Rebels (39 page)

He holds Livia in outstretched arms. Looks at her. She smiles, all warmth. She reaches for him. He allows her to grab his finger, but his eyes are cold and hard. His jaw trembles faintly.

Notations are swept aside. Livia and I are laid side by side on his workstation. I watch, mesmerized, as he holds my chin still and lifts a laser to my eye. “You will find each other again,” he says.

The laser flashes and baby me opens her mouth to scream. I close my mouth and stare at him defiantly.

Little Livia is next. She cocks her head to the left and gives him a curious look.

“You will find each other and know. Just by looking each other in the eyes.”

Livia wails at the flash. My father chokes back his emotions and pauses as if making a decision. “Put her in the cradle pod,” he whispers. Roscoe places Livia in the tiny capsule. She's asleep instantly.

As Roscoe turns back, Father holds me tight. He kisses my forehead. “Go with her,” he says. Roscoe takes me. Father turns away from him, unable to bear the sight. When he looks back, Roscoe is gone. So am I.

I turn to the Roscoe still in the room. The old one who shows me horrible Archives. “Where did you take me?” I ask.

“The Lower Levels,” he says quietly. “The Orphanage.”

“I am ready,” my mother says as she emerges from behind the curtain to join our father, her face tearless and hard as stone. She lifts me from the cradle pod, and I remain asleep. My eyes move fast beneath the fragile skin of my eyelids.
Hopefully I am dreaming of something pretty.

“It did not have to be this way,” says my father.

“Of course it did. I could not live . . . if they had not.” She pulls me close to her chest. “Besides, I should have left long ago. I hate this place.
Indra
. You can ignore the truth for only so long. We were never meant to be up here. The Founders did us all a disservice.”

“It's not safe out there,” he says.

“Not yet. Because we've stopped trying to make it so. Imagine if you'd turned your mind to making that possible?”

“Then our daughters would not exist. You cannot have everything.”

Her face softens. “That doesn't mean we shouldn't stop trying. We owe the world to them. We must try to ensure that it welcomes them when the time comes.”

“If only we could do that together.”

She stares down at baby me, then up at the ceiling. Anywhere but his face.

“Where will you go?” he asks.

“I'm not sure. My mother has told me all my life that we're descendants of the Founders. That the blood of Atros is also mine and my children's. But now I know his mistakes are ours as well. I will survive, do not fear.” She takes a deep breath. “I wish I was that certain about you.”

My father moves toward her, his gaze unwavering, until they are very close. The baby me gives a small sigh from between them.

“Look at me, Delphia.”

“I cannot.”

“Please,” he says.

Their eyes lock. Suddenly, she reaches for him, grasps him tightly, and pulls him toward her. She kisses him with ferocious abandon.

A good-bye kiss.

She pulls away and then she's gone.

We are returned to Roscoe's study.
In a cavern
, I remind myself.
In Rock Bottom.

No one speaks as we remove our Archive chips. There is no more to see. That is all that remains of our parents.

I can't look at Livia or Roscoe. I can barely tolerate my own racing mind.

“Where did she take me?” Livia asks, her voice smaller than I expect.

“Her music studio,” Roscoe says. “She left you sleeping at the base of her air harp. She couldn't take either of you, she knew that. If she was found out, one of you wouldn't have survived. That was not an acceptable risk.”

“And the imprint our father gave us both,” I say, “why did he do that?”

“Only he and your mother have that answer.”

“Great,” Livia says. “So we'll never know.”

“Did you never receive your father's research?”

Livia shakes her head. “Marius told me it no longer existed.”

“Marius?”

“My guardian.”

“Yes, yes, I remember Marius, but . . . Waslo had orders.” His face boils with anger. “Your father's work is rightfully yours! You should have been given that long ago. You must retrieve it at all costs.”

“What about our father's lab?” Livia asks. “Would it help if we went there?”

“I should think, if it's still hidden beneath your grandparents' island,” answers Roscoe.

I ask, “The Island, does it have a name?”

“Orona. I haven't been there since you were born . . . The PCF raided it when they came after your father. They even instituted a no-fly zone over its airspace for the shame he brought upon Indra. I even heard rumors that riggers tried to demolish it, but it was booby-trapped, and they fled.”

“That wouldn't have stopped a rigger, no way,” I say. “What about that law? The one you told me about.”

“The Law of Twins,” replies Livia.

“Yes,” says Roscoe.

“I never heard of it in the Academy. Even in Indrithian Customs.”

“It is not something spoken of even in Proper circles. An older law, though still viable. Not mentioned because it is so rarely needed. The EX2 pill, after all, was your father's greatest creation.”

“Not us?”

“Yes, of course.” He barely smiles. “I am sure you take dosages yourselves.” Livia and I look at each other.

Of course we do
, I think.
Popping your daily EX2 is like getting up in the morning. You do it without even thinking. All thanks to one man. Our father.
“As you know, Indra must protect its limited resources. With the creation of EX2, multiple births would never be a problem. A single-child limit could be easily enforced.” I can hear the bitterness creeping into his voice. “Want a child? Just trade the EX2 for the 2.2 Supplement. Conceive said child, birth the infant, and live pleasantly ever after.” He sighs. “As long as you resume your daily EX2 dosage, you will be obeying Indrithian guidelines to the letter.”

“Is it used down here?”

“Of course not.”

He sounds so clinical. The geneticist side, I know, but I'm uneasy. He's talking about children, after all. He's talking about
us
.

It's been days since I've had my last dose. Livia, as well. I guess we will see what happens without our father's invention.

“But why did he create it?” I ask.

“To preserve Indra that is.”

“Then he was a fool.”

“Your father realized his mistake.”

“Too late for him, and too late for us.”

“Your father,” Roscoe intones, “paid for his
foolishness
. We have all made mistakes that haunt us, do not think that gives you the right to . . .” His anger overcomes him.

“But our mother,” Livia interjects. “It didn't work on her?”

“No. She could not conceive at all. Could not have what she wanted most in the world: a child.”

“So our father created something new to help her. Reason to say it would probably help any woman with a similar condition.”

“Yes, but his lab was destroyed, and Indra had no need of more children. There are some flaws it does not wish to fix.”

Livia looks at me in the firelight. The imprint in her eye is shining. “The people of Upper Indra are wrong to fear us,” I say, “and not to hope that we can show them a better future.”

“There was no other option,” says Roscoe. “Since your mother refused to abort the embryos and insisted upon bringing the babies to term, she and your father only had one choice. She was a wise woman, Delphia. I miss her every day.”

Lex and I exchange knowing looks. She gives me a sad smile.
There is no reason to ask Roscoe, for we already know the answer. We heard it in his words:
I miss her every day.

Truth be told, we probably knew long before that. Our mother is dead. And she has been dead for a very long time.

“What about our father?” I say. “What happened to him? After you took Lex to the Orphanage and Mother left me at her air harp?”

A strange look crosses Roscoe's face. Pain?

“I do not know,” he says. “I never saw him again.”

From the tone of his voice, I know Armand Cosmo's fate as well. Father's outcome was most likely the same as mother's.

I am an orphan, just as I always knew I was.

We
are orphans.

“You are special, Lex and Livia,” Roscoe says. “And even before you were born, Delphia already had a sense.”

“A sense of what?” asks Lex. She's trying to keep strong, I know, yet I hear the faint shaking in her voice.

“That you would be special.
Very
special. And for that fact, your mother was eternally thankful.”

For the first time in my life, I do not mind that word.

“The injections changed us,” Lex says.

“I do not know if that is what he intended, but I suspect you are correct. He knew you would have to survive on your own.”

“Then he chose for us to be different,” I say.

“The drive to be different, to separate from the pack, is what motivated the Founders. Our history may show us to be slow to accept new ideas and ways of thinking, but we desperately need them. We can always be better. Though Indra believes itself to exist in a perpetual state of perfection, you must show them what they cannot see.

“Perhaps the injections were an influence, but they are only part of what makes you two so special. There is far more to your uniqueness than a twist in your genetics.”

“More?” says Lex. “How much
more
can there be?” She's reached
her limit, and soon she will explode.
Stay calm
, I want to tell her, but I would be a hypocrite, as my own heart is racing, my mind searching for answers.

“I get it, okay?” she continues. “Livia and I are
against the law
. We have these weird capabilities—”

“Gifts,” says Roscoe.

“Maybe because of injections. Or maybe not. It doesn't matter either way.” Her voice is growing strained. “But what more could there be? We are freaks,
end of story
.”

“There is also the matter of destiny,” says Roscoe. “Your destinies, to be exact.”

“Destiny?” Lex is incredulous. “To the core with your destiny.
Destined
to be outcasts, perhaps, and you are
destined
to search for another set of saviors. Let's go,” she says to me, “before he fills us with more nonsense and half-truths.”

I stare up at her face. She is an angry stranger, yet she is also my sister.

I rise, standing next to my twin. But I cannot move with her. “I think Roscoe misspoke. Destiny is written in stone. It is the stuff of make-believe.”

“An old man who still places his trust in make-believe is a danger to both of us.”

“Make-believe, perhaps,” he says, “but let an old man believe in something. In the days after former earth but before New Indra, it is said that a pair of twins shaped the world into what it was to be. Andru and Atros, two of the Founders were twins, your ancestors. So some were taught, and yes, I am one who believes them, that twins will come again to unite our two worlds, the way they're supposed to be. Since the Lower Levels came into existence, every child on the day they are born is told that one day twins will arrive below in their seventeenth year.”

“And do
what
?” asks Lex.

Roscoe takes us both by the hand. “Lead us all out of Indra.”

Livia looks like she might pass out. I put my arm around her, and she's amenable to my touch.

“Leave Indra? We'll burn to a crisp,” I say. “Everyone knows that. Burn up the second we step outside. The earth is uninhabitable. That's why we came here in the first place.”

“Not the entire earth,” says Roscoe. “Just the area bordering Indra. That is the only place that still burns, but only because Indra wills it. The radiation is a by-product of its own overworked ecosystem. But beyond that . . . an inhabitable world exists. Some have already escaped to the Outlands.”

“How come more do not flee?”

“The journey is hard. The supplies, even harder to come by. It's not meant for all.”

“How would they get past?” I ask.

“There is a tunnel. It comes up right past the irradiated area. It is long and dangerous, but two such as you, you have already faced much worse. All hope that you will go yourselves, and seek out others who you will find living in the Outlands. Bring them back to the Lower Levels. Unite their forces with the ones already gathered.”

Sure
, I think.
Just that easy
.

“With your help, Lex and Livia, we will take back all of Indra. Upper and Lower.”

“I don't want to rule Indra,” I say.

“Me either,” Livia agrees.

“Then return it to its people,” Roscoe says.

“That,” I say, “is core-low crazy. Its people are what have gotten us here in the first place.”

I don't believe it's possible, what he suggests. I don't think he misleads us, but I'm far from a dreamer.

Then I hear something. Livia, softly whispering in my ear. “We can do it,” she says. “I feel it.”

Together we have experienced most of what this world has to offer, and found it sorely lacking. I have followed orders, and she has conformed to Indra's highest social standards, and yet, here we are apart from it all. Unwanted. Roscoe may be crazy, but he is right, too. This world needs improving.

A shudder runs through my body.
Is it possible?
It sounds like a make-believe. Not something that could actually happen.