer. The bed was barely two feet wide – I’d have fallen off if I’d tossed and turned. As Gunnison’s shouts echoed, I reached behind me for the bundle I’d been resting my head on: the pair of too-small boots with my flight jacket wrapped around them.

  Around us, thirty-eight more women in nineteen other narrow beds were stirring. The wooden bunks lined the small, draughty hut. A pair of legs appeared in front of me as someone climbed down from the one above ours.

  I sat on the side of our bed and struggled to pull on one of the flimsy red boots. Familiar pain throbbed in my toes.

  I stood up, trying not to wince. I knew I looked as scarecrow-like as the other women: my clothes hadn’t survived “disinfecting” very well. They were practically falling off me now anyway.

  “The Discordant elements must be rooted out, folks! And with the power of the stars, we…”

  Fran took a makeshift wooden comb from somewhere under her clothes and ran it through her limp hair.

  “Want to use it?” she asked, holding the comb out to me.

  I didn’t move. “How much?”

  “Half your breakfast.”

  “No,” I said shortly. We only got two meals a day and I worked in one of the mines. If I collapsed on the job, I’d get beaten. Or worse, sent to solitary again.

  Fran shrugged and put the comb away. I didn’t blame her for not offering it to me anyway. If I’d owned something so precious here, I wouldn’t either. I thought of my pilot’s boots and a hopeless resentment filled me. I still couldn’t believe I’d been so stupid.

  I went to stand by the door. We’d be called to the First Counting soon – you didn’t want to be caught lagging behind, no matter what. From across the room, a girl named Natalie gave a low exclamation of dismay. “I’ve started!”

  A woman named Claudia, not as thin as most here, puffed herself up slightly. She knew what was coming. So did the rest of us; we shot her sideways glances of disgust and envy.

  Natalie went over to her. Snatches of low conversation drifted over.

  “Half my food for two days.”

  “Three.”

  “Three? Are you crazy? They’re just rags!”

  “Yes, but you need them, don’t you?” Claudia sounded smug. She worked in the laundry and could steal scraps of cloth. The laundry was for the Guns, of course, not us. Claudia’s hands were often raw and blistered from detergent, but any of us would have swapped places with her in a heartbeat.

  Three days on half-rations…and Natalie’s cheekbones were already growing so sharp. Nobody met her eyes. I had a tattered rag that I was saving, tied safely around my upper thigh. I gripped my elbows, glad no one knew about it.

  “Fine,” said Natalie tightly. “Three days.”

  Claudia passed over a rag. She kept them tucked close against her body, in some secret pouch. Natalie went off into the corner and turned her back to us as she fitted it in place in her underclothes.

  A sign on the concrete wall read: GRATITUDE IS HARMONY.

  Gunnison’s voice blared on. Natalie came and stood next to me at the door, lips tight. “At least with three days of hardly any food, I might just stop having the damn things altogether,” she muttered.

  “Or you could get pregnant,” said someone snidely. “One of the male Guns would probably help you out. You’re still pretty enough. Just.”

  It wasn’t really a joke. Some of the women did sleep with the Guns, for protection, for food. Once I’d thought I could never consider it. Now I understood. I’d been hungry too often myself.

  I was hungry now, but doubted any Gun would appear to offer me a deal.

  Natalie took in my thinness. In an undertone, she said, “Do you still have them? You’ve been here, what – five months?” It was a lifetime here.

  “Six,” I said. “And sometimes.” I gazed straight ahead at the door’s worn wood. Some of the women banded together, helped each other pay for necessities. I wanted none of it. Betrayal was too easy.

  Natalie snorted. “You don’t have to be so stand-offish. Everyone knows who you are…Wildcat.”

  She didn’t say it as if she really cared. The world may have decided once that I was a crooked Peacefighter and a murderer, but what did that mean to anyone here?

  I pulled my flight jacket tighter and touched its hem, feeling the square of paper that was still there, its edges worn now. Ma. Hal. Emotion threatened. I knew better than this. I dropped my hand.

  We all stiffened as another siren blared. A Gun flung open our door. She looked almost unbelievably clean and warm: a long wool coat; a fur-lined hat.

  “Outside, Discordant scum,” she barked.

  I filed out with the others into the harshly lit yard.

  The sky was a glittering sweep of stars. The moving-picture screen rose up from beyond the other buildings. A huge black-and-white Gunnison waved his fist. “Our Harmonic society depends on it! I will not falter, friends and neighbours!”

  His face was open, trustworthy. I barely glanced at it. I knew the cheering crowds, the waving flags, by heart.

  Other prisoners had exited their own huts and waited shivering outside too, hundreds of us – and this was just the women’s section. We formed a series of long lines. I could feel the grimy snow soaking through the thin boots already.

  “Hands out,” ordered a Gun. We all held out our right hands. I unfolded mine slowly, my fingers aching with cold. I didn’t look down at the tattoo, or allow myself to think of the other one, on the hand of someone I’d once loved.

  Flaps up, I thought. Mixture control to rich…then flip the ignition switch and the engine starts up and you can hardly hear; it’s your own little world…

  My hand gradually went numb. When a Gun got to me, she’d shown a flashlight at the tattoo, mutter
ed, “Aries, number seven, hut twelve,” and checked me off her list. She moved on and I slid my hand gratefully back in my pocket. It erupted into pins and needles as I rubbed my fingers together.

  Abruptly, Gunnison’s voice dropped to an urgent whisper. No one reacted. The non-stop footage changed volume at the whim of the Guns in the projection hut, sometimes blaring in the middle of the night.

  At the rumble of an engine, all other thoughts vanished.

  Awareness rippled down the line: the food truck was coming. I swallowed reflexively as its headlights appeared down the road, snow tyres rattling. With one hand I clutched the tin cup that I wore around my neck.

  The truck stopped just past us. Snow covered its grille; a high arch of canvas protected the bed. The smell of food hit me and I felt faint.

  A Gun sat in the back with a large black cauldron. I tensely studied his nondescript form.

  “Who is it, can you tell?” muttered Rosie, standing beside me.

  I stiffened and glanced at the guard still checking our group. We were supposed to stand silently. Someone else answered in a low whisper: “I think it’s Fergus.”

  The name was muttered from person to person. I stayed motionless, wishing desperately they’d all shut up. The Guns weren’t above punishing a whole group for the actions of a few. Half my group had never been beaten, never been in solitary. They didn’t know – though they should. My gaze flicked to the heads just visible on the fence.

  To my deep relief, the Guns didn’t hear the whispers. When they finally let us go, those of us who’d been there longer hung back, letting the new people rush to the front of the line. Along with a few others, I manoeuvred my way to somewhere near the end, even though my stomach, now that it had been promised food, was alive and roaring.

  We edged forward. Fergus stood in the open back of the truck, his movements rhythmical. One ladle of soup each. One small piece of bread. I kept my eyes locked on his hand, terrified that he’d chosen this day to change his routine.

  But just like always, he skimmed the soup from the top of the cauldron. Those at the front had mostly watery broth. By the time I held up my cup, my hands trembling, he’d gotten to the soup’s substance. I had two small chunks of potato, even a scrap of meat.