Outcasts (3 page)

He thought back to his trial before the Safe Lands Guild, and their accusations. Though they hadn’t been able to prove he’d been involved in the harem escape, Lawten Renzor, the task director general of the Safe Lands, had warned him they were watching him.

So as Mason made his way down Belleview Drive, he scanned the street and sidewalks for suspicious persons. This was his first time in the Midlands, and its dullness surprised him. The structures and fake vegetation were the same strange colors — he passed a building of turquoise bricks with pale pink shrubs out front — but the place lacked the cleanliness and polished luxuriousness of the Highlands.

There were plenty of Wyndo screens flashing the latest mimic styles and product expositions to the public, but they were caked with dust and grime and the occasional cobweb. The streets were cracked and dirty. The buildings were flaking and had patches of paint that covered graffiti. Some had graffiti still, doubtlessly put there by rebels. Mason passed by some that said, “The Black Army wants you” and “Enforcers are evil.”

And it wasn’t only the scenery that was more rundown than the Highlands: Even the Midlands people didn’t seem as extravagant. Sure, silver was everywhere as people mimicked Finley Gray and
Luella Flynn, but there was less Roller Paint here. And he couldn’t be certain, but it seemed like less cosmetic surgery as well.

A plane flew overhead and Mason stopped to watch it. All his life he’d seen them and wondered. Now he knew the Safe Lands sent planes to Wyoming to trade and to other places to scavenge. Since there were people here in Colorado and in Wyoming as well, there were likely other civilizations in the world too. Perhaps the Safe Lands Guild knew of more.

Mason took a deep breath and continued on, recalling Levi’s directions to the rebel meeting place. His older brother had never been great with details, but so far Mason had encountered no obstacles or confusion. He walked past the Get It Now store, past the charge station, and stopped in front of the Sim Slingers SimArt shop where Omar officially tasked, though his little brother also did various jobs for Bender that the Safe Lands Registration Department didn’t know about. Besides Mason, Mia, and Jennifer, Omar was the only other outsider who was still officially registered as a Safe Lands national.

A steady beat throbbed from within the shop. The windows were Wyndo viewing glass, and Mason found himself watching the image of a technician altering SimArt on a computer while a SimArt flower on her client’s shoulder changed colors. Such technology seemed similar to painting. No wonder Omar liked it.

Sim Slingers stood beside the Cinetopia Theater on Whetstone Road, separated by an alley. That was where Mason needed to go. He slipped down the alley, then poured on the speed, hoping to reach the corridor before anyone passed by on the street behind. He scanned the alley for the break in the wall that supposedly led to the back of theater nine, which was where Bender’s rebels met.

Mason looked over his shoulder more often than he should, which caused him to almost miss the narrow opening in the cement wall of the theater. He darted into the corridor. Ahead, two men stood beside a door, looking like pillars.

Mason walked up to them and stopped, unsure what to say.

“Name?” Pillar One asked.

“Eagle,” Mason said, which was short for his radio call sign, Eagle Eyes, and the code name Levi had told him to use for meetings.

Pillar Two pulled out a SimScanner and ran it over Mason’s body, the dull buzz seeming to prolong the awkwardness of the moment. “He’s clean.”

Pillar One stepped aside. “Go on in.”

“Thanks.” Mason entered the building and passed down a dark hallway that let out in the left front corner of a small movie theater. The low rumble of Bender’s voice signaled that the meeting had already begun.

The theater held maybe a hundred seats, all covered in thick red fabric. According to Levi, Jakk, the man who operated the theater, was one of Bender’s rebels. Years ago, he’d built a wall over the interior entrance to theater nine to offer a secure meeting location for Safe Lands rebels. The only entrances now were through the back alley or a chute in the floor that led to an underground storm drain. The rest of the theater was open for business and showed the latest Safe Lands feature films to the public.

There were maybe two dozen people scattered in the seats in the front three rows of the theater, all eyes on the rebel called Bender, who stood in front of the darkened movie screen.

Bender looked to be in his fifties — too old to exist legally in the Safe Lands. His forehead was a mass of soft wrinkles, and a short gray beard covered his cheeks and chin. A scar had melted the skin over his left eye so that he always appeared to be squinting. He wore all black. Fitting for a man of the shadows.

Mason spotted Levi in the second row and made his way toward him as Bender continued his speech. Levi still had a small scab on the bridge of his nose, which was now slightly crooked since he’d never gotten it fixed after Omar had broken it.

“… learned a valuable lesson in all this. Liberations are a sham. They’re not filmed live. We should’ve known, really. It’s always been obvious that they edited things out. Just never suspected … I take full responsibility for failing Lonn.”

Mason slid past the knees of those sitting in the second row: Shaylinn, Jordan, Levi. Jemma, Levi’s wife, scooted down, leaving the seat between her and Levi open for Mason.

He sat down, thankful to have finally arrived. “Thanks, Jemma.”

“You’re late,” Levi whispered.

“Sorry. My rebel skills are not as proficient as yours, brother.” He truly didn’t want to be here. The news he was carrying would only depress everyone further.

Zane sat in the row ahead of Mason. The rebel teen had been shot in the leg trying to help them free the women from the harem and still walked with a limp. He had short, spiky brown hair, was missing one ear, and had three spirals of gold metal looped through one nostril. He raised his hand and leaned back in his seat, which cracked under his weight. “You think Lonn is dead, then?” he asked Bender. “You think that’s what liberation truly is?”

“Don’t know what to think,” Bender said. “I don’t feel like he’s dead. Either way, his liberation has people scared, and rightly so. We’ve lost eleven that I know of in the past year. We need to assure our followers that the Black Army is strong. That we have purpose and safety. And we need more members.”

“Maybe you should stop using the messenger offices.” Omar’s soft voice came from the back of the room.

Mason looked over his shoulder and saw that his little brother was sitting alone in the very top row of the theater. The light on the end of the personal vaporizer he was holding to his lips glowed blue, which meant he was inhaling.

“Someone knew Chord was up to something,” Omar said, his voice hoarse from the vapor.

“You were on watch, Omar,” Bender said. “Why didn’t you see anything?”

Omar didn’t answer. He simply blew out a plume of black vapor.

Mason winced at his little brother’s attitude. He understood it, but Omar was in a dangerous place right now, and picking fights with the head of the rebels was ignorant.

“We can’t stop using the messenger office,” Bender said. “It’s vital to communication between rebels and potential recruits. Levi, since Chord was killed when one of yours was on watch, you provide a replacement.”

“I don’t think so,” Levi said, and his tone made Mason flinch. “It’s one thing to ask us to man your lookout posts, but it’s another to ask us to make your deliveries. We don’t want to get involved in your little war.”

“I’m not asking,” Bender said. “Find me a replacement for Chord, and I want your people helping us scout for new members.”

Levi made to stand, but his best friend, Jordan, held him back. “Why should we help the Black Army?” Jordan asked. “We just want to get to our kids and get out of this dung pile.”

“Levi and I made a deal.” Bender scowled, which made his scarred eye close as if he were winking angrily. “I let you and your people stay in my bunker and keep you fed. In exchange, you do what I say. Once you’re gone, you’re gone. Until then, you work for me.”

“You want my pregnant wife to walk up to people and say, ‘Hey, you want to help take over the government?’ “ Jordan asked. “Are you nuts?”

“None of you will recruit,” Bender said. “Just be on the lookout. I want the names of people who’ve been Xed, complainers, people who’ve lost a lifer. Ask questions. Listen. You get the feeling someone might join, tell me and we’ll make contact. But be careful. Some of these people might be spies. Otley’s not a shell. He didn’t like that you outsiders got your women out of the harem and made him look incompetent.”

“I’d like to volunteer,” Shaylinn said. “To work in Chord’s position.”

“Um, no she wouldn’t,” Jordan said, glaring at his baby sister.

“
Yes
, I would,” Shaylinn said. “I’m tired of staying indoors.”

Jemma leaned past Mason’s knees to look down to where Shaylinn sat at the end of the row. “It’s not safe, Shay. Your face is plastered all over the Safe Lands.”

“Then we can dye my hair or something.” Shaylinn was tall for
fourteen, but it would be foolish for her to go outdoors with Safe Lands enforcers looking for her, since they’d made her pregnant in the Surrogacy Center just before the women had escaped the harem.

“We could certainly create a convincing disguise,” Bender said. “Did you make a connection to Kendall Collin when you were in the harem, Miss Shaylinn?”

“Yes.” Shaylinn leaned forward on her chair and bounced, as if Bender’s attention were a special gift. “She was my mentor.”

“Stop talking, Shay,” Jordan said.

“She’ll be perfect, then,” Bender said. “I’ll have Red come by this evening to work on a dis — ”

“No.” Jordan stood up and strangled the back of the chair in front of his. “She’s not doing this.”

Levi stood as well. “Omar will take Chord’s place.”

“But
Levi.
” Shaylinn leaned past Jordan and fixed her gaze on Levi, big brown eyes blinking, lips turned in a frown. “I want to help. Please?”

“Omar already knows the messenger office, Shay, so he’s the logical choice.”

How very diplomatic of Levi to make it sound like Omar was merely the best candidate for the job when Mason knew his brother would never send a fourteen-year-old girl to be a spy. Omar was only sixteen, but Levi didn’t have a lot of options.

“I’m just a part-time rover,” Omar whined from the back. “I can’t guarantee I’ll get the right shifts.”

“The shifts don’t matter,” Bender said. “New messages will show up in your sorter.”

“Then that’s settled,” Levi said, sitting back down.

“Good.” Jordan fell back to his seat as well.

Shaylinn slouched, scowling at her lap. She might not look pregnant, but that didn’t change the fact that there was a child growing inside her. Perhaps once she began to show she would stop volunteering for risky positions.

“That’s all I have for today,” Bender said. “Levi, feel free to use the
theater as long as you need to.” Bender turned and walked toward the exit.

Over half the people stood to leave. Levi climbed over the front row seats and chased Bender. He caught up with him just before the exit. Jordan got up and squeezed past Shaylinn, then met Levi down front.

With the movement of so many people leaving, Mason couldn’t hear what Levi and Bender were talking about. Shaylinn got up from her seat at the end of the row and scooted down until she sat beside Mason.

Jemma, still sitting on Mason’s left, leaned over his lap. “Shay, why do you insist on antagonizing him?”

“I just want to do something important,” Shaylinn said. “Soon I’ll have a kid and my adventuring days will be over.”

“I’m no expert on the subject,” Mason said, “but my mother always claimed that raising her boys was her greatest adventure.”

“Well said, Mason.” Jemma patted his arm. “See, Shay? Adventure is coming! Oh, Levi is waving me over. Excuse me.”

Mason twisted his knees to the side to let Jemma pass. Once she was down the stairs, Shaylinn lowered her voice to a whisper. “Were you able to find an answer to my question?” She winced, like she wasn’t quite sure she wanted to know.

Mason could relate. “I’m sorry, Shay. I’ve been distracted lately with the trial.” And there was the fact that Mason wasn’t eager to learn the answer. This mystery donor from Wyoming, who was supposedly the genetic father of the baby Shaylinn was carrying, troubled him. But the alternative was to hope she was carrying Omar’s child, which was an equally disturbing idea. “I should be able to find out this week.” A promise he would have to keep this time.

“Thank you,” Shaylinn said. “I mostly just want to make sure I wasn’t infected during the procedure. I heard Levi and Jem talking, and, well … Levi thinks I am.”

Mason’s older brother was paranoid. “The goal of the Surrogacy Center is to produce healthy children, Shay, don’t forget.”

“But Kendall got infected.”

“Yes, but my understanding is that Kendall’s donor was infected.”

Shaylinn wrinkled her nose. “And you think mine wasn’t?”

Oh, he hoped not. “That’s my theory.”

She smiled the same smile her siblings, Jemma and Jordan, had. One that bared full lips and perfect teeth. “Is it frightening living up there all alone?”

“The trial was a difficult time,” Mason said. “But since they acquitted me, I’ve been treated like any other Safe Lands national. And when I’m working, I’m too busy to worry.” Worrying wasn’t logical, anyway.

“If you’ll all quiet down, we need to discuss some things,” Levi said, facing those who remained: the remnant from Glenrock and Levi’s Safe Lander friend Zane. Levi stood in front of the movie screen, in the same place Bender had spoken from. Jemma and Jordan now sat in the front row. “First, I want to hear from Mason.”

Wonderful. May as well get the worst over with. Mason scooted to the edge of his seat. “I’ll start with some news from the harem. Jennifer and Mia are both pregnant.”

The other women gasped and murmured around him. He wondered how their reactions might differ if they knew Mia had gotten pregnant on her own just days before she was scheduled for her ETP procedure. It was a fact he’d decided to keep to himself. But that now made two people from Glenrock who had contracted the thin plague. Omar and Mia.