The Eden Conspiracy: Book 2 of The Liberty Box Trilogy

by C. A. Gray

  They passed us by. They didn’t even slow down at the shed. I wanted to cry with relief.

  When the voices vanished entirely, I heard Charlie shift and stand up.

  “Other way,” he whispered, and I understood he meant we needed to go in the opposite direction from the agents and our parents. “Come on.”

  “Why are you helping me?”

  “You told me to give you an alternate explanation for your jammer.” He hesitated. “I can’t.”

  I giggled a little with overwhelming relief, as tears welled up in my eyes. But I didn’t have time to indulge in the moment—Charlie thrust the door open and sprinted across our neighbors’ yards until we reached the next major intersection.

  “We have to keep out of sight as much as possible,” he said.

  “No kidding, really?”

  He looked over his shoulder and smirked at me. “All right. I deserve that. Maybe I should ask you where we’re going.”

  “The less you know, the better.” Man, it felt good to say that. “Just follow me, and I’ll show you.”

  “How did you get here, anyway?”

  “Bullet trains.”

  He shook his head. “No way. We’d never make it out of the station!”

  “We wouldn’t now, no,” I agreed, annoyed. “But we’re much too far away to go on foot, so—”

  “And we can’t risk hitchhiking either,” Charlie surmised. “So we’re gonna have to carjack.”

  I grabbed his arm and pulled him to a stop. “Excuse me?”

  “Steal a car,” he said again. “Commandeer a vehicle. Not while the driver is in it though—too risky. We’ll have to find one in someone’s yard, far enough outside of town that nobody will see us hot-wiring it…” he rubbed his hands together. “I have always wanted to do this!”

  I gaped, but followed behind him, trying to think of a way to protest and coming up dry. Now that I’d been discovered, there’d probably be a broadcast on about me within the hour, it was true. Any method of transportation that involved anybody seeing me, even in disguise, was pretty much out at this point.

  “You still have so much explaining to do,” Charlie said, looking over his shoulder at me so he didn’t see where we were headed. I gasped, and he turned around when he heard me, so that he could see what I saw.

  “Kate and Charlie Brandeis,” said the agent directly in front of us, his weapon drawn, “You are under arrest as fugitives of the Potentate.”

  Chapter 21: Kate

  One of the agents told the other to take us directly to the Potentate’s palace. That was when I really understood how bad our situation was. I wasn’t sure where they generally held prisoners for trial, but I suspected the palace dungeon must be reserved only for the most infamous prisoners.

  I’d known before I left that I might die on this mission. But it was one thing, expecting it at some nebulous time in the future… and another thing entirely to be escorted to my death. I watched the gray, bleak Republic whizzing by with the heightened awareness of a last look, feeling frightened and regretful by turns. But mostly, I felt numb.

  Despite the signal disruptor, when the palace came into view, it glittered in the sunlight with a familiar golden sheen, nestled between groves of fir trees and bursting with flowers on its immense lawn. It looked exactly like the pictures I remembered—that, at least, was real. A helicopter, the first I’d ever seen outside of the pages of a book, descended to land on its roof. Perhaps the Potentate was reviving the old United States aircraft after all.

  Four more agents ran up to our shiny black sedan when we arrived, two on Charlie’s side and two on mine. I wasn’t sure if this was because they deemed us a national security threat or what, considering there were two more agents driving, and both Charlie and I were cuffed. One of the men roughly pulled me out of the vehicle and gave me a shove down a lovely sloping path which descended to an ominous door. Involuntarily I glanced over toward a green hill I recognized well. Many a famous execution had occurred there. I’d done the voice-overs for quite a few of them.

  The door clanged shut behind us.

  The room where we now found ourselves felt dank and drafty, with very little light—like the inside of a cave. It smelled of feces and vomit.

  “Strip them down,” said a guard behind the desk. He tossed two gray cotton uniforms onto the desk, and the agent who had shoved me out of the car started to remove my clothes, inspecting each article as he went.

  “Wait—” I interrupted automatically, but the agent had already found the ammunition for my gun. With my jacket removed, the weapon itself was plainly exposed too. Charlie underwent similar treatment, though he was unarmed, of course.

  “Brandeis is packing,” said the agent beside me, inspecting the ammunition. “This is old school stuff. Not deep impact. Where did you get these?” he asked me.

  I glared back at him and said nothing. He didn’t seem to mind this, and removed my gun next, followed by my pants. I tried not to feel too humiliated, and didn’t look at Charlie.

  “What’s this?” the agent said when he’d removed the pants, lifting the signal disruptor from the pocket.

  Of course I said nothing, nor did Charlie. But he passed it to the other agents, all of whom inspected it in turn. They flipped it on, off, on, off—and Charlie and I, and one of the agents all started as they did. The dungeon became light and clean, still with prison bars but also with plush couches and area rugs. It felt like an intimate sitting room. And then with a flash—feces and vomit. Then flash—inviting and warm. Flash—filled with despair.

  Three of the agents didn’t seem to notice this at all. The one who did looked spooked.

  “What are you playing at?” he demanded of me.

  I noted that the other three agents looked thoroughly confused by his question. I held my head high with as much pride as I could, standing there in my underwear. But something told me not to announce to the guards the nature of the disruptor they held. If three of the four guards believed it to be worthless, they’d be less likely to report it. Instead, I settled on, “You’ve been brainwashed, Lancaster.” I read his name off his badge. “And I think you’ve always known it, deep down.”

  Lancaster recoiled in disgust, and yanked the battery out of the signal disruptor, tossing it in the trash. The dungeon became inviting and warm again, filled with light, and the faint smell of baking bread. No doubt it was constructed to make prisoners feel at home—more likely to confess, believing they’d receive leniency.

  “Put these on,” Lancaster barked, throwing the gray uniform at me. I obeyed, and so did Charlie.

  “What are you going to do with us?” Charlie asked, tightening the drawstring on his pants.

  Lancaster glanced at me, and spat, “Brandeis is a suspected EOS in collaboration with her late fiancé, Will Anderson. You attempted escape with her, and in so doing, you threw in your lot with hers. You will both await trial before the Tribunal tomorrow morning.”

  We followed Lancaster to our cell. The dungeon felt oddly like a hotel, but for the bars. I concentrated as hard as I could—as much as I’d prefer to stay in a hotel than in a dungeon on my last night on earth, I knew was a lie. I wanted to see the truth. I needed to see the truth.

  Lancaster unlocked one of the cells, and the door swung open.

  “Sleep tight,” he said, and gave me a nasty smile.

  When we heard his footsteps recede, I looked at Charlie, and he looked at me. Finally, Charlie said aloud what we were both thinking.

  “They’re going to shoot us tomorrow.”

  I nodded. “Probably.”

  “Thanks so much for coming back for me, sis. Really appreciate that.”

  I sighed. “I needed your help. The whole Republic knows my face, and I thought if I could just hijack a broadcast signal, I could tell everybody the truth all at once.” I sank down, resting my elbows on my knees and my head in my hands. “But if even the signal disruptor doesn
’t work on everybody, I wonder how many would actually listen if I went on air and did that. Ten percent maybe?” I shook my head. “I just can’t understand—how can the signal disruptor not always work?”

  Charlie watched me for a long moment. Finally, he asked, “Kate, what happened?”

  So I told him. I told Charlie about the memories coming back to me after I found out about my former roommate Maggie’s death, about Will’s digging for me leading to his supposed death, my flight to the cave communities and the story they told me of what had really happened in the old United States, and the rise of the Republic all those years ago. I told him about the hunters’ raids to rescue citizens marked for extermination, how the Potentate realized our existence as a result of them and bombed the caves, killing off most of our community, and how Will had shown up incognito with the soldiers to rescue me and as many of us as he could. The rest of us were now on the run, while attempting to come up with a strategy to fight back. I told him that Will had found out the Potentate was building more control centers in New Estonia now —that he had plans to expand his power internationally. This wasn’t even just about the people in the Republic anymore.

  “But I thought the only real obstacle was getting people to believe that the government signals existed,” I added. “Some people already suspect it, and those are the ones who are the easiest to convince. They’re also the most likely to be slated for execution. Everyone else though…” I shook my head. “I’d thought that with a signal disruptor, everyone would see the truth. How could they not? If the government signals can’t even get through anymore, how can they still see the illusions? How come the disruptor worked on you, but not Mom and Dad?”

  Charlie didn’t respond right away, like he was still trying to digest what I’d told him. At last he said, “You must be right.”

  “About which part?”

  “About only those of us who had already started to suspect being able to see clearly.” He shifted in his seat on the supposedly plush couch and turned to look at me. “When Will died and you disappeared, I knew something was wrong. I mean, you were always a little suspect, but Will seemed like a really rational guy—no offense.”

  I made a face at him, but I knew what he meant. I’d been sent to McCormick as a kid, which had pretty much called my judgment into question from that point forward.

  “I couldn’t get over the idea that Will, of all people, could suddenly become an EOS. There had to be more to the story. I paid more attention after that, I guess. And then… I don’t know, I just started to notice things that didn’t add up.

  “But Mom and Dad never questioned anything, I don’t think. Maybe because they didn’t know Will like I did. I knew he wouldn’t just turn like that, not without a damn good reason.”

  I wasn’t surprised that Will was the one who’d convinced Charlie. Charlie and I had never been close, but when I’d started dating Will, we became a little closer because of him. The two of them hit it off, and were more like brothers to one another than Charlie and I ever had been.

  Probably shouldn’t mention we’d broken up, then.

  Charlie went on, “I wonder if brainwashing has a sort of… self-perpetuating aspect to it? After awhile we just see what we expect to see, regardless of signals or no signals?”

  “If that’s the case, then why do we still—”

  I stopped, and caught my breath. For a flash, I saw the dungeon again, and I shivered in the draft. Then it was gone—like the flashes I’d once gotten in my apartment.

  “Why do we still what?”

  “See luxury,” I finished weakly. “Charlie, concentrate. Meditate on what you know is there, not on what you see.”

  “Meditate?” he repeated, and I could hear the scoff in his voice.

  “Yes. It just means to concentrate intensely on a single idea, or point of focus. Here, I’ll show you: close your eyes to shut out their visual signals. Now, just focus on your breath. Every time your mind starts to wander, bring it back to your breath.” I said this as much for my own benefit as for his, trying not to let my thoughts stray to the familiar hill outside the dungeon, and the firing squad that would likely be standing there waiting for us tomorrow at sunset. Traditionally executions took place at sunset. Did they always occur the same day as the trial? Frankly I wasn’t even sure if everyone got a trial, and I was certain they were a farce of justice anyway…

  Focus, Kate.

  The voice in my head was Jackson’s.

  “Why are we doing this again?” Charlie interrupted.

  “Because the more you focus on something you know to be real—like your own breath—the easier it will be for you to tune in to other things that are real.”

  I felt my brother looking at me, and I opened my eyes to meet his gaze. I saw the dungeon now, and wrinkled my nose against the intense smell of human suffering.

  “Man,” he said at last. “You’ve really changed.” He said it with admiration, though.

  “Thanks, Charlie,” I said, and meant it.

  Chapter 22: Jackson

  Now what? I wondered.

  I stood outside the bullet train station staring at the empty streets, trying to decide which way Kate had gone. I couldn’t be that far behind her, but in a concrete jungle like this, tracking became impossible. And she’d never given me any further directions about where her family lived. I’d counted on following her after this point.

  If I just picked a direction, I had a fifty-fifty shot. I couldn’t think of a better plan, unfortunately. So I went left.

  When I got to a part of the Republic where the crowds thickened again, I got even more stares than I had earlier, and people gave me a wide berth. I realized then that I probably needed a disguise after all, but I didn’t want to veer off course and risk losing Kate’s trail… on the off chance that I was even on her trail to begin with.

  After a few hours of fruitless wandering, I started to lose hope. I needed a better strategy. Could I just ask someone where Kate’s family lived? Would anyone know? I wasn’t sure exactly how big a celebrity she’d been. And if I essentially announced where I was going, would that be even worse, for all of us?

  Just as I thought this, in one intersection, I saw a large silver screen crackle to life. Everyone came to a stop as the seal of the Republic appeared to announce the beginning of a broadcast. My heart sank: I’d been waiting for this ever since the incident in the bullet train station. I was almost surprised it took them this long.

  Jillian’s concerned image appeared, her blond hair plastered perfectly in place like a wig, and her full lips drawn together.

  “Breaking news,” she announced, and paused. For a moment, I thought she had tears in her eyes. “It is with a full heart and deepest regret that I bring you this announcement.” Kate’s image appeared on the screen, in her former glory days, and my stomach did a backflip. If she was up on that screen instead of me… that couldn’t be good.

  Also: man, she cleaned up well.

  “My former coanchor, Kathryn Brandeis, was arrested today, along with her brother Charles Brandeis. As you know, Kate vanished shortly after her fiancé, Will Anderson, was found to be an Enemy of State. Her disappearance cast Kate’s allegiance to the Republic into question as well, but I’d held out hope that we would eventually clear her name.” Jillian paused and took a deep breath, biting her lip. “Unfortunately, Kate reappeared on public soil today, incognito.”

  I closed my eyes. No.

  “She fled from authorities, along with her brother Charles, and so far her behavior has confirmed that she and Anderson were in fact in league with one another against the Potentate and our Republic. She and Charles have been taken into custody, and will await trial by the Tribunal tomorrow… for treason.”

  Where? I thought desperately. Where will she await trial?

  “In other news, terrorist Jackson MacNamera—”

  I wasn’t even listening to this part, as my own image flashed o
n the screen, and Jillian launched into the story I’d expected her to air in the first place.

  “Where do trials by the Tribunal typically occur?” I asked the man standing beside me. I leaned in toward him but didn’t look at him, hoping that he’d reply without looking at me either.

  Unfortunately I guess the question was so strange that he did glance at me, as he replied, “The Potentate’s Palace, of course.” Then he did a double take, looking at the screen, and back at me. His eyes widened.

  I could flee, and then the man would make a scene and the agents would be after me again… or I could capitalize on his fear. I chose the latter. I leaned in to the man, lowering my voice.

  “Tell me what I need to know, do not make a commotion, and you’ll live,” I growled. “How do I get to the Potentate’s palace? Where is it?”

  It took the man a moment to find his voice. “Countryside!” he finally said, “A few hours’ drive from here!”

  “Can you get there by bullet train?”

  He shook his head frantically. “N-no, I don’t think so!”

  I sighed. I hated to do this, but I didn’t see that I had much choice. “Take me there,” I demanded, pushing the barrel of the agent’s gun I had stolen into the man’s stomach. I hid it with my other arm so that it would be less visible to the rest of the crowd. “I want safe transportation and directions. Now.”

  Chapter 23: Kate

  I woke at dawn with a start, surprised for the second night in a row to find that I’d slept at all.

  In a strange way, from the moment I started to consistently see the dungeon for what it was, I felt a sort of peace about the day ahead. I would die, yes… but at least I would die seeing the world as it really was. I’d die having finally become the girl I should have been all along. That gave me some small comfort.

  “I’m sorry, maybe you’re resigned to death, but I’m not!” Charlie snapped when I expressed this to him. “If the world isn’t what it seems to be, surely we can… use that to our advantage somehow. To escape. I just can’t figure out how…”