Taken (20 page)

The food is surprisingly tasty but carefully rationed. I’m still hungry when I finish my small meal—a cup of soup, a piece of bread, a half ear of corn—but some food is better than none. Bree and I sit at a table with several other Rebels whom she instantly joins in conversation. She avoids introducing me, so I simply listen.

“We haven’t found them yet,” Bree tells a stout boy sitting beside her.

“You said Luke had one, though,” he interjects.

“Dammit, Hal, do you never listen?” another girl at the table argues, chucking a clump of bread at his face. “They caught one of them days ago, and Luke’s been questioning him, but no new developments since then.”

“Well, thanks for putting it so bluntly, Polly.” Hal throws the bit of bread back at her. It hits her square between the eyes and falls into her soup, crust first. The impact splatters broth onto the front of her tunic and the brown braids that frame her face.

“If we’re talking details,” Bree says, clearing her throat and making it apparent that she, and only she, has all the facts, “the man we caught isn’t giving up anything. Won’t tell us any of the operation’s details or a possible location of Evan’s troops. My guess is they’re long gone.”

“Gone where?” Hal asks.

“Back to Taem,” she says. “I think our chances of catching them are few and far between, and the man in the interrogation center will likely die under Luke’s blade before revealing anything.”

“Bummer.” Polly sighs. She drags her bread across the base of her cup and sops up the remaining broth.

“Yeah,” Bree agrees, “but at least we’ve got Gray now. Maybe he can shed some light on the mission.”

“You were with the Order?” Polly nearly shrieks, acknowledging me for the first time.

“No . . . not really,” I say. “I was about to be executed, so I was trying to come here. But then I ran into the Order’s camp, and my brother was there, and I tried to—”

“So your brother’s with the Order,” Hal interrupts. “Trash. I don’t know why we show mercy to your lot. I think we should only take the ones that show up at the Crevice with their hands over their heads and walk in, begging to join. The ones that risk their lives attempting to get here are the only trustworthy ones.”

“That’s what I was trying to do,” I argue.

Hal snorts. “Sure. Or maybe that’s just your story. Besides, running to us because you were going to be executed proves nothing other than the fact that you only care about your own hide.”

“He’s Owen’s son,” Bree says. “If he’s anything like his father, we just might end up happy we have him. And his brother, too, if he ever wakes up.”

“Maybe,” Hal says. “Or maybe he’s a Forgery. It’s a crapshoot with these flaky acquisitions.”

“Excuse me folks, but I think I’ll determine if he’s a Forgery.” There’s a middle-aged man standing behind Hal and Polly and staring at me. He’s wearing an odd sweater that lacks arms and struggles to hold an otherwise bland shirt in place. I know who he is. Those eyes, those dark, dark eyes.

“Sorry to interrupt your dinner,” he continues, “but I need to borrow Gray here. Turns out, Fallyn convinced Ryder it would do good to run a few tests to be sure.”

“To be sure of what?” I ask.

“That you’re who you say you are. That you’re not a Forgery.” He smiles, and it fills out the otherwise hollow coves of his cheeks. His eyes even brighten a little. He is so plain in person, so feeble. I wonder why Frank wants him back so badly—and alive, no less—if he isn’t actually responsible for the Laicos Project.

“Oh, go on already,” Bree grumbles, elbowing me in the side. “Harvey couldn’t hurt a fly.”

Harvey chuckles lightly and lifts a hand from his pocket. “How foolish of me, not introducing myself. I’m Harvey Maldoon. I head up all technological operations here in Crevice Valley.”

“Gray Weathersby,” I say, shaking his hand. He has a weak grip and even softer fingers.

“Well, that is what we are about to confirm. That you are indeed Gray Weathersby.” He smiles again, waving an arm in a sweeping motion. “Shall we?”

He leads me from the table and down yet another darkened passageway as Bree and her friends stare on with interest.

TWENTY-FIVE

IN A WINDOWLESS ROOM, HIDDEN
among Crevice Valley’s innumerable folds, Harvey hooks me up to an odd-looking machine. He tells me to not worry, that nothing will hurt, but it’s hard to believe him. The machine has needles and levers and knobs that he twists to his liking after attaching various cords to my arms and temples. I’m certain pain is going to jolt through me at any moment, but when Harvey says we are ready to begin, the pain never comes.

“State your name,” he says.

“Gray Weathersby.”

Harvey makes a mark on a piece of paper feeding through the unit.

“Your age.”

“Eighteen. Only . . . I thought I was seventeen until a few weeks ago.”

Harvey looks up at me over the rim of his glasses as he marks the paper again.

“And why’s that?”

“My family lied to me. Told me I was a year younger—told everyone, actually—to see if I would be Heisted with Blaine.”

“I see.” Another mark. “And who is Blaine?”

“My brother.”

“Where is he now?”

“To the best of my knowledge, he’s in your hospital. They tell me he’s in a coma.”

It goes on like this for far too long. Question after question about my past, my time in Taem, my journey through the Great Forest and into Crevice Valley. Eventually, when Harvey seems to be wrapping up, a voice cuts into the room, amplified through an unseen device.

“Ask him something more personal,” it demands. Fallyn.

“He’s done well enough,” Harvey says, giving me a reassuring smile before whispering, “She likes to overdo things.”

“I mean it, Harvey. Ask something the Order wouldn’t know.”

Harvey looks at a mirror lining the wall and I get the feeling Fallyn is somehow watching from behind it.

“Just humor her,” a second voice says. This one belongs to Ryder.

“I’ll need a little help with the questions.” Harvey sighs in frustration.

My father speaks next. “What toy did I leave you and your brother before my Heist?”

“A wooden duck on wheels.”

“How many paces is it to the top of the Council stairs?”

“Thirty-six.”

“Why did Emma follow you over the Wall?”

I pause for a second. This question is harder. “She wanted answers. Like I did.”

“Who on earth is Emma and why does she matter?” Fallyn asks irritably.

I’m annoyed by this comment. Furious, even. “She matters because I am responsible for her being in Frank’s jail right now. She is amazing and sweet and strong willed, and I ran from her. I love her and yet I ran so that I could live.”

Harvey smirks at the mirror. “Well, there’s really no point asking anything else,” he announces. “We all know Forgeries are incapable of love. Not to mention he passed every question with flying colors, not even a smidgeon of deceit in his answers.”

“Well, one more question then,” Fallyn says. “What was the goal of that Order troop? Why was Evan looking to approach Mount Martyr?”

“It was called Operation Ferret,” I say. “The mission was to infiltrate Rebel Headquarters and bring Harvey back at all costs. Alive.”

“Now I wonder why they’d want to do that,” Harvey muses aloud, a playful note of humor in his voice.

“It’s quite obvious why, isn’t it, Harvey?” Fallyn jeers. “You’ve given us too much of an edge since you joined. The Order can’t deal with your revealing their secrets anymore.”

“Wait, what?” I ask.

“The Order’s greatest weapon is near useless against us now,” Fallyn continues. “Harvey knows all the secrets, the ticks, the signs. And Frank can’t have that. He can’t have someone revealing how all his technologies work, preparing for how to defend against them. Plus, he wants Harvey to finish the job he started.”

I stare at the mirror in the back of the room. “I’m not following any of this.”

Fallyn sighs heavily. “They want him back. They want back the man who engineered the Forgeries.”

This is how another truth is revealed to me, ironed out before my eyes. My father said that it was impossible for Harvey to have started the Laicos Project because he would have been too young. And this is true. But Harvey was utilized at a young age. He was somewhat of a child prodigy, a genius with technology and genetics. After Frank’s workers failed to create the tools he had hoped from the Heisted boys, Harvey was recruited at sixteen years old.

He worked in the Order’s defense and weaponry units in Union Central. He spent months, bent over operating tables, extracting what he needed from Heisted boys. Many terms that I do not understand are mentioned, but through his technological ingenuity, Harvey created what no other scientist or lab worker could. Harvey produced the first Forgery. It was identical to the Heisted boy, both in appearance and personality, opening its eyes with the same skills and mannerisms as its source. The Forgery was strong and healthy, but it was still only one soldier.

Despite Frank’s wishes, Harvey couldn’t create multiple Forgeries from a single test subject. Each further replica was a weaker, fuzzier, less perfect version of the first, growing ill and perishing quickly. Frank urged Harvey to stay focused, and in the meantime, put the first generation of Forgeries to work on the front lines. They were effective in the field against AmWest, stealthy and powerful.

“A few years ago, things fell apart,” Harvey says, as my father, Ryder, and Fallyn join us in the room. “I had been working to create limitless Forgeries for many years, and still couldn’t crack it. One day, the subject I was running a test on died during the procedure. Even though it was a Forgery of a Forgery, I realized it was still a real, living, breathing person. He had thoughts and a heart and a pulse. It was as if a veil of ignorance shattered then. For the first time in years I saw what I was doing. I was cutting up children and trying to make weapons for a man whose tactics I didn’t fully support.

“Things had gone from bad to worse in Taem since I started working for Frank. Sure, the city was orderly and he protected the people from AmWest, but everything was regulated to an extreme. For me, water was plentiful and there was a library always at my disposal for research. Frank even let me play old records of Mozart while I worked because I said it helped me focus. But all around me, people were being arrested for those very same acts.

“So the next day when I was supposed to report for work, I got on the trolley, went the other direction, and didn’t look back. I found a poor town beyond the dome willing to take me in. I stayed there for a few months, until the Order came looking for me. I took to the next town, and then the next. But they kept coming. They never stopped.

“I ran into Elijah in the Great Forest about three months ago. He told me that all across AmEast people had started to leave cities under Order control. Backlash in Taem was the worst. They knew the threat from AmWest was as present as ever, but they didn’t believe Frank’s way of life was their only option. Even former subjects of his project were slipping free when they could, running while on missions, or being snatched up by Elijah’s troops when intersected in the forest. Elijah told me about a hideout he’d recently established, burrowed inside the mountains. He said I was welcome there.

“I had no intention of joining him until he mentioned the look-alikes, the familiar faces that had begun showing up, only to murder people in their sleep. I knew immediately that Frank must have realized his Forgeries had an in. I doubt he liked the idea of people gathering in opposition to him, was probably terrified that they would poison his city with the idea that he was unjust. Or maybe he feared these Rebels would leak information to AmWest about water resources and access points to the domed cities. Regardless, he was using the Forgeries in an attempt to squash the Rebels, and I knew I could help.

“Now, when anyone new enters Crevice Valley, I immediately run him through my test and determine if he can be trusted. You and your brother are a unique case, of course. You came here together, one on the verge of death. That would have taken quite some planning had you been Forgeries. Not to mention you were captured. Most Forgeries walk right to us, claiming to be seeking shelter when they are truly spies.

“My arrival in Crevice Valley has made it hard for Frank. Forgeries used to be his way inside, and that weapon has become nearly ineffective. I know it’s nothing in comparison to all I’ve done in Frank’s labs, but I hope that my work here is a step in the right direction. I hope that one day someone like you, a victim of the Laicos Project, will be thankful for at least some of my work.”

Harvey’s story ends here. He smiles at me, but my stomach is so unsettled I can’t respond.

At first I hate him. How could he have
ever
thought his work for Frank was justified? But if I am unable to accept his change of heart, I’m no better than Hal or Polly, who disregarded me because I was brought into Crevice Valley by force. People have all sorts of pasts, sometimes dark or dreary, but perhaps the actions they choose in the present are the ones that carry the most weight. And Harvey is here, making changes, looking to undo the wrongs he has created. Maybe Harvey is okay.

“So what now?” my father asks, addressing no one in particular.

“Evan’s group has retreated back to Taem,” Ryder says. “And our scouts say the city has nearly recovered from the recent attack by AmWest. Regardless, if Frank wants Harvey, he will not rest until he has him.”

“Right, so what now?” my father urges again.

“We are well fortified here. We wait for them to approach again, and this time, we take out the entire unit. If they try again, we repeat. Harvey, I’m afraid for the time being you’ll be limited to Crevice Valley. It is far too risky for you to set foot outside.”

“Fair enough.” Harvey nods.

“That’s it?” I ask. “We just sit and wait? I thought you guys were all for fighting?”

“We are, Gray,” Ryder says, “but these things take time. When we are ready for that strike, it will be well planned and meticulously executed. For now, we wait and counter each advance as needed.”