by K. C. Finn
Soon we’re kneeling together on the muddy bank, gasping and filling our mouths with fresh water before we splash our faces. Nema dips her hair, the long strands made even longer by the weight of the water. She wraps it around her neck, patting and adjusting as the cool water runs under the collar of her faded, ragged fatigues. I dunk my whole head, then shake it off like a dog. I cast a shadow by the light of the morning sun, my hair spiked in wild directions atop a lean but thick frame.
“You look like a hedgehog.” Nema lies back on the bank, turning her face to the sky.
I rub my hair back into a wave, then dry my face on my sleeve.
“With any luck we can follow the river to the entrance to my old home. I think my father’s leading the others there.”
Nema nods, her eyes closed. “And then what?”
“We’re going to Tania.”
She turns, her body curling, and rests her chin on her knees. “To kill Prudell?”
I shrug. “Indirectly.”
She may have helped me out a lot, but it’s wise not to give Nema too much intel. If she really is a total survivalist, it’s still possible that she’ll sell me out to the first System soldier that comes along. Plus, she’s the one with the gun. Even though she’s thrown it off to wash and rest in the sun, the strap rests gently beneath one of her feet. She taps that foot, and my eyes trail up to the lump where she’s bandaged up under her trousers.
“I’m sorry about that.”
She quirks a brow, and I nod at her leg. To my surprise, Nema grins. “It’s actually not as bad as you think.”
Slowly, Nema curls the trouser leg up. The bandage is peppered with bloodspots, some crimson and others a rusty brown by now. It doesn’t look all too clean, but as she unwinds the cloth, the skin beneath isn’t as damaged as I’d have thought.
“I don’t know if you can see it, but I have a plate in my leg.” Nema points around the bullet-hole, which is scabby and red. “The shot hit and bounced out. You’ve bent my plate, and that’s giving me trouble, but aside from the infection risk I’m not doing so bad.”
I shuffle across the bank, eyeing her wound more closely. Deep in the dark red centre of the wound, something silver glints.
“When did you get this done?”
“A little over a year ago.” Nema starts to re-wrap the wound, using the best parts of the bandage first. “I broke it in a hockey game. I was a pretty big under-sixteens player, so the school offered to pay for this to help it heal. I was supposed to have it removed a year later, once the bones were solid, but I never got the chance to go back.”
The atmosphere thickens, and it’s not just the August heat settling in for the day. Nema’s body cuts sharper shapes when she’s wrapped up again. She takes her gun into her lap, taking sections away to clean it like a pro. I know this feeling, the one I wore like a shroud when I was at the Legion. Leave your past at the door. Always move forward. And I also know that it wasn’t until I admitted who I am that anything really began to change for me. It’s my turn to lean back and observe the sky, as casually as I can with my shoulder burning in agony.
“So you were inside the System, if you were at such a prestigious, wealthy school, and now you’re a legionnaire. Something went very wrong. You saw something. You said something. Or-”
“I know something,” Nema cuts in.
I resist the urge to lean in again, to look at her at all. I think of Stirling and his cocky grace, the way he used to make out he didn’t care at all about anyone’s story. He cares more than any of us, really. Certainly more than me. I’m already wondering what use Nema’s information might be, my guilt over her leg abating with every moment that the river trickles by.
“Unsurprising,” I say, my eyelids warming in the sunlight. “If Prudell’s almighty System has a weakness, it’s that she underestimates its children. We’re always there, seen and not heard. But we hear. We learn, whether she wants us to or not. And it’s us that will end her rule when the right moment comes.”
“And what happens next?” Nema asks.
I daren’t show the answer on my face. I turn onto my back and crawl back to the river, taking up a scoop of water for a drink. I look down into the clear, bright stream, my wobbly outline staring back between scoops.
“I mean,” she continues behind me. “Who takes over? Stryker? You?”
There’s no accusation in that last word. No hint of absurdity, even though it hits me like a train full of shock. Me? I hadn’t considered it. Taking over Malcolm’s role co-ordinating the others is one thing, but a military leader and the head of a nation are quite different things. When I can’t drink any more without looking suspicious, I turn and wipe my mouth. Sitting up straight makes my shoulder burn all the more, but at least the pain in my leg is fading. I rub it back and forth, testing the lumps and bruises.
“Well, there are plenty of local leaders,” I begin, watching my leg and not the curious girl ahead of me. “I’ve met them. Good, sensible people who could run their own communities. We’d organise ourselves back into free communities. And if someone wanted to lead, we would vote.”
“Prudell was voted for,” Nema replies. “Someone gave her the authority to do this.”
I have a feeling Nema knows her national history far better than me, but it doesn’t stop me shaking my head.
“This is an abuse of that authority. If we could travel back twenty years, would you vote for this world?”
It forces me to meet her eyes, to see her shake her head and hang it back on her hunched up knees. Nema looks smaller now, less powerful than the girl with the threat in her eyes and the one who punched numbers under extreme pressure. The girl who held my shoulder and popped it back into place.
“You’re medically trained, right?” I ask.
She nods. “I did a few courses at the Legion to get into the med core. It makes you valuable.”
“And it helps you stay alive,” I add, nodding too. “Good thinking. You could be useful, if you wanted to stay with us.”
“If.” Nema gets to her feet. She slings her gun over her shoulder, looking down at me. “We ought to move.”
I look at the gun, reassembled and ready in her grip. It strikes me that I might not be in charge of this situation, just as I’d feared. I stand, positioning myself to walk beside her, but Nema hangs a step back when we begin to walk. The river flows on ahead, and step after step the hackles start to rise, forming heat on the back of my neck. The sooner we get to the remains of the Atrium, the better.
We walk in silence for quite some distance, through a denser patch of woods that forces us into single file. With Nema and the rifle behind me, my eyes turn to the woods. Between the trees there are slices of light and dark, where different parts of the canopy cast shadows as others allow the summer sun through. But, now and then, the shadows are changing. It’s a subtle sight, not one that most people would pick up on, but for me I know the signs. I’ve done this manoeuvre myself, winding through the trees in camo to follow, but be unnoticed.
The shadows are moving on either side of us, and slowly slinking back out of my vision. Whoever they are, they’re tracking Nema, not me, and I have a brief moment to take stock of the situation. Sudden movement is sure to bring them into action, but I can only guess as to whether they’re tailing Nema to attack her, or to protect her. With either option, she might shoot me in the back out of shock. But if I don’t force the shadows into action soon, then it’ll be their turn to act, and I’ll have nothing.
The river is audible here but not visible, and if memory serves that means we’re getting closer to my old home. I can’t make out the clearing where the System moved in on top of us yet, but at a run I’d wager I’m not far off it. I could get back to safety, and hide in the place I know best of all, whoever these tails are that Nema has picked up. All I have to do is not get shot in the process.
I count it in my head, down from three. Bad leg tensed. Sore shoulder pressed hard to my side. One deep breath to st
art me off.
I burst into speed, dodging the nearest thick tree and getting behind it for a little cover. I charge on for a few more strides as Nema suddenly cries out behind me. The pain in her voice is palpable, and there’s a thud that suggests she might be on the ground already. No gunshot. I make to charge ahead, but another figure leaps down from a tree right ahead of me. There’s no time to swerve, and I find myself crashing straight into the waiting arms of my captor. He winds me in, holding me stiffly until I realise we’re both rocking with an uneven bounce.
I look up. Into a pale, freckled face that I know. It smiles back at me.
“There you are. We’ve been sweeping for hours.”
“Stirling.”
I fall into his body, rocking us again. Stirling cups my head to his chest, and a moment later I hear some calls from behind us. Kip’s melodic voice is the first to chime, and I’m surprised by the rush of comfort that it gives me.
“What do we do with this one, boss?”
I allow myself another moment close to Stirling, back to my team and my people. But when I break off, I find Kip dragging Nema towards me by the collar of her fatigues. She grimaces, her hands flailing now that they’re free of her gun.
“Let her go,” I say at once.
Kip’s pale brows rise.
I wave a hand at Nema. “She just wants to survive, so let her. She’s not one of us, Kip.”
“No!”
Nema protests, struggling to get her head upright and meet my eyes. “I was just… it’s preservation. You get that, I know you do. Please let me come with you.”
I haven’t forgotten the way she gripped her gun, and the steel in her eyes. We rebels have been burned before by those who just want to use us and lose us. Two more of my crew emerge from the woods, one of them carrying Nema’s gun. The Highlander hands it to me, and my soldiers wait with patience as I observe the girl again. I can’t make her out.
“I know things, remember,” Nema says. “Things about the System. Please. I can’t survive without you. Not now the Legion’s gone.”
“We’re not a babysitting service,” Stirling counters. When he walks up to her, Nema looks his legs over before she manages to focus on his face. “The kids who don’t want to help us are already down in the Underground, hiding like scared little idiots. Hoping the System will still come to save them. We only take the loyal with us, and we’re moving out now that Raja’s back.” He bounces on his haunches, bringing himself up taller than ever. “And if you ever point a gun at her again, I’ll bury you personally. Did you catch that, by the way?”
Nema gulps. Visibly. “I did.”
I can’t help the flush of pride in my cheeks. Whatever Goddie says about how things have changed, part of me will always know Stirling as my captain. He locks an arm around my shoulders to take me away, but when I hiss at the sudden pain, his face changes. He feels around gently, until I put his palm on the safest part of me to hold, around my waist. We walk back like that, with Nema marching along flanked on all sides. I hear the crackle of a radio behind me, then Kip clears his throat.
“Target acquired. We’re coming home, honey.”
Stirling leans in, and he smells fresh and clean despite the tunnelling ordeal he must have been through.
“We’ve put a convoy together as best we can. Apryl’s maps are loaded into Goddie’s gear. Ready to march on your command.”
“At the Underground?” I ask.
Stirling nods. “Just above.”
Above ground seems risky, and it makes my skin itch. “We need to move quickly.”
“Why?” Stirling replies. “The media is all over the airstrike. They think we’re all dead.”
“Briggs knows about the tunnel,” I reply. “He might even be trying to follow it. If he knows, then those siege forces are sure to become a search party soon.”
“Copy that,” Kip says behind me, and he’s back on the radio.
Stirling holds me closer than before, quickening the pace. A thought pops into my head, something long-buried from before the chaos began.
“What happened with the Reavers?” A vague shape enters my memory, two figures on the wall pointing and shouting at something outside the Legion’s barriers. “Did Livitka manage to get inside one?”
Stirling’s lip-biting does not inspire encouragement.
“Ah. About that…”
Seventeen
I have quickly discovered that I don’t like being carried on a stretcher. Once I told Stirling what had happened to my shoulder and my leg, he insisted on a team to carry me for a while so I can rest without aggravating either. Now I’m looking up at the bobbing canopy of the trees, blinking away sudden flashes of the sun. My thoughts are a maelstrom, and I wish I had the rhythmic thud of the march to focus on. Instead, I have the uncoordinated wobble of a thin fabric hammock as four rebels of varying sizes shunt me along.
“I can get up now.”
“No. Stay der.”
Goddie is the carrier at the right hand side of my head. He supports his corner with one hand for a moment, pushing me back into the centre of the fabric. I rock along with a grimace, rubbing my stomach.
“I’m going to be sick from the motion.”
He just grins, shaking his head. “Go ahead den.”
He walks on, and so do the others. I lie back with my eyes shut, hoping that they’ll let me up at the next shuffle. We’re marching down through the forest to avoid the barricade that still stands in the clear ground that leads to the south east coast, the path we once took down the country to reach Mancunia, the northernmost city. Now, we’re marching straight for the walls of the System itself, and the gilded monorails that run along those connecting fortifications. Those rails run city to city, some fifty feet above the ground, and they might well be our only direct route to Tania.
“I can’t believe what dat Boy did,” Goddie says, sucking his teeth. “De boys told ya, right?”
I’ve been trying not to think about it since Stirling gave me the news. Livitka is one of the rebels carrying me, and she gives Goddie the side-eye from her post at my lower left. He doesn’t seem to notice, but breaks a wider grin and sighs through his teeth.
“No tracker, no message, no nothing,” Goddie says, shaking his head. “If de kid does make it to Malcolm, we have no way of knowing. And no way of Malcolm knowing where we’re headed.”
“Little fucking idiot.”
Livitka spits the words out suddenly, her braids snapping as she marches. She picks up the pace, jostling my hammock, and then I really do feel sick from the motion.
“How did he get past you?” I ask her.
At first, I think my question is only going to get another grimace. But Livitka turns her body, side-stepping where she carries me. Her neck snaps back and forth between the trees ahead and my face, lips red with rage as she spits out her story.
“He injured himself. Deliberately.” She laughs, but it’s an empty, harsh expulsion of air. “The little bugger threw himself off the wall. He landed on his side and we heard a good crack. But Boy didn’t cry out. He didn’t even whimper. He just let the Reaver scoop him up with a big, beaming smile. And then it vanished with its quarry. Nothing we could do about it.”
Much as Boy has totally screwed up our plans in his effort to save Malcolm solo, I can’t help but admire his reckless stupidity. If Malcolm is alive out there somewhere, then the little idiot we’ve sent him will gladly give life and limb to protect our leader.
“At least someone went with them,” I say, looking back to the sky. “At least we didn’t miss the Reavers entirely.”
Livitka grumbles something I can’t make out, turning back to the march. She hangs her corner low now, forcing me to use my legs to keep myself steady. I look at Goddie, my eyes wide and pleading, but he still shakes his head.
“We can’t stop de march right now just for ya to get up. Can’t ya sleep or something? Ya must have been awake two days straight.”
It certainl
y feels that way, but if Goddie thinks there’s any sleep to be had in this lopsided hammock of pain, he’s got another thing coming. I turn on one side, stretching out my shoulder and feeling around the injury.
“How’s my family, Gods? Is Vinesh being subjected to one of these things too?”
Savvy as he’s gotten with navigating blind, I don’t see Vinnie chopping his way through the trees and stomping over the thick roots that litter the ground. A low branch often gets the better of our crewmen, and they’ve mostly got perfect vision.
“We’ve split into three companies,” Goddie explains. “Ya folks are with B company, de middle group, closely followed by C, which is carrying de last of de heavy stuff. Ya with A company now, and we’re ahead by about five miles.”
“Who organised all this?” I ask.
Goddie’s lips purse, and I know the name he’s going to say before he even does it.
“Stirling.”
Relieved as I was to see him earlier this morning, the last words he gave me before we parted at the Legion weren’t exactly kind. He’s back doing what he knows best now, leading whilst I’m injured. My stomach knots and twists with more than just motion sickness at the thought.
“Hey, none of dat,” Goddie says.
He takes the stretcher one-handed again, reaching for my cheek. The uneven clomping of the stretcher rewards me with a poke in the chin instead, but it makes us both grin.
“Ya Malcolm’s top priority, girl. Don’t let no-one take dat from ya.”
My heart hurts less and less when we speak his name now, and I’m not sure if that’s because of my faith that Boy will find him, or if it’s just time allowing me to let him go.
“How can you know that? I mean, really.”
“Because he told me so,” Goddie replies.
It takes a moment of silence for Goddie to gather his words. Livitka’s neck stiffens, not quite turning but definitely listening. Her hearing aids are certainly sharper than I’d thought. She’s loyal to Malcolm, like all his rebels are. Dying, like me, to know what Goddie means.