Blood Zero Sky (27 page)

~~~

With the final merger announced, the Protectorate’s end game, for better or worse, has begun. After two days of marching through tunnels and across endless, dead forests under the cover of night, laden down with heavy gear and under constant threat of attack, we’ve succeeded in moving the camp into an abandoned city once called Detroit.

From all over, those sympathetic to our cause gather here, in this old, crumbling convention center. I meet so many people; their faces parade before me in an almost unending line: there’s Antonio Russo, a carpenter; Joaquin Clay, a distribution manager; Christine Ahearn, a (hot) makeup artist with two small daughters.

I had imagined that anyone who would come here and risk so much for our cause would have a specific grievance, a family member who the Company dragged off to a work camp, maybe, or a lover killed by the squads. At the very least, I expected our new recruits would have firsthand knowledge of an atrocity like what happened in McCann’s village—a horror which, I learned, had been repeated all across the globe. But no. To my surprise, many of those I meet are like I once was: intelligent, good-hearted people who are cognizant only of a feeling that something in the world has gone awry and the Company is somehow to blame. They’re normal Company workers, regular tie-men and women, blessed with brand-new high-speed ICs and spacious, luxurious apartments, who’ve decided to trade in these extraneous toys for a shot at regaining their human dignity.

It’s a beautiful sight, these faces. Never, when I was a wildly whirling cog in the Company machine did I take the time to really see the people around me, to notice the lines on their faces or the shape and shade of their eyes. Among the rebels, there are relatively few plastic noses or sculpted bodies, but in the ugliness, the plainness, the dumpiness of the forms passing before me, there is a singular majesty that surpasses false beauty by far. These are God’s real creations: imperfect, fallible, unromantic, beautiful creatures. It makes me wonder how the false idols of youth and empty beauty ever eclipsed the honest humanity that used to pass before me, unnoticed.

Small camps are set up a few miles away from the city, where new recruits are required to go for screening and cross removal; a spy in our midst at this stage would be disastrous. Once the recruits undergo the baptism of the knife, they are escorted to the main camp, where they join the rest of us.

In the massive, debris-strewn foyer of the abandoned convention center, I stand in a line with the council members and greet the recruits as they come in, shaking each of their hands, introducing myself. Some of them are flushed with excitement and exchange loud jokes and hearty greetings. Others are very pale and hardly move their lips when they speak, as if petrified with fear. The latter, I imagine, are the wiser ones.

In the main hall, I walk among the people. Veteran soldiers show the new recruits how to use their weapons and orient them to the mission, but even in their busiest moments, my comrades always take the time to smile as I pass. This is the first time I’ve really noticed their affection for me. I’m naturally shy, and also—well, I hate most people. So it’s surprising to find this many people in one place who genuinely seem to like me. Despite the short time I’ve spent with the Protectorate, I realize, they are fast becoming my friends and family.

I’m surprised to find that some of those who are new to our ranks seem to know me as well. “You’re May Fields!” they say. “The one whose father is this CEO, right? You jumped from that helicopter! You’re with the Protectorate? Wow.” Then they stare at me goofily, their eyes wide with misplaced awe.

I mumble some assent and walk on through the crowd, blushing.

Then from across the room, I see Clair. The bruises on her face are almost completely healed, and even from here her eyes shine. Her body looks lean and powerful beneath the T-shirt and camouflage pants she wears. Ethan is with her, whispering something in her ear. His hand is on her waist. He goes to leave, and she smiles at him and takes his hand as he departs, letting his fingers slip through hers as he walks away. As I watch, a too familiar, gouging pain of longing stabs through me.

Clair watches Ethan leave, and as she does something about the way she crosses her arms is so familiar, so oddly stirring, that I can’t help but stare. Still smiling to herself, she turns and passes through a set of double doors.

Fighting through the crowd, I follow.

Beyond the double doors is a set of stairs. Echoes of my footsteps surround me as I go up and up, many flights. Several times I stop and poke my head through a doorway, only to find the hallway beyond empty. Finally, my legs aching with exertion, I reach the top. Here, a large window is broken, leaving the stairwell open to the outside. Staring outward, her back to me, is Clair. She rests the butt of her white machine gun on one cocked hip. In the air in front of her, two little birds follow each other in dizzying, twittering loops then disappear into the morning.

“I wondered when you’d try to talk to me again,” she says, not turning.

Since our little altercation after the prison break, I’ve avoided her whenever possible. I didn’t think she’d even noticed.

“I just . . . ” I begin, wondering how to explain myself. The truth would be easy enough to say: I realized that she’s with Ethan, and though there’s no logical reason it should hurt me, it does. But I can’t bring myself to utter the words. I shake my head, frustrated.

She laughs.

“The more people change, the more they stay the same,” she says.

What the hell does that mean?

I force myself to come up next to her, so we’re both looking out over the crumbling city, the smog-smudged sky and the ruined highway—I-75, it was once called—stretching to the horizon. Suddenly, I feel the urge to pour my heart out to her, to lay bare my entire soul, to confess all my failings, my silly wants, my unattainable desires. Even if she laughs at me, even if she hates me. It would be enough just once to say out loud what I’m feeling inside.

To me, I realize, this war is a war to be
heard
.

But she speaks first. “I’ve been avoiding you, too,” she says.

Why?
It can’t be because she feels the same way I do. . . . I want to ask her, but again, the words won’t come. The silence grinds on for too long, but I still can’t find the courage to speak. Finally, I clear my throat and say the first thing that comes to mind.

“I just wish everything was different. The whole world. I wish God would just wave his hand and make it all right.”

“God? You still believe in the Company lie?” she laughs, her voice suddenly acidic.

It’s funny, although all my recent experiences have made me completely disillusioned with Jimmy Shaw and the Company, I still never doubted God for a minute.

“I think maybe there are two Gods,” I say finally, “a false one to imprison people and the real one to set them free.”

More silence.

Clair stares out at the ruined city. I watch her. She’s so beautiful in this moment, standing there, her hazel eyes as dark as storm clouds. Those eyes are a different shape than I remember them. The face is different, the curve of the mouth, the angle of the chin, the slope of the nose. I don’t know how such things can change, but they have. I can’t keep myself in denial any longer. The revelation I’ve kept at bay for weeks now, since the first moment I saw her, hits me like a comet falling out of the sky.

“Kali,” I say, and she slowly turns to me. “I would know you anywhere,” I whisper.

Fury simmers in her eyes. “You know me?” she asks, “Do you? You know what it’s like to live in low-credit-level housing? Or in a work camp? Or to survive on the streets? Do you, Blackie?”

I heave a soul-shaking sigh of relief. It’s her. She didn’t deny it. It’s truly her. She’s alive. She’s here. There are so many questions—where has she been? Why does she look so different? “Kali—” I begin, fighting back tears.

“Clair! My name is Clair!” she glares at me fiercely, then finishes, her voice low: “Kali is dead. And you killed her.”

I stand a moment longer, fighting to dam the flood of emotion rising in me, but finally it becomes too much and I turn to bolt down the stairs. But she grabs my arm hard, wheels me around to face her.

“You don’t know me, May,” she snarls. “You never did.”

I open my mouth to speak, but no words come out. I don’t have the breath. “No,” I finally manage to say, “but I did love you.”

When she moves this time, I’m afraid she’s going to strike me, but instead she embraces me, wrapping one arm around my waist, putting one hand behind my head and pulling me to her.

Our lips hit one another’s so hard I taste blood, but I kiss her back anyway. I put my arms around her, pull her body to mine, so close I can feel her tears on my cheek.

When she finally pulls away, I can hardly breathe. I’m crying, shaking. Her gaze lingers on me a moment longer, then she turns back to the open window.

“I’m standing guard,” she says coldly, her eyes searching the distance for the enemy. And just like that, she is lost to me again.

I want to scream, to beg, to ask her a thousand questions, but the words fall back in my throat. This is enough for now. That kiss was enough. I sniff, take a deep breath, and descend the staircase on weak-feeling legs, trying (failing) to resist looking over my shoulder at her as I walk away. I wipe her taste from my lips and place one hand on my pistol, hoping the feeling of the weapon will bring me back into the world of harsh realities and dire consequences at hand.

But despite everything, I can’t help hoping that maybe, just maybe, this is the beginning of something. Maybe, after everything, after all my loneliness, all the misery, all the hollow days and torturous, silent nights I’ll finally have my happy ending.

But this is no time for love. This is war.

—Chapter Ø2Ø—

As I step out of the stairwell,
Grace rushes up to me.

“There you are! I was looking all over for you,” she huffs, out of breath. “Ethan needs you, now.”

For an instant, as she drags me by one arm through the crowd, I’m overcome with an illogical fear that Ethan has somehow already learned that I kissed Clair and he’s pissed. Then, pushing aside my personal fears, I begin to worry that some calamity is coming for all of us, that the Company’s learned our location and is at this moment training one of its infinitely deadly weapons on our hiding place. This premonition, too, I set aside. As Ethan taught me during my training, the only mindset befitting a warrior is one of expectant, watchful readiness.

Grace leads me across the great hall. From one wall to the other, restless people mill about. Some are chatting, their conversations often erupting into forced, nervous laughter; others sit quietly, staring at their guns, preparing themselves for the trials ahead. Lovers hold hands. Children run through the legs of their parents, giggling and chasing one another. Old men watch it all and smile, knowing that even as terrifying a day as this will pass, like all the others, into distant memory—at least for those who live to remember it. When we reach the other side of the room, Grace leads me through a door and into a hallway with large, mostly broken windows running along one side.

From the other end of the hallway, a man is coming toward us; he isn’t Ethan, I know that much right away—this guy is shorter and heavier than Ethan, his hair darker and longer, his gait lolling and clumsy. His figure is silhouetted, his features unclear.

“He says he knows you,” says Grace in a horse whisper, nodding at the approaching figure.

Only when he’s right before me do I see his face. He’s lost weight since the last time I saw him, and the dark circles under his eyes have become purple bags. Still, there’s no mistaking him. I’m overjoyed.

“Randal?”

“May Fields!” he says, his tired-sounding voice full of affection. “I d-do declare!”

We hug. He smells as if he hasn’t showered in days.

“What are you doing here?” I ask. “How did you know where I was?”

His eyes tick back and forth among the shadows at our feet. He taps one broad hand on his thigh at a rapid pace. He’s worse than the last time I saw him. Too much Peak. “It was easy to f-find you,” he says with his sheepish grin, then, as if it were sufficient explanation: “I knew where you’d be before you did.”

Grace reads the confusion on my face and steps in. “I might as well tell you now: he’s always been with us,” she says. “He’s the one who disabled the electronic protections and allowed us to break into the prison. He’s our genius, our guy on the inside.”

“R,” I say. Suddenly, the pieces are all fitting together. I look back at Randal, in shock.

“I’ve always been with the P-Protectorate,” he says. “From the beginning.”

“Holy crap!” I say, punching him in the arm. “I can’t believe you! And you never told me!”

He nods, grinning wanly. “I was watching you. I was the one who told Ethan to send Clair and her Reaper team to recruit you,” he says. “I d-d-do it all. I’m the eyes and ears of the Order. I create the e-disguises, crack the codes.”

“And he’s modest, too,” Grace says, rolling her eyes.

“Well, I knew that big nerdy head of yours would come in handy for something eventually,” I say, putting an arm around him.

The sound of footsteps from down the hall, crunching across broken glass, cuts our conversation short. Ethan approaches and, like Randal, he looks a little more haggard than usual.

“Hello, all,” he says. “I see your friend found you.”

I’m not sure whether he’s speaking to me or to Randal, but I reply: “Yeah. Why didn’t you tell me Randal was one of us?”

“His identity was one of our most closely held secrets. It was too important to jeopardize, although he seems to have jeopardized it himself.” He glares at Randal.

“Ethan’s mad at me for coming,” Randal explains.

“And with your cross, too. They could track you right to us, and you’d have the blood of three thousand people on your hands,” Ethan says.

“I disguised the signal in the computer,” says Randal. “They can’t track me.”

“You hope,” Ethan amends.

“I had to give you this information in person. It was the only way.”

“You could have used a pigeon,” says Ethan.

“Pigeon?” I say.

“We use homing pigeons for our most important communications,” Ethan explains. “Any electronic method could be decoded and human messengers can be followed. It’s the only safe way.” He turns back to Randal. “I’ll assemble the council in an hour and we’ll hear your briefing together. Meantime, get some rest. You look like death. Grace will show you to a room.”

Ethan turns on his heel and is gone. It’s hard to say what the difference in him is, but I’ve never seen him act quite like this. I resolve to talk to him before the meeting and find out what’s really going on.

Randal, Grace, and I look at one another.

“Okay,” Grace sighs. “Come on.”

On the way to Randal’s quarters, he speaks very little. He looks about nervously and blinks too fast. His lips make words, though no sounds come out. I wonder with vague dismay whether it’s just an overdose of Peak or some new, more insidious drug coursing through his system.

After a moment’s walk, we arrive at Randal’s room. Grace tries the knob but the door is stuck, so she slams into it with her shoulder a couple times until in swings in.

She gestures dismissively into the open doorway. “There’s a lantern and blankets. I think there’s a bottle of water if you want to drink or wash. I suggest you do both. We’ll get you when we’re ready.”

She seems even gruffer than usual, and I’m glad when the door closes behind her, leaving Randal and me alone. He sniffs and wipes his nose, then pats both legs with his open palms. He won’t look at me.

“Randal, what’s up with you, man? Are you okay?”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” he says. I don’t know if it’s just the dim light spilling into the darkened room from the open doorway, but his normal, disarming smile seems disturbingly counterfeit.

“Are—you—sure?” I say, speaking with mocking slowness that makes us both laugh.

“Sh-sh-sure,” he says.

I cross to the table, which I can hardly make out in the half-light, and find a book of matches next to a kerosene lantern. I strike us a light.

“You don’t mind if I stay with you for a few minutes?” I ask. “You’ve got a lot of explaining to do, and I . . . I could use somebody to talk to.” After finishing my sentence, I’m a little horrified by my words. Never can I remember admitting to another person that I needed help of any kind. Part of me panics, wishing I could snatch the words from the air and stuff them back in my mouth, but of course it’s too late.

Randal just raises his eyebrows.

“Well . . . ” he says, then laughs silently. Everything he does is so awkward. So unlike the Randal I first met so many years ago.

“What drugs do they have you on now?” I ask. “It’s something new, isn’t it?”

“It’s nothing,” he says, biting his fingernail. “Just new stuff. There’s always something new. New, new, n-new s-stuff. Yep. It doesn’t stop, this stuff. You just f-f-flat out don’t sleep. Don’t have to, actually. My w-work has gone into new realms. I’ve s-s-seen things.”

“What do you mean?”

“Oh,” he says with a wave of his hand. “Just new ways of seeing. New ways to get around the Company’s e-security measures. New ways of integrating c-c-cross implants with p-people’s brains. Ooh, they were mad when you took your implant out! Nobody thought you would really do it! But you did. . . . ”

“How did you know about that?”

“I know everything. The C-C-Company network is nothing but a big b-brain. And it has its own c-cross,” he says, giving me an exaggerated wink.

I pretend to understand. Really, what I want to talk about is myself.

“You wouldn’t believe everything I’ve learned here, Randal. I’ve learned to shoot; I’ve been shot at, I’ve seen people killed, I’ve killed people, I’ve rescued people, saved lives! And I’ve met some really amazing friends—the people who are with us in the Protectorate, some of them are just incredible. Even old Grace. And the prison, some of the prisoners we freed, you wouldn’t believe what the Company’s done to these people. And in the work camp, there’s one in the old city called In-something . . . Indianapolis! These people there are real slaves, not just indentured workers like the rest of us were, but
slaves
”

“I know,” Randal says with a distant sigh. “I saw.”

“What do you mean, you saw?”

“Company c-cameras. Everything everywhere is on camera. Of course, if there’s an important Protectorate mission going on, I’ll black out the c-cameras in that area when Ethan asks me to, but for something like your trip to the work camp, it’s all recorded. You just need to know where to look.”

“I see,” I say. Something in Randal’s demeanor disturbs me, no matter how hard I try to shake the feeling. Still, I feel like a piece of tinder about to catch fire. I’ve had so much to say—and nobody to say it to—that I can’t hold myself back.

“I’ve been reading, too,” I continue. “About the American government. Did you know they used to break Companies up when they got too big? It was called antitrust legislation, the big companies were called monopolies, and it was illegal! Then the Companies took over the government and put a stop to it, the bastards. And . . . Kali, Randal. Kali is alive. But of course you know all that, don’t you? You know everything.”

Randal nods distractedly. When I look at him more closely, I see that he’s about to cry.

“What’s wrong?” I ask.

He sighs, sniffs. “I missed you,” he says.

“I missed you, man.”

He opens his arms and we embrace. I give him a hardy pat on the back, and we pull apart.

The lamplight flickers. In it, I see a cavalcade of emotions cross his face, from yearning, to anger, to worry, to regret, to anger again. He stares into my eyes, his gaze more intense than I ever remember it, and his lips form silent words—threats, maybe, or an accusation.

“What Randal? It something wrong?” I ask him. “Say it.”

But he only shakes his head, takes a deep breath, and forces himself to smile.

“Nothing, nothing, nothing,” he says. “I’m just t-t-t-t-t-tired.”

“Okay. Should I let you get some rest?” I ask.

He nods, and I take a blanket from the corner and help him lay it out on the floor. I fold another one up for him to use as a pillow. I throw a third one over him, letting it fall over his face playfully.

“Get some rest,” I say. “You want me to turn out the lamp?”

He shakes his head emphatically.

“Alright.” I take a few steps toward the door, then stop. “Hey,” I say. “So, I won’t tell anyone before the big meeting, but what’s so important that you came all the way here? I mean, that was a big risk. And if it was that important, why didn’t you tell Ethan right away? Why are you waiting for the council to assemble?”

“My message is for the whole council, not just one person.” Randal says. “You’ll see. . . . ”

I don’t know why, but I’m overcome again with a strong sense of concern for him. Now, after all this time, after all I’ve learned, it’s easy for me to see what I was afraid to admit to myself before: Randal and I really are friends. Despite what happened all those years ago with him and Blackwell and Kali, we always have been. We are connected. In some way I still can’t completely comprehend, we are the same. And I care about him, deeply.

“Well, whatever it is,” I say, “we’ll face it together, alright?”

The only answer is his breathing, slower now, and steady.

“Hush little baby, don’t say a word . . . ”
I sing softly, playfully. That’s all I can stomach of my singing voice, so I stop. I can’t see him in the shadows, but I imagine his eyes closed and his pudgy, pale, sweat-slicked face finally relaxed and cherub-like in sleep.

I smile. It’s the most beautiful thing in the world to have friends. Too bad I found it out so late. I walk out the door and pull it shut very slowly behind me, releasing the knob carefully so that even the tiniest
click
won’t disturb Randal’s slumber.

Then, as I turn to leave, I hear it. The sound is low at first, low and heart-wrenching, then it rises in pitch and volume like a siren’s wail. I lean close to the door and listen.

Behind it, Randal is crying.

~~~

Something is horribly wrong with Randal. I decide the only one I can share this concern with is Ethan, but McCann tells me he’s indisposed. I consider finding Clair at her lookout post, but at the thought of our last encounter my resolve to find her wilts and I turn away at the foot of the stairwell.

So I walk aimlessly for about an hour or so, tangled in restless thoughts.

The battle is coming.
The words ring in my brain like a bugle blast and my heart beats as fast and steady as a marching cadence. Though I can hardly admit it to myself, I am in love with war. The feeling of firing a gun, like holding thunder in my hand, is intoxicating. The power to kill compensates for all I’ve been deprived of in my life. The love, respect, and freedom I’ve missed out on all amount to nothing compared to the force I wield with the simple, one-millimeter movement of a trigger. I remember the cries of the men I killed in the prison, the way their bodies twisted in agony as they fell, and all I can think is:
good.

I never wanted to hurt anyone, of course; I could never want that. I want to be happy. I want others to be happy. But in the absence of that happiness, I want revenge. I want the curtain separating “what is” from “what should be,” torn down and I want to do the tearing with my own bloodstained hands. Let the war come. I’m ready.

When Grace finally finds me, I’m lost in thought, watching Michel and a group of young boys playing soccer in a corner of the great room.

“May,” she says, and I turn. “Stop disappearing, would you? Come on!”

She tells me the council has assembled, awaiting Randal’s news.