The Isle

by Jordana Frankel

  They rock in each other’s arms until more people approach. Squeezing Mrs. Bedrosian one last time before separating, the older woman looks down at me.

  I realize . . . I know her too—

  “Miss Nale?” I whisper, standing.

  “Aventine Colatura,” my old headmistress says, smiling—I think she looks proud, though I have no idea why that would be. She takes both my hands in hers.

  “You’re here too.” I glance around Quarantine and Miss Nale’s smile falters.

  “It was bound to happen. I’ve seen too many of you children take sick.” She pauses to cough into her shoulder. “Never thought I’d see you again after you ran off in the dead of night. Ren’s idea, I’m sure.”

  I smirk and shrug. She’s not wrong. “I’d started to show symptoms. You were going to notice any day. Ren didn’t want me to go to a sickhouse.”

  I don’t say that I ended up there anyway, after she got nabbed. Being at the sickhouse used to be my worst memory. Now I have new worst memories.

  “Are you two still friends? Excuse me,” she says, catching herself. “Sisters, I mean?”

  I nod.

  “I’m glad. She was there, at my home, for so many years. She never trusted me, though. I would have thought of her as my own if she’d let me. I very much hope to see her again.”

  Me too.

  Miss Nale squeezes my arms once more before returning to Mrs. Bedrosian’s side.

  Still parched from the drugs, I use my bandaged wrists to lift my cup from the floor, and I look for more water. On the other side of the room, three steel barrels with spigots sit on top of a table. I head for them, moving through bodies so skeletal that if it weren’t for the tumors, I wouldn’t know that they had skin. Misshapen lumps bulge out of necks, cheeks, kneecaps.

  In the background, a radio is on. It’s broadcasting some West Isle radio channel no one here cares about. It’s just to distract us.

  When I try to fill my cup, the barrels are empty.

  “Orderly don’t come until morning to replace them,” a teenage boy says to me. His greasy black hair falls over one eye, and I see no tumors. I wonder if he has them in the lungs, like Mrs. B.

  I stare into my cup and close my eyes.

  Outside, a cure is waiting.

  In my head, a thought no bigger than a seed firmly takes root. I know from this second it will never go away on its own—it needs to grow. Its roots are too deep. It wants to be something important.

  We have to do something, I realize. Ren and me, together. For them.

  The thought gives me fire.

  10

  REN

  3:10 A.M., FRIDAY

  High volts of energy surge through the soles of my feet, pushing me to go, but running would jeopardize everything. No one runs in a lab.

  I walk slowly through a glass corridor, headed for the stairwell to the basement. As I pass each window, I look for glimpses of straw-colored hair, even though we don’t think she’s on this floor.

  An old woman wheels toward me from the other side of the wing. She’s chairbound with an IV dangling over her left shoulder. An aide pushes her along. The two talk in low tones, and our eyes meet. My feet stop, like they want me to get caught.

  Act like you’re supposed to be here, I remind myself, and continue on. As the woman and her aide near, I notice her features: skin darker than mine, but with a smattering of freckles over her nose and full cheekbones. Her hair turns out in every which way. I’ve seen that face before, but I don’t know where to place it.

  “Has the treatment kicked in yet? Are you feeling any better?” I overhear.

  The woman rolls her eyes, and if I’m not mistaken (there’s no one else in the hallway), she rolls her eyes at me. Like she wants me to laugh along.

  “I’m old, boy. Find me a cure for that. Then I’ll feel better.” Her voice grates, crude and pissed off. Once upon a time it might’ve been a nice voice. Now it’s just angry.

  “Well, Mrs. Voss, your husband—”

  Mrs. Voss?

  She looks so much older now.

  Back in the arboretum Governor Voss had shown me her picture—Emilce, he said her name was. Also said she was the only person he’d kill for.

  “Don’t talk to me about what my husband believes,” Emilce Voss interrupts. She waves her hand, exasperated. “You’re no better than him, keeping me here. One of these days I’ll be gone and he’ll blame you.”

  The aide snickers to himself. He finds her antics hilarious, clearly.

  “I can only pray.”

  I like this lady, I think to myself as the hallway goes dark. Soft blue emergency lights flicker on, and a woman’s calm voice sounds through the loudspeakers.

  “This is not a drill,” the voice announces just as I reach the stairwell and the small, metal fingerprint scanner. “Attention, employees: evacuate immediately to Basement C Detainment Center. This is not a drill. Thank you.”

  The speakers crackle and go silent.

  Derek’s distraction worked.

  A minute too soon—employees file into the hall, all heading for the stairwell to Basement C. The same stairwell as me.

  Brack. I gotta work fast.

  I slip on the Print Mimic. Pressing down on the scanner, I squish my finger around and linger there; it needs to pick up the entire fingerprint.

  But I don’t lift my finger soon enough—the scanner reads the unmolded jelly.

  “ERROR.”

  Behind me, I hear lab staff approaching. They’re murmuring to one another, asking if anyone knows anything about the evacuation. I don’t turn around; it’ll only look suspicious. I lift my index finger and press.

  “ENTER,” the door says. Its steel bolts unlock and I sprint down too many stairs to count. At each level, employees spill into the stairwell. I push past—it’s an evacuation; I can afford to be pushy.

  When I can go no lower, I throw open the door to BASEMENT A.

  The corridor is dark, empty but for one, single lab tech. He’s jogging, headed for the opposite staircase. Closing the door, I wait for him to leave. When I’m sure it’s safe, I push it open again.

  I race from one end of the corridor to the other, passing only one room. Through long glass windows an operating table stands abandoned. Where is she?

  I backtrack, spotting a second door.

  There wasn’t only one room. There was only one room with windows.

  To the right, an ID scanner.

  Irrationally, I begin to think I can sense her. Like maybe, we’ve been together for so long that I could let my gut be my guide. Some say that’s impossible. Don’t matter to me. Thinking something’s impossible only makes it less possible.

  Are you in there, Aven?

  I shake my hand, resetting the Print Mimic. I press down on the scanner. This time, I’m faster, wiggling my finger around before lifting it away.

  The bolts inside release.

  “ENTER.”

  Holding my breath, I turn the handle.

  I’m in the quarantine observation room. The green-tinted, two-way mirror gives it away. On the other side, men, women, girls, and boys. I can see them, but they can’t see me. They’re spread out along the floor, not two inches between mattresses. Some wear the hospital napkins. Others seem to be dressed in the clothes they were arrested in—coats or skirts or rags.

  A different handle catches my eye, this one closer to the floor. I lift, but it’s locked. I push a red, plastic button to the left that says OPEN. It sounds like turning on a vacuum. Air gets sucked out the other side and a metal bin pops open into my lap.

  Crumbs of food gather along the sides.

  This is how they feed the prisoners . . . like animals.

  I stare in disbelief. An old man, toothless and whiskered, notices I’ve opened the bin. He sticks out his tongue. Behind him stands a middle-aged woman with a gaunt face and long, wiry gunmetal hair.

  And right there, up against the far left . . . I spot her.

&nb
sp; My Aven.

  “Feathers,” I whisper, using her old nickname. She’s lying on a mattress, eyes closed, white-blond hair spread out like a fan of sunlight. I tap the glass, but I’m invisible. It’s already 3:16—only fourteen minutes before we meet Derek. I need to get her attention. I glance between my wrist and the two-way mirror, and that’s when I get an idea.

  I type Aven’s name into my comm. Then, after applying the projection setting, I unlatch my cuffcomm. I tilt its screen up against the glass mirror. Her name shines through. Holding my breath, I focus the image. Soon, the letters appear in blue-white light on the ceiling, for everyone to see.

  A-V-E-N.

  11

  AVEN

  3:16 A.M., FRIDAY

  Right before a lightning storm, the air starts to feel buzzy. Charged up. It knows something big is about to happen and it wants to be ready.

  Here in Quarantine, it feels exactly the same. The electric energy in the room wakes my chest up first and my ears up second.

  The room is abuzz with voices. . . . People saying something. A name, like a question.

  Aven? Aven?

  I hear it spoken a half dozen times before I’m sure this isn’t some drug dream, where the only word that exists in the human language happens to be my name. Opening my eyes, I see people moving like bees, antennae twitching left and right, looking at the ceiling.

  My name?

  I don’t understand at first. But then I notice a path has cleared between me and the observation room where the lab techs spy on us. Hope is a lightning bug in my heart, pulsing on and off again.

  Renny? Could it really be her? I won’t truly believe she’s here until I see her. Writing my name in lights definitely sounds like a trick she’d pull, though. My brain sends a message to the empty space where fingers used to be, telling them to cross each other for good luck. When I can’t do it, I worry that I don’t have any luck left.

  As I step off the mattress, I hide my arms behind my back. If it is Ren—if she’s really here—I don’t want her to see me this way, without hands for hugging her. Not just yet. She’ll be so angry, I know it.

  I don’t want anger to be the first thing she feels when she sees me.

  I walk toward the green mirror.

  It’s slow-going. My spine feels so old in my body. Once, at Nale’s, we were shown an image of a long-necked animal with fancy lady eyelashes and spots all over. It always held its spine straight and tall. As I walk, I pretend I’m that animal. I fake grace.

  Halfway there I hear: “It’s me! It’s Ren!”

  That’s all I need to believe it’s true, that she’s really come for me, and that soon we’ll be away from this place. My eyes grow wet, and I smile for the first time since they brought me here.

  “I’m going to get you out,” she calls through the food bin, and I wonder how she plans on doing it. I wouldn’t be surprised if she just took a battle-ax to the glass and called it a day. “But there’s no door to this room. We need a different one. How did you get in?”

  I glance around the room, trying to remember where I came in from, but nothing jogs my memory. I was in a different room with the governor, and then he had me brought here. I shrug at her through the mirror-glass, frustrated by my own uselessness. Even if I could find a door, I wouldn’t be able to open it for myself. My throat closes up.

  If this were a fairy tale, I would be the worst heroine ever. I’d be Rapunzel, without the hair.

  I start to cry, the not-good tears this time.

  Ren presses her hand to the glass. I stand there, wishing.

  “Don’t worry,” she says, voice muffled. “I’ll figure something out.”

  Eye level with the bin, I remember my earlier idea—it nearly worked too. I dig my elbow into its handle, hard enough to open the bin. “Unscrew its nails, Ren! Use your penny!” I call through the opening.

  Moments later, the metal bin is jiggling from the inside. It shakes and shimmies, and its nails drop to the floor—

  Ren yanks it aside. “Climb through!”

  A crowd gathers behind me, their voices low and rumbling as they watch. I hadn’t noticed, but now that I see them I don’t know what to do. They’re jam-packed together, leaving me no space at all.

  A little boy dodges in front of me. He throws his shoulders into the empty square. “I’m first!” he squeals. Other prisoners huddle closer, thinking they can follow.

  “What do I do, Ren?” I cry.

  The boy struggles as she tries to push him back. “You can’t,” she grunts frantically.

  Someone grabs hold of the boy’s ankles—“Foolish!”

  The space around me widens as Miss Nale drags him off to the side. Towering over his stalky frame, she stands him up by what’s left of his collar. “They have hardly any chance of escaping as it is. And when they are caught, the punishment will be far more severe than anything you’ve seen here in Quarantine.”

  The boy cowers under her grip, while the rest of the prisoners eye me. I slide in front of the opening, covering it with my body. “I’m sorry,” I say weakly, unable to meet anyone’s eyes. “She’s right. But if we do make it—if by some small chance we aren’t caught . . .”

  The seedling idea that was in my head explodes—kaboom. I look down at the empty space where my hands should be. “We will come back for you,” I tell them. “With every piece of me they haven’t taken, I promise you, we’ll come back!”

  Silence. Not dead silence, but an alive silence fills the room. It’s the breathing of hundreds of people. Thin, ragged, weak, in-and-out breathing. Together they make a tidal wave.

  I . . . I can’t believe I just said that.

  My promise terrifies me.

  “Ignore the two of them,” Miss Nale says. “Here, we are alive. Out there, we are criminals. They may make it out, they may not. But they certainly won’t with hundreds of us ogling, giving them away.”

  The crowd murmurs. A few pairs of eyes stray toward us, watching, but most head back to their mats and chairs.

  Through the empty square, Ren gawks back at me. “You do realize what you just told them, don’t you?” Then, shaking her head, she says, “We’ll figure it out later,” and anxiously waves me through the tiny square. “Hurry!”

  But it’s so small. . . .

  Maybe I am Rapunzel, I think. Maybe I don’t have hair, but I have my smallness. The very thing they took from me is the thing that will help get me free.

  I go feetfirst. My shins, knees, and thighs make it, but not my hips. They bang against both concrete sides, and they don’t budge any farther. “I don’t know if I can do this, Ren,” I say, shimmying myself back and forth, unable to squeeze through.

  Ren lifts up my legs and twists me at a diagonal.

  Then she pulls.

  Even though I’ve been through worse, I still whine. The concrete scrapes my hips and shoulders, shredding my paper gown.

  Then she sees my missing pieces.

  “Aven . . .” Ren’s face falls so quickly, I imagine all her freckles dusting away.

  Her jaw locks and I watch as that single vein on her forehead works overtime. It only shows up when she’s mad. “Voss won’t get away with this,” she promises, but her voice is a snarl and it doesn’t sound like she’s making this promise to me.

  I tuck my wrists under my armpits. Maybe if she can’t see them, she won’t be as mad. Spotting a pack of Virus Exposure Level tests on a shelf, something else occurs to me—

  “Ren, quick. Take my blood.”

  Understanding, she opens up a new pack. She sticks the needle into my arm as gently as she can, but I still flinch. Moments later, the scanner beeps.

  “Negative,” she says, but we don’t have time for relief. “Put this on,” she says, unbuttoning her lab coat and handing it to me. I do the best I can, shrugging it on after awkwardly finding the sleeves.

  Ren replaces the bin, leaving the nails on the floor. “C’mon,” she says, but the moment she touches the door—r />
  12

  REN

  3:30 A.M., FRIDAY

  “You’re not supposed to be here!”

  A lab tech in a plastic suit and a respirator mask barges into the observation room.

  I swallow. To get caught here, now. Like this? I’d be ashamed of myself.

  The lab tech ain’t dumb—he sees an escapee in a hospital gown and realizes there’s no containment breach. Pulling off his mask, he reaches for the wall, about to call for backup. Behind Aven, there’s that metal bin, as quiet and unassuming as any makeshift weapon.

  Only hard enough to knock him out, Ren.

  His hand’s on the dial pad. I don’t wait for security to answer his comm; my window of opportunity will have become a mouse hole.

  Grabbing the metal bin from the wall, I throw it into the triangle of soft skin under the man’s chin. The tech’s head whips back with a sharp crack. His jaw—I choke back a gasp. He collapses. Metal crashes.

  The tech’s face is bloodied, a gash under his neck spilling red onto the floor.

  I look to Aven shivering next to me. Her mouth forms a perfect, horrified O. She’s closed her eyes, covered them with her bandaged wrists . . . and I’m glad.

  I wouldn’t want to see myself do that either.

  “I had to,” I say, but I’m afraid. She’s seen me feed her, bathe her, care for her. But she’s never seen me care for her like this. Maybe she doesn’t know how far I’d go to keep her safe.

  Aven nods and drops her wrists, but her eyes stay closed.

  “I don’t think he’s dead, Feathers. I know how to fight.”

  She opens her eyes and looks at me like she’s assessing. Like she doesn’t know what to think.

  “We had no choice. . . .”

  We. I want her to remember that I’m not doing this for my health—I’m here for her. Aven’s never raised a hand to anyone; she’s never had to. Her goodness may be innate, but it’s also a privilege—one that I can’t afford, because I love her too much.

  Touching her forearm, I guide us back out the door. The corridor’s blue emergency lights are still on—staff’s still in detainment and the coast is clear, temporarily. If I’m right and security cameras gave us away, someone’s gonna follow up real soon. “We have to run,” I say, and I take off first hoping to jump-start her flight reaction.