daynight (20 page)

Five, Bailey’s going to be a real obstacle for my fake relationship, no question. Almost makes me wish she had her memory back. She spent our entire workout educating me on ways to have ‘fun’ without crossing the Cleaving line. If I’d thought she was pretty creative during our short relationship before… the stuff she whispered to me had me blushing (and otherwise reacting) and I don’t embarrass easily. That conversation required an extra long cold shower post-workout.

Six, I’m pretty sure that my fake relationship with Kira and potential Cleaving has everything to do with Kira and me being the ‘future of Thera.’ I’ve got whacked thoughts like they want us to breed a bunch of super DNT babies, which would explain why they’re all about our reproductive systems functioning. I just can’t tell how far they’re taking it.
 

All I know is the clinic just made me give them a sperm sample. And they’re in there doing who knows what to Kira. With any luck she’ll be able to detail it out for me, but I’m betting they’ll make sure she can’t. Ted told me the pregnancies were all done in-vitro, which screams ‘lab creations’ to me. For all I know they’re manufacturing a bunch of mini-me’s right now and there’s nothing I can do about it. Or maybe they’re shoving my goods up her to try to get her pregnant, but that doesn’t really jive either since we’re not Cleaved, so that means any pregnancy, ‘assisted’ or not and we’d be Exiled. However, it’s equally likely my upbringing has made my overly paranoid and they’re just trying to grow some DNT in a lab and the repro deal is a huge red herring.

My dad trained me for just about every scenario, but we never covered reproduction in a whole lot of detail. In fact, I don’t think he ever factored female influence into the equation, which was a major oversight on his part. He shut down my relationship with Bailey the moment he found out. Beat the crap out of me for getting involved with her, so between his reaction and Bailey’s reaction I equate girls with pain. Sure, I have a teenage sister. But it’s a heck of a lot different having a girlfriend, fake or not. I could foist my sister on my step-mom when she got touchy and emotional, but I’m expected to shoulder that responsibility with Kira and I am way out of my element. I’d give anything for a laptop and an hour of Internet access because a little research is in order. Google’d be my best friend about now. I wonder if somewhere deep within the SCI administration buildings if they don’t have some internet cable that runs through a portal.
 

I realize Kira hasn’t been in for long, but I want to see her and find myself pacing the small lobby of the clinic. The receptionist keeps glancing up like I’m an annoying distraction, but I don’t give a crap because I need to know what they’re doing to her and whether they’re hurting her. My sleep suffered as I spent the hours reliving how my body felt holding her. Though, if I’m being honest, I might have been thinking about some of Bailey’s suggestions, too. Bad-news Bailey’s the kind of distraction that could blow the mission completely.
 

The door to the clinic opens and I’m surprised to see Ethan the Intern stroll in.
 

“Hey, Ethan,” I say. He looks as shocked to see me as I am to see him.

“Hi. Blake was it? What are you doing here?” he asks.

“Waiting for my partner, Kira, to get out of surgery. They’re removing a lesion or something,” I say, trying not to put too much emphasis on the ‘or something,’ but failing.

“Is she okay?” he says, looking concerned. His fists are balled and clenched enough that I almost think he might deck me, so I back up a step. What’s got him strung so tight?

“She better be,” I say. “She’s supposed to be out any moment.” He shoves his hands in his pockets and rocks back and forth on his feet, as if he’s trying to figure out what to say. Sounds like he mumbles “Crap, not now” under his breath.

“I better check in for my appointment. I’m late,” he finally says in a nervous tone and then walks over to the desk. After whispering something to the receptionist, he’s immediately motioned to follow her back to a room. I had to wait twenty-five minutes for my appointment. “It was good to see you again, Blake,” he adds before disappearing down the hall.

“You, too,” I mumble. I hear some loud voices coming from the hallway, but can’t make out the conversation. One of the voices sounds like Ethan’s, but I can’t be sure.

After Ethan disappears, I hear the fight continue behind closed doors. Then I make out fragments of a conversation between Kira and a nurse in the hall, which doesn’t sound pleasant. About a minute later, the nurse wheels Kira out in a wheelchair. As much as I’d like to question the doctor about what they did to her, I decide to take her home. She’s resisting a bit and mumbling something about hearing the voice of someone she knows and needing to wait to see if it’s really him, but I assume she’s just loopy on the drugs, so I get her out of there. Ethan’s here and I’d still like to avoid the two of them meeting.

She tells me everything’s okay, but doesn’t know the details of what they did. But then the chair comes to a halt and Kira’s looking for answers, and refusing to move until I tell her. So I do. I unload the stuff I know, leaving out the nastiness about what I think the SCI has planned, and it doesn’t take her long to cut to the heart of the matter. She was headed for hell and I didn’t warn her, and that is freaking betrayal with a capital B. Sugar coating it isn’t going to help. I did what I did for good reason and it’s too late to change it now.

I release my grip on her hands and push her on up the rest the way to our house, cursing the screwed up situation. Letting them assign me a partner was a mistake, but allowing myself to care about her and what she thinks was an even bigger one. My chances with her were nil from the get-go between my sins of omission, she being way out of my league, her lover boy being brought back from the dead, and my focus needing to be on my mission and not some volatile chick who can’t possibly understand how important my success is.
 

The truth is that I’m not sorry and I’d do it again. Had I told her at any point before seeing the Second Chancers, we’d have both been exposed as frauds and be dead—and it’s not like we’d have been given another go at life on another planet. I’m done apologizing. It’s time to stop fretting over my fake relationship and for me to get to work. She’s going to have to get over it and help me. Because neither of us will have a decent future, if we don’t deliver. Nor will my dad, the Exilers, or the Second Chancers.
 

Yes, whatever lust-filled or otherwise feelings
I’ve got going for Kira (or my evil-ex) need to be extinguished for the duration. My father taught me to turn off my emotions. He’s an expert, having done it to all his colleagues post-Exile. He’d practically worshipped the Grand Council and Presiding Ten until he’d discovered their rap sheet. After that, he axed the relationship cords. It was much easier to plot against them without consideration of the human factor—all the dinners, parties, and stories they’d shared. He figured ‘screw them all, they deserve what they have coming,’ comparing them to the Third Reich during the Holocaust. They were playing Gad and mucking with the natural order of things.

I knew precious little about Garden City or its inhabitants until my father allowed me to join his band of humanitarians on a stakeout of the Eco barrier as a ‘teaching exercise,’ wanting me to learn survival skills. The group hoped to figure out a way through, over or under the toxic strip so they could steal supplies from an outlying warehouse. Doc Daryn came along to attend to the injuries he was sure the group would suffer, leaving his Cleave as nurse to the rest of the Exiled.

Our humble cave dwellings sat just two canyons away from Garden City, less than a night’s walk. So we’d left at sundown, traveled the night, and arrived by sunrise to a deep cave west of the city where we setup camp for the day. I was well accustomed to sleeping in sauna-like conditions, so curled in the back of the cave against a cool rock and slept until woken.

The first night we traversed a three-mile stretch along the barrier, throwing rocks from a distance to see if there were dead spots between the triggers of the deadly gasses. Despite it being mid-night the lights of Garden City glowed—a vast difference from the canyons back home where we had to use lanterns or flashlights.
 

Our group was able to determine that there were indeed dead spots in the barrier. However, the men weren’t able to throw far enough to map more than the first twenty feet of the pattern, and unfortunately the spaces appeared too small for a human foot to safely step between. While the men fought to uncover the barrier’s secrets, my father taught me the plants of the canyons, showing me which varieties were edible, those that were poisonous, and others that stored water. He instructed me how to craft a makeshift rope from canyon brush, tie knots, and chisel foot holds into canyon rock.
 

I already knew to find shelter from the sun for the day, but he taught me tricks of how to tell which cave ran deepest. And upon our return that first night, he schooled me on ways to build a safe fire pit within the cave to ward off creatures, and to cook any available food or sterilize water. He had Doc continue on into the morning, teaching me first aid skills—from burn treatment, to bandaging a sprained ankle, to proper care for cuts, bruises, bites, or gashes. I look back and blame my eagerness to be taught for his later decision to make me a permanent student in his school of Theran life and coup d’état.

Night two had been spent trying to dig under the barrier, with zero success. I was forced to watch the debacle from a distance. The sandy, rocky nature of the canyons caused immediate collapse and the gas bombs to ignite, the men barely running to safety before causing permanent damage to their lungs and skin, even while wearing Doc Daryn’s safety masks. This frustrated my father since Garden City had an elaborate tunnel system, but even the engineer in the group couldn’t figure out a safe way to proceed given their limited tools.
 

The men, lungs too weak to try anything else, returned early to the cave to rethink their strategy. As they did so, and by request, my father told me stories of the evil men who controlled Garden City and the other cities on Thera, every story justifying why my dad found it okay to steal from them. For me it was enough to know that we’d die without the food and supplies, but my father chattered for hours without break, describing the government, the Second Chancers, and a bleak life of endless rules and lack of choices.
 

The men left me behind the last night as they walked the distance of the barrier all the way to the ocean, trying to determine if there was a way in by sea. I’d spent the early part of the night at the mouth of my cave, gazing at the city and canyon lights, pondering the words of my father, and wondering if I’d ever live in a city such as the one before me, or the fantastical one my father had promised my mother he’d take me to somenight. Things like running water, bathrooms with toilets and showers, kitchens with refrigerators and stoves, not to mention technological gadgets were absolutely foreign to me, no matter how accurately described.

Bad, evil men were also alien to me. The Exiled men could be characterized as rough, but who wouldn’t be that way given our living conditions? From my father’s tales, those Exiled from Garden City were done so for unjust causes. That night, however, I met face-to-face two very bad men who’d been Exiled for excellent reason.
 

I saw two figures scrambling up the canyon face towards me, and thinking they were part of my father’s group I’d called out to them. But as they got closer I realized they weren’t familiar. I immediately recognized their Exile attire, so knew they’d been in the city recently, as every Exiler ditches the orange suit first chance they get. One man stood at least six and a half feet tall, was at least twice as wide as my father, and curly black hair covered his head, neck and arms. His companion had a small build, but a bald head and scruffy gray beard. At first they were friendly and I’d always been taught to be polite, so I invited them into the cave.

“You Exiled like us, Boy?” they’d said.

“My dad was Exiled before I was born, and all our friends are Exiled,” I’d responded.

“You live here?” the tall man asked.

“Nope, we live a night’s walk from here,” I said, wishing my father would return so he could answer their questions.
 

“Then why are you here all alone?” the small man asked.

“My dad and his friends are out, but should be back soon,” I said, even though I had no idea when they would return.

“We’ll hang with you and keep you safe, then,” they’d said. And stay they did, making small talk and asking questions about Exiled life until my father and friends showed up a couple hours later.
 

As the group entered the cave and my father called out to me, the big guy grabbed me into a chokehold, my legs flailing beneath me. He threatened to snap my neck if my father didn’t do exactly as prescribed. I remember gasping for air, but not being able to suck in enough. It felt like a three hundred pound weight was crushing my chest. Despite all the death I’d seen at a young age, it never occurred to me that kids could die. Or that Exilers could or would even want to kill other Exilers.

Exilers always arrived desperate, greedy, and willing to do anything to survive, so my father had been well versed in proper etiquette for diffusing panic. He greeted them warmly and assured them they were amongst friends and not harsh government dictate. Upon the promise of food, supplies, and lodging to the men, the man released his grip and dropped me to the cave floor. I scrambled to my father’s feet shaking, but my father’s eyes stayed trained on the men as his sales pitch continued.

My dad peddled our community as a luxury desert spa, plus promised the men they’d have first dibs on the next ship to bring supplies to Garden City that the Interceptors planned to pirate. The men lapped up the vision of freedom and long-term survival, and then hiked the distance to our caves with us that night. The large man forced me to ride on his shoulders to ensure my dad kept his end of the bargain, but upon getting there and being offered a meal by Doc’s Cleave, he’d let me join my sister as he and his cohort ate and surveyed the area. It’s not like I could run and escape either of the guys, plus we’d led them to a place with hundreds of potential hostages.