Reaping (8 page)

“We stood there gaping,” my father says, quietly.

“We’d been bound and all of us but Gabriel gagged—they didn’t recognize any of us but him and James, thankfully.”

It always sounds strange to me to hear Rhinehouse referred to by his first name.

“I heard an explosion in the distance, and it took me a moment to realize it was their airship.” the Director smiles. “I still don’t know how they blew up a shielded airship, but they did.”

“Who’s they?” 
Soren demands.

“Outsiders,” she responds.

“They killed all the Black Ops?” Eli raises his eyebrows in curious surprise.

“And then untied us and disappeared,” my father adds. “One minute there, and the next gone, with fifteen dead soldiers in their wake.”

I glance at Soren across the room, where he’s sitting next to Rhinehouse. He cocks his head to the side slightly, toward me, and I know we're wondering the same thing: 
Could Chan-Yu have been there? Or that Osprey person?

“Why would they have done that?” Adrienne asks.

The Director shakes her head. “I don’t know. They didn’t stay to explain. We know they harbor no love for the Sector. They’ve taken their own actions against Sector incursions into their territory. And we’ve tried to reach out to them. But they’ve always ignored our overtures.”

I open my mouth to speak, but Soren beats me to it, and I push back the twinge of annoyance that bites at me.

“It was an Outsider who helped Remy and I escape Sector headquarters. We never had a chance to tell you the whole story before the attack.”

“When I spoke with him, Valerian said a man he trusted had helped you,” Rhinehouse says quietly. “He neglected to tell me he was an Outsider, though.”

The Director fixes her gaze on Rhinehouse, considers him for a moment, and then turns toward me. I’ve never felt comfortable meeting her eyes, and now is no exception. I feel like she’s drawing out the very marrow of my bones.

“After dinner I want a full briefing from everyone who was on the raid the night you were captured. Every detail about your capture, your captivity, and your escape. Understood?”

Soren, Eli, and I all respond on cue.

“Yes, m’am.”

Eli turns to look behind me, and I follow his gaze. Hodges is in the doorway with Miah in tow. Miah is pale and shaky, but his eyes are fixed on the enormous slab of meat on the center table. Hodges glances at Soren who jumps up and grabs an empty chair. With a slight nod to Rhinehouse, Miah collapses into the chair with a grunt.

The Director’s eyes flit back and forth between Rhinehouse and Miah. Rhinehouse doesn’t look the least bit surprised to see Miah, but the Director’s wide eyes tell me she most certainly is.

“I felt sorry for him in the infirmary when the rest of us were celebrating,” Hodges explains. “I think he’s doing well enough to eat a little real food. A bit of bread and protein.” Hodges picks up a plate and puts a small piece of bread on it. Miah, however, looks ravenous and ready to celebrate anything that involves large quantities of solid food. The days in the woods had already hollowed him out, and being sick has thinned out his cheeks and created dark crescents under his eyes.

Soren, too, seems to have noticed how hungry Miah looks. He takes the plate from Hodges.

“I’ll do it,” I hear him say, as small talk picks up again around the hall. He goes about systematically loading the plate with every kind of food available on the center table. I smile as I watch him set the plate in front of Miah, who nods in gratitude. Hodges scowls a bit, but doesn’t object. Once Miah proves himself perfectly capable of ladling enormous helpings of food into his mouth, the medic relaxes.

There’s a clatter down the hall, and conversation in the mess hall quiets again.

“You’re shitting me,” someone says, a male voice.

“That’s what they said. You’ve gotta—”

Arms full of wine bottles, Zoe bursts back into the room, followed closely by the chubby man who gave me directions to the mess hall not so long ago.

“You’ll never believe this,” she says, staring at Adrienne and the Director. “The Sector is blaming Valerian Orleán’s disappearance on,” she points to Miah, “him.”

Miah, a fork-load of roasted vegetables halfway to his eager mouth, stares at her.

“What?” Soren.

“I stopped by the comm center on my way back from my room when I heard it. They’re scapegoating him. That horrible girl Linnea just said something about it on Sector News Network. They’re gonna make a formal announcement. You’ve got to see it.”

Chairs scrape. Bodies move. Voices, loud and whispered, float around my head like wisps of smoke. I clutch my father’s hand and wonder what this sudden change in tactics means. Miah leans on Soren as we all hurry through the hall, food utterly forgotten, to the comm room.

With the radio on, Eli and Zoe fuss over their antiquated video feed to see if they can set up a visual while cranking up the volume as loud as it will go. We crane our heads forward. I find myself pushed up against my father and Soren, whose body seems to hollow out a space for me, as we all wait.

“Citizens of Okaria! Farmers, workers, scientists, all.” It’s Philip Orleán, Vale’s father. His voice sounds like warm honey through the speakers. It quavers with both confidence and fear. It’s the kind of voice that could lead you off the edge of a cliff and make you glad you jumped.

I wonder if Vale is somewhere listening.

“I speak to you today not only as the chancellor of the Okarian Sector, but as a father. Today, I am saddened to be the bearer of grim news, both for my family and for the Sector at large. Valerian Augustus Orleán, the Director of the Seed Bank Protection Project, valedictorian graduate of the Academy, our state’s most prestigious institution of learning, better known to many of you as Vale—my own son—” his voice shakes with unabated emotion “—has been taken hostage.”

Just then, the tiny plasma screen—not even three dimensional, it’s so old-fashioned—flares up, and Philip’s face, lined with worry and sadness, appears in front of us.

The first thing I feel is rage.

Philip Orleán, the man who promised me a bowl of fresh figs if I betrayed my friends, my family, and everything I believe in. Who electrocuted me when I refused. Who pleaded innocent to the charge of my sister’s death.

Philip Orleán, the liar.

At his side, a little behind him, sits Corine, his wife, the woman who gave the orders that claimed my sister’s life. And my mother’s. The woman who ordered Chan-Yu to kill me and Soren. 
The Orleáns’ death toll continues to grow,
 I think, closing my eyes for a moment. 
How many more will die at their hands?

“Vale has been missing for just over four weeks. Terrorists have penetrated our deepest levels of security to take one of our most valuable citizens hostage, to hold us as a society hostage as we desperately negotiate for his safe return. These rebels, these guerilla fanatics, seek to dismantle the institutions we’ve built and to plunge us back into a time of starvation and chaos. We will never allow it.

“In the last few weeks, we’ve done everything possible to find answers, to discover Vale’s whereabouts, to find out how and why he was taken. It is with the deepest sadness and regret that I inform you that we have all been betrayed—that my son has been betrayed—by someone we once considered one of our own, a friend—both of the Sector and of our family. Jeremiah Sayyid, an engineer from the fourth quadrant of Okaria.”

Miah gasps. His face is ashen, and he looks like he might throw up. The room buzzes for a moment, before we all go silent again, straining to hear more.

“His father, Ezekiel Sayyid, is a known member of the increasingly well-organized terrorist network actively working to destroy the Sector. Jeremiah and Valerian both disappeared on the same day. Our intelligence now shows conclusively, though we don’t want to believe it, that Jeremiah is complicit in and central to the hostage-capture of our beloved son.” Here Philip’s voice cracks. He stares up at the elegant, arching interior of the Sector’s gorgeous Capital building, and blinks for a moment. Elsewhere in the room, someone conjures up a wad of saliva and spits it on the floor, summing up my feelings. I remember doing the same thing across the desk from Philip, not so long ago, before he slapped a few capacitors on me and turned up the charge.

“Jeremiah Sayyid was a friend of ours. He was welcomed into our home on too many occasions to count. He dined with us, celebrated with us, and seemed by all accounts to be a talented young man with great promise. How wrong we were only proves how deeply this terrorist group can corrupt.....

The sound goes dead and Zoe smacks the side of the audio unit with her hand.

“...lurk in the shadows of our society, growing in strength and number as vulnerable citizens are attracted to their empty promises. They don’t offer freedom or safety or protection, but a fast track to destruction and disease, a return to famine, to bloodshed, to a time of want and war.”

I clutch my father’s hand, close my eyes, and imagine watching Philip at the podium, in person. If I had stayed, would I believe him? Would his words strike fear in me?

“Citizens,” his voice crackles through the speakers. “This is a dark time for my family, and if we do not address this threat, it could prove to be a dark time for the Sector as well. But rest assured, we are hot on the terrorists’ heels. We will track Jeremiah and Ezekiel Sayyid down and hold them accountable for their crimes against the Sector—for their crimes against you, our people. We will find Vale and bring him home. Together, we the citizens of the Okarian Sector will not let these deluded fanatics return us to the dark ages of the past. Together, we will work for a brighter, more secure and prosperous future. As always ‘May we gain strength from the sowing, resilience from the reaping, and hope from the harvest.’ Good night.”

“Bastard.” A voice breaks the stillness. It’s my dad, who 
never
 curses. He hates it when Phillip quotes his poem, the poem that earned him his post as the Sector’s poet laureate.

The sounds dim for a moment, as Philip retreats from the podium and takes Corine’s hand. Wrapped in their long fur coats and warm leather gloves, they hold their hands high, together, a sign of resilience and strength.

After a long moment of fraught silence in the comm room, the vidscreen dies.

“Damn it,” Eli says, loudly. “I knew that piece of junk wouldn’t last long.”

Then I hear Linnea Heilmann’s perky voice through the radio, gilded with newsworthy suspense: “I am Linnea Heilmann, and that was Philip Orleán, Chancellor of the Okarian Sector, announcing the kidnapping of his own son and Sector Board Member, Valerian Orleán, by anti-Sector terrorists living in our midst.” She pauses, one of those calculated breaks to make everyone lean in a little closer. “Over the past few years, Sector intelligence agents have been conducting undercover investigations into the disappearances of several noted Sector citizens. Now we know the truth. This terrorist group—the Resistance, as they call themselves—is kidnapping them. But why? What does a ragtag group of resistance fighters hope to accomplish by holding our citizens hostage for months, sometimes years at a time? What are their demands? Why do they hide in the shadows? Those are just a few of the questions Sector Defense Forces and OAC Security personnel seek to answer. Until we get answers, we urge you to keep your eyes and ears open, your doors locked, and your hearts with those who have disappeared. Now, let’s welcome the young woman whose former boyfriend has betrayed the Sector, Miss Moriana Nair.”

Miah, his face like the color of flour, takes a step back from the radio, almost falling against the wall.

“Moriana attended the prestigious Okarian Academy as well as the Sector Research Institute with both Jeremiah Sayyid and Valerian. Hello, Moriana.”

“Linnea,” comes Moriana’s voice through the radio. I haven’t heard her voice in years. My thoughts fly out to Jahnu, Moriana’s cousin, wherever he is. I spare a moment and a silent hope that he’s all right.

“She hates Linnea,” Miah says, his voice somewhere between panicked and hyperventilating. “Why is she doing this?”

“You think she has a choice?” Soren asks sharply.

Sweat beads on Miah’s brow and Zoe, still sitting at the controls, looks up at him with pity. She stands, scoots her chair toward him, and he plops onto it.

“Why do you think Jeremiah turned against the Sector? What do you believe drove him to kidnap his best friend?” Linnea begins.

“There must be a misunderstanding. Miah couldn’t hurt anyone if he 
wanted
 to. He’s the sweetest person I’ve ever met in my life, and he loves Vale. I just can’t believe it. It’s not possible.” At Moriana’s words, Miah releases a long, relieved breath, grateful, I’m sure, that she, at least, doesn’t believe Philip Orleán.

“So how do you explain his disappearance? Did he give you any hint he was leaving? Were there any clues? Do you think he was jealous of Vale?”

“No, of course not!”

“Jealousy can be a powerful motivator. Is it possible Jeremiah was tired of living in Vale’s shadow? Could that be what motivated him to turn against the Sector?”

“Linnea, he wouldn’t have—” There’s desperation and confusion in her voice. I wish for everything the plasma screen hadn’t gone out when it did. I wish I could see her face. Miah’s staring into the distance as though he’s trying to murder Linnea just by thinking really hard.

“What gives you so much faith in this man, who Sector intelligence teams have concluded is guilty?”

“If he did it, he must have been forced into it. Maybe the terrorists tortured him or threatened his father or something. But Miah would never willingly hurt or betray Vale.”

“But would he betray the Sector? After all, his father is a known terrorist.”

“No, he—”

“My understanding is that you’ve been one of Vale’s closest friends for many years as well. If Jeremiah Sayyid didn’t kidnap him, how do you explain Vale’s disappearance?”

“I don’t know. They were there one night—at the Solstice Ball—and then they weren’t.” Her voice breaks. “Something else must have happened. It’s just not possible that Miah—”