Terra (11 page)

“Take it easy. You can keep that one too. I meant I could give you another one. It’s not just you, right? You take care of your younger brother. It’d be much easier if you each had your own filter. Or you could leave one at home—they attach to faucets too—and keep the other one portable.”

I purse my lips. He’s right, of course. It would make a world of difference for Mica and me. I can only imagine how much steel we’ll save if we can cross canteens off our purchase list. Still, I’m not sure I want to bring Adam to Sixteen. What kind of research would necessitate a visit there, when he didn’t even appear to know what or where it was until I told him?

“So what do you say?” Adam asks.

I feel the pressure building on me as he waits for my response. I go back and forth—yes or no, risk or reward—before I get an idea. The plan is already half-formed when I finally open my mouth.

“All right, fine,” I say. “You can come. We’ll figure out a story on the way. But I want the water filter first.”

Adam grins. “You got it.” He picks up a filter ring from the top of the table and tosses it at me. I reach out to grab it with my free hand but it zooms over my head. It rings out as it bounces on the floor behind me.

“Nice catch,” he teases.

“Nice throw,” I retort.

Adam scoops up the rest of his tools from the desk and retreats to the back of the room. Packing, I assume. I snatch up the filter from the floor and unzip the backpack, keeping an eye on Adam’s back. I pull the machine out of my pocket and dump it in the bag as well, then zip the backpack up before he has time to turn around.

“So… is there a, um, facility in here?” I stutter. “I have to… you know…”

Adam whips his head around, his brows creased in confusion. “Huh? Oh. Oh! Yeah, of course. Back through those doors, to the left. Sign with a bald person in a dress on the door, you can’t miss it. Let me just gather the rest of this stuff up, and I’ll meet you there when you’re done.”

“Thanks,” I say, my cheeks blazing. I hoist my irrationally heavy backpack high on my shoulders as I hurry into the hall. I can’t help but feel like my guilt is what’s weighing it down.

I charge down the hall and into the bathroom. It’s long and narrow with several walled-off stalls on one side of the room, and a row of sinks on the other. On the far end is a half-sized window at head height. Not the easiest escape route, but it’ll do.

I hop into one of the stalls. When I emerge, I brace my hands on either side of a sink and stare at my reflection in the mirror above it.

My hair sticks out in all directions, barely contained by my hair elastic anymore. My cheeks are still pink and there’s dirt on the left side of my face, as well as down my neck. There is a rip in the fabric of my t-shirt near my collarbone and faint red scratches run up both of my arms. I run the tap and gently wash my hands—they still feel a little raw—making sure to scrape out the dirt from beneath my fingernails. I splash some cool water on my face, careful to avoid my mouth and eyes. I wouldn’t be surprised if this water is already semi-filtered, like the tap water at home—not clean enough to drink, but good enough to wash in. Still, better safe than sorry.

I gently press on the side of my head where I hit it against the platform in the tunnel and wince when I feel the lump there. When I shake out my hair from its ponytail, my dark brown strands stay flattened in that spot. I carefully lift up a lock and realize that the hair there is slicked down with blood. I hadn’t even realized I’d been bleeding.

I pool some water in my hands and gingerly wash the blood out of my hair as best I can. The water runs pink as it swirls down the drain. Fortunately, the cut on my head is shallow and superficial. It doesn’t take long to clean it up.

I try to pull my hair back into a bun, but the bump makes it too painful. Somewhat begrudgingly, I settle for leaving it down in its wild state: wet and flat on one side, tangled and erratic on the other, with a large crimp from my hair elastic running through the middle.

“You look amazing,” I tell my reflection.

I walk over to the window at the far end of the bathroom. It’s about two feet wide and a foot and a half tall—just enough room for me to shimmy through. The window is hinged at the top and shut with a simple latch at the bottom. I twist the lock and the window pops open at an angle.

I unzip my backpack to take a quick inventory. Though the raiders left me the empty canteen, they appear to have taken everything else, including my flashlight. I instinctively groan as I think about how much steel it will take to replace, before remembering that cost isn’t as dire a concern anymore. I secure the machine by tucking it into an interior pocket, then zip the bag closed. I shove it through the open window first, then hike my foot up onto the sink nearest to me and hoist myself up.

Not without difficulty, I squirm through the opening and drop down onto the grass outside. I search around my feet for the backpack, but it’s nowhere to be found.

“Looking for something?”

I spin around to see Adam leaning against the side of the building, one leg propped up behind him. His voice is filled with amusement as he holds the bag out in front of him, dangling it from two of his fingers like bait.

“How did you—”

“I wasn’t born yesterday, Terra. Let’s go.” He tosses the bag to me and I cringe as I catch it. Did he look inside? I doubt he had time to, but the thought still makes me nervous.

“Sorry,” I say sheepishly, though I’m not sure exactly what I’m apologizing for: taking the machine or trying to leave him behind.

“Don’t worry about it. I wouldn’t be too inclined to trust me either.”

“Where’s your stuff?” I say, changing the subject.

Adam turns around to show me the thin pack slung across his back.

“All of it fit in there?” I ask skeptically.

“I left a few things behind, but it’s bigger than it looks.” He starts to walk away from the building and, reluctantly, I follow.

We walk back into the trees and I pluck a leaf off a low-hanging branch, twirling it between my fingers like he did earlier. “I’m still trying to wrap my head around the fact that all of this is fake,” I say.

“Well, it’s not really,” Adam says. “This is real grass, these are real trees, you drank real water. It just all happens to be down here. The sunlight is the only thing that’s fake.”

“That feels real too, though,” I admit.

“Yeah, it really is something, isn’t it? The panels mimic the normal cycle of day and night. It’s not a perfect match, but the sunsets in particular are quite accurate.” He looks sideways at me for a moment.

I look down to avoid meeting his eye. “Sunsets aren’t really my thing,” I say, stalking ahead of him.

Adam suddenly grabs my arm.

“Hey!” I protest. “You can’t force me to watch a fake sunset with you.”

“I’m sorry, did you want to walk into the wall?” he says.

I reach out into the air in front of me. Less than a foot from my face, I feel the cool resistance of metal beneath my fingers.

“Oh.”

Adam pushes on an invisible plate and, just like before, the scene before me shifts. A shallow doorway appears and I realize that he was right; there’s no way I would have been able to find this on my own, even if I had walked straight into the wall.

“You could have told me it was so close by,” I say.

“After you,” he says, sliding open the door inside. I tilt my head to peer through it and am met with the familiar blackness of the underground tunnels.

“You wouldn’t happen to have a flashlight, would you?” I ask.

Adam grins and pulls a tiny flashlight, no bigger than his index finger, out of his pocket and hands it to me.

“Er, thanks,” I say as he offers the laughably-small light to me. “I guess this is better than nothing.”

“I imagine it will be,” Adam says. “Twist the top to turn it on.”

I venture forward into the darkness, twisting a ridge at the top as instructed. The light that flares out from the flashlight is so bright that I yelp in surprise. The entire tunnel is illuminated. From behind me, I hear poorly muffled laughter.

“Think it’ll do?” Adam says innocently.

The tunnels here are cluttered with less debris than the ones I entered from, so we move through them quickly. Adam guides me with gentle directions; before long, we’re standing at the bottom of another stairwell.

“And you’re sure this goes back up to the surface?” I ask for the third time.

He sighs.

“Okay, okay,” I say as I begin my ascent. The steps feel much steeper going up than they did running down, and I find myself struggling for breath. Adam says nothing about my lack of stamina, nor does he offer to help.

After climbing for a while, the stairwell becomes noticeably brighter. I twist the flashlight off and hand it back to Adam. We emerge into sunlight in front of another locked black gate, though the padlock faces us this time.

Ugh, more climbing.

I take quick breaths through my nose to mask my labored breathing as I shove my foot between the bars and prepare to climb, but Adam shoves his hand onto my shoulder and stops me.

“Let me try something,” he says. He walks over and plants himself squarely in front of the padlock. Though I can’t see exactly what he’s doing, I do see his shoulders tense and the muscles flex in his back. A second later, I hear the grating sound of chains uncoiling.

“Carry a lock pick in your pocket, do you?” I say.

“Um…” Adam looks at me warily before responding. “Not exactly.” He holds up his hand and wiggles his fingers.

“Ah.”
Of course. He can pick locks with his mind.
“Well, no need to be all secretive about it on my account. Feel free to utilize your, er, talents as you see fit.”

“I didn’t want to freak you out again,” he replies.

“Why don’t we just assume from now on that I’m just generally freaked out at all times?”

Adam chuckles quietly as he pushes the gate open and scans the street. “No raiders,” he confirms. He steps onto the pavement and I walk out beside him.

Chapter 10

“Do you have any idea where we are?” I ask.

“You’re the local,” Adam says with a shrug.

“This hardly qualifies as my neighborhood.” I scan the new area. Buildings box us in on three sides, a block out in each direction, but the area where we have emerged is flat and empty. The ground is cracked and dry, sloping in front of us to form a dusty brown hill. The bottom half of a gargantuan stone obelisk is planted ceremonially in the middle of the hill. The top portion has broken off and lays in two pieces on the ground.

“I already miss it down there,” I say with a sigh. Wherever we are, the landscape of the District here differs drastically from the cityscape I ran through earlier. The area surrounding us is barren and still; I doubt there’s another underground entrance for miles.

“Tell me about it,” Adam says. “We covered at least two miles in the tunnel. I haven’t had a chance to collect data around here yet.”

I scan the horizon. The artificial sun in the biodome felt real, but the actual sun beats down much more unforgivingly. I squint into the distance, then glance back towards Adam. His pale skin practically glows in the sunlight. “If you’ve been down here for a week, and have been out in the ruins, collecting data and whatnot,” I begin, “why hasn’t your skin started to darken? I didn’t see a giant tube of sunscreen amongst your things.”

Adam creases his brow. “I… don’t need sunscreen,” he says finally.

“What?” I say, not bothering to hide my shock. “So in addition to portable water filters, you have some kind of portable UV filter too?”

“Not exactly,” he says slowly. “It’s more like… a procedure. My skin doesn’t absorb the sun the same way yours does.”

“Oh, of course. Heaven forbid anything happens that might sully your perfect paleness,” I say bitterly. Apparently, slathering on tube after tube of expensive sunscreen lotion isn’t enough anymore. Skydwellers have become so vain, they’re actually getting procedures done to preserve their vanity. Or they’re just getting lazier. Or both.

Adam becomes quiet, sensing my sudden upsurge of anger at the continued imbalance of our worlds. After a minute, he clears his throat. “So… do you recognize anything?”

I blink a few times, refocusing my mind on the task at hand. “That building kind of looks familiar,” I notice, pointing to a tall structure in the distance that has exposed girders where the roof should be. “But I’d need to see further out to tell where to go.” As much as I hate the idea of heading back toward the raiders, it’s our best bet for getting out of the ruins.

“Let’s get you a better vantage point then,” Adam says.

The barren ground shifts back into crumbling city streets as we make our way to the familiar building. We stop at the bare brass frame of what was once a double-door entrance; shards of glass dust the ground.

“Are you sure about this?” I ask.

“Not especially,” he answers. He steps through the doorway and offers his hand to pull me through. I shove past him without taking it. He rolls his eyes.

The room we enter is dark. The late-afternoon light that streams in from the doorway behind us only reaches so far. Adam pulls his flashlight out of his pocket and places it in my free hand, twisting the top for me as I hold the base. Light flares out from the tiny flashlight, and I see we are standing in an ornate lobby. It reminds me of the casino on the skycity, Lexicon—or of the photos I’ve seen, at least. The lobby’s walls are webbed with cracks, but the marble that lines them is smooth and polished. The ceiling seems miles above us, and old sofas that have been leeched of their color are set in fours across from each other. The sofas form little square booths that sparsely dot the room. Their legs have sunken into cracks in the patterned tile, as if the floor is trying to swallow them. An elaborate chandelier lies in pieces in the middle of the room; delicate crystals and heavy golden candelabras are strewn across the floor, twinkling under the flashlight’s beam as it passes over them.

I step forward into the room, awed by its grandeur. As I walk, a thick cloud of dust rises around my ankles. I point the flashlight at the floor, and swirls of dust dance along the cracked tile beneath my feet, the motes twirling around each other in the shadows. I am suddenly aware of how alone we are.