Begin Again

by K. A. Applegate

  For which Jobs was very glad.

  “You know, we won’t be able to rebuild an advanced civilization in our lifetime,” Olga pointed out “Not in many lifetimes. For countless generations there’ll be no masterpieces and museums to put them in. There’ll be no research hospitals. There’ll be no construction companies to build the hospitals and museums. No architects to design them, no —”

  “No books,” D-Caf blurted. “Okay, we could write some — but with what? First, we’d have to make paper of some sort. Then writing instruments. No printing presses! But what does that matter when there’s no population waiting for the latest installment of the series!”

  Jobs groaned. “Okay, I got it,” he said. “Life won’t suddenly be all cozy, like it was when we were shot into space. No links, no computers, no home entertainment centers. Okay, no hospitals or laser surgery or morphine. But so what? It’ll definitely be better than — than this!” Jobs said, sweeping his arm to indicate the gray, ashy surroundings.

  D-Caf grunted. “Until another Rock comes along, at least.”

  “Aren’t you upbeat today,” Violet noted. “Look, I’ve got my doubts, too. But I keep thinking of Tate. All the chances she took. For the future. For us. I just don’t see how we cannot try to make Billy’s scheme work.”

  “Yeah. Violet’s right,” Noyze said. “We’ve come so far. How can we give up now?”

  “No one’s talking about giving up,” D-Caf argued. “Some of us are just trying to be reasonable. Realistic. I just don’t think we should expect too much.”

  And I think we should expect everything, Jobs countered silently.

  “Your opinion. Jobs,” Violet said. “Honestly. Do you think it will ever come to pass? Will Earth ever be reborn?”

  Jobs felt all eyes upon him. Yes, he thought, I do. Aloud, he said, “That’s the second question none of us can answer. We still have to deal with the first question. What exactly is Billy trying to tell us? If we can’t answer that, then, no, Earth win never be reborn.”

  Mo’Steel got to his feet, and Jobs felt an adrenaline rush.

  “What’s up?” he whispered, darting a look at the Marauders. “Trouble?”

  “Leg cramp,” Mo’Steel replied.

  Olga giggled with relief.

  D-Caf leaned in. “Here’s something else,” he said. “Even if we discover what it is Billy wants us to do, there’s still the matter of doing it. What if the Marauders just won’t go along with the plan? Can we force them to? Do we even have the right to make them take a chance with us? With Billy?”

  Silence followed D-Caf’s words. Out of the corner of his eye. Jobs saw the Marauders returning.

  Quickly, he got to his feet. “Too many questions,” he said softly. “There are always too many questions.”

  Mattock dropped down next to Echo and Lyric.

  “Tell us again what j’ou saw in there,” Lyric said eagerly.

  Mattock looked over his shoulder, though the four exiled Alphas were clearly alone.

  “Yes,” Echo prodded, rocking the baby gently. “Tell us again.”

  It was strange, he began. He recounted the experience in detail, though the girls had heard it all twice before.

  Echo frowned. “What j’ou think of this new world Sanchez says will come?”

  “Might come,” Mattock corrected.

  “I think it sounds very nice,” Lyric said.

  “First the Alpha colony,” Echo murmured. “Now, this is our home. And already, we are talking about yet another place. I’m so tired….”

  “Are j’ou saying j’ou don’t want to live with plenty of water and food?” Mattock challenged.

  “Of course not. It’s just that…” Echo thought about how to express what she was feeling. “It’s just that I want my baby to be safe. To be happy. And already she has suffered so much.”

  Lyric leaned over and kissed the baby’s forehead. “A world with lots of food will be good for her,” she said.

  “Good for j’ou, j’ou mean,” Mattock laughed. Lyric smacked his arm but a grin spread across her face.

  “What if it’s all a lie,” Echo blurted. “I’m tired of being lied to. I don’t want to be made a fool of again. I don’t.”

  Echo struggled to her feet and looked down at her two companions, who’d suddenly stopped goofing around.

  “I’m going to the sleeping circle now,” she told them.

  She could feel their eyes on her as she walked away.

  CHAPTER 12

  “WE WANT THE NEW WORLD.”

  The rest of the camp was asleep. Only Newton remained awake, the official guard, prowling the perimeters. But while his eyes were watching for predators, his mind was focused on what had happened earlier.

  After the Marauders’ impromptu meeting, several of the group had rejoined some of Mo’Steel’s gang. Among them were Cocker and Badger. More disturbing. Claw, Snipe, and Balder had gone along with them. There’d been a lot of talk. Some loud voices. More laughter.

  Newton didn’t like laughter. Not now. Not ever.

  When he was sure everyone was deeply asleep, Newton woke each member of his crew with a kick to the side.

  Without too much of a racket, the four Marauders were gathered a few yards from the others. Newton had some business that needed to be taken care of now.

  “This new world thing,” he said, watching closely for signs of lying. “That what j’ou talking about with them others?”

  Readily — too readily — Claw, Snipe, and Balder nodded.

  “Yeah,” Snipe said. “We heard a lot.”

  Claw and Balder stayed silent but their demeanor showed no fear.

  This is no good, Newton thought.

  “J’ou with me or j’ou against me,” he hissed, grabbing Claw’s rotting fur vest and yanking him close. Claw’s facial tic grew more pronounced and his eyes bulged.

  “All I saying is it sound good,” he said pleadingly. “All that food.”

  With a curse, Newton threw Claw away from him. “J’ou make me sick. J’ou some kind of stupid person, trusting that kid!”

  Snipe licked his cracked lips and opened his mouth to speak. “Sanchez, he say it a good thing. We always go with Sanchez.”

  Newton sneered. “Sanchez is only telling us to listen to that — thing — ‘cause he like the girl. Violet, the one with the stories. She got him all turned around….”

  Balder hitched his baggy pants and shook his head. “Me, I want what they call — um … yeah, a life of leisure. I hear j’ou lay around, food come right to j’our mouth. Water all around, and it be warm and —”

  Beside him, Claw and Snipe nodded vigorously.

  “And a man, he be his own boss,” Balder added with a drawl. “That sound good to me.”

  “Who told j’ou that stuff?” Newton demanded.

  “All of them,” Claw replied.

  “That one, D-Caf,” Snipe added eagerly.

  “A kid!” Newton roared. “What he know? We let Sanchez and that — thing — do this —

  this regreening, I tell j’ou what happen. Earth go spinning around and we all fall off and die.

  That, or Marauders be slaves to the others. Be sure, something bad happen. Something very bad.”

  A slow, knowing smile spread across Balder’s face. “J’ou scared,” he said, the grin growing ever more broad. “Big Newton scared, ha-ha!”

  Claw and Snipe joined in the laughter. Newton felt almost weak with frustration.

  “J’ou saying j’ou not scared, too?” he cried, and immediately regretted his words.

  Snipe and Claw proceeded to fall all over each other, guffawing, slapping thighs and backs.

  Balder, on the other hand, sobered up and looked Newton straight in the eye.

  “It don’t matter what we are,” he said calmly, and Newton knew he’d lost his crew for good.

  “We want the new world.”

  Jobs was repairing a tear in one of the bladders. Already a few drops of water had le
aked through and that was a few drops too many. While he worked, he hummed a song that had been popular just before the Rock destroyed all singers and musicians and instruments and recording studios with their multimillion-dollar equipment. The tune had just popped into his head, startling him. He’d totally forgotten about it. He hadn’t even liked the song. So why was it still hanging around in his brain, taking up valuable space?

  “I want to tell j’ou why I left the Alpha colony.”

  Jobs jumped and dropped the half-repaired bladder Echo and the baby had appeared out of nowhere. “Whoa,” he said. “Sorry. I didn’t hear you come up.”

  Echo smiled and reached down to pick up the bladder at the same time Jobs reached down —

  “Ow!”

  “Ow!”

  They both stood, grinning sheepishly.

  “Are you hurt?” Jobs asked.

  “No. Are j’ou?”

  “I bruised my pride, but my head is pretty hard. I’m fine. So, uh, you were going —”

  “Yes. I want to tell j’ou why I left the Alpha colony.”

  Jobs had wondered about that. Olga and Noyze had told him some disturbing stuff about how the Alpha colony worked. So when Jobs had seen Echo’s baby, he’d made a guess….

  But he hadn’t expected the real story to be so awful.

  Echo talked, and Jobs listened.

  “So,” she said, “in the end they were going to let me starve. Me and my baby. Because we are imperfect.”

  “Excuse me?” Jobs said. “I mean — what?”

  “J’ou heard right.”

  Jobs nodded. “Okay. So, Mattock and Lyric came with you because —”

  “Because they are my friends,” Echo said.

  Jobs wanted to know if Mattock liked Echo the way he was beginning to like her. But he didn’t have the nerve to ask Mattock and he certainly didn’t have the guts to ask Echo —

  And he definitely didn’t want to question her about her friends’ genetic “purity.” Maybe there was more motivation than just friendship behind Mattock and Lyric’s escape.

  Whatever, Jobs thought. Echo has no idea how “flawed” we all are.

  “You’ll be happy in a green world,” he said abruptly. “We all will.”

  Echo placed a tiny kiss on her baby’s forehead before asking, “What does it mean, ‘a green world’?”

  Jobs looked at the delicate wisps of hair on the baby’s tiny head. “I don’t know exactly how it will be,” he admitted. “But I can tell you about how it was before the Rock. Some things will be the same — I hope. I believe. Like trees and flowers and rivers and lakes. We’ll be able to grow food pretty easily. There might even be animals, I don’t know —”

  “Animals? I’ve seen pictures of some animals. Elephants. And cows.”

  Another unknown, Jobs realized. What would they find in this new world? Would animals need to be domesticated? Or would there suddenly be tame house cats and curly-haired poodles roaming the green hills?

  Jobs felt slightly dizzy. The possibilities were overwhelming. How could he possibly paint a picture of a place beyond his feeble imagination? A place that currently existed only in Billy’s dreams? In his communion with — the Source. Mother.

  If the place existed at all.

  “Look,” Jobs said. “I really don’t know how it will be. But I believe in Billy. I wish you would trust in him, too.”

  Echo frowned. “I will try. But it’s hard. All I can promise is that I will do what’s best for my child. That’s all I know for sure.”

  “Okay,” Jobs conceded. But it was hard to let it go. In his heart, Jobs knew that a gentler, green environment would be far better for Echo’s baby than this harsh, sterile world. But Echo would have to come to that belief herself.

  “So, does your baby have a name yet?” Jobs asked, needing to change the subject.

  Echo shook her head. “We fled the colony before the Namer could perform the ritual. But even before, Marina never came to me. I think now that no one cared to waste any time on us.

  We were worthless to them.”

  “You don’t need them anyway,” Jobs said.

  Echo winced. “Don’t I?” she said. “They were my — family.”

  Jobs wanted to kick himself for being so insensitive. “What I mean is… Why don’t you pick a name? Right now. Go on.”

  The baby cooed and Echo smiled. “I have an idea,” she said suddenly. “Will j’ou be the Namer for my baby?”

  “Lumina,” he blurted.

  “Lumina?” Echo made a considering face — which Jobs found adorable — and then smiled.

  “I like that. It’s pretty.”

  Jobs laughed. “Whew, I’m glad. It just came rushing out of my mouth!”

  “What does it mean?” Echo asked, gently smoothing her baby’s fine pale hair. “Lumina,” she crooned.

  “It means light.” Suddenly, Jobs felt all choked up. What was there to cry about? Echo’s baby was blind, but… “Illumination. It sounds right for her,” he added, surreptitiously wiping a hand across his eyes.

  “Yes,” Echo said. “It sounds right.”

  CHAPTER 13

  THE RESPONSIBILITY WAS ALL HIS OWN.

  Sanchez was alone. Alone with the Source and his own troubled thoughts.

  Since their initial foray, only Sanchez had been allowed inside the ship. Those were Mo’Steel’s orders. The boy was a good leader He was always on guard against trouble.

  And he was concerned that Sanchez not be interrupted during his sessions with Billy.

  Not everyone was as supportive of Sanchez’s efforts.

  Sanchez was no fool. He knew that Newton, at least, eyed him with suspicion, even hatred.

  That he — and possibly other Marauders — saw Sanchez as a traitor to their people. As a troublemaker. Someone who was going to destroy the only way of life they had ever known.

  And for what?

  For a dream.

  But Sanchez had no choice. He was what he was. He was the holy man. The storyteller. The voice of wisdom. The shaman. That was a term Violet had explained to him just recently.

  Such men — or women — were either revered or despised. Sometimes simultaneously.

  Sanchez knew this. He also was acutely aware that the burden of interpreting the message from Billy/Mother/the Source rested entirely on his shoulders.

  True, Jobs and a few others had offered to help puzzle out the mystery of what the band needed to do — to provide? — in order to make the regreening ritual a success.

  Sanchez appreciated their efforts, but he didn’t allow them one shred of responsibility.

  The responsibility was all his own.

  It was the way it should be.

  But so much could go wrong. What if his spiritual gifts failed him and he couldn’t interpret the all-important message? What if Newton killed him? In either case, the regreening ritual would never be performed.

  So much could go wrong.

  As if reflecting Sanchez’s dark thoughts, a low moan suddenly seemed to seep up through the ruined floor of the ship. It was both a sound and a feeling of intense sadness. Of suffering.

  Sanchez put his hands to his ears but the moaning grew too loud to be kept out. The Source wanted Her pain to be known.

  And then, as suddenly as it had come, the sorrow was gone, and in its place was a spirit of…

  Sanchez didn’t know the exact term for what he felt emanating so powerfully from the Source.

  It reminded him, though, of what he felt radiating from the Alpha girl, Echo, when she cuddled her child to her breast.

  Pride. A fierce protectiveness. Power

  “Love.”

  “Billy?” Sanchez stepped closer to the boy, vaguely surprised that he hadn’t lost consciousness this time.

  “What else?” Sanchez whispered. “What do j’ou need from us? What do j’ou want us to do?

  We want to be reborn. Billy, why won’t j’ou talk to me?”

  “Three elements
.”

  “Yes?”

  “Three elements are needed for Earth to be reborn.”

  “Tell me, Billy.”

  “The Source. The Five embodied in me. And —”

  “Yes? And what?”

  “And—”

  Sanchez waited, hoping, but Billy said nothing more. After a while, he sensed that Billy was

  — dormant. That whatever energy he’d had was gone.

  Sanchez left the ship, fervently hoping Billy’s energy would return. Soon.

  The Source. The Five embodied in me.

  What kind of mumbo jumbo was Billy spouting, anyway?

  2Face crept through the shadow. Claw was on guard, the idiot. Everyone else was asleep. She had no trouble sneaking away from camp and toward the ship.

  Sanchez and his stupid messages. Couldn’t he see that the whole thing was a big farce? That Billy was just yanking his chain — everybody’s chain? Was she the only sane person left on Earth?

  Don’t answer that, 2Face told herself. The truth is too depressing.

  With a quick glance over her shoulder, 2Face stepped into the ruined ship. The interior was only slightly darker than the perpetual gloom outside. In a moment, her eyes had adjusted to the dimmer light.

  Good. Because she needed to find something. Some damning evidence against Billy. If only she had a camera! Then she could catch the jerk in the act of climbing out of whatever invisible contraption he’d erected to make it look like he was suspended in midair. No strings, my foot, 2Face thought angrily. At best, Billy was a magician. At worst, a complete and total fraud.

  Hey, she thought, maybe I’ll even find a weapon, something I can use to destroy Billy right on the spot. The freak seemed indestructible, but 2Face had no doubt she could find a way to eliminate him. Once and for all.

  A shudder ran through her then. Unexpected but… Okay, she was scared. She’d admit it. A teeny bit. Actually, more creeped-out than scared. Tate — or what was left of her — was lumped only twenty or so feet away. Back before the Rock, 2Face hadn’t been one for those stupid Halloween movies about teenagers too moronic to stay away from haunted houses and psycho killers. She was not at all down with the notion of ghosts and such. Even after being stranded on this freakish dead planet, what Violet called “home to seven billion ghosts.”