“What is it?” Keeping one eye on the door, I cock my head toward her.
“It stands for … ” she pauses, scrolling through a dense document. “Oh, my goodness. It stands for the Human Replication Project. Well, no surprise there, I guess.” She blows out a breath, scrolling. “There are thousands of names here. Thousands.”
“But where is it? How will we find it? Whose names?”
“Hold on, I’ll – ”
Just then there’s a commotion in the hall, a low scrabble of feet and voices. Immediately the knife feels harder to hold, like it’s slipping out of my grasp. My neck prickles.
“Tate,” I whisper.
“I know, I know.” Her fingers fly over the keyboard. “Almost got it.”
“Hurry!”
“I am, all right? This firewall is practically impenetrable.”
“What about Enoch? I have to go out there!” In contrast to her still-calm tone, I hear the panic rising in my own voice.
“Keep your voice down, Naiya!” Tate’s whisper is fierce. “We’ll need more than an address if we’re to get out of that lab alive. We need passwords, locations, information. Just one more second.”
“We might not have one more second, Tate. Let’s go.”
She reaches into a pocket, pulls out a drive. Inserting it, she taps her fingers and waits, looking nervously toward the door. I watch as the data uploads slowly, painstakingly. Then she pulls it free, turning off the monitor. “Done!”
I tear toward the door, yanking it open and looking left and right. I’m immediately greeted by the sight of Enoch, breathing heavily over the body of a stunned guard. Or maybe more than stunned.
“What happened?”
“Why should you get all the fun?” he asks me, a vicious gleam in his eye. Blood is pouring down his arm.
“Whose blood is that. Did you kill him?”
“I don’t think so, but I don’t want to find out,” Enoch says, flexing his arm and ignoring my first question. “He was alone, just patrolling. I surprised him as he was coming around a corner, or he would have had me. We need to leave.”
Tate nods, turning at once. “This way.”
We follow, skirting the unmoving guard and turning the corner, hurrying down a different flight of stairs and making for the nearest exit. My heart starts to beat harder as we turn into a long, long hallway. There are no hiding spots here, and I feel very exposed. Finally, we reach its end. Just as we prepare to round the corner, though, the door right in front of us opens.
Out walks a tall, dark-skinned professor in collegiate robes.
“Tate,” the man whispers, seeming not at all surprised to see us.
“P – Professor Ekwensi,” Tate returns, looking significantly more taken aback. “What are you doing here?”
“I work here, child, as you well know. I think a better question is why you aren’t leaving. ”
“I – I was – ”
“It doesn’t matter, T – ” He bites off her name abruptly. He lowers his voice to a whisper. “Never mind. I know why you left. Your secret’s safe with me. Go. Go now.”
But we aren’t quick enough. Just then Professor Ekwensi is joined at the door by another man in robes. He too looks surprised. “What – ?”
“Your father isn’t here, my dear,” Ekwensi says, louder now. “I’ll tell him you stopped by.”
“Tell him? But what’s she doing here without him?” the other professor asks suspiciously, before we can make good our escape. I itch to run, but can’t think of a way to do so without arousing more suspicion.
“Ah, children,” smiles Ekwensi, shooing us off. “You should be in bed. Always where they’re not supposed to be,” he smiles at his younger companion, as though we’re partygoers about whom he feels particularly affectionate.
“Wait,” the man says, narrowing his eyes at me. I look down hurriedly. “Isn’t that – wait a minute. Aren’t you Elijah Barrigan’s girl? And his son! Goodness, Ekwensi, don’t you know who they are? What are they doing here?” I coil as he pulls a communication device from his pocket. My well-placed kick knocks it flying, and now he is looking at me with more than mistrust; anger is plainly written on his face.
“You kids are staying here,” he snarls, grabbing Tate roughly by the arm. Again I kick out, and he releases her. As we whirl to leave, Tate fumbles her father’s pass, and it falls to the floor with a brittle clatter. In the confusion that follows, I have barely enough time to see the man lunge for Tate, Ekwensi block him, the two tussle, and the man break off long enough to pick his communicator up off the floor. Then we are around a corner, running, running, running. A screeching alarm sounds, and we are forced to hide from guards twice, first in another tapestry-covered alcove, the second time in mere naked-feeling shadow. It seems impossible that we’ll reach the exit before they block it off.
Don’t think about it, I order myself, running flat out, my palms burning with heat and fear and exertion and something that isn’t any of those. The archway looms in front of us, finally, predictably covered by a mass of Home Guard.
“No,” I moan, slowing.
“Naiya, come on,” Enoch pants, tugging at my arm.
I can feel myself beginning to panic, looking behind me at the empty hall – which will not be empty for long – and forward again, where the guards are now running toward us.
“I don’t want to kill anyone,” I gasp. “Not again.”
He looks straight at me, and in his gaze I read the truth: He’s known since the beginning. “This time you won’t be the only one,” he promises.
Turning, he rips his knife from his belt and throws it, watching with satisfaction as it buries itself in the chest of one of the guards. Another flings herself at him, whipping out with an extended baton. With a savage crack, it comes down on his already bleeding arm. He screams, yanking a spare blade from his boot and turning to face her.
As I watch, time slows. The guard that runs toward me seems to float between each step, his red eyes tracing a jouncing path along the dim hall. Almost with ease, I reach up and slit his throat, waiting for it to knit closed. It doesn’t; the wound is too deep. Tate ducks another, but it rebounds and comes for her quickly. We’ll never be able to fight them off: only the worst injuries kill Home Guard, and we simply can’t keep up.
Dread begins to close in on me, narrowing my vision to a bright spot at the end of a long, black tunnel. Each breath rips through my chest, and the entrance seems to get further and further away.
I watch in horror as one of the guards finally bats Tate’s baton away, pinning her arms behind her chest.
“No!”
My scream is lost in the mayhem. Enoch looks to be only barely standing, his teeth clenched in a white snarl as he tries to fight while favoring his arm. My limbs are turning to lead, and the knowledge that we can’t possibly win this saps my energy even more. Though I will heat to my hands, trying to stoke the internal fire, nothing happens.
Suddenly a gunshot rings out. A new, deeper fear crawls over me, and my free hand flies instinctively to my shoulder, to the barely healed scar there. I search desperately for Tate and Enoch, but it is a guard that goes down. Then another.
Looking around wildly, I see Ekwensi striding toward us, a grim expression on his kind face. He holds a small pistol straight out in front of him, his deadly aim picking off guard after guard. Each fresh bullet finds the head of another assailant, putting him down in a gory spray.
A sharp sting penetrates my thigh, and I see a knife embedded there. Wrenching it out with a cry of fury, I fling it at the guard who stabbed me. The poor throw glances off a shoulder, which increases my rage. I register the electric tingle only moments before the corridor lights up and a deafening crack shatters against my ears. Guards tumble like leaves, but too many are still standing.
“Run!” Ekwensi yells, firing frenetically as he’s overtaken.
Spurred to action, I wrench Tate from her captor and stumble toward the door. Enoch foll
ows, weaving through the mess of bodies, and I shut my eyes, running blind. But I can still see the dead.
TWENTY-ONE
“Wait until the shift change.”
“I know, Tate.”
She gives me a slow, reptilian look. Though she’s repeated the same warning a hundred times, in the same electronic-sounding tone of voice, she’s apparently not tired of it yet. “I just want to make sure.”
“Right.” I roll my eyes at Enoch, who either doesn’t notice or pretends not to. Sighing internally, I shift my gaze back to the scene in front of us. The walls, less than fifty feet away, tower in the air, colored red by sunset. Southgate, a vast semicircular hole cut into the stone, arches over a train of lorries arriving from the fields, loaded with produce to last the City through the winter. Two airships float nervously outside, monitoring the entrance and exit of the huge metal trucks.
From my perch behind a jagged pile of stone and rebar, I can see the grapes and apples, squashes and sacks of wheat as they are piled onto the loading dock, then swiftly moved into a huge warehouse by dozens of scurrying workers. It’s hard to imagine, looking at this bounty, that in a few months’ time the shortages will hit. But they always do, worsened by weather that hasn’t been the same since the moon broke and changed the tides, the world.
“I’d kill for some ice cream,” I whisper, watching crates of dairy move from hand to hand.
“Chocolate,” Enoch says, smiling. He flexes his bad arm, wincing. I can’t believe it isn’t broken. My leg is healed already, three days all it takes for Tate’s magic medicines to work.
My answering smile fades as two Home Guard stalk into view. Even with their eyes dark and their weapons safely tucked away, the sight gives me a jolt. Thankfully they are too far away to smell us. Eventually they wander on, continuing their patrol along the wall.
“Should be soon,” Tate says, checking the time.
Finally, most of the workers move inside, leaving an unlucky pair whose time has not yet come. They grouse for a moment, then one reaches into his shirt pocket and produces a pack of cigarettes. He pulls one out, extending it toward his buddy.
“Smoke?” he asks.
The other reaches to take it, and leans in for a light.
It is while both their backs are turned that we make our move, slipping past them and ducking behind a huge stack of crates. Reaching into his knapsack, Enoch pulls out the power pack and plugs it into the lock on one of the crates. It springs open, and I quickly remove several wheels of cheese. Some quick work allows us to liberate a large bunch of carrots, a tin of salt fish and a sack of apples with equal ease, and we’re through the door and running away before the guards have finished their cigarettes.
Our pace slows as we approach our most recent campsite. This time we’ve chosen a run-down house on the ground, in an abandoned neighborhood near the outer edge of the City. The night is unseasonably warm, and instead of huddling in the gutted living room, Enoch and Tate sit down in the mossy yard instead.
I wander behind the house, clutching a roll of bath tissue – also stolen from the Dispensary – in my hand. When I return, I pause by the small yard’s iron gate, trying to pretend I’m not watching them through the dubious cover of a holly hedge.
They talk companionably about something, their backs to me and their two bodies leaning close. Tate even laughs a little. Enoch passes her the water bottle, and she takes a sip, looking at him. Her pale, braided hair glows like silver in the twilight, and I touch my hair self-consciously with a free hand. It is dark and dirty, falling out of its ponytail as ever.
Shrugging to myself, I make to join them, then stop.
Tate is curving toward Enoch confidentially, saying something. He reaches forward, taking her hand and lacing his fingers through it, replying. She leaves her hand in his.
I stare in shock, feeling a kick of adrenaline from my madly pumping heart. Is this the same Tate? The same Enoch? I feel like I don’t even know them. Scratch that; I never knew her. I feel like I don’t know him. It occurs to me to disappear back behind the house, hide, give them their privacy, but I don’t. Instead I square my shoulders and walk over.
“So,” I say, feeling like an intruder on their intimacy. They look up at the same time. Enoch quickly removes his hand.
“Naiya,” he replies, looking confused and faintly embarrassed, then trying to cover both with concern. “Are you hungry?”
“No.”
“All right. Well, Tate and I were just discussing the plan.”
“Tomorrow night’s our best bet,” she says, apparently oblivious. “Saturday’s technically the weekend, but there will probably be some diehards there during the day. At night, the only people left will be a few guards.”
“What kind of guards?” I ask warily. Many of the factories are patrolled by simple workers, men with nothing more than radios to protect them. Something tells me this research facility will not have such light security.
“You know what kind,” Tate says. “But they’ll probably concentrate outside the building, which means once we’re in we shouldn’t have to worry about them.”
“Well, can we get in?”
“I think so. Come look at this map.” She waves her shiny power pack at me. Its small, white screen displays three-dimensional blueprints, meticulously numbered. I sit and watch as she scans through the sketches, brushing the screen lightly with her finger to navigate through them. “There are twenty-three entrances to the building in question, most of which are situated on Level 5, all impossible to get through. However, four of those entrances are on Level 4, in the basement of the building. Three of them open onto the main street and will be heavily patrolled by guards. But the fourth … here … will be unguarded.”
Reaching over, I take the pack, studying the image. “It looks like a storm drain.”
“It comes out in a storm drain,” Tate corrects, pointing at the small hatch in the side of the building’s cement foundation. “Accessible through the street outside. Not only is it well hidden, it hasn’t been used in decades.”
“How can you be sure?”
She frowns slightly. “I’m sure,” she says. “This is an old blueprint, and the entrance doesn’t even show up on the newer ones. Don’t worry about it. The only thing is, we might have a little trouble getting through the door.”
“Not likely,” Enoch says, winking at me. “We’re pretty good at getting through old doors.”
I smile back, but weakly. “So once we’re in, will they notice we’re there? Do we need passwords?”
Tate shakes her head. “No passwords; they’re relying almost entirely on external security. There’s no ID attached to that keycard,” she says. “As long as they don’t know it’s missing, and they probably don’t, it won’t register as anything odd – just someone coming in on the weekend.”
“What if our signal pops up while we’re inside?”
“That seems unlikely.” Tate hesitates. “I’ve been thinking about it, and someone must be protecting us. I know it sounds strange,” she says, forestalling me, “but there’s no other explanation. Someone on the inside must be helping. Ekwensi, maybe. If so, he probably wasn’t acting alone … suppressing a signal is no mean feat.”
“But we’ve been found before,” I object.
She shrugs. “I know. Clearly the system isn’t perfect. Still, we’ve been off the map for way too long. I’ve never seen anything like it. Anyway, the bigger problem is security cameras.”
“Where?”
“In a high-tech, super-secret lab like that? Everywhere. Every hall, every room.”
“Can we knock them out?” Enoch asks.
“No. They’re controlled by the Party mainframe, I’m sure of it. We don’t stand a chance until we’re inside the complex.”
“So if someone is watching and they see us before we can do that … ”
“Right. And that lab is pretty deep in the building, one floor up from where we’ll enter. We wouldn’t be abl
e to get out fast enough.”
There’s a long pause.
“What’s the best bet?” I say finally.
“I’m glad you asked that,” Tate replies, almost conversationally. “The best bet is that I go in alone.”
* * * * *
Striding along through the cool night air is a relief. Moving feels like a huge improvement over the long day spent hiding in the moldy, smelly house, where I had nothing to do but nurse my irritation.
Enoch backed Tate, of course. Though I argued endlessly, they were immovable.
“But what if someone sees you?” I demanded.
“Hopefully no one will. That’s why we’re going in the back way.”
“And if they do?”
“No one will question me,” Tate insisted, ultimately even raising her voice. “That professor hardly even noticed me, the one with Ekwensi, remember? All he saw was you. If I go alone, everyone will think I’m there on my father’s behalf. It’s ridiculous for you to come with me.”
“You’re wanted too!”
“That’s what I’m telling you,” she said. “I don’t think I am. I still don’t think my father has let on.”
“But – ”
“We could talk about this all night and it wouldn’t change anything,” Enoch thundered. “She goes in alone, Naiya.”
And that was that.
Now even the brisk pace can’t quell the tumultuous thoughts in my head. Foremost on my mind is idea that someone must be helping us, but who would that be? Why wouldn’t Papa have pointed us to them? I’d planned to finish my mission, then turn my back on this City forever. But the fact that it might mean leaving an unknown friend behind gives me pause. So does Professor Ekwensi’s sacrifice: By letting us escape, he’s certainly exposed himself.
Which means if he was the one watching out for us, he might not be able to any more.
The selfishness of the thought makes me cringe, but I can’t help it. Tate’s assertion that our protector isn’t acting alone doesn’t make me feel better. I voice these concerns to Enoch, quietly. Because I make no effort to keep Tate from overhearing me, she assumes she’s part of the conversation too.
Broken Moon Page 20