My question asked her to drop all of those defenses and give up something personal. I hadn’t been thinking. I didn’t know if I would disclose something like that, and yet I’d just casually asked her to.
I quickly decided that I’d better alleviate the pressure.
“When I was a kid,” I began, giving her a little smile and then turning to stare into a candle to distract myself, remembering. “I loved arts and crafts. We had a nanny who taught me some basic sewing techniques, and I was always building things. Drawing new ideas, giving them color and shape.”
I turned to Jace and grinned at him.
“That was how I knew how to fix your clothes and make your sister that present. It had been a long time since I’d used that skill, but it was still right there, stored in the back of my mind.”
“You sewed his clothes?” Jackie asked, smirking. “Exactly how long have you two been…?”
She gestured vaguely between us, and I felt the blush raging across my cheeks.
“We’re not!” I said, copying her hand gesture and making it more outlandish, keeping my eyes firmly away from Jace. “I’m sure you noticed when we met him that his clothes… didn’t quite fit. I just helped him with that.”
She pressed her lips together and opened her eyes in an expression that said she didn’t believe me. I glared back at her defiantly.
“And what about you two?” I asked, lifting a brow at her and Ant. “You’ve been spending an awful lot of time together, yourselves.”
Ant choked on a bite of apple, and Jackie shot me a look that promised certain death. I suppressed a smile. The two of them had been spending a lot of alone time together. I had no solid evidence to support my suspicion that they were becoming something closer than just friends, but I also wasn’t born yesterday. There were moments of subtle tenderness between them that I hadn’t picked up on before—and I didn’t think it was just coincidence.
“When I was a kid,” Jackie announced, suddenly deciding that talking about her childhood wouldn’t be so bad after all, “I was a tinkerer. I tinkered with everything. I took things apart and put them back together, just to see how they worked, and to see if I could build them again. It drove my parents crazy. They were always coming into my room to find the vacuum cleaner in pieces, or me ‘improving’ my little radio.”
She grinned at the memory, and I realized that I’d never seen her face look so soft or relaxed.
“But I never failed at it,” she went on, “and I could fix anything that broke. We were poor, so that was important.”
Her voice faded, then, and I guessed that she was probably keeping herself from adding the next thought.
They’d been poor. That’s why she lost her siblings. To the Ministry.
It was a stark reminder that I came from a very different world than she did, and I looked away, suddenly feeling uncomfortable.
“My turn,” Ant said sharply.
I glanced at him, realizing that he’d probably heard the same thing in Jackie’s voice and wanted to save her from continuing.
“We were… stolen,” he said quietly. “Abe and me. I guess we were lucky to be placed in the same family, at least, especially considering what we’ve seen since we started working with Nelson.”
He gulped, and I stared at him. He’d never told us that they’d been adopted out. Siblings were very rarely given to the same family. It was almost unheard of. I didn’t know why the Ministry worked that way, but I suspected it had something to do with the idea that kids related to each other would ask too many questions, cause too many issues.
If there was one thing this government didn’t like, it was being questioned.
“How did you two manage to stay together?” Jackie asked softly.
Ant shrugged. “Obviously I can’t know that, can I?” he muttered, his voice just as soft. “I don’t know if they always keep twins together, but I can’t imagine why they would. We’ve always thought it was some sort of mistake. Maybe because our names were so close to the same, or because we looked so much alike, something happened, and they doubled up. Like, one Ministry agent grabbed Abe first, and then another thought they’d forgotten and grabbed me, sort of thing.”
I couldn’t help but smile at that reasoning. Then, unexpectedly, I felt a sharp pang of jealousy.
“You were taken with your real brother…” I breathed. You had someone else from your real family. I’d never known anyone else from my biological family. I didn’t even know if I’d had siblings.
Ant gave me a brief look.
“Sure was,” he replied, his tone of voice turning cold and hard. “And as soon as we were old enough to figure out that we were adopted, we started searching for the truth.”
He paused then and exhaled heavily.
“I don’t want to play this game anymore,” he announced after a moment. “Let’s go to sleep.”
He abruptly turned and flopped down on the couch, his back to us, and the rest of us stared at him for a long moment. He remained quiet and still, and eventually we lay down as well, the silence in the room heavy and full of heartbreak. I’d never expected to hear Ant’s story, and if I’d ever thought much about it, I certainly wouldn’t have expected it to be what it was. To have been taken together…
To have been taken at all, I reminded myself. Because that was the problem, at the end of the day—and I was losing it in the idea that he’d gotten to keep his brother. He hadn’t been allowed to keep his parents, or any other siblings they might have had. Just like I hadn’t.
That’s what we’re fighting for now. That’s what I’m fighting for. To make sure things like that don’t happen to families anymore, regardless of their economic status.
We were involved in a smaller mission at present, with our focus on getting our team back, but I couldn’t lose sight of how big this had become and what it was all about.
We were trying to stop a government who stole its people’s heritages and ripped from them the most valuable treasure a human being could ever hold: their children.
The next morning came too quickly after our eyes finally closed, and I felt like I’d slept for three seconds. Before I knew it, Jace’s fingers were running down my cheek, from my temple to my chin, and he was touching me lightly on the nose.
“Wake up, sleeping beauty,” he said softly. “Unfortunately, the morning has come, and you know what that means.”
My eyelids fluttered open, and I sighed deeply. “It means I have to come back into the real world and face the fact that we’re trying to come up with a plan to not only break into an Authority jail, but rescue our friends and get back out again in one piece,” I murmured, feeling the weight of it drop right back onto my shoulders. “But I was having such a lovely dream. We were all in a meadow somewhere, and there were flowers and butterflies…”
He chuckled.
“You really do talk too much in the morning,” he muttered, chucking me gently under the chin. “But I’ll take you to a meadow just like that, I promise. Just as soon as we get this thing done.”
I opened my eyes and gave him a glare, but it melted beneath his honey-eyed stare. I turned my gaze to his lips, wondering…
He stood up and stretched, casting a meaningful glance at the couch where Jackie and Ant had fallen asleep.
“You guys up and alive?” he asked.
A groan was the only answer he got, and he gave me a sideways grin, then shrugged. “I’m going upstairs to secure us some breakfast. You guys can sort out who gets the shower first. Don’t forget that there’s very little hot water.” He put his hand up to his face to block his mouth and whispered loudly in my direction. “I recommend you go first. After the first shower, it’s a toss-up on the hot water.”
He quickly waggled his eyebrows, and it was such a clownish gesture that I had to laugh.
He’s doing whatever it takes to put us at ease, I realized. With a pastry and some coffee in my belly, and Jace soothing my nerves, I might just be able to get my brai
n to move rationally into finding a solution to this problem.
We didn’t have time to sit around moping, and we couldn’t afford to go into the coming meeting full of emotion and nerves. We needed cold, hard thoughts and rational ideas that would get us into that prison and save our friends.
I did indeed get to the shower first, thanks in part to the fact that Ant was still flat on his back on the couch.
Jackie took one look at my hair, lifted an eyebrow, and said, “I suggest you go first, Robin, before your hair eats us all.”
I laughed at that, but wasn’t going to say no, and made my way to the bathroom.
It was another utilitarian space, and I wondered if it had been added after Jace moved in. It gave the impression of a box that had been stuck up against one of the walls rather than something that was in the original blueprint of the building. Then again, how many people would have come down here to use the bathroom at all? Surely the coffee house above had its own facilities.
I stripped out of my clothes, realizing it was my third day in them. I really needed to get home and grab something new to wear—if that was an option at all. I stepped into the shower, which consisted of three feet by three feet of tiled space and a showerhead. The ceiling was high, which was probably the only reason Jace fit, and the tall showerhead made for a sort of rainfall experience—which was pleasant, but a less-than-efficient way to wash.
Regardless, I finished quickly, dried off, and dressed again. After a glance at my tired face in the mirror, I was finished in the bathroom.
I exited, and saw that Ant was back to snoring.
“I was quick, so hopefully there’s still plenty of hot water left. The soap is on the ledge in the corner. Try not to drown,” I told Jackie, grinning.
She gave me an odd look, but didn’t say anything as she made her way to the bathroom.
I retreated to my blanket bed with a pad of paper and pen I’d spotted on the floor and started making notes. Writing had always been an easy way to focus my thoughts, and I hoped that if I kept at it long enough, I might be able to come up with something resembling a plan to present to the group. But before I started that…
Gabs, you up? I typed out via the encrypted app on my phone.
You bet, came the quick answer. Quick enough that I wondered if she’d actually been sitting there looking at her phone, waiting for me to text, when I sent the message. I smiled at the thought. I wouldn’t put it past her. What’s up?
Wondering if you can do me a favor, I typed out, my mind flying rapidly through the things I’d seen and heard of late. The government having our friends, and potentially all of our addresses. Finding ourselves wrapped up in something that we’d never imagined—and something that was a ton bigger than we’d ever planned for.
But more than that, my mind was on the man who’d pulled us all into it, and the fact that we’d never even met him. And more specifically, the fact that I couldn’t even get in touch with him if I wanted to. I was extremely tired of him being such an important part of what was going on—and depending on second- or third-hand information to answer all questions about him. I wanted to be able to get to the source at my own discretion.
Anything, came the answer.
This Nathan guy, I typed, chewing my lip as I wrote out my thoughts. I don’t know who he is or what exactly he’s doing, and I don’t know what you can do, but… can you try to do some research on him? I can’t kick the feeling that there’s more going on here than we know, and I’d feel a whole lot better if I actually knew who he was and what he’s doing. If we could go straight to the source…
We might have a better shot at figuring out what’s going on, she replied, picking up where I left off.
Exactly, I typed quickly. That was exactly it.
Will work on it as soon as I’ve got a better handle on how we’re going to get our friends out, she replied. And if you’ve got any ideas for that, I’m all ears.
I leaned back, both relived that Gabby was going to look into Nathan for me—and tense over the coming jailbreak.
We were going to be running right into the hornet’s nest, and we still didn’t have a single clue what we were going to do once we got there.
We sat in the wide, grassy area of the park again, and everyone looked as exhausted as I felt. Worse, it was looking more and more like the only thing we had were a bunch of thoughts that weren’t leading anywhere.
“We need to go as early as possible and get it over with,” Zion said, agreeing with Ant, who had made his earlier thought public. “And I definitely don’t think we should assume our friends have been executed. There’s a good chance that the government is, in fact, using them as bait.”
“Which means we need to figure out who’s doing what so that we can get to work,” I pressed. “I don’t know if we’ll have anything more than that in terms of a plan until Gabby’s got a better idea of what we’re up against, right?”
Gabby, who was on my phone’s speaker, answered that quickly.
“Yes, about that. I was up writing notes to myself last night, and I think the best place for me to start is with the traffic cams. The government has them planted all over the place, and they’re not exactly high-security sorts of cameras, because they’re just for the traffic division. I was doing some research, and I think I can get into them pretty easily. It’s the simplest way for me to figure out where they took our friends.”
I could see a number of potential problems with that, but I didn’t say them aloud. I could bring them up to Gabby later, in private.
“And once you know where the building is?” Zion asked. “What then?”
There was a momentary silence, and I decided to step in for the girl.
“One problem at a time, Zion. Once she can see where they were taken, we’ll be able to form a better plan,” I said, repeating my earlier point. “Until we know what we’re looking at…”
I sighed, indicating that we couldn’t come up with a plan when we didn’t even know the location, how it was guarded, etc.
Zion seemed to agree.
“That’s valid,” he replied. “In that case, Gabby, your job for the day is to find out what you can on those cams. Once you know, get in touch with us so that we can proceed with figuring out what we’re going to do.”
He turned to the girl sitting next to him.
“Alexy, Boyd, and I are going to be gathering supplies and intel. You’ve all got the suits we wore on the last raid, correct? Some of you may have to try and go back to your apartments to grab them, because we’ll want to use those, I think. And as for the rest… I want to know as much as we can know before we go in there.”
I looked at him, confused at the vague statements.
Supplies and intel? What was he going to do, just go around asking people what they’d seen, and if they knew anything about the Authority?
It didn’t seem like any plan at all.
Then again, Alexy, Zion, and Cloyd had been slightly questionable from the start. They seemed to know a lot more than they were letting on. Maybe they had sources that we didn’t know about. I didn’t really care as long as they could use those sources for our purpose. Maybe it would make Cloyd feel better to be a part of something that Jace wasn’t involved in.
“And the rest of us?” Marco asked sharply. “We aren’t going to just sit around waiting, if that’s what you think.”
Alexy gave him a grin.
“Take it easy, Marc-o,” she said, giving his name a singsong cadence. “We’ve got an important job for you. No matter what we do, we’re going to need the airship geared up and ready to go. I’m guessing we’ll need some sort of drive-by rescuing at the end of this mission, and that will be your job. You and Julia get back to the airship, make sure it’s still in one piece. If it is, stock it for a long flight.”
She turned toward me, Jace, Ant, and Jackie.
“Since you four have become such a tight-knit group, I suggest we keep you all together, too. Gabby isn’t goin
g to be able to sort this all out on her own. Robin, you’re her contact person. Whatever she needs, you get it for her. If she’s got a problem she can’t solve, you four are on the case. Get to the library, get your hands on the blueprints of any buildings you can find, and keep your phones charged. Something tells me Gabby’s going to have things to look at sooner rather than later, and you’re our boots on the ground.”
Then she turned to Allerra, and her face softened.
“Allerra, I’d really like to tell you to just go home and stay out of this,” she said quietly. “Seems to me we’re all worried about you and wishing you weren’t involved, but I don’t suppose it would do me any good, would it?”
Allerra lifted her chin, her lips taut, and shook her head, and Alexy nodded once.
“I thought as much. I’m putting you in the least dangerous place possible, for now. You’re with Julia and Marco. If they get in a hurry and miss anything on the ship, it’s your job to point it out. You’re going to be their supervisor.” She cast a grin at Marco, and it grew when she saw the look on his face. “He gives you any trouble, you come right to me.”
I smiled, glad that Allerra would be in a safer position, at least for the time being, and then glanced at the others. Across the board, I saw straightened shoulders, firmed chins, and eyes glinting in determination at our various missions.
Yes, it was going to be dangerous.
Yes, we were putting our lives on the line.
Yet not one of us was complaining about it.
30
Jace disappeared after the meeting. He said he needed to take care of some things before he lost touch with Cloyd and Zion. Although I was curious to know what those “things” were exactly, I took the opportunity to speak privately with Gabby about the flaws I could see in her plan.
“Gab, it’s Robin,” I said when she answered.