Chaos Walking

by Patrick Ness

  Is that the Land? the Source asks. Has the Land done this?

  It has not, shows the Sky. He steps quickly out of the Pathways’ End, gesturing us to follow. We go to the steep path where I will have to help the still-weak Source climb down, and as we reach it, the Source’s voice is filled with one thing–

  Fear.

  Not for himself, not for the peace process–

  Fear for the Knife. All his voice can show is how much he fears losing the Knife on the very morning they were to be reunited, fear that the worst has happened, that he has lost his son, his most beloved son, and I can feel his heart aching with worry, aching with love and concern–

  An ache I know, an ache I have felt–

  An ache that passes from the Source to me as we climb down–

  The Knife–

  Todd–

  Standing in my voice, as real and fragile and worthy of life as any other–

  And I do not want it.

  I do not want it.

  [TODD]

  A small intake of breath is all the Mayor gives when Mistress Lawson presses the bandages against the back of his scalp, tho the burns there are horrible to see.

  “Severe,” Mistress Lawson says, “but shallow. The flash was so fast it didn’t go very deep. You’ll scar, but you’ll heal.”

  “Thank you, Mistress,” the Mayor says, as she wipes a clear gel over the burns on his face, which ain’t as bad as on the back of his head.

  “I’m merely doing my job,” Mistress Lawson says sharply. “And now there are others to be treated.”

  She leaves the healing room of the scout ship, taking a pile of bandages with her. I’m sitting in a chair near the Mayor, burn gel on my hands, too. Wilf is on the other bed, burnt up his front but still alive cuz he was already falling when the bomb went off.

  Outside is another story. Using the Noise of the crowd, Lee’s out there helping the dozens of people who were burnt and injured in Mistress Coyle’s suicide.

  Killed, too. At least five men and one woman in the crowd.

  And Mistress Coyle herself, of course.

  And Simone.

  Viola ain’t spoken to me since the bomb. She and Bradley are off doing something.

  Something away from me.

  “It’ll be all right, Todd,” the Mayor says, seeing me keep checking the door. “They’ll realize you had to make a split-second decision and I was closest–”

  “No, you weren’t,” I say. I clench my fists and wince at the pain from the burns. “I had to reach farther to grab you.”

  “And you did grab me,” the Mayor says, marvelling a little.

  “Yeah, yeah, all right,” I say.

  “You saved me,” he says, almost to himself.

  “Yeah, I know–”

  “No, Todd,” he says, sitting up on the bed, tho it obviously pains him. “You saved me. When you didn’t have to. I can’t tell you how much that means to me.”

  “You sure keep trying.”

  “I’ll never forget this, that you think of me as worth saving. And I am, Todd. And it’s you who’s made me that way.”

  “Quit talking like that,” I say. “Other people are dead. Other people I didn’t save.”

  He just nods, nods and lets me feel crap all over again for not saving Simone.

  And then he says, “She won’t have died in vain, Todd. We’ll make sure of that.”

  And he sounds truthful, like he always does.

  (it sure feels true–)

  (and the faint hum–)

  (it’s glowing with joy–)

  I look over to Wilf. He’s staring up at the ceiling, soot-covered skin poking out thru white bandages. “Ah think you mighta saved me, too,” he says. “Yoo said, Jump. Yoo said, Get offa the cart.”

  I clear my throat. “That ain’t really saving you, Wilf. It didn’t save Simone.”

  “Yoo were in mah head,” Wilf says. “Yoo were in mah head sayin, Jump and my feet were jumpin afore Ah even tole ’em to. Yoo made me jump.” He blinks at me. “How d’yoo do that?”

  I look away at the thought of it. I probably did do it, reached out and controlled him, and if Simone didn’t have Noise, she wouldn’t have responded to it.

  But the Mayor might have. I might not have even needed to grab him.

  The Mayor sets both feet on the floor and painfully, slowly, brings himself to standing.

  “Where do you think yer going?” I say.

  “To address the crowds,” he says. “We need to tell them that the peace process doesn’t end because of the actions of one mistress. We need to show them that I am still alive and that Viola is.” He puts a hand gingerly to the back of his neck. “This peace is fragile. The people are fragile. We need to tell them there’s no reason to give up hope.”

  I wince a little at his last word.

  Mr Tate comes thru the door carrying a pile of clothes. “As requested, sir,” he says, handing ’em to the Mayor.

  “Yer putting on clean clothes?” I say.

  “So are you,” he says, handing me half the pile. “We certainly can’t go out there in burnt rags.”

  I look down at my own clothes, what’s left of ’em after Mistress Lawson peeled the burnt ones off my skin.

  “Put them on, Todd,” the Mayor says. “You’ll be surprised at how much better they make you feel.”

  (and the faint hum–)

  (the joy of it–)

  (it’s kinda making me feel not so terrible–)

  I start putting on the new clothes.

  {VIOLA}

  “There.” Bradley points at the screen in the cockpit. “He is closer to Simone, but Prentiss is closer to the edge of the platform.”

  He slows down the recording and stops it at the point where Mistress Coyle is about to press the button on the bomb. The point where Simone is still heading straight for her and where Wilf is stepping backwards to jump off the cart.

  And where Todd is already reaching for the Mayor.

  “He wouldn’t have even had a chance to think,” Bradley says, his voice thick, “much less choose.”

  “He went right for the Mayor,” I say. “He didn’t have to think.”

  We watch the explosion again, an image that was broadcast to the town outside and to the people watching on the hilltop, who are thinking God knows what right now.

  We watch as the Mayor is saved again.

  And Simone isn’t.

  Bradley’s Noise is so sad, so broken, I can barely look at it.

  “You told me,” he says, closing his eyes, “that whoever else I doubted on this planet, Todd was the one I could trust. You said that, Viola. And you’ve been right every time.”

  “Except this time.” Because I can read Bradley’s Noise, read what it really thinks. “You blame him, too.”

  He looks away from me, and I see his Noise struggling with itself. “Todd obviously regrets it,” he says. “You can see it all over his face.”

  “But you can’t hear it. Not in his Noise. Not the truth.”

  “Have you asked him?”

  I just look again at the screen, at the fire and chaos that followed Mistress Coyle blowing herself up.

  “Viola–”

  “Why did she do it?” I say, too loud, trying to ignore the sudden Simone-shaped hole in the world. “Why when we had peace?”

  “Maybe with the both of them gone,” Bradley says sadly, “she hoped the planet would rally around someone like you.”

  “I don’t want that responsibility. I didn’t ask for it.”

  “But you could probably have it,” he says. “And you’d use it wisely.”

  “How do you know?” I say. “I don’t even know that. You said war should never be personal, but that’s all it’s ever been for me. If I hadn’t fired that missile, we wouldn’t even be here. Simone would still be–”

  “Hey,” Bradley says, stopping me because I’m getting even more upset. “Look, I need to contact the convoy, tell them what happened.” H
is Noise folds with grief. “Tell them we’ve lost her.”

  I nod, my eyes wetting further.

  “And you,” he says, “you need to talk to your boy.” He lifts my chin. “And if he needs saving, then you save him. Isn’t that what you told me you did for each other?”

  I let go a few more tears but then I nod. “Over and over again.”

  He gives me a hug, a strong and sad one, and I leave him so he can call the convoy. I walk the short hallway back to the healing room as slow as I can, feeling like someone’s torn me in two. I can’t believe Simone is dead. I can’t believe Mistress Coyle is dead.

  And I can’t believe Todd saved the Mayor.

  But it’s Todd. Todd, who I trust with my life. Literally. I trusted him to put these bandages on me, which frankly have me feeling better than I have in months.

  And if he saved the Mayor, then there must be a reason. There must be.

  I take a deep breath outside the door of the healing room.

  Because that reason is goodness, isn’t it? Isn’t that what Todd basically is? Despite the mistakes, despite killing the Spackle by the riverside, despite the work he did for the Mayor, Todd is essentially good, I know this, I’ve seen it, I’ve felt it in his Noise-

  But I can’t feel it any more.

  “No,” I say again. “It’s Todd. It’s Todd.”

  I push the panel to open the door.

  And see Todd and the Mayor wearing matching uniforms.

  [TODD]

  I see her in the doorway, see how healthy she’s looking–

  See her see the clothes me and the Mayor are wearing, the same right down to the gold stripe on the sleeves of the jackets.

  “It’s not what you think,” I say, “my clothes were all burnt–”

  But she’s already stepping back from the door, stepping away–

  “Viola,” the Mayor says, strong enough to stop her. “I know this is a tough time for you, but we must address the people. We must reassure them that the peace process will go forward as planned. And as soon as we can, we must send a delegation to the Spackle to assure them of the same thing.”

  Viola looks him square in the eye. “You say must way too easy.”

  The Mayor tries to smile thru his burns. “If we don’t talk to the people right now, Viola, things could fall apart. The Answer might wish to finish Mistress Coyle’s action and use this moment of chaos to do so. The Spackle could attack us for the same reason. My own men might even get it into their heads that I’m incapacitated and decide to stage a coup. I trust that these are not outcomes you would want.”

  And I can see that she feels it, too.

  The weird joy coming from him.

  “What would you say to them?” she says.

  “What would you like me to say?” he asks. “Tell me and I’ll repeat it word for word.”

  She narrows her eyes. “What are you playing at?”

  “I’m not playing at anything,” he says. “I could have died today and I did not. And I did not because Todd saved me.” He steps forward, eagerness in his voice. “It may not have been what you wanted, but if Todd saved me, then I’m worth saving, don’t you see? And if I’m worth saving, then we all are, this whole place, this whole world.”

  Viola looks to me for help.

  “I think he’s in shock,” I say.

  “I think you may be right,” the Mayor says, “but I’m not wrong about talking to the crowds, Viola. We need to do it. And quickly.”

  Viola’s looking at me now, looking at the uniform I’m wearing, searching for some truth. I try to make my Noise heavy, to let her see how I’m feeling, to show her how every­thing’s spun outta control, how I didn’t mean for this to happen, but now that it has, maybe–

  “I can’t hear you,” she says quietly.

  And I try to open up again but it feels like something’s blocking me–

  She glances over to Wilf, and her face gets even frownier.

  “All right,” she says, not looking at me. “Let’s go talk to the people.”

  {VIOLA}

  “Viola,” Todd calls after me down the ramp. “Viola, I’m sorry. Why won’t you even let me say that?”

  And I stop there, trying to read him.

  But there’s still just silence.

  “Are you really sorry?” I say. “If you had to choose all over again, are you sure you wouldn’t do the same thing?”

  “How can you even ask that?” he says, frowning.

  “Have you seen what you’re wearing lately?” I look back up at the Mayor, walking slowly to the top of the ramp, taking care with his injuries but still smiling through the burn gel on his face, still wearing an impossibly clean uniform.

  Just like Todd.

  “You could be father and son.”

  “Don’t say that!”

  “It’s true, though. Look at yourselves.”

  “Viola, you know me. Out of everyone left alive on this planet, yer the one who does.”

  But I’m shaking my head. “Maybe not any more. Since I stopped being able to hear you–”

  He really frowns at this. “So that’s what you want, is it? I’m fine as long as you can hear everything I think but not the other way round? We’re friends as long as you got all the power?”

  “It’s not about power, Todd. It’s about trust–”

  “And I ain’t done enough for you to trust me?” He points up the ramp at the Mayor. “He’s fighting for peace now, Viola. And he’s doing that cuz of me. Cuz I changed him.”

  “Yeah,” I say, flicking the gold stripe on his sleeve. “And how has he changed you? Enough so you save him and not Simone?”

  “He hasn’t changed me, Viola–”

  “Did you control Wilf to get him to jump off the cart?”

  His eyes open wide.

  “I saw it in his Noise,” I say. “And if it bothered Wilf, it can’t be a good thing.”

  “I saved his life!” he shouts. “I was doing it for good–”

  “So that makes it okay? That makes it okay that you said you couldn’t do it? That you wouldn’t do it? How many other people have you controlled for their own good?”

  He fights with his words for a minute and I can see some real regret in his eyes, regret over something he hasn’t told me, but which I still can’t see in his complete lack of Noise–

  “I’m doing all this for you!” he finally shouts. “I’m trying to make this a safe world for you!”

  “And I’ve done it for you, Todd!” I shout back. “Only to find out that maybe you’re not you any more!”

  And his face is so angry but also so horrified, so shocked and hurt by what I’m saying I can almost–

  For a second I can almost–

  “IT’S HIM!”

  A single voice, cutting thru the ROAR of the crowd gathered round the scout ship.

  “IT’S THE PRESIDENT!”

  Other voices follow, one, then a hundred, then a thousand, and the ROAR gets higher and louder, until it feels like we’re in an ocean of Noise, surging up the ramp and lifting the Mayor above it all. He starts walking slowly down, his head up, his face beaming, his hand reaching out to the crowd to show them that, yes, he’s all right, he’s survived, he’s still their leader.

  Still in charge. Still the victor.

  “Come, Todd, Viola,” he says. “The world awaits.”

  [TODD]

  “The world awaits,” the Mayor says, taking my arm, pulling me away from Viola, his eyes on the crowd cheering him, ROARing for him, and I see that the projeckshuns are still running, the probes still programmed to follow us, follow him, and there we are on the walls of the buildings around the square, the Mayor leading the way, me being pulled along behind him, Viola still standing on the ramp with Bradley and Wilf coming down behind her–

  “Listen to them, Todd,” the Mayor says to me and again I feel the hum–

  The hum of joy–

  I feel it even in the ROAR of the crowd–


  “We can really do it,” he’s saying as the crowd parts before us, giving us room to walk to a new platform Mr Tate and Mr O’Hare musta cobbled together. “We can really rule this world,” the Mayor says. “We can really make it a better place.”

  “Let me go,” I say.

  But he don’t let go.

  He don’t even look at me.

  I turn back to find Viola. She ain’t moved from the ramp. Lee’s come thru the crowd to her and they’re all watching me let myself get dragged away by the Mayor, both of us wearing the same uniform–

  “Let me go,” I say again, pulling away.

  The Mayor turns round, grabbing me hard by the shoulders and the crowds are closing up the pathway twixt me and Viola–

  “Todd,” the Mayor says, the hum of joy coming off him like sunshine. “Todd, don’t you see? You’ve done it. You’ve led me down the road to redemption and we’ve arrived.”

  The crowd are still ROARing, loud as anything now that the Mayor’s among them. He stands up straighter, looks round at the soldiers and townsfolk and even women round us all cheering, and with a smile on his face, he says, “Quiet, please.”

  {VIOLA}

  “What the hell?” I say, as the ROAR of the crowd vanishes almost instantly, spreading out in circles till the cheering stops, in voice and in Noise, as near as this place ever comes to silence. Even the women as they see how quiet the men have gone.

  “I heard it,” Bradley whispers.

  And Wilf whispers, “Ah heard it, too.”

  “Heard what?” I say, too loud in the new quiet, causing faces from the crowd to look back and shush me.

  “Just the words Quiet, please,” Bradley whispers. “Right in the middle of my head. And I swear my Noise is quieter, too.”

  “And mine,” Lee says. “It’s like I’ve gone blind all over again.”

  “How?” I say. “How can he have that much power?”