First to Dance (35 page)

They talked for a few minutes, and h
e agreed to leave food for them in the forest here across the street from his house. They were about to leave, when Aira asked, “Can you bring paint, too?”

Acton looked confused, but Ayita’s dad smiled. “I sure can,” he said.
He quietly slipped into the house and brought out a small bag of produce. “I’ll have to get the paint out for you tomorrow. I don’t want to wake up Taya, but I will leave it there for you among the trees with another bag of food tomorrow night.”

“Thank you.” They set off toward the space center again.
  When they returned, Acton sat down to watch more of the videos from inside the secondary school.

“What are you waiting for?” Aira asked. “You have your plan, so why not just go for it?”

“I need to learn the inside of the building like it was the back of my hand. I need to be able to run in and not get lost, even for a second. Memorizing the building isn’t as easy as memorizing words in a book. Plus, I want to get an idea of what the people are like. I can set them all free, but I might not want all of them to know about this place.”

“If they don’t come here, where will they go?”

He shrugged his shoulders. “That’s their problem, I suppose. But if one wrong person finds out about this place, none of us will have a place to go.”

The next night, Acton offered to go gather the food from Ayita’s father by himself, but Aira insisted on coming along. When they arrived, she saw the two paint cans he’d left and smiled.

“I still don’t understand what you wanted
those
for,” Acton said. He picked up the food and started walking back toward the space center.

“I’ll be back later,” Aira told him. She took the paint cans and started walking in a different direction.

“Where are you going?”

Aira smiled. “I’m going to put a touch of beauty on the school building.”

Acton was confused. “I’m coming with you,” he said. They walked silently by moonlight to where the school building stood, and there Aira opened the paint cans. Acton stood and watched nervously as she finger-painted flowers along the wall. She added smiley faces and stars, swirls and polka dots.

“Aira,” Acton whispered, “what’s the point of this? You’re going to get us in trouble before we even have a chance to make a difference for everyone.”

“I am making a difference,” she replied. “And if you’re concerned about getting caught, then go back.”

“Making a difference how? All you’re doing is scribbling on the wall.”

“I’m not scribbling,” she replied, offended, “I’m creating artwork. For everyone to see.” Then she stopped and looked at him. “Ayita liked to paint,” she said. “I’m doing this for Ayita.”

Acton sighed, put down the bag of food, and joined her in painting the side of the building.

The next day, the people were in
a frenzy over what happened. The school was shut down until the painting could be washed off, and four of the guards at the secondary school were called out to search for Ayita, who they assumed made the painting. When they couldn’t find her after she first disappeared, they didn’t put a strong emphasis on the project, assuming she would show up eventually and then they would have her. The primary goal was to keep her away from the civilians so she couldn’t spread her Earth-ideas. Now that it was obvious she wouldn’t cease, finding her became a priority.

“Aira, you’re a genius,” Acton said.

“Now what did I do?”

“Everyone is going to be hiding around town tonight waiting for Ayita to show her face. There will be less people guarding the secondary school. Tonight’s the night.”

“Tonight?”

“Yes.”

Acton left quickly and cautiously went through the forest so he could leave a note for Ayita’s father. The note simply said “Tonight” and nothing else. But then, he thought, they would probably be watching that house, and they would watch Ayita’s father if he left home for a late-night errand. Acton paused for a moment and then turned back. He would have to complete this task on his own. There was too much risk in asking his help tonight. So Acton returned to the space center.

“Aira, I can’t deliver the letter. Someone will see me, or see him, and the plan will fail.”

Aira nodded. “You’re probably right,” she said. “I thought about that, too, but I didn’t want to be the one to tell you.”

Acton rolled his eyes. “Tell me next time, okay?”

Aira smiled. “I thought you
didn’t
want me to tell you when your plan isn’t going to work.”

He smiled too. “I only want you to tell me when you’re right about it.”

“Well,” Aira said, “Whether it works or not, tonight’s the night. They’re pretty upset about that painting, and it might not be long before they start heading through the forest in search parties to find her.”

Acton nodded. “Yeah,” he said. Then he yawned. “I need a nap before tonight. I’m going to take the bed,
okay? I know you’ve been sleeping there, but just this once, would you mind having a turn on the floor?”

“That’s fine,” she said.
She stretched and yawned, too, and after clicking around on the computer some more, she curled up in the blanket on the floor to sleep.

They were both sleeping soundly when Acton’s mind snapped to alert as he heard a sound. The front door to the space center had opened. He silently slipped out of bed and into the computer room, closing the door behind him.

“Acton? What’s going—“

“Shhh”, he whispered, holding a finger to her lips. “Someone else is here.”

They listened intently to the footsteps.

“I only hear one person. When we hear him walk into the bedroom, we run for it.”

“Acton, the computer.
They’ll know where we are.”

Acton thought about that for a moment. Destroy it? But they didn’t have time to both destroy it and run.

“You run, Aira. I’ll stay here and destroy the computer. At least you’ll be safe.”

Aira wanted to argue with him, but she didn’t have time, because at that moment the door opened and they were both discovered. Acton was just about to smash the computer to
the floor, knowing how much evil would be done if it came in to the wrong hands, but the person at the door wasn’t someone here to take them away; it was Ayita’s father.

“Aira, Acton,” he said. “I came to tell you that you’ve upset pretty much everyone with that painting. If you’re going to follow through on your plans, it has to be tonight.”

Acton breathed a sigh of relief. “I know,” he said. “And I’m so glad it’s you. I thought I was about to be on my way to the secondary school.”

Aira rushed to the computer.

“What are you doing?” Acton asked.

“Checking if anyone followed him.”

This intrigued Ayita’s father. “You mean, the computer can tell you that?”

“It tells us pretty much everything. I was about to destroy it before I knew it was you coming in.”

“Can it…can it tell me about Ayita?”

Acton nodded. “Everything until she left,” he said. “I don’t think it updates while she’s in space. I don’t know if it will update when she lands on Earth or not, but even if it does, it’s a thirty year wait for us to find out.”

He nodded. “I will learn more about my daughter later, then. Tonight, we have a mission to accomplish.”

Acton waited, hidden among the trees outside the secondary school. He had to time this just right. Then, about twenty minutes before a guard would come out through the east door, he sprang into action, quickly but quietly moving his pile of wood out of the forest and near the door. He set it on fire and stirred the fire into action, then quietly moved around through the trees to the north side of the building. Nervously he watched the smoke rise in the sky.

The guard at the north door started to sniff the air as the wind blew the smoke this way, and then they heard the shout: “Fire!
Fire!” The guard quickly left his post, and Acton ran to the door.

The rooms inside were all locked by deadbolt, and after unlocking the first room, Acton stepped inside and woke up the person sleeping there. “I’m here to help you escape,” he said. “The guards are distracted. Run out through the north door, into the forest and run straight through until you come upon a clearing. There will be a man there; wait with him.”

The man drowsily got out of bed until he realized what was taking place. “No, no, I will help you,” he said, and he ran ahead down the hallway to start unlocking the other rooms in the building. The two of them worked together, and they had more than half of the people out of their rooms before one of the guards noticed what was going on. He roughly pushed Acton into a room and locked the door. Then he looked both ways down the hallway, and, seeing no one else letting the people out, he ran outside and alerted the others, who divided into two groups: one to take care of the fire which was quickly spreading toward the building and one to race after and round up the escapees.

The man helping Acton walked out of a room with an elderly woman beside him. “Go on without me,” she said. “You know I can’t go running through the forest. Help the others and leave me here.”

“No mom,” he said. “I won’t do that. I’ll carry you if I have to. I’m not leaving you here, and I won’t argue about it anymore.”

“Well at least help me last, then.”

He kissed her on the cheek and then ran down the hallway banging on doors and unlocking them. “Wake up!” he shouted. “Wake up and run!” He flung the doors open and continued banging on the doors and the walls. The guards outside heard it, but it was too late. Nearly everyone was out of the building, and their concern now was the fire. Smoke was starting to enter the building through the east door, and they couldn’t seem to put the fire out fast enough.

The man picked up his mother and started to carry her toward the door whe
n she called out, “Wait! There’s another door that hasn’t been unlocked yet.” The man looked and saw a door that he was sure he’d unlocked earlier. He remembered going through that door and waking the young man who slept there.

“I already got that one, mom. I know I did.”

“It’s still
locked
,” she said. “Now put me down.” She started to kick her legs like a child, and the man almost laughed, but this was not a time for laughter. He unlocked the door and found Acton inside, lying still on the floor. The man simply stared at him for a moment. He couldn’t carry both of them.

“He needs your help more than I do,” his mom said.
“And there isn’t time to argue with me.” She started walking toward the northern exit.

The man picked up Acton. “I’ll be right back, mother. I promise.” He ran down the hallway and out the door.

“I know you will, son,” she whispered. Then she started coughing. The smoke was thicker in the hallway now, and it was getting warm. She walked as quickly as she could.

Ayita’s father waited with several people who’d escaped, as others were arriving. He kept an eye out for Acton, but didn’t see him. In the meantime, he tried to answer everyone’s questions, but most of them he didn’t have answers to. Where was everyone going to go? Not even he was sure. The next step in this plan? Who knew. But the people were free, now, and even if they didn’t have houses to live in, they could find a way to survive if they worked together.

When one of the guards showed up, everyone scattered, and as he ran, he realized that Acton probably wasn’t coming. Their mission had been interrupted, and he felt instantly that something went wrong.

When Acton came to, it was daylight. He was lying on the ground about a hundred feet from the building, which was now burnt to the ground. The guards, who had been up all night trying to stop the fire and chase down everyone who’d escaped, were now all sleeping around him. He would have to step carefully between their limbs to get away.  He looked around and saw only one other person there who was not a guard. It was the first man he’d let out of the building, and he stood still in front of the ruins.

Acton walked up to him and put a hand on his shoulder. The man gave him a quick glance and then looked back at the fallen building.

“How long was this place your home?” Acton asked.

“Seventeen years.” He bowed his head. “It was my mother’s home for twenty-five.”

“Oh.” Acton looked away for a moment. He didn’t remember most of the details from that night. He wondered about what happened to everyone that escaped. It seemed that he and this man were the only two the guards had held back. “We should probably go,” he said.
“Before the guards wake up.”

“First I need to say goodbye,” the man said.

“To the school?”

“To my mother.”

“Oh.” Suddenly he understood. He waited silently for a few minutes before speaking again. “Did anyone else die?”

“No.” The man closed his eyes and breathed deeply. Then he turned to Acton and held out his hand. “I’m
Joash.”

“Acton.”