The Ark

by Laura Liddell Nolen

  Oh, awesome. So much for being stealthy.

  I cleared my throat. “Don’t come any closer. I have a weapon.”

  The guy who had grabbed me in the hallway came into view. When he saw me, he lifted his hands, as though to surrender. And either it was my imagination, or he was also suppressing a chuckle. “Seriously? You’re threatening me with an oboe?”

  “Just… just put down your stunner.”

  “Yeah, sure,” he said, smiling slightly. He unclipped his stunner and placed it on the ground, then slid it toward me. “Don’t, like, play me to sleep or something.” He shook his head. “I honestly don’t see how you’ve made it this far. It’s impressive, really.”

  I rolled my eyes. “Right, ’cause you’re so good at your job, too. How’s the neck?”

  He rubbed his shoulder before responding. “Fine, thanks. I see you found a change of clothing.”

  I frowned, then squinted at him. “Eren?”

  He raised his eyebrows slightly, then settled himself on the couch with a sigh. “You didn’t recognize me? That explains the nutshot.”

  This conversation was making no sense. “Nut—oh. Right. Well, you were asking for it.”

  “Sure. One minute I’m standing there, trying to figure out why the alarm was going off, then the next minute a highly dangerous fugitive in handcuffs runs into me and tries to leave me crippled for life. Definitely my bad.”

  Something about the way he said “highly dangerous” made me feel less remorseful about hitting him. “You grabbed me!”

  “Fair enough. But you caught me off-guard and knocked the wind out of me, and plus, I wanted to see if it was you.”

  “What do you mean, me?”

  “Look. I know your name isn’t Magda, or whatever. And when I scanned your pass on the boat, it came up as belonging to a medical doctor with special clearance. So either you’re a lot older than you look, or you had someone else’s pass.”

  “It’s… it’s not what you think.”

  “I know.”

  “How could you possibly know that?”

  “I just do. You don’t seem the type to steal someone else’s spot.”

  “You don’t know that. You don’t know anything about me.”

  “Maybe, but I know you’re young, and I saw you save that kid on the boat. And I know that there are a lot more ways to get a valid pass than to steal one.”

  I cringed. I wasn’t sure why I had pulled the boy back onto the deck, but I definitely wasn’t the one who had saved him. That distinction belonged to the soldier who’d given up his starpass at the gate. But I couldn’t explain that to Eren. I needed him to think I was a good person. It was my best shot at not getting turned in.

  “If you knew I had the wrong pass, then why did you help me?”

  “The doors were about to close, so it’s not like I could change what had already happened. Let’s just say I had seen enough of people dying for one lifetime.”

  I didn’t have anything to say to that, so I lowered the oboe in silence. The stunner lay on the ground at my feet, but I didn’t feel like picking it up.

  “By the way, the officers will be here any minute. We should probably find you a place to hide. They’re not going to be threatened by your musical prowess.”

  Eren stood and fished a thin piece of metal from his pocket. He moved toward me, stepping over the t-shirts, and reached for my wrist.

  I jerked away. “Give it to me. I can handle it.”

  He looked surprised, but lifted the cuff key into the space between us. I felt myself blush a little.

  “Sorry,” I muttered. The cuffs snapped off, and I tossed them into his open wardrobe, on top of a pile of black uniforms. “You’re quite the housekeeper.”

  He snorted. “Been a busy day, what with the manhunt for a cold-blooded criminal, and all. I think we should try the cabinets.”

  “In the kitchen?”

  “Above the bookcase.”

  I looked around the room again, and saw that the far wall, which held floor-to-ceiling shelves, actually had a long, flat storage space on top.

  “They’re totally going to look there.”

  “Okay, Miss Expert in police procedure. Where do you propose to hide?”

  I bit my lip for a moment. “In the bed.”

  “They’re going to look under the bed before they get to the cabinet ten feet in the air.”

  “No, not under the bed. In it.” I hopped onto the mattress, which gave way under my hips instantly. I could not hide my surprise. “Holy cow. It’s like a cloud.”

  Eren did not respond to this observation. His expression was pinched.

  I smiled. “You don’t trust me.”

  “I’m not even going to consider the ways in which that statement is absurd.”

  I raised an eyebrow at him before sliding underneath the enormous comforter, stretching out my legs and leaving my arms at my side. “Now bunch it up around me. Make me look like a wrinkle.”

  “A wrinkle. Okay.” He must have been at least somewhat impressed, because the next thing I knew, he was carefully tucking the soft material all around my body. I was enveloped in feathers and darkness. This had to be my most comfortable hiding place ever. He was even more delicate around my head, sweeping my hair up and laying it lightly next to my neck. I was surprised that anyone wearing a uniform could be that gentle.

  “Okay. Just don’t move,” he said, sounding tense.

  “Um, duh.”

  “Okay.”

  “Stop saying ‘okay.’”

  “Ok— fine. They’re coming.”

  “Relax. This will work. And put your stunner back on. And hide the cuffs.”

  I heard a click as he fastened the weapon onto his belt. “So, what is your name?”

  “None of your business.”

  He gave a small snort. “I think at this point—”

  I sighed roughly, cutting him off. “Why does it even matter? Just call me whatever you want.”

  “I want to call you by your name.”

  “I don’t have one.”

  “Everybody has a name.”

  “No they don’t. Not me.”

  “How is that even possible?”

  “You really want to have this argument right now?”

  “I really want to know your name.”

  “Well, like I said. I don’t have one.”

  “Everyone has one!”

  “Agree to disagree,” I said in a bored tone.

  “Fine,” he said.

  “Fine,” I snapped back.

  And then we heard the knock.

  Fifteen

  “Come on in,” said Eren. I heard a soft smack as he hit the door button, followed by the hiss of the panel as it opened.

  “Sorry, sir,” came the first cop. “We’re about to go door-to-door on the hall, and your room was flagged because the door was opened after the alarm went off. Protocol. You understand.” The last statement sounded a little like a question, as though the cop were hoping Eren understood, instead of assuming he would.

  “Some kind of trouble?”

  “Same perp as before, but the Commander upgraded the threat to Level Three.”

  Eren laughed. “Level Three? I understood she was a stowaway. Now she’s some kind of terrorist?”

  “Yes, sir. Apparently she used deadly force on a guardian in the receiving dock, and there’s evidence she might have brought some contraband from… down below. So we’re to assume she’s armed and dangerous.”

  “Really,” Eren said dryly.

  “Well, Commander says we can’t be too careful. Same ending for her, either way. I guess you haven’t seen her.” Now he sounded downright deferential, and I had the momentary thought that maybe things would be different on the Ark to how they had been on Earth. I’d never known a cop to be so polite, except when they spoke to my father. Then I remembered the weapons cache in the cargo bin, and dismissed the thought entirely.

  “No.”

 
“We’re required to search your quarters, sir, because of the flag. Do you mind?”

  “Not at all.” His tone was light, but I heard the note of tension in his voice. I slowed my breathing until my lungs began to burn.

  There was the sound of several footsteps, followed by a few grunts, and I guessed that at least one of the cops was unused to a lot of crouching and standing.

  “Nothing to report, sir,” said an unfamiliar voice.

  “Good. Fine. We’ll leave you alone, sir. Sorry for the inconvenience. Everyone’s been on edge lately, after what happened to Ark Five.”

  “Unbelievable tragedy.”

  “Yes, sir. Terrorism has never been this easy. Assuming it wasn’t an accident, that is.”

  “Terrorism? I heard it was a leak of some kind.”

  “They’re still looking into it, sir.”

  “Have there been any demands? Is anyone claiming responsibility?” Eren asked.

  “Not yet, sir.”

  “Let me know when this, uh, threat is uncovered,” said Eren.

  “Oh, you will. Commander says we’re going to announce the apprehension publicly, and broadcast the verdict as well.” Eren didn’t respond audibly, and the officer cleared his throat. “To show we’re running things according to the Treaty.”

  “Of course. A good plan.”

  “Yes, sir. I’ll keep you posted.”

  There was a swish as the door closed, and a moment of silence.

  “All clear,” said Eren, in a much quieter tone.

  I allowed a moment to suck in as much air as I wanted, then sat up on the bed and chucked the covers aside, grinning. “Didn’t I tell you? Easy as cake. Which end of the hall do you think they’ll start on? I need to get moving in the opposite direction.”

  Eren was still staring at the door. “No. No way.” He turned to me, and I saw that he was upset about something.

  “What do you mean, ‘no’?”

  “You can’t leave here. You’re a Level Three threat, for crying… They’ll have the entire floor locked down till they find you.”

  I frowned. I had no intention of staying put. Not that he’d be able to make me.

  He continued, oblivious to my expression. “What were they talking about, before? How is it even possible to get a weapon past the bioscanner?”

  “It’s not, as far as I know. But someone sure did. I found an entire cargo bin full of assault rifles in the—”

  “Assault rifles? That can’t be true.” He rubbed his neck and squinted at me, as though evaluating what he saw. I got the impression that he was trying to decide whether he’d been wrong to help me after all.

  “No, I’m serious. There were rows and rows of them. It’s in the cargo hold.”

  “You’ve been to the cargo hold? That’s not exactly a safe place to be.”

  “Why not?”

  “It’s about forty levels down. Gravity is too strong there.”

  “Sure, there’s that. And also guns.”

  “Mag—I mean, whoever you are—you have to understand. Those kinds of weapons aren’t allowed anymore.”

  “Yeah. I kinda got that from the five thousand or so announcements since the Treaty was signed. Didn’t stop someone from outfitting a small army up here.”

  He continued to stare at me. “Agree to disagree.”

  I snorted. “Fine.”

  “But,” he said, brightening with the change of subject. “You still have to stay here for now. And I’m hungry. Grilled cheese?”

  “Um, definitely. That sounds delightful.” I could eat, then split. After all, I did need to keep my strength up.

  He smiled and turned toward the kitchen. I stood and began arranging the sheets, suddenly conscious of the fact that I was hanging out in the bed of a strange guy.

  “So. You don’t have a name. Where did you grow up? Or is that classified, too?”

  I considered that for a moment, then decided it would be safe to answer. “Manhattan, mostly.” I didn’t see the need to mention the fact that I’d probably done most of my “growing up” in various juvy halls, depending on how you defined the phrase.

  “Ah.”

  “You?”

  “Everywhere. Nowhere in particular.” He produced some kind of blade and began popping the seals off the boxes stacked in the kitchenette.

  “Military brat?”

  “Yeah. Can’t say I’ll miss it too much. Before that, we had a farm.”

  “A farm?! Like, pigs and chickens and stuff? Did you milk cows?” I don’t know why that struck me as funny. It wasn’t hard to picture Eren baling hay in the hot sun, or whatever it is you do on a farm. He definitely had the build for it.

  “Goats, actually.”

  “You milked a goat?” I had seen pictures of farms in children’s books. Farms were full of color. They had grass everywhere, and manmade wooden fences, and bright green trees full of red apples. Not a bad place for a childhood. A sight better than Manhattan, I was sure.

  “We raised them.”

  I squinted. Real farms, like the ones Eren was talking about, had been illegal for several decades. They weren’t efficient enough to warrant the space they used, unlike modern meat and produce factories. “How did your dad pull that off?”

  “It was my mother, actually. It had been in the family for so many years that they had to let her keep it. She loved it more than anything, until she met my dad. We lived on the farm until he went into the service.” His tone was light but careful, as though he wanted to tell me about the farm, and his mother, but wasn’t sure how I’d react.

  “She sold it?”

  “She’d have done anything for him. He knew that.” The way he talked about his mom was like hiking through the sand on a beach. Heavy, wearying work, but worth it, because of the view. He almost smiled, but there was bitterness in this memory, too. “I just never understood why he asked her to.” He took a moment, cleared his throat. “She died the next year.”

  “I’m sorry.”

  He paused again, holding the pot he’d unpacked in midair. “They both made their choices. And I got along with the other kids on the bases. I mean, it was a different group every time we moved, and my mom was long gone by then. I didn’t have siblings. I just wanted…”

  I didn’t press him to finish the sentence. Instead, I took extra care in making the bed, tucking the end of the dark blue comforter under the enormous mattress and pulling the far corners until every wrinkle had disappeared. When I glanced back at Eren, he’d located a frying pan and was rummaging through the icer for cheese. I took a small breath. “You wanted something permanent. You wanted to belong to just one place.”

  He closed the door of the icer and stared at me. I got the same feeling as before, like he was trying to decide what to think about me. Finally, he nodded. “Yeah. One place. I assume you want double cheese on this.”

  “You assume correctly, sir.”

  He laughed. “They say that to everyone.”

  “I can promise you they don’t.” I suppressed the urge to touch the bruise on my face. “In my entire life, a cop has never called me ma’am. I’d probably die of shock if they did.”

  “I’ll be sure to steer clear of it, then. And we prefer “guardian,” up here, Miss.”

  I giggled. “Well, that changes everything, then.”

  “What’s your problem with cops, anyway?” He plopped a healthy-sized pat of butter into the skillet and looked back at me while it sizzled. “Oh, right. But, before all this.”

  I picked up the small stack of plates he’d left next to the boxes and chose a spot for them in the empty cabinets. “Let’s just say, I’ve been told I have a problem with authority.”

  “You? Impossible.” Eren laid a piece of bread in the buttery pan and began stacking layers of cheese on top of it. I inhaled deeply, allowing my stomach to growl. The smell was heavenly.

  “I can see why that would be hard for you to believe.”

  He shrugged and flipped the sandwich.
“Some people are naturally rebellious. I just never saw the point. Nothing wrong with that.”

  “That is the point. If you don’t question the rules, they’ll just make you do whatever they want.”

  “Who exactly is ‘they’? And why is that such a bad thing? Rules are meant to protect us.”

  “Some rules, maybe. Other rules only protect a small group.”

  “Like what?”

  “Like, rules about who can use a museum, who can apply to public colleges.” I stopped for a moment, filling the silence by clanging a package of silverware into an open drawer. “Who gets to go on the Ark, for example.”

  “You don’t seem like the type who cares a lot about museums.”

  “Maybe I would have, if I’d been allowed to go there.”

  “And the Ark. They tried to make it as fair as possible. It’s not like they could save everybody.”

  “Fine. But they could have saved more than they did.”

  Eren looked pained. “I can’t really argue that. It’s like, you can always fit one more person. I guess they just had to draw the line somewhere. But they did everything they could to make the best new society possible.”

  “That’s exactly what I’m talking about. Someone made up all these rules, but no one could really question things because then they wouldn’t get a spot on an Ark. And now there’s a bin full of weapons in the cargo hold. Makes you wonder what else they’re lying about. But as long as everyone just lets it happen, whoever’s in charge is only going to get more and more powerful. Doesn’t that scare you?”

  “Maybe the person in charge isn’t so bad.”

  “Maybe they’re worse than you can imagine.”

  “No, they’re not.”

  “How would you know?”

  “I just… I just do. Not everyone is out to get you.”

  “Spoken like someone who never had his face broken by a ‘guardian.’”

  Eren stopped for a moment. “A guardian did that to you?”

  I touched my cheek and regretted bringing it up. He was staring again. “Of course he did.”

  “I wasn’t going to ask. Now I wish I hadn’t.” He shoved the sandwich onto a plate and looked down at it for a moment. A muscle in his jaw worked back and forth before he spoke again. “What was his name?” His voice was overly casual, as though he wanted me to answer the question without thinking about it.