He moves a little closer behind me and when I glance up to look at him his gray gaze is locked with his brother’s. There’s a challenge and something else I can’t read.
Samuai looks away first.
“To a mountain.” He pauses then adds, “This ship never went in space.”
Hot then cold. Goosebumps rise on my skin and my knees threaten to give way.
“I don’t believe you.” Mother speaks first. Four words filled with grief and all the anger of a lifetime of servitude.
We could have walked out at anytime. The new life we’ve been promised with a fresh start for humanity was a big trick. Everything we’ve lived with for three generations is a lie.
Launch it all to hell.
“No.”
“It’s true,” says the girl by Samuai’s side.
It fits with the pond, with the strange girl, with Samuai and Zed, and the Nauts disappearing off a ship in the middle of space. It’s why I couldn’t see the stars.
My brain can’t mesh everything and come up with something that makes sense. “But there’s a countdown.”
Samuai shrugs. “I don’t know what they planned for when it hits zero.”
“They?” Mother picks up on his words. “You know who did this to us.”
There’s movement behind Samuai and two men in green robes step through the engine room door. More strangers. One is stocky and dark-haired with a blockhead and a grim expression.
“You call them Nauts,” the man says. “We call them Company. Either way they’re the enemy.”
“Who are you?” I ask, because everyone else seems too shocked. I’m aware a crowd of Lifers has gathered in the Control Room. Whispers pass on the news about the ship to each new person who arrives.
I wonder whether the Fishies contained on the level below us know yet.
“My name’s Keane,” the man says. He gestures to the man at his side. “This is Toby. We are part of a rebellion on Earth against the powerful Company that’s kept you imprisoned here for their own ends. Samuai came to us with no memory of you, or this place. He risked his life to find the answers and then again to warn you.”
“Hero,” Davyd says under his breath.
“Warn us?” I say loudly to drown out the doubts raised by Davyd’s sarcasm. “We’ve been safe here for generations.”
Samuai seems to consider. “The Company might know I’m here and they’re known to be ruthless when people go against their wishes.”
“They shot my brother in the back because he wore a green robe,” Megs adds with a tremor in her voice. “He’s just a kid.”
Like mine. My eyes meet the Earth girl’s. Despite her purple hair and strange clothes, I feel kinship between us. It disappears as she breaks eye contact and Samuai refuses to meet my gaze.
The gathered crowd of Lifers waits for a decision with a buzz in the air. Earth. Freedom. Walking around under the open sky is something we’ve all longed to do. But the ship’s our home and we’ve just won control of it.
I look to Mother to lead but she’s staring into the darkness behind Samuai as though Zed might still walk through the door. Lady’s attention is fixed on her son and she’s in a kind of happy trance. The Fishies are locked up and the Nauts are gone.
The weight of the next move settles on my shoulders.
Mine and Davyd’s. I never thought it would be him I’d turn to when I couldn’t be sure whether to trust Samuai. His gray eyes are unreadable.
“What do you think?” I ask in a low tone.
I don’t really expect help from him but asking will give me time to think. He was close to Maston and he didn’t exactly faint with shock when Samuai explained that the whole ship thing is a lie.
He smiles that slow, charming, irritating smile. “I think you’d look sexy in sunshine.”
Heat climbs my throat and I glance around at Samuai and Mother and the Lifers. Did his words carry? No one reacts, and I exhale a shaky sigh. His sheer audacity breaks the stress of the moment. I can think again.
I have no interest in being a dictator here. The rebellion was never about swapping one tyrannical ruler for another. “We’ll gather the whole ship and vote.”
While I spoke to Davyd, the second man, Toby, I think he was called, limped through the doors and returned. He clears his throat and the smile he offers is more like a grimace. “Whatever you do, you’d better make it fast. Company officers are waiting outside.”
“So you say.” Mother spits the words. Her eyes dart around the room, taking us all in but focusing on nobody. “They say all this but we don’t know they’re telling the truth.” Finally, she fixes on me. “Zed could be out there.”
The pain in Samuai’s eyes and voice when he spoke was real. I’m sure of it. “He’s gone, Mother.”
She shakes her head. Hard, jerky movements of denial. “No. They’re lying.” Tears well in her eyes. “They have to be lying.”
She grabs a club from the nearest Lifer. The metal pipe appears so dirty and big in her slender hand. Then she’s pushing past the men at the door and into the engine room at a run.
There’s a heartbeat of shocked silence.
“Mother, stop!” The cry rips from my throat but she’s beyond hearing me.
I’m first to follow through the machines and the dark twisting path. My feet slap on the floor, in time to my thumping heart and racing pulse. But she’s way too fast.
The door at the end bursts open, streaming light into the greasy dark space. She’s out into the morning sun before I reach the threshold. I glimpse a green meadow with Lady’s yellow flowers.
Samuai was telling the truth. But I can’t even take in the sky because Mother has my focus.
Twenty figures lift their weapons to shoot.
“Mother.”
I step after her but I’m dragged back by a fistful of dress. Davyd.
“Let me go,” I scream. I fight him. My nails rip at the bare skin of his arms and face but he’s too strong.
All I can do is watch.
“Fire,” the tallest man calls out.
As one they flick the switch on their weapons.
“No. No. No.” The emotion clogging my throat makes the cry a squeak.
For a second, nothing happens.
She’s closing the gap, screaming something that sounds like my brother’s name. Tears blur my eyes and my pulse is loud in my ears. They’re stepping back, looking at each other in confusion.
She reaches them with club swinging. Crunch. The pipe sends one slight figure flying with a spray of blood. Another swing. I feel the impact through my own body.
Maybe she’ll make it. That’s two down. But there are too many. Way too many. Then she’s surrounded. They fall on her like a swarm of ship moths at the light.
They drag the club from her hands but she fights on. Kicking out with bare blue-inked feet. Thud. One strike lands in a woman’s stomach and she doubles over.
But now they have her club. And I need to get to her. I have to help.
“Mother.”
But Davyd won’t let me go. His arms imprison me when I need to be free. “You dying won’t save anyone.”
My heels connect with his shins but it doesn’t make any difference. “Don’t you understand?” My voice scrapes from my throat. “I don’t care.”
I fall to my knees as they drag her to hers. My hands go to my head with the first blow of the club striking her skull. Then it’s on her jaw and I bone juts through the mangled flesh and pooling blood. Then she’s down among them, and their fists and feet are flying.
Acid burns my throat. I need to be sick, but I can’t look away.
“Mo-ther.”
Davyd drags me backwards despite me fighting to stay. The door closes. We’re in darkness again.
Chapter Twenty
[Samuai]
We sit around a table in what was once the Control Room. We know now it did little more than run survei
llance and air-conditioning. Megs and Keane are on one side. My mother, Davyd, Asher, and another Lifer I don’t know sit on the other.
We told Asher she didn’t have to be here after what happened to Elex but she insisted. She’s cried no tears since she returned through the engine room door, leaning on my brother’s arm, but she’s pale and silent.
Toby stands guard at the door with two Lifers I don’t know.
“Seems it’s not going to be as easy to get out as it was to get in,” I say into the silence. “A traitor from the city warned the Company I would come here.” I avoid the might-have-beens of hitting Eliza harder in our fight. “They’re armed and waiting outside.”
“What’s this Company?” My mother’s voice is strong and sure. “Why do all this?”
Her question echoes the million I’ve had over the last few days. The unique Q weapon, the aliens, the lack of a real army.
Why?
Guilt muddies my thinking and makes the air hot and heavy in my lungs.
I can’t sit still a second longer. The screech of my chair pushing back makes both Megs and Asher flinch. I pace the room from the table to the console.
“The Company is the remains of what government pulled together after the Upheaval,” Keane explains. “It ran the propaganda to get resources for the big launch of this ship.”
“Their officers wear the same uniforms as the Nauts, but they carry a strange weapon. I seem to be immune.” I lift my shirt to show the green marks still on my skin. “Shots like this are what left Megs’ brother fighting for his life. I think everyone on board is resistant. It’s why they couldn’t bring Elex down easily. I’m guessing they weren’t sure their experiment worked or they wouldn’t have come armed with Qs.”
Asher says nothing but recoils at the sound of her mother’s name.
“But you don’t know.” Davyd’s non question is filled with skepticism.
The perpetual smirk on his face triggers my hands to ball into fists. He led me to the Control Room. He wanted to get rid of me. Now he’s sitting next to Asher like he owns the place.
I grab the Q from my pocket. Stride around the table. And fire into the skin of his bare arm. A green mark forms in seconds but he doesn’t even flinch.
“There. Guess confirmed.”
Davyd jumps to his feet and grabs a handful of my t-shirt. “Whatever you have to say, just say it.”
I smack his hand free. “Who says I have something to say?” But the memory of the last time I saw him won’t go away.
“Me.” His brows go up all innocent-like and I almost punch him. “I’m not surprised you’d prefer to skulk in the shadows. After all, that’s how you left.”
Every eye in the room is on me. “I believed I could help.”
“By running away?”
“You know an awful lot about what happened for someone who stayed behind.” I wave my hand around the table. “Yet, I suspect you didn’t share anything with anyone here.”
He hesitates a beat, but I’m the only one who notices. “For weeks you and Maston had these secret meetings, clamming up whenever anyone was around. I was working late when ordered to bring you to him. You weren’t surprised that night to be woken and then you disappeared with him.” He swallows as though the words are hard to get out. “When Maston returned, he reported your tragic death. I’d just lost my big brother. Who would blame me if I didn’t want to tarnish your memory?”
He sounds so sincere, but he’s not. There was the smirk for starters—it’s the last thing I saw on the ship as Maston led me through the door. And he’s too ambitious not to be involved. Our whole lives he resented me for being older and being the one Maston chose for Naut work, leaving him with Huckle. He’s playing us, playing all of us and I don’t have a shred of evidence to prove it.
I glance around the table and see sympathy for the position Davyd found himself in Asher’s beautiful face. Damn him to hell, I never thought he’d have her conned.
“You knew,” I say. But there’s doubt in my voice and I hate that there’s still so much going on with Maston that I don’t understand. “You’re probably still working for them.”
Davyd holds out his hands. “I didn’t.” He even manages to have his voice catch. “I want the same as you. Freedom, equality, all of it.”
I shove him back so he lands heavily in his seat. I feel Keane’s eyes on me but I don’t want to look his way and see censure. Instead, I return to my place and stare at the table.
Keane takes over again. “We’re guessing it’s something they’re putting in the air or the water here deliberately.”
Mother waves her arm to speak and then waits for Keane to nod his head. “All children on the ship get injections. Maybe there’s something in those.”
I zone out when he talks about the green robes and rebellion. I’ve heard the spiel before. None of it will bring Asher’s family back. Maston and his CEO must have a stake in all this. Having seen their fledgling New City, I know they don’t have resources to throw away on keeping a pretend ship running.
“Could the aliens be real?” Keane asks. His brows are lowered and he’s jiggling his right knee like the rapid thoughts in his brain need some kind of outlet.
I slap my forehead. “That’s it.”
Davyd leans forward in exaggerated anticipation. “Wow us, oh brilliant brother.”
I ignore him and look to Keane. “The Company doesn’t need to recruit an army.”
“Because they’re breeding one.” Asher’s soft words finish my sentence.
I nod. Obviously her silence was less wounded and more thoughtful. She’s become so strong. The girl I knew would’ve given up after her mother died.
“Yes. It’s us. We’ve been created to be immune to the Q, the greatest weapon in the Upheaval.”
“We need to get away.” Asher’s voice is strong and sure. “Now, while we outnumber the Company.”
Davyd nods. “I agree.”
Keane and Toby share a glance. Keane stands. “The world out there is unstable. Resources in the city are few. Leaving’s fine but where will you go?”
Megs clears her throat. “We could take you beyond the mountains.” She’s speaking to everyone but her gaze is on Asher. She’s trying to help.
I remember the place Megs talked about that day on the roof. It could be a fresh start for everyone on the ship.
Keane frowns. “We’re not ready to move.”
“On this ship we have farmers and tailors and mechanics and cooks.” As I speak I’m aware I’m listing the jobs of the Lifers. The Fishies don’t have much to contribute. “We have skills. If you’re making a new start we could help. Work together.”
“Together?” Keane asks. He pins Asher with questions in his eyes. “What about those you’ve captured below?”
She drags a hand across her eyes, then looks at all of us. “Get past the Company and we all get a new start. They’ll have the same choice: stay here in the shell of a spaceship or start fresh with you.”
Keane nods. “You’d be welcome.”
“Let’s get this over.” Asher shoves her chair back and stands. Incredibly fragile, incredibly strong. She turns to the Lifers, her face ice. “Everyone gather in the ballroom.”
They move at once to obey her command.
***
“Listen up,” I call to the Fishies and Lifers squeezed into the ballroom.
I don’t look for her but I know Asher’s behind me. She’s the one who made this decision when she could have left the Fishies to rot. But it’s up to me to speak.
The weight of her brother’s loss and now her mother’s is a wall between us. If she knew the truth…
I tamp down the memories. There’ll be time to tell her, sometime when we’re safe from the Company and its plans, in the place Megs told me about beyond the mountains. But we have to get through a wall of Company soldiers and off this island first.
The crowd of Lifers an
d Fishies look to me and the weight of expectation in their eyes almost freezes my throat.
Almost.
“The Company has a specially developed weapon. It will take down anyone from the city but those of us from the Pelican are immune.”
“They still have fists and feet.” Davyd glares at me like I was disrespecting Asher’s mother. He stands at her side and despite Megs—despite the fact I left her—jealousy rears in my chest where I held her image close to my heart for so long.
I stare my little brother down. The one who betrayed me to the Company to get me off the ship. I don’t know whether he planned to get closer to Maston or Asher, but whatever his reason, I know he has Zed’s blood on his hands too. There will be a reckoning between us but not at the risk of more lives.
I owe too many people to be sidetracked now. “I will go first.” My emphasis is deliberate. I know he can’t stand to be thought chicken.
But it’s Asher who responds first. “These people from the city have freed us to a life on earth.” She stares out over the crowd. Touching them all with her gaze. “All we have to do is take it.”
And I see the girl I fell in love with all those years ago. Strong and determined. She has lost more than all of us, but is willing to fight for what she believes in.
The Lifers close rank around her. Even before Elex’s death they followed her as leader but I don’t think she’s realized her power yet.
I find myself looking to my people, the Fishies, in the hope they’ll step up to the battle. For several long seconds there’s nothing. I’m aware of those from the city observing and shame spikes within me.
Then Davyd moves from Asher’s side. He saunters through the Fishies’ crowd like he’s heading to the bar. Soon they are all looking at him. He halts in front. “We’re with you. Wouldn’t want you showing us up.”
In an instant he’s spoken for everybody and claimed them as his own.
Davyd and Asher become a blur of action. Keane and Toby confer about the best approach once they open the door. They work together easily, finishing each other’s thoughts. They direct those who will stay and care for the wounded and children, and select those who will join us in the attack.
Lifer Page 24