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WITHOUT THE watch, I wasn’t able to time how long Valcas experimented with the watch inside the Fire Falls.
As for the twenty-two days we’d stayed behind the Falls, it was pretty evident from our camp that we’d been here for a while. We’d dried out enough leaves to weave together mattresses, which we’d stuffed with crunchy seaweed. Ivory, the biggest neat freak among us, had twisted leaves into a rough broom so she could transfer dust from one place to another. Our clothes were showing signs of wear, although they were nowhere near as thin as my father’s. We really needed to get out of the Falls, and the sooner the better.
After rinsing out our dinner leaves, I pulled on my sweatshirt and sat down in front of the light stick pile, next to Ray. “Hey,” I said. “I’m glad you’re feeling better. I missed you.”
Ray smiled at me. All traces of pain seemed to have vanished from his dark blue eyes.
“Thanks, Calla. I missed you too.” He popped one of the fading light sticks so it glowed brighter and warmer. “How are things with you... and Valcas?”
Ivory sniffed. “I’d say they’re off to a rocky start.” She opened her arms, embracing our cave and all its glory. “You know, here in the Stone Age.”
I rolled my eyes. “We’re fine,” I said. “I’m new to this sort of thing. Maybe you could give me some advice, Ivory. Since you’re into protecting loved ones and all—enough to get charged with a TSTA infraction. Why don’t you tell us about the person you’re protecting, hmm?”
Ivory looked back and forth between me and Ray. “It’s not like that,” she said.
“Come on, tell us.” I grinned. “What’s the big secret?”
“Not while he’s still out there... alive.”
“So it is a he? Tell us about him.” I rested my face on my palms. “You said you were protecting someone you love. Were you in love?”
The corners of Ivory’s lips pulled down into a slight frown. “Once upon a time,” she said. She cleared her throat and socked Ray in the arm. “What I’ve been waiting to hear is your story. Now that you’re feeling better, tell us what your infraction was about.”
I could tell Ivory was trying to lighten things up again, but judging from the tightness in her voice, I knew I’d gone too far. Desperate to direct the conversation away from my budding relationship with Valcas, I hadn’t picked up on Ivory’s reluctance to talk about her infraction. I reminded myself to apologize to her later.
“To tell the truth,” Ray said, “I was surprised to find out I’d done anything wrong. One minute I was hanging out at home, and the next I was being carried off to TSTA Headquarters by a group of TSTA officers.”
“Did you know that the TSTA existed?” I asked.
“Yes. My parents had told me stories about the agency and signed me up for training to sharpen my Detail Technician talents. But I didn’t know all of the TSTA’s rules, not that it would have mattered. I never left a daily reminder in anyone’s past. My infraction was contributory.”
Contributory. I’d heard that word before. Commissioner Reese had said the person Ivory protected could still be found contributorily liable. “What does that mean?” I asked. “Did someone overwrite a daily reminder to protect you?”
Ray shook his head. “It’s weirder than that.” He pulled at the hem of his T-shirt.
Ivory narrowed her eyes. “What are you doing?”
Ignoring her, Ray pulled his T-shirt over his head. The tattoo I’d caught a glimpse of earlier stood out, lit by the glow of the light stick pile. Never Forget Susana.
Ray pointed to the words, inked in delicate italics, just below his left rib. “I have no idea who did this.”
I lifted a brow. “How did you get a tattoo without feeling it?”
“I think someone drugged me, and then did it while I was asleep.”
“What does it mean?” asked Ivory. “Who’s Susana?”
Ray furrowed his brows. “I have no idea.”
Ivory and I looked at each other. I could see the wheels spinning in her head, but there was no flicker of comprehension in her eyes.
“Never forget Susana,” I whispered. “Do you think someone named Susana did this?”
“Your guess is as good as mine,” Ray said. “It means nothing to me. I’ve tried having my photo taken so I could look at it without the words being reversed, the way they are when I look into the mirror. I burned the image into my mind—recorded it, analyzed it over and over, but I can’t figure it out.”
“When we get out of here, we’ll have to find out who Susana is,” said Ivory. “It’s clearly a daily reminder. Even if you had nothing to do with creating it, I now see why you’ve been charged under contributory liability.”
My mouth dropped open. “But he wasn’t conscious when it happened.”
The flicker of understanding I’d been searching for finally crackled behind Ivory’s eyes. “Ray isn’t contributorily liable for actively creating a daily reminder.” She wrinkled her nose. “He is one.”
While I let that sink in, Ivory rubbed her eyes and yawned. “We could sit here and speculate all we want about what it means, but I’m ready to hit the hay... well, I would, if we had hay.” She shrugged. “Tomorrow’s going to be a long day. Maybe even a good one.”
“How can you fall asleep after hearing this, Ivory? Ray, our Ray, is a writing on a physical object. Someone inked a reminder on him! He had nothing to do with it.”
“We don’t know that,” said Ivory.
“Huh?”
“Remember when Valcas destroyed the daily reminder—the photograph—at your TSTA Hearing?”
“Yeah, so?”
“It’s possible there used to be another daily reminder out there—one that explains Ray’s tattoo. Maybe Ray knew about it at one time. Maybe that memory was deleted.”
“But he still has the tattoo,” I said. “Someone out there still needs to be reminded of something.”
Ivory shrugged. “Maybe, maybe not. It’s also possible that whoever did it has already been charged and convicted of the infraction. Had the TSTA wanted to, they could have also destroyed the reminder about Susana, but they didn’t.”
I swallowed. Destroying the reminder would mean destroying Ray. But, thankfully, Ray was still alive.
Ivory patted down her leaf mattress, which I’d learned was her signal that she’d had enough talking and wanted to go to sleep. “I refuse to credit the TSTA with kindness for not killing Ray,” she said. “I’m sure Plaka would agree with me—that Ray is alive so he could be punished for his part in the infraction. He’s also a public warning to others not to use people as canvasses for daily reminders.”