“What the —?” Wyck asks.
I make sure the girls are okay and then stand and press my face against the window’s cool surface, straining to see. We’re in the second car, close to the front, and I can see something on the tracks, but can’t make out what it is. Maybe we’ve hit a fallen tree.
“I think it’s a tree on the tracks,” I’m saying when a movement in the kudzu catches my eye. The wind must really be rising. No. The kudzu is creeping up on us, mounds of it detaching from the sea of vines and moving toward the train. “Outlaws!” I gasp.
Chapter Three
Brr-boom! The train rocks; we’ve been hit by a weapon. Something big. I brace my legs wider. Repos who were previously trying, like me, to see what was happening, drop to the floor. Only Wyck and I remain standing. IPF troops deploy from their compartment two behind us, firing as they drop to the ground. A clump of kudzu comes close enough that I can see the face beneath the camouflage. It’s all beard and rage, and then it’s gone as a particle beam from a soldier’s weapon blasts it away. Red mists the window. I jerk back involuntarily.
“Bastards,” Wyck screams. He thumps on the window. “You didn’t have to beam him.”
I’m startled to realize he’s yelling at the soldiers. One passes beneath us, anonymous and insectoid behind his bio-chem mask and helmet. I don’t suppose he can hear Wyck, but I’m not taking the chance. Hooking an arm around his shoulders, I say, “Get down.”
I drop, taking Wyck with me and bruising my knees. Most kids have their arms over their heads. Two or three of the younger ones are crying. Halla’s got her arm around a little boy, trying to comfort him, even though her face says she’s as scared as he is. He clings to her, calmed by that quality in her that makes all the under-tens love and trust her. She starts singing a simple melody I imagine she learned from her grandmother and some of the little ones join in. “Jesus loves the little children . . .”
“Why would outlaws attack us?” I ask Wyck. We’re huddled together, and even in the chaos of the attack, I’m conscious of his bony shoulder knocking against mine, and of his breath on my cheek. “We don’t have any food.”
“Not outlaws,” Wyck says. “Defiers.”
“Here?” He’s wrong. The Defiance operates much farther west, harassing the government troops defending pioneer outposts and generally being a nuisance. They wouldn’t dare come this close to Atlanta. The government has this area secured.
“They’ve been moving east and I heard they captured a weapons depot north of New Orleans,” Wyck says. An almost admiring note in his voice makes me uneasy. Surely Wyck doesn’t sympathize with—
A crack, as of a window shattering, sounds from the first compartment and the floor shudders. I hear screams.
“What’s happening?” someone calls out, hysteria pitching her voice high.
The distinctive whine and blast of beamers drowns her out. I risk a peek and see soldiers’ gray backs as they pursue the attackers into the dense undergrowth. Micro-drones are overhead now, tracking the fleeing men. An outlaw—or a Defier, if Wyck's right—lies near the tracks, shredded kudzu leaves forming a corona around him, limbs flung out. There’s a dark splotch in his mid-section and, as I stare in horror, his chest heaves in and out rapidly, six, eight times, and a bloody froth bubbles from his mouth. His muscles seize, and then he stills. I'm willing him to breathe, watching for his chest to inflate again. Come on, I urge silently. Nothing.
I slump, and stare blindly ahead. He was an outlaw, I tell myself. That doesn’t make me feel any better. Wyck puts an awkward arm around me, but I stay stiff. The fight has moved away from the train and it’s quiet now, except for sniffles and heavy breathing. Dusk is falling and soon it’s hard to make out faces. We’re all still, waiting. Halla, two toddlers sharing her lap, slips her hand into mine and I squeeze it.
“‘I will fear no evil, for you are with me; your rod and your staff, they comfort me,’” Halla recites quietly under her breath.
Wyck jumps up like a spring compressed too long. “I’m going to find out what’s happening.” Before he can move, the train’s announcement system crackles and Proctor Fonner’s voice flows calmly through the speaker.
“Everything is fine. There is nothing to worry about. Our IPF commander assures me the threat is neutralized. Resume your seats. The train will start up again momentarily. Our Kube medical team will meet us on the platform and assist those needing medical care. All others are to report directly to their rooms and remain there. Curfew is in effect until zero-six-hundred tomorrow morning. Anyone caught breaking it will be subject to severe discipline. Thank you for your bravery and control under difficult conditions. Well done.”
Like robots, we push ourselves up and settle on the bench seats. It’s too dark now to assess the damage to the compartment that was hit. Apparently it wasn’t knocked off the tracks because we’re underway with a grinding sound within ten minutes. At the Kube transport station, we file off the train quietly. The proctors are waving us along, directing us into the Kube, but I glimpse the starburst hole in the side of the first compartment, the metal curved inward in sharp, jagged triangles. I see splattered blood and someone’s lower leg jerking before the medical cadre hustles up and sets a screen between us and the damaged train car. I swallow hard.
“—damn laser scalpel is cutting out,” a tense voice growls from behind the screen. “The energy pack isn’t—”
On the words, Wyck darts away and around the screen, pulling the ever-present tool pouch from his belt. The proctors let him through; everyone knows that Wyck can fix anything.
Looking around as I follow Halla inside, I try to see if anyone I know is missing. I don’t see Yuna—her ginger head is usually easy to spot—or the six-foot-seven Dal. They’re already inside, I tell myself. Safe.
The Kube’s living quarters are laid out with four towers connected by a central dining and common area on the first floor. “Tower” is something of a misnomer, since the complex is only four stories high, but that’s what we’ve always called them. The building was once an office complex, but the government repurposed it as an InKubator, which helps explains why the vibe is impersonal and utilitarian rather than homey. Proctor Fonner’s personality has a lot to do with that, too, I’ve always suspected. The northeast tower holds the infants and nursery children. The southeast tower houses repos five to ten years old, and the southwest tower is for the proctors and staff. Halla and Wyck and I, along with the other eleven- to sixteen-year-olds, live in the northwest tower. Gleaming white subway tiles lit by overhead fixtures make the common area, the building’s former lobby, almost painfully bright. I blink. Obedient to the direction of the proctors, who seem tenser than normal, I let myself be herded toward the elevators. I get into the glass capsule, squished against Halla and some younger girls.
When the doors whish open on Halla’s level, she gets off slowly. When the others have passed her, she turns around and mouths “Please” to me before the doors shut again. Her brown eyes shimmer with unshed tears. For a moment, I’m puzzled, but then I remember her plea to talk. We’re under curfew—there’s no way we can get together.
“Do you . . . do you think anyone was badly hurt?”
It takes a moment for the words to register, but then I look at the fourteen-year-old whose room is two doors down from mine. Her fingers twist a hank of mousy hair. She’s looking at me hopefully, as if I’ll deny what we both suspect.
“There’s no way to know if—” I start to say, but then switch to the truth. “Probably.”
The word hangs there for a moment, but then Shaliqua, who lives at the end of the hall, spits out, “Damn those outlaws! Damn them. I hope the IPF shot them, every one of them.” Her fists are clenched at her sides and her thin frame is trembling with fury, or reaction to the day’s events. The two boys standing behind me murmur agreement.
Remembering the outlaw I saw die, I say nothing, merely stepping off the elevator when it opens, and walking directly to
my room. It’s tiny and utilitarian, with a single bed and nightstand, hooks and shelves for clothes and my few personal items, including my Little House on the Prairie, and a toilet and sink in an alcove. Hygiene facilities with showers are communal, down the hall. As one of the oldest repos, I’ve got a corner room with floor to ceiling windows on two sides. During the day, I can glimpse the sea. It’s dark now, though, and all I can see is the dim glow from the dome and the harsh glare of the perimeter lights. There’s a lot of activity at the IPF compound, a stone’s throw away, and it seems there are more soldiers than usual on patrol.
Hungry, I eat a vegeprote bar, then sponge bathe rather than go down to the hyfac. I try to read a paper on epigenetics that Dr. Ronan assigned me, but I can’t focus. Halla’s face keeps intruding. I can’t violate curfew, I tell her image. I can’t. Day after tomorrow’s April twelfth. Reunion Day. I can’t risk it. Surely whatever you want to talk about will keep until morning. I keep seeing her mouth form the word “Please.” Damn it. I fling my reader onto the bed and knuckle my eyes until lights flash behind them. In my mind, the ghostly shapes of my parents struggle with the solid form of my best friend.
I pick up my Little House on the Prairie and hold it loosely. It’s the only thing I have from before the Kube, my only link with my parents. It’s an actual book with a picture of a little girl in braids on the cover, her parents and a log cabin in the background. I’ve read it so many times I can recite large chunks, and I don’t read it now. Just holding it comforts me and brings me closer to the parents who sent it with me for some reason. I’ve searched it for messages, but there’s not so much as a name on the flyleaf or an underlined passage. I wonder sometimes if it means my parents were pioneers at an outpost. Mostly, though, I think they were trying to tell me that they love me like Ma and Pa Ingalls loved Laura. I stroke the cover and put it back.
I can’t not go. I can feel that Halla really needs me. Mind made up, I remove my boots, sling my bag across my chest, and cross to the door. I ease it open. The hall is dark, but not black, with dim biolume fixtures set on the wall every fifty feet. Scanning left and right, I see no one. The stairs are six doors down. I glide toward them.
I try the stairway door. Locked. I’m not surprised. This isn’t exactly the first time I’ve gone sneaking around after hours. I pull the mini EMP gadget Wyck built me from my bag and hold it against the maglock armature. He talked about solenoids and soft iron cores when he gave it to me, but the only part I care about is that the electromagnetic pulse disrupts the lock’s power supply for a half-second. Bzzt. I pull the door open, mildly triumphant. The stairwell is can’t-see-my-hand–in-front-of-my-face dark. Putting one hand on the wall, I step down. I grope for the door when I reach the next landing.
All is silent and still on Halla’s floor, and moments later I’m tapping gently on her door. It opens immediately and then Halla is hugging me. I catch a whiff of body odor under her natural cinnamony scent. She hasn’t washed or changed.
“You came,” she breathes. The fruitiness of ketosis tells me it’s been a long time since she ate.
I hug her back hard. “Of course I came,” I say, as if there was never any doubt. I’m glad I did. In the dim light from the table lamp her eyes are red and swollen. A pile of sodden tissues on the bed testifies to quarts of tears; she should be dehydrated by now. “Did you eat anything?”
She shakes her head and blinks back more tears, trying to speak. Pulling a vegeprote bar out of my bag, I hand it to her. “Eat first,” I insist, whispering. We can’t afford to be heard and informed on. I can’t afford it.
She sags onto the bed and bites through the edible wrapper. I fetch a glass of water and hand it to her. It chatters against her teeth as she drinks. I take it, place it on the nightstand next to her open Bible, and sit beside her. She takes another bite of the energy bar, and says something unintelligible.
“What?”
She swallows hard.
“I’m pregnant.”
“What!” I jerk and my elbow smacks the water glass. It falls to the tile floor and smashes.
We freeze, listening for any indication that someone heard us. There’s no sound from the next rooms. Glass slivers glitter on the floor, but neither of us makes a move to sweep them up.
I relax slightly, ashamed that my first reaction is hurt that Halla didn’t tell me that she and Loudon were even having sex. What do I say now? “How pregnant?” Stupid question. Pregnant is totally pregnant, no gradations.
“Six months.”
“Oh, Halla.” I’m sad that she’s kept this secret alone for so long. I’d noticed she was getting a bit plumper, but she’s always been on the round side, so I hadn’t thought much of it. “Does Loudon know?”
She shakes her head and the tears stream again. Last time I saw her this upset was the day Loudon left to start his IPF training. Coincidentally, that was six months ago.
Handing her more tissues, I say, “It isn’t the end of the world. You’ll have the baby, it’ll be sent to another Kube, and you can—”
“I want to keep my baby.” She puts a protective hand on her belly. “Our baby—mine and Loudon’s.”
Oh. Different story. No way is that possible. She doesn’t have a husband or a procreation license, and hasn’t contributed the mandatory nation service that would earn her the right to have a baby and keep it. This baby was conceived without a license: the law says it belongs to the state. I don’t bother telling Halla that—she knows it.
“This baby is God’s gift to me, me and Loudon. The government shouldn’t be able to take him away because we don’t have a license and haven’t done our service yet.” Her lower lip sticks out. “I’m not going to let them. I’ll die first.”
Normally a gentle person, Halla has a stubborn streak and I know she means it.
“What are you . . . how do you plan to—?”
She looks me in the eyes, her own red-rimmed, but determined. “I’m running away.”
“You can’t!”
“I have to.”
The difficulties that will confront her swirl in my mind. How will she find food? What about shelter? She’ll be an enemy of the state—hunted. Her family is dead, so they can’t help. Her parents died when she was one and her grandmother took her in; she lived not far from the coast in the Delta Canton, a land of swamps, drawling speech, hurricanes and religious enclaves that were among the last hold-outs against the Pragmatist government. When her grandmother disappeared and was presumed dead, Halla came here. She’s soft and gentle, not a fighter. She’ll fall prey to one of the roving bands of outlaws. Horrible images hold me silent. “Where will you go?” I finally ask.
“To Loudon.” Her soft mouth sets mulishly. “I heard from him a week ago. He’s finished his training and been assigned to an IPF base outside of Atlanta.”
“You haven’t told him?”
She shakes her head, dense curls dancing. “How could I? You know the Prags are reading and listening to everything.”
I nod. I wonder what Loudon’s reaction will be if she reaches him. I know he loves her; I watched their friendship turn into something more in the year before he left. But it takes a special kind of love to give up everything familiar and safe, and make yourself a fugitive for your beloved’s sake.
“He loves me,” she says fiercely, as if reading my mind.
“I’m sure he does,” I say, “but that doesn’t fix anything. Even if you get to him . . .”
We both know her troubles aren’t over. Even if she manages to find Loudon, he’s still an IPF recruit with six years to serve on his mandatory enlistment, not allowed to marry until he’s done. They still don’t have a procreation license.
“We’ll go west,” Halla says, “to a pioneer outpost. They need all the people they can get.” She nods hard twice, more assuring herself that her plan is workable than trying to convince me. “Loudon and I are strong—we’ll be good pioneers.”
Yeah, right. The chances of a pregnant wo
man and a deserter reaching an outpost are non-existent. They’ll be hunted down and captured before they reach the Mississippi.
“There’s got to be another option. Let’s think abou—”
“I have my semi-annual physical day Thursday,” Halla says. Today is Monday. “The doctor will find out. I have to leave before then. Will you help me?” Her eyes plead with me.
I’m sure the most helpful thing I can do is talk her out of this insane plan. I try. I bring up the hardships she’ll face traveling to Atlanta, the dangers, the very real possibility of her being tracked down and captured. I imagine she’d get prison time, or worse. She listens with an expression that says she’s hearing me out to be polite, but her mind is made up. I need to jar her back to reality.
I stab her with, “You’re going to kill this baby. You won’t have enough to eat, so the baby will starve. It’s little better than murder.”
When she pales, I’m immediately ashamed. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean—”
She stands, looking shaken but resolute, and says, “I have to do this.”
Suddenly, I’m angry. “You don’t! You’re going to end up dead and your baby with you. Or you’re going to end up in prison and your baby will end up who knows where. How is that better?” I try to sound calm and reasonable when inside I’m so afraid. “You’re not thinking this through. You’re making an emotional decision, not a logical one. The Prags have the best plan, one that benefits the baby and the country. Let them raise the baby. They did okay with us. They’ll make sure the baby is educated so it can—”
“Him! Not it—him!” Halla’s chin juts out. “You say ‘emotional’ like it’s a bad thing. It’s not. Everything’s not about smart and rational and intellectual and data. Some things are about feelings. Love. Not that you would know. And don’t bother to hit me over the head with science and tell me my hormones are out of whack, because I know that. I’ve been puking my guts up and crying for no reason for months—I freaking know that. But they haven’t changed who I am or messed me up like a Dr. Jekyll potion. There’s science for you! I love Little Loudon and I know—I know—that he belongs with me. We belong together. I thought you would help me. I thought you were my friend.” She breathes hard through her nose, her chest rising and falling.
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