Evolution (29 page)

I catch sight of him, then glance at Apollon. 
"Look," I say, "your weapon of choice."

He looks at the rabbit and starts laughing.

Jonas tosses the carcass down.  "I killed
it..."

I sigh.  Apollon is still working on... whatever. 
I climb up, grab the rabbit, and take it to the side to clean it.

"Save some guts for me," Apollon hollers after me.

I give him a doubtful look over my shoulder.  I'm
really not sure I want to know where all this is going.  Catgut, needle,
and rabbit entrails.  What's he going to make out of that?  Some sort
of bunny zombie?  I shiver and turn my thoughts to the more practical
matter of preparing dinner.  But in the end, I do it.  I save Apollon
some guts, and even deliver them to him on a bunny-skin platter.

***

It's the middle of the night.  I'm sound asleep. 
Warm and comfortable, with Jonas' arms nestled around me.  Shrieking sends
me flying out of my pack and bolting to my feet.  The boys are up
instantly, knives drawn, trying to make sense of what's happening. 
There's just a moment where we all blink around in the dim light from the
fire's coals.  Our eyes fall on Jack.  He's still shrieking.

Wrestling around in his pack, kicking, flailing.  There
are words in there somewhere, but I can't tell what they are.  Just
fragments.  He's dreaming, I think.  I've had those dreams before.

I drop to my knees beside him, put my hand on his
shoulder.  "Jack," I say softly, but I don't think he hears
me.  He just keeps screaming and flailing.  "Jack," I say,
louder, shaking harder.  "Jack, it's a dream.  You're OK. 
You're safe."

He startles awake, but it's no better.  He's still
screaming.  Panicked, hyperventilating.  His eyes are open and
looking around, but finding no comfort.

I pat his shoulder.  "You're OK."  I
want to help him, but feel completely unable.  I think of all the nights
my friends have helped me climb out of the claws of nightmares.  But Jack
is different.  There is a distance I don't know how to breach—don't know
if I want to.

It doesn't matter.  He flops over suddenly, throwing
his head into my lap.  He clings to me with shaking arms, like a terrified
child clinging to its mother.  He's sobbing violently, his fingers clawing
at me, and he's not going to let go.  For just an instant, I recoil,
wanting to shove him away.  But then I'm petting his head, and I strangely
can't see him through my blurry eyes.  I whisper again and again,
"It's OK, Jack.  You're safe.  You're OK."  And I want
more than anything in the world for that to be true.

Jack sobs and sobs.  There is nothing I can do, nothing
I can say to make him feel better.  I sit with him, stroke away his tears,
and promise him that we'll look after him.  Crying it out takes a long
time—time that I'm in my head, pushing back my own memories, but also
furious.  Sentries
are
stupid, I'm thinking.  But they cannot
be blamed.  They're simply faulty machinery.  The Forefathers are to
blame for this.  They were the ones who were stupid.  I feel
something stirring inside me.  A mess of questions, anger, and the edge of
a realization I can't quite verbalize yet.  I think of that hand—that
horrible severed hand—and I know that everything is going to end up there.

Jonas startles me out of my thoughts, crouching down in
front of me.  Jack is now just shuddering, eyes clamped, his chest
involuntarily choking in air now and then.  Jonas has a whole armload of
nuts, and Jack's bag as well.  "Jack," he coaxes softly,
"look what I brought you.  More nuts."

Jack slowly opens his eyes.

Jonas gently pries one of Jack's arms from me and places a
nut in his hand.  "One."

In only a moment, Jonas has Jack sitting up, counting
nuts.  Jonas meets my gaze, and a little smile tugs at the corners of his
mouth.  He turns back to Jack with an unexpected tenderness, and counts as
he passes him nuts.  For the longest time, I watch them, seeing something
I think I have never seen before.  Apollon brings us water warmed on the
fire.  I sip, and watch.  Counting.  Recounting.  I'm
yawning, but I don't want to sleep.  Every once in a while, Jonas eyes
flick to me.  His voice is so soft as it touches each number.  He
almost drops a nut as he passes it to Jack, and they share a little smile as
well.  It hits me that this might seem the most mundane, pointless thing
in the world to someone who didn't understand.  But it has the deepest
significance for us, who do, and I know beyond doubt that I will long remember
this night, sitting, counting nuts when we all should be sleeping.

Apollon and Jack are still sound asleep when Jonas and I
drag ourselves out of bed and into the grey morning.  It's not early, but
it feels like it.  The sun has not yet gotten its strength.

Leaving my cocoon of warmth is less than desirable, but
laying there when we're both awake, pretending not to be, is not the wisest
call either.

I put some more wood on the fire and poke at it, watch the
flames slowly crawl up the logs.  Then Jonas and I retreat to a large rock
within view of the campsite, but far enough away where we won't disturb our
friends if we talk softly.  I sit looking off into the deep woods, and he
faces me, cross-legged.  Almost immediately he's laughing, saying my hair
is a mess, and his hand goes to the back of my neck, where his fingers bring
order to my locks but taunt my nerves into a tangle.

"So where do you think we'll end up?" he asks, as
if he has no clue what he's doing.

I eye him sideways, then grab his arm—his other arm. 
His hand drops from my hair and rests lightly on the rock as he watches to see
what I'm doing.

Slowly, cautiously, I tug his arm toward me.  There's a
fear underneath that he'll yank it away if he suspects me.  I'm
deliberate.  I don't want to surprise him.  My eyes only leave his
when my fingers are on his coat sleeve.  I push it up.  My heart
races, because he hasn't pulled away.  I place my index finger on his
wrist, touching the place where his wrist and hand intersect, on the lowest
point of his compass-shaped scar.  Here, is what the voice in my head
says, but it doesn't come out. I look at his face again.  This doesn't
need words.

He only hesitates for a moment, and surprisingly, he still
does not yank his arm away.  He doesn't even look uncomfortable.  His
eyelids come halfway down over those green eyes.  "It doesn't matter
anymore, you know."

He lets me chew on that a second.

Then he leans in a little.  Somehow, instead of me
having hold of his wrist, he's got hold of my hand.  "You're
right.  I've been thinking about it a lot."  He shakes his
head.  "We're not those people.  We're just... us."

I'm searching his expression.  It was my idea, but I'm
not entirely sure I believe it.  I'm not sure I want
him
to. 
But I see a freedom in his eyes that I have never seen before.  A
release.  And I cannot help but feel joy for him, that he's discovered it,
even as part of me is sinking.  The thing about being erased is, you
always feel like there is something, somewhere, that you are missing.  Not
knowing torments you.  There's always a panic underneath.  A need to
return.  But what if we could actually set that need aside?  What if
we could be whole?  Truly something new?  Maybe for some of us it's
possible.  Apollon seems to have never been anything other than
Apollon.  And now, maybe Jonas is finding a way to that place.  But
I'm not there yet, and I don't know if I ever will be.  There's something
in me that's not normal.  A part of me that hung on, despite the
erasure.  I don't know how it got there, or how it stayed, but I don't
think I'll be able to let go until I've put all these mysteries to rest.
 So in a sense, I feel like I'm watching Jonas turn into a butterfly, and
here I am stuck being a caterpillar.  I feel like he's flying away from
me, and as beautiful as that might be, I can't help but notice how alone I am.

Maybe I've gone too long without speaking, or maybe he reads
all the emotion and doubt in my eyes.  "It's hard at first," he
says, squeezing my hand.  "I know.  But every day you're finding
out who you are.  And look at us."  His eyes dart around the
forest around us—the solemn trees, still in the morning light.  I breathe
the smell of campfire and river.  He smiles softly.  His words are
just as soft, but they ring through the forest.  "We're free."

I look down at the rock we're sitting on, unable to form a
reply.  I'm all over the place.  Happy, sad, feeling the strength of
friendship, and the heartache of being alone.  My thoughts go one way, and
then another.  I'm OK with it, and I'm not.  I want to stay here, and
I want to get up and run.  But most of all, I don't want him to let go of
my hands.

He does.  Letting go is inevitable.

Apollon and Jack are stirring in the camp, and a little
twitch shoots through Jonas—so subtle I wouldn't have seen it, but I feel it
through his hands.  He drops mine and looks toward the fire.  Toward
our friends.  "'Bout time," he calls.

Apollon stands, rubbing his hair, yawning at us, but there's
something speculative in his look.  "I hope you two made
breakfast."

"Sure," I say, climbing off the rock and heading
toward camp.  "If you count leftover cold rabbit as
breakfast."  I divvy up what's left of last night's dinner, and we
sit in silence, picking the meat from the bones.  It doesn’t seem like
much.  We'll need to do some more hunting.  "So, we're hiking
back up to that... building?"

Apollon looks like he's just remembered something.  He
licks the last of the rabbit grease from his fingers, then scurries back up the
tree.  Jonas and I stand below looking up.  Meanwhile, Jack is
picking up more nuts.

"Anything interesting?" Jonas calls up.

"Hard to see," Apollon answers.  "But
I'm pretty sure there's more than just one building."  He comes back
down the tree and they look at each other... some sort of silent communication.

Jonas nods his head toward the distance.  "Let's
go check it out."

We make sure our raft is secure, debate leaving our packs
behind as well, and end up taking them with us.  Who knows what we'll run
into, or where our journey could take us.  Better to be prepared. 
The edge of the river is thick with trees.  We walk quietly, listening for
anything we might hunt on the way.  We flush out one rabbit on our walk,
and both Jonas and I miss it.  He retrieves our thrown knives from the
same spot in the ground, and gives me a long look as he hands mine back to
me.  I take it and say nothing, wondering if he woke up from erasure with
his knife-throwing skills as well.

The walk is a lot longer than the five minutes we drifted
down the river, but we make it to the ruins in about half an hour. 
Apollon is right.  There's more than just one building.  It's a small
clump of buildings, really, most of them set back a little off the river. 
The one we saw is right on the edge, its feet in the water, and crumbling the
worst out of any of them.  Not to say that anything here is in good
shape.  Much like the ruins outside of Minneapolis, these buildings are
missing roofs in places, walls in others.  Everything looks ready to fall
in on itself.  We pick our way through them, afraid to touch much of
anything, lest we send it falling to the ground.

There is one building, made entirely of stone, that seems
strangely intact.  The roof is gone, and whatever door there was is
reduced to a mass of splinters hanging at a slant.  We step over the
remains of the door and walk inside, looking around.  The building is wide
and low, and there are still things in it.  Piles where things that were
once things have rotted, much like the door.  It's difficult to tell what
a lot of it was.  But then there are things that are still mostly
solid.  A broken piece of pottery with rusted metal poking out the top. 
On one surface, a cup.  I pick it up and turn it over in my hands. 
It still seems usable, though I cannot make out what the words on it used to
say.  Quietly, perhaps afraid to speak, we poke through the remnants of
another world.

In one corner, a metal desk has been deserted by two of its
legs.  It lays diagonally, its contents overturned.  On further
inspection, I find a drawer.  It squeals as I force it open, drawing my
friends' attention from across the room.  They look at me, but don't
approach.  Not until after I pull the pink thing from inside. 
There's a casing of rubber that flakes in my hands.  I let it fall
away.  Inside, protected by the aged case, is a hand-sized
rectangle.  One side thin, flaking glass.  The other is white
plastic.  There's a picture of an apple, or maybe a peach, with a bite
taken out of it.  Beneath, a word.  "…Ih-pad?" I ask,
holding it out so my friends can see.  The word sounds funny in my mouth,
like something incomplete.  Like only the ending of a word. 
"What's an iPad?"

Apollon is at my side, grabbing the thing away from
me.  He turns it over and over.  There is a crease across his brow,
and a look of disbelief in his eyes.

I want to ask, but I don't.

"Can I have this?" he finally asks.

I nod.  Jonas and I exchange a look as our friend tucks
the thing into his coat.  I watch Apollon turn away.  He shivers and
walks to the next room to poke around some more.

Suddenly, I don't want to be here anymore.  I walk back
outside, where I see Jack scrambling out from a hole in another building. 
He's got something with him.  He sits down on what used to be steps, and
opens a plastic box.  He begins counting something small from inside.

I go over and sit next to him.  "Hey, Jack,"
I say, a little curious about what he's got, but mostly just wanting a
distraction.  The box is full of little metal bits, and some spools of
string that look like catgut.  I'm not sure what any of it is meant to
be.  Jack dumps out a little plastic container into my hand, and I help
him count the things back into the box.  It keeps us busy until Apollon
and Jonas are done rummaging.

When they finally come to join us, Apollon looks at the
stuff we're counting.  "After all my creative improvising, too."

I frown up at him.

He just smiles and says, "You'll see."

Apollon and Jonas wander off to do some more
exploring.  I stay with Jack on the steps.  He hums that child's song
over and over, but he never does the part with scary face.  The humming
isn't so bad.  I can tell he's feeling a little restless, and so am
I.  I'm not sure why, but I don't want to be here.  Even though we
really have no plan, I feel like we should be moving.  Going
somewhere.  Doing something.  I can't help but think back on the
Outpost and wonder if everyone is alright.  I wish for all the world that
Miranda and Neveah were with us.  And Matt.  I wish he was with us,
too.

I'm laughing at myself then, picturing what that would be
like.  As if things aren't weird enough.  Jack throws me a
questioning, half-alarmed look.  Then he starts laughing, too, as if he
could just see the chaos in my head.  There's something so disarming about
the way he smiles—something so real.  We just keep laughing and laughing,
bouncing off of each other.  And I feel better.  Really, truly
better.

Apollon and Jonas come back to find us still giggling.

Jonas has some sort of largish bird carcass by the
feet.  Something he's obviously caught roosting in the wrong place. 
He smiles as he shows it off  "Lunch.  There's an old chimney
back there that'll be a good place to make a fire."  He glances at
the sky that is still grey and filled with clouds.  "It might
rain.  Maybe we should stay here."

I stand up and brush myself off.  "I'd rather
not.  Lunch, OK, but I want to get going.  I don't want to stay
here."

We all move to the half-standing building with the intact
chimney, where we build a fire and roast the bird.

"Here," Jonas says softly, offering me the
choicest part of the meal, along with a lingering smile.  Then he leans
back against the hearth wall and munches a drumstick.  "So what
now?"

I chew on a mouthful of meat and consider.  Keep
moving.  Keep going.  That's the only answer.  Again I'm
thinking about white towers, and strange men who seem to know me, and how on
earth it could all make sense.  That's when I know I want to continue our
quest, despite everything.  I want to find another tower.  But that
would mean going back into a city, possibly getting stuck there, or
worse.  After the last one, do I really want to risk leading my friends
back inside the barrier?  I find myself shaking my head, staring into the
fire.

Apollon, standing next to me, says, "We could stay
here.  Or build our own place in the wilderness."  He gives me a
sultry look and pokes me in the stomach.  "You know, repopulate the
earth and all."

I turn crimson—half because Apollon hasn't hit on me in so
long I was absolutely not prepared for it, and half because I'm sure this was a
little jab aimed at Jonas, who is right
there
.  I swat Apollon's
arm away and narrow my eyes at him.  "I'm not repopulating anything
with you."

He starts laughing, just laughing at me.

I roll my eyes and make myself look at Jonas.  "I
know I'm an idiot..."

Before I can continue I hear Apollon muttering at my side,
"You are an idiot."

I ignore him, and finish.  "But I can’t help but
want to find another tower."

Silence.  Now Apollon actually looks at me. 
"You are an idiot," he says, loud enough for everyone to hear this
time.

My idea sinks in.  Jack starts humming again.

Jonas closes his eyes for a moment, then looks at me. 
"What about Fate?" he asks, the last thing I expect.

I take a deep breath through my mouth.  The answer
comes back out before I know I have it.  "Fate can decide. 
There's got to be a city along this river somewhere.  When we're able to
see one, we stop and that's our city."  I don’t add the trailing
thought:
Hopefully we don’t all die.

Jonas considers my plan, but Apollon shakes his head,
rubbing his forehead.  "No," he says, slowly, like he's putting
a lot of thought into it.  "Eden, we're going south."

"So?"

"So that's where we're going," he insists, like
he's not up for arguing about it.  The slightest flick of his eyes in
Jonas' direction clues me in.

I turn and look at Jonas.  Does he even still want to
chase after his scar?  And if he doesn't, is he going to tell Apollon
about it?