State of Nature: Book Three of The Park Service Trilogy (7 page)

He bends and reaches to pull the leg of his zipsuit over his ankle bracelet. Then he stands again and says, “You keep on trustin’ Hannah, but you shouldn’t.”

“I’m not trusting her to keep her word this time, Jimmy. I’m trusting her to be logical. There’s no value in keeping us around once I do this, and there’s no reason to kill us if we’re out somewhere minding our own business.”

“But I thought they was tryin’ to kill all humans.”

“And they are. But not all right away.”

“Ain’t they worried we’ll make more?”

“More people?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, I kind of agreed that we’d all get vasectomies.”

“Vasecto-whats?”

“Just a little operation so we can’t have kids. No big deal. Don’t look at me like that. I saw you get circumcised with an old knife and no pain killers. You’ll be fine with it.”

“But what if I want kids?” he asks. “My pa always said I’d have a son to carry on the name, remember? I brought you to the cave and showed you the head.”

I remember his cave and their fearless leader who was really just the bust of an old movie star they’d dug up.

“Jimmy, who would you even have kids with?”

“Whatever,” he says, pulling open the door. “That big lady wasn’t very happy, so we better hurry on.”

The valley is strangely quiet as we weave our way along the path toward the square. We pass the gray education annex and it seems somehow smaller and less impressive to me now, so much so that it’s difficult to even imagine the anxiety I felt that day I tested with all the other 15s. Back then my biggest fears were moving to a different level and getting punched by Red.

A steadily growing buzz of conversation foretells what we’ll see when we turn onto the public square—everyone, and I mean everyone, is there. I’ve never seen so many people gathered in one place before. I guess we never had occasion for it, growing up. Mrs. Hightower’s head floats above the others where she stands at a makeshift stage, scanning the edges of the crowd for our arrival. She sees us and waves us over.

“It’s about time,” she huffs. “They were about to come and drag you out here themselves in another few minutes.”

She points to a platform where a microphone waits for me. I look to Jimmy for reassurance, but all I get is a sad mixture of anxiety and disappointment written on his face. I climb the step to the platform and pull the microphone toward my mouth.

“Hello.”

I jolt away from the mic when my voice echoes back from every corner of the cavern. The crowd ceases its murmuring and focusses on me. It’s a sea of blank faces, although a few of them form into loose approximations of people that I used to know. Is that Mrs. Kelly from the infirmary where I went once with a fever? I was lucky it hadn’t gotten worse, she’d said, because otherwise they would have sent me up to Eden. Then I see Chad, my father’s old friend from work. He must be due to retire any day. There are kids I know from class too, standing in groups, whispering and pointing. One girl who was a few years ahead of me is in the front row, and I see that she’s pregnant. Her husband is holding her hand. There are others I know I should know but can hardly remember. They’re all looking at me and waiting for me to speak—waiting for me to tell them that everything is okay, that their lives can go on just as they as always have. And they’ll trust me because I’m one of them.

“Hello, friends.”

Just saying the word “friends” makes me feel like a fraud. What is a friend anyway? Someone you feel affection for? Someone who will do you no harm? I push my self-doubt away, take a deep breath, and speak to the crowd.

“As many of you know, retirement has been on hold for the last few months or so. I’m here to explain why. Eden is undergoing some simple improvements to make the experience even better than it already was. But I can assure you that no one is going to be forced to work beyond age thirty-five and that the promise of Eden is alive and better than ever.”

“What’s better about it?” someone shouts from the crowd.

“Well ...” I stammer, not having thought of any particular improvements to pitch to them. “For one thing we had to expand it to make more room. But that’s just the start. As many of you know, you can be anywhere you want while you’re in Eden. Any paradise you can imagine. Well, imagine being able to be in multiple paradises at once.”

“How would you do that?” someone asks.

“The software behind it is quite complicated, of course,” I say, lying through my gritted teeth, “but basically you can be in more than one place at a time in the new Eden.”

After it comes out, I realize that I’m just mixing in the professor’s crazy submarine speech about particles existing in more than one place at any given time, and I’m not really even sure how you could enjoy being in two places at once. I look at Jimmy for his reaction, but I can’t tell if he looks impressed by my speaking skills or my ability to lie.

“What else?” another asks.

I close my eyes for a moment, trying to think, trying to not lie too much. Then I open them and go on:

“New places to go and explore without even having to imagine them. Like gorgeous coastlines of blue water, and pine forests, and snowcapped mountains, and beautiful lakes with homey houses on their edge for you to relax in. Tennis courts. Beds made of feathers. Planes that fly you over the landscape and show you deserts and prairies and grazing beasts that had long ago gone extinct. And whole islands across the sea where castles rise up out of the water, and where majestic hills roll on forever, and you can ride horses and hunt deer and eat feasts prepared for kings.”

When I finish, the crowd oohs and aahs. But I notice that Jimmy just looks sad. I’m guessing that’s because he knows that I’m not talking some imagined reality in Eden, but our life.

“Now,” I say, feeling the time is right to go for the close, “if we can just get back to business as usual and get the supplies sent up, we’ll be able to restart retirements in almost no time.”

The crowd parts, and a young girl about my own age steps to the front and looks up at me.

“But what about Red?”

This must be BethAnn, Red’s girlfriend.

“He’s fine,” I tell her. “But he can’t come back.”

“Why not?” she asks.

“Well, because he sneaked around and was exposed to some unsterilized areas. I’m afraid he’s contagious.”

I see the crowd collectively cringe at the word contagious, many shaking their heads and others waving the word away as if waving Red away with it. We’ve lived long enough in these close quarters to know the danger of a foreign agent infecting us; even if that foreign agent is the truth.

But BethAnn doesn’t wave Red away.

Instead, she looks up at me with dewy eyes and says, “Maybe Red and I could go to Eden early then. That way we could be together forever.”

Her willingness to go render her brain into Eden early just to be with Red rips my heart out. There she is, true as they come. I look over at Jimmy, and he’s shaking his head. I look out at the crowd, the trusting faces colored with hope that they too will someday be reunited with their loved ones in Eden. Then I see Mrs. Hightower and her unforgiving face and I’m reminded of the video of Dr. Radcliffe that she showed us on the big test day, the one where he lied to us all about Eden and about him being the first one to enter it.

Suddenly, I’m back in that classroom, taking my test. I’m looking again at the question: would I kill an entire level to save humankind? I answered blindly then. But I’m not blind now. I’m standing here with my eyes wide open, lying to these people and sending them to be slaughtered when they turn 35. I’m no better than Radcliffe was. But I can be. I can still change the course of my destiny. I can still redeem myself. I can still make my father proud, wherever he is.

I turn back to the microphone.

“I owe you all an apology because I’ve been standing up here lying to you this whole time. Eden is a sham ...”

Just as I realize that the microphone has been killed and that none of my last statement was broadcast, a strong hand grabs my arm and yanks me off the platform. Then I’m being pulled through the crowd by Mrs. Hightower. Hands reach to pat me on the back, faces smile at me, voices cheer my name, and all of it slides by so fast, I can’t get a word out to anyone.

When the noise of the crowd fades away behind us, I look back and see Jimmy following along with his hands stuffed in his pockets and his head down.

“Where are you taking me?”

“Home,” Mrs. Hightower says, without turning back.

We arrive at the door and she throws it open and pushes me inside. Then she lets Jimmy enter before stepping inside herself and pulling the door closed.

“What was that about?” she asks.

“What was what about?”

“You know damn well what I mean,” she insists. “What were you thinking, saying what you said?”

“You heard me?”

“Of course, I did.”

“Then why aren’t you shocked?”

She sighs. “There’s a lot you don’t yet understand.”

“Well, why don’t you fill me in?”

“I can’t,” she says. “Not here.”

“Where then? When?”

She glances at Jimmy. “How does he fit in?”

“He’s with me,” I say. “He’s my best friend.”

“So, he knows?”

“Yes, he knows everything.”

“Fine,” she replies. “You two stay here. Keep low profiles. Don’t talk to anyone. We’ll come and collect you at midnight.”

“Who’s we?”

“You’ll see,” she says. “You’ll see.”

Then she steps to the door, pulls it open, and looks back.

“Not a word to anyone. Got it?”

I nod that I do.

“You too,” she says, glancing at Jimmy.

“Yes, ma’am,” he replies.

She looks at us one last time, as if to be sure, and then she stoops through the door and pulls it shut behind her.

“What the hell?” Jimmy asks.

“I don’t know,” I say, shaking my head. “I tried to tell the truth at the last minute, but the microphone cut off, and then Mrs. Hightower dragged me from the stage.”

“I dun’ trust her.”

“Neither do I. But what can we do except wait for her or whoever to come back?”

Jimmy flops on the couch and pulls the ball that Finn gave him from his pocket, tosses it into the air, and catches it.

“What do you think woulda happened?”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” he says, “If you’d got off the truth.”

“I don’t know,” I admit, taking the only other chair in the small living room. “Maybe Hannah was tuned in somehow and would have flooded us on the spot. Maybe we’d be drowned by now. Or maybe the people would have been angry enough to do something for once. The only thing I know for sure is that I was wrong to lie to them. Eden is a slaughterhouse.”

“But why does this high-legged lady seem to know?”

“Mrs. Hightower? That I don’t understand. It’s a mystery. And what else has me curious is why is she down here if she knows? Do you think she’s working for Hannah?”

“I wouldn’t put nothin’ past her,” he says.

We each fall quiet with our own thoughts. I sit and watch the ball rise and fall as Jimmy lies on his back playing catch with himself. It’s hypnotic to watch, and I begin to sort through all these mysterious pieces of information. Hannah betrayed us, blowing up the Isle of Man. Red accidentally betrayed Hannah to Holocene II with a note to his girlfriend. Hannah sent us down here to fix it. I try to tell them the truth and am stopped from doing it by Mrs. Hightower, who already knows. It’s puzzle enough to make me dizzy.

“That was sad about Red’s girl,” Jimmy says.

“I know,” I reply, happy to free my mind from the maze of questions there. “And I promised Red that I’d tell her he was okay. That he was thinking about her. And I kind of did, but not really. I should go find her and reassure her that he’ll be fine. You want to come with me?”

“But that lady said to stay here.”

“Yeah, but midnight’s a long time from now. And besides, maybe they’re just coming to kill us anyway, whoever they are.”

Jimmy tosses me the ball and I catch it.

“I’m in for whatever,” he says. “Jus’ lead the way.”

We stick to the edges of the valley and the mostly empty living quarters, since everyone would have gone back to work after my speech. But the problem is, I only have a general idea where BethAnn lives from having seen Red sneak out his window and head to her block of buildings in the middle of the night. Turns out, we don’t need to know much more than that, though, because as we approach a row of apartments, I can hear weeping coming from an open window.

“BethAnn,” I call up.

When she doesn’t respond, Jimmy whistles. The sobbing ceases and a pale face appears in the window.

“What do you want?” she calls down.

“Let us up. I need to talk with you.”

“You can talk with me from there,” she says.

I look around, but there doesn’t seem to be anyone about.

“Fine,” I half whisper, half shout. “I have a message from Red. He said to tell you that he’s thinking about you, and that he misses you, and that everything will work out just fine.”

“What’s that mean?” she asks.

“What’s what mean?”

“That everything will work out?”

“I don’t know. That’s just what he said. So don’t cry.”

She leans out the window a little farther and looks around. Then she looks back down at me with a question on her face.

“How come you can talk to him?”

“What do you mean?” I ask.

“If he’s contagious like you say, why can you talk to him?”

It’s a good question, and I should have considered it before coming to find her. Maybe this was a mistake. I stumble to find an answer, but Jimmy jumps in and saves me.

“He wrote the message and Aubrey read it,” he says, which is brilliant because it’s kind of the truth.

“Is that it?” she asks.

“What do you mean is that it?”

“Is that all he wrote?”

“He said he was sorry.”

“Well,” she says, “you told me. Now go away.”

Then she pulls the window closed. We turn to walk away, but we don’t get far when I hear the window slide open again.