Me too.
Gesturing for me to follow, he trudges off. I follow, placing my feet in the footprints he leaves in the deep snow. The dark of night is so profound that I can barely see him ahead of me, much less where we are going. But after a few minutes we reach a high fence. It looks like something that humans built, flimsy and poorly designed. Each post is crowned with a watery blue light. The other Eighth waits for me to join him, then places his index finger dramatically on the fence. It crackles with electricity. He flicks his head back a couple of times. I’ve seen only Sixth laugh before. On this one it’s not as mean. He’s laughing at the fence, not at me. Electricity is not something that deters us. The fence must be left over from whatever this place was before we arrived. Why it is still electrified, I don’t know. Maybe someone thought it would prevent escapes. It’s then I realize what his intention is, the other Eighth; he means to escape. He pinches a wire of the fence and pulls it easily away from the steel post. A couple of sparks hiss into the snow. He pulls another and another, until there is a gap wide enough to crawl through.
He stands back, turns to me, and holds one hand down, fingers apart, like he’s grasping something large and round. Then he turns his hand upward. I’ve never seen this sign before, but like all of them, I somehow know what it means. It wouldn’t be one that was needed very often in our lives.
Free.
I repeat it, making it a question. Free?
The other Eighth nods and ushers me forward. I step over the bent wire, glancing back at him as he follows me through the gap.
Turn, he signs when he reaches me. I obey without thinking, turning my back to him. I see from our shadows in the snow that he has one of our knives in his hand—a knife he should have turned in when they locked us inside. He could hurt me with that knife, but more than any fear of that I’m intrigued by his disobedience. He’s defective, like me.
I feel him press the knife into the back of my neck. Maybe he is going to kill me. Part of me longs for it; part of me would rather be dead than . . . whatever this is.
There’s a loud click and then silence.
Silence. The perpetual humming of the degraded mission directives has stopped. My thoughts empty of it so quickly, I feel faint and sway where I stand. The other Eighth takes my arm to steady me as I turn back to him. He holds out a small bundle of metal and wires, no bigger than a beetle.
Muddy death, he’s beyond defective; he’s crazy. Disconnecting a transponder will get us both killed.
Run, he signs.
I do as I’m told, expecting him to follow me. I run fast, taking long strides through the white drifts. After a few seconds I find myself on a raised road. The wind has kept it clear of snow. My brain works well enough to realize this means I could go either way and they couldn’t track me. I’m not sure which way to go, so I turn toward the city. The mountains are past the city, and I still feel the tug of the air and trees and mist I know I’ll find there.
The other Eighth appears at the edge of the road behind me. Behind him, I can barely make out that he has stepped into my footprints.
Together?
He shakes his head. I think I must have made a mistake, or maybe he intends to go the other way on the road. It’s a reasonable plan, less chance of being caught.
Run, he says again.
I start to run toward the city. A hundred meters on I find a human’s car, stop beside it, and look back. I don’t understand what’s happening. In the unfamiliar silence of my thoughts I’m confused, and the syrupy sludge isn’t helping. It surges through me, trying to focus me, but without the buzz of my mission directives, it has nowhere to go, nothing to work with. The other Eighth is still standing where I left him on the road. I’m about to wave at him, or maybe go back when . . .
A shot rings out. The other Eighth clutches at his throat and tumbles forward. I dive behind the car, poking my head out just enough to see what happens next.
Three high ranks come to the side of the road. One of them throws something down on Eighth where he fell, and he explodes into flames.
I shrink back behind the car, my fists pressed in front of my mouth.
As if I could scream.
RAVEN
We leave a week later, all of us who signed up except Emily, who has fallen ill with some kind of stomach bug.
“I bet she’s pregnant,” Xander whispers conspiratorially as we run through a final supply check.
Liam overhears. “Not by me, she’s not.” His tone is cool. Seeing these two boys banter about a girl’s fate, even a girl I don’t particularly like, gives me a chill. Was there a time when people were more considerate? Maybe ages ago. There are fistfights over food now and hushed rumors that someone got raped on perimeter watch. Sometimes when I can’t sleep, I fantasize that someone tries something with me, and I kill him. Is that just me being a badass, or is this place getting to me, changing me? I’m actually happy to leave the so-called safety of our refuge, happy to leave all these desperate rats in a cage.
Before the invasion it always seemed like nature was out to get us—with cold or rain or plagues of grasshoppers. Now I see we were always our own worst enemy.
Liam brings five other volunteers with him. A girl called Britney, who I think might be Liam’s new . . . whatever, a guy called Dinesh, and three white boys whose names all sound the same. I’m sure that older people volunteered, but Liam made the final selections and somehow managed to choose other teenagers. Not sure what that says about him. He’s not happy that Sawyer is older than he is, that’s clear.
We’re heavily armed. Kim has trained me on a small but she says very powerful pistol with which my aim is slightly better. It seems powerful, but what would I have to compare it to? I know it nearly threw my arm out of the shoulder socket the first time I used it. We’re low on ammo though. I have three clips for it. When those run out, I’m left with my knife. If I lose that, I’m dead.
Apart from weapons, our packs are light. We wear all our clothes, and if we don’t find food in Calgary, we’ll be very hungry on the way back. Mandy rejects a box of bottled water in favor of more first aid supplies.
“The ground is covered in snow, Liam,” she says when he complains. “Everyone has a canteen, right?”
Liam makes a big show of confirming this with all of us and going through other items in our personal kits so pedantically I’m ready to throttle him.