Rebellion (7 page)

I force the word out before I can change my mind again: “Okay.”

“Okay?” Beechy says.

“I’ll do it.”

Even if I fail and end up captured, I will be one step closer to Charlie—one step closer to killing the man who has taken almost everything from me. I owe it to Oliver, to Cady, to avenge their deaths. I owe it to everyone Charlie has ever stolen from me.

“Good,” Beechy says. “As I said, I’ll do my best to protect you.”

“How come you trust me, even after what I did to Cady?” I blurt out the words. I’m sick of not talking about this. I’m sick of pretending it’s not my fault she’s dead. “You saw what I did in the jet. You saw how I lost control. I … I killed her, Beechy.”

In the silence, Beechy doesn’t say anything, and his expression is impossible to read. I keep talking because I don’t know what else to do.

“I didn’t know what I was doing.” The words come out hoarse, like I’m wrenching them from my lungs. “I started hallucinating and I thought I was back in Karum. I thought Charlie was strangling me, and I couldn’t do anything to stop him. But I need to stop him. He needs to lose something, since he’s stolen so many people from us.”

“He will.” Beechy moves closer to me. His palm touches my cheek, gently guiding my face to look at his.

My eyes water, but the warmth of his hand helps me focus. The emergency lights turn his normally brown eyes a shade of midnight blue, making me think of the sky I sometimes wish would swallow me whole.

“We’ll beat him,” Beechy says softly. “You and I. All of us, together. But only if we don’t fall apart.”

“It’s hard not to.”

“I know.” He presses his fingertips into my cheek, then lets his hand fall away.

Silently, I promise myself I won’t cry for a long time, maybe not ever again after we leave the KIMO facility. I need to shed my weak skin and put on armor, or there’s no way I’ll survive.

In my next breath, I make a decision. Wiping my eyes, I push past Beechy until I reach the wall of compartments. I open them until I find a medikit with a small pair of scissors inside. The blades seem a bit dull, but they’ll have to do.

I put the medikit back where it goes and walk down the perpendicular corridor to the passenger bunk room. There’s a mirror inside. The light is dim, as it is everywhere, but there’s enough of it for me to make out my reflection. I pull the elastic band out of my hair and watch my curls fall down. They’re longer than they used to be; the tips reach well past my shoulders.

I open the scissors and slide the blades between my hair, lining them up with the base of my neck and moving them higher. Shorter is best. Short like a boy, so hopefully I’ll be harder to recognize.

I make the first cut to my hair, then the second. Again and again, keeping my hands as steady as I’m able. Beechy helps me cut the back straight.

When we’re finished, my reflection stares back at me, unfamiliar. She looks uncertain at first, fingering the short ends of her hair.

Slowly, the edges of her lips curve upward. When she smiles like that, she looks braver than I feel, but maybe that’s all that matters.

7

When I return to my bunk room around four thirty in the morning, the compound is starting to wake up. All my roommates’ beds are empty; they’re probably in the mess hall. Logan is rubbing his eyes and pulling on his boots in the dim light from the space heater.

He looks up after I walk in.

“Hey,” I say.

He opens his mouth to reply, but freezes as soon as he notices what’s different about me. My cheeks flush under his gaze.

My hair isn’t just shorter; it’s also blonder now. I spent the last half hour soaking my curls with bleaching chemicals Beechy helped me find in the storage room, to better my disguise. It’s not foolproof, since the color won’t last forever and there’s not an easy way for me to bring chemicals with me on the mission. Once I’m in the camp, I’ll have to improvise.

I have more pressing concerns at the moment though. Beechy asked me to talk to Logan, to see if he’ll come with me to the work camp. I have a feeling he’s not going to be happy I agreed to it. He’s going to try to talk me out of it.

But I’ve made up my mind, and I won’t change it.

“We need to talk,” I say.

Logan blinks once, twice, falling out of his stare. “When did you wake up?” he asks.

I bite my lip. “About an hour ago. Sorry I left. I just couldn’t fall back asleep, and I didn’t want to bother you.”

“It’s fine,” he says, but the slight hitch in his voice makes me think it isn’t. He rubs his eyes again, as if he isn’t fully awake yet. Walking closer to me, he reaches out and touches my short curls. “This looks nice, by the way. Different, but it suits you.”

“Thanks,” I say, though I’m not sure I believe him. But I don’t care if it looks nice or not, as long as it helps me survive a little longer. “I figured it might make me less easy to recognize, since we’re going into enemy territory and all.”

“I think it’ll help.” Logan gives me a sad smile. “Though I’ll worry no matter what.”

He’ll worry even more once I tell him where I’m going.

“What did you want to talk about?” he asks.

I hesitate, searching for the right words. “I ran into Beechy. I talked to him about my assignment for the mission.” I pause.
Just get it over with.
He’s going to find out sooner or later. “I’m going to go undercover in one of the work camps in the lower sectors. Beechy wants me to spread talk of our rebellion among the workers and recruit their help.”

Logan stares at me, his smile slowly fading.

“He thinks it will work best coming from someone like me, instead of someone disguised as an official,” I continue.

“Beechy’s sending you to a camp. And you agreed to it?” Logan’s voice cracks on the words. “You didn’t argue against it?”

“I said I would do it.”

“Why?”

“I think I can do the most good there. We’ll have the best chance of overthrowing the Developers if we work with the kids in the camps. You know what they’re like, Logan. They’ll want to fight if they know they’re not alone.”

“Yes, but you won’t be safe there.”

“Beechy said he’ll send in rebels disguised as officials too—”

Logan presses his fists against his forehead in agitation. “But they can’t stay with you every second. You could still end up hurt or captured. You could still end up in quarantine.”

I run a hand down my arm. My chest hurts, but I ignore it. “I know.”

Logan’s silence stretches as if he’s waiting for me to say something else, something that might convince him to stop worrying. If only I had words that would help him feel better.

“But you don’t care,” he says.

“There are more important things than what might happen to me,” I say softly.

I’m more afraid of what will happen to Logan if he comes with me. I could handle getting captured or beaten or shoved into a kill chamber, but I don’t know if I could handle that happening to him. It would be easier if he’d stay here in the compound, so I could do what I have to do without worrying about him.

“You’re always trying to protect other people,” he says. “Like you don’t even care about yourself. Like you think no else cares about you, either, or would be affected if you were killed. But I would be. I want to protect you, if I can, but you have to let me.”

No one can protect me,
I want to tell him. As long as the Developers rule Kiel, I will always be facing capture and death.

“Beechy said you can go with me, if you want,” I say, no longer meeting his eyes. “Or you can stay here with some of the others and join up with us when we attack the Core. It’s your choice.”

“Of course I’m going with you. If I’m not going to change your mind, there’s no vruxing way I’m letting you go in there alone. I’m not losing you again.” Logan’s jaw hardens, and he balls his hands at his sides.

I can see there’s no changing his mind, either.

“Okay,” I say. “Together, then.”

Logan nods stiffly. “I’ll tell Beechy.”

He limps past me and opens the door.

I stand alone in the bunk room after he’s gone, releasing the panic I was bottling up so he wouldn’t see it.

I hope I made the right decision when I agreed to this. I hope I haven’t put Logan in a position where I will lose him forever.

But worrying about what’s going to happen won’t change a thing; it will only make me more vulnerable to losing control of myself again.

I will count to three, and then I will take control. I will stop being afraid.

One

Two

Three

I walk out the door.

*   *   *

“You’re sure this will work?” I ask, watching the nurse, Uma, fill a thick syringe with black ink.

Machines beep around me in the medical bay, and the scent of antiseptic fills the air. Beechy brought me and Logan here so Uma could alter the citizenship numbers branded on our wrists, which officials could use to identify us with their special scanners in the work camp.

“Don’t worry, she knows what she’s doing,” Beechy says, giving me a reassuring smile. Logan stands beside him, his arms folded, waiting for his turn in the chair.

Uma finishes filling the syringe and sets the half-empty tube of ink on a tray. She flicks the syringe. “The consistency should be right. But this may hurt, honey. Usually doctors use a special machine for branding.”

“I’ll manage,” I say, trying not to squirm in my seat. I want her to hurry and get this over with. If I could remember my first branding, I’d know more what to expect. But new children in the work camps are tagged with their identification number within a few days of birth.

At least we’re altering only two of my numbers, not giving me a brand-new set.

“So how will this work?” Logan asks. “You give us each a new tag and the officials won’t be able to identify us in their system?”

“Yes,” Beechy says. “Their scanners will pull up a new profile, a fake one. Sandy and one of our techs figured out how to hack into the Core citizen registrar through our computers. There’s a file for every single citizen in both the cities and the work camps. We’ll create a brand-new file for you connected to your new tag number. No one should notice it among all the other files, and then officials shouldn’t have any reason to suspect who you really are. It’ll be safer than tampering with your real file, since that could alert Charlie to the fact you’re both still alive.”

“Good,” I say. I’d prefer if Charlie wasn’t certain of that fact until I’m standing in front of him with a gun aimed at his forehead.

Beechy glances at his time-band. “I hate to leave, but I need to hand out mission assignments and check on how the prep is going. We’re aiming to leave in about an hour.”

“We’ll be fine,” I say. “You can go.”

“Good luck,” he says, and heads out of the room.

“Lay your wrist flat on the armrest,” Uma says, setting the syringe down and picking up an antiseptic wipe.

I set my left arm on the rest and flex my hand. The harsh light directly overhead makes the inked characters on my wrist—S68477—paler than usual. I focus on the beeping of the monitors and the rustle of the curtains around the beds as Uma wipes my skin.

“Ready?” she asks, picking up the syringe.

“Ready.” I do my best to keep still as she guides the needle under my skin and squeezes out a drop of ink.

“Is it bad?” Logan asks.

“Stings a little.” It could be much worse.

The curtains stir around the cot across the aisle from my chair.

“I need some help,” a male voice says. A short cough follows.

The other nurse on duty walks over. “Everything all right, Mal?”

The nurse pushes the curtain back enough for me to glimpse the young man in the bed. His blond hair is pulled back in a ponytail. His arm is in a sling, and there’s a thick bandage on his forehead.

My body tenses. It’s the young official on Cady’s ship, who came from the Surface city.

The curtain shuts again, blocking him from view.

Uma continues guiding the needle under my skin, in and out, but I barely feel it anymore. Mal was on a gurney yesterday, covered in blood after the medics pulled him from the recon mission wreckage. He was unconscious because of me.

The nurse draws the curtain open again a minute later, and Mal steps out from behind it, fixing the collar of his shirt with his unwounded arm. He’s dressed in a tight gray suit and knee-high boots, like Sam and other Core officials used to wear. Mal must’ve had the outfit on underneath his armor.

“You sure you feel strong enough to walk?” the nurse asks.

“I feel strong enough to lift a mountain,” Mal says. “Though I’m not sure my left arm agrees.”

The nurse laughs. “If you say so. Make sure you let someone know if you change your mind. Feeling weak or dizzy after what you went through wouldn’t be unusual.”

“Understood.” Mal’s gaze falls on me as he heads for the door out of the sick bay. The softest frown creases his brow. I quickly return my focus to Uma’s hand guiding the ink needle.

He was unconscious when he saw me last, so there’s no way he’d recognize me from yesterday. But if he’s worked in the Surface city for a long time, he might’ve seen me. He might’ve yelled at me a hundred times, or hurt me, even. I have no way of knowing. Most officials wore their helmets when they were on patrol.

Out of the corner of my eye, Mal disappears through the door. Thank goodness.

“You okay?” Logan asks, looking at me strangely. I wonder what my face looks like.

“Yeah.” I grimace. “The needle’s just hurting a bit much.” It’s not a complete lie.

“Almost finished,” Uma says. “Keep holding still.”

I shouldn’t be afraid of Mal, since he’s on our side, but it’s hard to believe he’s really different than all the other officials I’ve met. It’s hard not to worry that he would do something to me if he discovered I’m the reason he almost died yesterday.

Hopefully he won’t find out.

*   *   *

Logan and I leave the medical bay half an hour later. Distant voices echo in the corridors, and a low rumble comes from the flight port ahead. People were just starting to load the ships with equipment when we passed through there earlier.