Harvesting Ashwood Minnesota 2037 (30 page)

“I wish Grandma and Grandpa were with us.” Her frightened voice became wispy.

“Can you tell us what happened last night, Anne?” Andrew asked. “And what does Cook Terrell mean when he said you’re not in good shape?”

“Let me sit down.” I looked around the room. “Noah, can you unfold a chair for me?” As he pulled a chair from its storage rack I took the time to look at each child, wondering how their morning had played out before the call to send us into safety. “Thank you.” I hugged him at my side, leaned on him just a bit as I lowered myself into the chair. “If you want chairs, each grab one and we’ll talk. Stay near me and away from the door.”

Andrew handed each child a chair, stayed back as they positioned themselves, Noah and John to my left, Phoebe on my right. He set up next to Phoebe, his chair completing our circle.

“Maybe Dr. Frances told you that I’m banged up. She says I’ll be as good as new in a couple of weeks. All the same, you can understand if I’m cranky. Lots of me hurts. And I have to use this cane. Not cool.”

The little boys’ shoulders lowered on my poor attempt at tempting their smiles. “Look at me the next time you’re think of climbing too high in a tree and stop. This boot really slows me down.” Still no lightness in their faces. “We’re all here and we’re safe. Just like we’ve practiced.”

“But Dad’s not here and Andrew’s never practiced with us,” Noah said. “Should we show him how to use the toilet and where the water and food are stored?”

“My family has one of these, too.” Andrew’s voice faltered. “Had one.”

“Maybe, if we’re in here for a long time, you might tell us about your family?” Phoebe’s request let me know she was finding a way to deal with her fears. “Stuff you liked to do with your parents.”

Our girl at her best, I thought, and wished for many reasons that David was with us. “I’m sure Andrew appreciates our interest, Phoebe, but he’ll tell us stories when he’s ready.” I pulled together a smile, something we never had to practice in our annual safe room exercises. “I do have news about Dad.” The air system became louder than the children’s breathing. “The people looking for Dad saw him and two people sitting under a tree and eating.”

Phoebe’s head drooped and tears fell. I leaned her way and welcomed her weight against my shoulder. “This is the best news we’ve heard.” My voice fell.

“John and I pray for him every night,” Noah said. “And we prayed for you and Grandpa last night. We were really scared when you didn’t come back.”

Beautiful dark eyes from his father’s family were the highlight of Noah’s face. I thought about how David once told me that Tia was the only female scientist in their government group willing to consider marriage to a rather plain lab rat. At the time I was talking to a married man and couldn’t tell him that anyone with his dark eyes would never be considered plain.

“Thank you, Noah.” I hesitated, trying to form a safe description for the kids about last night. “Grandpa and Lao and Milan discovered that the people using the DOE offices were not operating with authority of the U.S. government.” All watched me. “Captain Peterson became angry when I challenged his right to be at Ashwood.”

“But our soldiers aren’t supposed to hurt us, Mom.” John, my logical son, sat still. “Then other soldiers came to protect us. How do we know the good soldiers from the bad?”

Phoebe, with her intelligence, would be exempted from mandatory military or domestic service. Hopefully, the boys would be able to contribute years of domestic volunteer work instead of going into the armed services. I couldn’t know their futures, didn’t want to say anything that might change their unbiased minds.

“Sometimes people make bad decisions, and when those people are leaders that can cause big problems.” I knew their attention would wander soon, so I cut this lesson short. “The marines who report to Captain Peterson have to follow his orders. So they think they’re doing what is right to protect the United States because they trust him. But Captain Peterson is disobeying his leaders.”

“But did soldiers hurt you or did Captain Peterson hurt you?” John puzzled.

“That’s not important, John.” I patted his knee. “I’d like to get our monitors set up. Could you three show Andrew around this space?”

“It’s just like the one at my old house.”

“Humor me, Andrew, and could I have the communication band?” I stood, wondered how long the pain medication would hold. He handed the wristband to me and I made my way across the room to a security station wired into the safe room’s dedicated energy cell.

The cabinet opened with a scan of my iris. Three simple monitors came on. Inside the residence all appeared quiet with Terrell and Sarah working in the kitchen with a dozen other people. That screen changed to show an empty hallway outside the storage rooms. In the outside view, Magda waved to a smaller transport leaving Ashwood’s courtyard.

The DOE building interior resembled an old black-and-white movie of urban espionage. The complete disconnect between the quiet in Ashwood’s residence and a real battle taking place in our offices stopped me, then accelerated my heart rate.

I moved so the children would not be able to see uniformed people using tasers, or maybe real guns, on other uniformed people. I stared for seconds at what might have been a dead body outside my shattered office window, at the beginning of a blaze from somewhere near the coffee area. In the extraordinary quiet of the safe room, I closed the monitor station, took a breath, and turned. Four children, digesting what their unready eyes had seen, moved close.

“We have to watch, Mom.” Phoebe approached, hands extended. “That fight is going on in Dad’s office.”

“But he’s not there. We’re not going to watch, Phoebe.” I backed against the monitor box. “I’ll check it in few minutes, but we’re not going to watch that fight.” I activated the communication band, signaling for Lao, needing information.

While I waited, I shepherded the kids back to their chairs, spending extra seconds smoothing hair or touching an arm.

“Anne.” Sounding winded, Lao’s voice gave me a half second of a secure feeling. “What do you need?”

“An update of any kind.” I walked away from the kids’ circle, as far away as the room allowed and turned toward a storage shelf that doubled as a sleeping bunk. “I saw action in the DOE building, but I don’t understand.”

“The marines shutting down one of their own who went rogue.”

“And the fire. That building can’t sustain fire damage. David’s work archives.”

“Trust me, it was a small fire. I’m monitoring everything. Should be about over.” He turned away briefly, speaking to someone else. “Hold tight, Anne. I have to manage logistics. We’ll be in touch.”

“Lao, can’t we return to the residence?”

“Negative. Not until all is clear.”

I opened the security box again, using my body to block the kids’ view. Gardens and yards were empty. Inside the residence, quiet ruled. I couldn’t understand what I saw in the office building, felt emotional at the destruction and possible deaths. I closed it down once more, returned to our chairs.

“Andrew, would you be strong and help distract us by telling us a story or two about your family?” His frown indicated confusion or reluctance. “Or maybe about your favorite school.”

“What do you want to know?” His voice quivered, a nearly eleven-year-old boy in a scary situation.

“We’d love anything you’d be willing to tell us. What your cook made for breakfast. How was your bedroom arranged. What you like about your big brother.”

Looking down at his leg, Andrew spoke low, running words together. “My brother and I shared a room until he went to school in England. He’s seven years older than me and was born during our father’s first marriage. So we’re half-brothers.”

“Like you and John,” Phoebe offered.

“Yeah, I guess so.” Andrew looked up. John sat on the edge of his chair, hands under his legs. “Anyway, when Timothy went to England, I got the whole room to myself.” He paused. “We lived in Philadelphia where estates are just old homes with a few greenhouses and a small barn for chickens and cows. I never saw a place as big as this before.”

“What about school?” Phoebe’s favorite activity. “Didn’t you have your own school?”

“No, we were picked up by a transport. I started when I was three. Really long days Monday through Friday and a half day on Saturday for stuff like music.” Noah made a monster face. Andrew nodded before continuing. “It was hard, but because my parents were like yours, I didn’t have a choice.”

His voice strengthened and I noticed how well he told his story. “I liked the mornings our cook made fried apples for breakfast with scrapple. That’s a kind of special sausage. I didn’t talk with the workers very much ’cause they had classes at night and I had homework. Lots of homework.”

“Did you have a dog?” John asked with sincere interest. “We asked for a dog for Christmas.”

Andrew shook his head. “No dog. But I had fish and we had house cats to hunt mice. It was a very old house. My father hated living in an old place. He would have liked this place.” The last words were said softly and made me think what a topsy-turvy world the government threw in place. Its most valued citizens received prime housing. Some of those people those loved wood and windows and hated the energy-efficient concrete and steel residences they were assigned, while those who wanted high-rise glass-window views lived in Victorian comfort.

My band vibrated. These four kids watched me raise my arm. “Anne, here.”

“If you’re watching the monitors, we’re moving everyone still here into air-filtered buildings because an unknown device placed near the DOE building is spewing a cloudy substance. Good news is that Peterson and his troops are under arrest.” Lao’s military training sounded in his brisk tone. “Military experts are out testing the emission and searching the grounds.”

“Is everyone safe?” I walked while we talked, wished for my earbud communicator instead of the wristband that provided no buffer for the kids from Lao’s information.

“Yes.” Voices filled in behind Lao. “We’ll talk later.”

My left foot’s swelling now extended from my arch through my calf, but I tried to move quickly away from the kids. “Andrew, if you could continue,” I said over my shoulder. “Maybe tell John and Noah and Phoebe about your favorite foods or books. I don’t want any of you to turn around to watch the monitor.” Phoebe, always a firstborn, protested and rose from her chair.

“Sit down, Phoebe.” She stood tall, then pushed aside her chair to follow me. “Please, I don’t have time to discuss this with you. Just do what I asked.” She hesitated. “Please, Phoebe.” I kept my pace, a hand now on the security setup. She returned to her seat, put her head in her lap, cried.

The first monitor showed the dining area crowded with a small group of adults gathered behind fire doors and breathing filtered air. “Grandma and Grandpa are in the dining room,” I reported back to the kids. Outside, the empty courtyard with closed building doors looked both eerie and calm.

The DOE building camera scanned destruction, two inert bodies, marines standing at guard at its entrances. External weather shutters installed during a recent energy project, closed in some areas. Before closing the station, I broke open the safe room’s earpiece communicator and placed it in my ear to follow estate conversations.

Being plugged in to Lao’s actions this way calmed me. I returned to the kids. “We have playing cards if you’d like to do something.” Noah opened the small stock of books and games. “Phoebs, we’re going to be okay.” I sat next to her. “Want to huggle?” She moved close at the use of a babyhood word. “When we get upstairs, I will need a nap. Interested?”

“We just got up, Mom,” she reminded me.

“You lucky girl,” I teased. She stayed at my side.

Chapter Twenty-Seven

The boys slid over a box to use as a table and we played a few hands of Crazy Eights. Noah suggested some other game that involved sitting on the floor, and they were gone. Through the earpiece, I followed Lao’s identification of the haze as an eye irritant that dissipated with the start of light drizzle.

One hour after invoking the filtered air protocol, Lao gave an all clear call for the rest of the estate. The buses could return and work resumed. By two hours into our evacuation, playing games ceased to amuse the kids. The boys built towers with the cards. Phoebe made up stories about the structures, her voice often raised to a level not easy to tolerate in a metal and concrete space. John found a safe room instruction manual and sat on the floor next to me to read.

By eleven o’clock, after four hours in isolation, hearing nothing about us in Lao’s communication with estate security, I became irritated. Visual monitors implied that everyone outside once again moved freely.

“Anne, you’re getting impatient?” I heard fatigue in Lao’s voice. “You have not been forgotten.”

“I trust you, but unless the estate is still under military control, decisions should be running through me.” I heard Paul in the background, maybe Milan. “If there’s no specific threat, we’re leaving the safe room.”

There followed a blur of voices. “I’ll meet you in the hall,” Lao said. “Is there anything you need?”

“An ankle support once we’re upstairs and something mild for the discomfort.” I gave the okay sign to the kids as I spoke. “The kids are ready for lunch and a piece of fruit with a nutrition bar would be great for me. I want to see the DOE building damage.”