I have a surprise reassignment from Dennel’s office to Laundry the following morning. My thoughts turn to the sergeant as the hours drag on, but my brain produces more reasonable explanations for his absence than it had when Kaleb’s disappearance sent me to the giant room a couple months ago. Residential Affairs Conference? I’m more annoyed by the transfer than concerned. Even more so by whatever our lunch is supposed to be.
“It’s fishy mush day again,” Vi says as I drop my lunch tray on the table.
“Your favorite.”
“I’d rather break my head again than eat this shit. At least I’d get to hang with Kaleb some more.”
“I don’t know, Vi. That’s two friends you’ve made,” I say, and she grunts.
“Don’t make me regret it.”
Even that brief amusement can’t last more than a second before our attention solidifies on the approach of a guard.
“Ms. Sorenson?” she asks.
“Yes, ma’am?”
“Come with me, please.”
I force a smile to Vi and swing my legs over the bench.
“What’s going on?” she asks.
“It’s fine, Vi. I’ll fill you in later.”
Main Event Andie has the attention of everyone in the cafeteria, but I refuse to show fear—except to the rain-stained window of a waiting vehicle. I stare at my distorted reflection as we jerk into motion. The questions slam against my lips, but stall in silent torment. As usual there are no answers in this jeep and my heart pounds when it’s clear we’re headed back to the administration building.
We slide to a stop, and I wait for my door to open. After climbing down, I follow the soldier up the steps and through security. This path is becoming familiar, and I call bullshit on the axiom that routine breeds comfort. I try to steady my breathing as we move down the hall toward Staff Sergeant Henry’s office. Any satisfaction with my correct assumptions is canceled by the presence of a woman I don’t recognize.
“Thank you, Private Ballard.”
The soldier salutes and leaves me with Henry and the decorated stranger. I close the door and take my usual seat.
“Andie, I’d like you to meet Captain Wilhelmina Emery.”
I’ve been waiting a long time to meet this woman, but my greeting never came out as a squeak when I imagined it.
“Ms. Sorenson, we greatly appreciate all your help with this complicated situation involving Lance Corporal Novelli,” Captain Emery says. “Staff Sergeant Henry has done an excellent job keeping me informed of your sacrifices.”
She comes around the desk and takes the chair beside me. Her eyes are dark, heavy, and I know I’m about to have my heart ripped from my chest.
“What is it? What’s wrong?”
She leans forward. “I understand these last couple of weeks have been difficult. I know how much you care for Lance Corporal Novelli. Staff Sergeant Henry has sung your praises about your patience and commitment throughout this painful process. It’s why I asked him to invite you here today. You deserve to be informed of the latest developments, and maybe you can help.”
She seems to have no problems breathing. My body is encased in cement.
“We gave orders that Kaleb Novelli was to be released today. He was supposed to report to the administration wing to work on a special assignment under Staff Sergeant Henry. When the guards went to carry out our orders, they found his cell empty.” Her eyes change. “There were signs of a struggle. We believe he’s been abducted.”
I shake my head. “No. That doesn’t make sense.” Because it doesn’t. Blood thuds through my skull, smashing the walls at a dizzying rate.
“Andie, this is a lot to handle, I know, but I need you to listen to me. Time is working against us. We need information, anything, you have that might help us find him.”
My head is still shaking, or nodding. Attached to my neck? Who even knows anymore? “Me? I’m your best hope right now?” I’m so tired of bad news, of people expecting nothing and everything at the same time. I can’t be the only hope when I’m no help at all. “Don’t you have cameras? Everyone has cameras! You have to know where he is. How could someone break him out of prison? It doesn’t make sense!”
“It does if it’s the person responsible for the leak,” Henry interrupts, and I almost choke.
“We weren’t surprised to find the surveillance footage unhelpful. Whoever did this knew how to avoid detection. We can see Novelli being taken, but we can’t identify the assailants,” Henry explains.
“Sergeant Dennel is missing as well,” Emery adds. “He didn’t report for duty this morning, and a search of the compound has turned up no traces of him. Even his wife is gone. We have reason to believe that he’s involved in Novelli’s abduction.”
No.
I shake my head. Just. No.
“I’m sorry, Andie.”
More lies. More delayed truths. More nothings I have to add to my growing stack of nothing. Dennel is the traitor? Kaleb’s friend, my ally? The man seemed to love him like a son. This isn’t just a grenade exploding in my stomach. They’re atomic bombs. Total annihilation scattering my consciousness in a hundred other places.
“Sergeant Dennel?” I repeat the name as if it will make more sense out loud. It doesn’t.
They nod, and I close my eyes because it’s worse than that. If he’s a traitor, so am I.
“I told him,” I whisper.
“What?”
“I thought he was trying to help me with Kaleb since his arrest. I thought they were friends. He said he owed Kaleb his life. We’ve been sharing information.”
Or so I’d thought.
How much of what Dennel had said was a lie? Had he been manipulating me since the beginning? Or maybe the liars are in this office. Traitors can wear medals too. So many questions. No hope of answers. Boom, fucking, boom!
“Dennel was there when Kaleb was first taken, wasn’t he?” I say.
“Supposedly,” Captain Emery confirms. “This development has led us to believe that maybe the initial kidnapping wasn’t an accident like we assumed.”
The thought settles around me, poisoning me with a truth that changes everything. Again. And again. And…
“What did you tell Dennel?” Henry asks. “We only gave the order to release him last night. That’s not enough time to pull together an abduction of this scale.”
“He had plenty of warning,” I say. “I told Dennel immediately after our conversation that you were thinking about releasing him.”
All my strength melts away.
Henry lets out an angry breath. “Well, it’s done. You’re a civilian, a refugee for heaven’s sake. You shouldn’t even be involved in this, so we need to figure it out and move on.”
I appreciate his attempt, but telling me I’m a naïve, untrained civilian girl who got her boyfriend killed doesn’t make him any less dead.
“When was this conversation with Sergeant Dennel?” Emery asks me.
I close my eyes. Facts.
It was right after the lounge visit, which was last Monday. No, wait, the day after that.
“Last Tuesday morning. What can I do?” My back no longer touches the chair, my muscles taut and ready for battle.
Emery sighs. “I can only imagine how you feel right now, but this is a situation we have to navigate very carefully. I’m sorry for being so blunt, but part of this problem is because we’ve involved you in something we shouldn’t have. For your sake and for ours, it’s best that you let us do our job and return to life in 9B.”
It sounds even more absurd out loud. “Return to laundry knowing Kaleb is out there, likely being held by the same people who ripped him apart?”
“I get your concern, but you can rest assured that we share the same understanding of the gravity of this situation. Right now our top priority is finding Lance Corporal Novelli.”
“For his sake or for yours?” I knew the fury would come out sooner or later. “Talk about a security risk. It was one thing when he didn’t know anything. Now what?”
She clearly doesn’t like my tone or my implications. Accusations? Definitely.
“I can assure you that while it certainly concerns us to know that an asset like Novelli is in the hands of our enemies, we also care deeply about his well-being. In that, our interests are aligned.”
The officers exchange a look, and I bite my tongue to keep from ending up in prison as well.
“We discussed another option before we invited you here. The truth is, we do understand what you’re going through and have sympathy for your concern for Kaleb. And yes, after everything that’s happened, we are also hesitant to put you back in 9B where further breaches are possible.
“So here’s our proposal. If you’re willing to give up contact with all other civilians, it would benefit us to put you in protective custody where we can do our best to maintain control of this situation.
“In exchange, we will keep you informed of Kaleb’s case and allow you to help us whenever possible. We will share information about any rescue operations, in addition to anything else we uncover related to his status and condition. Protective custody would also allow us to better keep you safe in case there proves to be a threat to you as well.”
“You’re giving me a choice?”
She sighs. “There’s been enough pain, so yes, we will not make any demands. It does us no good to have you in either position against your will. We need your full cooperation above everything, so it’s your choice.”
Her expression hardens. “You should know, however, that if you choose to go back to 9B, we will be forced to close all doors to Lance Corporal Novelli. You will hear nothing about him from this moment forward. We’d be exposing ourselves to enough risk by returning you to the general population with what you already know. We won’t risk anything more.”
And there it is. An offer I could debate for days while they stare at me like they need my answer before leaving this chair.
“Can I think about it?”
“You may, but we will need your answer while you’re here. You will either be going to a dorm room upstairs in the administrative building or returning to 9B to continue your life in silence.”
“What about my friends? My roommates? My mother? Won’t they worry if I just disappear?”
“We’ll tell them you’ve been transferred to a different compound,” Emery responds, and it’s chilling to see your life as an X on their strategy boards.
“We’ll give you one hour to think about it,” Henry says. “It’s our hope that you will choose to help us.” He pauses, giving my nerves enough time to flare again. “And to that end, you should see this before you make your choice.”
I brace against metal armrests as he turns his screen to reveal a grainy corridor. Silent screams rise in my throat, but I suck them back to my lungs, watching instead as two large, fully covered figures shove a third down a stairwell toward an exit door. The captive struggles against them, a hood over his head, hands anchored behind his back. He breaks away and launches a solid shove toward his attackers, but they subdue him with hard blows to his chest and abdomen. The prisoner writhes on the floor, and they grip his arms again, this time dragging him the rest of the way to the exit. The screen goes dark.
My stomach collapses. This is it. My last image of Kaleb. This is the scene that gets seared into my consciousness to carry with me into our stolen future.
“There was no footage from the main cellblock, but they must have forgotten about the cameras in the stairwells. This is all we have,” Henry explains.
I meet his eyes, my expression firm despite the mist of tears. I don’t know why they said I have a choice.
“I don’t need an hour. I’m in.”
My mint leaf.
I miss Vi, but it’s my mint leaf that tenses my body in sudden panic. Maybe they’d retrieve it for me. Maybe I could get a message to Vi and—what? I curl on my bed, clenching my fist around a phantom relic. It’s gone. Just like Kaleb. Just like my mom. Just like Vi. A swell of nausea fills my stomach at the thought of my brittle hope lying splintered and discarded in the bottom of a waste bin as they clear my bed for the next resident.
A vent wheezes from somewhere in the bare room. It’s not hard to find among the stark, mottled walls. Upper far corner. Same location they like to mount cameras. Is there one in here now?
The ancient cot groans as I turn toward the wall. This room smells different than my apartment in 9B. Older, less convincing in its conversion to a living space. Awkward angles jut out from floor to ceiling, and I wonder what this space was designed to be. Storage maybe?
Whatever it was reminds me of home. Our one bedroom apartment became two when we transformed a small sitting area into my retreat. That was a great day. The celebration of my registration, my promotion from girl to woman. The rebels probably occupy it now. That small mattress crushed beneath the weight of an intruding soldier. My chest tightens, and I force my thoughts back to the present.
Vi will return from her dinner tonight to find our room empty. They’ll need a good story to satisfy my skeptical friend. I hope she’ll believe it for her sake, and Kaleb’s stance becomes real. He hoped his end would bring me a new beginning as well. My stomach clenches at what it must have done to him to force away the only person who saw him. To imagine me transferring my love to another man because he wasn’t allowed to accept it.
Facts.
I blink up at the ceiling. Facts.
These compounds are a strange setup: military bases combined with refugee centers. Strange before the war, that is. Neither side had the chance for an organized response when the fighting broke out a decade ago, so makeshift attempts at survival have resulted in all kinds of strange. Strangest of all how neighbors became enemies overnight. How the rebellion that started in Region 10 has spread into a full-fledged Resistance capable of matching government forces.
Fact: the current enemy appears to be Sergeant Max Dennel. Well, Max Dennel now. I doubt he still has his rank.
Then, it all comes together in a maddening blur.
Dennel was there when Kaleb was taken the first time. By all accounts Kaleb had sacrificed himself for his friend, but what if that was the plan all along? What if while Kaleb was being a noble friend, Dennel had orchestrated the worst kind of betrayal? The thought makes me sick. I start to develop other theories.
Theories like, it was a terrible accident. Dennel was the leak but never intended for his friend to pay the price. He thought he could play both sides. After all, it was working okay until I gave him the heads-up about the coming witch hunt, and he no longer had a choice. Game over.
And here we are.
I pull the blanket tight around my shoulders. Kaleb has only one ally he can trust. Me. And I will give my life to prove it.
I choose Kaleb Novelli.