by Krista McGee
“He told you this?”
“He wants to use me because I studied linguistics and can be a translator.”
“For what purpose?”
Alex shrugs. “Not much different from my father’s.”
The word father makes me physically ill. I swallow back the bile that threatens to spill out all over Dr. Spires’s dusty floor.
“What is it?”
“I don’t have time to tell you now.” I look away from Alex. “We just need to get Kristie and get out.”
“He’ll come back for us, Thalli.” Alex places a hand on my knee. “We can’t just run away. We have to stop him.”
“Stop Dr. Loudin?” We can barely hide from him. How could we stop him?
Alex moves his hand from my knee to my shoulder, then pulls me toward him. I lean against him, so his face is inches away from my face. He caresses my cheek. “Oh, Thalli, I’ve missed you so much.”
I close my eyes. I cannot discuss that right now. I cannot even process it. My brain is saturated with information—about Kristie, Loudin, James. “Alex, we have to do something. Help me.”
“I’m sorry.” He pulls his hand away. “You’re right. Of course.”
“Whatever Loudin is planning when he goes to the villages can’t be good. Those people are like you. He calls them ‘primitive.’ There is no way he is all right with them continuing on the same way they’ve lived.”
“You think he’ll try to drug them?”
I think of Athens, how King Jason kept the people submissive through airborne pharmaceuticals. “Has Loudin asked you about Athens’s drugs?”
“No.” Alex runs his hand through his hair. “Not yet. He’s been too focused on the ‘meetings.’ ”
“What does he want you to say to them?”
“He hasn’t told me.” Alex stands and paces. “For a while I was just being tested on by those guys in all white.”
“The Assistants.”
“Right. But when he found out about my linguistics training, he brought me here, to his lab. Asked me all kinds of questions. When you came in today, he was showing me a map of the places he wants to go.”
“Where are they?”
“All over.” Alex keeps moving, though the office is so small he can barely take two steps without having to turn around. “At least one on every continent but Antarctica. Some continents have as many as ten or twelve.”
Dozens of surviving villages. Places like New Hope and Athens. I am overjoyed and afraid at the same time.
“Loudin wants to start in South America. I am most comfortable with the Spanish language.”
“Do these other places have communications?”
Alex shakes his head. “Not global communication. Some have electricity, like Athens. But it is localized. None seem to have developed capability to go beyond their borders. They probably don’t see the purpose in it. If they’re like us, and everything within hundreds of miles was decimated, they probably believe the whole world looks like that. Best to just rebuild what remained.”
An idea is forming, improbable, almost impossible, but . . . “If Loudin were left there, in one of those locations, he couldn’t get back.”
“What?”
“If we could find a way to take the aircraft when Loudin is with the villagers, he would be forced to remain there. Right?”
“We’d have to overpower the Monitors, learn how to maneuver the aircraft, prevent everyone here who is loyal to him from going back after him . . .”
“But it is possible.”
“Possible?” Alex stops. “Yes. I suppose it is possible.”
I stand and hug Alex. The move is so unexpected that he almost falls over before reaching around and pulling me to him. He laughs in my ear and almost squeezes all the air from my lungs.
CHAPTER 11
They are in here.” A Monitor pushes the door to the office open and speaks into his communications pad.
I jump back, out of Alex’s arms, as three more Monitors converge into the tiny room, pushing us back into the desk at the far end.
“Take them to my laboratory.” Dr. Loudin’s voice whines from the first Monitor’s communications pad.
Alex nods in my direction. I won’t fight them. Not this time. We have a plan. I have no idea how we will execute that plan, how all the details of the plan will work out, but it is a beginning. And we have hope. If we can leave Dr. Loudin in South America when he goes to make contact with the survivors there, then the State—and the rest of the world—will be free to live as they choose. I feel slightly guilty about forcing him on the survivors in South America. But without his resources and his followers, Loudin will not be a danger to them. I hope.
We are ushered into Loudin’s laboratory, and I am immediately assaulted by memories. None of them good. This man—my father—a master manipulator and megalomaniac, must be stopped. He cannot be allowed to do to others what he has done to those of us here.
“Sit.” A Monitor points to a chair in the center of the room. I obey with reluctance. Alex is seated three feet from me. As if we are too dangerous to be close together.
Maybe we are.
That thought makes me smile. They are a little frightened of me. And why not? I left an Assistant unconscious in the hall and escaped my pod. They lost track of Alex and me. Not for long, but still. To hide at all in this State is an impressive feat.
The silence in the room is oppressive. After several minutes, I feel as if the quiet has become a living organism, crawling around, suffocating me, tormenting me. But I will not speak. I cannot show weakness. Not to the Monitors, not to Loudin.
I try to focus on something else. I close my eyes and the first image that comes to my mind is Berk, standing in New Hope. The wind is blowing his light-brown hair, his face is tanned by the sun, and his smile is white. His green eyes gaze into mine, and I step into his arms. I can almost smell the soap on his skin, feel the fabric of his shirt against my cheek.
The joy I feel melts into an aching sadness. He is not here. I do not know when I will see him again. He could be sick. Hurt. He could grow tired of my absence, of my insecurities and uncertainties. He could discover that the girls in New Hope are far more suited to him, far better for him than I could ever be.
I open my eyes. I prefer silence to those thoughts.
“Thalli and Alex.” Loudin enters. His voice, a clarinet with a broken reed, dissolves the silence in the room. The Monitors stand straighter. “Quite a chase you sent us on. Clever. Fighting and subterfuge—are these the skills you have learned above, Thalli?”
I do not answer him, but neither do I look away. I will not cower in fear like the Monitors.
“Intellect and strategy—those are beneficial.” Loudin stands directly in front of me. I look into his face and cannot help but search it for similarities to my own. My eyes are shaped like his—large, a noticeable feature. His mouth, though, is small, his lips thin. With the wrinkles in his skin and sunken cheeks, his eyes look even bigger. Haunting. Or haunted? “But not like this. And what were you trying to accomplish? Certainly you weren’t planning to escape. You are too smart for that, aren’t you? You know I’ll just find you again, bring you back here. So what was it?”
“We just wanted to be together.” Alex blurts this out in a voice that doesn’t even sound like his own—high pitched, forced. “We were engaged in Athens.”
I try not to let the shock register on my face. Our “engagement” was a ruse by Alex’s father, who planned to murder me on our wedding night so his city would be incited to go to war against New Hope. But Loudin doesn’t know that. I turn my face toward Alex, eyebrows raised. He responds with a sigh.
“I love her, Dr. Loudin.” Alex shrugs.
Brilliant. The boy is brilliant. Now we seem like children given into emotions and not grown people plotting a coup. Admiration—that I pray looks like love—fills my heart.
“Is this true?” Loudin bends toward me, his foul breath spilling onto my face. “You love Alex?�
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I swallow. John taught me there are different kinds of love. So I am not lying when I say, “Yes. I do love him. Very much.”
Alex’s smile widens and I bite my lip. He does not know I am speaking of a friendship love. Or perhaps, hopefully, he is simply playing along.
“You have forgotten Berk so soon?” Loudin straightens, but the stench of his breath remains. “I seem to recall you and he having secret rendezvous as well. Is your heart so liquid that you can transfer your affections from one man to another in so short a period of time?”
Is he thinking of Kristie or me? Or thinking that in this, I am like her? But she didn’t choose Carey over Loudin out of a “liquid” heart. She chose him because Loudin’s heart was so dark. She could not love him.
“Very well.” Loudin’s thin lips part, revealing perfectly straight, perfectly white teeth. “No need to escape or to injure any more of my Assistants. Alex may join you in Pod C. He can tell you about the adventure we are planning—a trip to South America. Perhaps he can even teach you a little Spanish. If you want so much to be together, then you may be together. I was thinking of bringing Thalli anyway, as sort of an ambassador to the other villages. You have lived in both worlds. You can tell the people the advantages of life above and life below. Right?”
It was not a question. But it is an opportunity. An invitation to go with him to South America? Time with Alex to plan that trip? Once, in New Hope, Berk brought me flowers—a gift, he said. Something unexpected and beautiful. This, though Loudin does not know it, is a gift. I look at Alex and smile.
“When can we begin?”
CHAPTER 12
Alex and I have been in Pod C for two days. It is odd, being here with him. But we have been busy. Loudin insisted that Alex teach me Spanish. Because Alex is unfamiliar with our learning pads, he requested paper and writing utensils. Those are rare here, but Loudin found some and gave them to Alex. But he insisted I teach Alex to use the learning pad as well, since the paper will run out before the lessons have been completed. So we have spent half our days on Spanish and the other half on technology. We have not spoken of anything but these assignments because we are being observed. We cannot allow Loudin to suspect that we have our own plans for this trip.
Alex has been affectionate since we have been here, even with the Monitors watching. I play along because they all believe we are in love. I am concerned, though, that Alex believes it too. I know he has feelings for me. Before we left New Hope, he proposed—not a proposal forced on him by his father, but an emotional one. He asked me to stay with him and help him as he takes over the throne left vacant by the assassination of his father, the king.
I did not respond, and we have not spoken of it since. But every time he touches me, caressing my cheek or pulling me close to him as we study, I am reminded of that moment. And I cannot deny I have feelings for Alex—deep feelings, borne out of shared experiences and mutual respect. Tragedies have melded us together in ways I have never known. Alex is not ashamed to feel, to express his feelings. I have never doubted him like I doubt Berk. I know what Alex feels, what he thinks, in ways I still don’t know with Berk, even though I have known him since birth.
“Thalli?” Alex interrupts my thoughts and points back to the sentence he wrote. I would like to learn to write words. It is a beautiful thing to watch, this movement, the scraping of the utensil against the paper. Certainly it takes longer than typing on the learning pad, but there is something so personal about it, as if the words mean more when they are labored over, pressed into existence on paper that will yellow with age and become brittle, like the rare music I was occasionally given in the performance pod.
“Yes. Sí.” This language feels strange coming out of my mouth. But I enjoy learning it. It is like music, with its own cadence and key. “Escucha.”
“Escucho.” Alex corrects me with a wink.
“I am hungry.” I stand and stretch my arms over my head. “Can we take a break?”
“I noticed the greenhouse behind us.” Alex stands beside me. “Could we go there?”
“I don’t think there is anything edible in there anymore.”
Alex looks down into my eyes. “Could we just take a look anyway?”
The greenhouse is the perfect place. I should have thought of that two days ago. “Of course.”
“You don’t mind if we go there alone, do you?” Alex puts a hand on the Monitor’s arm. “Just for a few minutes?”
The Monitor looks at Alex’s hand as if it were a primitive disease, and Alex pulls it away. After tapping on his communications pad—asking Loudin, no doubt, for permission—he nods and moves into the kitchen to make himself a meal in our absence.
Once inside the greenhouse, Alex pulls me into his arms. “The Monitor may be watching. We don’t want to look like we are plotting.”
I lean my head against his chest and breathe in. Something about being near Alex calms me, slows me down. “So what are you thinking?”
Alex pulls back, and his blue eyes seem to darken a shade. “I am thinking you truly are the most amazing girl on the planet, and I want to spend every day with you—here, in Athens, in New Hope, South America. I want you by my side forever.”
I pull away. “There aren’t any cameras in here, Alex. We can speak freely.”
“I am speaking freely.” He cups my face in his hands. “I love you, Thalli. I’ll do whatever we need to do to help everyone here, but when we’re done, I want to marry you. In Athens. In front of my people. I want to take you on that honeymoon we were deprived of . . .”
I take several steps away, my face heating at his words, my throat constricting. “Alex . . . I can’t. Loudin and Kristie . . . We need to focus.” I can barely complete a sentence. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know how I feel. In our time here, I have forgotten who Alex is—King of Athens. And when this is over, if we are able to leave Loudin in South America and return to New Hope and Athens, Alex will resume his position. His responsibilities are immense, and he does need help and support.
All the emotions I felt at his first real proposal bubble back to the surface. All the reasons why marrying Alex is logical, beneficial to him and to others, assert themselves. The feelings I had for him—the feelings I have—are confusing. They make my mind feel as fuzzy as it did when I was under King Jason’s pharmaceuticals.
“I’m sorry.” Alex closes his eyes. “You are rightly focused on this task. Don’t answer my question. Think about it. I will wait for you as long as it takes.”
I blink back a tear. His sister was right—Alex deserves someone who truly, deeply loves him. Am I that person? Can I be?
Alex shifts into task mode and discusses what he has dubbed “The Mission.” One of us must learn how to fly the aircraft. With everything here run by the most advanced technology, that duty falls to me. Once again I wish Berk were here. He would not have any problem flying it. I fear I will cause us to crash, leaving us dead or stranded in South America along with Dr. Loudin.
We also must lure Loudin and his Monitors far enough away so we have time to get the aircraft into the air. We are hoping the villagers will assist us. That they will trust us more than Loudin.
“Why would they trust anyone?” I look out the window of the greenhouse. “They are just like the people in Athens and New Hope. Suspicious of outsiders. They will be even more so since they have probably never even heard of the State.”
“What we knew of the State made us more suspicious, not less.” Alex shakes his head. “We heard the stories from the Scientists who escaped. We knew Loudin launched the first nuclear warhead. They don’t know that.”
That fact still makes me ill. Loudin—my father—didn’t respond to the Nuclear War. He initiated it. Because of him, the world was destroyed. John’s family and millions—billions—of families like his had been wiped out in seconds. I take a deep breath.
“Alex, I need to tell you something.” I dig around in the dirt surrounding the dead plants
, hoping that to the Monitor I appear to be looking for food. I do this also because I cannot look Alex in the eye when I tell him about Loudin and Kristie. I cannot bear seeing the pity there when he realizes the evil that lives in Loudin is inside me as well.
Alex moves closer to me as I tell him, his hand on my back. The pity I did not want to see in his eyes is there in his touch. But I find I need the strength that comes from that comfort to tell this story.
“You once told me”—Alex takes my filthy hands in his—“that I am not responsible for my father’s mistakes. Now it’s my turn to say the same to you.”
Tears I was holding back burst out. I cling to Alex and he holds me, whispering over and over again, “You are not your father.”
CHAPTER 13
Dr. Loudin requested that you both come to his quarters.” If the Monitor is uncomfortable at the sight of me in Alex’s arms, sobbing, he does not show it. I suppose he has already been informed I am an anomaly, and Alex is earth born so our behavior is expected to be abnormal.
I pull away and wipe my eyes, then wipe my hands on my pants. I will not allow Loudin to see me upset. I will not allow him to have that power over me. I take several deep breaths before following the Monitor from the greenhouse. “Tell him we are on our way.”
Alex and I say nothing as we walk back to the Scientists’ quarters. I am struggling to regain my composure. I can only imagine what Alex is thinking. Considering yet another overthrow of a dictatorial ruler.
I approach the towering building. It is by far the largest edifice in the State, so wide I cannot see around it. It goes below the ground where I am standing, down to levels I never knew existed until I was taken to be annihilated. Kristie was here when this was built, Carey too. What had they thought as they oversaw its construction? Did they imagine they would live here, or did they assume it was just a precaution, that no one would really be so diabolical as to begin a war that would end the world as they knew it?