She didn’t want to leave.
“Positive,” Rachel answered, just as the world faded away completely.
Brynn woke on the hard wooden floor without jumping or being shocked awake. For the first time since she could remember, she simply opened her eyes and found that her dream had ended. There was no cold sweat; no panting or panic attacks. She was simply awake and slightly colder than she had been when she’d first fallen asleep.
With just one blanket to cover her in the drafty room, she went over the dream in her head again.
Finally having a peaceful dream meant that Brynn actually wanted to remember it, though she found she was already beginning to forget the details. Instead, she was left with a fuzzy recollection of a secret place Rachel and Maxwell had built, and a general feeling of contentment.
She tucked away the idea that Rachel may have hidden information somewhere other than A1 and instead replayed the events of the previous day in her head. The ‘initiation’ she’d been put through had riled her up quite a bit but the most shocking thing to Brynn, was the look on Jonah’s face right before she fell from the horizontal tree trunk overhanging the ocean. She wondered if Jonah were beginning to realize how serious everything they were doing was.
It had always seemed to Brynn like Jonah was along for the ride. He had agreed to help Brynn with finding A1 because he just wanted an adventure, or something out of the norm. Jonah hadn’t ever been the type to think before he leapt, but the way he reacted when she had fallen from the tree trunk made her rethink her view of the carefree boy.
Brynn could hear the rhythmic breathing of Rusty, Devey, Cambria, Bennett, and Amber in the room and she suddenly felt claustrophobic. The house was easily too crowded when everyone was in different rooms. But now, as Brynn tried to sleep in a small, cold room with five other girls, she realized just how much she needed some space.
Trying to be quiet, she walked on bare feet through the house, holding the brown boots Rusty had given her against her chest as she attempted to keep her breathing silent. Wind whipped through the trees outside and made howling sounds as it rushed through the old windows. Shadows danced on the walls and Brynn felt an odd sense of unease that seemed deeper and more primal than her fear of A1.
She hadn’t ever been one to be afraid of the dark, but walking through this old house that didn’t speak to her, she was beginning to understand where that particular phobia came from. A complete lack of technology was a frightening thing. It made her feel alone.
Walking over to one of the windows on the top floor of the boarding house, Brynn pressed her warm palms against the cool glass, a thin layer of condensation forming a perfect halo on the pane around her skin. She looked out at the turbulent and stormy world just beyond the safe confines of the building and felt a desire to be out among the chaos, rather than contained within the house.
Grasping the wooden window frame and pushing it open with the palms of her hands, she tried to ignore the loud scraping sound it made as it inched upward. Wind instantly rushed through the hallway, ruffling her clothes around her and sending a chill through her body.
Brynn slipped her boots on, hoping they would offer her some sort of grip as she attempted to find a place of solitude in the overcrowded house.
Crawling through the open window and standing up on the sill outside, she stretched her arms high over her head, trying to reach the lowest portion of the roof above. It took a moment for Brynn to convince herself that she could easily hoist herself up onto the roof, and an even longer moment for her to pretend she had any idea how to get back down once she was ready to stop toying with her safety.
Eventually she pushed off of the window sill with her boots and used all of her arm strength to pull herself onto the roof.
Her feet scrabbled against the side of the house as she slowly and shakily got herself into a safe position on the very slanted ridge. The wind did nothing to silence her fears and she rubbed the bumpy bottoms of her boots, hoping they would give her some traction on the loose shingles.
Brynn crawled up the roof, taking refuge on the highest point and squinting her eyes to look out over the place Rusty called The Moor. The wind whipping her hair around was enough to convince her that finding a little peace and quiet in the too crowded boarding house wasn’t worth falling off of a rooftop and breaking her neck, but she had already made it to the top and figured she may as well take advantage of the solitude.
Lights twinkled in the distance and Brynn could almost make out people walking around in the city that lay just beyond the foggy field, keeping the boarding house safely separated from the rest of The Moor. She thought briefly that the residents of Panurgic may be coming home from a party at this late hour before reminding herself that they were more than likely returning from a shift at one of the many factories that spewed dark smoke into the constantly overcast sky.
Tall smoke stacks dotted the skyline, backlit by orange factory spotlights that never seemed to be turned off. The wind sent the dark billowing smoke that hung over The Moor skittering across the murky night sky and the sight instantly made Brynn realize just why Rusty and the rest of The Alliance hated people from Halcyon so much.
How could they not dislike someone who was constantly surrounded by beauty and leisure when they were faced with the dark and dreary existence of Panurgic?
“Not much to look at, is it?” said a voice directly behind Brynn, causing her to start and almost sending her rolling down the steep incline of the roof.
Brynn whipped her head around as quickly as she safely could to find the Royter, the one member of The Alliance she hadn’t really spoken to, standing behind her. She didn’t understand how the girl had gotten up onto the roof, let alone how she had managed to sneak up on Brynn without making a sound. Her short black bob framed her face, making her olive skin seem lighter than it really was.
“What are you doing up here?” Brynn asked, a bit more loudly than she had intended.
The wind was beginning to die down, leaving the girls in silence as it slowly turned from the raging wind storm it had just been, into a light breeze that picked up the ends of Brynn’s hair and made them dance across her shoulders.
Royter studied Brynn’s face with her dark, slanted eyes, a small scar near her mouth creasing when she smiled at her.
“I could easily ask you the same question.”
Brynn had to admit that the girl did have her there. She didn’t exactly have a great excuse for nearly getting herself killed as she climbed onto the unstable roof, so instead of fabricating an interesting lie, like her gut told her to, she settled for the less impressive, but more reliable truth.
“I needed somewhere to think and the house is way too crowded,” Brynn said honestly.
“That’s not a crime,” Royter replied easily, taking a seat next to Brynn and crossing her long legs in front of her. “What did you need to think about?”
“I don’t know if you know this or not,” Brynn began, not sure how much Royter was kept in the loop of everything that was going on, “But I dream in Rachel’s memories.”
“I know,” she said simply, not sounding like she was offended that Brynn thought she was uninformed, but simply like she was answering an easy yes or no question. “So what did you dream about tonight?” she asked, guessing where the conversation was heading.
“Rachel and this other scientist who worked in A1 had some sort of house…,” Brynn said, not quite satisfied with the explanation she was giving. “Or a base or hiding place. I don’t really know what it was,” she finished, hoping she was making sense in the late hour.
“Like some sort of safe house?” Royter asked, raising a black eyebrow at Brynn.
“Something like that,” she agreed. “I should probably tell The Alliance tomorrow just in case she hid information there. I just wish she had been a bit more specific about its location. Narrowing it down to Arcadian doesn’t really help me.”
“If I were you,” Royter began, before stop
ping mid-sentence.
She squinted her eyes for a moment as she stared out over the foggy field below the house and the factory filled city that lay beyond. She didn’t speak again for a moment and Brynn almost wondered if she had forgotten what she was going to say.
“What?” Brynn pressed.
“I wouldn’t tell anyone about the safe house,” Royter finally finished, not looking at Brynn.
She kept her eyes trained straight ahead.
“Why shouldn’t I tell The Alliance?” Brynn asked, genuinely interested in Royter’s reasoning behind this revelation. “Aren’t you on their side? Shouldn’t you want me to share every bit of information I have?”
“I know Rusty and Hadlock put a lot of stock in their little inventions, but knowledge is the only power any one of us has. Give that away and you have nothing,” she said with a shrug. “I, personally, don’t think power is something we should be giving away freely when we have so little of it.”
“But isn’t that the whole reason I’m here?” Brynn asked, still confused. “The only reason The Alliance has been looking for me for so long is because they think I have information they don’t have. Information like this.”
“I’m not telling you what to do,” Royter said simply. “You’re a grown woman capable of making her own decisions. I’m just telling you that I’d keep that particular bit of information to myself until it became absolutely vital to our mission. If you’re on a need to know basis, why shouldn’t they be?” she asked quite reasonably.
“I guess that makes sense,” Brynn agreed, not sure when she had gone from loving the ambition of The Alliance, to withholding information from them on the word of a girl she barely knew.
The two girls sat in silence for a while longer, both pondering over different things before Brynn finally broke the quiet.
“So what are you doing up here?” Brynn asked. “You never told me.”
“Same thing as you,” Royter answered with a smile in Brynn’s direction. “The house is too crowded so I come up here to think sometimes.”
Brynn nodded at this statement but didn’t say anything. She didn’t know what to say.
She was sure she should trust Royter, but this short five minute conversation was the most Brynn had gotten out of her since meeting her. It was always difficult to trust someone who kept their own secrets so close to the chest.
“What exactly do you do for The Alliance? Rift was very vague about your role,” Brynn asked.
“I deal in the one thing worth trading,” Royter answered simply. “I collect information and help spread the word to other cities.”
“And people just believe you when you tell them there’s some sinister plot going on?” Brynn couldn’t keep the disbelief from her voice.
“Things are different here,” she said. “People on Halcyon wouldn’t believe it because they don’t want to. Everything is perfect there. Why change it?”
“Fair point.”
“On Panurgic people are hoping for a change. They’re more than willing to believe that their lot in life isn’t final. That there’s some way for them to change their fate.”
“Is it really that bad here?” Brynn asked.
She was sure hard work was never a fun thing, but it didn’t seem like the quality of life was as bad as everyone let on.
“Working isn’t what’s difficult. If anything it gives you some purpose in life. I feel like I’d have a harder time living on Halcyon where I never did anything productive,” Royter began, casting a quick glance in Brynn’s direction.
She was actually quite surprised that she was getting the girl to speak to her so freely and so she said nothing and let her continue.
“The thing that’s hard is never progressing. We work hard but there’s no possibility to work towards a better life. Nothing changes here and while it does help that you can change your profession as you get older, you never really progress. Life without progression just doesn’t make any sense.”
“No one progresses on Halcyon,” Brynn pointed out, never having thought of it before but now finding the concept very odd.
“Yeah, but people don’t really care as much because they have everything they want. It’s a lot more obvious when you’re miserable.”
Brynn mulled this over for a moment in silence. It was true that life on Halcyon had always been comfortable, but that had never been enough for her. She’d always wanted more and the suffocating feeling that a lack of progression brought on was not a foreign one to her. She understood the restlessness Royter spoke of.
“Why do you think the A.I.s built A1 on Halcyon?” Brynn finally asked, not sure where the question had come from.
Royter was silent for a long time, staring off into the distance and breathing slowly. Brynn wondered if the girl had heard her question before she finally answered.
“I think the lack of curiosity and the fact that Halcyonites are already so happy made it an ideal location. Why go looking for something when you have everything?”
“You know about the curiosity?” Brynn asked, slightly amazed by this revelation.
“All of us do,” Royter answered, giving Brynn an odd look.
“I haven’t told anyone in my group yet,” she admitted, though she was sure Jonah already knew since he had seen the records room where the information was kept. “I don’t know how you drop something like that on someone.”
“I don’t think they’ll take it as hard as you think. Besides, it’s not like it’s an irreversible thing.”
“What does that mean?”
“The suppressed curiosity is just an impulse they placed in your brain,” she explained. “The more you explore and discover, the more you learn to be curious. Just because they took away the natural inclination doesn’t mean you can’t teach yourself to be curious.”
“Well that makes it better,” Brynn admitted, feeling like she wouldn’t mind telling her friends the news if she could quickly assure them that they had probably already overcome the suppression.
“You don’t seem to have any lack of curiosity,” Royter said.
“That’s because of Rachel,” Brynn reminded her.
“I wonder then,” Royter began slowly, her eyes locked on Brynn, “if you’d be curious about something The Alliance and the A.I.s don’t feel the need to share with those they don’t find important.”
Chapter 19: Ruin
Brynn wasn’t sure when she had consciously decided to follow a girl she hardly knew into the cold, muddy world outside of the boarding house. One minute, she and Royter had been talking on the roof, and the next she was trailing behind the girl through a muddy landscape that offered absolutely no light through the cloudy night sky.
Royter walked expertly through the sinking ground, looking as if the mud didn’t affect her at all as Brynn struggled to keep her boots from being swallowed whole. With each step she took, a deep slurping noise could be heard as the mud reluctantly surrendered her knee high boots back to her. The wind had died down considerably though a small breeze still blew, making the air much chillier than Brynn cared for.
She had asked Royter numerous times where they were going but the girl only told her that she would see once she got there.
They hadn’t gone through The Moor as Brynn had hoped, instead they walked parallel to it, though the lights from the factories quickly faded into the distance, once more engulfing both girls in darkness.
“How far are we going?” Brynn asked after a while, pulling her brown jacket tightly around her and wishing she had brought gloves or a scarf.
Royter wore all black, making it difficult for Brynn to follow her in the darkness. The only hint that she was still on the right path was the small patch of bare neck that could be seen below Royter’s black bob and above her black jacket collar where something that looked like a tattoo of a bird peeked through. Brynn made a mental note to ask her about the picture another time, when she wasn’t close to being swallowed up by the muddy ground.
&
nbsp; “We’re almost there,” the girl replied. “It’s surprisingly close, which seems risky on a continent full of curious people who’re likely to run away because they don’t like their lot in life.”
Brynn didn’t understand what Royter was talking about but continued to follow her anyway, knowing that soon enough all would be explained. At least, she hoped all would be explained. If this excursion went anything like all of the other adventures Brynn partook in, all she’d get would be more questions and absolutely no answers.
“Here we are,” Royter finally said, coming to an abrupt stop in front of a small town.
The little wooden houses and few factories that sat squat at the center of the town were dark and silent.
“Where is everyone?” Brynn asked, getting the feeling that the town wasn’t asleep; it was abandoned.
“Gone,” Royter said cryptically.
“They all just… left?”
“In a manner of speaking,” she answered. “They were terminated.”
The word ‘terminated’ sat heavily in Brynn’s mind and she couldn’t help but feel that using the euphemism didn’t make the loss of human life in this town any better.
The silent town suddenly seemed even more eerie to Brynn who couldn’t suppress a shudder at what she was hearing. The small, dark windows seemed to peer back at her as she stared at the still scene. She could imagine little children pressing their faces up against the glass or running happily through the street. The image left a sour taste in her mouth.
“Killed by who?” Brynn managed to ask, though she already knew the answer.
“Eris learned everything she needed to from them so she released the sugar scented gas into the town,” Royter explained. “They probably thought someone was baking cookies,” she added with disgust in her voice, making the exact same comparison Eris had once expressed.
Brynn could remember the way Rachel had taken a deep breath when the gas had entered her chamber, welcoming death it had seemed. And suddenly, something didn’t make sense to Brynn. If she was a clone of Rachel, how could she possibly dream in a memory that had happened after Rachel put her DNA into the human creation bay?