“You will not be armed until you’ve proven your loyalties to us. But we need all the help we can get. With your familiarity with the dome, your assistance could be invaluable.”
They shared a look before one answered. “I’d be happy to help in any way I can.”
“Wonderful.” Freya smiled and looked to the others. “The rest of you will stay here until you decide. When you do, we’ll send someone to retrieve you.”
A few more hesitantly got to their feet, falling into line behind the others.
Freya turned to the camera. “Colin, can you send anyone up here? I need someone to escort these men to the atrium where they will help sort the supplies and direct the newcomers to apartments.”
A long silence hung in the room before Aakil responded. “Yeah, will do. But Freya, can you come alone to the Security room? We need you up here.”
The guards moved in as the elevator door slid open, blocking the men from following Freya inside. The moment she stepped foot in the underground walkway, red lights lit a path, leading her toward the main Security hub.
The room was surprisingly empty, except for Colin and Aakil hunched over the desk with their back to her.
“Yes, Aakil.”
They both spun around, exposing that they were working on the radio from Idaho.
“Oh, good,” she remarked. “How long until we can talk to Hope?”
They shared a guilty look between them until Colin replied. “Not long. But, we aren’t going to have the same conversation with them we originally planned.”
Freya cocked her head to the side. “I don’t like the sound of that.”
Aakil shrugged. “We don’t know how it happened, but we just found a frequency broadcasting to the mountain. We think it’s a silent alarm.”
Her skin blanched. “They already know we’re here?”
“Maybe.” Colin swallowed hard. “But with that alarm, it’s too risky to invite all of Hope to pack up and head over here. Everyone should stay put.”
“Yeah,” Aakil joined in. “And we’ve got Hope’s army here, which leaves their community defenseless.”
Freya leaned against the wall for support as her head spun. “They didn’t agree to this. Die at our side in a battle, yes. But live inside the dome, separated from their loved ones who will probably either fall victim to another airstrike or starve, it’s too much to ask.”
Colin stepped closer to her. “I know. But we need to make sure we’re on the same page here. Nobody gets in or out.”
Freya nodded.
“Yeah,” Aakil nodded. “We thought so too. I’ve got it set up. Are you ready to talk to them?”
She stepped past Colin, taking a seat. “As ready as I ever am to deliver bad news.”
Chapter 27
Freya
She paced back and forth on the hard concrete floor. They needed to make a decision yet didn’t have the time to explore their options.
Gwen hollered as she passed into the living space of the State House, quickly closing the gap between them on the balcony.
“Gwen.” Freya’s restless feet halted. “Thank you for coming so quickly.”
Gwen smiled and nodded politely, yet her eyes were dull. “No problem. We’ve cleared everyone out.” She looked over at Aakil. “And I got a good reserve of wine and whisky, with the equipment to make more.”
Aakil gave a half smile in response. “Well, I’m glad we have some good news.”
Gwen’s eyes widened. “What did I miss?”
“Two things,” Freya began, “A silent alarm is broadcasting to the mountain. We don’t know how, but we believe the High Council has been alerted to some kind of suspicious activity here. And so, we made the tough decision to tell the rest of the community of Hope to remain where they are and go into lockdown.”
Gwen’s face fell. “It doesn’t seem right. Why does my community make it safely inside the dome, and the people at Hope didn’t even get to hear about that option until it was too late?”
Freya nodded somberly. “We have a difficult adjustment ahead of us. I think it would be best if we form some sort of board or committee—”
“No!” Colin and Aakil both said in unison.
Freya swallowed hard. “I’m aware of the experience you had on the colony, but my motivations are far more political than you think.”
“Good. More politics,” Aakil jibbed.
“We have a situation here. We have the small population of men living inside the dome, Hope’s army, and our previously merged group of colonists and Gwen’s community. I feel we need one representative from each group of people. They will communicate decisions we’ve made and will represent the needs of their people in all meetings.”
Colin kept his eyes cast downward. “Freya, this is a mistake. We should talk about this.”
“We don’t have the time,” she said. “We need to act. The High Council will dispatch the military any moment now—if they haven’t already—and we’re going to be stuck in here together for a long time.”
Aakil rubbed his face. “So, you think getting this group together will make them feel heard? Make everyone cooperate? What will it do?”
Freya pursed her lips. “Sometimes, people feeling heard is enough. Besides, if people don’t like the decisions, it will at least break up the delivery of bad news. It might keep groups of people from starting an uprising.”
“Or,” Aakil said. “The segregation will keep them from feeling interested in anyone other than their own group. There could be a cue.”
Freya huffed. “Well then, Aakil, what do you recommend?”
He responded with silence.
“That’s the fact we need to accept here. There is no easy or right answer. No matter what, we’re going to make someone unhappy. That’s the problem with merging everyone into one shared space. But it’s necessary. We can’t just send each group to separate ends of the dome.”
Aakil perked up. “Are you sure? Why don’t we explore that?”
Colin pressed a curled finger to his lips. “You know, I think that may have some merit, especially if it will keep us from forming any type of committee.”
Freya glared at them both. “Let’s just table that thought for now and focus on the alarm. Do we wait and see what the High Council does? Or do we take a more proactive action?”
Aakil teetered his head back and forth. “What if they ignore the alarm? I’d be willing to bet that it has something to do with Lewis. Like he hasn’t done something within a certain amount of time, so they wonder if the old guy died.”
Freya nodded. “I agree. The alarm is probably to alert them of Lewis’ absents.”
“But what difference does that make?” Gwen asked. “I mean, if they think he’s dead, how does that change their response.”
Colin pursed his lips before responding. “It’s the difference between if they send one vehicle to remove his body or bring their full arsenal.”
Gwen looked at him blankly. “Why would we want to speed that up?”
Colin shrugged. “Why wait.”
Freya felt the tension in her chest lessen. She wanted to just get this over with but wasn’t certain it was wise. Having a little confirmation helped. “Aakil, your thoughts?”
Aakil wrinkled his nose. “I’m with Colin. What will more time buy us that we don’t already have? We’ve got as many people as we’re going to get inside here. We’ve got all the supplies we want from Idaho. We’ve set up a rotation of guards in place for each access. So, how will a good night’s sleep change anything? I’d rather get it done so those guards take their post seriously.”
“Not to mention,” Colin jumped in, “I’d like to see them play their hand.”
Freya perked up, satisfied that their answers aligned with her gut reaction. “I also want to see their response. I can’t see an extra day changing the outcome.”
The three of them looked over at Gwen, who shook her head. “You guys know more about this than I do. I don’t kno
w this city or those people inside the mountain. If you think facing them head-on is better, that makes sense to me.”
Freya nodded. “They will have a military, but we don’t know their numbers or capabilities. They may send soldiers here, or they may intensify their drone search for Hope. There is a slight chance they won’t have the resources to respond at all, which would allow us to move the rest of Hope inside the dome. The point is, we won’t know until we are certain that they know we’re here.”
A silence fell momentarily around the table until Gwen said, “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s go see what they got.”
Freya took in a breath, her one moment reprieve before she took an action that may forever change humanity.
The four of them rose from the table and moved into the office. Aakil quickly got to work, tinkering with the tablet while Freya checked her appearance in the nearby bathroom mirror. She instantly regretted it because all she saw was the fear in her eyes reflected back at her.
Freya, you can do this. It’s time.
She straightened her collar and jacket, then walked to the office. The monitor was already switched on and Colin had dragged a chair behind the desk. As soon as she sat, it felt off. The height was wrong. But Colin had done the right thing; she wouldn’t want to make this call in the same chair that Lewis had just died in.
“Freya, did you take a look at the pictures Lewis took?”
“No. But even as the Head of State, I never saw the High Council. I don’t think I’d know anyone.”
Aakil nodded. “Okay. Well, I’ve got the file open, so I’ll know if the people who answer are the same people he’s got here. Then it will help us know if he was telling the truth.”
Freya grimaced. “Aakil, I doubt Lewis would have had anyone else to speak to. If those are screenshots, it’s them. The bit he said about Dr. Rhetta sounded too real to be a lie.”
He shrugged. “Okay then. Tell me when you’re ready.”
She took a tight, shallow breath. “I’m as ready as I’ll ever be.”
She held her breath as Aakil typed into the tablet. In only a flash, an image flickered onto the monitor: a woman, although it took a moment for Freya to define her gender.
The woman’s head was shaved so short, light reflected off her scalp through her dark stubble. But her features were soft, feminine, beautiful… familiar.
“Well, Freya. I must admit, I’m surprised to see you sitting there, again.”
Freya’s jaw fell open. The combination of hearing her voice, the sarcastic inflection in her words, it suddenly clicked in her mind. Devina’s shaved head, combined with the passing years aging her had initially thrown Freya off, but it was abundantly clear to her what this meant.
If Devina was there, it meant she was, and always had been, a member of the High Council.
“Likewise.”
Freya’s jaw clenched as she took in a shaking breath. The High Council’s betrayal knew no bounds.
I must end this. Her. Their entire family.
Chapter 28
Freya
Devina pursed her lips. “Well, I guess I know why he hasn’t signed onto his tablet. Good thing I didn’t bother to send someone to confirm if he was dead.”
“His tablet,” Freya narrowed her eyes. “That’s how you knew. Did he know you were monitoring it?”
Devina rolled her eyes. “I doubt it. The alarm triggers every time he’s absent for over eight hours. I usually ignore it.”
Freya let a little tension loosen from her shoulders and looked over at Aakil. She knew it wasn’t the most pressing matter yet needed to ensure Aakil realized that Lewis didn’t willingly withhold information from them.
Maybe it has nothing to do with what Aakil thinks. Maybe I’m the one who needs to know we can trust the information he gave us.
“So, what did you do with your boy toy?”
Freya pursed her lips as she studied Devina’s face, hardly comprehending the woman she saw in front of her. Devina retained her ferocious good looks. Her large innocent eyes with endless lashes. Her bright, mischievous smile. Time had done nothing to diminish her beauty.
Beauty. Devina’s weapon.
Freya had always bought into Devina’s story. The way she used her charms on Victor, it fell into character with Freya’s conception of someone so stunning. But in reality, Victor wasn’t fooled, just responding as instructed to his superior.
It all added up. How someone so young could have been so deeply involved with the rebellion. That kind of programming couldn’t come from any rebellion family, only the High Council. The only part Freya’s mind couldn’t conceive was how someone as intoxicating as Devina could be related to Dr. Rhetta.
Devina raised an eyebrow after a moment of silence. “Well, if you’re holding him hostage, I think you should know better than anyone that he is of no value to us—not at his age. And we only kept him alive as long as we did because it was more convenient than disposing of him. If you think he offers a bargaining tool, you’re mistaken.”
Freya pushed aside her feelings of betrayal, numbing herself to any of Devina’s games. “He’s dead.”
Devina gasped and erupted into laughter. “Freya! You’re just so full of surprises. I had to beg you to kill Victor—who you hated: the man that destroyed your life—yet you walk in here and just murder your boy toy. Respect. I always thought you were so pathetic, but now I don’t know what to think.”
Freya clenched her jaw. This was suddenly so personal. “You wanted me to kill Victor—I mean, the High Council wanted me to kill him. Why?”
Devina rolled her eyes and sat back in her seat, arms crossed. “Well, that was short-lived. You’re definitely as pathetic as I always thought you were.”
Aakil stepped forward, drawing Devina’s attention to himself. “That’s not an answer.”
Devina cocked her head to the side. “Who’s this? Did you kill Lewis because you found a new boy toy as soon as you got to the colony? I guess that would make things awkward.”
Freya gripped the wooden armrests of her seat. She had to pull herself together. Devina would continuously play mind games if Freya allowed it. This had to end. “I understand that colonization was a hoax—clearly—but why me? Why did I have to kill Victor? Why did you need me for colonization?”
“Yes.” Devina rolled her eyes again. “We wanted you to be the Head of State. We needed the rebellion to believe in you, so they would also believe they took the colony from us. We never intended you to go through, though. But had you been killed as a martyr or arrived safely was inconsequential to us. Not when we intended to kill everyone as soon as you arrived.”
“But you didn’t kill me, or anyone else when I got there.”
Devina grimaced. “No. I guess you can thank your boy toy for that. Once we had the firepower, he convinced us that the survivors on the surface were a bigger threat. So, we decided to let you live unless you started causing problems.”
“I’d say she’s causing problems,” Aakil said.
Devina covered her mouth as she giggled. The sound seemed to bounce off the walls and pierce into Freya’s soul.
Once Devina recovered from her laughter, she said, “Hardly. I mean, kudos to you for making it this far. You have caused the State a minor inconvenience by wasting a perfectly good work crew. But we have no immediate intentions to take back the dome. We’ve decided to start anew. We will soon rewrite our history in the database and the next generation won’t even know the dome has been built yet.”
Freya’s entire body was rigid. Part of her wanted to argue and say that it would never work, but a different part of her knew it already had. Freya shook her head with her eyes cast to the ground. “So that’s it? We live in the dome and you in the mountain, forever?”
A glint sparked in Devina’s eyes. “Clearly, you haven’t looked around the dome yet. It hasn’t sunk in, has it?”
Freya’s jaw clenched as though it was wired shut. She was already feeling over Devina
’s mind games, yet she couldn’t stave off the panic setting in.
What did we miss? Should I have waited before I called?
“We don’t need the dome, but that doesn’t mean we’ll let you have it. You won’t live through this.”
Freya swallowed hard. “I disagree. We have helped ourselves to the armory and posted guards at each access point.”
Devina laughed. “Yet, I would have expected a former gardener to at least look at the greenhouses before she started acting all tough. You haven’t done the math. When you do, you’ll realize that you will starve long before we could ever want that dome back. We will leave your rotting corpses there for at least a generation before we even care enough to clean up the mess you made.”
Delivered: A Young Adult Dystopian Romance (The State Series Book 7) Page 20