THE CITY FEELS LIKE SOMETHING unknown and familiar at once from my spot on the orphanage roof, the moon looming in the sky overhead. I shiver in the cold. Sevvy left almost before the shouting in the square stopped, hardly pausing for medics to make sure Howl was stable enough to move before wheeling him straight to a heli, the Chairman trailing behind her like a dog on a leash.
He didn’t try to stop me from tying my own mother under the Arch or from stepping up to take control of the Seconds myself. The Chairman didn’t look back even once as I watched him get on the heli with Sev. My guess is he didn’t know what Sev had planned for him.
She was right all those weeks ago, when we were in the heli trying to plan what to do next. If things are going to work, we need a new start. New leaders. People who haven’t lived with power clutched between their fists so long that the tiniest deviation feels like oppression.
Helix and I have had our share of difficulties, though he has agreed to keep his forces to a separate part of the City from mine until a more substantial peace agreement can be met. We’ve put up barriers, established talks. Lieutenant Hao’s contacts among the Menghu who were left behind after the invasion have been instrumental in persuading Menghu from Outside to at least listen and see if we can work something out between us. Them and Mei.
They want Mantis. The cure. My own soldiers want it more than anything too, willing to look the other way when they see Menghu insignia within the City if it means no more masks. If it means bringing down the chemical torches entirely, letting people we love back into our lives.
Shots have been fired. More outside than inside the walls. But fewer than I would have expected. Everyone wants to believe the cure is real and is waiting for the first doses to arrive. And after that? Well, I guess we’ll take it one step at a time.
The trapdoor leading downstairs squeaks, and I look back to find Mei climbing up the ladder. “What are you doing up here?” she aks.
I turn back to the lights dotting the City streets, so many more than when I first returned. “Just looking, I guess. It’s almost like home again.”
“Have you heard from Sev or Sole yet?”
I shake my head. “They asked for scientists and some supplies to be flown in from the labs. Some things we needed to get from the farms, but it was a good start to freeing people who have been incarcerated out there, though the Firsts left over weren’t very happy about it. Our reach is sort of soft, but some of the people stayed on at the farms when we gave them the choice. More food. A promise of better living conditions, compensation, and the ability to stay or go in the future. I guess putting longtime workers in positions of authority and letting them take charge of their own bits of land helped.” I scrub a hand through my overgrown hair. I’ll have to find someone to cut it before it goes completely crazy. “Everyone seems much more… calm, now that we have a credible start on a cure.”
Mei drops down next to me, kicking her heels over the edge of the roof. The light on her hair casts her over in silver. “After so many years of lies from Dr. Yang, it’s hard to not feel a little worried.”
“Sevvy doesn’t lie. This is all she wanted. To give the cure to anyone who’d take it.”
She narrows her eyes a bit, but nods after a moment. “You’re going to be late for the meeting with Helix.”
The way she says his name makes my hackles rise. “You don’t like him.”
It takes a second for her to answer. “It’s hard to like anyone who is responsible for your life. If you screw up, then you screw everyone else over too. Leaders handle that differently, and the way he handled it when I was in his company was… bad.” She smiles grimly, looking over at me. “But if there’s one thing I’m sure of, it’s that Helix wants the fighting to stop.” Peeling herself up from the roof, she puts out a hand. “I don’t think any of us thought this was how it would stop, but it seems kind of silly now, in retrospect, that I assumed we’d just kill all of you.”
I let her help me up. “A little bit, I guess.”
“I saw you gave Captain Bai’s knife back.” She doesn’t look at me, opening the door to the stairs down. “I didn’t realize you went back for it.”
Captain Bai worked with Lieutenant Hao to clear the streets up to the Sanatorium, and we used the building as a place to set up a secure base. We were already planning a takeover of my mother’s regime when Mei contacted me over the link to tell me Sev’s plans. When I handed the knife back to Captain Bai, it didn’t feel like a betrayal anymore that it had been used against a Second. It was more like a symbol of what I wanted to be. Even less, actually, because I no longer want things to be thrust under my nose before I believe they exist.
It doesn’t come easily for me. But it’s like those cots back at Dazhai. I shouldn’t have to lie on one to know it’s itchy. A good leader listens. Investigates. Changes, if necessary.
I let Mei go ahead of me down the stairs, trying not to think of that night, the blood, and everything wrong in the world that still needs to be fixed, contenting myself to say, “I went back for the knife because I didn’t want Captain Bai to think I’d stolen it.”
She nods, as if that somehow isn’t nonsense. “I don’t think your reputation could take another black mark.” But then Mei looks at me out of the corner of her eye. “Hopefully, no one will have to use it again.”
We walk toward the Sanatorium, passing through one of the padding zones between our armies: the less militant of our numbers—engineers, cooks, doctors, teachers, and scientists—who consented to be part of the barrier between guns. Those actively infected with SS have agreed to stay beyond the torch line now that they have access to our food stores. Every day we move the torches back a block as more and more have access to Mantis.
Their patience isn’t only about having unspoiled food and clean water, though. Sev finding the cure changes everything. There’s an end in sight. It’s a lot easier to wait in line than it is to wait at the bottom of a hole, forgotten.
It’s not that our wars against each other have really stopped. But I’m hopeful this pause will be enough for everyone to seriously consider why they would want to go back to a life of hiding, shooting, worrying. I look at Mei, walking along beside me as if we aren’t from opposite sides of this conflict. Proof that no matter how deeply rooted hatred is inside you, there’s always hope to find some common ground.
Once we get to the City Center, Mei plops into a chair, growling at the person seated next to her until he moves to let me take the seat. I smile my thanks, and she shoots me an annoyed look, as if my noticing that she wants to sit next to me is impolite.
And, for all I’ve trained my whole life to deal with hostile forces, it seems like Mei so close beside me is a battle I’m not sure how to approach, much less win.
I think she likes it that way.
I think maybe I do too.