by Makansi, K.
“We’ve got company,” Eli growls, as his wristband flashes cerulean. His drone detector. Drones, here? This far into the Wilds?
Like a cresting wave, a thousand moments seem to converge on one as a crackling ball of electricity erupts out of the sky and crashes into the front of our hover car. It feels like a large hand has plunged into my gut, gripped my intestines and squeezed, and in a split second my whole body is alert and I’m shouting.
I push open the door and leap out, grabbing Remy’s arm and pulling her out with me. I dive to the ground and roll onto my back, watching as the hover car loses control and the momentum propels it straight through a stand of saplings and into an outcropping as big as a house. The car crumples into itself, but Kenzie, her red hair flying around her, scrambles safely out of the passenger window. Eli’s still inside and, from the looks of it, not moving.
I slide easily into combat mode. The air is alive with electricity, sparkling with low-powered Bolt fire. Above the treetops, the sky hums with recon drones. About the size of crows and faster still, these are programmed for speed and detection, not battle. Equipped with high-res cameras and topographic mapping capabilities but limited firepower, we’ve got a good chance of taking them out, but not before they transmit about a thousand photos of us to their base center. We’ll have to move fast once we’ve disabled them, before a half-dozen airships show up loaded with Black Ops.
I pull my handheld Bolt from the holster at my hip and flip the ray setting from STUN to DISPERSE. I fire a few shots into the sky, hoping the low electricity will scramble the drones’ guidance systems. Kenzie’s got her weapon out, too, but Remy is scrambling to her feet, launching herself in the direction of the ruined hover car. I throw a hand out to try to grab her clothes, to hold her back, but she’s too fast. Eli’s the closest thing to family she has right now. I couldn’t stop her from getting to his side. She sprints through the clearing to the hover car and starts pounding on the windows and pulling on the door handle.
“Eli!” she cries. To my relief, I see he's moving. He starts pushing against the doors, shouting, but his voice is muted through the crushed metal. I watch helplessly as Remy takes a direct hit, her back arching with the bolt of electricity. She slows only a half-second before pulling again, attempting to dislodge the mangled door.
I tilt my gun skyward and focus on where the drones seem to be grouping together. My handheld doesn’t have much more power than the drones do, but Kenzie’s got her big double barrel out. She fires repeatedly, slapping the capacitor over and over again. I can tell by the lack of arcing electricity that she’s got her weapon switched to disperse as well. After about five of her shots, the drones quiet and start drifting apart, listing without energy or direction. Several drop out of the sky entirely, incapacitated.
Remy and Eli have together managed to wrench one of the doors open just enough for him to squeeze out, and the two of them half-dive, half-fall behind a tree for cover from the drones. But it doesn’t matter. They’ve stopped firing.
For several seconds, nothing moves except a few drones, drifting through the sky, empty of purpose.
“Thank the harvest,” Kenzie breathes. “I think they’re done.”
She’s right. As if by some invisible force, the ones still aloft float away from us, all in one direction, and in a few seconds the sky is clear again. Kenzie stands and heads over to where Eli and Remy are lying, and I follow suit.
“You guys okay?” she asks.
Eli nods, and Kenzie offers both him and Remy a hand. They stand. Remy’s shaking, still feeling the shock from the Bolt that hit her.
“Let’s see your back,” Kenzie says, reaching gently down to lift Remy’s shirt. Remy turns so Kenzie can see better, and she pulls the cloth up to reveal a blistering red-and-white streak along her lower back. Low-powered Bolts might not kill, but they cause nasty electrical burns.
“Fuckers,” Eli swears.
“It’s nothing,” Remy says, but her voice is tight with pain. I grit my teeth, feeling the burn as if it was my own.
“It’s definitely something,” Kenzie says, dropping Remy’s shirt back into place. “But it could be worse. Lucky I’ve got a basic med kit. We’ll clean you up.” She grabs her pack out of the car and rummages through it.
“Where’d the drones go?” Eli asks, looking at me for answers. Anything to do with the Sector, Eli always expects me to have the answers. Most of the time, I do. “I didn’t know they could move that fast,” he says.
“Recon drones are built for speed,” I respond. “They’re never deployed in battle. Or out of the Sector.”
“So what are they doing out here shooting at us?” Eli demands.
I shrug, wishing I had better answers. “My best guess is they’re being deployed from an airship that’s looking for us, looking for other Resistance outposts. I’m sure they’ve been patrolling a wide swath of the Wilds since the attack on your headquarters. Driving the hover car again might have alerted them to the presence of electrical activity in the area. Or they might have just happened upon us. Either way, now we have no transportation, and we need to get out of here before they come back with more than just recon capability.”
“If they’ve ID’d you,” Eli says, holding my gaze, “they’ll be back with enough troopsto tear down the whole forest to find you.
I nod. There’s no doubt in my mind that if my parents find out where I am, they’ll send half the Defense Forces to try to bring me back. And, since those were recon drones, there’s about a 100% chance they’ve identified me.
“No chance we can fix the hover car?” Remy asks. We all cast a look at the crumpled carcass.
“Wishful thinking. I think we’ll be walking back.” Kenzie says. As she opens the tin and starts to smear burn ointment across Remy’s back, she glances up at me. “That was smart, setting your Bolt to disperse. They would have been impossible to hit otherwise, and we’d all need more than burn cream.”
Remy turns to me, but this time, instead of the watchful, wary look I’ve grown used to, her face is open.
“It helped,” I say. But not enough.
2 - REMY
Winter 27, Sector Annum 106, 10h32
Gregorian Calendar: January 16
“Why are you back so soon?” Jeremiah asks, furrowing a bushy brow as he stands up. He greets us at the cleared perimeter of the safe house. “Where’s the hovercar, and what’s—”
“We’re going on foot, now.” Eli says, cutting off his questions. Soren and Jahnu jog out to meet us, followed closely by Firestone and Bear. “And we’re leaving in ten minutes. Pack up.”
“What?” Jahnu demands. “Why so soon?”
“The drones likely ID’d Vale,” I respond, the weariness showing through in my voice. “All of us, really. They’ll send a team out to finish us off. We have to clear out of here as soon as possible.”
The cooling ointment Kenzie smeared on my back has worn off, and I wince as the pain from the burn returns threefold. It took us almost an hour of trudging through the woods just to get back to our little outpost. Vale insisted on carrying my backpack for me, and though I protested, I was grateful he wouldn’t take no for an answer.
“You’re hurt,” Jahnu says when he sees me grimace. Soren scowls at Vale and then tries to pull me in for a hug. The mingled look of anger and concern on his face brings a small smile to my own, but I throw out my hands to stop him.
“Sorry,” I say. “I got hit, and I’m a little torn up.”
His blue eyes are soft, concerned. He glances at me, his fingertips on the hem of my shirt, as if asking permission to look. I nod, too tired to care. He turns me around and pulls up the fabric. The cool air feels good on my skin and I shudder. Soren swears again, this time under his breath, and puts his arm around my shoulders. He plants a soft kiss on the top of my head, and I lean into the comforting curve of his body.
I feel Vale watching, though he drops his eyes as soon as I steal a glance over at him. A flush ru
ns through me, and I reach down to take Soren’s hand, pulling away a bit.
“The rest of you okay?” Jahnu asks. He shoulders Kenzie’s double-barreled Bolt and looks her up and down.
“We’re okay,” she says, “but we’re on foot from here on out.” She pulls his forehead to hers as if in a silent communion, and then they pull away.
“Recon drones,” Eli says. “A swarm of them. Just enough firepower to take out the hovercar and give Remy that nasty burn. Luckily Vale knew how to handle them.”
“He would,” Soren growls under his breath.
Vale ignores him. “They’re small, light, but fast. Disperse mode with your Bolts messes with their telemetry, confuses them.”
“The tiny fuckers shot us,” Eli continues, “and we crashed hard. That old piece of junk took quite the beating.”
“We were lucky to get out,” I add. “Eli almost got stuck inside.”
“Good to know that disperse setting is good for something,” Eli says, fatigue in his voice. “I wondered if it was a design flaw no one had ever bothered to correct.”
Kenzie smiles at Vale, and it occurs to me that, slowly but surely, Vale’s winning over everyone in our group.
Except Soren. And me.
I still don’t know what to think of him. He’s on our side, yes. For now. But for how long? And why the sudden change of heart? Every time I look at him, I first see the man at the podium on graduation day, announcing his placement, telling the world he had set out to destroy the Resistance and everything we stand for. And then I see him in the interrogation room, uncertain, as he confronted Soren and I as hostages and accused us of treason. But what I remember most is the sadness, the guilt deep in his voice as if he’d been breathing it, choking on it, when he held out my grandfather’s compass to me. I remember the way he offered his life to me as repayment for everything he’d done.
Two lives I owe you now, he said.
Which Vale is the real one?
“We’re splitting up,” Eli announces suddenly, bringing me back to the scene at hand. “Firestone, you take one group—”
“What?” I demand. “No way. We’re not splitting up again.”
“We have to, Little Bird,” Eli says. “Look how easily the drones found us this time. How easy will it be if we’re traveling in a group of ten? Our odds of making it to one of the other bases are better if we split up.”
“Or half of us could die,” I counter, “and the rest of us would never know.”
“Or we could all die when the drones call a squadron of Black Ops down on our heads, which is about to happen, right now,” Eli shoots back. I stare at him. Eli and I never disagree. And on the rare occasion when we do, he listens to me, instead of spitting back retorts. But I don’t have a good counterpoint, so I bite my tongue, and Eli turns his gaze back to the rest of the group.
“Firestone, you take half the group. Remy’s coming with me. Pick your team.”
“I want Vale,” Firestone says immediately, and I look up at him, startled. “What?” he shrugs. “He’s got military training, he’s taken down Sector airships, and he knew how to disable the recon drones, so I figure if he’s with me and the Black Ops find us, I’ve got a damn sight better chance of staying alive than with you losers.”
He’s got a point.
“Okay, Soren,” Eli starts.
“I’m going with Soren,” Bear pipes up. I smile at him. Bear’s become Soren’s little shadow, and Soren doesn’t seem to mind.
“Kenzie and Jahnu,” Firestone says. “I want a medic.”
Kenzie laughs. “I’m hardly a medic.”
“Better than anyone else. Oh, except Vale. Two medics. I win.”
“Miah’s with us, then.” I can feel Soren’s voice reverberate through my side. I look over and see Miah and Vale exchange glances. I don’t know how Miah does it, being caught in the middle of Soren and Vale.
“Good,” Eli says. “Pack up. We leave in ten.” Everyone starts to pull themselves to their feet but Eli, who hasn’t moved from his spot. “Firestone, you stay.”
Within minutes, the place looks as desolate as it did on the night we arrived—and more, because we’ve cleaned out all the food stores. We’ve been half-settled this whole time, prepared to leave with little warning. All our bags are mostly packed, ready to move. When I haul my pack outside, Firestone and Eli are still sitting huddled together, poring over my plasma, which has some decent maps of the area and the Resistance bases scattered around the Wilds. Finally, when everyone’s ready to go, Eli stands and announces the plan.
“My group is going directly to Normandy. It’s about one hundred and fifty kilometers, almost due north, so it should take between five to eight days, depending on the weather and how much ground we cover per day. Firestone’s group is taking a more roundabout way. They’re going to stop in at Waterloo, an outpost about a hundred kilometers northeast, and it’s another sixty or so to get to Normandy.”
“What if Normandy isn’t safe?” Kenzie asks. “How will we find you if you can’t stay there?”
I feel Eli tense. He meets Firestone’s eyes and then looks around the group.
“If Normandy isn’t safe, we’ll head back toward Waterloo. If Waterloo isn’t safe, you’ll continue on to Normandy. If neither is safe, we move to plan B and try to make our way on to the next closest known base. Each team has the encrypted coordinates of all the bases, so we’ll find each other eventually.” He pauses, and then looks back at Kenzie. “We have to operate on that assumption. We'll reconnect. We have to believe that.”
There’s a dull silence for several moments. I find myself watching Vale's mannerisms, the way he casts his eyes around on the ground as though he’s looking for something. The way he meets my eyes for only a half-second and stands straighter when he does, as though he has something to prove.
“So that’s the plan,” Eli says. “Good luck, everyone.” He pulls Firestone in for a bear hug and thumps him on the back as if trying to dislodge something from his throat. Firestone laughs and coughs and pushes him away. We exchange fraught farewells, all of us aware there’s a distinct possibility this is the last time we’ll see each other. I hug Firestone and Kenzie, and cling to Jahnu a little too tightly before I let them all go.
I turn to Vale. I know I should say something, but my mind draws a blank.
“Be safe,” he whispers, for my ears only.
Soren comes up beside me and points his knife at Vale’s throat. “Don’t fuck this up, Vale.”
Vale's jaw clenches and his shoulders tense, but he doesn’t respond. Soren, apparently satisfied he's had the last word, shoulders his pack and stalks off.
I keep my eyes on Vale until the moment I turn to follow the others. My hand, tucked into my jacket pocket, clutches my grandfather’s compass, the heirloom Vale returned to me not a month ago. A compass is more than a navigational tool, my grandfather Kanaan told Tai and I all those years ago. It represents the search for truth. It’s a symbol of finding true north.
What’s your truth, Vale?
Lying flat on my back, I watch the treetops quiver as birds alight and flit off, squirrels jump from branch to branch, and the wind teases bare branches, making them sway and bend like they’re dancing to a song only they can hear. It’s almost as if the trees themselves are waking from an evening’s rest. They probably got more sleep than I did. Curling up between the gnarled roots of an old hemlock, pinned between Eli on one side and Soren on the other, isn’t the best way to get a solid eight hours. Like usual, I woke early and wandered a few meters off to find a solitary place to await the dawn.
Today is our seventh day on the trail. The days pass in an empty blur, a haze of shivering cold nights and unseasonable warmth during the day. We sweat in the sun, soak our clothes through, and then freeze at night. Three days ago it rained: cold, sharp, ugly droplets, and, by the harvest, that was miserable. We froze, all of us huddled together in the same tent, trying desperately to recover the body heat los
t during the day. But the rest of the journey has been uneventful. We watch for drones in the sky, but there are none, and Eli’s drone detector never lights up.
Breathe in, breathe out. I close my eyes and let dawn’s crisp pink light wash over me. One more step forward, and another, and another, and then we’ll be there. Normandy draws closer every day. Dry clothes. Warmth. Beds. Food we didn’t have to kill, skin, and cook over a meager fire. And a shower. A shower!
The breathing exercises were Soren’s idea. He says they helped him after his own parents were, well, he won’t really say what exactly happened to them. He doesn’t even know the full extent of it. But he encouraged me to start meditating after the attack on Thermopylae. Soft as the lilting wind, he was the quietest I’d ever heard him when we first sat together and practiced. I replay his words in my mind now: Imagine that each thought is a little messenger bird carrying a slip of paper. Open the thought, examine it, accept it, and then tear it up. Watch the pieces of your thought disappear in the wind. Exhale, watch the bird fly away on the wind. Feel yourself become lighter. Let your breath center and ground you. Release. Breathe.
It helps. A little.
Every night has been the same since the attack that drove us from our base. The nightmares. My mother’s face, pale like the flesh of a crisp apple, her stillness, the exhale that never came. I thought I’d never get over Tai’s death. And now my mom’s gone, too. I am running on empty. I am empty.
After so many nights of feeling as cavernous as the black, starlit universe around me, the sleeplessness began to take hold of me. So I started the breathing exercises.
What helps the most, though, is watching the bruised, deep blue and purple sky fade into lilac, fierce orange, and rose pink. It reminds me that behind every black night is a rising sun, behind every cold hurt is a fiery healing, a new beginning. That thought keeps me going, even when Tai’s face swims in front of me. Even when my mother’s eyes close, over and over again, behind my own eyelids.