inDIVISIBLE (28 page)

T nodded. “Right out to that rock, hold our right hands up in the air so they can see we’ve removed our sensors, then we
detour and run like mad.”

We
waited for the helicopter to veer off to the south before we rushed to the rock. We stood together, every nerve tingling as we raised our right hands and waited for someone to see us—someone to shoot us through the back. T counted down from three and the moment he whispered, “One,” we bolted.  I stayed right on T’s heels, my back tingling as if the officers were only feet away. We went west, weaving between trees and jumping over rocks. When the trees got thicker, we turned back to the north, ducking under branches and jumping over shrubs. We had no food and only one bottle of water so we couldn’t stray too far from our route, but if we went right to the last checkpoint, we’d alert the Freemen that we were being pursued, and they wouldn’t draw us in. We had to get rid of these guys before we did anything else.

My legs turned rubbery but I pushed uphill, grabbing limbs to pull me along, using rocks to
propel me forward. I planted my foot and pushed, the rock slipping away, sending me crashing forward into a limb. It tangled in my hair but I pushed away and surged forward. Sweat formed along my hairline, and I swiped it away with the back of my hand wondering how I could be sweating when my mouth tasted like the desert. My tongue stuck to the roof of my mouth and breathing became difficult through my sticky throat.

T swayed in front of me along with the trees and hillside. I slowed, raising one hand to my head as if to keep my vision intact. I was wheezing.

T stopped, his eyebrows drawing together when he asked me if I was okay.

I shook my head. It felt as though it would explode, just ahead of my lungs. I sucked in air but it caught in my swollen throat. T took my face between his hands and stared me in the eye. “Look at me, Brynn.”

I tried but he fell in and out of focus so I looked down at the rocky ground. T placed his arm around me and led me up the steep mountainside to a rounded rock before helping me to my butt, feet splayed in front of me.

He pulled a water bottle from the pack and
uncapped the top. My throat burned, and I reached for the bottle but he jerked it away.

“You’ve got blood all over your face,” he whispered. “What did you do?”

I couldn’t remember. “Nothing,” I replied in a hoarse whisper.

T poured a little water at my hairline and gently rubbed it in to my skin, lo
osening the dried blood. He poured a bit more and my stomach growled for the water. I reached for it, snatched it out of his hand and guzzled more than half before I came up for air, coughing violently.

“You’ve got to take it slow
,” he cautioned, pulling the bottle from my weak fingers.

“I’m so tired
,” I whispered.

He poured one more bit and the
n wiped the side of my face with an old shirt from the pack. “That’ll have to do for now,” he said, placing his hand under my chin and tilting my face up to get a better look. “It’s bleeding again, but we can stop that.”

He reached back in his pack for the f
irst aid kit and opened a bandage. He placed it over the wound and sat back, admiring his work. I reached up and touched the bandage. I wondered how deep the cut had been as the throbbing began.

“It might leave a scar,” he said, “but most of it
’s covered by hair so it won’t be noticeable.”

I didn’t care about a scar. I cared about getting something in my stomach to keep me from fainting. “I have to eat, T.”

T pulled my hand down to examine it, and I noticed the blood covering the back of it for the first time. It hadn’t been sweat running down my forehead earlier, I realized. “Are you cut here too?” he asked.

I pulled my hand away and wiped it in v
ain on my jeans. “No. My hand’s fine,” I mumbled.

T stayed there, crouched in front of me for several minutes before he reached inside the backpack.
He pulled everything out of his pack, looking for anything edible we’d overlooked.

“
I wish there’d been a way to get out of there without cutting that sensor out so soon. We need more food, supplies, and we won’t get it anywhere without the sensors.”

I turned my hand over in my l
ap and touched the bandage, unwrapping it. Summer said the scar would fade over time. I hadn’t cared then but it reminded me of being pinned to that cutting board, and I wanted the image to flee. Cutting it out had been torture. Today I just felt numb … and thirsty … and on the verge of starvation.

“We’d be dead now
if we hadn’t cut them out,” I whispered.

T swiped the
hair from my face before he pulled out the scissors and cut the rest of the stitches free. “How’s that feel now?”

I flexed my hand. It hurt, but it didn’t split open anymore. “It’s better.
”

T took my hand
. “Starving to death is better than a bullet, right?”

“As long as we do it escaping from that life,” I muttered.

T stared at the ground for so long I though he may have fallen asleep but his head flicked up suddenly. “We can survive longer without food than water.”

I nodded. Seem
ed like I’d heard that somewhere—perhaps health class or biology? Maybe it had been one of the trivia blurbs that filled the new screens on our PCAs when they weren’t posting about terrorists or pandemics … or posting descriptions of new legislature … or changing history ...

“Did you know,” I started, remembering a
lesson from political science, “that President Abbots saved One United from financial and moral ruin?”

T
looked at me as if I’d just stepped off another planet.

I nodded. “It’s true.
One United was on the verge of total collapse until President Abbots … gave us everything.”

“He enslaved us,” T responded coldly.

I shook my head. “He bought our businesses so he could fix them. He gave us free doctors to keep us healthier; and sensors so we’d never get lost or want for anything ever again.”

“Except for freedom.”

              I laughed, and the sound startled me. I looked behind me to see if it could have come from someone else before I continued, trying to remember my point. “He taught the children things he wanted them to know, in schools that parents couldn’t control …” my thoughts wandered, and I fought to get them back. “He educated … no, he
brainwashed
the kids. He brainwashed
us
and then he turned himself into a hero.” My voice caught, and I swallowed, my tongue still thick and sticky. “He created the Alliance to protect …” I thought back to the news bar I’d seen the day I’d turned ten, the first time I’d questioned my father about the lessons they fed me in school.

             
“How does telling Citizens how they have to live protect them?” I asked.

             
He gave me the signal for silence and said, “The Alliance is the one with the research to know what’s healthiest, who has the most potential in which courses of study—” One eyebrow cocked even as he grimaced. His green eyes flickered with unspoken thought, something I grew to recognize easily when I got older, something I’d take as a signal for questioning the next time we went hiking, because that’s where my father talked more freely.

“… to control,” I finished, remembering those green eyes and wishing my father could share the wisdom behind them with me now.

T’s f
ace reflected the conflict I imagined shone on mine. “They don’t control us now.”

I shook my head, a shiver running from my tailbone to the base of my skull. “
No they don’t.”

“It may be a little harsh out here, the supplies lacking, but we’re free,
” he said. T lifted the water bottle I’d nearly drained, took a small sip for himself and handed the rest to me.

“We’re free,” I mimicked as I tried to keep the bottle from shaking in my hand. I lifted it to my cracked lips and
finished it. My stomach churned, and I closed my eyes, determined to keep it down.

“Take your time, Brynn.”

              I wondered at his calm voice, at his strength and restraint. Then I remembered that he’d trained for this—for running. Only, he’d trained to run
for
the Alliance, not
from
them. “When did you begin to question?” I asked, my eyes still closed.

“From the time I could speak,” he said. “My parents feared for me because they knew what happened to children like me.”

“What?”

“They’re taken, called special and put into programs to make them forget.”

“But they picked you because you had potential,” I justified, finally opening my eyes and realizing that the water would stay in my belly where I needed it.

He shrugged
, and I couldn’t help but touch his thinning cheek. “I had potential to win in the 800 meter dash, but I also had potential to expose them.”

My hand trailed down to his chin, my fingers lingeri
ng, wanting to touch his swollen lips. “We should reach our potential,” I said.
              He nodded. “It’s a God-given right.”

             
I smiled and a small chuckle escaped, sounding more like me this time than the last. “So you
do
believe in God?”

“The Alliance convinced me for years that He didn’t exist—
so far they’ve been wrong about everything else.”

“They were wrong to tell us we couldn’t see each other again,” I said.

T kissed me, his lips a whisper on mine. “They were definitely wrong on that count.”

I pushed to my feet and braced myself against a tree while my head swayed. “My father apparently believed that if he could get to these Freemen they’d help him expose the Alliance.”

T scrambled up beside me and took my arm to steady me as we began the climb up the face of the mountain.

“Can I ask you something?” T asked.

“Of course.”

“If you could be anything you wanted, what would you be?”

My face reddened and I continued forward.

“You said I could ask,” T said.

My lungs burned again but I refused to let my weakness stop us from finding the Freemen. “I said you could ask. I didn’t say I’d respond,” I teased.

“I could let you go and watch you stumble,” he threatened.

My head started to clear. “But you wouldn’t.”

“Want to try me?”

I stuck out my tongue.

“You’re right. I wouldn’t.”

I cleared my throat and said, “A poet.”

T laughed and I spun. I’d have slugged him if I’d had the strength. Instead, he caught me as I teetered and kept me upright.

“It’s not funny.”

“I’m laughing because I’m surprised.”

“Why?” I struggled up a short cliff, T pushing me from behind before he crept up next to me. As I stood there I realized we were entirely exposed to the valley and we both rushed for cover where we crouched and peered out over the hillside to see if we’d been spotted.

“Poets just don’t exist anymore,” he said, “not really.”

“Because they can express more than words,” I said. “They can convey ideas and feelings.”

“Does your poetry convey your deepest feelings?” he asked.

I nodded.

“I’d like to read some.”

“The Alliance took it all when they took my mother.”

T started forward again, his gait slower, more thoughtful. “There has to be something more,” he said.

“What do you mean?”

“They selected you for that trip to Europe. They only select people they can use.”

I shrugged. “They wanted to bug me for more dirt on my father.”

“And?” he asked.

I shimmied around some loose rocks so they wouldn’t go rolling down the mountain. “And nothing.”

T stopped for a breath and placed his hand on his hips. “They picked me because they sensed unrest in their Olympic athlete. They wanted to get me drunk, get me talking so they could see where my loyalties were. They found out— so when I got home they tried to take me and my friends out. They’re dead
, and I’m alive,” he ran one hand through his hair and asked, “what about you?”

“I was mediocre,” I said. “I did just enough to get by so I wouldn’t stand out.”

“But?” he prodded.

“My father once said I was borderline genius.”

“Photographic memory?”

I nodded.

“Science and technology?” he asked.

“My father was just proud,” I insisted. “All fathers comment on how smart their children are.”

T licked his lips. “But yours meant it.”

“The Alliance had a purpose for me. I was going to be a scientist.”

“Which you hate,” T said.