Darkness Follows

by L. A. Weatherly

  It was true, yet I felt bleak inside. There was still nothing out there for me.

  “So you betrayed someone to get them.” Ingo’s voice was expressionless.

  “In a way. She betrayed me first. Do we have to talk about this?”

  “Yes. If we’re going to do this thing, we have to trust each other.”

  “That goes both ways.”

  “It does. Do you trust me?”

  I fell silent. The crazy thing was that I had always trusted Ingo, even when I had very little reason. “I think I do,” I said at last. And briefly, I told him about Melody – about not speaking up when the Guns had read out the crime she didn’t do, and then sprinting to wrest the boots from her body.

  “I don’t regret it,” I said in a low voice. “I’d do it again. But…”

  “But much more of that, and you won’t be human any more,” finished Ingo. His hands were buried in his pockets, his thin shoulders hunched as he glared out at the men’s camp. “I know…oh, I know,” he said softly. “All right. I understand now. I’d feel the same.”

  We were standing close, our arms touching, our voices barely whispers. It was the first confidence I’d exchanged with anyone in months. Part of me felt panicked. I wanted to snatch the words back.

  “The Guns said they were looking forward to tomorrow night,” I said. “Does that have anything to do with your plan?”

  The shadow that was Ingo nodded. “Tomorrow’s Gunnison’s birthday. There’s a big party planned for tomorrow night. The Guns will all be celebrating – distracted.”

  From far away in the woods, an owl called. I pictured the always-bored Guns with something to do for a change. With luck, their focus would be entirely elsewhere.

  “You’re right, it’s a good time to try it,” I said. “What’s your plan?”

  Ingo leaned his head close and told me. I felt the blood leave my face. “You’re serious,” I said.

  He straightened. “It’s the only way. People who try for the train are found in no time. Have you got a better idea?”

  “No,” I said after a pause.

  I’d heard whispers of other escape plans. All had involved trying to reach the train and hide on it, to be taken away from this place. The Guns knew it was our only way out of this barren wasteland. Finding escapees was child’s play.

  If you were caught, you got thrown in solitary for days of “interrogation”. Then the Guns put what was left of you up on that platform near the gates and had their fun with you, for hours sometimes, before finally releasing you with a bullet.

  Ingo’s tone was faintly mocking. “Still want to try?”

  “Yes. Of course.” Though there was no other answer, the sense of despair in me grew.

  “We could both be killed, you know,” said Ingo. “Our heads could end up on that fence next to your betraying friend’s. I suppose she was the blonde? She must have been pretty, once.”

  “Yes, I know we could both be killed – that’s not exactly a newsflash! It doesn’t matter.”

  “Speak for yourself. I very much want to live.” Ingo fell silent, his dark eyes studying me. He looked away and let out a breath. “Look…there may not be time to talk about ‘what next’ tomorrow. You said before that there was nothing out there for you.”

  “There isn’t.”

  “I have information that might change that.”

  Surprise and wariness stirred. “Go on.”

  “A few months ago, I got a new bunkmate from another hut. He’d been with the Resistance. He was sick; he died not long after we met.”

  The word Resistance made me think of Collie and his “contacts”. I stiffened.

  “Who?” I said finally.

  “His name was Miguel. He knew people who worked for a conference centre in Appalachia.”

  “What does that—”

  “Listen! He said Gunnison’s planning a coup in February: he’s going to force President Weir to sign a treaty that annexes Appalachia to Can-Amer. Weir will still be in charge, but in name only. They’re calling it the Day of Three Suns – Gunnison and all his top people will be there.”

  So now my father’s thrown Peacefight would lead to Gunnison taking over the entire continent. Deep down, pain stirred in my gut.

  I gave a harsh, whispered laugh. “Are you suggesting we could try to stop it? This conversation’s insane, Ingo! We’re still in here.”

  “I realize that! When the hell do you propose we discuss it? Look, Miguel knew he was dying. He gave me a message about the Day of Three Suns for someone named Vince Griffin, in case I escaped. He said it’s vital if they’re going to bring down Gunnison.”

  I hated the urge that stirred in me to try. I’d tried before, with everything I had, and no one had cared. I started to protest…and then my trial flashed into my mind.

  Madeline.

  She’d somehow talked my father into betraying the world’s trust. She knew why he’d done it. And she worked for Gunnison now.

  If his top people were all going to be there, then so would she.

  Electricity touched my scalp. Slowly, I said, “This Day of Three Suns…do you know where in Appalachia it’s happening?”

  Ingo wrapped his thin coat more tightly around himself. “No. Miguel didn’t tell me everything in case I was captured. He said Vince Griffin would know the details from the message.”

  “You could have told me this before.”

  “Why should I give you such valuable information before you’d committed yourself?” Ingo gave me a sharp look. “It makes a difference to you, I take it?”

  From nowhere, I saw my father at our kitchen table again – heard my own voice.

  “Dad…you can tell me anything.”

  “Maybe someday. When you’re a Peacefighter, too. It’s the only thing worth being, Amity…I always knew that.”

  I stared blindly at the barbed wire of the men’s camp. The pain of my father’s thrown fight – my daily knowledge of exactly what it had led to – never left me, though ever since I’d gotten here I couldn’t bear to look at it too closely.

  I couldn’t now either. I shivered and shut it away somewhere deep. But I could confront Madeline – I could finally get answers. The thought was dizzying.

  I cleared my throat. “Yes,” I said. “It makes a difference.”

  “To me, too,” said Ingo. “Miguel said the Resistance would help me if I gave Vince Griffin the message. I think he hoped I might join them. Well, I have no interest in doing that. But I do have interest in getting their help.”

  “For what?”

  “To get home again,” Ingo said shortly. I remembered him saying that he was from the Germanic Counties, down near the Med – thousands of miles away.

  In the men’s camp the spotlights swung in their relentless arcs. The world was very still, full of defeated concrete buildings and jagged shadows.

  “So it’s agreed,” Ingo whispered after a pause. “If we make it out, we’ll go to Calgary. That’s where Miguel told me to go and ask for Vince.”

  I glanced at his profile. Calgary had to be at least a thousand miles south. “Ingo, are you sure you want to travel with me? Everyone knows who I am – I’ll put you in danger.”

  He snorted slightly. “I don’t want to insult you…”

  “That’s never stopped you before.”

  “Fine, so I won’t bother attempting tactfulness now. No one would ever recognize you from your photos these days, Amity. You look like shit.”

  And for some strange reason, this was the funniest thing I’d heard in a long time. I slumped against the side of the building, laughing weakly. Finally I straightened and swiped my eyes with the back of my hand.

  “You look like shit, too,” I said.

  “I know. Shit with half its face burned off. If anyone sees us, they’ll just think a pair of fiends from a telio play have appeared.” Ingo studied me. His tone grew more sombre. “If we’re really going to do this, then I propose a pact. Total trust. No matt
er what.”

  Remembering the last time I’d trusted someone so completely, I went taut. My fist clenched, hiding the tattoo even though it was too dark to see it.

  “Half the time I don’t even like you,” I said.

  “So? I don’t like you, either. But I trust you – and that matters a lot more right now. Have we got a pact?”

  I shivered. I knew if I made this vow, I’d keep it. Would Ingo? It was ridiculous to be so afraid – so angry at even the thought of trusting someone that way again.

  But if we were doing this, then that was the way it had to be.

  I put my hand out to him. “All right. Total trust. I swear it.”

  “And so do I,” said Ingo quietly.

  We shook.

  When we let go Ingo shoved his hands back in his pockets. “We’ve got to find something for you to pick the lock with tomorrow night. What do you need?”

  “Something long and thin. Remember, I used a letter opener before?”

  “I can’t get you that. But there’s a sort of marketplace in the men’s camp. A guy there had some thick wire earlier tonight that he wasn’t able to trade.”

  “That would do, if it’s thick enough.”

  “Good. Do you have anything to trade? I have an extra shoelace, but that won’t be enough.”

  I thought of Claudia and her rags and smiled wryly. “You could always promise him half your meals for the next week.”

  The dark silhouette that was Ingo gave a bitter laugh. “If he’d cheated me like your Melody, I’d do it. Come on, have you got anything?”

  I fingered the shard of glass in my pocket. It would get us whatever we needed. But tucked deep in my jacket’s lining, I could also feel the letter from Ma. I’d held onto it for so long, despite paper being so precious here – I’d resisted trading it even when desperate with hunger.

  I thought of Madeline and my spine tightened. I talked him into…I mean, I talked to Truce…

  I traced the glass’s lethal sharpness. Then I reached past it and pulled out the letter. Its paper felt soft to the touch. I handed it to Ingo.

  “Use this,” I said levelly.

  CHAPTER THIRTEEN

  March, 1941

  Collie helped me out of the back of the auto. My muscles had turned to cotton.

  “All right?” he whispered.

  It was three a.m. We were in an underground parking garage in Topeka, John Gunnison’s capital city. Autos crouched in pools of light, their long, rounded lines gleaming.

  “Just about,” I murmured back.

  The garage belonged to the Royal Archer Hotel. When Collie had gotten our room it had been too early for me to risk going up without being seen. We’d agreed that I’d stay hidden until it was safe.

  I put on the hat that he’d bought for me in the Western Quarter: a small, dainty thing with stylish black net that covered half my face. I smoothed my hands over my skirt. Collie had bought second-hand clothes for us both. I’d teased him when he brought them back to the motel room that he’d chosen tight-fitting blouses for me on purpose.

  “I’m really sorry you had to wait so long.” Collie grabbed up our cases and glanced at the stairwell. “Saturday night – I guess no one ever sleeps in this city. I kept hearing doors opening and closing in the corridor.”

  I caught a whiff of his breath and my eyebrows rose. “You’ve been drinking?”

  He nodded, his second-hand fedora shadowing his face. “Just a couple of beers. There was a message for me to get in touch with the Resistance guy. It seemed a good time to meet, so that we could get things going faster.”

  I started to answer and stopped. He’d met with the Resistance while I’d been hidden in the auto? I shook my disquiet away. Collie was right – it had been practical to start things moving.

  “Has anything been arranged?” I asked in an undertone as we headed towards the stairwell.

  “No, not yet.” Collie’s grip on our bags looked tense. “I have to meet someone else tomorrow who might be able to help us get the documents. I don’t even have any names… I think they’re trying to make sure I can still be trusted.”

  Before coming to Topeka, we’d spent several days near Angeles. Collie had liaised with contacts there, trying to get entry papers to the former Central States. The region was still guarded by checkpoints.

  He hadn’t told me who he’d met, but I assumed it wasn’t Mac Jones. Collie had gone to Mac before, when we’d been trying to find out how deep the corruption went. While we’d waited in vain to hear from Mac, our friend Clem, a fellow Peacefighter, had been taken away.

  But this time, whoever he’d gone to had come through. Yesterday, we’d gotten past the checkpoint more smoothly than we’d dared hope, with me hidden in the trunk and Collie showing his false papers.

  I knew how much Collie must hate being back in the Central States, where he’d lived in fear for years. But in a way it made no difference. We were all under Gunnison’s rule already.

  The Western Seaboard had fallen. I wondered what the outside world thought, but there was no news of it any more. All we’d seen on the cheap, battered telio set in the Angeles motel room were images of crowds lining the streets, cheering as tanks rolled past.

  I thought of the restaurant workers I’d heard talking. Would the rest of the world realize that people were just scared? Or believe whatever lies Gunnison was spouting?

  We went through the stairwell door and started up the winding steps. Our echoing treads were the only sound.

  One floor. Two.

  We both heard it at the same time: someone coming down. Collie moved all at once; he dropped the suitcases and shoved me up against the wall. He started kissing me. Despite everything, desire leaped through me.

  I wove my fingers through his hair. His hat fell to the floor. We kissed as if we were drowning and the other was air. I heard the footsteps pass and a low, masculine chuckle.

  Somewhere below, the stairwell door closed.

  We kept kissing, more slowly now, deep and lingering. When we finally pulled apart, I ached with wanting him. I touched his cheek, our eyes locked on each other.

  He grabbed up our things. “Come on,” he said, his voice husky. “Or I’ll start ripping your clothes off right here.”

  We were in room 303; when we got inside, we didn’t even make it to the bed. The hotel room had a soft rug with a pattern of swirling blues and greens. As we moved together on it, I let my hands roam his warm skin. Hope surged through me.

  We were here. We would do what we’d come to do. It would all be okay, somehow.

  In the bathroom afterwards, I noticed how nice the hotel room was. The taps were gleaming silver – the countertop black marble. A soft bathrobe hung on the door with “Royal Archer” embroidered on its pocket. I put it on.

  When I came out, Collie was putting down the phone, wearing only his trousers. “I got us room service,” he said. “Just one meal so they won’t guess, but we can share it.”

  “Good.” I was starving suddenly. I went to him and hugged his bare waist; he turned and held me tightly.

  “I really needed that,” he murmured, pressing his face against my neck. I knew he didn’t mean the hug. I pulled back and rumpled his tousled hair.

  “I was sending you crazed with lust?” I teased.

  He grinned. “You always do, you temptress.” He touched my cheek. “No…I just meant I needed to feel close to you.”

  I kissed his jaw. The window was right behind him, its silvery-grey curtains long and stiff-looking.

  I hesitated and then pulled one aside.

  Downtown Topeka lay below. The Zodiac complex was only a few blocks away. I stared at the familiar white domes I’d seen in so many newsreels, stark against the night sky.

  Collie’s arms encircled me from behind. His faint stubble prickled against the side of my forehead.

  “Don’t look,” he said, his voice bitter. “It’s a terrible view.”

  But I did look. I looked for a
long time, wondering whether my father had ever been here. Whether he’d been to secret meetings in that very building. Was it here that he’d agreed to throw the civil war Peacefight to ensure Gunnison’s win?

  My heart felt like thick glass: hard and breakable. Finally I let the curtain drop and gazed around us. The bed had a carved headboard. There was a walk-in closet, and a white dressing table with lights around the mirror like a telio star might use.

  My eyebrows knitted together. “We don’t really need to be throwing money around, do we?”

  Collie shrugged. “It’s where the Resistance guy back in the WS said we should stay, so we don’t have much choice. With luck we won’t be here long.”

  When the food arrived we hid my things and I stayed in the bathroom. We ate the burger and fries in bed, though I didn’t have much appetite after all. I kept picking up my half of the burger and then putting it down again. I couldn’t stop thinking of what lay just beyond the window.

  “Why would the Resistance want us to stay here?” I asked finally. “Wouldn’t we have been safer in a place that wasn’t so central?”

  Collie didn’t look at me. He ate his last piece of burger before replying.

  “I don’t think we’re safe anywhere,” he said. “But at least we’re close to where the documents are. That’s got to help.” Abruptly, he leaned over me to put the plate on the floor. I felt the stretch of his stomach muscles.

  I noticed that he hadn’t really answered the question. “Collie?” I asked, and then stopped, unsure what I wanted to say. Something about the way he was acting bothered me, though I couldn’t put my finger on it. But if he was acting slightly off-kilter, no wonder, when he was back in this place that he hated.

  He hefted himself upright again and kissed me. “It’ll be all right,” he whispered against my lips. “I promise.” He stroked my hair. “Are you ready to sleep? I’ve got to meet this guy in just a few hours.”

  “Yes, fine,” I said after a pause. He snapped out the light; the room fell into gloom. He pulled me close and I lay against his chest.

  I deliberately hadn’t asked Collie what the plan was, and could sense his relief. In a way it was insane that I’d come here – but we’d had no choice. The only place we could escape to once we had the documents was further east, to Appalachia. It was still a free country.