Rebels (11 page)

He hesitated. No way was this fool going to go easy on me. He wouldn't dare do me that way. No way.
What a—

He sidearmed it and launched it on my strong side, low and fast. The ball's electric whine whistled as it shot toward me. My gloves' field couldn't slow it from this range, but damn if it couldn't redirect its trajectory.

I reached out and could feel the tension between field and ball, catching ever so slightly . . . right before it blasted past the electro and hit just wide of the goal. I brought it back and signaled for a time-out.

“Guys, huddle up.”

They huddled closely around me. The two Hubbers were huffing
hard from their exertion. My vision had improved to a complete blur deadened by black spots that shifted every time I blinked.

“This is going to be hard, but I think we can win this. We just need one goal. If you can get me one goal, I will make sure they don't score any more.”

“You're going to be goalie?” Caesar asked.

“You're the best player we got,” Vippy said.

“Yeah. If she
scores
.” Caesar's heart was beating hard. What he didn't know was that with my hearing, at least from an offensive perspective, I couldn't detect the goals. They weren't electric, so they made absolutely no sound. There was no way I was going to thread a zip ball through one of those. But defending one?

That played into my sets of gifts very well.

“So tell me, who's gonna get the goal?”

There was no rush of hands being raised. But there was one.

Vippy.

I looked in the direction of her raised hand.

“You better.”

Well, she didn't score. She didn't even come close. But neither did Cassina's team, so I counted a tie game as a personal victory. Even though my head ached like a groundquake, my sight was improving. I mean, I could at least tell that Kane's smile was incredulous. The amount of pain I was in, it didn't even give him problems about thinking twice about scoring on me. He wasn't soft, he was just . . . Kane.

◊  ◊  ◊

Later that week, we settled in for afternoon rations when I heard the chatter.

The chatter quickly grew to a roar, and I thought that if there was any real trouble happening, the instructors would step in. Even Kane shrugged it off when it first began. But when I saw the instructors
step out of the lunchroom and actively ignore what was clearly an out-of-control situation, I couldn't ignore it any further. Perhaps they thought a fight would expend our energy. Perhaps one death, or two, was a necessary sacrifice.

Cassina and several of her paramours were gathered around a table. Vipsinia was on the ground next to it, one cheek puffy from being hit, her Hubber friends having already retreated way across the room. So much for loyalty

“Are you a rebel?!” Cassina shouted at her.

Vippy was nearly in tears.

“Well?! Are
you
?”

Vippy was shaking her head furiously, but couldn't get them to leave her alone.

I pushed my way through the growing crowd.

“Back off,” I told Cassina.

“One of the rebels came from her zone!”

“So?”

“Of course a dirtgirl like you—”

“—would be too high-minded not to jump to conclusions? If that whole zone was rebels, don't you think the PCF would've imprisoned them by now? Who'd allow Vippy to even be here if that were true?”

Cassina screwed up her face, nearly out of her mind. “Maybe
you're one
, too.”

I pushed her hard against the wall, taking her off her feet. One of her male companions put his hand on me, not seeing Kane right behind him. Kane tripped him, and sent him sprawling onto the ground. The other companion helped Cassina up, which she didn't appreciate, red-faced.

“A rebel!” she yelled. “At least we all know it now!”

“If you ever call me that again, you will see just how rebellious I can get.”

As much as I didn't let her see it, her words stung and there was
nothing I could do to reverse their effect on the other cadets. The break time buzzer sounded and that was all it took for the mob to disperse.

Vippy still hadn't moved, so I told her, “Get up.”

She wiped the tears from her face, and Kane took her hand and pulled her up. She sniffled. “Thank you.”

I had been angry for most of my life. It was the sort of thing Samantha had curbed just with her presence, and Kane was growing to fill that role as well. But here—in the wake of the past week, of the past year, and all those that came before—I felt those instincts become completely unhinged. I was beyond thought, beyond compassion. I looked at Vipsinia and all I could see were the same doubts Cassina had.

A rebel. I feared that I had stuck my neck out for one.

I used my size to show her how serious I was, and she held her ground as I pinned her back. “On your life, you better not be one,” I said.

The sun warms my back as Veda and I trot the winding dirt pathways through the village, passing weeping cherry trees and thatched huts. Outside one thatched hut, an aged woman hunches over a loom weaving iridescent patterns. Farther ahead, others gather at the river to rinse their garments, wringing water from them and gossiping loudly in their ancient tongue.

As of yet, we've gone unnoticed.

I halt Veda just beyond a prayer garden. “Rest,” I tell her. She shakes her ivory mane. Veda loves it here.

My mother adored Veda, often wishing she could take her into the Archives. In the end, my father implanted a personalized access chip in Veda's hoof that would mirror my mother's Archive experience. She simply led her to the reader pad built especially for Veda and placed her front right leg on the sensor, and they would enter the Archives together.

For some reason, Veda's chip also works for me. Just as she entered my mother's Archives, she can enter mine. This is not logical, a fact of which I'm well aware. Yet I have kept it a secret as long as I have known.

If I want Veda to join me in the Archives, I simply send the thought
to her and soon she is there beside me. I could be in the main quarters and she in the stable, and we will be together. I have always felt the emotions of others, but Veda is the first being who could sense me as well. She's the only animal in existence, and I often feel just as alone.

Now she looks at me, concerned.
Where are you going?

“Don't worry,” I tell her. “Rest.” She stomps the ground a few times, showing me her dissatisfaction, yet she complies.

I leap the wooden gates and cut through a thicket of brush. Bushes are trimmed into strange, slanting angles. Squat trees, their trunks twisting and coiling. A trickling brook weaves through the lush foliage, the water swarming with glimmering neon fish.

If only this were real. Still, the Archive training simulation is perfect, down to what I think is the sweet smell of cherry blossoms on the gentle breeze.

This simulation is part of my swordsmanship training program, yet strictly prohibited by Master. “You are not ready for opponents who fight with both sword and mind,” he's told me. “Perhaps one day, but not yet. You think too much, Livia, to engage in real battle.”

For all his warnings, Master never fails to leave the access chips unguarded. A test of my will, perhaps. A test I have chosen to fail.

This may well be my last chance. At least, this is what I told myself as I slipped the chip from the black box this very morning. Next week I will have my Emergence Ball, and soon after I will cohabitate. Proper Cohabitated Women of Indrithian Society don't practice swordsmanship, even though my mother did.

Now I'm somewhere I have never been, with no concept of what awaits me. For just a moment, I recline on a flat black rock. The surface is pleasantly cool, though I'm far from relaxed. This isn't a retreat, I remind myself.

The wait is short.

I'm on my feet, hands grasping the hilt of my zinger, when I hear the first footstep.

I have fought all breeds of enemy in the Archives . . . but this is something altogether different.

For a brief moment, I wonder if perhaps Master was correct. The opponent is unexpected, to say the very least.

He stands there dressed in a kimono, smiling at me calmly, as though ready to initiate a warm conversation, perhaps even invite me to tea.

I will myself to focus. I won't let his appearance deceive me. A samurai is never unarmed, even when taken off guard. As though he can read my thoughts, he draws a sword from the obi tied around his waist, the pleasant expression dropping as the sword rises. We both stare at its edge gleaming in the sunlight. He glares at me, his eyes as sharp as the blade itself.

I pose, zinger drawn and humming, my body prickling with energy. The samurai's face is rigid with concentration, barely a muscle flickering. His mind is clear, I know this from Master. He's been telling me since we first began training when I was a little girl:
The true warrior is empty of emotion.

I close my eyes and force my mind to go blank.

No Emergence Ball
.
No sashes. No Mica. No Etiquette Tutor or Life Guide or Helix Island. Only now. Only the battle.

An almost indiscernible rush of wind: I know he has launched into midair. I'm poised to attack before even opening my eyes.

I leap, my rigid body cutting through space. In that brief moment of flight, I feel every hair on my arm rising. All it takes is the space between two heartbeats.

Our blades clash.

We spin away from each other, our weapons locked the whole while. Our dance is violent. His face is inches from mine, lips drawn over his teeth, a growl rising from his throat.

The zinger releases a low note as I force him away. The impact throws me off balance. I land on my feet and stumble, disoriented,
trying to catch my breath and regain focus. My eyes scan the garden frantically. Where could he have gone?

A low groan. I turn just as he charges, eyes mellow, his form perfect. An unexpected beam of sunlight glints off his katana's edge, blinding me.

Do not think.

Forward thrust. I slice empty air. A faint whizzing to my left and I duck the instant his blade slashes down.

He trims a lock of hair from over my ear. It floats to the ground.

He was aiming for my head.

His emotional armor cracks. Now I can feel his fury rising. His programming is so real that he's incapable of controlling himself. I have gone from a mild annoyance to a skilled opponent. A mere child—
a girl, even worse—
has dared force him to work for his victory.

Master didn't teach me to do this. To
feel
people. I have read emotions since I was a child. At first, I could only read Veda. I would go to her stable when I was confused or sad, and feel her fret over me. She would try to cheer me up with a little galloping dance. When I finally smiled, I could feel her satisfaction.

I assumed it was only Veda I could feel. Perhaps because my father created her, I reasoned. Because she is the only one of her kind. Then one day, I hid from Life Guide in the synth-orchard, and I could sense his frustration growing from the other side of the island. I knew when Master was planning an intense training, or Governess worried over my eating habits.

I've always felt people, but never in an Archive.

He isn't real
, I remind myself.

◊  ◊  ◊

Archive simulations are meant to train and entertain Indrithian citizens. Archive memories are different. They are a record of your past,
allowing you to enter your own experiences. Archive memories replicate real events as you lived them.

I had attempted to access my own memories countless times. I'd hoped to see my mother and father, though I don't remember either.
Perhaps they held me as a child
, I reasoned,
and the memory remains buried right beneath the surface of my consciousness
. With every try, I would end up in a thick fog, a faint buzzing noise surrounding me.

I have cycled through every day of my existence, painstakingly tapping each date into the personal memory chip we're each issued as children. In the end, I found a few uninteresting moments, but none of importance. In one, Governess towered over my six-year-old self, encouraging me to eat my pudding. Even simulated, I found her very demanding. In another, I was picking synth-flowers in the orchard and winding them into a crown.

This cannot make up the entirety of my life experiences
, I thought.

One day I asked Marius about my memory blanks, and she merely gave a faint smile. “I do not know, my love. Some have many archived memories. Others have few.”

“But who decides?”

“The High Council,” she responded. By the tone of her voice, I knew not to inquire further.

In all truth, little is known of the Archives and their origin. Yet there are a few facts of which everyone is made aware: despite feeling fear or pain, you cannot be permanently injured. You may be stabbed by a simulated enemy, yet you will wake unscathed. As for the human simulations, they do not have emotion. As real as they may feel, they feel nothing in the slightest.

Yet here in the garden, I can feel this samurai. For a mere second, he seems to wallow in a hatred that almost feels authentic. Is this possible?

Who is this girl?
he wonders.
Why does she fight so well?

In that moment, he hesitates. In that moment, I swing.

He gasps. We both gaze downward. A drop of blood blossoms across his white kimono.

It's a flesh wound, yet I have caught him off guard. He stumbles backward and regains his footing, but not his composure. He grimaces at me, his face pained. His surprise turns to anger. Then he does something unexpected.