The New Wilderness

by Diane Cook

  “But we’ve never found them before,” said Bea. “Adam came to us. Why do you think we’ll know how to find them now?”

  “You found that dead guy,” spat the Boss. His eyes shifted from face to face, deeply distrustful of what he saw.

  “He was one?”

  “Yes.”

  “But he was dead. He couldn’t hide.”

  The Boss slammed back in his chair. Agnes didn’t understand what made him so upset. The Boss waved his hand at Ranger Bob, as though to say, Go ahead.

  “We know they want to rendezvous with you,” said Ranger Bob.

  “They want to steal our stuff,” said Carl.

  “Very likely.”

  “How do you know?”

  “We have intel.”

  “What intel? How?”

  “That’s classified.”

  Bea snorted. “Oh, come on.” But Bob put a hand up to quiet her, and she quieted, immediately.

  “This is an important operation. We need to bring this trespassing to light. To send a message to anyone who thinks it’s a good idea to follow in their footsteps.”

  “The message being, Stay out,” said Bea, filling in the blanks.

  “Yes.”

  Agnes looked out the window. She saw her Community and the vast Caldera ecosystem behind them. They were specks. And the Caldera was a speck on the map. It had taken them seasons to get here from the Basin, which they had spent seasons getting to.

  “But there’s plenty of room,” said Agnes.

  “What do you mean?” asked Ranger Bob.

  “I mean, it’s a big Wilderness. So what if some people stay?”

  “The Wilderness State is changing. It has a new mandate. No one can be here.”

  Agnes scoffed. “How can you have a Wilderness without any people?”

  The Boss answered. “The study has clearly shown that you can’t have a Wilderness with people.”

  This struck Agnes as ridiculous. “You wouldn’t even know we were here if we hid. There’d be no trace of us.”

  The Boss sneered. “Oh, if you hid, we’d find you and we’d round you up.”

  Before she could say more, her mother hissed, “Quiet, Agnes.”

  Carl said, “I have a question. Why don’t we just carry the tracker and press the alert button when we find them?” He looked despondent. Life as they knew it was over, and on top of that they had to work with the Rangers?

  Ranger Bob and the Boss looked at each other, deciding what to say. Then Ranger Bob smiled. “We don’t trust that you’ll do it.” He shrugged. “Sorry.”

  Agnes braced for Carl to rage at this, to feel babysat. But he sat there contemplating it, and surprisingly, he said, “That’s fair,” accepting the provisions. Adding, “Just as long as we are still in charge.”

  Bob raised his palms, a sign of mild surrender. “Of course. I’m just there for the button.” He smiled. “And a little adventure too. I don’t mind getting away from the uniform.” The Boss rolled his eyes, his mouth sharp and disapproving, but Bob smiled through it.

  “And what if we don’t help?”

  “Well, we sincerely hope you do.”

  “But what if we don’t?”

  “Like we said, the study is over,” said the Boss. “You’ll fill out some paperwork. And then go home. To the City.” He crossed his arms. “Tomorrow.”

  “It’s a good deal,” said Ranger Bob in a soothing, coaxing voice, the kind of voice Agnes used on skinny, needful, hungry hares when they’d noticed her but hadn’t run yet. He stared at Bea and smiled until he couldn’t smile anymore. His face blanked and briefly he frowned, and Agnes saw how tired they all looked. How dirty and wrinkled their uniforms were, the tongues of their boots askew, shirttails untucked. When usually they looked so official, proud and clean.

  Bea turned to Carl and held his eye for a long time. Then she looked out the window at the Community, everyone enjoying their time here, relaxing, perhaps thinking how nice it would be to relax for good. Perhaps thinking of them on a bus back to the City, weeping. Agnes couldn’t figure out what she was calculating. But she was nonetheless surprised when her mother said, “Okay. We’ll do it. We’ll help.” She nodded at Carl and he nodded, sullenly, back. She didn’t ask for Agnes’s opinion. No one did. And Agnes didn’t offer it. She had heard what she needed to hear.

  They left the table and went to their own corners. The Boss peered at Ranger Bob, clearly unhappy. Perhaps he had simply wanted to kick them out and Ranger Bob had managed to buy them more time. Agnes watched the Boss checking doors, whispering to the Rangers standing guard, casting looks back at her mother, Carl, Ranger Bob, and then to Agnes herself. She caught his eye, the color of the sky when it was blazing. The color of nothing. She guessed Ranger Bob trusted him because he was his boss and she guessed people trusted their bosses. And she knew her mother did because her mother trusted Ranger Bob. But Agnes didn’t trust this man. Not at all.

  * * *

  Around the fire, Bea presented the news to the Community as though it were just another directive. As though they were lucky to get the chance to stay a little while longer. And then, what a gift to relax and live a life of peace in the Private Lands.

  “So they’re forcing us to turn on those poor people?” Debra scowled.

  “Trespassers, Debra,” snapped Carl.

  “It’s that or be sent home,” Bea said. “Tomorrow.” She’d said this a few times already, wanting this to be the main takeaway from the announcement. Bea made a rueful face Agnes knew was fake and she realized that this must be part of her mother’s plan somehow. But she couldn’t imagine how.

  “So there was a choice?” Val’s voice was shrill, and she laughed short and awfully. “And this is what you chose for everyone?” she said to Carl, the words dripping distastefully from her mouth.

  “It’s a good deal,” he said to Val in the same coaxing voice Ranger Bob had used.

  Val shook her head. She turned to Agnes, forlorn. “You too, Agnes?”

  Agnes looked past everyone and at the Caldera wall, trying to find something to lock onto, something solid. She felt her mother’s eyes on her. “No,” she said.

  “Agnes,” warned her mother.

  Agnes met her gaze. “I’m staying here. I’m going to stay and disappear. Just like the Trespassers.”

  Bea’s mouth went slack, but it was Carl who venomously spit, “Like hell you are. This isn’t a decision you get to make.”

  But Celeste spoke over him. “We can’t carry everything we’d need ourselves,” she calculated, knowing already their numbers would be diminished.

  “We’d need to leave most of our stuff behind. We can’t take our books. We can’t take our kitchen. We won’t need the Manual. The Cast Iron is gone. We can take only something for warmth. Some food, water. Knives. Weapons. Only what you can carry on your backs. Tight against your backs.”

  “But we need this stuff,” said Juan. Agnes knew he was thinking mostly of his paints.

  “We’ll start over,” said Agnes. “New bowls and beds and clothes. We’ll need only what is absolutely essential. But we can find whatever we need after we find a better place to hide. We’ve done it before. When we were new. We’ll do it again.”

  Her mother was looking at her like she’d just been slapped.

  Again, Carl spat, “We aren’t splitting. We are staying together on this or it doesn’t work.”

  “Don’t tell her what to do,” yelled Debra, moving next to Agnes. “You’re not telling me what to do either, Carl.”

  “Yes, I am. I’m the leader. And so let me tell you you’re not being smart. If some of us run, all of us get fucked. They’ll never trust us to make contact with Trespassers if half of us run and become Trespassers. They’ll send us back to the City. All of us.” Carl’s voice cracked, and a chill went through Agnes. “If you run, you ruin this chance we have at something more.”

  “Not necessarily,” said Val, though now her voice was softened. She bit her
lip.

  “Oh, come on, Val.” Carl sneered. “Use that little brain of yours.”

  “Oh, you fucker,” said Val, and then Baby Egret woke, squalling, hungry, papoosed against her. “Dammit,” Val growled, thrusting her hands deep down her front and latching Baby Egret to her. When she straightened, she had tears streaming down her face. “Well, fuck,” she screamed into her hand while Egret nursed.

  Carl was right, Agnes realized, and she imagined Val had just realized it too. The Rangers would never reward those who remained. They would only notice who was gone. And they would punish everyone. She felt a hand on her arm and recoiled, thinking it was a hand meant to ensnare her. But it was Jake. He walked his fingers down to hers and held her hand tight.

  “But you hate following the rules,” Val wailed to Carl, accusingly.

  “I’m not going to run away and hide like a fugitive. I have a right to be here.” He lifted his chin. “Running away is cowardly,” he said.

  Val laughed. And then she laughed more, tears streaming, shaking wildly until Baby Egret shook loose from her nipple and squalled again.

  “I honestly don’t see what’s so funny,” sniffed Carl, and then he cast looks around. “This thing you want to do is going to get us all in trouble.”

  “You can’t trust the Rangers, Carl,” pleaded Val. “You know that. They are looking out for themselves. Why do you think they won’t round you up when they round up the Trespassers?”

  “I trust them more than I trust a bunch of people who came here uninvited and are ruining it for the rest of us.” Spittle foamed in the corners of his mouth, and Agnes understood. Carl was bitter. He had been given something special that was being taken away, and he needed someone to blame. Val nodded and took a step toward Agnes. Agnes noticed the Community members shifting positions. People crept closer to her or to her mother. They were quietly making decisions about the rest of their lives.

  She looked at her mother, who had been strangely silent. Her mother’s face was blank. Somewhere in her head she was lost in a maze of calculations.

  Frank said, “Well, I think it’s easy to take their word on the Private Lands existing. We’ve all seen the footage.”

  “We haven’t,” said Agnes. “The original Community. We left the City certain the Private Lands were a story dreamed up by crazy people. Now we’re expected to believe they are real, and more, that we get to live there? Who are we that we get to live there? What have we done except betray others who want the same thing we want? To be here. We can all run, together. We know how to hide.”

  Celeste was behind Agnes, muttering “Patty” and wagging her hand. Patty’s parents were behind Bea, hissing for Patty to join them. Poor Patty in the middle. The Newcomer adults had always wanted to go to the Private Lands. This deal with the Rangers must have felt like a miracle, and they weren’t going to waste it. But the younger Newcomers had a very different feeling about their future, as young people often do.

  “I’m not going back there,” Carl said. “Your mother has told me everything I need to know about the City. And now about the Private Lands.” Agnes realized he was speaking only to her. His eyes were steady even as his voice wavered. “We have to be unified on this,” said Carl.

  “Oh, now you need a unanimous decision? You need consensus!” Debra laughed. “That is perfect.”

  “Oh, shut up, Debra,” he said.

  “Fuck you, Carl. You’ve reached the limit of your power.”

  “Don’t bet on it,” said Carl, putting his finger up to Debra’s face.

  What happened next took seconds, but to Agnes it felt as though sunsets and sunrises had passed, and by the end she was wrung out, starved, unquenched, bereft, but clearheaded.

  Carl turned fast like a jackrabbit toward the Lodge and screamed, “Rangers!”

  And just as quickly Jake brought him to the ground. Jake, wiry and desperate, stepped on his knee and grabbed his foot as everyone watched agape. Carl howled and flopped to get away, but he was pinned. Agnes could see the instinct take over in Jake and knew that he was about to drop his weight and twist in such a way that would irreparably break Carl’s leg. A broken leg would leave him defenseless. He would not survive. The Rangers would leave him there to die. Or maybe, if he was lucky, they would pity him and ride him out so he could return to the City. Was that a death sentence too?

  Carl panted, slobbered, “Please, please.”

  “Stop,” Agnes yelled.

  Jake froze, peered up.

  “You’ll kill him.”

  “So?” Jake scowled.

  Agnes thought of Glen. Of his shrug and his twisted leg and of how he had been protecting them even then. She shook her head. “Don’t,” she said.

  Jake, angry and ashamed, untangled himself quickly and threw Carl’s leg down. He couldn’t look up at the faces around him. He just ran toward the woods, yelling, “Agnes, come on!”

  Now Agnes saw that some people had already run. Linda and Dolores and Joven were pulling whatever gear they could and running full-armed into the wooded slopes. Celeste was pulling Patty toward the woods, Patty blubbering, her arm reaching toward her mother and father, while her legs were fleeing with Celeste. Helen and Frank and Patty’s mom screamed for their daughters, but they did not follow. Once the Twins’ bags were slung over their shoulders, the girls never looked back. Debra had slipped out with Pinecone, but Sister and Brother were cowering behind Juan, who was standing shocked behind Bea. Val and Baby Egret were calmly walking away, not fearful or panicked. Egret was cradled sideways, nursing, and Val wouldn’t want to jostle him.

  Agnes knew she too was moving, but she couldn’t feel it. She felt stuck, immobile. Her silent mother looked stuck too, her face morphing like storm skies while Carl rolled around on the ground behind her, perhaps already damaged beyond repair. Her mother stood offering empty palms, her shoulders at once tense and slumped, like the curve of a boulder. Agnes watched her mouth twitching, as though wishing to open and scream Ranger too so that Agnes would be captured. She watched her mother’s hand twitch, and Agnes imagined it reaching out to keep her there, or, maybe, just say goodbye. Agnes took a tentative step backwards, watching all this emotion inside her mother that she would not release. Few members of the Community remained. The people who chose to run had run.

  The ones who remained, Agnes saw herself in their eyes. She was too wild, something uncontrollable and wholly selfish, and while that had served them well in the past, now her survival instinct seemed to disgust them. She looked again at her mother, and felt a longing that almost knocked her down, to be curled up with her, not under skins around the fire, not with her hand clamped around her mother’s cold ankle. She wished to be curled up in her mother’s lap in her own small bed, or in her mother’s bigger bed, on the sofa by the window, peering out any window at the white sky, living their life in that City apartment because they had never known life anywhere else. If she’d never come here, if she’d known nothing else, couldn’t she be happy with what they’d had?

  “Mom,” Agnes said, taking another step back.

  Her mother’s mouth settled in a hard thin line, and she stepped urgently toward Agnes, reaching.

  Agnes ran.

  • • •

  Agnes came to a clear outcrop and looked down at the land below, angry, bewildered, and terrified that she had lost contact with everyone. Where had Jake gone? Dolores and her mother and brother? The Twins? Val and Baby Egret? How could everything have changed so suddenly? The tangled cinder cone forest hugged the Caldera like a parasite. And beyond she saw a set of lights traveling across the desert toward the Caldera. A vehicle. A large one. Then a hand slipped over her mouth.

  “Don’t let them hear you,” her mother hissed in her ear. Agnes felt a flush of relief until her mother dragged her into the trees.

  Agnes tried to dig in her heels. “Mom,” she hissed.

  “Don’t speak.”

  “Mom,” Agnes screamed, and her mother stopped in shock.<
br />
  “Are you trying to get caught?”

  “Where are we going?” Agnes hissed.

  “We have to get to the eastern foot of the Caldera.”

  “Why?” Agnes’s voice shook. She was disoriented and enraged by her mother’s hand shackled around her arm.

  “We are meeting Bob.”

  “No way. I’m not going to a Ranger.”

  “We have to. It’s all planned.”

  “What do you mean, it’s all planned?”

  “Getting to the Private Lands. We were trying to get dropped close to the border before we made a run, but thanks to you, now we’ll have to stow away in some truck. Make the long trek from here. It certainly won’t be pleasant. But I don’t think we’ll get caught.”

  “What are you talking about?”

  “My plan!” Her mother made fists and looked wild. “The plan I had with Bob. He was going to take us to the border and get us across and to the Private Lands.” She scowled. “Don’t look at me like that. It was a good plan, Agnes.”

  “And that’s why we’re at the Caldera? To meet with Bob?”

  “Yes, so he could have a reason to bring us to the border quickly.”

  “But why?”

  “Because they were going to send us back to the City!”

  “So there are no Trespassers to find?”

  Bea’s eyes grew wide. “Oh, I didn’t say that. There are Trespassers here. The ones Adam told us about. The Mavericks. We don’t see them, but they see us.”

  “So Adam wasn’t a part of this?”

  “Oh no, Adam was a surprise. But a helpful one.”

  “Did you tell Bob about Adam?”

  “I had to.”

  “But how? We haven’t been to Post in years.”

  “We leave notes for each other.”

  “Where?”

  “In trees,” her mother muttered.

  The grass lake. Agnes remembered her mother tucking something into a tree’s trunk. It had been for Bob. “For how long?”

  “Since I came back. We’ve been communicating since then.” Her mother looked ashamed, unveiled. Her mother seemed unfathomably complicated and mysterious again. Briefly. Then she looked terrified.