Arriving at the fields, I realized we had a lot of work to do. The flower weed had overrun the crops and was choking the life from every useful plant. We stopped at the edge, and Smith began to speak from behind us. “Follow what Aella says. These were her fields; she’ll know what to do.”
“Still are my fields, Smith,” I said.
“We’ll see about that,” he answered with a slight smile.
We worked, pulling weeds in the fields for hours, down on our knees in the wet dirt with the hot sun beating down on us. The flower weed was resilient and threatened to cut the skin on my hands with every pull. Sweat ran down my face into my eyes, making them sting. Occasionally some of the crew would bring us water but not much. The only thing that made the work bearable was that we were allowed to talk.
“So, why do you think he did it?” I asked.
“Who? Who did what?”
“The guy that smashed a tree on Smith’s head. Why do you think he did it? Other than the obvious reasons,” I said, rolling my eyes.
Tears welled up in her eyes when she answered. “Because he’s my husband, and he saw Smith talking to me. Must have just sent him over the top, I guess.”
“He’s your husband?” I asked, shocked. “I didn’t realize there were people with us that were close before all of this.”
“Yeah, my husband and I came as a package deal, so they kinda had to take us together. ‘Together or not at all’ is what Jack told ‘em,” she said.
“Jack...I just realized I don’t even know your name,” I said.
“It’s Sierra.” She smiled at me, her short blonde hair tickling her face in the breeze. “I think we need to stick together, Aella.”
“I think so too.” I looked up from digging in the dirt and saw Sierra smiling at me. Her face looked young but exhausted. I guessed her to be about my age or maybe a little older; she looked wise and strong, like she had seen more than I had—or experienced more. The curls in her hair showed tangles beyond repair, which made me wonder if she’d always been that way, or if it was new. As I observed her and made assumptions, I detected movement in the tree line behind her and shot a glance in that direction. I saw two men moving quickly through the trees and realized it was Spencer and Garrett. My breath caught for a moment, until I remembered I shouldn’t give them away. Focusing all my efforts back down at the soil, it was hard not to try to figure out what they were doing. Every part of my mind urged me to run towards them, every muscle in my body ready to fire, but I stayed still. Watching out of the corner of my eye, they disappeared, out of sight, and I wondered again what they were up to.
Heading back to camp that night, we were told there would be a meeting. A level three meeting. We returned our tools back to the guarded shed as we were ordered and gathered around the meeting place to sit down. A man behind me speculated that we would get a reward for a hard day’s work. Another suspected we would get a talk about how we needed to work harder. I didn’t know what to expect, I just knew I didn’t want to be there.
Smith sat down on the ground opposite our group quietly. After waiting for a long time, Leslie finally walked up to greet the group. “Hello! Did you miss me?” he asked in an animated tone.
Blank stares answered his question.
“I’m sure you all did, but it seems someone misses home a little more than they miss me. Am I right? Because I seem to be missing something, and one of you—maybe a few of you—know what I’m talking about, don’t you?” His eyes narrowed at our small group.
I looked around to see everyone else in my group glancing around at each other with confused faces. What the hell was he talking about?
“Don’t play coy with me, you twits! I know, you didn’t think you’d get caught, but guess what? Here we are. Just fess up now, and we can get this over with. We don’t need to sit out here all night and play ‘who done it.’ Just tell me if you know something, or fess up. That’s it. I don’t have the patience for this shit.”
Everyone sat silent until I heard a man’s voice from the back of our group. “What happened to Jack?” he asked. His voice resonated in the still air. Met with silence, I felt a chill run down my spine. Why wasn’t Leslie answering? “Where is he?” the man asked again.
“Where is my husband?” Sierra growled.
“That’s it! I’ve had Enough!” Leslie screamed. “You!” he yelled, as he pointed to the man in the back of the group, “Get up here, now.”
“Why?” the man asked.
“It wasn’t a question. Now.”
The man slowly stood and weaved his way through the sitting people in the group in front of him. Standing at the edge of the group, Leslie egged him to come closer by nodding his head.
The man stepped forward until he was a foot from Leslie and stared back at him.
“Now, apologize,” Leslie said.
“For asking where my friend is?”
“You heard me, now.”
“What did you do?” the man asked. “What did you do that you won’t tell us? Must be pretty bad, huh? Just ‘cause he didn’t like how you ruined everything? How you took over and think you can rule us like we’re your peasants? No. No, I’m not going to apologize to you.” The man spit on Leslie’s shirt and stared him down.
Leslie wiped the grime from his shirt in disgust and flung it towards the ground. When his glare returned to the man, it was one of rage. “You will apologize or you will suffer the consequences,” Leslie said in a plain tone.
“Like Jack?” The intense stare down between the two beckoned for action. Standing only inches from each other now, Leslie took a large step back. The man’s eyebrows narrowed, confused as to why Leslie was already backing away or backing down. He had obviously expected more from him.
“Smith?” Leslie said.
I turned from the two of them just in time to catch Smith standing, pulling a black pistol from his pants, and pointing the gun at the man before firing. Bang. The light flashed from the barrel, and my ears rang. The man dropped to the dirt, dead. Leslie stood away from the man, his face turned from the carnage and covered in blood. He looked towards the group. “Someone else wanna be next?” he asked.
Silence hung in the air except for the muffled sobs. “That’s what I thought. I told you. I don’t have the patience or the stomach for this. Just tell me who took the soft phone, and this can all be over.” He made no effort to wipe the splatter of blood from his face, like he knew it added drama to his request. Typical Leslie. We all sat quiet. I honestly believed no one had any idea of the whereabouts of the communication device.
“Maybe you lost it,” Sierra said. Her jaw worked back and forth, and tears streamed down her face. Her voice was defiant against the quiet. “Maybe your dumbass lost it.”
“Excuse me?” His tone dared her to make another sound. He stepped forward as if he would punch her himself, but I knew better.
“You heard me, you just don’t like when someone calls you out on your shit, right?” She had nothing left to lose. Her husband was missing, everything she had created on Circadia had been in vain, and she was a slave. She was daring him to kill her, to make her another martyr.
“If you wanna be next, that’s your decision. Get up here,” he said, tilting his head as he stepped back, inviting her up. His smile was enough to tell me that this wasn’t going to end well for her. He was enjoying being the center of attention, the so-called bad-ass. But ‘bad-ass’ was the furthest thing from Leslie; he was a coward, ordering another to do his bidding for him. Power was everything though, and he had enough of it to lead an army and then some. How he ever came to have this kind of pull over people, I didn’t understand.
Sierra stood and bravely walked over to stand toe to toe with him. He took a long step back as he had done before and looked away. “Smith,” he said.
I squeezed my eyes shut. I didn’t want to see what was about to happen. Sierra was my friend, and Smith was going to kill her. Waiting, squeezing my eyes shut, crying into my hands, I
felt all the stages of grief. Please don’t kill her, I thought. Take me instead. Why does she have to die? She won’t die. Someone will stop this. This isn’t happening. Please, don’t. The words in my head plagued me. Over and over they repeated, demanding to be heard. I sobbed, and my heartbeat pounded in my ears like an entire tribe of drums. When I couldn’t take any more, when I thought I was going to pass out, suddenly there was quiet, and I came to realize the silence didn’t only exist in my head.
I glanced up to see Sierra still standing there with Smith still pointing his gun at her. It was like time was frozen. Tears fell from Smith’s eyes like he was struggling with the idea of killing her.
“What are you waiting for?” Leslie asked. “You know what to do,” he demanded.
Smith shook his head with shocked and reddened eyes. “I’m not sure that I do...”
“What?” Leslie asked.
“I don’t know that I know what to do...” Smith said in a daze. “I’m not sure I know what to do...”
“Smith! Fucking shoot her, now!” he yelled.
Smith rose the gun back up, aiming directly for her head, shaking while gripping the gun. His finger slowly started to pull back on the trigger when I stood up. There was weakness. This was our chance.
“Leslie!” I yelled.
Smith’s eyes shot open wide in panic. Leslie did a slow turn to face me, his upper lip quivering and teeth gritting. “I’m sorry, did you just speak to me?”
“Yeah, I did,” I answered boldly. “Why are you doing this?” I drove my eyes into his demanding an answer. Everyone went quiet. Smith stood there trembling. The man sitting next to me tugged at my pants, trying to get me to sit back down. “What’s the point of all of this? I know there’s a reason you’re doing this! What is it? You can’t be this bad of a person. What gives?” I was calm. My hands were still now, no longer trembling. I could feel the adrenaline coursing through my veins, flowing, as I waited for an answer. I just needed to know. I couldn’t believe this was all just over power, there had to be something else. This was low, even for Leslie. I just needed to know before he killed us all. I knew I would die for questioning him. I knew my friends probably would too, but I didn’t have a care in the world about anything but the answer to my question when I stood up.
He stared back at me for what felt like hours—even though I’m sure it was only a few moments—until he answered in a quiet voice. “You dumb, naïve girl. You think—”
“If I’m so dumb then shoot me. Shoot me, instead of her.” I glanced towards Sierra. “Come on, shoot me.” My eyes panned to see Smith’s eyes darting between me and Leslie.
Leslie looked down and shook his head. A tight grin swept across his face as he looked up. “Smith,” he said. “You heard the woman, she’d like to make a trade. Shoot her instead.”
Smith’s eyes bulged from his head. His arms held the gun that shook in his hands still aimed at Sierra. “I can’t,” he said.
“You can and you will,” Leslie growled. His lip quivered as he stared Smith down, his face red.
Smith’s eyes welled up, as his arms slowly swung in my direction. Once the gun was pointed at me, I stared back at his glistening eyes. “Do it,” I said.
“I’m sorry,” he said and closed his eyes.
I took a deep breath in. This was it. Smith was going to pull the trigger, and it would all be over. I never got an answer from Leslie, but in that moment it didn’t matter. It was too late. I closed my eyes and exhaled. Here it comes, I thought.
Boom. The percussion from the gunpowder lighting exploded in my ears, and I quickly squinted my eyes shut tighter and waited for the bullet...but there was nothing. I opened my eyes to see Smith staring down at the gun with wide eyes and a roar of smoke behind him. To everyone's surprise, the loud boom hadn’t come from the gun but rather the explosion that went off nearby.
Leslie’s house went up in flames. I shot a glance over to Leslie to see his reaction. He was knelt down with an arm up to block the intense heat that was beginning to radiate our way. I did catch a glimpse of his face though, and his expression was priceless. “What the hell?” he cried.
Boom. There was another hit to the surrounding huts. Three more explosions rang out as the crew began to panic. Some came running from the huts on fire, screaming. It was jarring, but I knew this was the time. This was the time to run.
The time to make a decision was now. For fear of being caught again I was scared to run, so I had to make sure I went in the right direction, and quickly. Naturally, everyone was running away from the explosions, so I decided to run towards them. Right past Smith. Smith turned to look me in the eye for a second, but he didn’t make any motion to stop me. I took off for the field in a hurry, and the rest of the group followed. I heard a few captured behind me, but we ran like mad through the creek and the field. Spencer waited on the opposite side, waving his arms to draw our attention.
Chapter Four
AS WE ENTERED THE WOODS, Spencer led us away from the camp and into the wilderness of Circadia. He moved quickly, and we all struggled to keep up. Our breathing came rapidly as we jumped over downed trees and maneuvered through thick brush. No one chased after us. They were too busy with damage control in the camp from the explosions.
I threw a glance over my shoulder to see who had made it, and there were only about ten people following me. We had taken a drastic drop in numbers from the meeting area to the field, but at least we were out. Where we were going, though, I had no idea.
Spencer turned to give me a wink. “We have a lot farther to go, so let’s keep a good pace going.”
Deeper and deeper we went until we reached a large cliff. Spencer turned around to assess all of us, then said, “Follow me.” He began scaling the wall of the cliff. Hanging on to jagged rocks and ledges for support, he looked down to see that we weren’t following. “Hurry up, before someone sees you.”
I took to the cliff first, and the rest of the group followed suit. I grabbed for ledges of rocks that felt as though they would crumble away the second I touched them. Sweat ran from my face as I struggled up the cliff. My hands became slippery and shaky from the exhaustion. Finally, I watched as Spencer crested a ridge up ahead of me, and I pushed forward.
At first, my hand felt the ledge, then I hoisted my entire arm up over the edge to gain a grip. I felt two hands grab my arm and assist me up. When I stood up beside the drop-off, I realized the person helping me was none other than Garrett Wells. His broad shoulders and dark tousled hair were a sight to see. His dark eyes met mine with a look of worry and wonder. Without even thinking about the stark drop behind me, I wrapped my arms around his body as tight as I could and held on. He was the comfort I had known before. The man who had helped me through my fears and doubts, and there he was, standing on a cliff, waiting for me.
Ripped out of the moment, I remembered the rest of the group scaling the cliffside, and we turned around to help them up and over. As everyone arrived safely, I wondered what we would be now. Would we be on the run forever? I thought. Unsure of how far we could get or what would wait for us out there was daunting. They had more resources than us, but we had the brains. Which led me to my next question, would we fight?
My concerns bombarded my mind until I turned to see inside a cave nearby where upwards of nearly sixty people sat staring and waiting. My mind went blank as I looked over their encampment. It was obvious this was where they had found refuge and camped out. Remnants of fire and makeshift beds were scattered out behind them. They looked rough, not like us, but they were in pretty bad shape. Hungry eyes watched me and made me nervous.
Throughout camp, I saw piles of remnants of plants and dried meats. I wondered briefly what the meats were and how they got them. The plants were plants that I’d never seen, and I wondered if they had been eating them. There were small tools and computers that looked to have been stolen from Leslie’s camp at some point. It made me wonder when and how they’d accomplished all of this, but I was
caught off guard.
Jane ran out from the crowd to hug me. “How’d you like that light show back there?” she asked.
“That was you?” I asked, amazed.
“What do you think?” she asked, giving me a wink.
I couldn’t help but laugh. “Why are they all looking at me?” I asked, motioning at the crowd in front of us. Their eager eyes made me wonder what they were thinking and why I was so interesting. The number of eyes with full attention on me made me extremely uneasy.
“They’ve been waiting for you. They have been waiting to hear from you,” she said.
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Spencer and Garrett have been holding strong that no decisions were to be made until you got back,” she said. “Half the people here want to run; half the people here want to fight back. It’s been a big debate the whole time you’ve been gone. Garrett told them you had the biggest problem with Leslie out of anyone, and you would also be better informed of what we were working with since you were in their camp for so much longer than us. They had a vote, and it was tied, you’re the tiebreaker.”
Dr. Mayhew stepped up to greet me, with a slight smile on his face. “Not everyone was happy that you were the tiebreaker. Not everyone here has met you, and some didn’t understand why we wanted you to be the decision maker, but when they saw what you did down there, everyone understood.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“Well, you see, everyone wanted to watch Leslie’s shit go up in flames, and a few guys from the camera crew snuck into your captive group down there with their little hand-held video cameras, and live streamed it back here,” Jane said, motioning towards the small screen. “They knew there would be an explosion and escape soon so they weren’t too worried, you know... ‘the art of journalism’ thing, but they got a completely different show than what any of us were expecting.”
“What do you mean?” I asked.
“We all saw what you pulled back there with Leslie and Smith! You were willing to die to save that woman,” Jane said. She looked down and I noticed her eyes were glistening with tears. “It made every single one of us proud to be on your team, and what’s more than that, have you as our leader.”
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