daynight (41 page)

Someone demands to know how the Ten and Grand Council will keep them safe. Have no fear Garden City citizens. The Ten and the Grand Council have a Grand Plan. They will protect the residents of Garden City, even if it means the annihilation of the extremist Exilers. The crowd cheers “Thanks to the Ten” over and over again. If security in Garden City has ever been lax, it isn’t now. Brad wouldn’t create widespread panic if he didn’t have a plan to defeat any intruders. Doc Daryn was right when he warned my father not to underestimate the SCI.

While joining in the chanting I circle the crowd looking for beautiful strawberry blonde ringlets. I finally spot Kira and am dismayed to see Ethan by her side looking at her like a puppy in a pet shop window who wants to be taken home. Friend, my booty. Guys don’t do girls as friends. At least not hot girls like Kira. Why’s he not Cleaved to his dream girl again? Right, he doesn’t have to Cleave, as he’s not under Garden City jurisdiction. His daddy made an exception until he could find Ethan the right girl. One with the right blood type. For a guy who told me he’d never be able to look at another girl again, he surely seems to be in love with my girlfriend. I’m sure that was daddy’s plan by sending them away and then locking them up together. With that much time alone some feelings were bound to crop up.

I sneak up behind Kira and hug her from the back, slipping my watch back out of her pocket and onto my wrist.

“I’ve been looking everywhere for you,” I say as I unwrap my arms and slip between her and Ethan. I give her a juicy kiss for good measure.

“Likewise,” she says. “We finally gave up and decided to stay in one place so you could find us.”

“Thank goodness for that or we’d have probably kept missing each other,” I say. I can’t tell if she’s buying it. In fact, since she got back I don’t have a clue how she feels because no matter what she
says
, her face shows nothing except a smile.

“Ethan’s in love with you,”
I say to her as we walk back from the Festival.
 

“You are way out of line. You have no idea what you are talking about,” she says. “He’s in love with someone else. Not me.”

“I see the way he looks at you. Don’t pretend like you can’t see it, too,” I say. I hate that she affects me the way she does. Even my father can’t hurt me or make me angry like Kira can. “I think you understated your relationship with him.”

“Are you accusing me of lying to you?” she says. Her eyes and body language scream defensive.
 

“No. Omitting,” I say. I know I’m being a hypocritical jerk. It’s not like I told her Bailey kissed me. Since Bailey got Exiled, I didn’t see any real reason to bring it up. And I’m the one who escalated my relationship with Kira. The moment I saw her come back home with Ethan in tow, I knew I had to raise the bar and tell her I love her. Or else I’d lose her. Bailey had been Exiled by that point, so I could give Kira my undivided attention.

“Wow. I mean, wow. That’s so choice,” she says. “You ditch me for the entire Festival and suddenly I’m a lying, cheating whore when I spend a little time with a friend?” Now she’s pissed.

“That’s my problem. I don’t think he sees you as just a friend,” I say.
 

“How would you even know? You don’t know him like I do. I like him. He’s important to me. We went through some crazy stuff together. But, we’re just friends and that’s the last time I’m going to say it. Believe me or not, I don’t care,” she says with her poker face. I do have a bad attitude about Ethan. His daddy wants him to Cleave my girlfriend. And, the thing I keep coming back to—he’s nice and devoted and ready to settle down. More so than me. What bugs me about Ethan is that he has that same look as his father and the other SCI higher-ups. Pretty on the outside. Talks a good game. But probably masking a whole lot of ugly under that beautiful façade.

“I’m sorry I mentioned it,” I say. “I don’t want to fight with you.” I know she’s hiding something from me and it involves Ethan. But the conversation’s going nowhere, and who am I to talk? I haven’t exactly been forthright about my own plans and activities. Though none of my activities involve a ‘friend’ that’s a girl (only a hot girl enemy who’s no longer in the picture).
 

“I don’t want to fight either. I wish we could just be on the same page about things. I feel like we’re heading down divergent paths and that really scares me,” she says, finally showing some emotion, as I can see the fear in her eyes.

“How can you be so complacent after everything the SCI has done to you? It seems like you’ve just given up and decided to live with it. I can’t do that. I’ll fight to the end to get my freedom and the freedom of the Second Chancers and Exilers, even if I decide to go about it differently than my dad. Why can’t you do the same?” I ask.

“Because I decided I
can
live with the status quo, for now, if it means that we can be together and live in safety. Or at least try to affect the status quo from the inside,” she says. “I have nothing to go back to on Earth. Everything I care about is here. I’m not willing to risk a life with the people I love over an effort that I think is hopeless. ”

“So let me get this straight,” I say. “You want to Cleave me, have two kids, and live unhappily ever after on this hellhole?” She stares directly into my eyes and pauses only momentarily before responding.

“That’s better than the alternative,” she says. “Think it over. Since we’re so important to the future of Thera, perhaps we can have a positive effect on the way things are run. Regardless though, what’s more important to you? A futile cause or the potential of a life together?”

“Is that an ultimatum?” I ask.

“No, of course not. I just have spent a lot of time thinking about it myself and well, it’s obvious what conclusion I came to. It’d just be nice if you did the same—I mean the thinking, not to necessarily come to the same conclusion,” she says, shrugging her shoulders.

“That’s not fair. It’s not black and white. One or the other,” I say, crossing my arms.

“Life’s not freaking fair,” she says. “I think we both know that.”

We walk the rest the way in silence.

I had completely forgotten
until just now, but Ted Rosenberg once told me “life wasn’t fair but that it’s my life, so I need to get over it and make the most of what I have.” My father dumped me on him for a week when I went through a period of rebellion at the age of ten. The first thing Ted did was to take me to the graveyard where his daughters were buried to give me a little object lesson.

“Well, life isn’t fair,” I’d told him.

“What’s not fair exactly?” he said.

“My mom died. I had to grow up on that dark craphole Thera and then my dad makes me learn all this stuff I don’t care about just so he can send me back there,” I said.

“Let me tell you something, Blake,” Ted said. He takes a picture out of his wallet and hands it to me. It’s of two darling girls that remind me a bit of Leila when she was little. “My beautiful, beautiful daughters were born here on Earth. But they died way before they should have—when they were just little girls. They got a second chance to live—on that ‘craphole’ Thera as you call it. They love it there. They’re happy. Really, really, happy. So I hold a really special place in my heart for Thera. It’s a place of miracles for my daughters and for me.”

“Well, it wasn’t for me,” I said, kicking a clump of grass out of the turf and sending it flying.
 

“Did you know that if it wasn’t for your family—and they go way, way back—that my daughters would have never gotten a second chance and people like you and me couldn’t travel back and forth between Earth and Thera?” he said.

“Nope,” I said.

“You are going to have the opportunity one day to help make sure the people on Thera—like my daughters and the rest of the people living there—get treated right, including the Exilers. It’s your birthright,” he said.

“What’s a birthright?” I asked.

“It’s something that gets passed down from father to son to father to son and so on. If Thera had Kings you’d be one. You’ve got royal blood in you, Blake. You and your brother will one day get to rule Thera as goodly Kings,” he said.

“You mean sister, right? I don’t have a brother. Only Leila,” I said.

“Yeah, sorry. When you get old you say stupid things,” he said with a laugh. “Leila can be like a Queen. And you both can have children that will get your birthright, too. That way more people can travel back and forth and help the people on both Thera and on Earth.”

“I don’t see how going there helps anyone,” I said.
 

“You’ll understand someday,” he said.

“Why do you care so much what I do?” I said.
 

“I would do absolutely anything to protect my daughters and the people I love. Your dad feels the same way about the Exilers. But one day all the people that your dad and I care about will depend on you to make good choices and do the right thing,” he said. “Can you promise to do that?”

“I guess. I have no clue what you’re talking about, but I’ll try to be good,” I said.

“I’m counting on that,” he said.

I remember that I asked my dad about the whole birthright thing and he told me that Ted must’ve been making up a story to get me motivated. But now I know it wasn’t a story at all. Which means that Ted knew who I was all along and about my importance to Thera and the SCI. And he didn’t tell my father. Well, Teddy boy, time for you to step up and show where your allegiance lies. If you’re really on the side of ‘good for all Therans’ then you can play a bigger role in helping my dad’s coup. Why should I risk my life to sneak into headquarters again—during regular business hours this time—when Ted Rosenberg works there?

And if Ted’s loyalty has drifted over the years… well then, he’s got a date with the Reaper a.k.a. my father.

“I’m going boarding,”
I tell Ted and Kira. Ted’s here first thing in the evening for our nightly Handler meeting since it’s a Sunnight and we don’t have school.
 

“You’re not supposed to exercise for another week,” Kira says, her green eyes stabbing me with accusation of poor judgment.

“I feel fine and I need some air. Thinking time. No tricks, I promise,” I say. It’s ironic I’m using Kira’s ‘suggestion’ I spend some time thinking to do the things she’d prefer me to avoid like the plague.

The truth is that I’m not really ready to ride, but I need to get a message about the meeting of the city heads to my father. So I grab my board, walk out the front door, and roll down the ramp before Kira can stop me. The temperature is brutal. I note the sun is setting to the East, so it shouldn’t be long before the heat backs off. It’s a long ride to the beach, but I’ve left my watch at home, so unless I encounter someone who has the audacity to ask me what I’m doing, I should be fine.

Despite continual adjustments to my stance while boarding I feel like someone’s trying to rip the grafts off my back with a giant claw. The new skin doesn’t stretch well. I start to worry that my back will look like it’s been through a shredder by the time I get back. The paths get bumpier the closer I get to the beach, having been ravaged by the storm. Apparently the Garden City maintenance crew hasn’t bothered to fix this stretch. The pain from being jostled on my board slows me down. It takes a half hour to get to the mouth of the canyon and by the time I get there the sun has fully disappeared.

Without the lift of the flash flood water it takes a couple minutes to find some footholds in the canyon wall to help me climb to the shelf. I manage to get up, though I can feel blood seeping through the back of my shirt. Not good. My doctor will be most displeased with me. I turn my focus to maneuvering up the shelf. The slickness of rain slowed my forward progress before. Tonight, vertigo attacks me as a full moon and stars illuminate the increasing distance between the beach and me.

When I finally hit the end of the shelf I give the signal. Short long short long. I repeat it several times and get a response within minutes. My dad comes personally, lantern in hand, which sheds light on his mood. Angry.

“Why are you here?” he yells up at me.

“Nice to see you, too,” I say. “I just missed you so much that I thought I’d come for a visit.”

“I don’t have time for your sarcasm, Blake. We’re busy preparing for our mission,” he says.

“Well, I have some intel that could and should influence your plans,” I say. “After what I tell you, perhaps you’ll listen to Doc Daryn. You’ve way underestimated the SCI.” I detail my visit to headquarters and the information I obtained, including a warning about the ten minute time limit to cross the Eco barrier, the ever-changing barrier configurations, list of meeting attendees, and Brad Darcton’s speech about the Exilers.
 

“Are you sure about the timing of the meeting?” he asks.

“That’s what it said on their master schedule,” I say. “So unless Ted set me up, it should be accurate. He gave me the passkey and code to get on the computer.”

“Ted can be trusted,” he says.

“Really? I’m not so sure,” I say. I recount the memory of my trip to the graveyard with Ted and how it proves that he knew about me being an Original long before I arrived in Garden City.

“Just because he knew doesn’t say anything about his loyalties,” my father says.

“Doesn’t it?” I say.

“If Ted has turned and you can prove it I’ll personally put a bullet through his oversized brain. But until then, we’re going to act on this intel. The opportunity to remove all the city heads at once may not come again.”

“The SCI is expecting you. They’ve warned the entire city. There’s no way you can come waltzing in and expect no resistance.”

“We haven’t seen a single ship come through—so where is the Ten’s supposed security force? Every security detail we’ve encountered from Garden City has been a dozen or less people. We can easily overpower whatever they have.”

I shake my head, incredulous at how overconfident he is. “So, you’re still coming? Same timing, just different night?”

“Yes, we’ll be there on meeting night at 1930 hours—just prior to the start of the work night. Dressed in city attire. The Interceptors got lucky on their last run a couple months back. The clothes will help us blend,” he says. Indeed, that will help. Once within city limits, officials won’t know who to be on the lookout for. “You should get back. It was a huge risk to come.”