27 - VALE

                                                                                                                                                                                                              Spring 27, Sector Annum 106, 10h45

                                                                                                                                                                                                                           Gregorian Calendar: April 15

 

 

“What’s wrong?” she asks. Remy’s face is painted with worry, her eyes dark and questioning, the bridge of her nose creased where her brows are furrowed. I would like nothing more than to plant my lips there, to smooth away all her worry lines. Instead, I grab her hand and pull her along after me.

“Come on,” I whisper. She follows without question, her hand tightening into mine, and I think it wondrously strange how far we’ve come. A month ago, she had trouble looking at me. Now I am holding her hand.

I lead her through a long hallway, past two sets of doors, and down toward the bunks. Finally, I push open the door to my room—the one I’m sharing with Miah, Eli, and Firestone—and pull her in. I have no idea what she’s thinking, but when I see the look on her face, I know Linnea is not what she expected.

“What’s going on?” Accusation, confusion—and disappointment—tint her voice. Surely she doesn’t think Linnea and I….

“Linnea has something to say to you.” I cut that thought off before it takes hold.

“Okay.”

“You’re not a very popular person back home,” Linnea starts, looking at Remy as if she were a curiosity, like an old and now tasteless decoration from her childhood bedroom. Remy’s fingers are still entwined in mine, and I squeeze, trying to resist the urge to ball my hand up into a fist and pound something. A wall perhaps. Maybe Linnea’s face.

“Tell me something I don’t know,” Remy glances up at me as if to say you brought me here for this?

“Get to the point,” I say to Linnea.

“After that stunt you pulled carving up Evander’s face—really, Remy, how could you do that?” she shudders, shaking it off. “He was ready to come after you with everything at his disposal. To deploy the entirety of the Sector Defense Forces. But Corine and Philip were worried about Vale’s safety and Aulion said it was a waste of manpower and that he had a better idea. Apparently Aulion has had experience dispensing with people who had become ‘bothersome.’ Now I know he was talking about Soren’s parents. I don’t know who else he’s dispensed with, but—”

“Keep going,” I cut her off.

“Anyway, Evander wants you dead. Corine and Philip want Vale back home. And they want the Resistance destroyed. So they came to me with a proposal.” She stands and walks over to Eli’s bunk. She picks up his shower kit and runs her fingers over each item—his razor, his toothbrush, his comb. “Literally a proposal.”

“A proposal…” Remy repeats, not understanding.

Linnea turns and looks Remy in the eye. “I am infected with a targeted nanotech bug that operates just like a virus except that it is not ‘tuned’ to my biochemistry, only to Eli’s. My job was to infect Eli—really, Corine is obsessed with him—and, if I succeeded and made it back to Okaria, we’d kill two birds with one stone—one virus—and I would get my reward. Since Eli won’t let me near him, there was no chance of seducing him, of passing the virus to him via a more enjoyable means than using his toothbrush.” She shudders. “That was really quite disgusting.”

“A virus? Eli’s sick?” Remy lets go of my hand and sinks down onto my bed, deflated. “What kind of virus?”

“The virus changes the biochemistry in his brain so that he will hate you. The look of you, the very smell of you will repulse him to the point where he is enraged and will, eventually, kill you. It poisons his mind. It hijacks the synaptic transmission between neurons and disconnects images of you with positive thinking and reconnects those images with negative emotions. Fear. Pain. Anxiety. Anger. Hate.”

I’ve already heard all this. She came to me with her confession right before the briefing was to start, but now, hearing it all over again, watching Remy try to process it, makes me almost blind with rage. I thought I knew the depths my parents would sink to, but oh happy day, they’re always ready to surprise. Remy’s shaking hands have wadded up the edge of the blanket, gripping and ungripping.

The cruelty is astonishing. Turning Eli, the only survivor of the classroom attack into the same kind of maniacal killer who carried out the attack in the first place takes a warped mind that I thought only existed in fairy tales. Evil Queens. Despotic dictators. Murderous tyrants. My mother.

Linnea plunges ahead. “Of course, killing the darling Remy Alexander would be a very bad thing, and so chances are Eli would not be long for this world either.”

“Why are you telling me this?” she asks, glaring at Linnea as if she were a giant cockroach.

Linnea shrugs. “Because I changed my mind. I decided I don’t like being the vector for a synthetic disease that makes friends kill each other.”

“Is there any antidote?”

“I told you, it’s nanotech. Not a real virus,” Linnea snaps. Though she won’t show it, she’s at least mildly concerned about her complicity, but that does little to comfort me.

“But it functions like a virus?”

“It replicates and hijacks DNA like a virus. And some of its components are organic material. But some are synthetic, and can’t be destroyed by the immune system like a real virus.”

Remy is quiet for a moment, seething, and I sit beside her as she bites out her next question. “And what is your reward?”

I flinch at what I know comes next.

“Vale,” Linnea says, appraising me.

“What? What do you mean?” Remy’s eyes go wide and her cheeks flush dark as if Linnea had just slapped her. For one moment, the room is so quiet, I can hear the blood pulsing in my ears.

“Well, you’re dead. Eli’s dead. The hopes of the Resistance are dead. Aulion swoops in with his troops and takes Vale home and we live happily ever after. Mr. and Ms. Valerian Augustus Orleán.”

I put my hand on Remy’s, but this time she doesn’t move to entangle our fingers. She shakes her head, unbelieving, unmoored.

“I still don’t understand. Are you … are you …”

Linnea sighs again. “It’s simple, Remy. I never loved Vale and you do—”

“I—” Remy begins, then flushes and glances at me, at my hand on hers, and stops.

Linnea goes on as if Remy didn’t interrupt her. “You are Tai’s sister and she was my friend. I always wanted Eli, always liked him—actually became quite obsessed with him—but now I know beyond a shadow of a doubt that he’ll never want me even though Tai’s been gone all these years … but that’s okay. Life is like that sometimes. Anyway, sometimes people can change their minds. Besides,” she adds as if it is an afterthought. “I haven’t eaten a Mealpak in weeks and I feel different, and telling you this feels right.”

“Is Eli infected?” For the first time during this conversation, Linnea looks away. Ashamed.

“Yes,” she says. “I didn’t think the virus had taken hold, but just this morning, at breakfast, I saw him looking at you and there was something completely different in his expression. He couldn’t stop staring. His lip twitched, his eyes narrowed, nose flared. He was looking at you like you were prey.”

“I didn’t notice,” Remy says, looking at me like I could back her up, tell her it wasn’t true, that Eli didn’t have the virus. I can see the rage building in her face, the tension bunching her shoulders.

“Of course you didn’t notice. You were with Vale and Kenzie and Jahnu, closed off to the world … like friends should be. You weren’t paying attention like I was.” She pauses, then turns back to face us as if she wanted to say something more, as if she had yet more secrets up her sleeve. But she closes her mouth and remains silent.

Remy, now completely overcome with rage, jumps up and slams Linnea up against the wall. She hits her with a hard right upper-cut that snaps her head back with a crack. Blood pours from her nose and suddenly Linnea is all arms and legs, flailing against Remy, trying to push her away.

“How dare you,” Remy growls, throwing another right that lands with an oomph in Linnea’s diaphragm. Linnea sinks to the floor and Remy crouches down to face her.

“I’m sorry,” Linnea gasps, spitting blood through her split lip. “I’m so sorry.”

“You don’t give a shit if we all die, do you?”

“I’m sorry! I’m being honest, I swear. I know it was wrong—”

“It was fucking sick, Linnea,” she spits. “I can’t believe Tai was ever friends with you.” She stands up and backs into me and I wrap my arm around her waist as Linnea looks up at us. I never thought I’d see Linnea look remotely vulnerable. Even now, she’s guarded, glaring at us, but her face has softened, her authority taken away and her pride wounded.

“I want to help find the antidote.”

“You said it yourself, there is no antidote!” Remy yells, lunging forward again, then stopping herself and pulling back.

“Vale?” I turn to find Chan-Yu in the doorway. “What’s going on?”

Remy looks at him, abject, utter desolation etched across her face. “Oh, nothing except she’s infected Eli with a synthetic virus so he’ll kill me. So he’ll hate me and then murder me.”

“Ah,” Chan-Yu says, moving fully into the room.

Linnea’s facade of indifference weakens even more when Chan-Yu crouches and looks at Linnea like he is disappointed in her. Not that he was ever pleased with her, but I can only imagine the wrath of Chan-Yu’s disappointment.

“I finally understand. I didn’t truly think you came all the way out here because you loved Eli.”

“I was played. I wish I hadn’t done it, but I didn’t realize … I didn’t … I just wasn’t thinking about the true consequences. I want to help reverse it.” She touches a finger to her lip and winces, and looks up at Remy. There is true sorrow in her face, and I know Remy sees it, because her shoulders soften and the slightest sigh escapes her lips.

“Fine. Help us. We’ll need it. But first, fuck you.” Remy rounds on us and storms out the room. I turn to follow, but stop short. She probably needs to be alone right now.

“What are we going to do about Eli?” I ask, suddenly at a loss.

Chan-Yu turns to me. “We’ll have to ask Demeter.”

 

 

I burst through the door to Rhinehouse’s new lab ten minutes later with Linnea in tow. He’s hunched over a microscope, his back curled around it like a question mark. The grey beard he’s been sporting for the last few weeks looks like flakes of flint from the side.

“Rhinehouse, we need to talk,” I say.

“Can it wait?” he asks, his voice as rough as his beard.

“No,” Linnea answers for me.

He huffs an enormous sigh and pulls away from the microscope. He doesn’t really straighten so much as hunch in our direction, turning as he does and shutting off the light on the scope.

“What do you want?” he demands. Tact, I remember, is not his strong suit.

“Eli’s been compromised,” I say, trying to get the words out as fast as possible. “Linnea infected him with a synthetic virus that hijacks his memory and makes him want to kill Remy, but she owned up to it and now we need you to sample his blood and try to find an antidote. And we need to bump up my mission to Okaria. We need to leave as soon as possible. To get Remy away from Eli and see if we can get any information on the virus through my C-Link in case you can’t figure it out.”

Rhinehouse stares at us for a long, long minute. I count my breaths to keep myself from saying anything more before he has a chance to process and respond. Eleven, twelve, thirteen, fourteen … I’ve counted to seventeen breaths before he opens his mouth.

“Tell me about the virus.”

“I’m really sor—” Linnea starts.

“Spare me,” Rhinehouse grunts, cutting her off. “Tell me everything you know, as precisely as possible, about the way the nanotech operates.”

Linnea looks at me briefly, fear in her eyes, but I refuse to sympathize with her. She launches into a five minute ramble as she tries to remember everything Corine told her, while Rhinehouse stares at her, still hunched over, not moving at all except to blink occasionally. When she finally trails off, Rhinehouse turns to his computer and starts moving things around on the glass pane, pulling up new files and displays.

“Valerian. You will tell the Director your mission to Okaria leaves tomorrow, if possible. Next day at the latest.” He pulls up a headshot of Eli and I can see that he’s got Eli’s full genome mapped, all forty-six chromosomes in 3D holographic display. “We can keep Remy and Eli separated that way. Let’s hope your C-Link can access Corine’s files. Without more information about the specifics of the technology used to create this ‘virus,’” he emphasizes the word, “I will never be able to find an antidote or program the antibodies.” He turns away from his computer to stare at me and Linnea.

“You, girl,” he almost spits, “have proven yourself to be as despicable a human being as I’ve ever met. And I’ve met some doozies.” Linnea flinches as though she’s been slapped. “But you’ve also done something incredibly noble, and admitted that to yourself and your peers.” He turns to me. “Who else knows about this?”

“Remy and Chan-Yu.”

He looks at Linnea. “Besides the Director, no one else can know what you’ve done. If it gets out, you won’t be long for this world.”

I sigh. I wish we could have an end to secrets and politics and games. But I know he’s right.

“I want her to come with me to Okaria,” I say. “Linnea’s obviously as good a liar as anyone and she knows the city.”

“Adding yet another incredibly recognizable face to your current team of celebrities hardly seems like a good idea, Vale,” Rhinehouse says, fixing me with a wooden stare.

“We’ll all be wearing disguises anyway, Doctor,” I say, as respectfully as I can, “and Linnea’s the smoothest player in the game.” Rhinehouse stares at me for a long time and then finally nods.

“Fine. I’ll back you up and will inform the Director of the situation. Keep Remy close and prepare your team and all the equipment you need.”

“Can I take Jeremiah?” I ask, knowing in advance what the answer will be.

“Absolutely not. I’ll give you a pass on her”—he cocks his head toward Linnea—“but Jeremiah is too big a liability, not to mention all of Okaria’s on the lookout for him as a traitor to the Sector.”

I sigh, but don’t protest. It’ll be hard enough to get this mission ready to go in twenty-four hours, when I was expecting to have another two solid weeks. And he’s right. Miah still hasn’t shaped up into a soldier. He’s a great pilot, at least as good as Firestone, but, like Moriana always said, he’s a teddy bear.

“Report back at seventeen hundred hours, Valerian.”

I bob my head in acquiescence and turn to leave. I catch Linnea’s eye as she turns to follow me. She gives me a weak and unhappy little smile as she mouths the words thank you. I look away. I am not quite ready to actually interact with her, except to resolve this whole clusterfucked situation.

“Linnea,” Rhinehouse calls out as I step out the door. “You stay. I need you.”

 

 

The next day dawns red and orange, like burnt embers, as we load up our airship in preparation to leave. What was that old rhyme my father used to tell me, before I went to sleep? Red at night, fire and light. Red at dawn, blood’s been drawn. It was an old code, he told me, used by the very earliest proponents of unification, who fought to bring the various regions of the Sector under one peaceful rule. It didn’t have anything to do with the actual colors in the sky; soldiers would say red in the sky this morning if the previous night’s battles had been lost, or red in the sky last night if all had gone well.

There is a time for peace and a time for war, I think, remembering a line from a poem Gabriel read to me and Remy one time, telling us never to repeat it, because it’s a banned text from before the Religious Wars. The time for peace has been long and prosperous, but we faltered somewhere along the way. It’s time to rebuild our world again—but is it time for war?

My team consists of Remy, Chan-Yu, Soren, and Linnea, with Firestone manning the airship until we reach the drop point. Remy’s less than thrilled that she has to spend one more second with Linnea, but leaving her behind didn’t make sense. I think she’s genuinely sorry, at least I hope she is, but that doesn’t make spending time with her any more pleasant. If anything, being near her is worse than before. I wouldn’t feel right refusing to give her a second chance, given my own history, but for Remy’s sake I want to hate her.

Soo-Sun is staying here to work with Eli and Rhinehouse coordinating communications with Osprey, the messenger between the Resistance and the Outsiders. Chan-Yu is already loaded up and sitting peacefully in the passenger bay, meditating—on what, I’m not sure. Maybe nothing. Maybe that’s how he finds his center, by emptying himself out every once in a while. Always ready for whatever comes next.

“Come what may,” he said, after our meeting with Rhinehouse. It was comforting, in a weird way, to think that whatever happens next is beyond our control, and somehow, someway, we will get through it.

Linnea’s strapped in as well, her eyes red and cheeks puffy. I can only imagine what kind of dressing down Rhinehouse gave her last night, and I hope it’s enough to keep her from causing any more mischief. She’s sipping a cup of coffee, a rarity around the Resistance base, since the beans are hard to come by. The Director took pity on her this morning when she realized Linnea hadn’t slept at all, and spared her a cup from her special stash. Not out of kindness, but because she knew we couldn’t afford a sleepy team member. Soren and Remy haven’t showed up yet.

I check to ensure my Bolt is fully charged and tuck it into the holster at my hip, staring aimlessly into the rising dawn. The prospect of heading back into the place I fled six months ago is no more appealing than it was a few days ago, but determination has set in. Some kind of confidence has replaced the aimless, displaced feeling that has carried me, drifting in its undertow, for so many months. I think of Eli, and Remy, and I know that my confidence is built on my desire to protect them both. Eli no more deserves to be a cold-hearted killer than Remy deserves to be the victim. And I know I will do everything I can to stop my mother’s virus from killing the woman I can’t stop thinking about, the woman that drives me mad. The woman I love.

Despite my confidence, the hum of anxiety still flows through me. Even after six months, I think of Okaria as home. It’s a beautiful city, one that I’ve always loved, and just as I wanted to see it thrive as son of the Chancellor, Director of the Seed Bank Protection Project, now I want to see it thrive as a full-fledged member of the Resistance. I want to see it rid of the scourge of hatred and desire for unchallenged power. No more Evander Sun-Zi, no more Aulion. No more Corine Orleán. But what about my father? I think about the ride to the Solstice Ball when I confronted my mother. Was my father surprised? Did he know about her crimes?

Soren comes up beside me, shaking me from my reverie, his equipment bag over his shoulder. He arrived back in camp from a short rendezvous with Bear, Luis, and Rose, who were rallying more Farm Workers to our cause, just in time to be told to pack up again for the mission to Okaria. He’s bleary-eyed from lack of sleep. I imagine he and Osprey were up all night together, as this could be the last time they see each other for several weeks. Or forever.

Remy’s beside me suddenly, arm slipping into the crook of mine as if she’s done this a thousand times.

“Hi,” she says.

“Hi back,” I say, the flush of pleasure at her touch startling me. She pulls my hand up to her lips and presses my fingertips into a soft kiss. My whole body buzzes and I struggle to stay hitched to reality. I close my fingers around hers and squeeze.

“Okay you two, hop to. We gotta finish loading everything onto the goddamn airship,” is what I hear Firestone bark behind me, and both Remy and I jerk away from each other as we turn towards his voice. He strides up the loading dock into the passenger bay looking like he hasn’t slept in a year. “Gotta be out of here in a half hour, so says the Director. So get your butts moving.”

Remy drops my hand and turns away. I want to reach out for her, but she’s gone out the hatch, disappeared from view in the rising, glaring sunlight.

I sigh and follow Firestone up from the passenger bay to the nose of the ship.

“You loaded up the coordinates on the drop point yet?” I ask, pushing thoughts of soft skin and moist lips from my mind.

“Just about to. Should take about two hours.” I know this already. “Smooth sailing, I think. Not expecting any trouble in the air. You all should be clear until you make it inside the Sector’s drone range.”

“We’ve all got detectors,” I respond, nodding. “We’ll know when they’re around.” We’ve got an old-drone blocking unit installed on the ship, but it’s not foolproof like Firestone’s new version. The new one’s not portable yet, so for now, we’ll still have to avoid them when we’re in Okaria.

“Tell the others to finish loading up and strap in. We’ll be on our way shortly.”