Exodia (18 page)

She was suddenly too tired
to make sense of it all. Gresham finished nursing. She burped him
and tried to get as comfortable as she could, cradling her son as
if she were wearing the sling. Her last thought before slipping off
to sleep was of Sana yelling at her in her cryptic code:
rotate dot
.

* * *

I wake from a dream, quite real, of
long-tailed rodents scratching at my face and arms. I jerk upright
and brush the dirt and debris from my skin, wipe the drool from my
mouth and look from my sleeping brother to the truck and back again
to my brother. My brother. Harmon.

Another scream and I’m fully awake and
Harmon moves, too. We jump to our feet. Race to the truck. Mira and
Kassandra are gone. I recognize the shrieks. They’re Gresham’s. I
hear, too, the gentle sobs of his mother. They remind me of the
time she cried when she found the dried flower that had been in
Lydia’s hair. It was stuck to the camp well contraption in my belt
sack. My few possessions were hers when we married. I could’ve lied
to her about my feelings but I didn’t then. Later I did.

Another cry. Another sob.

“
Over there!” Harmon points
and we run across the open area, through the woods, and down a path
to a quiet creek. Kassandra is sitting on a rock, the baby crushed
against her chest, his tiny body bare. Blood drips from his
arm.

“
What are you doing?” I yell
the stupid question, but there is no need for an answer. Mira has a
leather purse laid open, a vial of red ink and needles rest against
the side. Gresham’s elbow will be sore for a few days, but he won’t
remember the tattooing.

Mira reads my face, calms me with an
explanation. Ronel had asked her to bring the ink. She holds it out
to me and says, “I’ll take the baby and you can ink Kassandra.
She’s ready.”

* * *

A mile on from the parking lot camp,
Flor and Sana held hands as they marched behind the others.
Whispered assurances from their mother that they would all escape
like Kassandra, Dalton, and the baby, did not elicit any prophetic
promises from Sana. Nor did Deandra make any guesses.

A certain soldier scowled at them
often, drew his whip out and snapped at the legs of the men ahead
or the women behind the Luna girls. They huddled closer and trudged
along thankful that the soldier spared them time and again. Even as
they lagged farther and farther behind, the guard continued to
ignore them and punished others instead, until finally they were at
the tail end of the procession.

The guard stood to the side as they
passed and then he hailed the mounted lieutenant.

He pointed toward the Lunas and said,
“That woman and her daughters are Reds, but they have no tattoos.
Law says death. I can take care of that before we enter Exodia.” He
drew his gun.

The lieutenant patted the sweaty neck
of his horse, looked from the round-faced guard to the stumbling
group of Lunas, and called for them to halt. The seven turned back
with a single shiver, every one of the girls touching their
mother–hand, sleeve, shoulder–every one of them
terrified.

“
Show your
elbows.”

They bared their arms, Flor offering
both elbows, the pointed ends sticking out like broken
wings.

The lieutenant laughed, his face
turning purple. “Too bad. Truslow’s law means death for
you.”

Mrs. Luna tilted up her head and spoke,
“It’s an evil law, a millstone on us.”

“
Exactly right. But drowning
you with a millstone wouldn’t be as quick as this soldier’s gun. Do
it. Over there.” His horse backed up a step and the soldier cracked
his whip at the girls’ feet. They jumped toward the wooded side of
the road.

Sana dropped Flor’s hand and fell to
the ground. The seizure lasted only a moment before she rolled over
and started to get on her knees.

“
Shoot that one first,” the
lieutenant snarled. His eyes gleamed oily black.

Sana stared at him.
“
Evil law. Millstone on us.” Her lips
turned down and her chin quivered. She turned her head and looked
toward her family. “Some Lunas will not live.”

The lieutenant plucked a
gun off the side of his saddle, nudged his horse into a trot, and
rode toward Sana. She got up from her knees and started to
run.

The lieutenant pulled back
on the reins, rose in the stirrups, and took careful aim. Katie and
Marcela screamed for Sana to come back. Deandra stretched a
pleading arm toward the other soldier, the one she was sure meant
to help them.

An abrupt blast from the lieutenant’s
Stun-n-Run gun stopped Sana mid-stride. She sprawled forward and
her body began to spasm.

The lieutenant pressed the
gun back onto a saddle clip and drew a different gun from the
holster at his waist, changed the setting from automatic to single
shot, and fired.

Mother and daughters
shrieked and cried, ran to Sana’s still body, and fell to the
ground. The lieutenant pranced in a circle and took easy target
practice on each one. One shot, one less scream. Another shot,
another cry hushed.

The guard looked on in
shame. He holstered the gun he never intended to use and kept his
jaw clenched. He silently promised himself that he would find the
father.

“
Sorry if I stole your
fun,” the lieutenant said as he jiggled the reins. “Go look for
other law-breakers and you can have a turn.” He glanced back at the
huddled mound of what he considered human garbage and gave a final
snort.

Not a single Luna moved. Not
one.

* * *

Thanks to Barrett’s sharp hearing, he
and Lydia were well hidden in the trees before the troops and the
refugees shredded and widened the way into Exodia.

As soon as their resistance leader,
Teague, was arrested, Lydia begged Barrett to take her to Ronel.
All of Exodia was in a panic. Executive President Truslow believed
that the present chaos was a necessary stage in his power plan. But
Lydia was certain he was designing their extinction to look
self-inflicted.

For days there had been an influx of
Reds, herded through the city, and interned in filthy camps or
incarcerated in abandoned factories. No one was safe. Some of her
neighbors had disappeared.

Barrett broke a small branch off and
poked Lydia. They sat perched on strong limbs on opposite sides of
a thick tree trunk and he got her attention as quietly as he
could.

What?

Look there,
he mouthed.

She followed his pointing stick and
watched as a horse soldier and a foot soldier wedged off a small
group of women and girls. At least three looked to be her age. She
tightened her arm around the tree and watched. At first she thought
they were going to give aid to one of the small girls who fell and
had trouble rising up.

The horseman drew his gun. The sharp
report stung her ears and did worse to Barrett. He nearly lost his
balance. Lydia wanted to look away, but each successive murder held
her attention more intensely. One by one the shrill voices were
silenced but the piercing shrieks in her head grew louder. She
clung to the tree so hard that rather than the bark gouging her
soft palms she thought she must be the one leaving marks
behind.

The rider holstered his gun as he
pranced his horse around the single soldier, said something, and
trotted on as if he had merely been shooting bottles off a
rock.

The foot soldier walked a few steps
then turned back and examined each body. He pulled one out of the
tangle of arms and legs and blood and seemed to whisper in the poor
girl’s ear.

Lydia wiggled a leafy branch
to get Barrett’s attention.
What did he
say?

Barrett held a finger to his lips and
waited until the soldier caught up to the others. He whispered, “He
said he’d come back for her. She must not be dead.”

It was difficult to wait until the last
of the mass of people had gone from sight. Cautiously they
descended. Barrett stepped out into the road first and kept Lydia
behind him with a wave of his hand. They crossed over and he kept
his body between her and the grisly sight.

Tears gathered in Lydia’s eyes. She
thought she was pretty hardened by her life, but she had never seen
a person executed before, let alone gotten this close to a corpse.
She grabbed for Barrett’s hand. He guided her to the sole victim
that the soldier had moved aside. Together they bent close and
listened for her breathing.

“
She is alive,” Barrett
said. “Stay with her and I’ll check the others to be
sure.”

Lydia took the girl’s hand and tried to
coax her to open her eyes. Soft words, gentle squeezes. That was
all she could offer other than a drink from the bottle in her belt
sack. If only the girl would open her eyes.

Barrett returned and shook his head.
“We’ll have to take her somewhere for help before that soldier
comes back for her.” He lifted the girl’s arm and checked her
elbow. “No tattoo.”

“
Let’s not worry about that
now.” Lydia checked the girl all over for bleeding. There were a
few red smudges, but no bullet wounds. Finally she inspected the
blond hair. Her fingers came away bloody. There was a deep gash on
the back of the skull. “I don’t think he shot her. He must’ve
missed, but she fell on a rock and got knocked out.” She gave the
girl’s cheek a few mild slaps.

Her eyes opened. “Where?
What?”

“
It’s all right. You’re all
right.”

The girl struggled to sit up and caught
sight of her family. Barrett moved to block the bloody
scene.

“
What’s your name?” he
said.

She began to cry and grabbed both their
arms. Through the sobs she told them who she was.

* * *

I finish with Kassandra’s elbow and
wonder what made her change her mind, but we’ve been silent
throughout this little ordeal and I’m afraid that she might burst
into tears if I ask now. Mira has been slow dancing the baby who
hasn’t made a peep. I hope he’s not traumatized. There’s a small
bottle of anesthetic and I give Kassandra a quick dose. She voices
her relief and I’m glad to know it works so fast and that my son
experienced the same instant peace.

She looks at me with watery eyes. I
give her a weak hug.

We go back to camp where Harmon gives
us each an apple and some water. He’s anxious to get us to Exodia,
to put the plan in place, to be the one who speaks. He shows me a
suitcase full of fantastic gadgets that will give us power. I’m
skeptical because I’ve seen my grandfather’s cache of deadly
persuaders: armaments that convince brave men that they are weak,
weapons that put down uprisings in minutes, an arsenal of
improbable devices that will change an angry crowd’s
objective.

Kassandra and Mira stand a few feet
back and watch.

Harmon uses his fingertips to pull out
five multi-jointed tubes, each about ten inches long. He clamps
them together until it resembles a metal cane made of fifty
cartridges. He rests one end on the ground and holds the top tip
between his thumb and forefinger.

“
Watch this,” he says. He
lifts it up from the ground and with a flick of his thumbnail he
engages the mechanics of it and the individual sections come alive.
It writhes like a snake.

“
What does it
do?”

“
It burrows down and then
tunnels north a preset distance. All fifty cubes unlink from one
another, spread out a hundred yards, and detonate.”

I’m impressed. I imagine the
devastation such a device could’ve had on our town meeting. No need
to march a city of people away. A deadly serpent.
Delayed entraps
.

Harmon is still talking,
explaining, describing, and then he clicks the snake’s head and the
undulating abruptly ceases and the metallic rod snaps to attention.
A straight stick. I think of Sana coming up with an anagram for
that phrase too:
stacks
airtight
. I shake my head, envisioning my
little sisters, how scared they must be. A rush of regret depresses
me. I have a dreadful premonition. We shouldn’t have left
them.

Harmon is careful about separating the
three pieces. He nestles them in their molded spots and reaches for
another item, already churning out the academics of its use. I stop
him. I hear the far off buzz of an aircraft.

“
We need to leave,” I say,
as if I’m already the leader of this small group. Everyone obeys my
subdued command.

* * *

We’re on the road, following the truck.
The recharged solar Beast strains to keep up with my brother’s
crazy speed. Rolling down the mountain, braking often, I’m more
than a little concerned. And I’m apprehensive to be headed to meet
with the leaders of the Reds: Teague and Hamlin and
Korzon.

And maybe to see Lydia. I brake
again.

Gresham begins to cry as if he senses
my adulterous thoughts, that I would abandon him as well. But could
I? The guilt from my killing sin sits as miserably on my heart as
ever. To break Kassandra’s trust would complicate even more my
already dissonant life.