by Kyle Andrews
Libby turned away from the door and walked closer to Simon, but she couldn't stand still. As she reached him, Libby turned around and began pacing back and forth, trying to think of something useful to do, but she had no clever ideas. All she could do was wait, and she hated it.
Minutes passed and Libby's nervousness slowly began to turn into anger. She didn't come all this way for an empty room and waiting. She came for answers, and she wasn't going to leave without knowing why her life had been turned upside down.
Finally, the door opened and Leo returned. As soon as he was inside, he closed the door and stood beside it, looking out through the window from an angle, so that he was less likely to be spotted by anyone in the hallway.
“What's going on?” Libby asked.
“It's not good. The scanner isn't in here because it's not being tested anymore. There isn't just one scanner for profiling people. Every tablet that every nurse is carrying has a scanner on it,” Leo told them, turning around to face them. He was holding one of the tablets in his hand.
Simon stood and walked to Leo, taking the tablet from him. He said, “They're building their system. Probably scanning everyone who comes in here without their ever knowing why. Building a database.”
“I thought Aaron said there wouldn't be a database,” Libby said, confused. “I thought it was all stored inside of us.”
“There will be a database. They'll store the information for their own use. But then they'll store new information inside of each person so that the scanners won't have to communicate with the system in order to bring up a person's records. Nothing to hack into. Nothing to rewrite. Guess I'll be out of a job.” Simon had the tablet turned on and he was studying the interface for the scanner. He then turned back to Leo and said, “They're probably collecting blood samples from each person in here. They could be encoding records and feeding them back into people through the IV drips that literally everyone had hooked up to them out there. We figured that people would have to line up and register, just like getting a new Civvie. But what if they're implementing this system before people even know about it?”
The memory of walking through the hospital hallways only moments ago came back to Libby. She saw what seemed to be normal hospital procedures taking place. Nurses taking hands and putting a strap around wrists, seemingly to keep track of blood pressure, heart rates and whatever else they kept track of. Other nurses were swiping thermometers across foreheads.
So much of what happens at a hospital is strange and unfamiliar. People sit back and do what they're told. They're poked and probed without asking any questions. They're given pills and injections without ever wondering what's going into their body, or what's being taken out. The government could have been experimenting on people for years, and nobody would ever even know.
The idea of this new system was disturbing. It would mean altering people on a genetic level, without their knowledge or consent. Cataloging them like wild animals and sending them back home, none the wiser, with a barcode on every strand of DNA. It was a violation of the very structure of a human being. Libby didn't even know how to comprehend that type of invasion. It was too big.
“Scan me,” Libby said, wanting to know what was inside of her. She suddenly felt as though there were insects under her skin, and she needed to know why.
What was so important that Uly had to die?
Simon moved closer to her, but didn't move the scanner toward her yet. He said, “When Uly did this, there were alarms. He had to run for his life. You need to be ready to do the same thing.”
“I know that,” Libby said. “We'll scan me, get the data, and run. That's the plan we settled on, right?”
Simon nodded, glanced back to Leo and said, “We run.”
He held the tablet out in front of Libby and she took a deep breath, raising her hand toward it. As she exhaled, she lowered her thumb to the small scanner. The device scanned her and she waited for sirens and gunshots, but nothing happened.
The screen on the tablet flickered and then began to flash images and endless lines of text. Simon pulled it closer to himself so that he could study what was on the screen, and his jaw dropped when he realized what he was looking at.
As he set the tablet down and attached the flash drive, a goofy smile stretched across his face. To nobody in particular, he said, “This is amazing.”
“As long as it's fast, it can be amazing later,” Leo told him.
“No. There's too much here. There... It's everything,” Simon replied, staring at the screen in astonishment.
“Everything?” Libby asked. “What does that mean?”
“Books! Documents! The Declaration of Independence... Constitution... I don't know who Dean Koontz is, but he's in here too. Everything they don't want us to see is in here,” Simon told her, now looking at Libby as though she were made of solid gold. He then turned to Leo and said, “Get her out of here. Now. RUN!”
“What about you?” Libby was replying when Leo grabbed her arm and pulled her out of the room.
As Leo pulled her along, Libby looked back and saw Simon slipping out of the room and walking in the opposite direction. He was still staring at the screen and downloading information onto his drive.
“We can't leave him,” she told Leo, struggling to get her mask back on before someone recognized her.
“He knew it was a possibility. He needs more time to download what's on the drive.”
“They'll kill him.”
“They're not looking for him. They're looking for you. The farther away you are from him, the more likely he is to live.”
They turned a corner at full speed, but Leo stopped short when he saw HAND officers approaching at the other end of the hallway. He quickly turned around.
Libby was following him as best she could. She had questions that she wanted answered, but she couldn't afford to stop and ask them. She needed to keep moving.
As Leo pulled her down the hallway, she barely looked at where she was going. She didn't think about the people or the obstacles in her path. The only thing that mattered to Libby was Leo's back. She kept her eyes on him and moved where he moved without question or hesitation, bumping into people as she went along.
As they rounded another corner, her lack of care caught up with her and she slammed into a person who was making their way through the hallway.
“Sorry,” she muttered as she kept moving, never slowing down. Never thinking. At least, not until she reached the end of the hallway and the entrance to the stairwell. Then it struck her. She knew that person. She loved him.
As she walked through the door, she turned around and looked back down the hallway. There, she saw Sim standing in the middle of the sea of sick people. A group of HAND officers rushed past him, and two turned her way, but she was frozen at the sight of him.
Sim didn't seem to recognize her. He was distracted by the chaos of the HAND officers, trying to avoid being run down by them. But as Leo pulled Libby into the stairwell and the door started to close behind her, she saw Sim take a step toward her. In that moment, just before the door shut behind them, Libby knew that Sim recognized her. He knew that she was in the hospital, and he knew that HAND was after her.
As much as she may have wanted to stop right there, turn around and have a nice long talk with her boyfriend, she didn't have time to even consider what that conversation might sound like. She had to keep moving down the stairs. She moved so fast that she could barely keep track of her feet. She feared tripping and falling on her face, but she couldn't stop. She couldn't slow down.
HAND officers were close behind her. She didn't know how many of them there were, but she knew that they recognized her. Her face would undoubtedly be all over the news. The question was, would she become the next Collin Powers, or the next Uly Jacobs? She didn't even know which she preferred at this point. Neither story had ended particularly well.
Leo opened the door to the parking garage and pushed Libby through it first.
“Run,” he ordered her, slamming the door shut behind him.
Libby never questioned his order. She turned and ran toward the exit as quickly as she could, now leading the way as Leo followed.
Seconds later, the door to the parking garage burst open and two HAND officers ran through it. One of them had his hand to his ear. He was calling in their situation. The other officer had his gun aimed squarely at Libby, until Leo put himself between them.
Libby could only afford a glance back as she neared the exit. When she took that glance, she saw a hole rip through Leo's arm and his face fill with pain.
The bullet was meant for her, and it narrowly missed her as it exited Leo and struck the door that led outside.
Instinct told Libby to stop and make sure that Leo was okay. She needed to take care of his wound. But her instincts were not what they should have been, and she knew that. Intelligence won out and Libby kept moving, pulling the door open and rushing through it, with Leo following at her heels.
Once they were outside, Libby knew that the HAND officers were not far behind. She shut the door as soon as they were through it, but she didn't know where to go from there. The car was nowhere to be seen. Without it, there was no way that they could escape.
“Keep moving,” Leo ordered. “Get into the shadows. Wait for the car.”
He was breathing heavily and was obviously in a fair amount of pain, but Libby left him behind and ran to the shadows. Leo had warned her about the dangers of that area only a short while ago, and now she was just hoping that whatever dangers lurked within the shadows would be less of a threat than HAND.
The door shot open once again. Libby turned and watched as Leo threw all of his weight against the door, catching one of the HAND officers as he was halfway through it. Leo slammed himself against the door over and over again, until the HAND officer dropped his gun.
A shot rang out and the HAND officer dropped to the ground, shot by one of his own people. His body was preventing the door from being slammed shut. Leo grabbed the gun that had fallen on the ground and stood back up, just as the second HAND officer climbed over his fallen comrade and took aim at Leo.
Leo shot him dead with one shot. He then took a step closer and shot him three more times, just to make sure.
Libby turned and scanned the area around her, partly to see if she was still concealed within the shadows, and partly to make sure that nobody was sneaking up from behind her.
In the darkness, she could hear whispers and moans. She heard what sounded like the muffled whimpers of a woman with a hand placed over her mouth. An image flashed through her mind, of someone bound at the wrists and fighting for her life. But there was nothing that Libby could do about it. She couldn't even see through the darkness. And if she could, what would she do? She was powerless. All she ever did was run and hide.
The whimpers turned into a giggle, just as Libby heard a crash from near the door, forcing her to turn her attention back to the fight.
She saw another HAND officer struggling with Leo. The officer threw Leo against the wall and punched him in the stomach. Leo doubled over, but didn't stop fighting. He wrapped his arms around the officer, keeping the officer from throwing any more punches or kicks, and he slammed his forehead into the nose of the HAND officer.
Another HAND officer came through the door. And another. They immediately grabbed Leo and threw him onto the ground, keeping their guns aimed at his head.
Libby needed to do something. She couldn't just stand there any longer. The problem was that she didn't know what to do. She couldn't fight. She couldn't do anything useful to save Leo. All she could do was close her eyes and listen to the command that he had been barking at her all night, 'Run!'
Her own fear had now taken on Leo's voice. She obeyed its command, but never fooled herself into believing that it was anything but cowardice.
She turned and moved through the shadows, hoping that she was still hidden, and that she wouldn't trip over anything—or anyone—and break her neck.
Behind her, HAND vehicles were approaching the door, shining lights into the shadows, looking for her. She knew that they would find her. It was only a matter of time.
Eventually, Libby ran into a wall. She could move forward no more and she had no idea where to turn next. She could head deeper into the shadows, or she could risk running, hoping not to be seen by HAND as she did it.
Neither option sounded like a realistic means of staying alive. She was pinned in a corner, trying to make herself as small and invisible as possible.
The smell of garbage hung heavy in the air. There were dumpsters nearby, somewhere. If she could have found one to hide behind, she would have. But it was too dark, and she was too scared to move.
Leo was dead. Simon was quite possibly dead or captured as well. This entire mission had been a waste of time, and for what?
Freedom. Knowledge. According to Simon, everything that the government had tried to take away from them was encoded within her. It was in her blood, but it belonged to everyone. This was why they had saved her instead of Collin Powers. She couldn't allow it to die like this.
Libby took a deep breath and looked back toward the door where Leo was no longer visible behind three HAND vehicles. Officers were moving into the shadows, shining their flashlights across faces which never wanted to be seen, and actions which she would forever wish could be unseen.
She saw the dumpsters now, along with delivery trucks and several cars that she could have hidden behind if she'd only known they were there. To go toward them now would be suicide.
She turned and looked in the other direction. There were buildings all around her. If she could make it past the end of the parking lot, she might be able to reach a street. Or maybe she could slip between two buildings, where HAND vehicles couldn't follow.
Her escape wasn't likely, but she didn't have many choices. All Libby could afford to do at this point was take a deep breath and run.
11
Upon finding Amanda in the home, Justin was speechless. He stood over her, watching her sleep and wondering what he could possibly do or say to make this situation better.
In her sleep, Amanda coughed, and her face twisted into a pained expression. She was pale. Her skin looked as thin as paper. Her hair looked thinner, as did her lips.
What could he do? There was nobody there to help him. Justin had seen at least one dead body and countless sick people on his way to Amanda's cot. The truth was that nobody cared about her in that place. If she died, it was a freed bed for someone else.
He had no car. He didn't have many credits to spare. The entire situation was looking pretty grim, but Justin couldn't walk away from her, even if he intended to return. If he left and she died, what would he tell Libby?
Taking off his jacket, Justin moved closer to Amanda. He wrapped the jacket around her and scooped her up in his arms. He had feared that she would be too heavy for him to carry, but as he walked away from the cot and through the building with her, he found her to be light. Too light.
He walked past the counter where the woman he'd spoken to earlier was still working. He glanced over at her as he passed, expecting for her to call after him, or to call the police. Instead, she smiled a friendly goodbye. He was left desperately hoping that she saw some kindness in him and believed that he was doing good. Otherwise, the woman just let a strange man walk out of the place with an unconscious woman, and didn't even care.
Once he was on the street, it struck him that he didn't know where he was going or how he was going to get there. He was in an area of the city which was specifically designed to be isolated and forgotten. There would be nobody to help him.
Could he take her to the Garden? If he did, he would be bringing in a woman who had never shown any sign of being sympathetic toward their cause. Unlike Libby, she wasn't being hunted by HAND and would have no reason to remain loyal to Freedom once she was on her feet—if such a time ever came.
Justin was ashamed of himself fo
r even questioning whether or not she should be treated by the only people who offered her a chance at survival, but he had to think about the bigger picture. He couldn't allow his own emotions to interfere with what he knew was the right thing to do. He had to ask himself what Aaron would say if Justin approached him with a request to bring Amanda in, and when he asked himself that question he knew what the answer would be.
They couldn't treat everyone in the city. They couldn't afford to spare the supplies for everyone who needed them. They couldn't risk having the authorities called. There was no way that Aaron would say yes.
Continuing to walk down the sidewalk, a thought occurred to Justin. Amanda was Libby's only family. Her only true link to the world outside of Freedom—high school boyfriends notwithstanding. So if HAND were looking for Libby, why wouldn't they have people watching Amanda, waiting for Libby to show up? Could she have a GPS chip on her clothes or under her skin?
Thinking back on it, the woman who let Justin walk out of that home could have been smiling because she knew that their bait had been taken and it was only a matter of time before the big fish would be caught.
He was stupid. He allowed his emotions to get in the way of logical thinking. In doing so, he put himself and everyone he cared about in danger.
But what was he supposed to do now? He couldn't just drop Amanda on the sidewalk and walk away. She was still Libby's mother. Still the same person that he'd known for most of his life. Now she was groaning in her sleep as he held her. She was sick. Dying, as much as he didn't want to think of it in those terms. Whether she was being tracked or not, he wouldn't turn his back on her.
The best way to ensure that Freedom was safe from this situation was to not involve them at all. The best way to make sure that Libby wasn't found was to bring Amanda someplace far away from her. There was only one option. Justin had no choice but to bring Amanda to his own apartment.
The apartment was miles away, and Justin expected that curfew would fall long before he had a chance to get Amanda inside. If he was seen wandering the streets, he would be stopped and questioned. Best case scenario, he would be given a lift home and the police officers would make a report about the incident. It would be innocent enough, but he would still be drawing attention to himself, and that was bad.