I don’t see my mother when we disembark. The Intrepid’s crew is numerous to account for the ship’s size, so when we walk off the gangplank, it’s with several hundred other people who are eager to get back to their homes on the ground. Vega keeps me close, going so far as to handcuff me before we get off the ship. I take in as much information as I can, sweeping my gaze back and forth across the port. Everything looks similar to the way I left it. There’s the downtown shopping area for rich locals, the hilly suburb off to the right, and the Academy off in the distance to the left. It’s a few miles away, so Vega shoves me into a self-driving taxi at the port’s exit.
“Not much has changed, huh?” I say, peering through the tinted window. IA propaganda bombards me from every direction. The official logo is printed on road signs, billboards, and even stamped into concrete curbs. “It’s all—” I give Vega the official IA salute.
She returns a wry smile. “Did you expect something else?”
“No, I guess not.”
We ride in silence for a few minutes as I take in my surroundings. Years ago, when we were troublesome teenagers, Vega and I scampered around these streets like wild dogs. Whenever we had free time off of school, I dragged her to every shop and restaurant in the downtown area, paying with my parents’ credits until I spent so much that my mother cut me off.
“There’s Cosmic,” Vega says, pointing at a café through the window. “Remember when we crashed Ray’s open mic night? I thought he was going to murder us.”
I can’t help but chuckle. “That coffee cake we stole was great though.”
“Yeah, until I ate so much of it, I barfed.”
“I forgot about that!”
“Lucky you,” Vega says. Her smile fades. “It wasn’t all bad, was it? You didn’t leave because of me, right?”
“You know that’s not the reason,” I reply. “I told you. I wasn’t cut out for this place. Discipline, rigidity, structure. Never my thing.”
The automatic car chugs up a grassy hill. In the summer, we used to roll through the pink and purple wildflowers here then return to school covered in pollen. The Academy sits at the crest of the hill, lording over the little town near the port. Like the rest of Harmonia, it hasn’t changed. The main building is an architectural accomplishment, shaped like an enormous barrelled wave out of thick, tinted glass. The glass itself collects and distributes solar energy. The entire school runs on the strength of the Pavo galaxy’s sun. The campus is huge, stretching far and wide. It branches off into two sections: Intelligence and Defense. In my day, most students only ever saw the half of the school they trained in.
“There’s my—our building,” Vega says, pointing out a newer construction. “It’s for people like me who are trying to bridge the gap between Intelligence and Defense. Eventually, we’ll both be working in there.”
“Eventually?”
“Commander Holmes would like you to review basic coursework,” she says. “Tomorrow, you start training with the cadets.”
I stare at her in disbelief, my jaw slack. “You want me to train with a bunch of kids? I’ll kill them!”
“You’ll find our students to be quite proficient,” Vega replies. “The commander fears you’ve forgotten IA’s combat rules and regulations. Think of this as a refresher course.”
“I’m twenty-five,” I spit. “I’m not going to train with a bunch of teenagers.”
“You’ll do whatever I say.”
“Yeah, we’ll see.”
I cross my arms and slump in my seat as the car passes the Academy and continues to the housing areas on campus. The first ring of buildings are all dorms for the students. Beyond that are real houses for faculty members and staff who can afford to live here. As the houses get bigger and bigger the farther we drive, Vega’s lips tighten in a thin line.
“Tell me something,” I say. “What’s really going on with your mother? Because I’m starting to doubt the sob story you fed me on The Impossible.”
“Everything I told you about my mother is true,” Vega answers. “She’s sick from opalite poisoning, and the IA takes care of her as long as I don’t step out of line. It’s the best deal I could ask for.”
“Aside from all the—” I salute her again.
She smacks my hand. “Stop doing that. We’re almost there.”
The car pulls up to a high wall of thick shrubbery. No matter how much I crane my neck, I can’t see past the bushes.
“Vega, this is a jungle, not a house.”
Vega, never without her trusty IA-issued tablet, pulls it out, types in a code, and presses enter. The shrubbery shudders, then an entire chunk of bushes moves out of the way to reveal an opening just big enough for our car. The car trundles through the thick foliage and emerges on the other side.
The house, no longer hidden behind the bushes, is enormous. It’s a beautiful construction, all clean, pleasing angles. The outside is white and gray with darkly-stained wood accents. A balcony wraps around the second floor, large enough to host parties of one hundred or more. When we step out of the car, the salty sea breeze ruffles my hair. We’re close to the coast. No doubt my mother wanted the best view and easy access to the ocean, not that she spares the time to go out there.
“Ophelia!”
A lanky man bursts from the front door of the house, jogs down the steps, and throws his arms around me. Because of the handcuffs, I can’t combat the hug, but when the man steps back again, I recognize him.
“Laertes?”
My older brother beams. He looks completely different. Gone is the skinny twenty-year-old with plump cheeks and golden curls that I remember. This man has a shaved head, a narrow face, and a scruffy blond beard. He wears a forest-green vest with an IA trainer pin on the shoulder.
“It’s so good to see you,” Laertes says, still smiling. “You have no idea how ecstatic I was when I heard Mom had found you. It’s not the same without you, Fee. I’m glad you’re home.”
I eyeball the gigantic house behind him. “This is home? Not exactly the apartment on Proioxis I remember, is it?”
“Oh, of course!” Laertes says. “You haven’t been here yet. I forgot. Come in, come in!”
He ushers me and Vega inside, leaving the car on its own to unload our luggage. While I walk alone, my brother puts a friendly arm around Vega’s shoulders. She leans into him, snuggling a bit. She’s comfortable here. They’re close. It’s weird.
The inside of the house is just as impressive as the outside, or at least I guess it is to other people. I think the minimalist decor is quite cold, but it matches my mother’s personality. It’s an open floor plan. The living and kitchen areas are on the first floor. An interior mezzanine conquers the second floor. The third floor, I assume, is reserved for everyone’s private bedrooms.
“Is Mom here?” I ask Laertes, having trouble with the underlying affection associated with that word.
Laertes is too busy making eyes at Vega to answer at first. “No, she went straight to HQ. She has a lot of paperwork to complete regarding your cap—rescue.”
“My capture? Great.”
Laertes’s face falls. “That’s not what I meant.”
“It’s fine,” I say. “I get it. I’m a criminal. I did the worst thing any IA agent can do. You don’t have to pretend like you like me, Laertes.”
Vega politely excuses herself to give us the illusion of privacy, but she retires to the kitchen, where she can hear everything that’s being said anyway.
“I don’t blame you for what you did, Ophelia,” Laertes says as he takes my shoulder in one of his surprisingly weak hands. His fingers feel brittle compared to the muscle of my shoulder. “You were young. You were feeling a lot of pressure from our family and from IA to be the best. I get that.”
“You get it?” I shrug off his hand. “I’m not sure you do. I haven’t been ruminating on my supposed mistake all these years. I wasn’t held captive aboard The Impossible, wishing for IA to come rescue me. I liked living witho
ut rules. I liked having the freedom to run my own life.”
“What freedom?” Vega calls from the kitchen as she chews on an apple. “You were Saint Rita’s lap dog.”
“The point is,” I say, raising my voice, “that I chose to be a pirate. I chose to engage in criminal activity. I chose to work against IA. You can’t tell me you’re okay with that.”
Laertes’s throat bobs, like he’s swallowing his discomfort. “O, I understand how it is to feel like you’re being shoved through a door you don’t want to go through. You did what you had to do to survive on that pirate ship, but you’re home now. You can start fresh. We can start fresh. The whole family—”
“Just stop,” I say. “You do realize I’m still in handcuffs, right?”
“Oh…”
Vega returns from the kitchen, the half-eaten apple lodged between her teeth as she unlocks the handcuffs. “Sorry,” she mumbles, mouth full. “I forgot.”
“Sure you did.” I rub my wrists. At this rate, I’m going to have permanent red welts around the skin there. “Where’s Dad and Claudia?”
“Dad’s in his office,” Laertes answers. “He’s pretty much always in his office these days, and Claudia—”
Somewhere on the third floor, a door slams. Footsteps hurry down the staircase, and my sister emerges in the kitchen. Unlike Laertes, she looks exactly the same. Her long, blonde hair is swept up in a neat ponytail. She’s toned and tan, her muscles visible through the fabric of her crimson IA vest. When she sees me, she stops dead in her tracks.
“Hey, Cloud.” I wave, suddenly shy. “Nice to see you.”
She stares at me. The air thickens. My breath gets caught somewhere between my throat and my lungs. A lasso of tension reels me in as Claudia steps forward. She never blinks. Her intense eyes—blue like my mother’s—scan me from head to toe. She says one word:
“Disgrace.”
She knocks my shoulder and stomps past me. Through the window, I watch as she gets into her car—a midsize four-door with all-terrain tires—turns off the automation, and peels out of the driveway. The tires kick up gravel as the shrubbery parts to let her through, and then she’s gone.
“That’s more like it,” I say. It’s a joke, but the tremble in my voice betrays my real emotions. “Can I have an apple?”
“Of course!” Laertes takes one out of the fridge and shines it on his shirt. “There you are—”
His words are cut off by a sudden hacking fit. He doubles over, wheezing as the coughs interrupt his every breath. He thumps his chest until the fit subsides.
“Excuse me,” he says, removing his wire-frame glasses to wipe his streaming eyes. “I have an autoimmune disorder with quite unattractive symptoms.”
“Are you okay?” Vega says.
“Fine, fine!” He checks his watch. “I’d better be going. I can’t be late today. Fresh batch of trainees! See you later, lovelies. Stay out of trouble.”
After the freshest breakfast I’ve had in years, Vega lets me explore the house on my own. Most of it is empty, but well-decorated. I’m particularly enamored by the backyard. The pool my mother promised is long enough to swim laps, and the house—as I suspected—is within walking distance of the beach. Upstairs, I snoop through a game room, a library with printed books instead of electronic ones, and an exercise room complete with weights and whatever else a Defense officer needs to keep in shape.
On the third floor, two of the rooms are locked. I assume these belong to my mother and my sister, as they’re the most private members of our family. A third bedroom obviously belongs to Laertes. The bed is scrupulously made, the clothing in the closet is arranged according to color, and a computer monitor blocks the light from the window.
The fourth bedroom must be for me and Vega. Despite my mother’s bunk bed joke, the room is large enough to accommodate two queens. The linens are all white, like this is a hotel instead of a house. Fresh towels—for the pool and for the shower—are stacked neatly on a shelf near the adjoining bathroom. Someone anticipated my lack of IA-appropriate attire and stocked the closet with new clothes. Half of them are too big for me. Those must belong to Vega.
I change into a swimsuit, grab a pool towel, and head downstairs. Through the window, I see that Vega’s one step ahead of me. She’s out on the deck already, tanning next to the pool in a form-flattering one piece. The sun sparkles like glints of gold off the water droplets on her dark skin. If this is how life on Harmonia’s going to be outside my IA duties, I’m not complaining.
I go to join Vega, but a strange noise from an adjoining room stops me. To my left, hidden beneath the staircase, is a room I didn’t notice on my first trip around the house. The door is slightly ajar, but no light emanates from the opening. I inch toward it and slowly push it open.
The air in here is thick and musty. Thick curtains cover the window. Dust dances through the tiny strip of sunlight that has made its way in. In the far corner, an older woman in a mint-green medical uniform bends over a man in a leather armchair. When she straightens up, I see my father. The woman hears my footsteps.
“Hello there,” she says, smiling without her eyes. “You must be Ophelia. I’m Wendy, your father’s caretaker.”
She holds a bowl of pulverized carrots and a spoon. She’s been feeding my father, or at least trying to. By the looks of things, there’s more carrot on his chin and the bib around his neck than in his mouth. He stares blankly, jaw slightly open, spit dribbling from his lips. He’s completely out of it.
“He’s doing well today.” Wendy leans in and whispers like we’re sharing a secret. “I think he’s excited you’re finally home. Aren’t you, Polonius?”
My father doesn’t reply. He stares. He drools. I pull Wendy to the opposite corner of the darkened study.
“What’s wrong with him?” I ask her.
“Nothing, according to the doctors,” Wendy replies as she wipes mashed carrots off her mint-green scrubs. “He simply stopped taking care of himself one day. Wouldn’t bathe or eat. He hardly moves or leaves this study. My guess is his trauma from the war has finally caught up with him.”
“The war was ages ago, and he wasn’t like this when I left,” I say. “When did this get so bad?”
“Your mother hired me about six and a half years ago.”
She lets me process the time frame, but her eyebrows remain raised in judgement. I get it. My father’s catatonic state is my fault. It started shortly after I left the Academy.
“Are you always here?” I ask Wendy.
“There’s a night nurse who relieves me after dinner.”
“I’d like a word alone with my father.”
Wendy’s eyebrows shoot even higher. “Aren’t you supposed to have supervision at all times? Commander Holmes told me Vega Major is meant to be keeping an eye on you.”
“She’s on the pool deck,” I say, “and I’m entitled to a private reunion with my own father, am I not?”
“I don’t think—”
“Look, you can either willingly give me five minutes with him, or I can escort you from this study myself,” I say. “Believe me, the latter option will not be pleasant.”
“I’m going to get Officer Major.”
“Be my guest.”
Wendy scurries out of the room, presumably to fetch Vega from the pool, but it gives me enough time to get what I wanted. I approach my father and kneel next to him. His eyes—the familiar brown ones I see in the mirror in my own face—don’t move or focus on me.
“Dad? It’s me. It’s Ophelia.” Tentatively, I rest one hand over my father’s. His skin is pale and papery. He hasn’t seen the sun in years. “I’m back.”
He doesn’t move or reply.
“What happened?” I whisper. “Why are you like this?”
The hand beneath mine trembles. Ever so slowly, his fist turns over and his fingers unfurl. I fear his brittle bones might crack and break. There, resting in the palm of his hand, is a crumpled piece of paper. I pick it up and smooth i
t out. Drawn on the paper in red ink is a messy recreation of some mysterious insignia with the letter V featured in the middle.
“What is this?” I ask my father.
When he speaks, his voice cracks. I lean forward to hear him.
“Find them,” he whispers.
4
Vega waits for me outside the study door. She’s dripping wet, her usually springy curls hanging around her face instead. Water drops coat her long eyelashes. When I exit the study, she expectantly holds out her hand. I stare at her palm.
“You want a high five or something?”
“The paper,” she says. “The one he gave you.”
“Spy.”
“Hand it over, Ophelia.”
“Fine.” I crumple up the page and toss it at her. “Good luck making sense out of it.”
She unravels the paper like I did and squints at the insignia. “What the hell is this?”
“Veritas,” I say. “I recognize it from my dad’s old journals.”
“The rebel group that started the Second Planetary War,” Vega recalls. “Does he think they’re back? Should we warn your mother? Headquarters?”
I snatch the paper and stroll past her to the pool deck. “Stop panicking. Have you seen my father? He’s completely screwy. It doesn’t mean anything.”
Vega follows me as I lay my towel out on one of the deck chairs and carefully tuck the paper under a corner of the fabric. No matter what I tell Vega, I intend to keep it.
“It means something,” Vega says, watching as I line my toes up at the edge of the pool. “Your father hasn’t spoken or moved in seven years. You show up, and he’s suddenly active again? That’s not a coincidence—Ophelia, I’m talking to you!”
The Impossible Book 1 Page 3