by Kyle Andrews
“I wish we had an angle on the parents or a clear picture of what was being done to the girl,” Aaron said. “As it is, they could spin this footage into anything. They could say that one of us fired shots in the crowd.”
Tracy stepped forward and said, “I have a crazy idea. Why don't we use this video the same way they would? Yeah, we don't have the angles that we want, but we have the opportunity to spin this any way we want. We can rally the people before they have a chance to respond.”
“Spin it how?” Collin asked.
With a shrug, Tracy said, “Tell the people that they shot the girl. Cut out the picture right before we hear the shots. Fill in the rest with commentary. Make the people imagine what they don't see. Maybe throw in a roundtable discussion where old chicks with giant, god-awful jewelry repeat our message over and over again.”
“But we don't know that they shot the girl,” Dor replied, as though Tracy were insane for suggesting it.
“We don't know that they didn't,” Mig said. “That fact alone, and the fact that everyone at home knows that it could be true, should be enough to tip the scales. You saw how people reacted in the stadium.”
Collin scratched his chin and walked away from the TV. When he turned around, he could see Dor watching him and waiting for him to speak up. He knew what she expected him to say, and she was right.
“We're not even past the gate yet and we're turning into them,” Collin said, mostly to Dor. Turning to face the others, he said, “We aren't going to lie to the people. What we will do is tell them the truth. Show them the truth, as much as we have it. The girl wasn't shot, and telling people that she was isn't going to help our mission to save her. Especially when the authorities can just pull her out on stage and show the world that we lied to them.”
“Then what's the plan?” Tracy asked. “How do we get the entire city on our side with one broadcast?”
With a shrug, Collin said, “That's the question. We have to do this right, or we might as well not do it at all. We need to plan. We need to coordinate this broadcast with the rescue mission, and neither one of those things can be done halfway.”
Aaron nodded, “The people at the stadium were clearly upset by what they saw. If we can get that reaction to the rest of people in this city, we can burn the whole house down. Once and for all, we can do to them what they did to us at the Garden.”
“An we'll need to keep the ball rolling afterward. Interviews,” Dor suggested. “We have to be able to track down some of the people who were there at the stadium, so they can tell their stories.”
Collin was deep in thought, and shrugged at Dor's suggestion. “We can do interviews for the paper over the next few issues, but we probably won't have enough time for them now. I don't expect the authorities to let us broadcast for long.”
“How long do you think we'll have?” Mig asked Simon.
Bobbing his head back and forth while thinking, Simon said, “It'll take them a couple of seconds to realize what's happening. After that, they try to take back the signal. That fails, so they pull the plug and go to black... A few minutes, maybe. I'd say five, tops.”
“And that's probably being generous,” Aaron agreed.
“Five minutes is a lifetime on TV,” Collin assured them.
“Just don't save the vital information for last,” Simon warned him, “No dramatic pauses. No surprise twists. Get in and out fast.”
“Mek's not back yet. We still need some time to figure out what happened to the girl,” Mig reminded everyone. “Until then, we can't do much of anything.”
“We can assume that she's either in the HAND building or on a transport, headed for reprogramming. If she's out of town, there's no getting to her. We should focus on the HAND building,” Collin told her, and once again his head was flooded with images of that poor little girl, sitting in the same room that he'd been held in, with her body being ripped open.
It seemed like the entire room was thinking the same thing. Collin looked to the ground, because he didn't want to know who was looking at him with pity in their eyes, which he'd come to hate seeing every single time the topic of torture came up.
Eventually, Aaron turned to Simon and ordered, “Monitor communications and check with the pigeons. See if we can get anything that way.”
“What are the 'pigeons?'” Tracy asked.
Though Collin was just as curious as she was, he knew that it was pointless to ask Aaron to reveal every avenue of intelligence gathering.
He didn't wait for Aaron to respond to Tracy before telling her, “We don't need to worry about that any more than they need to know who our contacts around the city are. Let's just do our jobs. We don't have much time.”
After that, everyone got to work. Mig went to check and see if Mek was back yet. Aaron and Simon sifted through all of their various forms of intelligence gathering. And Collin tried to figure out what he could possibly say in less than five minutes that would convince an entire city of doubters to join his side in this war.
How hard could that be?
19
The Underground was buzzing with activity. The celebration was over as soon as the news of what happened at the stadium reached them, and everyone was now preparing to take action.
Rose was no different than any of the others. Though none of them knew exactly what was going to happen next, none of them were willing to sit at home that night.
For weeks, Rose had been sidelined with a broken arm. She had watched while everyone else went on missions. She was jealous of them, even when their missions failed. She went to sleep every night and dreamed about the day when she would be able to get back out there and make HAND pay for what they had done to the Garden.
She never forgot about that day. She never allowed herself to put it behind her or to come to terms with what happened. She held onto that anger as tightly as she possibly could, because it was what got her out of bed every day.
There was no denying that she liked her life now. She enjoyed the work that she did with the Underground. She loved Paul and the life that they were building together. But she hated herself for having those things, because so many of her friends would never have the opportunity to fight or to live.
People would tell Rose that her friends would want her to be happy, or that she deserved a little bit of joy in her life. Those people didn't know her friends very well. Rose's friends would want her to look into the eyes of the man who had ordered that attack and make sure that he experienced every bit of pain that was inflicted upon the people of the Garden. Rose's friends would want vengeance. That was why she loved her friends so much.
There was a thing that she did sometimes, when she was alone, loading her gun or cleaning her knife. She would repeat the name of someone that had fallen in the Garden, and she would think of one memory about that person, trying never to repeat herself. If she was loading her gun, she would remember one person for each bullet that she placed in the gun, dedicating whatever shot she took with that bullet to the person that she was remembering. She told herself that this kept her aim true, because to miss would mean dishonoring a fallen friend.
After she heard about the stadium, and while she waited for Paul and Mek to return with marching orders, Rose returned to her room. She walked to the locker where she kept her favorite handgun. It was a HAND design, taken off of an officer on the night of the riot years earlier. It had clean lines, a thirteen-round capacity, and a laser sight which she rarely ever used but still enjoyed having.
She didn't love killing people. She loved taking out the enemy, because it meant that she was defending the rights of her people. She loved holding the gun in her hand, not because it gave her the power to kill, but because it gave her the ability to fight back. She was no longer a victim of the world around her.
Once she had the gun in her hand, Rose walked to an old dog bowl that she kept on her desk. She ran her fingers over the name that was written on the side of the bowl in red paint: 'AMMO'
Then she reached into the bowl and grabbed a handful of the bullets that she kept there. She walked back to the bed and sat down, placing the bullets beside her.
Picking up the first bullet she said, “Sara Goode,” and she loaded the first round. “You put jam on your pancakes. Strawberry was your favorite.”
Second bullet, “Raj Markum. You couldn't throw a ball to save your life. You took out a computer monitor with one of your horrible throws.”
Third bullet, “Tir... I don't know your last name. I spoke to you once. You hated needles.”
Fourth bullet, “Daniel Owens. You taught me to enjoy the smell of tomato blossoms.”
There was a tingling in the back of Rose's nose as tears threatened to blur her vision. It hurt her to remember these people. Every name she spoke conjured the image of the yard in front of the Garden, littered with bodies. It occurred to her that she might have known more dead people than living. How could that be possible? But she refused to cry. This work wasn't about crying, it was about anger.
Swallowing hard, Rose pushed away the tears and she clenched her jaw as tightly as she could.
Fifth bullet, “Chris. You monitored the news. There wasn't much more we could have asked of you at the time.”
Sixth bullet, “Carlie Yussman...” Rose hesitated. She smiled and said, “I promised I wouldn't repeat it.”
Seventh bullet, “Old lady who used to ogle the young dudes. You were creepy, but weirdly funny.”
Eighth bullet... The door to Rose's room opened and Paul walked in. She watched him as he stood in the doorway for a moment, watching her back. He then closed the door and moved to the bed. He sat down, looked Rose in the eyes and just shook his head a little.
From that action alone, Rose could tell that he was pissed off.
“What are our orders?” she asked.
“We get ready, and we wait for orders,” he replied.
“We sit here? That's it?”
“They're putting together a plan now.”
“What plan? We go. We shoot. We take down as many of those bastards as we can.”
“This is bigger than that. The stadium was a riot. People were openly rebelling. This isn't going to be a random strike. This is going to be a battle.”
As he said that, Paul's eyes drifted down to Rose's gun. He looked at it for a second or two and he was about to say something about it, but Rose shook her head and said, “If you tell me to stay here, I will use one of these bullets on you.”
“I believe you would. But we can't have you out there with one arm tied behind your back,” Paul replied. He then looked away from Rose's gun and met her eyes as he said, “I can't have you out there like that.”
“I don't care if I'm bound and gagged, I'm still a better shot than most people. And I can drive.”
Paul wanted to respond, she could see that much, but he had to know that doing so would only cause a fight. When Rose set her mind to something, she usually did it. Paul knew how to handle her, and arguing was rarely the way.
He looked over at the dog bowl on her desk and just stared at it. He pressed his lips together and furrowed his brow. There was something that he wasn't telling her.
Rose didn't come out and ask Paul what he wasn't saying. Instead, she put her hand on his and when he looked at her, she asked the question with her eyes alone.
“I saw Justin out there. He was hit over the head.”
“Is he okay?”
“I saw them get him into a HAND vehicle. I don't know anything after that.”
“Has Marti checked in?”
“I didn't hear anything at the Campus. She might have by now.”
“How long can Aaron keep them in there?”
Paul didn't have an answer for her.
Rose turned her attention back to the bullet that she was holding with her bad hand. She loaded it into the magazine.
20
Marti stood next to Justin's bed, holding his hand and looking down at his injuries. She offered him more pain killers, but he refused. She offered him another pillow, but he refused that too.
She would have loved to do more than just offer to make him more comfortable. She wanted to talk to him about everything that happened and the fact that they had the chance to get in with the Governor's son, but the room was full of other HAND officers, so Marti had to play the concerned girlfriend.
Looking down at him with as sympathetic a look as she could muster, Marti said, “I looked at your scans. You sure know how to get your ass kicked, don't you?”
“One of my many talents,” Justin said in a playfully seductive tone, obviously for the sake of others in the room, more than for Marti.
With a coy grin, she smacked his shoulder and in a slightly raised voice said, “Justin! We're not alone here.”
He winced as she smacked him. She didn't mean to actually hurt him and she couldn't help but mirror his expression as she realized what she'd done.
“Sorry,” she said.
“Don't worry about it.”
“Are you sure that you're okay?”
“I'll be back on my feet in no time. I'm thinking maybe tomorrow.”
“You need to rest. Seriously, you need to rest.”
“Yes, Nurse Marti,” he mocked, and she couldn't tell whether he was putting on an act or just messing around with his old friend. Sometimes it could be hard to keep track of which Justin she was talking to, or which Marti she was supposed to be playing.
Sim walked into the room and over to Justin's bed. He smiled at Marti and then seemed to take in the sight of both of them together. In his eyes, Marti could see a question of some sort, but he never asked it.
“Tell my stubborn boyfriend that he needs to rest,” Marti ordered Sim.
“You need to rest,” Sim told Justin, much more dryly than Marti would have liked. He then took on a more serious tone as he told Justin, “I ran into Liss in the hall.”
Liss was Justin and Sim's commanding officer. He liked to believe that he was a part of the elite class, rubbing elbows with the Mayor and Governor. He attended their parties and stood behind them during speeches. But he was an idiot, and no matter how hard he tried, he would never be one of those people. His silly elitist attitude was going to get someone killed eventually.
Marti just hoped that it was the right person getting killed.
“What did he want?” Justin asked.
“He's taking inventory. Seeing who is really injured and who just wants a day off. He told me that I'm transporting a prisoner tomorrow morning.”
“Better than sitting around doing nothing.”
“Yeah. So hard to be you. I hate watching TV and eating pudding all day too,” Sim quipped.
Justin tried to adjust the angle at which he was sitting. In doing so, he caused himself a good amount of pain. Marti quickly moved to help him.
“Are you sure that you won't let me get you something?” she asked him.
“I want my head clear,” Justin replied.
“Why?” Sim grinned.
Marti ignored Sim and told Justin, “Your VIP friend says that he wants to see you when you're up to it.”
“My VIP friend?”
“The guy you saved.”
“Geo Garrison. The Governor's son,” Sim added, with a raised eyebrow.
“I saved the Governor's son?” Justin asked Sim, and then his eyes met Marti's. It was quick, but she got the impression that he was starting to think down the same path as her.
“I'd be careful though. He's something of a flirt,” Marti joked, hoping to get more of her message across to Justin.
“The Governor's son was flirting with you?” Sim asked with more than a little bit of surprise in his voice.
Marti turned to Sim and replied, “Is that so hard to believe?”
“I didn't mean it that way. I just mean...” Sim turned to Justin and said, “You should keep her close or she'll trade you in for a better model.”
“Shut up,” Marti scolded Sim. She tu
rned to Justin and said, “He is not a better model. He's just a different model.”
Sim couldn't help but laugh at her comment, pointing at Justin as though he'd been burned by his own girlfriend.
With a straight face, Justin said, “Don't you people have work to do? I'm supposed to be resting here.”
“Off duty,” Sim replied.
“Off duty,” Marti followed. “I can stay all night, if you want.”
Justin narrowed his eyes into a seductive gaze and said, “Just you, me, and a handful of my brothers in arms.”
With a shrug, Marti replied, “I don't mind if you don't.”
“I don't want to be hearing this,” Sim said to himself. He then winked at Marti and said, “Or maybe I do.”
There were times when the three of them were joking around and Marti actually found herself having fun. She had absolutely no desire to drive a knife through either of their hearts, even if Sim was a legitimate HAND officer. She couldn't rationalize it, but she didn't have to. At least, not yet.
Maybe he was worse than the others. He still did the job, and he wasn't a member of Freedom. How could anyone with a soul help to oppress people?
There was a chance that Sim would need to die someday. The weird part was that Marti didn't want to be the one to do it, and she knew that Justin felt the same way. Though, she suspected that Justin's willingness to accept Sim might have had something to do with their mutual friend. If Libby could have loved Sim, she must have seen something good in him.
Of course, Libby was a crazy girl who walked right into her own death, so Marti wasn't following her lead on this one. She was following herself.
Justin squeezed Marti's hand and said, “You know what I will let you get me?”
“What's that?” she asked.
“Coffee. The good stuff.”
She tilted her head at him and asked, “Seriously?”
He nodded. She looked him in the eyes for a few seconds, as though she were debating whether or not to comply with his request, but the truth was that she'd been looking for an excuse to go to the coffee shop all day.