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Emma’s good mood deflates as soon as they get back to Christine’s.
Deirdre stalks toward them before they even open the doors. She purses her lips into a thin line and narrows her eyes.
“Good job, Compass,” Deirdre says as Jess hops out of the car.
“Uh, thanks.” Jess reaches over and squeezes Emma’s hand. “Don’t let her get you down,” she whispers.
Emma smiles at her in appreciation. “Thanks.”
“Your parents want to see you in the communication annex,” Deirdre says to Jess.
“Oh, okay—” Jess glances at Emma.
“Go ahead,” Emma says.
Jess gives Emma one last look before dashing out of the carport.
Deirdre turns on Emma, straightening her spine as she looks down her nose. “What were you doing on the mission?” Deirdre demands.
“Helping.” Emma crosses her arms.
“You could have gotten hurt. You distracted the others from their tasks.”
“I was an integral part of the escape,” Emma snaps.
“Stay out of it,” Deirdre says. “For the last time. Go help Chloe set up a chore wheel or something. This is meta-human business only.”
“Meta-human business only,” Emma mutters to herself, flicking through the computer console. “The Resistance is my business,” she says, kicking a file cabinet. She glances at her ear-set radio on the table. It’d be pointless putting it on; everyone is too far away anyway, gone on a mission, carrying out the plans; Emma’s plans.
She scrolls aimlessly through the decoded notes from the data recovered from Orion’s research, flicking through incoherent ramblings. It seems as though all of this wasn’t even decoded; Brendan must have looked at it and just decided they were useless, random phrases floating ominously through the void.
Emma sighs. The past few days have been a whirlwind of activity; every single day, a team goes out to interfere with a battle, often coming back with another meta-human. Among the new recruits are Icebolt and Fireheart; everyone is thrilled, but Emma can’t find it in herself to care.
She should be excited, she should be thrilled, but every time she tries to get involved, Deirdre suggests tasks like filing, and she keeps everyone so busy that no one notices that Emma’s being left behind. Emma doesn’t have the heart to tell them either. Brendan’s busy developing new communication tech, Abby’s off working on her mecha-suit again, and Bells and Jess are leading most of the teams taking on the League.
It seems as if it’s going well until Vindication shows up. He ruins everything; he’s too powerful, and somehow the Authorities always aren’t too far behind him. He’s only appeared a few times, but no one has been able to challenge him. Even Mistress Mischief, who’s been able to hold her own against Captain Orion, had to retreat because Vindication would just keep attacking, often without regard for the safety of onlookers. It would take several people just to get people out of the way of his lightning blasts.
Vindication is also unpredictable; no algorithm can predict where or when he will appear.
“He can fly; he’s got lightning and energy blasts,” Emma mutters to herself. “He’s stronger than Orion.” She sighs. What is she even doing? Is this pointless, continuing to plan?
No.
Emma is Mastermind.
They need someone who could defeat Vindication. Bells is their strongest, but his abilities aren’t geared toward direct attack. They need someone whose destructive power could actually take him out. Even Smasher’s super strength and Mistress Mischief’s levitation powers aren’t a match; they run out of power too soon, and somehow Vindication only appears at the end of a battle when Smasher and Mistress are already tapped out. The few times they’ve tried to save their strength, Vindication never showed.
Emma paces, thinking about the origin of meta-abilities themselves. They need someone who is powerful and has stamina, like someone directly descended from one of the original meta-humans on the SS Intrepid who were exposed to the brunt of the X29 flare.
Or maybe one of the originals themselves.
But they’re all dead.
Wait! Are they?
There’s a knock on the door. Jess leans against it with a concerned look on her face. “Hey, have you been here the whole time?”
“Yeah, I was just looking through the data Claudia sent to us.” Emma yawns.
“Cool,” Jess says. “Hey, I know we haven’t been able to hang out since the missions really started taking off, but you know that everyone appreciates you, right?”
Emma pats Jess’ hand and attempts to smile at her. “Thanks.”
Jess sits down next to her, squinting at the screen. “Did you find anything interesting?”
Emma shrugs, scrolling through her notes, lingering on Orion’s thoughts about destroying the League. “Hey, do you have a copy of your old history textbook somewhere?”
“I think so,” Jess says, pulling up her tablet and flicking through it. “Yeah, there’s a bunch of books I threw on here so I could study while at the Rockies.” She pulls up the history book, chuckling as she hands it to Emma. “I meant to, but never got around to it.”
Emma takes the tablet, searching for information on the Intrepid. “You know all the meta-humans your parents have been recruiting? You’ve been looking for people on the Registry, people Orion was targeting for experiments. What about people who have been forgotten, people incredibly powerful, people who were on the Intrepid?”
Jess tilts her head, taking this information in. “Gravitus is dead. I don’t think anyone else on that ship became a hero.” She frowns. “One became a professor? And one— oh! Do you remember the Mountain?”
“No?” Emma’s never heard the name.
Jess nods, tapping a name on tablet. “That’s her: Patricia Southard. She was one of the astronauts on the Intrepid. She was powerful, too, but disappeared after the League was formed. Abby had this comic of the Mountain and Gravitus fighting crime together. They had similar powers, I think.”
Emma reads the passage.
During the X29 solar flare, cosmic radiation catalyzed the latent meta-gene in 0.0001% of the population, resulting in the first wave of meta-humans. The types of abilities and the level of intensity varied in genetic expression, and it was clear that this was not a mere fluke in human history, but a milestone in the evolution of the human genome. The meta-gene is still under close study as monitored by the Department of Meta-Human Affairs, but the effects of X29 will be seen for generations to come.
The astronauts on the SS Intrepid during the incident were exposed to a significantly higher amount of cosmic radiation, resulting in four of the crew exhibiting extremely heightened meta-abilities. Lieutenant James Oliphaous, who later became known as Lieutenant Orion, was one of the first A-class heroes in history. His superstrength, speed, flight, and manipulation of heat were among the most powerful abilities ever recorded in both intensity and class level. Dr. Olivia Tham’s precognition and fortitude were the driving force behind the success of the formation of the North American Collective in the wake of the disasters. Vance Stackson’s ability to manipulate soil, earth, and the force of gravity itself and Dr. Patricia Southard’s ability to transform bedrock made them a formidable team as Gravitus and Mountain.
“Tham was a key part in creating the Collective and probably the League itself,” Emma mutters. “It would be hard to convince her that the League is wrong. What if she came up with some of the staged battle ideas?”
Jess shrugs. “In any case, she’s a retired professor at Port Clarion University. I’m not sure she’d be able to take on Vindication in a fight, though.”
“Yeah,” Emma agrees. “They’d be like, over a hundred years old, all of them, if they went through X29 as adults.”
“You still think Southard would be a good idea?”
“Hey, my abuela Claudia can totally handle herself,” Emma says. “I think Southard is a great idea.” She scans the rest of the page and does a quick search through the book, but Southard’s name never comes up again. “That’s all it says about her. What happened?”
“The League did,” Jess says. “I mean, the whole fight between Lieutenant Orion and Gravitus was about the formation of the League and the purpose of it. I’m guessing Mountain wanted to stay out of it. There aren’t any mentions of her aside from that one old comic; it’s like she disappeared.”
Emma snaps her fingers. “That’s it. We need to get her.”
“Absolutely not,” Deirdre says. “Look, it’s great that you found this information, but no one has heard from Southard in over fifty years.”
“Right, so not even the League remembers her or cares,” Emma says. “But if we got her on our side, told her about the League— I mean, she was there when it formed! She could tell us all sorts of inside information.”
“It would be a pointless mission,” Deirdre says. “We do not have the time or resources to devote to looking for a woman who doesn’t want to be found.”
“I could start.”
“You do not have the authority to lead any missions,” Deirdre sniffs dismissively, handing her a datachip. “Now these are reports that need to be sorted.”
Emma is done. She’s done playing nice, done asking for permission, and done with people judging her value. She knows what she’s worth and she’s going to prove it. She throws the duffel bag of clothes into the car and double-checks her provisions: the solar panel for the car, protein packs, and other dried foods. She’s ready. They don’t need her here. She’s better off going and getting information, being useful in the ways she knows she can be.
Instead of doing Deirdre’s filing, Emma put on a disguise and headed right to the New Bright City Library, where she dove into research about Patricia Southard. She found archives about the crew of the Intrepid that said Southard was born in Havenstown in pre-Collective Canada. The North, now. With the map she and Bells found on their trip, Emma pinpointed exactly where it is. It should only take her a few days to get there. She also found a number of unexplained incidents through the years that sound exactly like Southard’s powers. Three years ago, a man fell through an icy lake, but a column of earth rose up under him, carrying him to safety. Another family was rescued on the road when a mudslide mysteriously moved itself out of the way so they could pass through. It’s clear that Southard is still in that area, hiding somewhere.
Emma shuts the trunk.
I’m not running away, she tells herself.
Footsteps sound behind her.
“Emma,” Bells says softly. In the soft light of the tunnel, the worried set of his jaw almost seems to speak for him.
Emma sighs. She should have known he would put the pieces together and figure out she was leaving. She should have been more secretive; but Bells knows her, knows her patterns; he would have noticed something was wrong the minute he spotted missing food provisions.
“Where are we going?” he asks, all casual.
“We aren’t going anywhere,” Emma says.
“I know you’ve got a plan.” Bells steps forward. “And now you’ve all packed up and you’re raring to go. I’m ready, whatever it is.”
Emma shuts the trunk, and it clicks with a resolute finality.
“The Resistance needs you here,” she says, biting her lip to keep it from wobbling. Her voice quavers and, if she doesn’t finish this and finish this fast, she’s going to cry. “You’re important to the plan. It’s started already, people are questioning the League. You, you need to stay.”
“What?”
“I need to go.” The words seem to grow in the air as she speaks, getting heavier and heavier, as if they’re tangible.
“Emma, you don’t have to go alone,” Bells says. “Here, just let me go get Jess and—”
“No!” Emma snaps, louder than she means to, but it feels good to say no. After all this time doing what other people want, going along with the plan because it’s good for the Resistance, she’s tired.
“Em—”
The nickname irritates her, and Emma tosses her bag into the car, slamming it shut.
“No. I don’t want you to come with me, I don’t want Jess or Abby or Brendan or Christine or anyone. I don’t need you!” Emma says, her voice getting louder with every word. “You all can stay here with your powers and going on missions and being super together! You’re just wasting your time, you know that? The plan is great, but no one accounted for Vindication, and even with all these meta-humans, you can’t figure out a way to keep doing the broadcasts without anyone getting hurt.”
The car trembles as if it’s going to break. It just might. Or maybe that’s Emma.
“I’m going to go make things right,” Emma says. “Don’t follow me.” She’s tired, so tired of being taken for granted and not being good enough. “Goodbye,” she says, without even a backward glance.
She drives down the tunnel with Bells’ stunned form standing still in her rearview mirror. He gets smaller and smaller as she goes, and every so often Emma glances back to see if he follows her, but he doesn’t. He just watches her go.
Emma tries to shake Bells’ hurt, stricken look from her mind. He’ll be fine. She knows he’ll be fine. He’s got plenty of missions to lead and the Resistance isn’t even going to miss her. Her friends all have better things to worry about than the fact that Emma doesn’t get to go on the missions.
The tears come hot and fast, blurring her vision. The night air whistles past her, and snow starts to fall around her, and she can’t see past the flurry of white, so she slows down while she tries to figure out how to turn on the windshield wipers.
Emma jabs furiously at the car’s control screen; her fingerprints smudge the oils already there. A fat teardrop lands next to her hand, and another, and another.
Emma wakes up cold and stiff. At least it’s not snowing anymore. She drives carefully, watching for people, but it’s all empty, crumbling highways and rusted signs, including one she passes reading Welcome to Canada.
There’d been a border here once, just as there once was a border between the United States and Mexico; both had been long forgotten once the Collective came together, but that sign was still here, a reminder of old borders that no longer matter, cities that barely exist. The roads are all that’s left, crackling and crumbling as the force of nature reclaims them.
It’s just a chance, driving out here on a hunch, but Emma knows how strongly home resonates. Southard’s got to be out here.
Emma thinks of the home where she grew up with her mothers doting on her, her friends nearby, when her biggest dreams and worries had to do with school and space. Would she go back? Emma thinks of the house in the canyons, the one built by Abby and her mom, the one where her moms are now— is that home? She’s lived in so many places this year, they’re all blending together.
She shakes herself as she parks and exits the old, creaking vehicle, imagining herself triumphantly coming with Southard to New Bright City. She sets up the solar panel, heaves it and grunts, and thinks of defeating Vindication and not of how difficult this is by herself.
Emma sighs. This whole plan seemed a lot more glamorous when she first thought of it when she left. “I’m not useless,” Emma says to the empty road and field.
She’s going to find Southard, and then Deirdre and everyone will eat their words. Emma is a valuable member of the team despite what others may think. She doesn’t need to be on missions with everyone; she just wants them to see her.
Don’t you want powers? You could be a hero like your friends, a small voice inside her says.
Emma pushes the voice aside, trying not to think about what that would entail. She clears a flat area to lay her sleeping mat down. She’s got wood to gather for a fire and dinner to make. She doesn’t have time to worry about her abilities. She’s got this.
Emma sleeps when she’s tired, eats when she’s hungry, and is at the whim of no one. If she wants to drive recklessly and all over the road, she can. She makes her own schedule, is the boss of her own mission.
It’s only fun for a short while. Soon loneliness and guilt eat at her, and Emma keeps seeing Bells’ stricken face over and over again. For the first time in a long time, she’s truly and utterly alone, with the whole of the world in front of her and a mission of her own to pursue. Emma thought it would mean freedom, but she misses everyone.
At every spectacular view she thinks of Bells and how he’d love it; Abby would love the strangeness and stillness of the abandoned factories and would want to explore them; Jess would squeal about how cute those rabbits are. Emma misses Bells elbowing her when she sleeps, the way they chatted about anything and nothing, even the way he snored.
Emma hefts the solar panel back into the trunk one morning and it clunks loudly, as if it’s hitting another piece of metal. She fumbles around in the trunk until she finds a small case. Inside is a cracked tablet. She didn’t pack it; Bells must have snuck it in, hoping she’d find a way to message him on the encrypted channel. Or maybe he left a message for her. Either way, it’s broken now. There’s no point in wondering why he left it for her.
Emma takes a deep breath, focusing on the road and pushing those thoughts away. They’re better off without her, anyway.
A cold, sweeping wind rushes across the valley. The sky is clear for now; clouds are forming in the distance. It’s a good thing she’s charging the solar panels; it looks as though there’s another storm coming.
Havenstown is empty, and her arrival is anticlimactic. It’s filled with nothing but desolate buildings half-covered in snow. Emma tries hard to ignore her disappointment; it’s not over, not yet. Southard was definitely spotted near here. All Emma has to do is thoroughly search the surrounding area.
The back of her neck prickles. She should get going. Every instinct is telling her to leave, get out of the open, but not committing to a full charge could very well mean getting stuck in the storm.
“Hello?” Emma calls out.
Out of the corner of her eye, she sees something move. “Is someone there?”
Emma shakes herself, trying not to jump at shadows on the deserted street. Maybe it’s coming from a vantage point. Havenstown’s buildings sprawl as far as she can see, climbing even onto the high slopes of the mountain. Emma can see homes built on those steep slopes and even higher, accessible only by a winding road. She shakes her head. Ridiculous.
Snow is starting to come down now, and she wonders how the people would deal with it, whether they’d be able to access the town for food and supplies. She gets dizzy, trying to trace the road hugging the side of the cliff and almost misses the flicker of light.
Emma watches it carefully. Is that a cloud or a plume of smoke?
There’s that flicker again, almost like the gleam of cam-foil. Emma looks closer; there’s a perfect mirror of that exact tree line, just like at the Broussard’s secret farm. Someone is hiding here, in this ghost town in the middle of nowhere.
Emma continues on foot, trudging toward where she saw the light. If Jess were here, she’d know immediately where she was going, and if Bells… well, he’d do something amazing. He’s always got something up his sleeve. And Abby would have plotted the trajectory or pinpointed exactly where Southard’s hideout was based on the glimmer of the reflection of that holo.
Powers aren’t everything, Emma tells herself. The logical part of her says she’s being childish, that of course her friends love and appreciate her, but she’s tired, tired of being excluded, tired of being looked over, of being asked to stand back.
“No more,” Emma mutters angrily, and then promptly trips and falls face first into a snowbank. She dusts herself off and keeps going.
She has no idea how far she has to go. She should probably get back to the car and change out of these wet clothes before she’s too tired, but it’s not as if the car has any charge to run a heater anyway. As long as she keeps moving, she’ll be fine.
She hears something ahead.
“Patricia Southard?” Emma calls. “Is that you? My name’s Emma. I’m a friend. I’m not with the League,” she announces. Her breath blossoms into little clouds in front of her as she pants with effort, hustling up the hill.
As she gets closer, she can see a person’s shadow at the top of the hill. Emma waves, picks up the pace until she gets a little closer, and then stops.
It’s not a person.
A howl echoes in the air.
Emma freezes. She knows the stories of the wild animals that roam the Unmaintained lands, of the hordes of previously domesticated animals, dogs and cats and who knows what else, left to themselves to forage and hunt, gone feral over a hundred years. There are also animals that were always wild in this country: bison and wolves and bears and mountain lions and coyotes. But they all went extinct, right?
Another howl.
“No one knows for sure,” Emma tells herself. “The Collective tells everyone that the Unmaintained lands are unsafe, that there are creatures out here, but they’re just stories, lies from the Collective.”
More howls this time; whatever it is, there’s more than one.
Emma spots movement above her on the far snowbank: something that moves quickly, something that is decidedly not human or robot, an animal on four legs, with pointed ears and a tail pointed up. It raises its great head and howls again. Another beast joins it, and another, and they stalk forward.
“Wolf,” Emma says, laughing in spite of her fear. “Hi,” she says. “There are a lot of you, aren’t there?” Had they been following her? How long have they been watching her?
The largest wolf’s eyes are ice blue and gleam with intelligence. They all look hungry, snarling at her, and Emma shakes when she spots the teeth.
Teeth. Long and sharp and so many of them.
Emma stands tall, shaking, and she tries not to let them know she’s afraid. She has no idea what to do. Her mind spins in all different directions about how this is it, and she didn’t even get to say goodbye…
The largest one howls again and yips loudly.
“Heel, Star! You too, Baby!” calls a gruff voice behind her.
The wolves—dogs?—wag their tails, and they sprint to a bundled-up figure behind them. Their demeanors immediately become playful.
“Oh, come on now, you can’t have forgotten what a person looks like; they’re clearly not a rabbit, you silly fools,” the person says fondly to the wolves, patting them on their heads. The largest one stands to greet the person. On its hind legs, it’s as tall as the person is. It should be frightening, but Emma wants to laugh at the eager animal.
“You,” the person says. “Who are you, and why are you here? How’d you find me?” The wolves turn to look at Emma with a wary eye, and one of them starts snarling again.
Emma holds her hands up. “I’m not with the League! My name is Emma,” she says, and then fatigue and exhaustion take over and she loses her balance, falling forward.
Emma stirs. There’s a warm heavy weight on her, something fluffy like fur that’s moving rhythmically, and then something rough and wet drags across her face. “Eurgh,” she says.
“Eurgh is right,” says the voice next to her.
She opens her eyes wearily, one at a time. There’s a crackling fire and the smell of something savory and delicious coming from somewhere, and an old woman is regarding her curiously.
On top of Emma is one of the wolves, no, two of them. The wolf—or dog?—beams at her, tongue lolling out of its mouth and panting, and then licks her face again. It’s so strange that Emma just accepts it, as if she’s in a dream.
“You’ve been out of it the whole ride back. You don’t hardly weigh a thing,” the woman says gruffly. “You’ll need to change out of your wet clothes or you’ll get hypothermia. These are clean. There’s a bathroom in there.” She jerks her head at a small door. “Do you need help? Star, Yeti, come over here.”
The furry weights move off her, and Emma just stares, not really believing what she’s seeing. It feels as though she’s moving underwater, and she’s so cold and tired, and her mind is hazy. She moves on autopilot to the small cramped bathroom. The sweater and sweatpants are clean and dry, and a bit too big for her, but Emma is grateful to be out of her wet clothes.
She is immediately greeted by wet noses and eager dogs when she exits the bathroom. “Thanks,” she says hesitantly. Is she dreaming? That would make much more sense. She’s freezing to death out in the cold on a pointless mission gone wrong, and her mind is playing tricks on her.
“Rest.” The voice is gentle and firm.
Emma is gently bundled up in a blanket and tucked in and then she drifts off to sleep.
Emma wakes up again, unfathomably warm, but with a much clearer head. She jolts upright with alarm, the details of the foolhardy mission and nearly freezing to death in the search for Southard.
There’s a confused whimper next to her, and Emma almost startles again, seeing the wolf-like creature eye her curiously. She remembers them surrounding her, and Emma thought it was going to be like the stories of the wild creatures roaming the Unmaintained lands, tearing and ripping her to pieces. This one’s mouth is open, with the tongue lolling out in a comical way.
“You’re a dangerous predator,” Emma says. Saying what she knows calms her down, but the wolf’s tail begins to wag with so much enthusiasm that his entire body shakes. “You’re a wolf? A dog?”
Emma remembers that dogs had been kept as pets before the Disasters. Like cats, there are plenty of historical holovids of them floating around the Net, but unlike cats, who occasionally were still kept as luxury pets, there are only stories about dogs.
The wolfdog is making a sad, whining noise now and noses at her face. It’s soft and wet, and Emma laughs despite herself, throwing her hands in her face to stop it. Her hands touch the soft, warm fur, and there’s a happy rumbling noise of approval. “Okay,” Emma says, patting the creature on the head again, and he seems to smile, panting excitedly, and she keeps up the motion.
Emma sits back, petting the wolfdog and taking in her surroundings. She’s in a one-room cabin dominated by a woodburning stove in the center. There’s a bed filled with quilts, a desk cluttered with strange items Emma has no name for, and what looks like a bulky piece of tech, possibly a pre-Collective computer. A fire crackles merrily in the stove, lighting the place with a soft, amber light. A delicious smell wafts from a pot, and Emma’s stomach growls.
How long was she out? She vaguely remembers being found, waking up in the cabin, and changing into dry clothes, but barely remembers anything else, aside from an old woman and an improbable number of wolfdogs. Emma pulls the blankets around her and spots her clothes drying on a rack near the fire and the contents of her pockets carefully laid out on a side table.
The door opens, and with it a gust of howling cold wind rushes inside, along with a figure wrapped head to toe in a puffy coat and even more wolfdogs. It’s a chaos of noise and furry bodies and noses as they bound inside the cabin.
The one by Emma’s side lets out a joyful bark, and the others answer, excitedly dancing about the figure as layers are removed to reveal an old woman. Emma watches as she pulls a scarf from her face. Her glittering eyes regard Emma.
“You need to eat,” she says, stepping closer. Up close, Emma can see her face is gnarled with wrinkles. Wisps of flyaway hair frame her face. Across her face runs a wicked looking scar, branched and forked like lightning, so faded it’s almost imperceptible.
Oh. She’s encountered Captain Orion, or someone with that very same lightning power.
Emma straightens up, brimming with questions.
“Eat,” the woman says, ladling the contents of the pot into a bowl and pressing it and a spoon into her hands.
“Oh, I didn’t—” Emma struggles. She isn’t sure of her place here, doesn’t want to assume anything. She feels strange, lightheaded, but takes a mouthful, hesitantly, and then almost groans in relief. It’s a thick, hearty stew flavored with spices, with chunks of vegetables and meat. She eats ravenously, finishing the bowl before she even knows it.
“Eat more; you’re too skinny,” the woman says, refilling her bowl and handing it back to her.
Emma smiles at her, feeling warm and content, not just with the food; the gesture is so reminiscent of her abuela. She feels safe and protected, and, despite the strangeness of the situation, thinks everything is going to be okay. She pats the dog next to her and watches the others, fascinated. Every inch of floor is covered with dogs; there are seven, all looking at her and her bowl with various amounts of interest.
“Oh, they won’t bother you. They just like the chase, and you gave them quite the chase. Yeti, quit it,” the woman says to the dog trying to nudge under her shoulder. “That one is Star, you’ve already petted him once, and now he’s going to be badgering you all night to be in your lap.” She jerks her head, pointing out each dog in turn. “Yeti and Bigfoot and Sasquatch and Baby and Pluto and Neptune.”
The dogs grow bolder and bolder, licking her face and demanding more attention. Emma is more curious about this woman who is introducing all her dogs before herself. She jumps up, remembering the car still sitting on the outskirts of town. The movement startles Star, who makes a sad noise as he topples to the floor.
“My car, I need to—”
“Your car will be covered in a foot of snow in an hour. Don’t worry about it.”
Emma sinks back onto the couch, and Star and Yeti clamber into her lap and lick her face as her host gives her a calculating look.
“And who are you, and why are you wandering around the Unmaintained lands by yourself?”
“My name is Emma. I’m not—”
“With the League. Like you said.” The woman snorts, handing her a cup of something hot. “You can call me…” she frowns, as if she’s forgotten her own name. “My friends called me Trish.”
“Nice to meet you. I’m Emma.” Emma looks at Trish, taking her in, noting the ominous past tense. Maybe all her friends are gone now. She looks as though she could be Emma’s abuela’s age, maybe older. “Thank you for helping me,” she says. “I was looking for…” Emma shrugs and sighs. “Well, I’m not sure if you know anything about them. It was a while ago.”
“Must be someone important,” Trish says. “For you to risk your life coming out here.”
Emma shrugs. “It had to be done. We’re going to need all the help we can get to bring down the League.”
Trish snorts. “The League!” She places her hand on Emma’s forehead. “Well, you’re not feverish, that’s good.”
Emma gestures out the window. “That’s Havenstown, right?”
“It once was, yeah. People are long gone, aside from me.”
“Do you know Patricia Southard? She was one of the astronauts on the Intrepid. Did she ever come back to this town? It would have been after 2035. I was researching the original meta-humans, and I think she must be the only one unaccounted for from that first wave of people who got powers.”
Trish stares her down and then tosses another log in the fire, which pops and crackles. “You finish eating that. I’ve got work to do.”
Trish is a very gruff and barely talkative host. She ignores all of Emma’s questions about Southard, seems to have very little interest in the League and the Resistance. For all her taciturn and grumpy manner, she makes Emma take the bed, despite Emma’s protests that she can take the couch.
On the next day, Emma starts packing up to go, but Trish takes one look at her zipping up her thin jacket and sits her down. “Look, a storm like this, you’ll never get enough sun to recharge your panels, and, even if you did, you won’t make it far before you run out of juice again.” Trish shakes her head. “I’m surprised you made it all the way out here. You’re tough. But it would be pointless for you to die in the storm. Better to stay here, at least till the storm’s over.”
“And how long will that be?”
An indifferent shrug is the answer. “Days. A week, maybe. Maybe longer. It’s a long way to spring just yet.”
Emma’s too weak to argue on the first day. Besides, the dogs are good company. Star’s taken to following her around, curling up at her feet and sitting in her lap as she peruses Trish’s bookshelf full of dusty romance novels. Emma can begin to see why people loved having these companions.
Trish disappears for hours at a time, bundled up in layers. Sometimes she brings the dogs with her; sometimes she goes alone.
“Can I help you do anything while I’m here?” Emma asks on the second day.
Trish gives her a calculating look. “You look like the wind could knock you over, but, by all means, if you want to help, I’ve got a million chores to do.”
She leads Emma down a packed snow tunnel outside the cabin; it’s surprisingly warm inside, and Emma marvels at how thick the snow is. There’s a neat little enclosed trail that goes to another shed, where an axe is resting in next to a pile of logs.
“Can you chop wood?”
“I can try,” Emma says.
A few minutes later her arms and shoulders are sore, but she doesn’t want to give up. Besides, Trish, despite her gruffness, or maybe because of it, really does remind Emma of her abuela, and she thinks about how she would feel, living all the way out here alone.
There is wood to chop and the dogs to feed and traps to check and fish to catch and it seems Emma is terrible at all of it, aside from petting the dogs, but she tries her best. She can do this.
The mornings have a serene beauty, all icy frost and trees glistening gently. There’s a silence that Emma has never known before, deeper, as if the world is waiting, listening.
Emma thinks about the world beyond this little icy haven, about the Council and the League and the battles raging on.
I could stay here, Emma thinks. Trish seems in no way wanting to kick her out. Emma thinks she might be lonely.
Emma could stay here and hide forever. She would miss Bells and Jess and Abby and her parents but surely the Resistance will go on without her; it’s not as though her plans have been very useful lately, anyway.
Before Emma knows it, a week has passed. It’s hard to tell, the way the days and the routines blur together.
Trish taps her spoon on her oatmeal bowl and eyes Emma. “So what are you hiding from?”
Emma scowls at her breakfast. “I’m not hiding from anything. I’m here on a mission, I told you.”
Trish waves her spoon at Emma. “There’s no one here. Storm’s over. You can go home now, you know.” She takes a bite of oatmeal. “It’s no problem if you want to stay, though. It’s been nice having the help. And you’re not so bad to talk to.”
Emma huffs. “I can leave at any time I want.”
Trish gestures toward the door.
Emma takes another bite of oatmeal. She can’t leave empty-handed, and she doesn’t know what the next step in looking for Southard is either.
“You are running away!” Trish guffaws at her. “Don’t worry. I ran away too. We can be two outcasts together.”
Emma scowls. “You don’t understand! I’m not— I’m not a meta-human, and Deirdre said I couldn’t come on any of the missions, and I just felt so useless I had to go do something.”
Trish takes a long sip from her coffee. “You talk a big talk about making change and doing stuff, but it sounds like you left your friends to do the work.”
“That’s not true,” Emma says angrily, setting down the bowl. “I can do work. I’m gonna do some right now.”
Emma heaves the axe, muttering angrily to herself as it lands solidly in the thick trunk of the tree, wedging a sharp cut in the wood. She steps back, ready for the tree to fall. She didn’t leave the work to her friends. She wasn’t even allowed to go on missions. Trish is just trying to rile her up. It must be living out here alone for so long.
The tree creaks again, and a clump of snow falls as it shudders and then topples to the right, hitting another tree. The trajectory changes dramatically, and then both trees topple toward Emma. She takes a step back, eyes widening, and then glances up at the swaying branches and towering trunks of the trees. She turns around to run, get out of the way, but it’s already falling.
Suddenly a huge pillar of earth shoots up, scattering snow and debris everywhere, building a wall between Emma and the falling trees, swooping up and over her head and hardening, like an earthen cave. Emma can hear the thunderous creaks as the trees crash down upon her, but she’s safe in her little cave. She touches the wall; it’s solid. She traces her fingers across the grains and finds the water bottle she was drinking from. It’s frozen, stuck inside the earth.
Something shifts outside, and she hears more creaks and noises.
Then the cave dissolves into fine grains, and Emma’s bottle clatters to the ground.
Trish is standing there, her eyebrows scrunched up in concern. “Are you okay?”
“I’m fine!” Emma says, standing up and brushing off dirt. “That was amazing— you’re— you’re—” a meta-human, Emma’s brain helpfully supplies, but, as the shock fades, she realizes it’s not just that. “You’re Patricia Southard.”
Trish sighs. “Yes. That was me, a long time ago. It feels like another life. Sometimes I wonder, if I hadn’t been on that spaceship, if I wasn’t on that mission, if I could have just lived a nice, normal life, married the woman I loved, had some kids, and then died when I should have.” Trish turns, jerking her head back down the mountain.
Emma grabs her water bottle and the axe, and follows, her head spinning with questions. She’s wasted so much time, just hanging out at the cabin with the dogs and helping Trish with her chores. If she had known she had actually succeeded in finding Southard, the one meta-human who could tip the scales in their favor, she would have already been on her way to New Bright City by now, ready to save the day.
Trish doesn’t answer any of the questions that Emma peppers her with on the way to the cabin. “Why didn’t you say anything? You knew that I was part of the Resistance and we need your help. Don’t you care?”
Trish doesn’t answer, just busies herself with making tea. She hands Emma a mug, then stares into her own cup.
Emma takes a sip, savoring the invigorating tea while watching Trish. All this time this centenarian has been taking care of her; Emma’s come to think of them as friends.
“When you first showed up, I panicked,” Trish says. “I didn’t want to tell you who I was, especially if you were looking for me. I’m still surprised you managed to get here in the first place.”
Emma grins. “I knew that you grew up here, and I figured you were attached to this town before it was leveled by the Disasters.”
Trish sighs. “It’s beautiful here. It still is. It’s not the same, after the eruption, but it’s my home. It’s always been. I mean, it was enough that the government trotted me around like their prize pony from city to city that sprung up in this newfangled alliance—”
“The Collective.”
Trish snorts. “Right. Three countries— one country now, with one goal: survival. And survive we did. We dismantled the space program, dedicated everything toward clean energy and rebuilding our cities and our heroes, who led the way.” She sighs, looking out the window.
“It was really hard to find anything about you,” Emma says. “Other than the fact you were on the Intrepid.”
Trish shakes her head. “I stopped playing the part. Left before it all blew up, before Vance started demanding and arguing with James about his League, about its goals—”
“Look, Vance. Gravitus knew it was wrong, creating this system,” Emma says. “It’s gotten out of control now. People are getting hurt.”
“Vance is dead,” Trish says heavily. “Look, Emma, I appreciate everything you’ve done, but I just want to live out here. On my own. With my dogs. I’d rather just not be involved with what the League gets up to, and how they use my name. I’d rather just be forgotten and I’m fine with how all that played out. Last I heard of the world, James’ grandkid was running the show.”
Emma bristles. “That kid, Captain Orion—”
Trish laughs. “She ain’t a Captain of anything, didn’t serve our nation in any way other than to fight in staged shows all across the nation. Keeps the public mollified, you see.”
“I know all that. Look, I told you—” Emma swallows. “My friends and I, we found out about all that. That’s why we started the Resistance. We’re going to stop everything.”
“Stop what, the League?” Trish laughs again. “Good luck with that. They’re the most powerful organization in the country.”
“But the Collective—”
“You think that the League and the Collective are two different organizations? Come on now. The leaders of our great nation have always been working with James and his little band of so-called heroes. It’s built into the foundation of this country. The heroes protect. Or rather, distract.”
“The Council—”
“A bunch of figureheads. The Three run the whole show.”
Emma bristles. “The Councilmembers do good. They work hard. My mom has been on the Council for ten years; she’s served Nevada well.”
Trish eyes her. “I’m not saying that the Councilmembers don’t do a good job of running their little Regions and helping their constituents. But how much power do they have to really create change? How much change is possible?”
“I know that the Council, once they learn about the League, they’ll want to change it. They won’t want to be part of a lie.”
Trish stands up, shaking her head. “What if the lie is too great? That people will lose faith in how their country is run, that they’ve been lied to this whole time? Widespread panic. Chaos. Maybe we’ll return to the time of the Disasters.”
“The people deserve to know!” Emma can’t believe she’s gotten this far, actually found the famous Patricia Southard, and she just wants to hide here in her cabin?
Trish eyes her. “You are tired. You need to get some rest.”