“Because a city wall isn’t as simple as the wall of a building. It has to be thicker. Stronger. It doesn’t just define the edge of Lakeview; it defends the city from anything on the other side.”
Yet in my lifetime, Lakeview has not been in need of defense, that I know of. Was that different in the past? Did we have enemies determined to breach such a barrier?
“This wall is twelve feet thick and twenty feet tall, and it’s hollow on the inside to allow for the movement of troops and supplies regardless of the conditions outside. We’ve come up in the middle, so we’ve bypassed the locked gate that lets people inside the wall. But there’s another up ahead. That one actually leads out of the city.”
“Can you open it?” I ask.
“We’re about to find out.”
“What does that mean?”
“That means that a camera feed is one thing, but I doubt my basic electronic systems unit gave me sufficient skills to hack the VIP gate. But I’m going to give it a shot.”
Yet after several minutes and a series of dimly lit wall sconces, no gate appears. Finally Trigger stops walking.
“What’s wrong?” I glance back the way we came. “Are we going the wrong way?”
He shakes his head. “We can’t be.” But he turns to follow my gaze anyway. “I could have sworn the gate was to the left. We should have found it by now.”
“Well, unless they’ve moved it, I think we went the wrong way.”
“But we didn’t,” he insists. “I patrolled this section of the wall for an entire week. Let’s just round that curve, and if the gate isn’t there we’ll go back.”
Yet before we even get to the curve, laughter echoes toward us from some point beyond it.
Trigger freezes. His eyes close. “That’s the patrol break room,” he whispers. “The break room was left. The gate was right.”
“We all make mistakes.” Evidently. I take his hand and try to pull him back the way we came, but he stands his ground, staring in the direction of the laughter.
“I didn’t think there’d be anyone patrolling right now. We’re a month away from the summit.”
“You can’t know everything that happens in Lakeview, Trigger.”
“Yes, but I checked the security status using my instructor’s clearance and there was nothing listed. Whatever’s going on here, Defense officially knows nothing about it.”
“Even more reason we should get moving. Come on,” I whisper fiercely, tugging on his hand now.
He takes one step backward. Then we both go still as footsteps echo toward us from around the curve.
“Too late,” Trigger mumbles. “Stay put.”
“Why?” I ask as he retreats into shadow, where the light from one sconce doesn’t quite meet the light from the next. A second later a soldier rounds the curve. Only he isn’t a typical patrol soldier. He’s wearing all black—like the Administrator’s private security.
The soldier stops when he sees me, and his hand hovers over the gun strapped to the belt at his waist. “Who are…?” He steps closer, and his gaze focuses on my face. “Oh.” His hand falls away from his gun. “What are you…?”
Trigger appears silently in the shadows behind him, a silhouette against what little light falls on the passage inside the city’s wall. Before the soldier can turn, Trigger wraps one arm around his neck and squeezes, applying extra pressure by gripping his own wrist with his free hand.
The soldier claws at Trigger’s arm, but within seconds his face turns an alarming shade of red. His eyes roll into his head and his arms go slack. When his legs fold beneath him, Trigger drags the poor man into the deepest shadows against the wall.
“I don’t think he was going to shoot me,” I whisper as Trigger ushers me back the way we came.
“Of course not.” We pass through the light from one fixture into the light of the next, our footsteps nearly silent on the stone floor. “The Administrator wants you alive.”
“No, I mean he didn’t seem like a threat.”
“You’re wrong about that. Only the deadliest Special Forces soldiers are recruited for private security.” His pause feels strangely heavy. “That was my ambition.”
“I’m sorry.” I’ve pulled him from the life of honor and distinction he was supposed to have.
“Don’t be. There’s something exciting about not knowing what’s next. Don’t you think? Something exhilarating.”
I’m not sure I do think that. As much as I like the idea of picking wild vegetables, I also liked knowing when and where I would get my next meal. I liked sitting with Poppy in the cafeteria, trading my corn for her tomatoes.
It’s dinnertime, and I don’t know how to find food now that I’m not supposed to exist, either in Lakeview or in the wild. And I don’t have Poppy.
“I wonder what’s going on?” Trigger mumbles as we walk, and I realize he’s lost in thoughts of his own. “That private soldier—I recognized his genome. He graduated when I was a year fourteen. If all the soldiers in the break room were private security, something big must be going on….”
We slow down after we pass the Administrator’s secret tunnel, and Trigger starts to look more confident. “Yes. This is the way. Sorry for the detour.”
I can’t resist a small smile. “It’s good to know you’re not right all the time.”
“Why would that be good to—”
A soft scraping noise draws us both to a startled stop. He raises one finger to his lips, but I’m already too scared to make a sound, other than the thunder of my heartbeat in my ears.
Trigger holds one palm out in a “wait here” gesture, but my feet don’t want to listen. I don’t even realize I’m still following him—finally I’ve mastered silent steps—until over his shoulder I see a man wearing a long white lab coat. He’s hunched over a scanner built into the stone wall next to a massive, reinforced metal door. The man turns, and I recognize him.
We’ve found both the runaway geneticist and the city gate.
“Wexler 42!” His name explodes from my mouth before I even feel it on my tongue, and when Trigger flinches I realize I’ve shouted. The geneticist looks up as his name bounces back at me from every surface of the stone tunnel. Our gazes meet. His expression shuffles through surprise, then relief. He’s not happy to see me, but he’s not frightened by my presence either.
Trigger, however…
“Who’s your friend?” Wexler demands as his gaze rakes over the cadet, apparently searching for weapons.
Friend. My eyes close and Poppy’s smile flashes across my memory. I’ve never used the term friend to refer to anyone who doesn’t look just like me, but this new use of the word feels less strange than it might have before Trigger’s nontraditional use of words like beautiful and kiss.
“This is Trigger 17.” There’s no reason to withhold that information, because his felonious aiding and abetting has probably already been discovered by Management. He’s probably as wanted as I am.
That, and if we come a few feet closer he’ll be able to read Trigger’s name on his uniform.
“Trigger.” Wexler seems to be tasting the name. Trying it out. “The toy soldier who woke up Sleeping Beauty. Too bad the world will never hear that story.”
My brow furrows. I don’t understand.