He stared down at his feet as he walked to the dumping ground. He had nearly seventeen days’ worth of food and water saved up based on his usual allotment of six cakes per day, and he knew the journey he was planning would already be dangerous enough even with that much.
He furrowed his brow in thought. Eating the full daily allotment was meant to provide enough for weight gain, and surely walking wouldn’t require as much energy as working at the grid did. Granted, he would be carrying almost sixty pounds of food and water with him when he left, but he had already survived this whole time on just five cakes a day despite all the hard labor. He was almost certain that reducing that number to four would be more than enough to keep from starving. Shorting himself felt worth it if it made it possible to bring Amber along, and he chuckled under his breath at the irony.
He hadn’t been willing to consider setting out with less food when his own life was on the line, but now that she was involved, the risk seemed like nothing. She wouldn’t need much, anyway; the cakes contained more calories than the food she ate, so she could survive on two a day. The only problem would be toxosis; if she began burning into muscle again, she would die.
A tiny snippet of conversation flashed through the ration’s mind, and he focused, trying to remember what he had overheard during his time in the resource center’s laboratory. He could almost picture the words in his head, and a moment later, the echo of the researcher’s thin voice against the white-washed walls of the lab rushed out of his memory to fill his ears.
“Sipp, David, researcher 49821. Timestamp 96:17:09 since commencement of trial 3842, aversion therapy formulation 621 in response to early-onset toxosis. Symptoms have not reoccurred. Test subject has returned to normal function as evidenced by administration of the Tornet Battery for assessment of physical and mental reactivity. Supplement compounds one through eleven have been maintained at three times the standard prescribed dose upon subject’s waking, as notated in previous entry. Subject exhibits no retention of said compounds as evidenced by blood saturation levels, consistent with results from previous test subjects. Conclusion: aversion therapy formulation 621 continues to prevent re-adhesion of supplement compounds beyond the acceptable time threshold…”
The ration’s eyes lit up; for once, the memory of that place didn’t cause his hands to tremble. The aversion dose forced the release of all of the supplement stores from the body, binding to them and flushing them out, and its effects lasted at least four days according to the results of that particular test.
The research team had considered this a problem and had been working to solve it, but in this case, it could mean salvation. There was still time; for nearly two more days, any supplements Amber took would still be counteracted by the dose she had received, and as long as she didn’t take any more beyond that, toxosis could be avoided even if she wasn’t getting enough calories.
If they had enough water, they could probably stretch the food out by an extra week. That extended the distance they could travel on what little he had saved by quite a bit, but it meant they would have to hold back even more on their daily water allotments. It could work; they had a few days shy of four weeks before the next weight check, which should give them more than enough time. He smiled to himself, picking up his pace as he hurried to finish his work.
* * *
Amber sighed, tossing small pebbles against the wall of her house as she waited for the ration to return with her father. The hour she had to wait felt like forever, and she kept glancing up to check for their approach. Finally, she saw two figures appear in the distance, and her heart leaped into her throat as she dropped the last of her handful of pebbles on the ground. She could tell it was them just from their silhouettes; the ration’s figure towered over her father’s slight frame unlike anyone else she had ever seen, and she grinned with excitement.
It was excruciating to wait for the sun to go down, and she sat beside the ration in silence as she pretended to read her book. Her mother came out to check on her twice, eliminating the option of reading out loud, so instead, Amber counted the minutes in her head until the light began to fade from the sky.
She sighed with relief as the cold night winds began to blow, and the ration’s face was bright as he stared at her, waiting for the house to fall quiet.
“Hello,” he whispered in her ear when it was safe, settling in beside her and covering her with the blanket. “I feel like I missed you all day.”
“Me too,” Amber breathed, closing her eyes as he kissed her. “This is all I’ve been able to think about.”
His eyes grew wide.
“Really?”
She giggled at the happiness in his tone.
“Well, mostly. I’ve also been thinking about what you said.”
“I’ve been thinking about that, too,” he told her, drawing her into his arms. She was sitting in front of him, her back resting against his chest, and she drew a deep breath.
“I want to come with you.”
The ration’s heart swelled as she spoke; he hadn’t even considered the possibility that she wouldn’t.
“You can’t take any more supplements, then,” he said quietly, kissing the top of her head. “The aversion dose got rid of everything in your body up until now, but it will only keep working for another day.”
“How do you know?”
“The resource center. I was there when they were working on trials for a new version of the dose, I heard them talking about it.”
He hoped she wouldn’t ask any more; he had done his best to forget it all, and he didn’t want to go into the details.
“I’ll need more calories, though,” Amber pointed out. “I’ll starve without the supplements.”
“No, you won’t. The metabolic inhibitor is a one-time dose, it permanently slowed your body down the very first time you took it as a child.”
She twisted around, staring up at him in confusion.
“They don’t affect how much food I need?”
The ration sighed.
“The supplements aren’t what you think.”
“Then what are they?”
A memory tried to force its way up in his mind, and he swallowed hard.
“We don’t have a lot of time, it’ll take too long to explain. I’ll tell you more after we leave, when we can talk freely.”
Amber’s heart skipped a beat. The thought of speaking with him whenever she wanted to sent a shiver of anticipation up her spine, and she couldn’t wait to go.
Another thought occurred to her, and she pursed her lips, instantly feeling foolish for not asking sooner.
“What’s your name?”
To her surprise, the ration shook his head.
“I don’t have one, I’m just the number I was assigned.”
“You never decided on something to call yourself?”
He shrugged.
“I didn’t think I’d live this long, it never seemed important.”
The ease with which he spoke hurt her heart, and she sat up.
“Everyone deserves a name, especially you. Even the stars have names. What do you want to be called?”
The ration thought for a moment; he had never considered it before.
“I don’t know. How do you pick a name?”
Amber hesitated.
“Usually you don’t have much of a choice, so I don’t know. My parents let my grandmother name me, I was told that she spent six whole months before deciding so it must be pretty important to choose a good one. Amber Talia Ordell. She said that she named me after the last rain that ever fell on the earth, she saw it when she was six years old.”
She closed her eyes, remembering the frail voice of her grandmother recounting the tale. She still knew every word by heart, even after all these years.
“The drought was still gripping the earth, and the heavens had been dry for almost fifty years. No one was expecting it, not after that long. There were no cloud
s in the sky, but the rain came anyway. The sun was setting, burning the sheets of water in brilliant amber, and tiny puffs of dust flew into the air beneath each drop that fell. The ground was so hot that they all evaporated the moment they touched the earth, vanishing only a moment after the sky bore them, and it was as if they somehow knew they were no longer welcome here. They fled, never to return again, and that was the day the earth scorned the rain.”
Amber sighed, trying to picture it. Her grandmother had been almost 97 years old when she died, meaning it had now been over a hundred years since any rain had fallen.
“Talia means rain, that’s why my grandma picked it. She chose Jude’s name, too, but I don’t know the story behind that one.”
“What about the stars?” the ration asked, glancing up at the sky. “I saw the names in the book, but I couldn’t read them upside down.”
She gasped in surprise.
“You can read?”
He chuckled, kissing her cheek.
“You learn a lot when your world revolves around silent observation.”
“I never would have guessed.”
“That’s because you also learn how to keep secrets,” he added, giving her a quick squeeze. “So the stars, what are their names?”
“Well, you already know the constellations,” Amber began, furrowing her brow as she tried to think. “But most of those would probably sound pretty dumb as a name. It’d be weird to call you Hercules or Orion, although you could definitely pull off the first one just by how you look.”
He laughed quietly, and she smiled at the sound.
“Most of the stars have really long or really silly names,” she went on. “I don’t think the astronomers in charge of picking them were very creative, but there are a few that could work. There’s Alcor, one of the stars in the bear, and a star in Orion called Rigel. I might have to go get the book again, I don’t remember many of them.”
“What about Taurus?” the ration asked, pointing up at the sky. Her heart skipped a beat; that was her sister’s constellation. She definitely remembered that one.
“Aldebaran is the big eye,” she whispered, her voice cracking. She could almost hear an echo of herself from all those years ago, speaking the exact same words to a piece of her heart that was now a ghost.
“And Ayn is the smaller one. I told Jude once that the eyes were glaring at Orion, and that’s when she started making up her stories about them fighting with each other.”
“Ayn.”
He tasted the word on his tongue, listening to the sound, and Amber turned her head to look at him. She smiled. It suited him.
†‡†
CHAPTER
TWENTY-FOUR
Amber was quiet as she worked the next day, but her mind was a flurry of thought as she focused on finding a way to talk to Ayn without getting caught. There wasn’t enough time at night to discuss very much, and she had questions about his plans to leave.
Ayn.
Her heart fluttered. It felt magical to whisper the name and know that it belonged to him, and she had trouble keeping herself from getting distracted every time the word passed through her thoughts.
She glanced up. Ayn was working on the other side of the grid, shoveling dirt into the hauling sacks. She studied him as he moved, a sense of awe washing over her. He was so full of life, so full of awareness and depth, and she didn’t know how he had managed to keep it all to himself for so long. It must have been a lonely existence. She couldn’t imagine what it would be like to hold back like that, and she was glad that he finally had someone to share it with.
Amber sighed to herself. Even with the freedom to speak and a family of her own, she knew at least a little of what loneliness felt like. Not to the degree that he did, of course, but she could understand the pain to a small extent.
She was grateful for that pain and loneliness now, though, because she knew that it was what had pushed her into his arms. The years of feeling isolated were all worth it if it meant they had helped to open her eyes to who he was, and she found that she almost couldn’t remember what it was like before he had entered her life. The memory of that time had been erased by his presence, and she smiled softly, appreciation filling her heart as she watched him begin lifting bags of dirt onto his back.
Ayn glanced at her as he prepared to leave with another load. He could see the smile in her eyes, and he knew that she could see his, too. He felt different, as if choosing a name had given him a sense of permanence, and his stance seemed more confident as he made his way to the dumping ground. He hadn’t realized just how much it would mean to him, but it made him feel as if his existence was somehow more than what it had been before.
For all of his short life, he had just been Strain 27680, even to himself. He had almost been like one of the unknown stars in the sky, a tiny speck among countless others, but now he was known. Now, like the constellations, there was a single word that could sum him up and set him apart from all the rest, something unique beyond what lay within his own heart and mind. It made him happy.
The day flew by, and before long, Richard announced that it was time for Amber to leave. She didn’t bother arguing with him, glad that it was only thirty minutes early instead of a full hour like yesterday, and she trudged back to her house, still lost in thought as she tried to come up with a way to be alone with Ayn. She frowned; nothing she had considered so far seemed like it would work.
She wondered if they could get away with hiding in the neighbor’s vacant house like she used to with John, but she quickly dismissed the idea. It was too close to hers, and the risk of getting caught was too high. All it would take is one word from his lips carried along the wind to her mother’s ears and it would be over.
The grid was the only place that offered both privacy and distance, but it would seem suspicious to go there after the workday ended. Amber got her book, wiping the sweat from her face as she sat down outside to wait for Ayn to return with her father. The heat was miserable.
A thought occurred to her. Their grid was the deepest of all of them, and even though it was still hot there, it was a bit cooler than sitting in the shade on the surface of the ground. This was especially true in the afternoons once the sun moved past its peak. If she could raise the idea without drawing the suspicion of her parents, she could probably get away with the excuse of wanting to read there instead of close to home. Taking Ayn with her would be understandable since she was his keeper, and the grid would be completely abandoned after the workday ended.
She shielded her eyes as she glanced to the west. She could just barely make out Ayn’s figure approaching with her father, and she stood to her feet, rehearsing the words in her mind.
“Do you need my help with anything, dad?” Amber asked when her father drew near. Richard shook his head.
“Not today, my dear.”
She patted her book, trying not to look nervous.
“I’m going to go sit at the grid to read today. I think the heat is getting to me a little, and it’s cooler there.”
Ayn slowly lifted his gaze, and she could see the question on his face. She looked away as her father stepped closer and put his hand to her forehead.
“Are you feeling okay?” he asked quickly. “Did you do too much today?”
“No, I still feel fine,” she answered. “I think being so hot from the fever just made me a little sensitive to the weather.”
“Hopefully you’ll readjust quickly,” Richard said, giving a slight nod.
“I’m sure I will,” Amber told him. “I’ll be back before dark, I just want to finish a few chapters.”
She beckoned to Ayn and began walking, hoping her father wouldn’t stop her from taking him with her. After a few moments, she glanced back over her shoulder; he had already gone inside, and she breathed a sigh of relief.
Ayn followed her to the grid, studying her as they walked. He wasn’t sure what she was up to, but as the last of the day’
s workers left the mine area to head back into the settlement, he started to get an idea.
He watched as Amber lifted the flap of plastic that covered the steps that led down into the grid, then she gestured for him to go ahead of her. He obeyed, and she pulled it back into place before following him down. She walked to the center of the space and picked up a shovel, quickly filling one of the hauling sacks and leaving it open, then she sat down amid the piles of dirt that were still waiting to be hauled away.
“It’s deep enough,” she whispered as Ayn moved to her side. “And everyone’s gone. If someone does show up, you can just get up and start tying the sack off like you’re working.”
“It’s still risky,” he breathed, casting a wary glance at the tarp above them. “It’s just plastic up there, if someone gets close enough they might hear us.”
“But it’s loud,” she pointed out. “Listen.”
He cocked his head; she was right, the sound of the plastic lifting and falling with the breeze that blew across the ground above them did seem loud enough to drown out the sound of voices, especially because of how deep the grid was.
“We’ll still need to be quiet,” Ayn said, but this time, he spoke a little louder. She smiled.
“Good. My parents will be expecting me back before dark so we still don’t have much time, but at least it’s more than we have at night. We need to talk about what we’re going to do, right now I don’t know anything.”
He nodded quickly.
“I’ll show you, I think I have it worked out.”
Ayn got up, grabbing the chisel that was used for breaking apart salt rock and swiping his arm across the dirt to flatten out the surface. He began to draw.
“This is where we are,” he said, marking out the unmistakable outline of the continent and drawing squiggles to represent the ocean around its perimeter. He drew a circle near the middle, then he put an ‘X’ on the circle’s southwestern edge.
“This is your settlement, and the X is your house.”
He drew another circle to the northeast of the settlement.
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