by Carol Riggs
Besides, me being with her is a good cover so Mom and Dad won’t hassle me or get suspicious that things aren’t normal.
She chatters about the players and the score. I let out a long sigh. I’m tired of pretending. She’s so closed off to what’s going on, to the deadly reality of our lives.
“How terrible about your biology exam,” she says, misinterpreting my sigh.
I shrug. “I’m a normal person now. I got a bad grade.”
“Be serious.”
“What, you think I’m gonna flunk my ceremony because of one D-minus?” Man, I wish it were that easy.
She shakes her head, making her silky hair swish across my hand on her shoulders. “No. It’s just that when you get a really high score at your ceremony, I’ll be super proud of you.” Her hands fold around my free hand. “I forgot to ask you what your parents said about you beating up Konrad. It was sweet of you to stand up for me, but oh, his poor face…”
“I got a huge lecture. Got sentenced to juvenile curfews and extra chores. I’m actually getting used to being chewed out.”
“Stop acting so cheerful. You make it sound like getting in trouble is a good thing.”
“It is, and I plan to keep doing stuff like this until my ceremony.”
Her frown looks out of place on her pretty face. “Why would you do that? Does this have anything to do with you thinking your parents are some sort of fanged alien creatures?”
I tense up all over, my hand tightening on her shoulder. It’s a blooming miracle she brought it up, but then again, she knows me well enough to realize I don’t make up random stuff like this. She’s obviously been thinking more about it. Maybe there’s hope yet for me convincing her to become banished…and the sooner she starts lowering her score, the better. It’s the only way she’s going to live.
“It has everything to do with the fanged creatures,” I say in a near whisper. “I’m trying to flunk my Testing and get banished. And I have an imprintus for proof of the aliens. I can show you.”
She withdraws her hands from mine so fast I flinch. “Banished! That’s crazy. I can’t believe you’re even thinking of trying that, Jay. You’ll ruin all our plans for going to Promise City.”
“No, this is what’s going to ruin our plans.” I pull the imprintus from my pocket and flip off the cover. It’s a little faded already, but the image is unmistakable. “Take a good look at this, then look around this zone. Do you see anyone who used to be a graduate? Why hasn’t anyone come back? You can’t pretend nothing’s going on, Aubrie. If you do, you’ll be dead wrong—and in three weeks, dead.”
Her composure falters for a long second as she stares at my hideous gray image of Mom and Dad, her eyes widening and her nostrils flaring. “You got up and took this image in the middle of the night without them seeing you?”
“Yeah, around eleven o’clock. And I heard even worse things. Mom and Dad said they’re going to eat my brains and heart after my ceremony. The rest of me will be made into broth powder for their horde.”
She gives a mangled cry, as though the sound has been wrung from her. “No.”
“Yes. That’s both of our fates, unless we do something about it.”
Her head sinks to my shoulder. “It can’t be true,” she moans. “Not my parents. Not yours, not everyone’s.” She starts to weep, and I let her cry, smoothing her hair like I would Rachel’s or Tammi’s. With odd timing, a cheer erupts from the helioball game as the ball turns green and someone catches it before it changes to a lower-score color.
“Do you believe me?” I ask Aubrie after a few minutes.
“I— I guess, but I want you to be wrong. It’s too horrible to be right.”
“I’m not wrong. Banishment is our only hope.”
“That’s not a hope,” she says dully. “We’re going to die anyway, like Mick.”
“We don’t know that.” I’m not going to think about that possibility.
“I want everything to be the way it used to be,” she says. “Helping Mom bake bread, learning to play technoguitar with Dad. Were our whole lives a lie? Even you and me together, we’re not the same anymore. I’ve spent my whole life trying to be helpful and kind to people, willing to put others first instead of insisting on doing what I want. There’s no way I can do mean, selfish things to get banished. I just can’t.”
“Aubrie. You’ll die if you don’t.”
She wipes her eyes with vicious swipes. “At least I’ll die with honor. I don’t know why you’re ditching your values like this.”
“It hasn’t been easy. And I try to do things that don’t affect the kids.”
“We belong to a community. Everything we do affects each other.”
I think of Farrow’s scratched UHV, my missed chores, and how I smashed Konrad’s nose. Guilty as charged. “You could dump broth powder. That only affects adults.”
“I can’t do that,” Aubrie says. “My parents might guess I did it, and I’d get in trouble for wasting resources. Or they’d blame it on my brothers. They might even think I’ve found out their secret.”
“Then skip sessions, get bad grades! Don’t show up for your community service. Do other shady things in secret. Sure, our parents are nice, but they’re aliens who will eat us. You can’t run around doing business as usual. I won’t let you die.” A rising lump pushes its way up my windpipe and chokes off my air. I may not be as charged as I used to be about being with her, but I don’t want her to be killed.
“You could help me escape. We could do it together.”
“Too dangerous. I tried once and didn’t make it. Farrow posted even more guards. Trying for banishment is our best bet.”
She starts crying again. “I can’t do that. It’s not who I am, who I want to be. I don’t know how to be a bad person—and I don’t want to, Jay. I don’t want to.”
This isn’t working. I don’t know what to do.
I rub her arm and listen to her quiet sobs while the hoots and cheers of the game continue in front of us.
Chapter Seventeen
At home, after a depressing transport ride with Aubrie, I step inside and get bombarded by Rachel and Tammi in the entryway.
“Guess what?” Rachel asks as she hugs me. “I got an A on my English exam today.”
“That’s awesome. I got a D-minus on my biology exam.”
“Oh, no.” Disbelief colors her face.
“Did you cry?” Tammi asks, patting my hand.
I give her a sad smile. “No.”
“Boy, I would’ve.” She switches to a whisper. “Mom and Dad are gonna be really mad.”
“Yeah. I guess they will be.”
Rachel takes my arm and lugs me across the lounge room. “Didn’t you study?”
“I couldn’t concentrate because I had a blasting headache.”
“That sucks.”
“It’s all right. I’ll survive.” Literally, I hope.
Tammi bounces with her curls. “We’re grinding wheat berries. Come help us.”
“I’d be glad to.” I lumber into the kitchen, hauling Tammi under one arm and Rachel with the other. Mom and Dad are drinking protein broth at the meal nook and look up at me with dark frowns. I brace myself against a sudden desire to stampede toward my bedroom.
I let go of my sisters and rub the back of my neck. “Uh, I take it you heard about my biology exam.”
“Yes, we have.” Mom’s tone is caustic. “What’s gotten into you lately? Skipping training sessions, staying out late at night, getting poor exam scores. Beating up other kids. I suspect you left the gardens early today, too.”
“He had a big headache yesterday,” Tammi chirps. “It was just a booboo. Jay’s the smartest big brother in all of Sanctuary.”
Dad’s gaze slides to Mom like something greasy. “That’s right. It is only one grade. Jay’s Testing score will still be very high.”
“I suppose.” Mom takes a long sip from her steaming cup, her irritation wafting across the room with the broth’
s nauseating smell.
“Jay’s going to help us make flour.” Rachel pulls me toward the grinder clamped to the edge of the counter. “Our arms are getting tired.”
“That’s nice of you, Jay,” Dad says, a little too heartily. “Just think, when you reach Promise City, they’ll have a factory with grinding machines to do that menial work.”
I nod like I’m an obedient son, crank the handle, and begin sending a spray of powder into a bowl. After a few minutes, Mom and Dad finish their broth and leave the kitchen. Rachel and Tammi flit around me, twittering about classes, friends, and the container of permawalk colorsticks Dad brought them from the supply station.
My emotions drift in and out of despair. What can I do for Aubrie? Should I ignore the risks and help her escape before my ceremony? I wish she’d stop holding onto the old ideas of what it means to be “good” and aim for banishment. Six out of eight days a week, she helps take care of dozens of snotty-nosed, demanding toddlers, so it’s not like she doesn’t have the strength inside her to do difficult things. Why can’t she face this thing head-on like Harrel, Peyton, and Leonard? She has to find the courage to lower her score—while she has time.
Although I’m not sure I can do enough to get myself banished.
That thought contaminates the rest of my evening. After I tuck Rachel and Tammi in for the night, I fake my pill swallowing and go to bed. I lie there, listening to air rush in and out of my lungs. I’m alive. For now.
Aubrie’s words charge through my head. At least I’ll die with honor. I don’t know why you’re ditching your values like this.
I wince. She makes it sound like I’m a coward, taking the easy way out and not standing up for what’s right. But I don’t see how resisting my own death is cowardly. I’m fighting for my life. I won’t go down without a struggle. If I fail and die, I want to know I’ve done everything I could to prevent it. I hate how that jumbles my values, but I don’t have a choice. Things aren’t black and white anymore. White has become black, black has become white, and I have to navigate the grays in between as best as I can.
At least she accepts the truth and won’t go running off to tell Farrow if I do something publicly rebellious. That broadens my horizons, as long as I don’t get locked up in a detention cell for a week like Mick did, as Peyton reminded me at the Nebula.
I wrestle with my blankets and my thoughts for a few hours. Fatigue finally sets in. The next thing I know, Tammi’s voice is shrill and shouting near my closed door. Two sets of feet thump down the hall.
“Mom, Rachel can’t hog the colorsticks! Some of them are mine.”
“I already gave you some,” Rachel says. “Two blues, a purple, and a yellow.”
“Girls, girls,” Mom says. “One more word about those blazing colorsticks and I’m putting them away for a week. Make an agreement and be done with it. I’m leaving to catch a transport, so be ready for the next one when Dad wants to go to the gardens.”
I groan and sit up. What’s up with the alien who’s pretending to be my mother? She sounds really scorchy this morning. I can’t believe something as petty as Rachel and Tammi arguing over colorsticks has demolished her mood.
The front door whooshes open and thuds closed, taking my sisters’ discussion with it. I pad down the hall to shower and get dressed. When I finish, I grab a hunk of bread and spoon greshfruit jam onto it.
Dad comes into the kitchen. “Good morning. Your mother was wondering when you’d ever come out of your room. Don’t forget, you have extra work hours to complete this weekend.”
“Okay,” I say, just to get him off my back. I leave the kitchen with my bread. As I cross the lounge room, a hard rat-a-tat-tat sounds on the front door. I open it to find Leonard.
“Hey,” he says, his eyes flicking like nervous yar-flies to check beyond me. “They need extra help at the dairy today. You coming?”
I tense up, catching his mood. Something’s wrong. He hasn’t come to my unit for years. I doubt the dairy needs anything. I whip out the door and close it before Dad sees Leonard or insists I start the day with garden work. Wolfing down my bread, I pass Rachel and Tammi, who are drawing hopscotch grids on the pavement with their colorsticks. At the end of the street, Peyton stands, waiting. Unsmiling. The early sun washes over her in a faint, anemic light.
“Come on, we’ll tell you what’s up while we walk.” She keeps her gaze on the road as we head out. “We have bad news.”
“Bad, bad news,” Leonard echoes.
“I figured. Let me have it.”
“Niya came over to my unit earlier. Crying up a storm. She told me Rich is gone.”
My legs go weak, watery. “Gone? What do you mean, gone?”
“I mean she went to see him at his unit, and his parents said he had an emergency last night. Excruciating pain. His appendix, they thought. They said they rushed him to the hospital in Fort Hope.”
I stare at her. My insides melt with my legs.
“Dude, you know what really happened,” Leonard whispers. “He skipped his pill last night to check out the aliens.”
A curse slips from my mouth as easily as if I’ve done it all my life. “They caught him.”
“That’s our guess,” Peyton says.
We fall into a weighty silence, and I’m not sure what to say. Only the sounds of our feet scuffing the roadway and the harsh cry of a rawker in a nearby tree break the morning stillness. We head down the road toward the dairy, cattle, and chicken compounds.
“Niya’s a wreck,” Peyton says after a few minutes. “With Rich gone like that, she’s afraid if she does anything to get banished and gets caught, the Board will figure out why she did it.”
Fear stabs my chest. “She can’t do nothing—she’ll die.”
“I know. Let’s leave her alone until tomorrow, and I’ll talk to her and the other girls again. I could do things with them to help them get banished, to make sure they don’t get caught. Maybe you guys and Thomas can plot together.”
“Maybe we should try escaping again instead,” Leonard says. “We already have those supplies from Boggs stashed in the redberry briars.”
“If we do that, we’ll need to swipe at least one laser pistol,” Peyton says. “To hunt for food and protect us from vermals or briarcats. It’d be good to have a first aid kit, too.”
I frown. “Too risky, and rotten timing. If the guards catch us with supplies and pistols, they’ll suspect we know what Rich knows. Besides, I’m not leaving without Aubrie. Yesterday she finally decided to believe me.”
“Then we’ll take her with us.” She says the words, but she doesn’t look thrilled about the idea.
“I’m not sure she can do it. She’s freaked, like Niya.”
Peyton gives a choked cry. “It’s hard enough to do this ourselves, without having to hold everyone else’s hand. Don’t they realize they have to get moving on this?”
“Sure they do,” Leonard mutters. “They just don’t want to end up dead.”
Like Rich.
He doesn’t say it, but he doesn’t have to. “I bet the deal with Rich is why Mom’s in such a bad mood this morning. The whole horde is probably panicked he found out their secret, and they’re wondering whether anyone else knows.”
“Do you think Rich told them about us?” Leonard’s words are scratchier than usual, stretched thin.
Peyton’s gaze meets mine. “Maybe we should make a run for it.”
“He wouldn’t have told,” I say. “Niya’s his girlfriend. He would’ve protected her. All of us.”
“Unless they tortured him,” Leonard says.
I’m tempted to slug his arm for that horrible thought. “My guess is they didn’t, or we’d be dragged off already.”
Peyton gives a terse grunt. “Even if we don’t escape today, I’d feel galaxies better with a laser pistol and a first aid kit. We could hide them near the tunnel in case we need to leave in a hurry.”
“Like we’ll get a warning and have time to leave?” Leonar
d asks.
“Having a med kit and a gun is a great idea,” I say. “But it isn’t good timing to swipe things like that.”
“I’m not waiting until it’s too late, guys,” Peyton says. “In case Niya and the other girls won’t try for banishment, I’ll have to help them escape. Tonight, after the aliens are asleep, I’m going to steal a pistol.”
A crawly sensation makes its way down my spine. I don’t like the stubborn tone in her voice or the set of her chin. It sounds like she’s really going to do it. And knowing Peyton, she will.
“You’re not doing it alone,” I say, snapping out the words. “I’m coming with you.”
Leonard starts shaking his head like it’s loose. “No way, brainvoids! With the guns for the shooting range locked up and guarded, you’d be tranquilized or killed. You’d definitely be lasered if you’re sneaking around at night while they’re looking like aliens.”
“Do you think guards patrol inside the zone at night?” I ask. “With all of us drugged, I doubt Farrow protects anywhere except along the perimeter fence. I have a feeling the guards are more for keeping kids in than keeping threats out.”
“Yeah, but we don’t know that for sure.” Peyton swaps an uncertain glance with me.
“Do you guys have to do it at night?” Leonard asks, sweat beading up above his top lip. “Go in the daytime, for freak’s sake. If you’re caught, you can say you wanted to shoot targets without signing up and having adults hanging over your shoulders. It wouldn’t be a matter of life and death that way.”
“He has a good point,” I say to Peyton, earning me a grateful look from Leonard. “Dad has a plugger to take care of ground rodents. Maybe we should swipe that gun instead. It’s secure-locked in the gardens office, but maybe I could find out the code.”
Peyton snaps her fingers. “Even better, Nash’s dad has a laser pistol stashed in an enigma safebox in his outbuilding. Nash spied on him once and told me how it opens. It’ll be fitting to steal it from there, after what the monsters did to Nash.”
“Are you even listening to Jay and me?” Leonard’s voice notches into a higher pitch.