“Have a seat,” she said as I crunched away, eyes fixed on the screen. The argument had ended and now a ship was sailing over glossy water. Settling onto a recliner, I expected her to start with the third degree—ask about my age, where I came from, or—worst of all—my family. But she didn’t. Instead we just sat quietly and watched the movie.
A small while passed before I asked, “What’s going on?”
“They’re looking for that girl’s father. He was shipwrecked.”
I nodded.
“What’s your name?” she asked.
“Rhyan.”
“Have some more Cheetos, Rhyan.”
She didn’t have to ask twice. As I turned from the screen to help myself, I caught a glimpse of her legs. They were missing below the knee.
“Did—did the aliens do that?”
She actually laughed. “Oh heavens no. I was born this way.”
“And you—you’ve lived here long?”
“Going on a decade. It was a lucky day when I took a job in one of the only cities to survive the invasion.”
“What did you do?”
“Fixed electronics. Still do, actually. But since no one’s staring at their phones anymore, I switched to other stuff—radios, walkie talkies, even appliances sometimes. It’s how I earn my keep.”
I glanced around and saw a long table running the length of the room. It was covered with all sorts of wires, circuitry and other components I would never be able to identify if my life depended on it.
“You look like you’ve been outside the walls for a while.”
I glanced down, a little indignant. My clothes were fresh and my skin was clean.
“Just that you’re skinnier than a shadow and have more scrapes than a car at a monster truck rally.”
“Like I said, I just got here.”
“Well, let me know if there’s anything I can do for you. I’d be happy to lend you a cup of sugar anytime you have need. It’s been a while since I had neighbors.”
“There aren’t many people here?”
For the first time the cheerful tone in her voice was gone.
“It took a lot to fortify this place. Be glad you got here after that mess.”
Scoffing inwardly, I had to bite my tongue. There was plenty of mess outside the city as well, but I didn’t want to argue with her. She was friendly and definitely the most pleasant company I’d had since Meg.
The actors were singing a lighthearted tune. I turned my attention back to the screen. Between the upbeat movie and indulgent snack, my mood couldn’t help but lift. When the credits finally rolled, I thanked Claire for inviting me in and went back to my bed, where I fell asleep in no time.
Chapter 16
The clock on the wall read 11:26 am when a knock came at the door. Though I’d been in the middle of a dream, I sat up, alert at once.
“Who is it?”
“It’s Sadie,” came the reply.
I opened the door to see Sadie standing in jeans and a scowl. I was beginning to think it was her natural expression. She gave me a once-over.
“The Captain wants to see you now,” she said brusquely. “You ready?”
“The Captain?”
“The guy in charge of this sector. Don’t worry—he’s not going to sell you into slavery or anything. Once he’s done, you’ll be sent over to the hospital.”
“The hospital,” I repeated warily.
“Just to be sure you won’t be getting us all sick or anything. They evaluate everybody.”
“Oh. Okay,” I said. I didn’t know what this place expected from me—so far, nothing—but I worried that saying the wrong thing might get me kicked out. Keeping things as uncomplicated as possible was probably the best policy, at least for now. I changed into a too-big faded red t-shirt and jeans that had been carelessly shoved into the dresser along with some other clothes. Sadie stood in the open doorway and watched mutely, even as I strapped on my knives. Her gun was still at her waist.
We went down the stairs and stepped outside. Although the sun was high in the sky, the tall buildings cast shadow over the streets. A few people—none younger than myself—milled about the weed-ridden sidewalks, but no one lingered. Everyone seemed to have a place to be and was headed there straightaway, no “hellos” or “how-do-you-dos” about it.
We walked a half a mile or so down the quiet streets—streets always seem quiet when there are no cars driving them—until we reached a wide cement staircase leading up to squat gray building. It looked like it might have been a police headquarters in a past life.
“In here,” my companion said, proceeding straight up.
Feeling wary, I followed her up and into the double glass doors.
The foyer was empty, except for a hand-held radio sitting on a desk. A paper next to it read in black-markered scrawl, “Please announce your arrival.”
Sadie picked it up and pressed the button.
“I’ve brought the girl from last night.”
“Perfect timing,” a deep voice replied. “Send her in.”
Sadie gestured toward a heavy wooden door.
“In there.”
“You aren’t coming?” I asked.
“What am I, your babysitter?”
She turned and walked out the door.
Gee thanks.
I hesitated a moment, then went over and pushed the door open. A tall clean-shaven man was standing behind a broad desk. His shoulders filled out the black business suit he was wearing (a suit—really?) and his striking blue eyes glinted with an unsettling edge. He walked over, hand extended.
“Hello,” he said with authority. “I’m Captain Mark. You can call me Captain. So glad you’re here…”
He trailed off, waiting.
“Rhyan.”
“Rhyan, yes. Glad you made it. Have a seat.”
I perched on one of the plush black chairs arranged opposite his desk.
“I’m sure you’re wondering what this is about,” he said, settling into the seat behind the desk. “I’ve instructed the guards to alert me whenever someone arrives from outside the fence. Not all sector leaders do it that way, but I like to keep tabs on who’s here.”
He paused as if expecting a response.
“Okay,” I said.
“You certainly made a first impression—taking on the enemy by yourself in the dark. They don't attack the city directly anymore, but they do like to hide outside the gates, waiting. They know the light attracts people."
He watched me closely as he spoke, and it was making me uncomfortable. I shifted in my seat as he went on.
“I like to give everybody a sort of orientation about how things are run here. Make sure you understand what’s expected from you. You did arrive alone, correct?”
“Yeah.”
“That’s unfortunate. We’re getting fewer and fewer arrivals. Which just makes you more valuable.”
He paused again. What was he expecting? When I didn’t say anything, he finally went on.
“We are fortunate here to enjoy electricity. The city is run by wind turbines and solar panels set up in huge fields before the arrival. The enemy knows this, but has apparently decided to allow us this source of power. They destroyed all the nuclear and coal burning power plants, as you probably know.”
He plucked a paper from one of the stacks on the desk and pushed it toward me. I read the top line:
Welcome to Springfield, the safest place in America!
Propaganda? In the middle of an apocalypse?
“That paper outlines the hierarchy of our city,” the Captain continued. “Basically, there are twelve safety levels. New entrants begin at safety level twelve, which is where you’ll be starting. The more you prove your value, the higher your safety level will rise. The higher your safety level, the more protection you’ll receive. Capiche?”
I capiched. If you want to live, become indispensable. The currency of this place was safety levels.
“Level eights and higher
are not required to leave the city.”
“So what do twelves do?” I asked, scanning the paper.
“Mostly, they’re sent out of the city on missions. There’s a wide range of them, but for you—the girl who slays Vela alone in the dark—we have something special in mind.”
“You let me into the city just so you can send me right back out again?” I said, infuriated. “If you’re not going to let me stay, why would I even want to help you?”
His gaze turned icy. His response was slow and pointed.
“Rhyan, there’s nowhere else to go. Believe me when I tell you no other city for a two hundred mile radius has power. Now, you’re welcome to go and fend for yourself. But I’d think long and hard before leaving if I were you.”
He probably had a point, but I didn’t like it.
“What do you want from me?”
“We’ve been preparing for a very special mission for a while now. I’ll leave it up to the level twelve supervisor to go over the details, but I think it’ll play right into your strengths. We’re sending you into the Vela stronghold.”
Chapter 17
“You can’t be serious. That’s suicide.”
“I’m always serious.”
Sitting up, I looked him square in the eye.
“Look. I don’t know why you would think I’m going to run off and do whatever you say, but I’m not. Definitely not if you want me to run straight to death’s door. What kind of place is this anyway? ‘Hi, here’s some food—now go out and kill yourself for us, will ya?’”
I scoffed.
The Captain’s eyes narrowed, but his voice was calm.
“The least you could do—for your own benefit—is hear the plan out. As I’ve said, we’ve been working on this for some time. We could really use someone who knows how to handle a weapon.”
“What about this place? You’ve got people—you’ve got power. Why don’t you just manufacture up a few bombs or something and save the world?”
“If it were that simple, our visitors would be long gone and you and I wouldn’t be sitting here today,” he replied shortly. “I’m not going into the details of the global situation with you. But I will tell you that if you return successfully from this mission, your safety level will be raised to an eight, and you won’t have to leave the walls again.”
The way he said that, somehow it felt like a lie. But what were my choices, really? I could leave, be on my own again. No food. I knew too well what that was like. Or I could stay, take a chance on the unknown, and hope against hope that I could survive a suicide mission. Maybe live behind walls. With food.
“Okay,” I said. “What do I need to know?”
He didn’t even bat an eye—as if he knew I would agree. Probably everyone did.
“I’ll leave it up to the twelve supervisor—Kalisha—to go over the details. She’ll also get your twelve clothes. Each level is assigned to wear a different color—twelves are yellow. The twelves are still training for the next couple of days before heading out, so be sure to attend those sessions.”
“Fine. Anything else?”
“The nurses at the hospital are waiting for you.”
He flipped the paper over where a hand-drawn map had been photocopied.
“Here’s where we are,” he indicated with a red-marker X, “and here’s the hospital.”
It was only a block away.
“Kalisha will be in touch this afternoon. She’ll stop by your room, so go there after the hospital.” He stuck his hand out again, but I didn’t take it. He retracted the offer smoothly and said, “I’m glad you’re here, Rhyan. I hope we’ll meet again.”
You mean you hope I don’t die on your screwball mission. Jerk.
I turned on my heel and walked out without another word. Manners hadn’t been a priority for a long time.
The hospital had several entrances, but someone had duct-taped big poster board signs on the doors that said, “NOT THIS ONE” or “KEEP GOING” until finally one was marked “ENTER HERE!” with a smiley face.
Seriously, a smiley face.
The glass doors slid open when I approached. I stepped into a foyer with apprehension. The distinctive hospital scent was prevalent, and my stomach began spawning butterflies as it always did when I encountered that smell. The end of the world may have come, but some things hadn’t changed. I hated hospitals.
“You must be our new arrival,” a man said as he turned from a hallway into the room. He was short, slightly plump, and wearing green scrubs. “I’m Liam.”
“Hi.”
“Come with me,” he said, turning back down the empty hall. Except for our footsteps, the place was ghostly quiet. Liam glanced back as I trailed after him.
“No need to be nervous. We’re just going to do a routine physical. Nothing traumatizing, I promise.”
Routine physicals were traumatizing. Why had I even come here? I should have just gone back to my room where I thought I’d spotted a bag of chocolate chips in the back corner of the pantry.
Liam held a door open for me to step inside. It was just the usual hospital room—bed, monitors, instruments of torture.
Another person—a woman—entered. She was wearing red scrubs and together with Liam they looked like a pair of Christmas elves.
“Hi, I’m Maddy,” she said smiling.
“I’m Rhyan,” I said, not smiling. It was weird, the way they were acting like everything was normal.
“Great. First thing, put on this gown.”
She held up a white piece of cloth.
I took it from her with trepidation and the nurses stepped out for me to change. Then the fun began: blood pressure check, reflex test, chest x-ray, blood draw, etcetera. I hated every second of it, but the deeper my scowl got, the more chipper the nurses became, the sadists.
Maddy left to run tests on my blood, leaving Liam and I sitting together awkwardly in an empty room.
“You know,” he began conversationally, “for someone who’s had as many scrapes as you have, I’m surprised you’re so skittish about a little medical work.”
Neither of them had hidden their dismay very well when they’d seen all the scars I’d accumulated. Especially the one Vanessa hadn’t been around to stitch up, which was now covered over with ugly scabs. They’d insisted on cleaning the area and injecting me with something.
“I hate sitting around, letting people hurt me. At least with the aliens I can strike back.”
“Fair enough,” Liam replied. “So what’s your story?”
“My story?”
“Everyone has a story now. How they made it this far, who they’ve lost.”
How nosy was he? I turned to glare at him.
“I’ve lost everyone,” I said. “And I’ve made it this far by killing. Anything I needed to.”
He seemed taken aback. Good.
“But you’re just a kid. You haven’t had anyone?”
“No.”
I meant for it to come out forcefully, but my voice cracked.
He looked at me speculatively for a moment before Maddy entered, oblivious to the mood.
“You’re all clear, Rhyan,” she said cheerfully. “Welcome to Springfield, officially.”
“Thanks,” I muttered, and began walking out.
“Wait. You need this.” She clipped a blue hospital bracelet around my wrist.
“It’s so everyone knows you’ve been cleared. You’ll have to wear it for a week.”
I didn’t even nod before I walked out of the hospital, wishing I’d never come.
Chapter 18
I really tried not to let my brief interaction with Liam get to me—no use losing it over a trivial conversation—but I couldn’t. Storming down the sidewalk, lost in thought, my feet somehow directed themselves. By the time I got back to my room, everything I’d been holding at bay flooded through my mind: the unknown fate of Tristen and Tanya, Meg’s startling end, the disastrous death of John, Vanessa’s desertion, and above all, Dad and Za
ch’s horrible demise.
Always that.
I hadn’t even buried them. Their bodies were probably still lying there in the house, rotting more with every passing day.
Devastation, violence, ruin. Those were the things that made up ‘my story’. I couldn’t even remember why I had decided to keep going. There was no point. Meg, John, Dad, Zach—such senseless loss. When the time came, my death would be senseless too.
A loud knock startled me from my ruminations. I climbed off the bed slowly and opened the door to a tall, athletic-looking woman, her arms full of yellow material. Her eyes shifted from her load to me, swallowing me in a glance.
“You must be Rhyan, huh?” she said in a musical voice. “I’m Kalisha. Here—these are for you.”
She shoved the bundle of fabric at me and waltzed in without waiting to be invited. I lifted the top piece of material and it unraveled into the shape of a shirt.
“Your new wardrobe. Nice, huh?”
I couldn’t tell if she was joking or if she actually liked saggy and faded.
“Thanks.”
“Sit,” she ordered, pointing to the worn chair in the corner. I sat.
“I know the Captain told you I was comin’, and what we’re gearin’ up for. It’s vengeance time, baby. I hear you know how to handle yourself out there. That’s good ‘cause I ain’t no babysitter. We’re leavin’ in three days. Most of us have been preppin’ for over a month, so you’ll have to cram fast. Got any questions?”
“Uh, yeah,” I said, failing to keep the sarcasm out of my voice. “Your ‘captain’ didn’t tell me anything except that he wants us to go to an alien base or something. But I don’t know why, or what he wants us to do when we get there, or even where it is.”
Kalisha frowned.
“All right, well, listen up then ‘cause I ain’t gonna say this twice. The Vela started takin’ people captive a while back. We don’t know why, but there’s gotta be some reason they’re takin’ instead of killin’. So first, we’re gonna let ourselves get captured and brought to their base. Once we’re in there—”
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