The Earth Dwellers

“They let you in and wouldn’t let you out.” I’m still shocked that she’s standing in front of me. “But you’re here.”

“Borg was so welcoming,” she says, and I cringe at the way she says his name, like it’s so familiar, that of an old friend…or more. “He helped me get on my feet, showed me around, ate meals with me…” She sits on the bed, but I remain standing.

There are more shouts outside and I glance at the window. “They won’t look for you here,” she says. “At least not right away. Here I might as well be dead, and sometimes I wish it.”

“Don’t say that,” I say, for Tristan’s sake, although I’m still mildly disturbed by the gentle way she had recounted her memories of Lecter.

She shrugs, as if talk of suicide is a part of her daily life. “I started asking questions when what I was seeing around the city didn’t look right. The people, despite being the first in hundreds of years to live on the earth’s surface, were unhappy. They depended on Borg for everything. He was in complete control.” Her tone changes. Gone is the lightness. “I demanded to know the truth, and you know what? He told me. Every last detail. How he wanted to control everything, to create more cities like this one, to destroy the savages from off the face of the earth. I tried to run, to get away, to go back down to find my children, but his guards grabbed me and brought me here. I’ve been living here ever since.”

“You’re a prisoner,” I say.

“Just like everyone else in this twisted city,” she says, pursing her lips, which are now wet with tears. “Borg’s a monster, and I fell for his charms just like I did for Edward’s. I’m a fool.”

Although I’m still confused and in a semi-state of shock, I can’t watch Tristan’s mother—who is very much alive—crying like that. The woman who brought me and her son together. The woman who loved her son enough to give him a chance at a different life. The one who gave Tristan his only truly happy childhood memories.

I sit down on the bed, wrap a tentative arm around her, and hold her as she silently weeps.

Suddenly her body stiffens and her head jerks to look at me. “You can stay here for a while, but not forever,” she says. “They’re looking for you; eventually they’ll find you.”

I stare at her. “Of course they’re looking for me. I just killed three presidential guards. But they don’t know who I am.”

“They do,” she says. She reaches over and snatches a controller off a table. It looks like the one in the room I’m staying in. She presses a button and one of the walls brightens. A vid screen.

“What are you doing?” I ask. Strange time to be watching the news.

I gasp when the image appears. Because it’s…it’s…

It’s me.

~~~

Crap, crap, crap. This is not good. Beneath the photo that was taken at the Get Chipped! offices, is my false name, Tawni Sanders, and the words “Armed and Dangerous.” At least they got that part right.

But how?

The image changes to a news report. A woman wearing a black dress and bright red lipstick speaks:

“The two soldiers who had been missing for days have been found. They were tied up in an electrical room in the army medical building. Suffering from severe dehydration and malnourishment, they’re being treated as we speak. However, they have confirmed that the girl you saw on screen a moment earlier is their attacker. The army has not yet speculated on the reasons for her actions, except to say, ‘She’s a seriously disturbed girl.’ President Lecter himself has urged all citizens to assist in the identification and capture of the girl calling herself Tawni Sanders, and a reward will be considered for information leading to her arrest. According to sources close to the investigation, Miss Sanders’ chip was found moments ago in the room that was registered in her name. Somehow she’d managed to extract it and leave the building, suggesting assistance from another citizen.”

The woman glances to the left, cups a hand to her ear. “What’s that?” she says to someone off-camera. “Okay, okay.” She turns back to face the screen. “This just in. We’ve just received reports of a dead night watchman. There are also rumors of three dead guards at the presidential quarters. Although no official statement has been issued, there are suspicions that the murders are linked to Tawni Sanders. More as this story evolves.”

The image flashes back to my photo. Crap.

“The story has been looping for a while now,” Jocelyn says, pressing a button that turns the volume off but leaves the video on. “Each time there’s more information.”

“Crap,” I say aloud.

“What are you doing here?” Jocelyn asks.

Does she mean on the surface of the earth, in the New City, or in her room? I’ve got to tell her everything that’s happened, but she’s not off the hook yet.

“Look, I’ll tell you what you need to know, but first I need some answers.”

Jocelyn looks shocked. Since I crawled through her window I’ve snapped at her, held her while she cried, and now I’ve come full circle.

“You’re so much like your mother,” she says. Not what I expected her to say. “What happened to her?”

“She’s fine,” I say. “She’s a general in the Lower Realms army. When my father died, she led the Resistance.” I feel a swell of pride for the woman who raised me.

“That doesn’t surprise me,” Jocelyn says, and I feel a smile tug at the corners of my lips. “She was always a strong woman.”

“So are you,” I find myself saying. “You defied your husband, took a chance, did something crazy and unpredictable—we thought you were dead. Nailin told us you were dead.”

She shakes her head. “I learned very early on in my relationship with Edward that you could never trust any words that passed from his throat through his lips. Even his body language was a lie most of the time.”

“Tristan has to know; we’ve got to get you out…”

“Impossible. There’s no leaving once you’re here,” Jocelyn says.

I feel something under my foot, on the floor. The pillow. The blanket. “Why are you sleeping on the floor?” I ask. The bed feels very comfortable, much better than the tiny beds in Lin and Avery’s building.

She looks away. “I’m a prisoner,” she says, which doesn’t answer my question at all, and makes even less sense.

“You’re a prisoner who can open your window? What’s to stop you from climbing down and escaping?” I’m missing something. Something big. What is she not telling me?

“I—I’ve been slowly getting my privileges back,” she says. I can barely see the tear that slips down her cheek. “Borg, he—when I found out the truth, and I slapped him, and I ran…he stuck me in a cell barely big enough to squeeze into, didn’t feed me for a week. Gave me a squeeze of water from a sponge each day, dribbled it personally into my burning mouth. He—he thought he broke me.”

My God. “But he didn’t?” I ask, hoping I’m right. Tristan’s mother seems weak, damaged, but not broken. Not yet anyway.

When she looks back at me, there’s a fire in her eyes I haven’t seen yet. Even with hot tears ru

Not broken at all. Chipped a little, maybe, but not broken. She still hasn’t answered my question. I motion to the floor.

She raises a fisted hand to her mouth, bites lightly on her knuckle, closes her eyes. “He makes me do things on this bed,” she says. “The nightmares never end when I try to sleep on it.”

I’m on my feet in an instant, my entire body tight and full of anger. I want to punch something—no, someone. Lecter. Borg, as this abused woman calls him. I stalk back and forth, staying out of view of the window. Why does she let him do this? If it was me, and he tried to so much as touch me, I’d freaking—