Outcasts (16 page)

“Only cooking classes. One on how to bake bread and one on how to bake cakes.”

“Before or after you burned the spice cake?” he asked, recalling the charred cake in Ciddah’s kitchen sink.

“Before.” She elbowed him. “I also took a dancercise class.”

“What’s that?”

“Exercise by dancing.”

“You like to dance or exercise?”

“Dance.” She wrinkled her nose. “But only when no one’s watching. Have you taken any classes there?”

He shook his head. He didn’t even know the location of the Highland Civic Center. “Any suggestions?”

“Classes for Mason Elias, who already knows everything … hmm.”

“Ciddah, I don’t know every — ”

“Shh, I’m thinking.” She tugged on her bottom lip. “There are science classes … speed math. You might also like the wonders of nature course, though knowing where you grew up, you could probably teach it. I had a friend take a robotic craft course that sounded fun for … smart men. But I think your favorite class might be brain fitness.”

“What does it mean, ‘brain fitness’?”

“It’s a class that teaches techniques on focus, memory skills, concentration, reaction time, and reshaping your brain through plasticity — things like that.”

“Fascinating. And what’s plasticity?”

“Neuroplasticity, actually. It’s the brain’s ability to be changed, modified, and in some cases, repaired.”

Retraining the brain was certainly plausible, but modifying? “Are you certain it’s not a brainwashing class?”

She chuckled. “If you ever go, I suggest you avoid the classes on seeing into your past lives. I don’t think you’d like that very much.”

“That much is certain,” Mason said.

The train stopped at Champion Park South Station, and Mason stood. “This is our stop.”

“We’re going to the lake?” Ciddah asked.

“Stop guessing. You’ll know soon enough.”

They exited the train and walked across the platform toward the stairs. Mason flew down the steps to street level.

“
Mason,
wait up!” Ciddah called from behind.

He stopped and turned to wait, realizing he’d already forgotten most of the tips Jemma and Zane had given him. When Ciddah reached his side, though it went against every instinct in him, he reached out and took hold of her hand. “Sorry,” he said.

She beamed at him, then bumped her cheek against his shoulder. Mason marveled at the power human touch had over this girl. She’d touched him often when they’d first met, but after Lonn’s liberation, she’d kept her distance. Who could comprehend females?

They walked into Champion Park, which was a half mile of forest, lake, and concrete walking trails. There were quite a few people out, many walking dogs. In the distance, the north side of the park ran along the Highlands-Midlands wall. If not for that eyesore, Mason might have felt like he was back in Glenrock.

They walked to the docks and a rowboat rental shop. Mason paid for the rental with his SimTag.

“We’re going in a boat?” Ciddah asked.

“Yes, is that acceptable?”

“Sure. I’ve never been in one.”

“Me either.”

They both put on life jackets. Mason helped Ciddah into the boat first, then he stepped in. The craft rocked under his feet. Ciddah grabbed his arm to steady him, and he managed to sit on the bench seat, facing her, without capsizing the small craft.

Mason had used the grid to research how to row a boat, and he did his best to do so confidently. He rowed toward the island in the center of Lake Joie, enjoying the breeze and the view.

He asked Ciddah her task aspirations next, and while she told him about wanting to rank a level twenty medic, he practiced stints of five seconds of eye contact, marveling at her beauty. He knew eyes did not glimmer, that such an effect was produced when light reflected off the cornea, but Ciddah’s eyes seemed to be proving otherwise. And her skin … Some Safe Lands women looked painted, but not Ciddah. She had a little makeup on her eyes and lips, but besides the slight fade to the number seven on her cheek, he couldn’t tell she was wearing Roller Paint at all. If he hadn’t seen her tears wash it away the day of Lonn’s liberation, he wouldn’t know now. She was perfection.

Hunger panged in his stomach. He checked his Wyndo and saw it was 12:36. Time for lunch. He’d forgotten how stimulating conversation with Ciddah could be. He’d also gotten off course with his rowing and had to steer them back toward the island.

Mason got out first, secured the craft, then helped Ciddah out. They left their life jackets in the boat. He took hold of her hand and led her down a winding path that entered a forested area. Ahead, on the side of the path, a small crowd of people was clustered around a bronze statue of a man and a woman wrapped in a loving embrace. The man was kissing the woman’s neck, and the woman’s head was thrown back, her face frozen in laughter.

“What does this sculpture represent?” Mason asked Ciddah.

“It’s the Champion Memorial.” And at his blank stare, Ciddah continued. “Loca and Liberté Champion founded the Safe Lands in the aftermath of the Great Pandemic.”

Ah, yes. Papa Eli had spoken of this pair. They were not heroes in Glenrock history, but hedonistic megalomaniacs. Strange that the Safe Lands and Glenrock cultures each deemed the other in such negative light.

The crowd moved on, and Mason stepped closer so he could read the words inscribed under the couple’s feet. “ ‘Find pleasure in life.’ The task director said that to me.”

“It’s the motto of the Safe Lands,” Ciddah said. “Loca and Liberté
wanted to create a place where people were free to enjoy themselves, where cost wasn’t a factor.”

“Yet the pursuit of such pleasure cost the people everything,” Mason said, “the thin plague being a blood-borne virus.”

Ciddah’s posture stiffened. “Mason, you don’t understand. Everyone was already infected. Because of the Great Pandemic.”

“Is that what they teach in your boarding school? Ciddah, my great-grandfather met Loca and Liberté Champion. And when he saw how carelessly they treated the virus, he and his friends fled this place. That’s why my people aren’t infected and yours are. The blood-borne strain came after the ‘Safe Lands’ were founded, not before.”

Ciddah didn’t answer, so Mason looked at her. She was staring at him, tears in her eyes.

“I’m sorry,” he said. “I broke my rule and argued.”

She sniffled and brushed a lock of hair from her eyes. “You like to be right.”

He looked back to the statue. “I’m always happy to be proven wrong.”

But Ciddah made no comment.

They left the statue and continued through the forest until Mason found a flat, grassy spot under a tree. “This will do.” He removed his backpack and unzipped it.

“Will do for what?”

“For lunch.” Mason removed a blanket and spread it over the grass, then set out the meal he’d packed, which consisted of a chicken salad sandwich for Ciddah, a peanut butter and jelly one for him, potato flakes, apple wedges, and cupcakes from BabyKakes. “One spice cake and one chocolate.”

Ciddah groaned but smiled. “Did you make these sandwiches?”

“I bought them at the G.I.N. store.”

They enjoyed their meal, and Mason was careful to keep the topics away from anything controversial. He asked her what it was like to be raised in the boarding school, but she had little to say on that subject. Did she suspect him of trying to gather information to free the children?

After lunch, they rowed back to the boat rental return, then got on the train headed west.

“You realize we live the other way?” Ciddah said. “Don’t tell me. It’s another surprise.”

“The day is not over yet.”

It was only one stop to the second location on Mason’s agenda. They got off the train and walked two blocks until they stood outside what looked like a huge warehouse.

“Virtual Floors?” Ciddah said. “Is it a home décor store?”

“It’s a museum,” Mason said, pleased that she’d never been there. He held the door open for her, then took hold of her hand again when he joined her inside a small room.

A man stood at a counter, and Mason paid the entry fees.

“Welcome to Virtual Floors,” the man said after they both tapped in their SimTags, “a journey into your imagination. Each chamber will transport you to a different place in time, from the heights of City Hall, to the depths of Calamity Cliffs. Stepping on and touching the floors is encouraged. You cannot ruin the art. Press your SimTag to each door and it will open only when the next chamber is empty, allowing you a private experience for each room. Your tour begins through those doors, but beware of the beasts that lurk in the waters. They aren’t often fed, and may find you quite appetizing.”

Ciddah’s eyes lit up, and she smiled at Mason.

“Let’s go in,” he said, pressing his fist to the pad beside the door to the first chamber. It opened right away. Ciddah took hold of his hand again and they walked through the door.

Inside, the room felt damp and smelled of hay and mildew. It looked like the outside of one of Jemma’s fairy tale castles. Walls of stone and ivy were in fact only painted to look that way. A three-dimensional image of a drawbridge was down and passed over a moat that was filled with crocodiles with teeth as long as Mason’s hand. The reptiles seemed to be snapping at their heels. It looked so realistic that Mason jumped.

“It’s wonderful!” Ciddah said.

Mason slid his shoe back and forth over the edge of the drawbridge and the crocodile’s teeth. It was completely flat. He bumped Ciddah’s side, knocking her onto the painted water. “Look out!”

She laughed and pulled him with her. Mason jumped onto a crocodile’s head and pretended he was trying to keep his balance. Ciddah pulled his hand again and stepped onto the blue water.

“You got eaten,” she said.

“Well, you’re drowning.” He motioned to her feet. “Omar would love this place.”

“Your brother?”

“The younger. Omar’s an artist. He paints and draws everything.”

“Do you miss him?”

The question gave him pause, and he realized that from Ciddah’s view, Omar had gone into hiding last month as a rebel. “I miss the way things were when we were younger. Levi’s relationship with Jemma turned everything into a competition with Omar. Ever since, things have been difficult.”

The second chamber was a forest. It smelled of pine and wildflowers. A raging, three-dimensional river rapids stretched diagonally across the floor. An inflated yellow raft had been painted just above a waterfall, and Mason and Ciddah sat cross-legged on the painting of the boat.

Ciddah giggled and lifted her hands. “We’re going to go over the edge!” She pretended to slip out of the boat, but Mason grabbed her waist, and she fell across his lap on her back.

“You saved my life,” she said, staring up at him.

“You’re welcome,” he said, making sure to count to five before looking away.

The next room was an aerial view of the buildings in the Highlands with the walls painted to match the surrounding view — even the ceiling was blue and filled with clouds. A soft breeze wafted through the room, and Mason could smell metal and tires and a hint of popcorn.

He stood on top of City Hall and looked toward the forest that once had been Glenrock. It was nothing but trees. The experience chilled him. “How do they make the smells?”

“I don’t know,” Ciddah said,” but I think it’s wonderful.”

Some of the other chambers they passed through were a cathedral, a cavern with a rope bridge, a room where the floor was crumbling underfoot, one where monsters were crawling up from a fiery lava pit and trying to grab their ankles, a nightclub, and a burning building. Each one seemed tangible and incorporated smells and appropriate temperatures, which Mason found absolutely brilliant.

By the time they finished the museum, it was 5:26 p.m.

“Are you hungry?” Mason asked, taking her hand as they left Virtual Floors.

“Yes.”

“Good.”

They took the train back to the heart of the Highlands. According to the grid, Below Zero was a restaurant bar made of ice. Mason had thought it would be a nice touch after Virtual Floors, but now he wondered if it would only be more of the same.

But when Ciddah saw the sign, she squealed. “I’ve always wanted to come here!”

“Why haven’t you?” Mason asked.

“They don’t allow minors, and once I started working, I never had time.”

They stepped inside the restaurant, and an instant chill clapped onto Mason’s arms. The place was small, no bigger than the front half of his apartment. The blue and white walls glowed brightly, coated in real ice and frost. A bar chiseled from ice stretched down one side of the room and maybe a dozen people on barstools sat there, draped in animal pelts. Mason quickly counted eight booths made of ice on the opposite wall.

A woman approached them. She wore a bright blue fur coat that made her look huge, though her face was slender. “Name?” she asked them.

“Mason Elias,” Mason said, glad he’d made a reservation.

The woman left and returned with two fur coats. Mason was given a black one, Ciddah a white one. The woman in blue also gave them
matching fur caps. They helped each other put them on, laughing at how silly it all seemed.

The hostess seated them in a small booth with a view of a man chiseling a statue from a block of ice in the middle of the room. Mason ran his finger over the table, then the bench. Both were made of real ice. Fascinating.

Mason ordered a zucchini grinder sandwich. Ciddah ordered a polar bear burger, which the waitress said was beef, not bear. When the food came, Mason’s sandwich was a long white bread roll, sliced horizontally and stuffed with chunks of baked zucchini, red and yellow peppers, marinara sauce, and melted white cheese. Ciddah’s was a stack of three chubby, square patties topped with a square bun. It reminded Mason of City Hall.

“How am I supposed to eat this?” Ciddah asked.

Mason fought back a laugh. “One bite at a time?”

They ate and watched the sculptor chisel away at the ice, which slowly took the shape of a woman riding a bird.

“That’s from a movie,” Ciddah said. “
Gogo Magie.
It’s the story of a girl who finds magic in everything she touches and uses it for all kinds of frivolous reasons, yet when a boy she loves is injured, and she tries to use the magic to heal him, she discovers that the magic had been flowing out of her all along, not in. And now she’s empty. She wasted her magic in pursuit of her own pleasure, and the boy suffered a premature liberation.”