by Casey Hays
The bridge looms in front of me now. A big, metal giant with the river rushing beneath it. Small waves of the current crash against the still-standing supports, giving the impression that the whole bridge is teetering. And maybe it is. The entire middle section is gone, leaving a fifteen or twenty foot gap from one side of the bridge to the other. But it’s the only place to cross the river without having to swim.
After my escape, I did swim it. I was so close to home—so close I could taste it. I didn’t waste time building a raft; I just jumped in and swam, fighting the current the whole way. I’m grateful I don’t have to do it again. Even with the extraordinary heat of my body, the water would be ice cold and numbing. And now, after the Shift, I must admit, I’ve never been more grateful to see a bulking hunk of twisted metal in all my life.
My first step onto the bridge vibrates loudly in my ears as dirt is exchanged for asphalt. I don’t slow my speed. If I want to make the jump, I can’t slow down. Not even a little. I clutch Tabitha a bit tighter, brace myself for the moment my feet will leave the solid foundation under me, and I hurl myself up and forward.
And I’m flying. And it’s exhilarating!
My momentum carries me well over the gap—another ten feet past it, at least—and I land with a jolt and spring into my even pace without stalling, without slowing.
“Yeah! Woo-hoo! Yeah!”
Perfection. My tight smile widens just a little. I’ve mastered the leap and land twice over. And if I wasn’t short on energy from lack of sleep, I’d have cleared another ten feet. I’ve no doubt. Still, Jones will be proud.
Tabitha doesn’t budge. I’m not sure if this is because she’s so close to the end or if it’s because my jump was just that smooth, but she is as still as death. I raise the blanket and peek at her, fearing she may already be dead.
No. Her eyes flutter once. She’s still with me. I clench my jaw and push forward.
“Hang in there, girl. We’re almost home.”
Three hours. I make a stop in the shade of some trees to clean Tabitha and force some warm water down her throat with Justin’s makeshift bottle. She takes only a few swallows—not nearly enough—and most of it dribbles out the corner of her mouth. I have no idea if I’m getting anything down. But I keep trying until she squawks and turns her head, clamping her mouth tight. I leave her lying on the blanket while I take a gulp of water from my own bottle.
That’s when I hear it. The snap of a branch a few feet behind me.
In a flash my bow is in my hands. I whip out an arrow and whirl, and within seconds, I’m standing face to face with the intruder, the tip of my arrow an inch from his nose. He raises his hands in surrender.
“Whoa! Whoa, there, son. I come in peace.”
I don’t move a muscle, my arms stiff, the bow taut. I could take him. One flick of my finger, and he’d be a goner. I narrow my gaze and peer down the length of the arrow and right into his watery, brown eyes. He’s extremely composed considering there’s an arrow stuck in his face.
To my seventeen year old thinking, he’s roughly fifty. Skin weathered, clothes shabby. He’s probably harmless. He stands, unmoving, his hands still raised above his head. And he waits for me to decide if I’m going to kill him.
I’m not. I’ve never killed anything in my life besides dinner.
I lower the bow.
“Do you need something?” I ask. I keep my voice level, tough. He raises the floppy, brown hat from the top of his head and scratches his thinning hair before replacing it. His hands look rough. They’re hard-working hands—like the hands I’ve seen on the people of Gath. He’s a field worker. But he’s awfully far from Gath.
“I wondered if you could spare some water.”
My eyes never leave him as I pull a half-full bottle of water from my belt and toss it to him. He catches it and gulps greedily before wiping the back of his hand across his lips. My eyes roam over him, looking for any sign of the Set-Typhon insignia. Nothing.
I’m paranoid is all.
“Thank you,” he says.
He holds the bottle out. I shake my head.
“Keep it.”
I examine him. He’s strong. I can tell by his build that he does some heavy lifting in his line of work. Bailing cotton, maybe? Or wheat. Both are harvested in Gath.
“You’re a pretty long way from home,” I say. “What brings you this way?”
He smiles, looks up at me, fidgets with the water bottle. The remaining water sloshes against the plastic. “I could ask the same of you. You’re from Eden, aren’t you?”
I nod. It’s hard to hide that fact when you’re six foot four with over two-hundred pounds of muscle.
“So of the two of us,” he continues. “Which one do you think looks more suspicious?”
I raise a brow. “What do you mean?”
“I mean, I could be out here for a number of reasons. But I’m alone, and I have no weapon. No supplies. Just me. But you, son? You’re a different story.”
I purse my lips. My fingers tighten around the handle of my bow. His eyes flick downward, seeing this.
“So what is your story, son? I’m going to assume that baby’s not yours.”
I don’t flinch outwardly, although my insides suddenly rumble. It’s not his business, and I don’t have to answer to this guy. I’m intimidating enough towering over him. I could grab the upper hand if I wanted to. But then, there’s that part of me that tends to respect my elders until I know they aren’t worth respecting.
“You first,” I say, keeping my voice steady despite my nerves.
He squints up at the sun and pulls the brim of his hat down lower over his eyes. “Looking for my daughter,” he says. “She took off about a week ago, after her baby disappeared.” His eyes find Tabitha again. “I don’t suppose that’s a boy?”
I shake my head slowly. “Nope.”
“So, I guess . . . you wouldn’t mind if I had a look? Just to be sure?”
I tense. “You’re wrong there.” I raise my bow just slightly, the arrow still poised and ready for release. “I think you should just be on your way, sir. I hope you find your daughter.”
He’s still for a minute longer, cool eyes sparring with mine, before he nods.
“Thanks again for the water.”
He turns his back on me, seemingly without any fear that I might drive an arrow through his back. I watch, my bow ready, until he’s a safe enough distance away. I find it pretty unbelievable that he’s out here searching for his daughter with no gear. It could be a long search, and no one could be that stupid.
I gather up Tabitha, and I’m gone before he can look back. For all he knows, I was a phantom. A mirage haunting his mind in the heat.
But my gut tightens at the thought of his daughter’s baby—if he was telling the truth. I weigh the options. The baby is probably dead, but if he isn’t, she won’t ever find him. Babies are a rare commodity these days. That’s just the way it is in the world we live in. And people can be desperate.
Even babies born in Eden are lucky to survive. Of course, babies born in Eden are few and far between. Most come to us from somewhere else. Like that man’s grandson. For all I know, that baby’s in Eden already. But the Serum doesn’t work on all of them. So like I said, either he’s dead or his mother will never find him.
I used to wonder why people stayed in Eden once they found the toxin there. Why they bothered to find a cure instead of just packing up and leaving. And then, I learned that the outside world had been worse—overloaded with toxins that flipped your insides right out of your body. After the Shift, I stopped wondering altogether. I knew the answer. We need the toxin to live as much as it wants us to die. We turned its agenda upside down. And we are the winners.
Of course, people out here don’t have to think like that anymore. There are no toxins—except one. The one Eden continues to generate—on purpose. I take in a deep breath and let the strength of my abilities overtake me. I don’t know about the rest of them, but wh
en I’m out here like this, in the wide open, I understand fully why Eden did it. Being a super freak does have some pretty cool advantages.
But people out here—people like Kate and Diana and this baby. They’re chased only by natural death. Accidents, sickness, old age—the easy stuff that’s supposed to overtake you anyway.
I peer beneath the blankets, concern scrunching my brows. Then why is Tabitha dying of a toxin that should be contained?
My thoughts return to Kate, and Guilt invades me like a slow death. I should have told her the truth about Eden—all the truth, too. I shouldn’t have dragged my feet. She was there, so close to me I could taste the salty sweat on her skin as the rain pummeled the cabin’s roof. We were alone, and I said nothing. And once I finally worked up the nerve to approach her with it, things had gone sour, Tabitha was sick, and there wasn’t time.
And still, what kind of excuse do I have, really? I was in the Pit for weeks. I had numerous chances, and I never took one. Not even when she’d proven I could trust her.
Time was all I had in the Pit.
And now? Does it matter? Because whether I tell her or whether I don’t, “now” is all we have to measure against it. And that doesn’t change the facts. She can’t go to Eden.
If I did take her there, she might be lucky enough to resist the toxin for a while. She might not. It’s true, some of the babies live a whole nine months, ten months, a year in Eden before it takes them out. But . . .
I won’t take her there. I won’t risk it.
The one thing I dread telling her—that I’ve put off for too long already— is that we’ve done it on purpose. That the production of the toxin was Eden’s own warped way of preserving itself for all time at any cost.
I press a hand against the dying baby’s back and bite my lip. Kate will never understand this. Not now.
And her friend? John. I cringe, unsure of what I feel when I think of him. But he survived two months exposed. Two months! I don’t get it. And I don’t trust it.
I wonder if Justin will tell Kate about Jordan, or if he’ll wait until I get back. I wonder what she will think of me if he does. And how much damage control I may have to do afterwards.
I kept the Code. The whole time I was in that pit, I never once broke it. I sigh. Eden has trained me well. But for Kate, I should have made an exception. She’s going to be so disappointed in me. And it won’t be the first time.
I hate disappointing her.
And loving her? Loving her is the craziest, scariest thing I’ve ever done. She’s an Outsider—savage and coarse . . . and backwards. This is what my people would say if they met her. What my parents would say.
And yet, when I’m with her, I am sane. More sane than I’ve been in all my life.
When I’m with her, I don’t care what anybody thinks.
Chapter 16
The sky is nearly black when I reach the outer wall of Eden. Not one star peers at me from above. It’s just a thick blanket of complete darkness.
The wall looms tall and marches around the entire boundary of the city, enclosing it. The guards up top don’t see me through the scratched Plexiglas windows that skirt the perimeter just below the domed roof, and not just because it’s dark. Darkness helps, but stealth is one of my “specialties.” I’ve learned a thing or two about not being seen in the last few months. It’s a welcome advantage.
The guards stand rigid, their firearms hidden at their sides, unmoving except for the occasional turn of their heads slowly from left to right, ever alert. Maneuvering through the shadows, I reach the entrance and check the gauge embedded into the wall. It indicates normal levels inside the chamber, which means no one has used the entrance recently. I press the code on the key pad near the solid, gray gate—the outer gate that blends so expertly with the wall itself it’s nearly indistinguishable. It beeps its recognition. There’s the familiar whoosh as the gaskets release, and the gate slides open.
I step into the equalization chamber—the holding cell for anybody leaving or entering the city—and the gate silently slides shut. The area is small and houses checkpoint number one just inside.
The equalization chamber is crucial for toxin containment. Every time the inner gate opens, it floods this area with toxins that have to dissipate before the outer gate can be activated. It’s an effective system for keeping the toxins from escaping. I frown and press a hand against Tabitha’s tiny back. Well, it was effective last time I was home.
The tinted windows of the small guard post barely allow a shallow light to leak through them. Behind them, I see a recognizable, hulking shadow. Ernie is on duty tonight. I tense up at about the same moment he spots me. His shadow rises from its seat and materializes into the man as he steps out of the building to greet me.
“Ian Roberts, where in the hell have you been?”
Maybe “greet” isn’t exactly the correct word choice.
“Hey, Ernie.”
He stands tall, arms crossed over his chest, a frown causing a long crease to form just between his eyes. I concentrate on this area as my mind races. How am I going to explain myself this time?
“Your parents have been frantic about you. What were you thinking wandering off like that again after last time? Do you have a death wish?”
“It’s possible,” I say, not missing a beat. He only shakes his head, and his eyes drift upward to connect with a guard at his post who’s leaned over the railing to inquire as to who I am. I can barely make out blurry starbursts through fuzzy glass behind him.
“It’s just the Roberts’ kid, Tag.” Ernie informs.
“Really?” Tag leans over a bit further, and I scowl.
Perfect! It just had to be Tag on watch tonight of all nights. I make a silent wish that he’d go on and lean over that railing just a bit further. Go ahead, Tag. A fall that short wouldn’t do much damage, but still; I’d get a little bit of satisfaction at seeing it happen.
“Man, are you in trouble, Ian.” Tag continues. “Not sure I’d go home if I were you.”
“Don’t worry. I’m not planning to.”
“Yeah, right. He smirks and disappears from sight.
I return my full attention to Ernie. “Can you clear me? And call Dr. Phillips? I really need to see him.”
Ernie rubs a big hand across his scruffy chin, his muscles bulging and tightening the short sleeves of the t-shirt he wears until I see the thin lines of his veins right through it.
“And why would you need to see him at this hour of the night?”
I tighten enough to feel the slight weight of Tabitha buried in the deep folds of the blanket against my chest. I feel the light rise and fall of her breathing—weak, but still with me.
“I . . . have a . . . package for him. It’s urgent.”
“A package?” Ernie’s disbelief rides on his voice. “And where would you have picked up a package for the good, old doctor?”
“It’s personal, Ernie. Come on. Just let me through.”
“You know I can’t do that, Ian. Not before inspecting this so-called ‘package’.” He gestures for me to hand it over, whatever it is. “Where’d you get it?”
I wonder which part of “personal” he’s not quite understanding.
“No place you’ve been,” I murmur under my breath.
“What was that?” He leans in, adjusting his belt, and the gun at his side shifts into view as he lays his hand over the holster. If he needs me to feel threatened, he’s wasting his time. I straighten, squaring my shoulders with his. And right on cue, Tabitha decides to raise her tiny voice.
Ernie’s beady eyes twitch toward the sound before he raises his brows. I loosen the blanket enough for him to see her tucked inside. He leans in, rubs a massive hand against his chin again.
“A baby?”
I don’t have to say anything more. And he knows he’d better not delay in calling Dr. Phillips.
“Where on this dead planet did you go to get that baby?” Ernie’s already turned back to the guard
post. He swings open the door. “Not Gaza. You were gone far too long.”
“Yeah, it’s a long story,” I offer, just as Ernie disappears inside. I hear the gasket releasing “whoosh” of the inner gate at the same time he calls in his crackling request for the doctor.
“Tell him I’ll meet him at the lab,” I say as I slip through the opening.
“The lab?” Confusion sprinkles his voice. “Proper protocol is to take the baby to the clinic.”
“I’m not going to the clinic. I’ll meet him at the lab. Just tell him, Ernie.”
“But—“
Is he kidding me? I whirl and duck my head back through the gate’s opening. “The lab, Ernie. And clear me with the second checkpoint. I’m in a hurry.”
My eyes connect with his in a fierce command. I don’t care who he is. He could be the commander of an entire fleet, and I couldn’t care less at the moment.
After a short face off, he nods curtly and makes the call. We don’t mess around where a baby is concerned. Ernie’s angry expression disappears as the gate slides into place and seals.
Normally, I would never get away with talking to a guard like that. Not one as prestigious as Ernie, who has earned a higher ranking for his years of dedicated service and even commands a couple of squadrons. In fact, I wouldn’t have dared to challenge him on any other night. But I have the upper hand at the moment; I’m the one holding the baby. And time is running out.
The buildings of the city line the street ahead, dark statues against an even darker backdrop. It’s late, and Eden sleeps, each family tucked inside, safe and whole—as families should be.
I think of my family, and my chest tightens. I wonder if they sleep. Is Ava snuggled into her big, pink bed with the few raggedy, stuffed animals she’s collected stationed around her to keep a look out for the boogie man? To this day, she believes he took me and held me captive for the months I was missing and that he would try to take her next. Nothing could convince her otherwise until I came back. The boogie man stopped visiting my little sister the first night I lined those critters at her feet and told her he was afraid of fur.