“I think next week, we should do the videos,” Clark nodded. “Everyone can prepare their stories, and it can be the humans also, talking about the treatment they suffered with the Commission. We won’t be able to send it out like the emails, we can’t risk sneaking in to the Censor Board again, but maybe the fort has something we can use to upload the videos.”
“We have a few programmers,” Tori nodded. “We’ll see what they can accomplish.”
“In the meantime,” Griffin sighed, “we lie low.”
Mark raised his hand, grabbing our attention. He turned to Josh and motioned a few things before Josh straightened.
“Oh, right,” he nodded. “He was thinking that we could have Mykail appear a few times on his own.”
“What do you mean?” I said nervously.
“Just quickly, enough to remind people that he has real wings,” Josh explained. “Like fly through town and then disappear again.”
I turned to Mark, who was already looking at me, waiting to see my reaction. I sighed heavily and my hands tightened around the blanket. I looked at the ground, turning the idea over in my head. I knew this was a critical time in our movement against the Commission and I wanted to trust the experiments with their ideas, but I was worried about Mykail being hurt or captured.
“Will you be sure he’s safe?” I asked, looking at Mark seriously.
He nodded, keeping eye contact, promising me.
* *** *
Friday, a large group on Massachusetts Avenue—where there was a large military base—in the Mid-North Region in the city of Jefferson’s Point was flooded with people, holding signs and demanding answers about the winged man at the Liberation Day Parade. Many were holding signs that commanded Dana show his face and explain what was happening in the Commission of the People.
The worry had died down at school, but at the end of the school day, something happened that I had never experienced before in my life.
It was twenty minutes before the end of the last class when the intercom system in the school went off.
“Code Red. The school is currently in Code Red.”
Everyone looked around worriedly, unsure of what the statement actually meant.
Our teacher blinked at the intercom box and then turned to the class.
“Okay, everyone in the back row, close the blinds. Everyone move to this corner of the room, sit down on the floor and remain quiet.”
Not believing what was happening, I quickly moved to the corner as our teacher locked the door and took a towel out of the storage cabinet, laying it across the threshold. I shared worried looks with my classmates, all of us jumping when the lights were turned off, the room lit only by the slats of sunlight barely visible through the gaps in the blinds.
Sitting in a confused huddle, most students pulled out their phones, quickly searching to find out what was going on outside that caused the Code Red. I watched my teacher move around the room, counting heads and going to her computer, submitting her attendance to the main office to account for who was in her class.
“Oh my God…” Madison, one of the girls who normally sat in the back of the room to sleep, whispered. Everyone turned. “The angel…he’s back.”
“What?” we all said at the same time.
“Stay quiet,” our teacher hissed.
“It says that the city is on lockdown because the angel was spotted flying around the downtown office buildings. Witnesses say that he was holding a red flag and had a banner behind him that said: ‘Rally Against the Commission.’ He’s back…”
I was a little worried that two revolutionary activities in one day would send the country into dangerous panic—the city was frightened enough to put the schools on lockdown—but I was also a little pleased to hear that everyone was calling Mykail the angel and not the monster or the weapon.
We were trying to make him our figurehead, and the way people perceived him worked to our advantage. I was trying to keep myself from smiling, but as I thought about the way Dana must be reacting to Mykail’s sudden reappearance made me giggle without wanting to. I tried to pass it off as a cough before people asked me what I was laughing about.
“Do you think he’s real?” one boy whispered.
“What do you mean? Of course he’s real!” another groaned.
“I know that, moron, I mean…do you think that the Commission put wings on his back and made him into a weapon? Or do you think that the wings are fake?”
“They’re real,” one girl shook her head. “I was at the Liberation Day Parade and the way he was flying, it was like watching a bird. I don’t think animatronics could make wings move that fluidly.”
“But…how?” one girl hissed.
“I’m thinking more about him as a person,” another girl mused. “The group said to stop the torture of the Commission, so he was made this way against his will. That means that there’s more of them, that the Commission has been making people into test subjects. Their guidelines state that they can do nothing but humanely treat their prisoners and return them to their native countries if it is applicable to the situation.”
“Well, they’re obviously violating those laws,” one boy growled. “My grandmother always said that she knew the Commission of the People would get too powerful and try to take over the country one day…”
“Are you part of the terrorist group?” Madison teased.
“No,” the boy groaned. “But I don’t disagree with what people are saying. Do we really still need the Commission?”
“What do you think, Commish Kid?” another boy snarled, glaring at me. I was startled by how quickly the conversation swung to me.
“What do you mean?”
“Do you think we need the Commission still?”
I looked at the expectant faces surrounding me, worried that they would attack at any moment.
“To be honest, no,” I whispered, pretending as though I didn’t want anyone else to hear. Everyone leaned closer, interested. “I don’t know if this is really something that’s been going on in the Commission, but it would make sense. A lot of people even in the Commission don’t know what Dana Christenson does…”
“Really?” they gasped. I nodded.
“We’re forced to sign a non-disclosure agreement before we even enter the building. So, who knows who could have done this…”
“Holy shit, that’s scary…” one boy hissed. “Even some people in the Commission don’t know? That’s not right.”
“So you don’t know if the angel was really made by the Commission?” Madison pressed. I shook my head. I had, at least temporarily, cleared the names of some of the Commish Kids.
We were in Code Red for an hour, and when we were finally released, there were people on their phones calling parents and friends, asking them what they knew. I did not call my parents. I went around the side of the school to see if Mark was waiting.
Clark was already at the car. He motioned me over quickly and I jogged carefully across the icy asphalt.
“Are you alright?” he asked.
“I’m fine. You?”
“I’m fine,” he assured. He opened the door for me, and I glanced briefly at Mark, who was still sitting in the driver’s seat, watching both of us. I assumed from his presence that he had successfully kept Mykail safe and hid him at the fort again.
When I slid into the car, Mark reached back, handing me a business card. I took it and looked at the scribbled message on the back.
Call Sean. #4.
“Is everything okay?” I hissed worriedly. Mark nodded and smiled to reassure me.
Deciding to trust Mark despite my nervousness, I pulled out my phone and dialed 4.
“Hello?”
“Hello, Sean, it’s Lily Sandover,” I greeted awkwardly.
“Oh, hello,” Sean smiled. “So, you’re with Mark. Good. I’m assuming you know what happened this afternoon?”
“Yes.”
“We’re putting the city on lockdown and searching
for Mykail, so Dana wants you both to go to your homes and stay there. No one is allowed to leave their homes until we can be sure the city is secure.”
“Wait, really?”
“Yes, and, obviously, we need Mark, so can you tell Clark that I’ll be borrowing him for the rest of the day?” Sean asked.
“Um…sure,” I agreed. “Is it that serious?”
“The people are frightened,” Sean admitted. “We’re trying to find him. If you hear anything, let us know.”
I hesitated, surprised by what Sean said. He sighed on the other end in response to my silence.
“I know Dana thinks that you’re somehow behind all this but, call me old-fashioned, I believe in innocent until proven guilty.”
Again, I was stumped at how such a caring person could be working for Dana.
“Will you tell Clark?” Sean asked.
“Yes, I will.”
“Thank you.”
“And Sean?” I started. The words stuck in my throat. I felt extremely guilty about the lie I was about to tell. “If I hear or see anything, I’ll call you…”
“Thank you, Lily,” Sean said, a smile in his voice. “Have a good afternoon.”
“You, too,” I said mechanically. “Bye.”
I hung up the phone and turned to Clark, trying to breathe around the tightness of my ribs.
“What did he say?”
“We’re supposed to go home and not leave. They’re searching the city. And they need Mark, so Sean says he’s borrowing him for the rest of the day,” I relayed. Mark started driving. I leaned forward. “Hey, are you sure everything’s okay?”
Mark nodded with a smile and gave me a thumbs-up. I decided, with how cautious Mark was, things really were alright.
I got home and was surprised to see my parents waiting. They asked if I was alright, and then would not let me escape to my room, telling me to do my homework in the living room. They had closed all the windows and locked the doors, as the news was telling everyone to do until the Central had declared the city safe. There was reluctance from the military to help in securing the city and finding Mykail because many of the lower level men and women were sympathetic with the growing rebellion, and that slowed things down.
What really made me smile was when there was a knock on our door and we saw that someone had been sent to search our house.
“Oh…come in, please,” my mother said, motioning the two suit-clad men inside. They stepped in and removed their glasses. I tried not to smile at the familiar faces of Hiroki and Minsoo.
“We’re here for search,” Hiroki said with a fake, thick accent.
“Please, go ahead,” my mother nodded, motioning them further into the house. They walked through the house, looking around at closets and pantries as we remained in the living room.
“The Eight Group is checking the Commission houses?” I asked as casually as I could manage.
“Makes sense,” my father nodded. “I mean, after all, they would not be surprised at the experiments in everyone’s homes.”
“Every home but ours,” my mother sighed. “I hope they catch him soon, before this gets out of hand…”
“Mom…if they catch him, Dana will kill him.”
“At this point, it’s understandable. It’d be better if they kill him on camera to prove that he’s gone. Maybe that will calm people down,” she whispered.
“How can you say that?” I gaped.
“I cared about him just as much as you did,” my mother defended.
I sincerely doubt that… I barely managed not to say.
“But he is dangerous to the stability of America. And he betrayed us. He betrayed our trust. We have to look at the bigger picture.”
I bit my tongue.
Our house was cleared and Hiroki and Minsoo left. The city was later deemed safe, though no one had found Mykail.
The following day, we had to go to the Commission meeting.
As it had been the last few times, there was a lot of talk about how the situation needed to be contained. Dana stood at the front of the room and listened to the babble for over an hour before he finally spoke.
“Alright, I have heard what you have to say, now let me tell you what we are going to do,” he started. “Right now, we will admit to looking at the possibility of improving human strength, but nothing more. We will state that this information was in the most basic state and we had not started testing, but somehow the information leaked, and the terrorist group used that to formulate an attack on us.
“As for Mykail, I understand the concern and I agree that we need to catch him as soon as possible. However, as far as the Commission is concerned, we have absolutely no idea where he came from,” he continued with a sharp tone. “We will only react to him when he appears publicly. We will not search for him in ways that the public can notice. We will shrug and say we have no idea where he came from, but we will not rush to cover anything up. A hurried response will lend credibility to the idea that we created him.”
Dana sighed.
“There are many foreign nations that are getting nervous. They are watching us very carefully. There are many that know of our program, and are beginning to see a threat to their credibility as leaders. As you know, we have sold many of our successes to foreign countries and that makes them conspirators. We do not need an international scandal so near the completion of the Machine of Neutralization project.”
My stomach flipped. Somehow, I had completely forgotten about Eyna.
“Sir,” one of the men in the front called, “if you plan to mass-produce the Machine of Neutralization, how can you allow the people to know that we were only in the beginning stages of such a project?”
Dana glanced at me and my blood ran cold. There was something devious and dangerous in the eyes of the leader of the Commission of the People.
“I’m working on that,” he said. “I have an idea, but we will see if I even need to use it.”
* *** *
Due to the panic of the city, Mark refused to take us to the fort on Sunday. While I didn’t blame him, I was upset that I would not get to see Mykail. Instead, I stayed home and caught up on homework, thinking about other things the rebellion needed to do. I felt as though the revolution was teetering on a cliff. The frightening thing was I knew where it was going…
I saw the bloodshed coming at me rapidly. I knew things were going to get violent and all I could think about was the way water spilled from a ruptured jug. All it took was one bullet and we would be at war with Central…in a bloodbath with Dana Christenson.
I was standing there, looking at it just before it was about to begin. I could feel the oncoming war in my bones.
That night, I dreamt I was in the echoing, cavernous room with the gun laying on the table in front of me. Dana was on the other side of the table, a gun already in his hand, smiling darkly. I turned briefly to see Mark, Griffin, Tori, Clark, Mykail, and hundreds of others behind me. I turned back to Dana, confident in my army.
Dana tapped the gun’s handle with his forefinger, smiling.
“Well?”
I picked up the gun, put it together as I had the previous week, and pointed it at him.
“I think it’s only fair that you understand the concept of the game,” he told me. “You move your pieces, and I’ll move mine. You shoot me, and I’ll shoot you…”
I aimed at his heart and pulled the trigger. The gun had no recoil, and the bullet soared through Dana’s chest, causing his shoulder to fall back with the force of the blow. But he straightened and raised his gun.
“My turn.”
The gunshot was loud and I flinched. The bullet hit me. I felt the cold air that soared through my chest, but I did not fall. Blinking, I turned and saw Griffin lying dead behind me. The others were staring ahead, unblinking, as though Griffin had not died at all.
Frightened, I turned back to Dana and shot the gun as many times as I could, hitting him, knowing I needed to kill him before he killed an
yone else. His body jerked and jolted as it was riddled with bullets, but he remained standing, smiling darkly, unable to fall, too strong and deeply rooted.
When the clip was empty, I pulled the trigger uselessly as I saw Dana raise his arm to aim at me.
The cold air hit my body like a train as he fired bullets with the same rapid fire I had used on him. I felt my body move, shivering and shaking from the cold, but I did not fall, either. There was not enough force to push me down completely.
When he stopped firing, I was terrified to turn around.
As much as I screamed at myself not to, I turned.
The bodies littered the floor of the room, soaking the cold concrete in blood as it eased out the wounds. The ungraceful heap of mangled limbs and glassy eyes made my panic swell.
“What a mess you made…” Dana hissed.
I jolted awake, trying to find my breath and come back to reality. Every time I blinked, I saw the dead bodies. In a panic, I leapt out of bed and turned my lights on, looking around the room frantically.
In that frantic and terrified moment, I wanted to stop the revolution.
Throughout Monday, I replayed the dream, trying to convince myself that it was just a dream. When I heard that Maryland-Tuckett University in the Western Region, which was a school mostly dedicated to humanitarian efforts and aid to Third World countries, had called the Commission out on inhumane treatment and becoming the next death concentration camp, I realized the ball was rolling too fast for me to stop.
I was becoming fearful of what I had set in motion.
I tried to block out the chatter around school about Mykail and Maryland-Tuckett University calling for investigation into the health and care of the criminals the Commission kept, but every time I heard about it, I saw another dead body. This was another strike against Dana, and he was going to strike back soon enough, like a taunted predator.
That was the first day I felt that we were really at war.
At the end of the day, I was exhausted and worried about the rapid progression of events. Clark noticed, and he seemed to be feeling the same way. We did not speak as we were driven to the Commission, and stoic Mark did not provide any insight into how he was feeling about the growing tension.
Inside Page 100