by Annie Oldham
“I’ve been bringing the nomads to the colonies to get them away from the government. You may or may not know that I was imprisoned in a labor camp while I was on the Burn, so I’ve seen firsthand some of the atrocities the government is capable of. I was imprisoned for nothing more than not being in a designated city. Many of the other inmates there were imprisoned for much less. They deserve a better government—one that will treat them like people.
“What I’m doing on the Burn is important to me, and it’s making a difference in the lives of the nomads who come down here. They’ve become an essential part of colony life. They’re happy and healthy.” I eye the council member over medical affairs. “None of them have brought any diseases to the colony and have never posed a health risk.” I turn back to the rest of the council. “And they all work very hard. But it’s not enough. Up there, the government is working on a loyalty serum, a drug that alters people’s brains. It’s a way to force the citizens to become mindless drones. They’ll never oppose the government, and they’ll never have a voice again. As council members you all know how important it is that the people be heard. And the government is very close. I’ve come to ask the council to help me find a way to stop the production of the serum.”
I sit down and the whispers begin. It starts low, the hum of bees, and then it rises until the council members are shouting at each other. My father’s voice rises above it all.
“Quiet! Now is the time to voice your concerns.”
Starting at my father’s right, the council members speak.
“We can’t make a decision of this magnitude in the time provided this morning. It will take careful consideration—”
“But there is no time!” I say. My father silences me with a look.
The council member continues without even acknowledging me. “We have a strict code not to get involved. It would be dangerous for us to even think about assisting them.”
“Such an act would be a definitive acknowledgement of our existence. It would put us all in danger.”
“If we come to their aid now, they would expect us to help them at every juncture. When will it end?”
I snort at this response. My father glares at me and I glare right back. I’m ready to interrupt the next council member when the doors open and Gaea whisks into the room, her curly hair and long dress billowing behind her.
My father’s face warps from anger to confusion to sadness to shock and back through about five times. All the color has drained from his face and his mouth hangs open. Gaea comes to a stop right behind me and puts a hand on my shoulder.
The next council member in line flaps her mouth. “Who are you to barge in here like this? We are in the middle of an important meeting. There’s a reason you need to schedule an appointment. Who are you anyway? Does anyone recognize this woman?” The council member sees my dad’s face. “Mr. Speaker? Do you know her?”
It’s all my father can do to speak. “Teresa?”
At the name, all the council members shift in their seats and the whispering behind hands begins. I can just imagine the wheels cranking. Teresa? Wasn’t that his wife’s name? She disappeared years ago, not long after Terra and Jessa were born. Do you know why she left? No, I never heard. Just up and left him. I think it was another man. Well I think she couldn’t live in his shadow, being the speaker of the colony. If it is her where has she been all these years? And look at her. Who knows where she’s been hiding looking like that.
My father is still paralyzed, so I stand up. She may not have been much of a mother to me, but she’s helped me more in the past year than this entire colony has in my lifetime, and frankly I’m tired of the pettiness running rampant through the council right now.
“That’s enough!” I’m actually kind of impressed with the way the voice box carries my anger. “This is my mother, and you should show her the same respect you show any other member of this colony.”
Gaea’s hand trembles on my shoulder, and I raise one of my own to squeeze it. I feel Jack’s warmth next to me, and I know that no matter what happens next, I can do this.
My father wobbles to his feet and takes one step around the table. “Teresa, where have you been?”
Gaea doesn’t move an inch as she watches him approach. She grabs my hand with her other to keep from bolting.
“Say something,” I whisper.
“I—” Her voice comes out in a creak and she clears her throat. “I’ve been in the trench.”
My father steps back. “You didn’t transfer to another colony?”
She raises an eyebrow. She’s steadier now. “You would have known if I had. You tried to trace me.”
“You left me. How could I not trace you?”
“I left because of what you did to my children.” Her voice is soft, but there’s so much venom in it that my father flinches back like he’s been slapped.
The council member next to him looks defiantly at Gaea. “Mr. Speaker, what is this woman raving about?”
My father finally shakes the shock off. “This woman is my wife, council member. Her name is Teresa. She is not a raving mad woman. Please correct your tone.”
The council member hrmphs, but sits back.
“And everything she says is true.” My father’s eyes fall to the floor. I’ve never seen him look so defeated.
The whispers start again, and my father raises his hands. “We don’t have time to go into details now. This time was reserved for Terra. When she is dismissed, we will discuss this further. Please continue.”
Gaea leans down to me. “Do you mind?”
I shake my head.
“I have access to the satellites orbiting the earth. You’re not the only ones who can spy.”
Two council members glare at her. Spying, huh? If the council members have the same access to the Burn as Gaea does, that would explain the council member’s slip when he said New America. But why would the council lie so much about what they know?
“As such, and you may already know this depending on your dedication to the said spying, you know everything that Terra has presented is true.”
A shrewish woman leans forward. “Regardless, it is not our concern.”
“Silence!” My father glares at her. “This colony may have protocols regarding the Burn, but this council also has protocols regarding these proceedings. You’d do best to remember that.”
The woman eyes him icily and leans back.
“My only question for the esteemed and wise council—” the sarcasm in her voice is unmistakable “—is what will you do when the mindless drones created by the loyalty serum are ordered to attack the colonies?”
I brace myself for more shouting, but the silence is deafening. I lean to Jack and smirk.
“A real stumper.” I feel so relieved to have another ally that all I want to do is laugh, but Jack shakes his head. He’s right. Now’s not the time.
My father crosses his arms. “Did you have anything more to add, Terra?”
“I wish you would help the people of New America because you want to—because it’s what’s right. Not because you’re worried about saving your own skins.”
“It’s not that easy, Terra. You’ve grown up here. You know how difficult the relationship we have with New America is.”
I roll my eyes. “What relationship? You always told me contact was forbidden, and now I’m suddenly learning that you guys know just about everything that goes on up there.”
Gaea leans forward. “If you would just give Terra the access she needs to their computer system, she could get to the government island, and—”
“And what?” A council member snorts. “Maneuver a sub right to their doorstep, sneak on board, and hijack them? They would know in an instant a nomad could never accomplish such a thing. Once again, it would confirm our existence.”
Government island. It’s what the physician’s assistant said in the tunnels. It gives me hope. Surely it would be easier to reach an island than to penetrate a mount
ain fortress. My mind races.
“Just give me the resources I need. You don’t even have to offer any more help than that. Just let me take a sub to this island, and I will do what I can.”
One of the council members rolls his eyes, and that makes me seethe. I look to my father, wanting an ally somewhere, but he looks about helplessly. I can tell he’s deciding exactly what to tell me. Finally he scrapes his hands down his face and speaks.
“The colonies kept an eye on the Burn from day one. There were a lot of reasons, but the two that were tossed around the most were to monitor military activity—for our own protection—and to see if there ever came a time when we would go back up.”
Go back up? My heart dares to jump. Could the colonists abandon the underwater life and create a new one on land? My father holds out a hand.
“I see that look in your eyes. Don’t get your hopes up. It would take a lot more than a loyalty serum to convince us to return. A loyalty serum could be enough to convince most colonists to never return. We don’t have the resources to come charging out of the sea like a cleansing army. It doesn’t work that way. And from what I have heard from the nomads, most citizens of New America despise colonists. I don’t see how that would help us at all.”
“They hate colonists because we abandoned them! But everyone I’ve met on the Burn gets over that pretty quick.”
“Regardless, it’s not in my power to simply command us all to migrate land-side.”
“And it’s also not in your power to at least help the people up there?”
Dad pinches the bridge of his nose. “We can’t do anything, Terra. Not right away.”
“There is no time. My friend Nell who came with me, she was under the effect of the loyalty serum, and it scared me to death. If they’ve made it work for one person, it won’t take them long to get it to work for the whole population.”
“Terra, the founders laid out rules and protocols for a reason, and I’m not going to disregard those at the first emergency that crops up.”
“The first emergency? This is just one in a long string of emergencies. Have you heard anything about what the government is doing to its people? Did you hear anything I said about my time in the labor camp? Don’t you understand? People are dying up there for this.”
“And we’re not to get involved without the consent of the council—not just this council, but the high council over all the colonies—and that takes time.” Dad looks at me with narrowed eyes, and I’m reminded of the way he looked at me every time I failed at a vocation.
“Do I look like that same child to you? Do you think I’m still that same girl who left all those months ago? You think I’ll be cowed just because you’re glaring at me? I appreciate that you’re in a tight spot right now, Dad, but it’s not going to get any easier from here on out.”
Dad’s color is rising, and he makes a sound at the back of his throat like he’s really trying to be civil, but it’s not working out so well.
“You can talk with all the council members and spin in circles all you like. I’m leaving—going back to the Burn—” Dad’s eyes nearly bug out of his head “—and doing something to help the people that you somehow feel no responsibility for.”
Gaea sweeps away from me, and I jump to my feet. My chair falls over, and the clatter echoes around the room. Jack stands next to me, but he doesn’t touch me. He lets me stand up to my father alone, to show him I don’t need anyone else to do it. But I know he’s there just an arm’s length away, and I’m so grateful he’s here with me especially with the eyes of all the council members on me, burrowing into my skin.
I stand as straight as I can and turn and leave the room.
Chapter Nineteen
I sink to the floor. I’m not even sure where I am—a supply closet, maybe? As soon as I left the council chamber, I ran blindly down the corridors with Jack calling my name behind me. But I didn’t slow down for him, not until my palm print opened a random door. When it closed behind me, all I could hear was my breath coming in gasps and my heart churning in my chest.
Now that I’m alone and it’s dark and no one is watching, I cry. The feeling of being stared at like a specimen slowly fades, but not slowly enough. The looks of the council members remind me too much of the way the agents looked at me. I don’t remember anyone ever looking at me that way before I left for the Burn. Did my time up there really make me so different from them? Can they not bear to think of me as one of them anymore? That I’ve somehow been tainted?
I lean back and find something soft to rest my head on. A mop, maybe. Right now I don’t care if it’s dirty. Knowing the hygiene protocols down here, it’s probably as sterile as the medical area. I take a deep breath, and then there’s a soft knock on the door. I fold my arms over my face.
“Go away,” I say without even thinking. My fingers find the voice box. I sigh.
“Terra, can I come in?”
Jessa.
The door slides open and the light shines in my eyes. After I stop squinting at her, she smiles.
“How did you find me?”
“You don’t know where you are?”
I shrug. “Supply closet. There’s dozens of them around here.”
She nudges me with the toe of her slipper. “Not just any supply closet. This is the same one you hid in after dad’s big blow up the day you first asked him about the Burn.”
“Really?” I look around. I remember that closet lurking over me like a huge mouth ready to swallow me. This supply closet just looks like a supply closet.
“I’m not surprised you found the same one. Jack told me what happened.”
I’m all cried out and my eyes are too dry. I rub them hard. “I don’t know why those people can’t see past the ends of their noses.”
Jessa laughs. “Well, for the evil witch—” I wonder if she means the shrew “—that would be pretty hard. Did you see how big her nose is?”
Oh, Jessa. I can’t help but laugh, and Jessa smiles. Mission accomplished. She always knows just how to snap me out of it. She holds out a hand and helps me up.
We wander the corridors with no real direction and then take the transport to the vocational quarter. Our feet take one step and then another until we end up by the fields. I put a hand on the glass, and Jessa sits on the floor.
Jessa hugs her knees as she stares though the glass into the field. “We’re seventeen, you know. I should be off with Brant right now, kissing on the Juice Deck. He’s a good kisser, did you know that?”
I smirk. “Jess, how in the world would I know?”
“What? Oh, right. But that’s why I decided to help you, to bring the sub every time.”
I frown. “You bring the sub because Brant’s a good kisser?”
She smiles, but there’s no humor in it and her voice quavers when she speaks. “When you asked for a sub that first time, Mom told me what you were planning, so I went.” I blink. When did Gaea become Mom? “And then I saw how you were helping, how what you were doing really mattered. I wanted that, too. I mean, sure growing food is important, but there are dozens of other people doing the same thing, and dozens more who could take my place. But what you were doing mattered. It changed lives, and you were the only one who could do it. I needed to help. I don’t know why Dad couldn’t see that.”
“When did he find out you were taking the sub?”
“Not until I came back with your friends that first time. He flipped. First that I left without permission, second that I was going to the Burn, and third that there had to be someone else helping me, but I wouldn’t tell him who. Terra, he almost had me turned in for illegal contact with the Burn. Me. His angel child.”
She looks at her hands. I study the carefully manicured fingers and look at my own hands. The nails used to be rough and uneven, but now they’re filed down just like hers.
I look in her eyes. They shine in the bright light. “He doesn’t understand that we need to help because he doesn’t want to see,” I say. “T
hat’s a lot easier than dealing with the truth.”
“All you asked the council for was some help.”
I shake my head. “But to him—to them—it was so much more than that. If they agree to help, that would mean they admit that everything they ever told us was wrong.”
“It’s amazing how there is this whole world that exists that I didn’t even know about.”
“None of us did.”
“That’s not true, though. You listened to Mr. Klein. The rest of us heard it like it was a fairy tale, but you did something about it. You knew. I was happy just ignoring it.” Her face scrunches up and finally a tear streaks down her cheek. She wipes it away and leans her head on her hands.
“But you’re helping now.”
“Sure. But am I doing enough?”
“It’s never enough.” I put my chin on my hands and look at the rows of strawberries. The field is empty, and I wonder why Dave isn’t out there.
“I can’t come with you to the Burn,” Jessa says. “I can’t do it. Piloting the sub, that’s all I can do. I’m not brave like you.”
I rest my head on her shoulder. “I never asked you to come with. You’re doing more than I ever dreamed you would.”
She laughs, and the sound is warped by tears. “I probably am, huh, when all I ever cared about before was dressing you up and coercing you to come to a dance with me.”
My mind flashes back to a tall, gangly redhead boy. Funny how I haven’t thought about him in months. Not since I started wandering with Jack. “Whatever happened to Matt anyway?”
Jessa shrugs. “Last I heard he transferred to another colony.”
I stand up and brush off my pants and offer my hands to her. She grabs mine and stands up. We link arms and walk down the corridor. Funny how we never walked like this before I left. We’re walking like old friends, equal partners, like sisters. Why didn’t we do this before? I didn’t love her any less back then.
“I feel like I’m finally starting to understand you, Terra.” Jessa trails her other hand down the padded corridor wall. “I could never do what you’re doing, but I finally get it.”