Warriors

by Sarah Noffke

  Again and again my father scolded my mother for bringing me there, but she had conviction in her voice when she made her whispered case to him. I only remember one other thing from that memory, from their bitter argument. Several times my child ears heard the name “Violet.”

  The forgotten memory connects with new memories, links with information I’ve recently learned. And as I run on autopilot, leading a group of soldiers and Zack, I piece together more of this Valley’s brutal history. This is how Vider became privy to the espionage his wife Violet was doing to convict him. It must have been my parents. They found her out first. But Violet’s tortured soul always thought that she made the mistake that got her caught. But she didn’t. She was doomed all along.

  “The old warehouse.” It’s the place Violet had been searching for. But she never would have found it. I’m certain of that. It was too removed from town, and camouflaged in the ground. Only a roof and a door. It’s where I believe Vider held the children he kidnapped. That rusty storm-shelter-type building from a memory I forgot was mine is where the testing was done to synthesize cerevitium. And more importantly, it’s where Ren and Nona are.

  The southern side of town has little traffic. The mountain pass keeps the traffic on that end low. It’s a hard terrain to build on. And now I realize a perfect place to store an underground facility. For a whole mile I feel Zack on my heels, keeping pace with me. The yawning darkness reminds me that my time to rescue Nona and Ren is running low. I don’t know where in the “warehouse” they’re being held, but it’s been hinted that it’s small, enclosed, and lacks oxygen. I can only imagine the torture they’ve endured during these long eight hours.

  My feet slow on the dirt path, now overgrown. It’s only when I spy the small roof and its rusty door that I pause completely. The roof and door stand in clear view, but the building obviously stretches deep underground, as it’s not visible from the surface. From here it looks like the building was sucked into the earth and only just survived by chance. But I know better. I know that something survives in that building that looks to be swallowed by quicksand.

  I race to the door, my heart a bomb ready to explode from fear and adrenaline. Shaking fingers test the handle and I’m unsurprised to find the door is bolted shut.

  “Stand back, miss.” Sergeant Miller says at my back.

  Taking three steps back I watch as he raises his automatic weapon. I just think to cover my ears at the last possible second. The sergeant fires three times at the lock above the handle. The door springs open at once. In front of me there’s only darkness. Without a second thought I bound through the door and down the stairs I know will be there. A cold rail guides me through the blackness. I’m blind in the approaching space, yet I race forward and almost stumble when the stairs end abruptly. My legs were ready to descend and I have to correct their movement as I find I’m on even ground. Behind me a beam of light switches on with a loud click. It gives little detail to the room I’ve entered, but it does tell me I’m about to run into a counter. I wheel around. Sergeant Miller directs a flashlight at a wall of switches. He flips three of them before dim lights, powered by a generator, take away the building’s darkened mystery.

  We’re standing in a white-tiled lab. It holds an uncanny resemblance to the labs in town.

  “Spread out, men,” Sergeant Miller orders. “I want every area searched.”

  Four doors. One on the right. One on the left. Two at the back. And if this lab is set up like the one in town then it’s a maze of rooms and closets and compartments. There are so many options. I take off down a doorway at the back, Zack beside me.

  “Nona!” I scream, searching the sterile lab tables and corners and spaces. “Ren!” I scream again, rushing through the labs lit by dim emergency-type lighting. I don’t like the feel of these labs at all. Everything about them reeks of death and torture and wrongness. I almost expect Vider to bound out of a closet and grab me as I race farther through the network of rooms. A cold so deep, I feel like I’m submerged in icy water invades my body. Zack makes a muffled sound of confusion, which gains my attention. He pauses and blows out a deliberate breath through his mouth and it’s then that I understand his bewilderment. Mist wafts out of his mouth, like it does when the temperature drops below freezing.

  “What?” I say, and condensed frozen mist springs from my mouth too. And then a sharp realization sticks me straight to the chest and needles my skin with trepidation. If Tutu was alive and with me, she’d show me what really exists here. Spirits. Dozens of spirits. I feel them even if I can’t see them. They’re circling me. These are the children Vider stole, tested on, and euthanized. Children. People aren’t meant for such things. They lost their lives here. And their confused, tortured souls remain. The dozens of ghost energies huddled around us is what makes the space frigid.

  “What is it?” Zack asks, having read the comprehension on my face.

  “Spirits,” I say, through a shiver.

  “Oh,” Zack says, opening a closet door and scanning its contents. “Where do you think Nona and Ren could be?”

  “I don’t know,” I say. Just like the labs where I received my injections for all those years, this building is convoluted. The rooms stretch on endlessly. They have no clear paths to follow. Finding anything here in a quick manner is useless.

  I’m all out of ideas of how to locate them. All I can think about is Tutu and how if she was here, she’d have all the spirits at her disposal. She’d have them escort us right to them. I close my eyes, wishing she was here, and then quite suddenly something tugs on my hand. I whip open my eyes, sure that Zack is trying to get my attention, but he’s on the other side of the room.

  There’s nothing in front of me, but then so clearly I hear, “Em…” The voice sounds like wind, a noise that is almost not there. I look around realizing, I didn’t hear that in this realm. And something is in front of me. From my constant shivers I know there are many things around me. The spirits of the children. And if I can allow them to, maybe they can lead me. I do feel their chill encircling me, shifting as I move. Why shouldn’t they be able to communicate with me in other ways?

  “Where are they?” I ask, to the thin air in front on me.

  Zack’s eyes pinch with frustration. “I don’t know,” he says, sounding half defeated.

  “I’m not talking to you,” I say, knowing I sound crazy. “The spirits know where they are. They would have witnessed them being locked up in here.”

  Comprehension dawns on Zack’s face, taking some of the edge away.

  I close my eyes, outstretch my arms. “Show me where they are.” Moving forward, I open my eyes, trying to tune in to the sensations around me. My fingers reach into the darkness and not a few seconds later a nip, like teeth biting into my skin, pierces the right side of my hand. A pinch of cold. I turn in that direction and discover a dark hallway. It is partially hidden by a stack of containers, but the ghost somehow brought it to my attention. I push around the rolling cart and move forward, using touch and feel rather than my usually relied upon senses. It’s when I almost careen into a wall I didn’t see in the darkness that I feel another bite of cold on my outstretched hand. It makes me pause. This one was on the bottom of my left palm. I wheel around in that direction and to my astonishment I find an industrial freezer. Its closed door is large. Again a cold bite, but this time sharp and against the base of my neck.

  “Here?” I ask the air. Once more the nip on my skin, but now on my back, like someone is trying to push me forward.

  The temperature gauge to the right of the door says the freezer is turned off, but the lock says it’s engaged. I tuck my hand under the industrial handle and yank up. It’s rusty from disuse, yet it relinquishes to my attempts and with Zack’s help I pull the door free of the seal. From the dim light in the corridor, I barely spy two heads hanging low, their arms pinned up high, handcuffed above them on a metal shelf. I rush forward at once and realize that the oxygen in this compartment is almost at z
ero.

  “Get oxygen,” I call over my shoulder to a soldier who I didn’t know was following me. Blanketed in her long locks of golden hair, Nona’s face is almost hidden. I cup both my hands to her cheeks and beg to the gods for her to hear me. Her eyes are closed, her breath nonexistent on my hands cradling her face. “Nona,” I say, “can you hear me? I’m here. Wake up. You’re safe.”

  Sergeant Miller rushes over, sticking something into her cuffs which automatically releases her. I catch her in my arms at once and she’s too weak, too far gone to respond to my attempts to rouse her. I stroke the hair back from my sister’s face. Rock her in my arms. Please, Nona. Please. Don’t. Come back. Come back. Come back. Don’t leave me. And it’s a different soldier who rushes in and sticks a mask to her face. It’s similar to the one Parker gave me.

  The soldiers, now crowding the small space, take her from me, almost push me to the side as they lay her flat on the concrete floor. I watch, completely helpless as men I don’t know pump my sister’s chest. Each second is too long. Each movement not hers. I stand frozen and watch as again and again they pump her chest. My little sister lies like a doll, all lifeless on the ground. And then to my unbounded relief Nona’s eyes spring open and she sucks in a sudden gasping breath. The man who saved her life moves back a little, making room for me as I fall to her side.

  “Nona!” I scream with tears of relief. “You’re alive!” I say through a raw aching assault on my throat. Nona stares back at me with bewilderment. She looks at me with a strange dawning expression, then around the freezer, and finally to the stranger soldier. When her brave eyes return to mine she gives me a look of astonished gratitude that is enough to keep me content for all of my days.

  “Get that bloody thing off me,” Ren says behind me. I turn to find a soldier standing over him, trying to administer oxygen, but Ren’s apparently not having any of that.

  Turning back to Nona, I lean down and kiss her forehead as she takes greedy breaths of the oxygen. Zack is beside her now. His eyes catch mine and he nods, seemingly reading my thoughts. He seems to understand that I want him to stay with her. I stand and take three steps and squat down next to Ren, who’s regarding the oxygen tank like a nuisance.

  He pulls the mask off and throws the whole thing to the side. “I told you never to save me.”

  “Sue me,” I say.

  “I might,” he says in a raspy voice.

  “How do you feel?” I say, noticing the blood oozing from the side of his head.

  “I’ve had better days.”

  “Well, call me crazy, but I think you should let a paramedic look at that gash on your head,” I say.

  “You’re bloody crazy,” Ren says.

  “Probably. I hear it runs in the family,” I say, taking a standing position and extending a hand to my uncle. “What do you say we get the hell out of here?”

  Chapter Thirty-Nine

  Three days since war swept through Austin Valley and already the town hardly shows signs of the struggle that affected every single Reverian. As a society we repair things. It’s sewn into the fabric of our beings to fix that which is broken, to clean that which is dirty, and to throw out that which is irreparable. It will take much time to reverse the programming before Reverians will allow imperfection in this Valley. It’s a strange thing to strive for, however a goal. Who are we when we don’t allow flaws in our existence, but people of denial? To delude ourselves into believing we are perfect or that perfection exists at any level is an injustice to who we really are.

  Humans.

  We are humans who make wrong decisions, who act in strange ways, who have freckles and ailments. We are humans who are incredible in both our capacity to love and our resistance to hate. And in our imperfections we are beautiful. But it may be many years before Austin Valley shows widespread signs of accepting this. From my place on the steps to the labs I spy that merely half the Dream Travelers I see are wearing plain clothes. Most men still have their hair meticulously slicked back in the style they’ve worn most or all of their lives. Changing who we’ve always been isn’t something that happens overnight, but with knowledge change does become a more enticing idea. The people of Austin Valley now have the privilege to be whoever they want to be. And they also will have access to knowledge to choose who they want to be, and what they want to change.

  Down the block construction has already begun on the new library. It will be on the lot where the newspaper was. The old library is too small to adequately house the thousands of books the Reverians will soon have access to. I’ve ensured that every book of significance will be in there. I have that right since I’m funding the library with the money Tutu gave me.

  Half of the money has been put aside for Nona, for when she’s of age. I’ve already had fantasies of her using the money for college, maybe on the east coast or maybe abroad. Paris, Amsterdam, Sydney. There are endless possibilities. And just that short phrase feels like butter on my lips, rich and enticing. There are endless possibilities. It applies to Nona’s future. And mine. And Zack’s. And every single Reverian in Austin Valley.

  A crisp winter wind sways through the trees in the main plaza before greeting my cheeks and the backs of my hands. I lift my chin and smile, a real smile, one enlivened by the morning sunlight.

  “You know, sometimes I wish I had the power to control the wind,” Zack says, leaning over my shoulder.

  I turn and look at his bright eyes. The scratches on his face are almost healed. “And why is that?” I say.

  “Because a fresh breeze always seems to bring a smile to your face,” he says.

  If possible, the smile on my face grows wider. “You make me smile,” I say. “Always have.” I reach out and fix his collar. He isn’t wearing a tie. Not that I think he’s given them up, but I see now that he realizes how he holds his same confidence and power no matter what he wears. Authentic power comes from within.

  Zack’s eyes dart to just over my shoulder. “Looks like it’s almost time,” he says.

  A sound I’ve rarely heard in Austin Valley greets my ears. I turn to see bikes parting on the main road to make way for the black van.

  It’s almost time. Excitement and dread both fill my insides, although I never realized they were emotions that could exist together.

  The van comes to a halt in front of us and before the brake is even on the back door swings open and four armed U.S. military soldiers spill out. From the front passenger seat Smith steps onto the pavement. The men line up in formation, ready for his command. He stalks past them and up the stairs to where we stand at the top of the stoop.

  “Good morning,” I say and he responds by inclining his head slightly.

  He looks around at the Valley, inspecting the repaired buildings and people interacting on the streets. “You people work fast,” he says, sounding slightly impressed.

  “We have our interim mayor to thank for the progress, although he has encouraged the population to rest properly and not push ourselves to do everything at once,” I say.

  “Yes, thanks to John Conerly’s efforts I was able to get clearance to invade the Valley,” Smith says. “John will make a fine mayor.”

  “I agree,” Zack says with pride. “I hope that my father is elected fully into the position, but that’s for the people to decide.”

  I smile up at Zack.

  Smith looks at the front door of the lab. Something is churning in his head. A thought. An idea. He’s chewing on the inside of his lip. Finally his eyes slide over and look at both Zack and me. “This Valley was stolen from our nation,” he says. “And now that it has returned it feels as though we are whole again.” He presses his mouth together, a steady stream of emotions in his usually impassive gaze. Pride is one of the emotions. “I never realized how missing the puzzle piece of Austin Valley affected us so much. Maybe it’s because Dream Travelers are in fact powerful people and the ones here were so stifled,” he says, sounding a little reluctant to admit this. “Now that this large po
pulation of Dream Travelers has been released I’m interested to see how they contribute to our nation.”

  I had had the same thought. “And I’m sure you’re happy that your colleagues and politicians have been released from Vider’s mind control,” I say.

  “That I am,” Smith says. “People in the U.S. government have awoken since Vider’s mind control stopped.”

  “The people here too,” I say.

  “I see that,” Smith says.

  “It’s astonishing how peaceful a society can be when permitted to rebel,” Zack says.

  Smith extends a hand first to Zack and then to me. I take it. “Thank you, Smith,” I say.

  “My name’s Forrest,” he says.

  I nod. “Thank you, Forrest.”

  He doesn’t say another word, only motions back to the soldiers on the sidewalk. They trot up the stairs at once in a line. Then the lab door swings open and they all file in, their boots making gentle beats on the concrete.

  One minute. That’s how long we wait. It’s too long and it’s too short. I need more time to ready myself for what I’ll see. And I need less time to worry about how it will impact me.

  One soldier exits first, holding open the lab door as two others pull their prisoner out into the winter’s air between them. Vider is wearing bright orange scrubs. The black hairs on his forearms rise from the cold. I spy this because he’s only a few feet away. I’m not seeing him with hyper-senses. He doesn’t have them anymore. The guards pause and then at Forrest’s command they turn and have Vider face me. I have one job left to do before my vacation officially begins and this is it. Forrest takes the position on the side of one of the U.S. military soldiers.

  “Well?” he says, giving me a questioning look.

  First my eyes scan Victor Vider. His black hair hangs loose on the sides of his bandaged head. His cuffed hands dangle in front of him, but I don’t sense that there’s any chance he’s going to attempt an escape. His head droops low, his broad shoulders slumped forward. Every part of him reeks with a demoralizing essence. He raises his chin as he takes a long breath and his green eyes focus on me. They are vacant, devoid of their usual power and prestige.