by J. R. Harber
He glanced at Eve. She had unfolded the map on her lap and was scrutinizing it.
“The mountains, then the river,” she said quietly.
“Then the wall, then the Waste,” he finished. “I know.”
They drove in silence.
The road narrowed as they approached the mountain range until it was scarcely wide enough for a single car, and the woods thickened around them. The mountains had always been part of the background of Asa’s life, but they were only scenery. They were beautiful, but no one he knew went to them. Slowly, the road began to climb, and Asa could see that it would wind back and forth among the mountains, climbing only the lowest points.
“What is it?” Eve asked, and he glanced at her, embarrassed.
“I kind of thought we’d have to go up one side of the mountain and down the other,” he admitted, and she laughed. “Hey!” he protested. “I’ve never done this before.”
She shook her head. “I was thinking the same thing,” she said, smiling. “You mean we’re just going to go around?”
“I mean, around, over, through—it’s a tricky road. But yeah, it’s easier than I imagined.” He grinned at her, feeling as though some of the tension had broken.
Eve settled back in her seat, looking out the window. “Do you think it’s true, that they just let you out into the Waste?” she asked after a moment.
Asa hesitated.
“I don’t see why not,” he said at last. “The way I always heard it was, if you don’t want to be part of the Founders’ plan for us, no one can make you. It’s only fair for people to be able to leave if they want.”
“It’s just getting back in they don’t allow,” Eve said darkly.
“Well, that makes sense too,” Asa said. “You can’t have people just coming and going, abandoning their communities and then wanting to be welcomed back. It would cause instability. Plus, the Waste changes people—it’s dangerous out there, violent. You know what it’s like.”
“Do I?” Eve murmured.
Asa glanced at her nervously, but she was staring out the window. He fixed his eyes on the road again, winding through the mountains.
It took less time than Asa had expected to cross the mountains. The sun had not yet set when the road began to straighten out, and they emerged into the lush forest again. Eve was curled up against the window, asleep, her hair covering most of her face. The trees thinned out as he drove on, and as he rounded a curve, the river came into view. He pulled off to the side of the road and stopped.
“Eve,” he whispered.
She didn’t respond, and he reached out and tapped her on the shoulder. She straightened up slowly, pushing her hair back.
“Where are we?” she asked sleepily.
Asa pointed. She looked; then without a word, she got out of the car and walked toward the water. He hurried to follow her.
Eve stopped a few feet from the riverbank. They were standing at least five feet above the water, but the river was nothing like the one outside Rosewood. Now that they were outside the car, it roared; the sound was overpowering. The water rushed so fast it looked white, cresting and splashing against rocks at a violent speed.
“Is this what you fell into?” Eve asked him, grasping his hand as he came up beside her.
“No. That one was … slower. Smaller.”
Eve took a step closer, and he held on to her hand, not moving.
“Eve, you’re making me nervous,” he said. She turned away from the water and came back to him.
“Sorry,” she said. “It’s mesmerizing.”
“Yeah.”
“We have to go.”
“I’m not the one who got out of the car,” she laughed.
It was only a few more minutes before the bridge loomed into view, a sturdy gray metal structure twice as wide as the road itself. Asa paused on the brink of it.
“Ready?” he asked.
“Ready,” she said with a quick, firm nod.
Asa sped across the bridge, looking straight ahead. Once on the other side, he let out a long breath; Eve did the same and grinned at him.
“You were holding your breath too?” she said.
He shrugged. “Superstition. Look.”
He pointed ahead. Through the woods, the wall was just visible, the color of sand, rising taller than the trees themselves.
“The edge of the world,” Eve said, echoing his own thoughts. He nodded curtly and drove on, his stomach fluttering nervously.
The road began to follow the wall, running alongside it close enough that they could see the large bricks of its construction. Eve had pulled her backpack up onto her lap again, and she was fiddling with something in her right hand, too small for Asa to see what it was. He looked back at the road, staring straight at the pavement ahead.
“There!” Eve said, and he jerked his eyes up, racing to a stop just in time.
The road forked, one path continuing straight ahead, the other turning sharply to the right. Asa started the car again, guiding it to the right. Ahead of them, the wall broke; there was a gap as wide as the narrow road, which appeared to simply continue through to the other side.
Asa slowed to a crawl. “I thought it was a checkpoint. Shouldn’t there be someone … checking?”
“I don’t know,” she said. “There’s probably a drone or two hanging around, concealed. Maybe that’s all they need.”
“Maybe.” They looked at each other. Eve’s face was tight; Asa was sure his own expression mirrored hers. “Are you ready?” he asked.
She shook her head, then took a deep breath and held out her hand. “Are you?”
“I’m ready,” he said and clasped her hand.
“Me too,” she said.
“Okay, then.” Asa forced himself to smile.
He tightened his grip on Eve’s hand, and they drove toward the gap.
CHAPTER TEN
THE SCREENS WENT BLANK AS JOAN ENTERED the viewing booth. This time Gabriel didn’t reactivate the clip.
“Are we ready to go?” he asked, standing.
“I wasn’t able to requisition the passenger drone,” Joan said, her voice a little too loud for the space.
He turned. “Why not?”
“We have to go before the Bureaucrats,” she said. She sounded challenging, as if she thought he was going to argue with her.
“Why?”
She shook her head, her posture relaxing a little. “I don’t know. The autom told me I didn’t have authorization. Then I got a message for us both to report to Hiram.”
“Hiram?” Gabriel raised his eyebrows. “What did you input? They’ve already got a head start. If we don’t leave now we could lose them altogether.”
Joan spread her hands in a helpless gesture. “I input the facts,” she said. “I don’t know why Hiram’s getting involved.”
“Well, he’d better make it quick,” Gabriel said darkly. “Come on.”
The Bureaucratic Authority was spread through all of the municipal buildings, but they had to walk a few blocks to get to Municipal 3, where the office of the Penultimate Authority for Contract Enforcement, Hiram Ward, was located. As they approached the building, Joan glanced nervously at Gabriel.
“I hate talking to the burrs,” she said in a low voice.
He laughed curtly. “Well, not calling them that will help.”
She blushed faintly—she had probably not intended to use the common slang for the Bureaucrats in front of him.
“It probably has to do with Daniel,” Gabriel said. “There are bound to be other threads tangled up with his death. We’ll need to be briefed.”
They went the rest of the way in silence. As they approached Hiram Ward’s office, the door was already open, waiting for them ominously. Gabriel squared his shoulders and knocked on the frame.
“Come in,” Hiram said.
They entered. Hiram Ward was a small, wiry Panafrican man with dark skin and extremely short hair who always looked like his clothes had just been ir
oned. He always seemed calm.
Gabriel had never met anyone who could remember him so much as raising his voice. Rather, he wielded his power as Penultimate with a quiet yet inflexible certainty; anyone who tried to argue with him, once he had made up his mind, would exhaust themselves. He would patiently listen, his eyes kind and unyielding, then repeat his decision in precisely the same words. Most people gave up after a few rounds of it.
Hiram stood. “Gabriel. I haven’t seen you since you returned. It’s good to have you back.”
“Thank you,” Gabriel said, obviously uncomfortable.
“Naomi’s passing was a great loss for the State.” He shook his head, voice accented with regret.
“Yes.” Gabriel waited.
Hiram sat down, motioning them to do the same, and Gabriel and Joan sat in the straight-backed chairs facing his desk. They were hard and uncomfortable. Gabriel knew the one Hiram sat in was identical. He thought it promoted good posture, which, at least in his case, it seemed to.
The rest of the office was severe as well: there were no decorations on the gray walls, only Hiram’s large standard white desk in the middle of the room. A small personal monitor, a square about six inches across, faced his chair, and three distinct keypads were built into the desk’s surface in front of it. Gabriel had seen the same desk in every Bureaucrat’s office he’d ever been to: neat, visually pleasing, and yet somehow slightly inadequate.
“Do you remember Omar Ward?” Hiram said, gesturing to the wall on their left, where a video screen was located.
Gabriel nodded and addressed the man on the screen. “Sir.”
“Sir,” Joan echoed, startled.
Omar Ward was the Ultimate Authority for Contract Enforcement, the only person, save the Chancellor, above Hiram in the hierarchy. Gabriel had met him only a few times before. He was a hefty man who had to be nearing sixty, though it would have been outrageous to speculate. He was completely bald, and his skin seemed to be perpetually sunburned, brightening his stern features.
“Gabriel,” Omar said. “Please consider Hiram’s words a reflection of my own sentiments.”
“Thank you, sir.”
“Continue, Hiram,” Omar said, settling in to watch.
Gabriel glanced at Joan, who looked anxious. She was probably right to be. It wasn’t often that Omar felt it necessary to sit in on routine meetings.
“Gabriel, why do you want to requisition a drone?” Hiram asked with what sounded like genuine interest.
“As you know, Daniel James Horizon has been murdered,” Gabriel began.
“No,” Hiram said before he could go on.
“You didn’t know? I’m sorry, I thought Joan … I mean, I thought we’d completed the filing.”
“Yes, Joan did complete the filing, and I’m well aware of the death. But I’m concerned that you’re so certain he was murdered.”
Gabriel was astonished. He searched for words. “I saw it happen,” he said at last. “I don’t know what else there is to say.”
Hiram smiled. “Gabriel, we both know how unreliable witness testimony can be,” he said gently.
“What?”
“You saw it happen in the moment. That makes you a witness—you were having all the reactions we know witnesses to have: you were shocked, and at that moment your brain was trying to explain something terrible. What you saw cannot be relied upon, unless additional evidence exists.”
“I …” At a loss, Gabriel glanced at Joan, and she felt startled, as if just realizing that she, too, was allowed to speak.
“I saw it too, sir.”
“It’s a drone feed, sir—there’s video,” Gabriel hastened to add. “I’ve watched it a dozen times. Asa Isaac Rosewood pushed Daniel out of that window.”
Hiram was nodding. “Yes, I understand that.”
“So, you see why we need to hurry.”
“I see why you feel this way.”
“Sir?” Gabriel realized he was clenching a fist, and he pulled it behind his back, slowly easing his hand open.
“You have been watching and rewatching the video of an event you have already interpreted. Each viewing reinforces your original impression.”
“That’s textbook,” Joan said under her breath. Hiram cast an amused eye at her but said nothing. Instead he turned back to Gabriel.
“I know you are accustomed to having free rein,” he said, looking into Gabriel’s eyes for an uncomfortably long moment. “We have always trusted you implicitly. But this is different. In this case, you are a witness to a violent death, and you must admit that even you are human. And after what you’ve been through, it must be said that your reaction to violent death cannot be fully—”
“Fine,” Gabriel said, struggling to keep an even tone.
Hiram showed no reaction to being interrupted.
That’s the problem with Hiram. He’s so calm, he makes everyone else want to blow up. Gabriel clenched his fists, then relaxed them slowly, breathing out. “Why don’t we all watch the video together?” he suggested when he could speak with composure, and Hiram nodded.
“I think that’s an excellent idea,” he said.
A slim monitor the size of his personal screen slid out of the right side of the desk and swiveled to face Joan and Gabriel.
“Can everyone see?” he asked. “Omar, can you see this on your end?” Omar nodded, and Hiram started the feed.
Gabriel waited as the drone feed started, with the fuzzy blue and red of the life-sign capture. It went blank, then flipped back on and abruptly switched to the image of Daniel, balanced for a moment in the open window, then falling forward and vanishing from view, revealing Asa and Eve behind him. Hiram stopped the feed, and the screen froze.
“Do you have image-capture footage of the moments before he fell?” he asked.
“No,” Gabriel said shortly. “Daniel had all but three drones in the vicinity blocked. This was the only one present.” He cursed Daniel—and himself—silently, but Hiram only nodded. “You can see it even from this feed,” Gabriel said steadily. “They’re right behind him. You can see his body lurch forward at the last second. He was pushed.”
“I disagree,” Hiram said.
Gabriel stood, throwing his hands up in frustration. “Then what do you think happened?” He took a deep breath, pulling his temper back into check. “I’m sorry. I don’t understand what else you could possibly have seen.”
“I saw a man fall from a window,” Hiram said.
“Yes.” Gabriel bit off the word delicately. The man was maddening on the best of days, and now … “Sir, I don’t mean to speak out of turn—”
“We’re having a discussion,” Hiram interrupted. “You are free to say what you wish.”
“Thank you, sir. It’s just, every second that we stay here discussing this, they’re getting farther and farther away. We have to act now!”
“Gabriel,” Hiram said. “Please sit.” Gabriel took a deep breath and obeyed. “Thank you. As tragic as all of this is, the man is already dead. Speed will not return his life.”
“But …”
Hiram held up a hand, and Gabriel fell silent again. “I can only guess how you must feel. It’s terrible that this is the case you’ve returned to, and if you would like, I can assign a different team to it.”
“I can handle it,” Gabriel said, suddenly alert. He could take me off the street if I screw this up, stick me behind a desk. It was the first time the possibility had occurred to him.
“Hiram,” he argued, “this is what I do, it’s what I was … what I was created for.”
Hiram nodded. “Yes, I know. We all were.”
“Of course, sir,” Gabriel said hastily, rebuked.
However out of touch with the stalkers on the street the Bureaucrats might seem, everyone in the Contract Enforcement Authority had been raised in the Wards, inculcated from childhood into their service to the State. Gabriel was exceptionally good, but he was not unique. Hiram did not appear offended, however.
“I will tell you why I’m concerned, Gabriel. I’m not making assumptions because of what happened to Naomi, although her death will no doubt affect your judgement, just as all our experiences affect our judgement. I am talking only about what you witnessed here. I told you I saw a man fall from a window. I wasn’t being glib: that is what I saw. I did see the young man behind him, but he could just as easily have been reaching out to save Daniel’s life.”
“No,” Gabriel said. “He wasn’t.”
“Do you have evidence of that?”
“We detained both of them the night before last,” Joan jumped in, and Gabriel looked to her, surprised to be almost grateful for her presence. “They were fighting in a nightbar.”
“What was the fight about?”
“We don’t know for sure,” Gabriel said.
“They both said it was about the woman, Eve,” Joan said. “They seem to have no other connection.”
Gabriel gave her a sidelong glance, then caught himself. She’s only telling them the truth. She should be telling them the truth. Our only allegiance is to the State, and the State’s allegiance is to all of us. We are all in this together.
“She’s right,” Gabriel admitted. “They don’t seem to have any other connection.”
“Joan, what did you think of the video? Did it appear that Daniel was pushed?”
Joan glanced at Gabriel, who nodded. “I … don’t know. I thought when I saw it that he was pushed, but … now I don’t see enough evidence to reach a reliable conclusion,” she said, the last words coming out in a rush.
“All right,” Hiram said. “What else, then, Gabriel?”
“Can you continue the video?” Gabriel asked.
Hiram started the feed again, and they waited as the drone hovered over Daniel’s body until Eve appeared. Gabriel looked away, instead staring at Hiram intently as Eve sobbed over Daniel’s corpse and then searched his pockets.
“Does that look like the action of an innocent woman?” he demanded when Hiram stopped the video.
“It’s still circumstantial,” Hiram said placidly. “I can’t allow you to hound our citizens without conclusive evidence.”