The door clanged shut behind me, taking all my newfound confidence with it. The room felt like a tomb. Well, I’d never been in a tomb, but I’d heard that expression somewhere. It seemed applicable.
Of course, I wasn’t sure if tombs were red-bricked conference rooms. Still, the mood from the people at the long table in front of me was somber enough for a funeral.
I dug my fingernails into my hand, keeping my back straight even as my steps faltered.
Tia’s dad took his seat, smiling at me as he did. I think this was meant to booster my confidence, but I was past any kind of external help. It was going to have to come from inside of me, or not at all.
The people I’d been informed were already on my side, John and Raj, flanked him on both sides. Raj was tall, thin, and dark with piercing brown eyes. I sort of knew his wife, Cindy. They lived on the same block as the Lyons. Occasionally, Tia and I would babysit for their twin five-year-old daughters. The girls were cute, and I liked the family. They never made snide remarks about my father or treated me like I was anything other than a normal teenager, like Tia.
I had never met, or even see, John Cohen before. He couldn’t fight anymore. Not since he and Tia’s father had taken on a Vampire Kiss—a collection of Vampires living and hunting together—all by themselves. They’d won their battle. Patrick had walked away unscathed, carrying John over his shoulder. Even with the best rehab he could get in the habitats, John walked with a cane. The story had been in the paper when it happened. I had sat up at nights wondering if I’d end my days that way, limping.
To my left, I could see a grey, steel cane leaning against the wall. A strange thought filled my mind, and I bit down on my lip as it passed through. That cane, whatever else it might be, was a weapon. I could pick it up and use it to get myself out of here if I needed to. I swallowed away the tart anxiety that thought provoked.
How long have I been doing that?
Every time I entered a place I hadn’t been before, I immediately identified all the things in the room I could use to defend myself. I supposed, for the line of work I had been chosen for, that technique was a good thing. Still, it was disconcerting, and I wished I had some time to actually dwell on the implications.
On the other side of the table, which was more a podium than a table, sat a woman I didn’t recognize, who must be Mia Sandry, and Liam and Noah Icahn. Liam regarded me with distant green eyes. They were the Icahn green eyes. The papers loved to refer to the family that way. The Icahn eyes, the Icahn handshake, the Icahn maneuvers. As if every member of the family did exactly the same thing or moved as one unit instead of individuals. Noah was less imposing than Liam. He slouched in his chair, his hand on his chin as he scratched the side of his face in an absentminded gesture, which made me wonder if he was thinking about what was going on here.
I had to fight the urge to rush forward and haul him over the table to shout, “You mind paying attention? We’re here to discuss a topic of life and death. My life and death.”
I blinked at my thoughts. I wasn’t usually so aggressive. What was happening to me? There was no time for introspection. I had to focus on the here and now.
Mia, the woman who had my fate in her hands, was small and dark-haired. She wore her hair in a severe bob with equally severe bangs covering her forehead. High cheekbones accentuated her long nose, and she’d painted her lips a dark shade of red. She wore all black and seemed to have stepped off the pages of a gothic novel I’d once read at Tia’s house. The word ‘witch’ came to my mind and goose bumps traveled over my skin. Apparently, I wasn’t too old to be terrified of children’s tales.
In the middle of the group sat eighty year old Dr. Isaac Icahn himself. For the habitats, where most people died in their sixties, he was ancient. A living legend amongst us, he’d had the foresight to design and build the habitats, using his own fortune to create them. He’d led humanity when we would have fallen. He’d given of himself time and again to better all our lives.
And now he wanted me dead.
For years, I’d envisioned my end. My death always seemed to be pain filled at the hands of a bloodsucker. I knew, however, that it was this man, the one who we all regarded so highly, who had chosen to bring this upon me, was almost more than I could take. It was just so…wrong.
Tia’s father spoke, drawing my attention. “Hello, Rachel. Welcome to the Council this evening.”
I knew the words I was supposed to say. Keith had driven them in our heads every Friday since we advanced to his class. “Hello, Council members. My name is Rachel Clancy. Today is my sixteenth birthday. I come to discover how I might best serve you, my habitat, and humanity.”
I liked the ritual of saying the words. I hadn’t realized I would. In the fuss of this whole nightmare, I hadn’t stopped to think I would finally get to utter that phrase and, to be honest, I hadn’t thought I wanted to utter it at all. It turned out that I did. It was funny, and I found myself smiling about it. How is it possible that I knew myself so little?
I want to be a Warrior.
Even the thought felt weird as it tickled my brain. All this time I’d been afraid, and now faced with the reality of it, I wasn’t. Apparently I was brave. I could have sprouted wings and flown from the delight of it. My emotions were ping-ponging all over the place. I wasn’t sure if it was the caffeine or the terror doing it.
“Hello, Rachel.” Dr. Icahn spoke, and I turned my gaze to him. “We welcome you to the Council tonight. Patrick was just telling us of some of your troubles in class.”
Well, here we were. The moment of truth. “Troubles, sir?”
The living legend arched his grey eyebrow at me. “According to reports today, you failed rather badly in a test given to you by Keith Endover.”
“It was a test I was meant to fail. Keith often gives us lessons like that to challenge us, to teach us how to behave in adverse situations.” I was incredibly proud of the vocabulary I was pulling out. Another few minutes and I might have to resort to some angst-ridden drivel, but for the moment, I could make my teachers proud.
Dr. Icahn looked confused. He arched back in his chair as he looked at Patrick Lyons. “What do you say about this new development, Patrick? Are you still going to push to keep the girl from completing a mission?”
“I never suggested she couldn’t complete a mission, Dr. Icahn. I merely stated she be given a mission more appropriate to her personal abilities.”
“What are your abilities?” The squeaky, high-pitched voice of Mia Sandry made me jump. Somehow, and I’m not sure why, I hadn’t expected her to speak. I guess I had this idea she would sort of pop up at the end of the discussion having listened silently the whole time. Or at least that’s how it had gone in my head. But as I had to relearn over and over again, real life didn’t go like it did in my personal script.
“I think I’m a good Initiate. I think I’m as capable as most of the group. There are some much better than me.” Like Tia. “And some who are really much worse. My own abilities fall somewhere in the middle.”
“An honest answer.” She nodded as if I’d confirmed something for her.
I spoke to the whole group. “You can all see my reports. They get sent to you, right?”
“They do, Rachel, they do,” Patrick answered. I couldn’t make out what he was thinking or what he wanted me to do. Usually at his home, he was so open, like a book I could read. Now, since I didn’t have him guiding me, I was going to have to navigate this situation all on my own.
“May I say something off topic for a moment, please?”
Liam Icahn shifted in his seat. “It is highly unusual for a sixteen year old Warrior to speak at these proceedings other than to follow protocol.”
“I know. I’m familiar with the protocol. I’m asking for special permission.”
Dr. Icahn looked at his son and spoke. “I have no issue with the young woman speaking.”
“Thank you, sir.” I swallowed. I was afraid, but the fear wasn’t as potent an emotion as the resolve that made me want to move forward. I could feel the steel determination I needed traveling through my bloodstream.
“Dr. Icahn, I want to say thank you to you, sir, for saving all of us forty-six years ago. I know I wouldn’t be here if you hadn’t. We would have all perished without your help.”
He seemed startled by my speech. Clearly, he’d not been expecting it. I hadn’t really anticipated saying it. But, I needed to talk from my heart. I needed to know I had done everything I could do. That was the best I was capable of.
“Um…” Dr. Icahn cleared his throat. Instead of looking imposing to me, he just looked old. My Dad had pictures of his father hanging on the walls. My grandfather had managed to save my father from the monsters on Armageddon day. They’d lived, just the two of them, until my grandfather passed away from the lung sickness three years before I was born. Back then the habitats didn’t have as good control over their air filtration systems. A lot of people succumbed to lung diseases, being underground and living with the reprocessed air.
Dr. Icahn reminded me of Granddad’s pictures, frail and falling apart but with steel resolve in his eyes that said his body might fail him but his mind never would. I couldn’t think of anything more commendable. My father had let his mind go. Not that I wanted to admire the man who wanted me dead. No. Only I couldn’t help feeling respect for him for fighting as long as he could, for living as long as he had.
Now the fact that he currently wanted to end my life made me mad as hell, however I had a feeling that discretion was what was called on here, not pure fury. I might be quiet but I could kick up hell on occasion. This, however, was not the time.
I needed to finish what I wanted to say before they took away my right to say it. “I understand my father was responsible for the death of your daughter.”
The silence that filled the room pushed at me so hard I feared I might fall over. I tried as hard as I could to keep my back straight, I smiled. “May I ask what her name was?”
He cleared his throat while his two sons who sat to his left shifted in their seats and looked at each other. “Her name was Tate. She was my only child with my second wife. The boys’ mother perished on the day the monsters came. I met Tate’s mother years later in the habitat.”
“I’m very sorry Tate died because of my father’s negligence. I’m hoping you’ll let me serve as she did.”
I stepped back. There was nothing more to say. All I could do was wait and find out what they were going to do. This was, after all, the story of my life. From the moment I was born, I’d been waiting to be sent Upwards. Now I had to wait to find out what level of hell they’d be sending me to. Either way, I’d stumbled into contentment, not expecting to ever find it.
As far as lives went, it was far from perfect, but it was mine.
Patrick moved forward so his torso leaned over the table, closing the space. “You should know, Rachel,”—he held my gaze, refusing to let my eyes go—”That we’ve been discussing for some time now what to do about your first day.” He leaned slightly to his left and extended his arm. “The Icahns seem to feel a person with your lineage—due to the outstanding work your father once did—should be sent up on her own.” He stared straight ahead and spoke through obviously gritted teeth. “Some of us still think that due to the fact that you are, in fact, a teenager, you shouldn’t be expected to handle more than anyone else your own age.”
I swallowed. Patrick was acting like I didn’t know all of this already. I wouldn’t betray him by telling everyone that I did. “And?”
Tia’s father leaned back in his chair. “Does anyone want to change their vote now that they’ve met and heard from Rachel?’
I wasn’t sure what that meant. Why would they want to alter how they voted or thought based on meeting me? I was just a regular person, nothing particularly special about me.
Dr. Icahn sat passively, without betraying his thoughts. He leaned back in his chair. “I’ll call for the vote. The two options are the same as they were earlier. Ms. Clancy goes up with the Ones and Twos or she goes on a scouting mission to the Hudson Outpost.”
I think I might have stopped breathing for a second. “That’s real?”
Dr. Icahn looked at me like I had two heads. “Of course it’s real, child, how on Earth do you think we keep in contact with one location to another? Every time we make a new linkage, the Vampires or the Wolves decode it and we’re back to square one. The only surefire, albeit dangerous, solution is person-to-person contact from the habitat to the Outpost. Then the Outpost sends a message to the next Outpost and so on until it reaches the last habitat.”
I was so out of my depth here. Once again, I wished I’d either had a father who discussed these kinds of things with me or that I’d spent more time eavesdropping on what the people around me spoke about.
“I didn’t realize we had moved back to that method.”
All they ever told us was how much we were progressing, how humanity was moving forward below ground, how we were no longer dependant on the ways we used to live to survive down here. Now I was hearing that we were basically back to the Stone Age.
“Yes, well, before today you weren’t meant to know.”
That was the problem with being a teenager. You were too young to know things and yet they expected you to behave like an adult, or in my case, to potentially die like an adult fighting monsters.
Tia’s dad voted first. “I vote for her going up with the Ones.”
John was next. “Me, too.”
Liam Icahn. “The Outpost.”
Dr. Icahn. “I second the Outpost.”
Really? He did. I tried, and failed, not to be disappointed he hadn’t cared that I’d reached out to him on a human level. I guess I’d been deluding myself. You really couldn’t make someone give up a lifetime of plotting revenge in a single moment of conversation.
Raj spoke next. “I think it’s crazy that we’re even having this discussion. I vote in favor of the Ones.”
Everyone looked at Mia as she stared at me, her face an unreadable mask of severe lines and darkness.
Patrick kicked the table. “I would remind you, Mia, her mother was a patriot. You liked her very much.”
Now we were talking about my mother? My father gets people killed, my mother was a patriot. What the heck was going on here? Why was no one talking about me? I was the one standing in the room.
“I liked Sandra a great deal.” She nodded. “She’s been dead for a long time.”
“She has,” I responded, feeling like an idiot. What was I supposed to say to that?
“Can you read a map?”
I knew right then how she was going to vote, and I hoped I could keep my voice steady when I answered her. “I can. Keith makes sure we can all read a map. I’ve memorized the quadrants. I’ll know my way around when I get Upwards.”
“That’s good, because the Vampires have hacked our GPS systems.”
Tia’s father slammed his fist onto the table, causing everyone to jump. “Does this mean you’re sending her out on her own to the Outpost?”
“I am, but not because I have some sort of vendetta interest or because I think she should have to pay for the crimes of her father. No.” She shook her head as she stood up and walked to me. “Keith Endover is given an incredible amount of leeway here to teach the students as he sees fit. I’m not convinced he’s doing a good job. We’ll call you a test subject. If you make it there and back again, then his methods work. If you don’t…then I guess we’ll have our answer.”
She smiled at me like she was my best friend as she walked from the room, leaving me in her wake.
“Did that seriously just happen?” My voice sounded funny, strained, but not destroyed, which I was glad about.
Dr. Icahn nodded. “Sometimes life is what it is.”
I still knew I was standing in front of a legend, but the problem was that I suddenly didn’t care. “You might ask yourself if Tate was still alive today, a Warrior fighting for all of us, if she’d want you to behave like this.”
“That’s the thing about death.” Dr. Icahn cleared his throat, and he didn’t look old and regal to me, just evil. “People don’t come back to tell us what they want.” He stood up. “They do sometimes come back as Vampires. You might want to be careful not to become one yourself.”
Had Tate been made a Vampire? If I lived through this, I was going to have a serious conversation with the adults in my life about what details they told me and which ones they did not.
“Rachel.” Liam handed me a piece of paper. The man acted like he hadn’t just plotted to end my life. Who were these people? Was this how the adults lived? Was this acceptable behavior?
“Guard this with your life. The coordinates for the Outpost are on the back. This is the communication the Outpost needs to send on to Freedom.”
“What?”
Liam smiled. The man had the nerve to smile at me. “I’m sure Patrick will get you all straightened up before you have to go Upwards. Good luck. You might not believe this, and I don’t know why I’m telling you, but I really hope you live through this to prove us all wrong. Then we’ll really know you’re special.”
“That’s enough, Liam.” Patrick stood next to me, his face a mixture of anger and concern.
“Just giving her a few last moments of advice, Lyons. She is, after all, practically family to you.”
Liam turned on his heel and left us. Patrick sighed. “Okay. Listen up. I’ve sent Raj to tell Keith to get your stuff ready to go Upwards. There are some things they’re not telling you.”
“More things?”
He laughed, a cold hard sound. “So many things they could fill a book. But here’s what you need to know. No one has heard from the Outpost in a month. It’s possible they’re gone. If you get there and they’re dead or no one is there, you turn around and you run—don’t walk—back here. There is a positive side to this. You might not see any monsters at all. You’re walking to one place, delivering a note, spending the day with the Outpost, and coming back.”
“Okay.”
That actually sounded do-able. I hoped. I might not die. Maybe I could do this. My hands tingled, and I felt like I could run a mile in under five minutes. Clearly, I had too much adrenaline inside of me now. I needed to calm down. There would be no time to crash.
Patrick pulled me into a tight embrace. He whispered in my ear, “You’re not almost family. You are family. Carol told Tia what’s been going on. She’s a wreck, her mother can’t get her out of her room, and the boys are so angry I won’t be surprised if one of them doesn’t come after you tonight.”
My eyes clouded up. God, I couldn’t stand the thought of Tia being upset because of me. “Tell her I’ll be fine, and tell the guys to stay away. It’s not their assignment. I won’t have anyone getting in trouble or—” I gulped, barely able to say the words aloud, “Hurt because of me.”
He let me go and I smiled, suddenly feeling five years old. “Anything else?”
“Stay close to the water. If you follow the map, you’ll hit it in two miles. It’s mostly uphill until you reach the cliffs. The Vamps don’t like the water. It doesn’t hurt them. They just don’t like it.”
“They never told us that in class.”
His eyes were somber. “I know. You should have learned that tonight. With the Ones.”
“Were there other things I won’t learn?” My heart fell into my stomach, and I was so nauseous I thought I might vomit on his shoes.
He touched my arm. “Vamps make you cold. Your senses will scream at you that you’re freezing. Wolves make the skin on your arms tingle. Vamps are cold, Wolves are goose bumps.”
“All right.”
He took my arm as he led me toward the elevator. Keith stood next to it. I’d avoided thinking of this moment since I was old enough to understand what was going on. Here it was.
The other kids always had their families to see them off, adult Warriors who had done this themselves. I had Keith and Patrick, and I knew Carol would have been there if she could have been. It was something. I wasn’t alone.
Not yet.
I put on a brave face and smiled at all of them. They’d tried to do so much for me, it was the least I could do for them.
Keith handed me a brown leather satchel. I looked down in confusion. This wasn’t the bag I’d packed three months ago in preparation.
He shrugged, but his eyes were moist. Ah…no…he couldn’t cry. I wouldn’t survive it.
“It’s still your stuff. It’s my old bag. I added some stuff to it. Open it and strap the weapons to you.” I nodded, doing as he said.
I pulled out my stakes, and I went through the practiced motions of attaching the wooden objects with rope to my body. Next came the wolf-fighting tools. I had to take off their heads. My father’s machete, which I had pulled out of the back of the linen closet in my house, was a good tool, or so everyone told me. That I wore on my back like a backpack. I reached once more in the bag, expecting to find my protein bars and water. Instead a strong wooden object nearly cut my hand. I pulled it out and gasped.
It was Keith’s stake. “You’re giving this to me?” Now I couldn’t keep the emotion out of my voice and I didn’t care.
“It’s lucky and now I’m giving it to you.” His eyes huge, he smiled as the elevator opened. “We’ll see you tomorrow. Tonight you walk, tomorrow night you come back.”
Or I didn’t.
But I wasn’t going to say that to them. Instead, I walked into the elevator—alone—without my fellow Warriors. I braced myself for the onslaught of the ride like I’d seen so many others do before me. Finally, I looked up to give them all one last smile.
“Rachel!” My head shot up as the elevator’s door closed in front of me.
I sunk to the floor, not letting the bar out of my hand. My Dad had shown up, and it had been too late to utter a word to him.