Vanishing Rain (Blue Spectrum Chronicles Book 2) Page 8

  “I have a funny feeling that we’ll see you again someday,” Garment added, patting me on the back.

  I tilted my head up to his. “I hope so,” I sniffed. “I really hope so.

  Chapter 19

  Warning

  I slept fitfully that night, tossing and turning. I would wake up thinking of what I was about to do, of all the dangers ahead of me, my heart racing and sweat breaking out on my forehead. Could I really go through with this? It seemed impossible, what I was attempting.

  Then I would place my hand on my stomach, trying to feel the Peanut. I felt nothing in there, just the growing bulge in my lower abdomen. “You’d better appreciate all I’m doing to keep you alive,” I whispered to him before finally falling back asleep.

  I was awakened by a voice. Pan’s urgent whisper. “It’s time, Vanish.”

  I sat up abruptly, nerves on edge. Pan handed me one of the jumpsuits and the body shield. This one was blue with red trim. “Why this one?” I asked him.

  “Matches your tattoos.” He thought for a minute, resting his hand on his chin. “And…last I knew the Blues are the mildest band out there.”

  “Oh.” That made sense to me, so I didn’t argue.

  “Get dressed. I’ll be back in a few minutes.”

  I stretched my arms out and then went to the bathroom. I splashed water on my face, wondering when I would have that luxury again. I changed into the jumpsuit, being careful to put the body shield around my stomach. I met Pan back by my couch-bed.

  A backpack dangled from his strong hands, the one that we had used in training. His voice was even more serious than usual, and he spoke in a harsh whisper. “Okay, you have dehydrated food, nutrition bars, and some water in here. There will be water stations along the way until you get to the Asters. Fill up every chance you get. Water is the most important thing.”

  “Okay.” I nodded, taking in the information like I did at school, as if I was going to have a test on it.

  Pan reached into the backpack and pulled out a belt, one I had never seen before. It was thick and black. He placed it around my waist then slipped six sharp knives in little loops along the way. I was already beginning to feel so heavy I didn’t know how I would hold the pack on top of it all.

  “Vanish?”

  “Yeah.”

  I have one important question before I send you along, one I should have asked you before.

  “What’s that?” I asked, curious.

  He hesitated for a minute, his eyes boring through me. “Can you kill a human?”

  I thought for a while, not really sure of the answer. We were trained to be pacifists since the moment we entered Citizen School. Could I really kill a human? How would I know? Just then I felt a fluttering in my stomach. Was it the Peanut or was it just nerves?

  I placed my hands on my stomach, thinking of my mom. She had been a pathetic excuse for a mother, choosing her work over her children. I understood why a little better at that point. If I would have had four of my children taken away from me, I might not be exactly sane, either. Still, I was angry at her, not just for what she had done to me, but how she had neglected Snow for all of those years.

  This baby needed me. I was firm about one thing – I was going to be a mother to him no matter what, even if it killed me. Even if I had to kill someone.

  I narrowed my eyes at Pan. “Yes. I can kill a human,” I finally answered. “If I have to.” My response must have been firm enough to please Pan, because he simply nodded his head once.

  “Good. It’s go time.”

  He reached into the backpack and pulled out a golden robe, just like those that the Arbitrators wore. “Put this on over your jumpsuit,” he ordered. I grabbed the golden robe, but the cloth seemed to burn my fingers as I thought of my mother, how she wore a robe just like this one every day. Pictures of her entered my mind, of her sitting at the head of the table when I was called to Arbitration, her eyes like green worms slithering in angry circles. She sat erect in her golden robe and white wig, casting judgment on her own daughter with no remorse.

  “This is an Arbitrator’s robe,” I quipped, still trying to figure out what was going on. He pulled a white, cottony wig out of the pack next.

  “I know. You’re going to have to walk downtown, and you can’t be seen with those tattoos and jumpsuit. They’ll arrest you so fast you won’t know what happened.”

  “But nobody messes with an Arbitrator,” I answered, connecting the pieces of the puzzle in mind.

  “You got it.”

  I placed the wig on my head just as Garment and Blush sauntered in. Sergio was sitting on the other couch eating a huge plate of food. Garment adjusted the wig on my head and fluffed some wrinkles out of the robe.

  “Pretty authentic,” he gushed, a puff of air leaving his lips. “Now, butterfly, keep a stern expression on your face as long as you’re on the streets. Walk with authority.”

  “Got it.” I stopped and thought for a minute. “Hey, Garment?”

  He didn’t answer but just lifted his perfectly formed eyebrows.

  “Did you have to kill anyone? When you were in the Asters?”

  His smile faded and he paused for a moment. “Yes, butterfly, I did. More than one.” He paused a moment as if remembering something. Then his blue eyes were focused directly on mine, the sternest expression on his face that I had ever seen. “Never forget. If it comes down to either them or you…always choose you.” He reached out and patted my cheek tenderly. “Or you will die.

  Chapter 20

  Bad-bye

  Blush made my face up, applying make-up to make me look older. As usual, she performed magic. When I looked in the mirror, I appeared to be about thirty years old, which forced a sad giggle out of my throat. Everybody remarked about the change in my appearance, and I couldn’t help but agree.

  Then I ate the biggest breakfast of my life. Sausage and bacon. Pancakes. Hash browns. Garment and Blush kept trying to force more food in me, but I stopped them, afraid I would bust wide open.

  Next, Pan handed me a large lapcase. “Your pack is inside of the lapcase,” he told me with a stern voice. “When you get in the old subway tunnel, get rid of it and just use the pack.”

  It was difficult to answer, the people who had played such an important part of my life surrounding me with nothing more than love and concern. I struggled inwardly to know what I had done to deserve it, but I couldn’t come up with any clear answers. I replied after a moment. “Okay.” It was a stupid response, I knew, but I couldn’t seem to come up with anything else.

  I paused, then, looking forlornly at each of them. “I guess this is it, huh?” My voice was shaking, and I desperately pushed down the tears that were flushing upward from the depths of my insides.

  “No crying,” Garment warned. “It will smudge the make-up.” Smudge. He said smudge. I grinned, thinking of how I despised Orion when I first met him, how I called him Smudge.

  “Okay, no crying,” I agreed, tamping back a deep pool of tears. I hugged Garment first, and his long arms wrapped around me. I felt safe in his arms and never wanted to leave them. “Thank you,” I whispered to him. “Thank you for everything.”

  “Be safe, butterfly,” he blathered just as Pan reached out and grabbed me, pulling me into a bear hug. “Remember everything I taught you, Vanish.” His arms were short, sinewy stumps compared to Garment’s long ones.

  “I will. And thank you…for everything.” Pan pushed me away just as Blush gave me a quick hug. “You’re okay, kid. You’ll make it,” she gruffly told me. I thanked her as well, our eyes meeting maybe for the last time. She nodded, her plain brown hair bobbing lightly. Then I turned to Sergio. He was done eating and was plopped on his couch, food smeared on his face.

  “Bye Sergio,” I told him, a lump in my throat. I didn’t expect a reply, knowing that he was nonverbal. He flapped his arms for a minute, then grunted.

  “B…bbb…yyy…eee.” The word was difficult to make out but we all just st
ared at him, our mouths hanging open like giant O’s.

  “He spoke,” Blush stated in a shocked tone. Garment clapped his hands excitedly.

  “It’s a good omen, butterfly. Sergio said good-bye!”

  I smiled at them all. One of those sad smiles with happiness mixed in with it. “Hey, Garment?”

  “Yes, love?”

  “Once you think I’m there, that I’m safe. Will you tell Dove what happened?

  “Of course, butterfly…after a while. She’s been fretting about you something fierce.”

  “I figured,” I told him in a whisper that I wasn’t sure could be heard.

  There was an uncomfortable, painful pause, then. The five of us were all watching each other, our eyes darting back and forth, blues and brown, hazel, and deep black. Pan cleared his throat, ever the tough one. Blush rocked back and forth on her heels, and Sergio began flapping his arms wildly, an occasional grunt escaping his lips.

  It was time.

  Garment, sweet, lovable Garment was the one who propelled me forward, because if he hadn’t spoken, hadn’t pushed me gently on the back with those long fingers I had memorized time and again, I think I might have dug in my heels and never left.

  “Butterfly,” he tenderly spoke, repeating the words that I knew he was instilling in my brain. “It’s time to fly.”

  It was. I had to fly or I would fall. I knew that. I took the deepest breath of my life, turned around to them all and let the words fall out of my heart, hoping they would land on safe ground. “I love you all,” I choked out, continuing to make eye contact with all four of them, not even acknowledging that Sergio had never looked me directly in the eye before that moment.

  The odd little group was wordless in return, but they all nodded in agreement. Blush, of all people, had a tear trickling down her cheek, and she didn’t even bother to wipe it away. Garment, of course, had a stream of tears washing his makeup into a bleeding mixture of tans and reds. Pan held himself firm, but I noticed his lip quivering. And Sergio, bless his sweet heart, was bawling. “B…b…y…eeeee,” he stammered yet again.

  His word strangled me, and I reached out and gently stroked his head, expecting him to fly off the handle. But he didn’t, and we had one of those moments that can only be explained by the two people sharing it. He tilted his chin up and made direct eye contact with me, and I stared back into his dark eyes.

  “Sergio,” I smiled sadly at him. He didn’t answer, but I didn’t care. For some reason, I felt that Sergio had as much to do with saving me as any of the other three people there.

  I turned my head toward Blush, and the single tear she had previously shed had turned into a waterfall. The gruff expression she had honed to perfection softened, and my throat constricted, as if a boa had wrapped its snaky body around it. Gods, I didn’t know if I could take it…yet another family I was saying good-bye to.

  Then, as if they had been given a directive from Ruler 9 himself, they each held their hands up to their lips and blew me a kiss. Even Sergio. It was rough. It was crude. It was jagged and imperfect in every way. But Sergio blew me a kiss.

  I was dying. I thought for sure that this had to be even worse than leaving my family. I pursed my lips, then drew my hand up to my mouth, and blew a kiss right back at them all. Then, biting my lower lip, I turned away from them. From Garment. Blush. Pan and Sergio. From the people who had saved my life, my baby’s life. The people who had cared more about me than my own mother. My chest clenched into a tight ball of sadness as I stifled back tears, knowing that this was the time, if ever, that I needed to be strong.

  I sighed deeply, so badly wanting to turn back toward the group of people I had grown to love so much, but I didn’t. I couldn’t. I knew I had to move forward, if not for me, then for the tiny life that was growing inside of me.

  It was a gasp. It was a strangling breath. It was a good-bye. It was a bad-bye.

  I had to go, and there was no way I could look back.

  I squared my shoulders and put one foot in front of the other, the weight of my back pack not nearly as heavy as the weight of my heart.

  Chapter 21

  Free

  Tucking them all raggedly into my heart, I strutted in perfect Orion fashion toward the door of Garment’s gaudily decorated fashion studio, wondering if I was being picked up on the Administration’s prying cameras. In my mind, I pretended that I was a real Arbitrator. I only hoped that I had the courage to back it up. I thought of Scarlett. “You can do this. You can do this,” I told myself over and over in my mind, a mantra that was somehow keeping me sane.

  Mechanically, I pushed a button and the door whished open. I took the necessary steps to the chute, lapcase in hand, and in a few minutes I was out on the street, breathing the first outside air I had in months. Smog and all, it felt wonderful.

  I knew my destination. Had practiced it with Pan what seemed like a million times. I turned left onto Fifth Avenue. Then continued on for several blocks, people jostling me along the way. I held my white wigged head high, putting one foot in front of the other, my golden robe swishing in the smoggy breeze. I sucked in a deep breath, my heart beating on overdrive.

  The crowds of people started thinning down and I continued plodding along, as if I had a mission to perform. That wasn’t too hard to pretend. I had the biggest mission of my life ahead of me.

  Sighing, then drawing in the bitter sweet air, I focused on the last turn I would make. A right one.

  I walked purposely forward for quite some time after that, nothing but empty buildings and rubbish in my path. I had never been on the outskirts of Province A, and it was nothing like the slick skyscrapers and clean streets I was used to.

  I continued trudging along, wondering if I had made a wrong turn. I replayed the route in my mind again. No, I was sure it was the correct path, the one the Pan and I had practiced over and over again.

  A noise startled me, and I stopped, looking around for the odd chirping sound. I turned toward its source, wanting to set the lapcase down, but knowing that I shouldn’t. It was beginning to get heavy, but Pan had warned me to not let go of it until I reached the inside of the old subway tunnel.

  My jaw literally dropped as I gawked at what was before me. It was a real tree, not the genetically manufactured ones that were planted in rows around our buildings, but an honest to God, real tree. I had never seen one before, had only read about them in one of my science classes.

  I marveled at it, sticking in my tracks as if I had seen a golden statue covered in jewels.

  A real tree.

  I tipped my head back, studying it. True, it was a sad, pathetic looking thing, with drooping yellowish-green leaves scattered about like loose popcorn, but it was a tree nonetheless.

  I heard the noise again. Tweet. Tweet. I narrowed my eyes and there, perched on one of the sad limbs of the tree was a bird. A colorful bird, so blue that it made Orion’s eyes seem dim. I had never seen anything like it in Province A. Sure, we had a few rogue birds here and there, but they were always dull, grey sparrows. A few stray pigeons that had managed to survive despite the smoggy air, unfavorable conditions.

  But this bird…it was magnificent. Its eyes were deep black, and it seemed to be taking me in, sizing me up. I couldn’t help but smile.

  It cocked its blue head at me, and I immediately thought of Dove and the bird crest that represented her family. I felt a sharp pang in my heart, missing Dove more than anything or anyone at that moment.

  Dove. I had never seen a real dove. Or an eagle for that matter, but there before me was a real tree hosting the bluest bird I had ever seen. It must mean something, I thought. I tipped my head back further and laughed out loud at the bird, wonder and happiness coursing through my veins.

  Just then a cascade of happy sounds twisted my attention away from the bird.

  I gripped the lapcase and quickly turned from the tree. Two young boys, dressed in the dirtiest, ragged clothes I had ever seen were running after each other, laughing
blissfully, even though they looked as if they hadn’t eaten a meal in days. I had never heard children laugh quite like that. I wondered what was so different, why that laughter was so fascinating. I had heard Snow laugh plenty, but never like this. Then it hit me.

  They were free. They didn’t have to line up in rows, take turns to speak, get the “charge” or mini-detentions for not following the endless mandates of Province A.

  They were free.

  Free. The word bounced crazily in my skull, luring me like a sweet chocolate I knew I couldn’t taste.

  I tipped my head to the side studying them. Neither of the boys had a tracker-timer implanted on their bare arms. Their dark, dirty hair was shaggy, and I assumed they were a couple of years younger than Snow and Ice, maybe five or six. There was one thing I noticed right away. Neither of them had S.L.A.G.

  Did someone else do what I had done? Run away to save their babies? Escape to the far edges of Province A in order to keep their babies from being killed by the Administration? I grunted inwardly. I had been so caught up in my own problem that I assumed I was the only one who was foolish or crazy enough to try to save a baby from the Administration. Obviously, I was wrong.

  I turned around, making a perfect circle, the blue bird continuing to chirp at me, as if we were fast friends. Where could the boys live, I wondered. Where were their parents?

  The boys stopped short when they spotted me, looks of complete horror filling their faces. At once, they spun around, as if I were an apparition, a ghost. The devil himself. They sped off on spindly legs, one daring to glance back over his shoulder at me.

  In an instant they were both gone, disappearing in a whirlwind of dust. There one minute, gone the next.

  I smiled at the memory of them, taking a last glance at my first real tree, the beautiful blue bird. I instinctively placed my hand on my stomach, even though I had a body shield covering it, and for the first time, I was grateful for the baby.