by Teri Terry
“It’ll be all right, Shay,” he says. “You belong with us. You’ll see.”
The stars are out. They cast just enough light to see the path, our surroundings. The houses are scattered under the trees. As I saw when we arrived, they all have plants growing on the roofs. As we go by and I look closer, I see details I didn’t before: most of the plants are herbs, lettuces, other things that can be eaten, but all are planted in a random way—not in neat rows. Is that to blend in under the trees if anyone looked down from the sky above?
The buildings almost feel like tree houses the way they are arranged, but built under the trees instead of in them. Or maybe with their living roofs, they’re more like hobbit holes. Where do they get power, water? Do they have phone lines or cell reception? Internet?
It’s nothing like any community I’ve seen anywhere before, and there is a sense of rightness about it. Mum would have loved it here—an involuntary thought. She always yearned to be close to the earth, the trees. And this is what he built.
My footsteps falter, and Xander pauses too. He looks at me, waits.
“What went wrong with you and my mother?”
“I loved her.” He speaks truth. “Part of me still does.” There is an intense sadness running through him and his aura.
“You were a survivor back then too, weren’t you, like Kai said. How?”
“There was an accident. At Desertron, in the US—have you ever heard of it?”
I shake my head.
“It was a particle accelerator complex, built in Texas before CERN existed. Officially the project was canceled before they’d finished construction. In reality it was completed, but that was covered up after the accident. Others died; I survived. No one realized what happened to me in the process.”
“When was that?”
“1993. A long time ago now. I’ve been alone a long time.”
“From what I’ve seen, there are always people who want to be around you.”
“Not ones like me. And you.” He regards me seriously. “We have much to learn about each other, and I’m sure you have some hard questions for me, as you should. But know this: I’ve always done what I thought was right. Things may not always have worked out the way I wanted them to, but I’ve tried. No matter what your mother or Kai may have said.”
He tugs my arm a little, and we walk on. Me too, I say in a small voice, only to myself. I do what I think is right—like when I thought I was a carrier and left Kai in order to turn myself in to the air force—but I was wrong that time. I was wrong not to believe Kai when he told me Xander had been a survivor for many years. I was wrong not to tell Kai that Xander was my father. How can I judge someone else for making mistakes when I make them all the time?
Though the consequences of Xander’s mistakes—well. Mine mostly hurt me; his have killed many thousands, perhaps millions by now.
There’s a larger structure ahead, and this is where we are going. There’s a low hum of voices. Faint lights through shaded windows.
Xander reaches for the door, holds it open, gestures for me to go first. He follows behind, shuts the door, and stands beside me. The room is full of people sitting on benches by long tables. They were chatting as we came in, but now all talking in the room ceases as everyone turns toward us.
Could Callie be here?
My eyes scan the room quickly: there are men, women, and children of all ages, Elena and Beatriz among them. But no one looks anything like Callie.
Everyone is still looking at us, and it feels like too many eyes focused too closely. But as if Xander senses I’m about to pull away, he takes my hand. I’m trapped.
“Greetings,” Xander says. “It’s been too long since we joined together, and there is much to talk about tonight. We’ll enjoy dinner in a moment, but first, I want to introduce you to someone.” He pauses and looks at me, smiles, drawing it out. “Everyone, this is Shay—my daughter.”
Ripples of surprise fill the room. I’d have thought because some of them knew about me that they’d have told the others by now. Though I’m getting the feeling Xander likes a stage. His followers obviously know it, so they don’t spoil his fun. Then there are smiles and nods all around, and murmurs of “Welcome.”
I feel like an idiot and want to escape, but don’t know where to go—there aren’t any empty spaces near Elena and Beatriz—and everyone is still looking at me, waiting. Do I have to say something?
I swallow, mouth suddenly dry. “Ah, hi. Thanks.”
Xander leads me to a small head table—one set for six—at the end of the rows. Cepta is already there, and three others; I wonder if someone got evicted for me? There are two empty seats, one next to Cepta, and I’m expecting Xander to sit there. But he takes the other chair, leaving me between him and Cepta’s quickly hidden displeasure.
I scan the room again in case I missed Callie somehow, but no. There are about a hundred people here tonight; perhaps this is the inner community Cepta mentioned, whatever that is. Everyone is in charming white and black apart from Xander and Cepta—they are both in blue tunics, though she wore white earlier—and there’s not much difference between men, women, and children. They all have a gold necklace like mine around their necks—Beatriz and Elena do now too. And the only survivors’ auras in the room are Xander, Cepta, Elena, Beatriz, and me. Until we arrived, Cepta was the only one. Is that why she is Speaker?
Cepta rings a little bell, and a door opens at the back. In come others bearing food and drinks to each table. They’re dressed differently, in more ordinary clothes, with variations of color and style.
A woman puts a plate of what looks like a vegetable-and-bean pie in front of me, and as she does, I see there’s a mark on her hand, like Xander’s: I for immune. His is false, but since nobody knew he was a survivor from that accident so long ago, they must have assumed he was immune when he didn’t get sick. Others bringing in food have the mark too.
“Most of our food is grown or gathered here, or traded with other communities like ours,” Cepta says. “You’ll find we’re all strictly vegetarian. I hope you don’t mind?”
I shrug. “When in Rome,” I say. And I’m remembering that Dr. 1’s place in Shetland where Kai and I stayed had only vegetarian food—not that we were invited guests, or that we knew back then that Xander was Dr. 1. Does Xander even know we were there?
“Have you still been eating meat?” Xander asks me, a note of surprise in his voice. And now I’m realizing that the whole time at his place in Northumberland we didn’t have meat either—I’d just assumed it wasn’t available, rather than that it was a deliberate choice.
“Um, yes—when it was there.”
They exchange a glance. “As survivors we find that eating animals when we can sense their auras and feelings so strongly is quite…distasteful,” Cepta says.
“We grow our own food here, ourselves,” Xander says. “So if we raised and then butchered an animal, we’d experience their death.”
“Of course, I get that,” I say. I hadn’t thought of it before, and it makes me have more enthusiasm for bean pie than previously. Though not everyone here is a survivor? To be fair, the food is good and plentiful enough, if a bit bland. I hadn’t wanted anything earlier, but now that it is in front of me, I’m starving.
Okay over there? It’s Elena, hailing me silently.
I think so, I answer the same way.
I was worried about you, Shay, Elena says, but you look amazing.
Get real.
Look. She shows me what her eyes see. My skin is positively glowing—maybe I overdid the healing earlier? Through Elena’s eyes I can secretly study Cepta next to me too, and she’s stunning. She actually looks a little like Mum did when Xander would have known her, going by photos from years ago. Does he have a type? Slender, long dark hair, too young for him by twenty or thirty years.
I’m not sur
e about her, Elena says.
“Shay?” I turn to Cepta. She’s looking at me, waiting, amusement in her aura. Did she say something to me?
“Sorry?”
“It’s time.” She nods and rings a little bell, and everyone stands. The door opens, and the servers come back in, clear the dishes and then the tables away; the benches are repositioned around the edges of the room.
People stand and chat in small groups, and I take the opportunity to escape to Beatriz and Elena. As I walk toward them, people gently move to the side, making room for me—watching me.
“Hey, how’re you?” I say to Beatriz.
“I don’t know. Why didn’t we sit with you?” The people we were with were boring, she adds silently.
Sorry about that. Xander’s seating plan, I think.
I tried to talk to one of the people bringing dinner, and they wouldn’t answer.
That’s weird.
People are starting to move to sit around the edges of the room, and I take Beatriz’s hand firmly. I’ll sit with you now. No one objects.
Cepta stays in the center of the room, smiling, while everyone sits down. “Welcome to all, and welcome back, Xander,” she says, and her smile widens as her eyes reach his. “And welcome to our new members, Beatriz and Elena. And Xander’s daughter, Shay.” She gestures toward us. “I won’t keep you tonight; I know we’re all waiting to hear from Xander.” She sits down, and he stands, walks to the center of the room.
There is a sense of anticipation in everyone. Cepta’s face is flushed, and she stares at Xander like his very presence is precious to her.
But he doesn’t say a word. Instead, he closes his eyes and reaches out to each survivor in the room. And he shows us newcomers—Elena, Beatriz, and me—what to do. To focus inward, and then outward: so we are reaching in and out at the same time. First we reach out only to each other, until we are in sync completely. Then we reach out to every other soul in this room: the non-survivors too.
To begin, everyone starts to breathe together: inhale, exhale, slower and slower, until all are synchronized. Then our hearts beat in sync too—the chambers contract and expand as if linked by the same electrical impulse—until finally we are all joined as if each person here in this room is part of me.
The rush of warmth and joy is so complete I almost let go unconditionally. But I can’t do that. I can’t let anyone know why I’m really here. I throw up walls, keeping part of me separate and alone, and hide that I’m doing it. And joined as I am with every mind and soul, I can tell there are two others who are partly shielded: Xander and Cepta.
We breathe as one, our hearts beat as one, and even with part of me held back, there is still a deep, aching peace, a salve to my bruised soul—one I’ve never experienced before.
And then it’s not just us, the people in this room. We reach farther—to the trees, to the buildings with their living roofs, to the creatures of the forest, even birds and insects. To Chamberlain too. And to the fields and gardens, with their chickens that lay our eggs and cows that provide milk, butter, and cheese.
I see now why the people here can’t countenance lamb or veal or any other meat. When you know the soul of the calf so completely—and his mother too—you just can’t have him for dinner. This is why they are all vegetarians.
There is such a sense of peace and belonging to each other, the earth and all its riches; it almost makes me want to cry.
We are filled with wonder at what is happening, and not just the three of us who are new to this experience—I can tell this is more than has ever happened here before. Having more survivors take part has allowed our joined minds to gather in more of the world that surrounds us.
Later we begin to separate, one by one, and go off to rest, to sleep, but as each person leaves, they still retain the sense of community—the name they give this place I understand more completely now. Survivors—Xander, Cepta, Elena, Beatriz, me—stay to the end, holding the links in our minds that make this possible, and we separate last of all.
We stand together, slowly coming back to here, to now, and open our eyes. Elena’s face is wet with the tears I resisted.
That was as you predicted, Xander, Cepta says. Her eyes are shining. We reached farther and for longer than ever before.
Yes. Imagine what this will be like when there are more of us.
Could we link to other Communities? Cepta asks. Could we reach far enough?
We can try. And then? Our entire planet—joined as one. And then beyond, to the stars. But now everyone must sleep.
As he says the words, I feel the fatigue deep inside. Reaching so widely, for so long, has worn us all out.
We file out the door into the night, Xander last behind us. The moon has moved across the sky: we’ve been in there for hours.
Xander’s hand touches my shoulder. Now you truly understand, Xander whispers inside of me, and only me. You’re one of us now, and you always will be.
When I’m back in my room, alone, I want to stay in that same frame of mind. Even now that we’ve all separated, the aftereffects—both of joy and of a bone-deep tiredness—are so strong that I feel like I’ve been drugged. I have to force myself to shield, withdraw, and consider what happened tonight.
I’d wanted—longed—to be with everyone fully, not holding any part of myself back.
And Beatriz was so happy she was glowing inside and out. It was the first time I’d ever seen her smile in a way that was all of her.
But I wasn’t the only one not fully in the joining: Cepta and Xander held back part of themselves also. They must have secrets they don’t want to share too. I wonder what they are.
If I know this about Xander, then he will know it about me as well: he will be wondering the same thing.
When we walked alone together earlier, and he told me how much he cared for Mum, we shared the same pain of having lost her. It felt real.
Earlier I resolved I had to make him trust me, but I was doing such a good job of fooling him about how I feel that I was fooling myself.
This is pretend. I can’t trust him, not when so much is at stake.
I must remember who and what he is—or at least work that out more fully. So many people died in the epidemic because of him—including Mum. He might not have meant for any of that to happen; he might have thought he was doing the right thing, like he said earlier, though it’s hard to see how. But if Callie is here—and the things he says and doesn’t say imply that she is, or that he at least knows where she is—then he stole a child away from her mother and brother. Nothing can make that right.
And there’s another issue. Xander wanted us to imagine what this will be like when there are more of us: but what about the cost? So few people survive the epidemic that makes us the way we are. It would have to keep spreading for more people to survive it; for those survivors to link and join around the earth, the epidemic would have to precede them.
Many people would have to die for a few more to live like this.
CHAPTER 7
LARA
I’M WAITING IN THE HOUSE around the hill—the one that is hidden away on its own. Cepta brought me here yesterday and told me not to go out. That she would come for me.
I was bored and did try to leave at one point, but I couldn’t find the door. It wasn’t where it usually is, and I was puzzled.
Why am I staying here? I usually sleep in my own room, in a small house near Cepta’s that is just outside the ring of Community. It is closer to Community than the places below the hill where the servants and field-workers live, but it’s not quite part of it either.
Me being hidden away now must have something to do with the visitors—the ones who came in the plane while I slept.
Lara? I’m coming. Cepta’s words in my head make me jump. And Xander is too; he wants to talk to you. We’ll be there in a few minutes.
; Xander is here, and he’s coming to see me? But that can’t be why I’ve been moved; he visits now and then, but I’ve never been hidden away like this before.
My heart starts to beat faster, and I feel Cepta’s light, calming touch—my heart rate eases.
Then the door reappears, and I consider making a break for it—but no, there’s not enough time. They step through the door.
Xander smiles, and he is only ever kind to me, but there is something about him—I don’t know what—that always makes me want to run.
“How are you?” he says.
“I’m fine.”
He looks at Cepta, and the way she looks back at him says they must be talking silently inside their heads. The slight twitch of Cepta’s lips says she’s annoyed. Abruptly she leaves.
The door shuts behind her, and my heart thuds again in my chest. This time Cepta doesn’t ease it.
“It’s all right, Lara. I just want to talk to you.” Xander sits down. “Are you still having nightmares?”
When he mentions my dreams, I remember them again in a rush of pain and fear. I feel the blood drain from my face, and nod.
He gestures, and I sit next to him on the low sofa. There is a space between us, and he doesn’t move to fill it, but I sense the disappointment in him that I didn’t sit closer.
“How are you getting along with Cepta?”
I raise my eyes in surprise. They flick to the door and back.
He half smiles. “It’s all right. She’s not listening.”
I’m startled. She always listens: not at doors, nothing as obvious as that—she doesn’t need to. And that’s when I realize her light touch on my mind—one that is nearly always there, to the point I almost don’t notice it anymore unless she says something to me—is gone.
“You mean I can think anything? Say anything?”
“Of course,” he says, and I can tell that he means it too. When Cepta asks questions, you know what you are supposed to answer, even if it isn’t true.
“Well, we get along okay, I guess.”