They keep to the left of the tunnel. Their feet amble forward as they feel their way with their hands like antennae. The surface of the wall is cool to the touch. Aris’s fingers feel the roughness of the concrete. With each step, crunching sounds echo off the walls of the cavernous passage. They could be walking on gravel or skeletons. Aris does not look down.
“Do you remember where you saw the red mark?” Metis asks.
“It was right before I saw the platform. But the train was going really fast.”
Her fingers begin to tremble. It’s the wall. The wall is vibrating.
“A train is coming!” Metis yells.
They run. The kicked-up pebbles bounce against the wall and across the path. Ahead, a light as bright as the sun is moving toward them. An image of them becoming red splatter on the tunnel wall flashes across Aris’s mind.
“There!” Metis says, pointing to a spot ahead.
They run faster. Acid pumps through her veins; pain stabs her sides. The light is coming closer.
A door. Metis pushes against it.
“It won’t open.”
“The train is coming!” she yells. She pounds on the door. Her arm hurts.
“Stand aside,” Metis says and kicks. It rattles against its frame. He kicks it again. A gap forms.
The light is shooting toward them like a meteor.
“Metis! Hurry!”
He kicks and kicks, widening the gap.
The light is as big as the moon and grows exponentially with each passing second.
“Hurry!”
The door gives, and they hurl themselves through. Aris watches as the train flashes by. A wave of goosebumps runs across her entire body.
“We need to keep going,” Metis says.
“How do we get out of here?”
He points up. Above them is a system of pipes that looks as complicated as neurotransmitters inside the brain. Lights blink at each juncture. Green. Red. Green. Red.
“Let’s walk,” Metis says.
They come to a T-junction after what feels like an hour. Without her watch, she has lost her sense of time.
“Right or left?” she asks.
“Left.”
“Do you know where you’re going?”
“Not really. But if we’re lucky, we’ll end up at a station on the edge of Elara.”
“And if we’re not?”
“We’re heading back toward Callisto.”
They come to a ladder. It seems to go up forever. They are deep underground.
“Let me go first,” Metis says.
They climb until Aris’s arms hurt. She looks down and sees a black pit. Fear creeps up, trying to grab hold, raising goosebumps over her skin.
She hears Metis speak. “There’s a door.”
He opens it and pushes himself out.
“What’s out there?” Aris asks.
There is no answer. She sees his hand reaching down. She takes it and feels her body being pulled up.
Darkness. The fresh smell of the desert touches her nose. They are outside. Free.
The path is dark with only the crescent moon to light the way. Aris and Metis follow the North Star, keeping the silhouette of the mountains on their right. The scent of sage is in the air. It’s almost spring, but the desert night is freezing. Aris welcomes it. The weight of her backpack feels heavier the longer she walks.
What’s today? Aris automatically looks at her wrist. It’s bare. She thinks back. Yesterday was the twentieth, so today is the twenty-first. Unless it’s past midnight, in which case it would be the twenty-second. She wonders how she will keep time without Lucy. Then she remembers what the Crone said about time being the least relevant thing in their life.
Their path ends at the foot of a hill. Aris looks up at the sky. The North Star shines bright above it.
“It lines up,” she says. It’s just as the Crone had told them.
“It’ll take us a while to climb up without light. Do you want to rest first?” asks Metis with a concerned voice.
She looks over her shoulders. No drones. No Officer Scyllas. No Interpreter. Yet she feels the need to keep going. She shakes her head. They are on flat ground. Exposed. The only thing cloaking them is the night. They need to get there before daybreak.
“Let’s just go,” she says and grabs the straps of her backpack. Her eyes focus on the dark spot ahead.
“What do you think is in the cave?” she asks.
Metis shrugs. “As long as it’s big enough to lay down in, I’m good.”
Aris raises her eyebrows.
“What?” Metis asks.
“I wasn’t expecting to hear that from someone used to living in a grand home in Lysithea.”
“Well, nothing is truly ours, is it?”
The side of the hill is covered in boulders that look like pieces of a toy a giant forgot to put away. The higher they go, the harder it is to stay upright. They use their hands for balance and grip.
Despite the cold weather, a bead of sweat drips from the nape of Aris’s neck down the groove of her back. As she scales, she feels like an ant climbing over crumbs. Her hands hurt from the sharp edges of the rocks. They are slippery. She periodically wipes them on her pants so she would not lose her grip and slide down to death below.
She can only hope they are close to their destination. It’s too late now to turn back. Behind them is their old life and the Four Cities. But they have each other. She looks at Metis. His body is like a cat in the night. Graceful limbs extending and retracting. Reaching toward the sky.
Aris feels a shiver coming. She fights it. She concentrates on the hardness of the ring digging against the bones of her fingers. She must keep climbing.
“We’re almost there. I can see the opening,” Metis says.
Aris pulls herself up on the last rock and finds herself standing on a ledge. In front of her is the cave. It’s made of boulders coming together to form a chamber. Her heavy breathing is constant in her ears. Her hands sting. Blisters are forming.
She feels the warm tips of Metis’s fingers on her hand.
“Look,” he says and gently turns her.
She is stunned by the sight. A sliver of moon is high against an expanse of stars. In the distance is the twinkling city of Elara. Beyond it are clusters of brightness that are the other cities.
“It’s beautiful,” she whispers. She can see a light smile on the corner of his lips. It is the first smile on him since they began their journey.
Metis leads her into the cave. He pulls a flashlight from his backpack and shines it around, being careful to keep it away from the entrance. The Interpreter, the Officer Scyllas, and their drones may still be out there.
The walls are rocks of various shapes and sizes. The ground is compacted earth. Inside the cave is empty but for a ring of stones with the charred remains of an old fire in one corner. Metis sticks a foot into the ring, kicking the black logs around. The ashes clump together from accumulated moisture. No one has been here for a long time.
This is the place the Crone wanted us to come to? Aris wonders. It looks like an ordinary cave—the size of an average room. There is no bed, no food, no water. Nothing here indicates this place is a sanctuary. How are they going to survive?
We don’t even know how to grow a head of lettuce.
Metis lets go of her hand and walks to the far end of the cave. She lowers herself to the ground. Her entire body aches from the long walk and climb. Her mind is exhausted from being suspended in fear and uncertainty. She shrugs the backpack off and feels the beginning of tears in her eyes. This is the first moment she allows herself to feel sorry about her fate. At least this place gives her that.
“It keeps going,” Metis’s voice yells, “There’s an opening. Not that big. But it looks like a tunnel.”
She g
ets up and follows him. They squeeze through a small passageway barely wide enough to walk single file. Aris feels suffocated. She is pressed from both sides.
“I see light from the other side! It just came on,” he says.
“Is someone in there?” Aris asks.
Metis stops. “I haven’t seen any signs of people. Do you want to turn around?”
Aris ponders the probability of someone being there against the idea of having to leave this place. “No. Let’s just keep going.”
They squeeze out of the tunnel and arrive inside a rectangular room with white walls. The room is bigger than the one they came from and looks nothing like it. It is built into the cave by expert hands. There’s no one here.
In the middle sits a lab-grade chemical distillation kit on a large wooden table. Aris approaches the table with curiosity. She examines the kit, bringing her face close to the glass bottles and tubes. A trace of green stains the bottom of the receiving flask.
“It’s for Absinthe,” Metis says. “Someone was making it here.”
Aris looks around. In one corner is a bed. It looks to be a tight fit for both her and Metis. There is a side table with a lamp, and next to it is an overstuffed bookcase. Stacks of books that could not fit into the shelf line one wall. It looks like a small library was transported to this place.
“How is this here?” she asks.
Metis shakes his head. He grabs her hand and walks over to the bed. He pulls her down onto it. She complies. They kick off their shoes and curl up together on their sides.
“Tomorrow,” he says and wraps his arms around her. “I can’t think anymore.”
Her eyes wander to the bookcase. She closes them and soon drifts off to sleep.
“Would you care to explain yourself?” Apollina asks.
Thane shifts in his chair. They are alone in her office. Behind her is the vast expanse of the park. The charcoal sky and dark leafless trees add to her intimidation.
The Interpreter stares at him with resentment in her eyes. She has always treated him like a necessary nuisance. He knows she wishes she had never needed him in the first place. He is a liability.
She says, “You told me you didn’t know the woman with Metis. Come to find out, you worked with her in the past. You’ve jeopardized our entire operation!”
Thane feels his own anger rising. He has spent nights in the freezing cold stalking suspects and has sacrificed friendship for the Interpreter Center. He has given up more than he should.
“How did I jeopardize it?” he says. “I found Metis. I got you the green drug. You didn’t have either one before.”
“Had you not withheld, we could have taken them both in without the police getting involved.”
“How? It’s just me, you, and Professor Jacob. How were we going to capture two people?”
“I have my ways.”
Thane does not doubt it. That was another reason he decided to contact the police. He does not trust her.
Apollina huffs. “Now they’re gone. Hiding somewhere in the desert of Elara.”
“The Officer Scyllas will find them.”
“Tabula Rasa is quickly approaching.”
“Where’s Professor Jacob?” he asks.
“Cleaning up your mess. The police need an explanation for your presence at the house in Elara. You lied to them, then you changed your story. You’re lucky you have him and his reputation to back you up.”
Thane has a feeling that if it were just Apollina, he would have been discarded once his purpose had been served.
Aris blinks her eyes open. Metis’s back is to her. Next to him are stacks of books. The image elicits a sense of déjà vu.
“Good morning,” she says.
He turns around, and she sees a small smile on his face.
“Good morning. Are you thirsty?” he asks.
“Yeah.”
He hands her a silver can labeled “water.” There is a tab on the top with a hole. She pries it open, and the entire top comes off. Clear liquid is inside. She tips the can into her mouth, letting the cool water rinse out the sleep from her throat. There’s no taste to it. Strange.
“There’s food also.” He gestures to a metal locker sitting on another end. She goes over and opens it. In it are shelves filled with silver cans labeled “water” and “food.” She doesn’t know who put them here or how long they’ve been around.
“At least we won’t starve,” she says.
Aris has never had food from a can before. She wonders what it would taste like. Everything she has ever eaten in her life has been freshly harvested.
She looks over her shoulder. “What are you reading?”
“A journal.”
She closes the locker and goes back to him.
“Who wrote it?” She hands him the water. He drinks from it and gives it back.
“I don’t know. There’s no name,” he says, “There’re more on the shelf and the floor.”
Aris looks around and sees several black bound notebooks with no titles. She picks one up from a pile, sits with her back against a wall, and begins to read.
They are daily accounts of life in the cave. Mostly things she already knows. How cold the desert nights are. How hard it is to go up and down the mountain. The flora and fauna of the desert. She flips through the pages, scanning for more significant clues. She comes across a passage.
“Hey, listen to this,” she says and begins to read out loud so Metis can hear.
“‘The Resistance sent word that they will use Elara as its headquarters. It’s the farthest from Callisto and the prying eyes of the system. It makes me immensely happy. I thought I’d have to learn to hunt the rodents and birds of the desert. Not having to worry about food and water will save a lot of time. Time I can use to work.’”
The idea of having to eat animals make Aris cringe with disgust. She, like all the citizens of the Four Cities, has been subsisting only on vegetables and vegetable-based foods. She is just as happy as the writer of this journal for not having to hunt down food.
She flips through the journal and sees another entry.
“‘A scout found a water source nearby. It’s a little spring seeping between rocks inside another cave. I may be able to get there easily enough to refill the cans.’”
Aris looks up. “We should try to find that cave. We can do the same thing.”
She goes back to the journal and scans through more pages.
“‘Almost got spotted by a drone today. I was careless. I should have known Eli would be looking for me. I’ll have to limit being outside to only at night from now on.’”
An idea forms. Aris searches the pages more urgently for evidence.
“Listen!” she says. “‘It took more than four men to bring up the table and distillation set. A beaker and a flask broke in the process. Someone will have to go to Callisto to get more of those. They won’t be easy to replace.’”
Aris raises her head from the journal. “I think the Crone wrote this.”
Metis flips through the journal in his hands and reads a page.
“‘The experiment has been slow going, but I still feel strongly that I’m on the right track. Tabula Rasa destroys nerve cells. At the same time, it increases the level of enzymes that break down the neurotransmitters for memory. I’m close to a formula that would counter the effects of Tabula Rasa. If I’m successful, it will inhibit the enzymes from breaking down the neurotransmitters and help rebuild the severed connections.’”
He looks at Aris.
“She was working on Absinthe’s formula here. Aris, this is from the beginning of the Four Cities. When she was human.”
He goes through more pages and stops.
His clear voice fills the cave. “‘Word from Callisto says Eli is planning on making a fail-safe for Tabula Rasa. He believes t
hat for his plan to work, everyone in the Four Cities must have their memories wiped at once. The Resistance has been recruiting people. More planned to refuse Tabula Rasa. The network inside Elara is working on hiding places so that people will not be collected and forced to take the treatments. I fear what Eli will do. He’s too smart and cunning—no one will be safe. He will find a way.’”
“A fail-safe?” Aris asks, “What does that mean?”
“It means that if the Planner was successful, Tabula Rasa cannot be stopped.”
“Is there anything in there to confirm whether or not he was successful?” she asks.
Metis looks through the rest of the journal and shakes this head. He pulls out another from the shelf and scans through it.
“I found something!” Metis says.
She gets up from the floor and walks to him. His hand holds a page open. On it is a design similar to that on their rings. A mandala of interwoven lines. Underneath it is a word. Resistance.
Aris feels like her head is spinning. Thoughts fight each other for attention. But she is too exhausted to think. She puts the journal in her hand down on the side table and picks up the backpack by Metis’s feet. She walks back to the locker and begins emptying the bag. The task of putting supplies into the locker calms her.
Metis comes to stand next to her. “Are you all right?”
“I’m fine.”
He reaches for her hand. She pulls back. She did not mean to do it, but it is too late. A flash of sadness touches his eyes.
“I’m sorry,” she says.
Silence follows.
“You know I saw Benja the week before he died. It was at his apartment,” Metis says.
She pauses, wondering what he is getting at.
“Why were you there?” she asks.
“To find out what happened to him,” he says.
“And what did you find?”
“The effects of the Dreamcatcher. He didn’t remember me. I looked familiar to him, but he couldn’t place where he had met me. That’s what the Dreamcatcher does to a person.”
“It didn’t just take his memories,” Aris says, “it drained him of hope.”
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