Rebels (32 page)

We're down in the abandoned heap and I can't get Hep's voice out of my head.

We live for a while, and then we die. Can't stop either when the time comes.

He's wrong. I was born to no one, so no one has claim over my life. And if I don't do anything now, this jackass will get us all killed.

Lying in wait, the PCF grind their teeth. They power up their blasters. Still, they're not quick enough for me.

I start blasting as soon as we round the corner. My shots don't hit anyone, but they distract the PCF long enough for the rebels to draw down. I've evened the odds, but I still wouldn't call it a fair fight.

Every rebel casualty will be pinned on my head, so no one else is dying just yet. We've only just begun striking back.

Zavier steers with one hand, shoots with the other. He curses. I'd curse too if I were that bad a shot. PCF fire hits the speeder on our left flank. A rebel falls off the back. The driver swerves, his arm smoking and enflamed by blaster splash. Still alert, but he's fading quick.

Zavier yells at the driver. “Robertson!”

“Bring me in,” I tell Zavier, my feet now on the seat under me.

“Don't you dare!” he yells back.

I can do this on my own. He grabs at me, but no one can stop me if I don't want them to.

I land hard on the seat, straddling the speeder behind the driver. He's completely slumped over by now and the speeder veers wide right. I reach over his body and grab the controls, correcting our course to get out of this dump.

I take his earfeed out and place it in my ear. Zavier's curses hide his wounded pride. Maybe he's not the leader he thought he was, but I just saved someone's life he should've been looking out for.

“If you're really here to protect us,” I say to everyone listening, “try to keep up.”

The drill-facil location pings red on my nav board. I plot the most direct course.

This time, everyone follows my lead.

We're waiting at the meet-up location when the dust billows our way. The PCF hunted us and we owe our freedom—and lives—to Chae's quick thinking.

One of the rebels asks how much longer we have to wait. “We're all in this together now,” Chae says. No one asks again.

I sit by Kane and we don't talk. I imagine he's thinking about Lex, too. I feel him watching me, and the heat coming off his body is a strange comfort to me.

The three of us, our lives are intertwined now. All my life I've looked for something more than island life and I feel as if I'm on the verge of . . . something. Maybe a nervous breakdown. Maybe I'll soon be recovering alongside Governess on Sunrise Retreat Island.

The dust cloud expands and my eyes sting. I tear away another piece of my dress to cover my mouth before I choke. At its heart I can hear firing engines.

Wild riders blaze out of the cloud with Lex at the lead. I'm relieved, yet far from surprised.

The first rebel we met, the shaggy-haired Zavier, leaps off his speeder as soon as it's touched down. No need to sense his feelings, since he does little to hide his overwhelming fury. It rivals Lex's at her peak. His bright blue eyes shine ice-cold, and he's handsome,
even like this, in a way island boys could never be, their natural appeal blunted by endless sculpting procedures. Of course, they're not prone to murder, either.

The focus of his indignation doesn't surprise me. Lex dismounts her speeder, regaining a level of militaristic swagger and . . . calm? How unlikely.

“Who do you think you are?” Zavier bumps right into her. He's a real savage, that one. And her? Placid as a reflecting pool. She refuses to engage with this bully. “You disobeyed my orders, you spoiled little—”

“I think everything worked out remarkably well.”

“Just because you went to the godforsaken Academy, you can—”

She grabs Zavier's face with one hand and squeezes his mouth shut. He knocks it away. “Don't you dare take your anger out on me,” she says.

Chae inserts himself between them and brushes Zavier back. “Lay off her, Z.”

Kane joins Lex's side, but knows not to step up, that she's quite capable of fighting her own battles.

If anything, Chae's interference makes Zavier more furious, and he has no regard for his new target. “Are you taking
her
side?” he yells.

“No sides, Z. Just us.”

“Robertson—”

“Got done in by Poppers.”

“But if she—”

“—didn't save Luther's life? What? What's your point?”

“One for one? Are you really trying to argue acceptable losses? You already forget what she did to Emil?!”

“I don't know any Emil,” Lex says. Zavier whips around, ready to tear her apart, and instinctively I reach for my zinger, ready to intervene.

“Of course you don't,” Zavier says. “You're just like the rest of
them, aren't you? Score another kill for your holofile, drop another rock on the pile.”

“Enough,” Roscoe says, not loudly, yet forcefully enough to bring the argument to a standstill. “Remember what we set out to accomplish. We have lost many, but today we have also gained three. Leave your anger for the enemy and be gracious in victory. Indra wasn't erected overnight, and we cannot hope that our dreams, fueled by our blood, will materialize quickly either.”

His words have turned half the rebels' eyes on me. The other half are on Lex. Even Zavier's. He swallows his anger, though it isn't far from the surface. But he seems to believe in something much greater than himself, at least some of the time.

I cannot fathom their beliefs, or how we could possibly tie into them. There is much to learn. It's frightening to mean this much to others.

Lex nods knowingly at me; we will go along with this. I nod back. Kane smiles, game for adventure.

“Now,” says Roscoe, when they seem to be settling down. “There is still more work to be done. So let us bid farewell to the once and future great City of Indra.”

The rebels get to work removing the grate from an enormous drainage pipe. It's already loose, but takes the strength of four to move.

Chae throws a towline down the pipe and secures it to the heavy grate. One by one, the rebels descend, then followed by Kane. Zavier goes last, mounting the pipe slowly. Before he drops, Roscoe puts a hand on his shoulder and Zavier looks up hopefully. He's tired. We all are.

Roscoe smiles. “We will speak, soon.” Zavier sighs, his shoulders slumping in relief. He drops, not seeking further affirmation from the three of us.

“I know you have questions,” Roscoe says to us, “and all will be answered. On this you have my word. But for now, let us take sanctuary.”

“No,” I say. “You have the bearing of a Proper Indrithian, so it would be uncustomary to not engage us in conversation when requested, would it not?”

“You are correct.”

“Then tell us who you are.”

I sense his hesitation; this isn't easy for him, and yet, he desperately wants us to trust him like the rebels do.

“The more appropriate question is not of my identity, but your own,” he says.

“You told me that you knew my mother,” I say. “That she was your friend. I have never met one who would match that claim. I did not think they existed any longer.”

“They do, as long as I live and breathe.” He looks to Lex. “I knew your mother as well.”

“I do not have a mother,” she says, surprising me.

“You do. In fact”—he looks from Lex to me and back again—“you share the same one. In fact, that is not all you share.”

Since the discovery of our symbols earlier, it is hard to look at her without seeing it. The flaw in each of our eyes, that shouldn't exist, but somehow does. How we mirror each other, not in exact appearance or attitude, but in our resolves. For almost eighteen years we have fought through life, only to be rewarded with the promise of more fighting to come.

“You share your birthday,” he says.

Twins.

Excerpted from
The Book of Indra,
Appendix IV: “Laws of Indra: The Population Control Acts”

As ordered by the Independent High Council of the City of Indra, it is hereby Law:

1. Women are prohibited from giving birth to more than one child.

2. Women are required to take the government-issued EX2 pill to prevent the conception of Twins.

3. Failure to comply in said Law will result in immediate banishment of both parental Cohabitants, as well as prompt seizure of Offspring.

4. Following seizure, the Independent High Council will determine the Twin they deem of Greater Use to Society.

5. The Twin not deemed such will be forfeited immediately to government holding for further tests.

I look at this uppity girl across from me. She wears gowns and says
perhaps
. She has a singing sword and her own island and a creature that shouldn't exist.

We are nothing alike.

She acts like she's different. From everyone else around her. Like somehow she is special.

Okay, maybe a little alike.

She doesn't say a word. Stares like she knows more than me. Like she sees through me. I hate her for that.

I want to punch her for even existing.

I don't have a chance.

Her arms are around me. And I don't push her off.

It feels good to not be alone for once.

I hadn't planned on putting my arms around Lex, and yet there they are. She's turned her face away from me, yet she keeps my embrace. I don't know what she's thinking, but the sleeve of my dress is wet with her tears.

I feel her fury: she'd rather not be standing with her arms around me.

And yet, she doesn't wish to let go either.

“I'm crying as well,” I tell her. “I'm crying with you. Maybe that's something twins do, I don't know.” I pat her back, like Governess would. We will work out what this means together. Of this I am sure.

She pulls back suddenly, her face streaked in tears.

“What is ‘twins'?” she asks.

At this point Roscoe gives us our space and stands lookout. He has nothing left to facilitate between us now, but he can't let us leave his sight.

Livia tells me that one of us should have died. And yet, here we are.

“They would just pick one? To kill?”

“Yes,” says Livia. “Though the law is rarely spoken about. It is rather old-fashioned. The EX2 controls the conception of twins, after all.”

“Not always, obviously,” I say. “And if anyone knew of us, one would die?”

Livia nods. “Though we have done so much wrong, I'm not certain they would spare either of us now.”

Now I'm pacing. It doesn't make sense. This is crazy, beyond insane.

“How do they pick?” I ask.

“I don't know. Why focus on things that haven't happened? Our parents refused to make that choice.”

That's when I realize she's wrong. Totally, completely wrong.

They picked
me
to get rid of. Yes, I'm still alive, but I didn't get to live on some island like her, to be coddled by a governess, kitchen staff, and garden crew. I most certainly wouldn't have lived
there all my life and allowed myself to be so
skinny
. I went to a place where you slept on cots and prayed you weren't the next one to go missing.

I was the twin they killed.

“I was sent to an Orphanage,” I tell her. “Did you know that?”

“I didn't even know you existed until today.”

“An Orphanage. You understand? Fighting just to eat. I had one uniform. One tiny bed. I was a number, do you get that? Somehow, I survived. Convinced them I was worthy. Without an Etiquette Tutor or Master . . .”

“You know nothing,” she says. “Only anger.”

We are worlds apart, once again. This is why the Upper and Lower Levels will never coexist.

“They should've picked you!” I say, pushing her against the alley wall. I'm screaming into her spoiled little face. “You got everything! You had an island and people to do every last thing you said and I was just . . . 242!”

I pull back my fist.

I force Lex off of me, and now
she's
fighting to be free of
me
. Yet at this moment, I'm stronger than her, strong enough that she doesn't have the luxury of ignoring me.

“No one else understands you, Lex, is that to be the correct assumption?” I ask, mimicking her rage too well. “No one else has ever had to suffer, it seems. You were given a number, and for that I apologize. Yet you were trained to do something that matters . . . and I was told to be quiet and look pretty. I was cinched up and spun on a pedestal until I was regarded as having no flaws. So you see, Lex? You are half-right. I did have everything . . . and absolutely nothing.”

“And everything I had,” she spits right back, “meant absolutely nothing.”

“Even Kane?”

I let go and back away, yet she doesn't move.

I stand across from her. Rage, resentment, and regret flowing between us. We're both crying. It's been too long since we've rested. The toll this day has taken overwhelms us both. We blame each other when neither is to blame. It takes a lot of silence for me to come to that conclusion.

There's a long, dark tunnel to travel below. We each grab a line and descend to join the others. Roscoe silently follows.

The rebels are smart enough to keep ahead of Roscoe, Livia, Kane, and me. I'm stuck with the old man, and Livia isn't helping. She's acting fascinated by everything, asking a million things. She's trying to act as though nothing happened. Doesn't want anyone to see her upset maybe. That is the polite response, I guess.