Not Your Backup, page 23
Instead of doing Deirdre’s filing, Emma put on a disguise and headed right to the New Bright City Library, where she dove into research about Patricia Southard. She found archives about the crew of the Intrepid that said Southard was born in Havenstown in pre-Collective Canada. The North, now. With the map she and Bells found on their trip, Emma pinpointed exactly where it is. It should only take her a few days to get there. She also found a number of unexplained incidents through the years that sound exactly like Southard’s powers. Three years ago, a man fell through an icy lake, but a column of earth rose up under him, carrying him to safety. Another family was rescued on the road when a mudslide mysteriously moved itself out of the way so they could pass through. It’s clear that Southard is still in that area, hiding somewhere.
Emma shuts the trunk.
I’m not running away, she tells herself.
Footsteps sound behind her.
“Emma,” Bells says softly. In the soft light of the tunnel, the worried set of his jaw almost seems to speak for him.
Emma sighs. She should have known he would put the pieces together and figure out she was leaving. She should have been more secretive; but Bells knows her, knows her patterns; he would have noticed something was wrong the minute he spotted missing food provisions.
“Where are we going?” he asks, all casual.
“We aren’t going anywhere,” Emma says.
“I know you’ve got a plan.” Bells steps forward. “And now you’ve all packed up and you’re raring to go. I’m ready, whatever it is.”
Emma shuts the trunk, and it clicks with a resolute finality.
“The Resistance needs you here,” she says, biting her lip to keep it from wobbling. Her voice quavers and, if she doesn’t finish this and finish this fast, she’s going to cry. “You’re important to the plan. It’s started already, people are questioning the League. You, you need to stay.”
“What?”
“I need to go.” The words seem to grow in the air as she speaks, getting heavier and heavier, as if they’re tangible.
“Emma, you don’t have to go alone,” Bells says. “Here, just let me go get Jess and—”
“No!” Emma snaps, louder than she means to, but it feels good to say no. After all this time doing what other people want, going along with the plan because it’s good for the Resistance, she’s tired.
“Em—”
The nickname irritates her, and Emma tosses her bag into the car, slamming it shut.
“No. I don’t want you to come with me, I don’t want Jess or Abby or Brendan or Christine or anyone. I don’t need you!” Emma says, her voice getting louder with every word. “You all can stay here with your powers and going on missions and being super together! You’re just wasting your time, you know that? The plan is great, but no one accounted for Vindication, and even with all these meta-humans, you can’t figure out a way to keep doing the broadcasts without anyone getting hurt.”
The car trembles as if it’s going to break. It just might. Or maybe that’s Emma.
“I’m going to go make things right,” Emma says. “Don’t follow me.” She’s tired, so tired of being taken for granted and not being good enough. “Goodbye,” she says, without even a backward glance.
She drives down the tunnel with Bells’ stunned form standing still in her rearview mirror. He gets smaller and smaller as she goes, and every so often Emma glances back to see if he follows her, but he doesn’t. He just watches her go.
Emma tries to shake Bells’ hurt, stricken look from her mind. He’ll be fine. She knows he’ll be fine. He’s got plenty of missions to lead and the Resistance isn’t even going to miss her. Her friends all have better things to worry about than the fact that Emma doesn’t get to go on the missions.
The tears come hot and fast, blurring her vision. The night air whistles past her, and snow starts to fall around her, and she can’t see past the flurry of white, so she slows down while she tries to figure out how to turn on the windshield wipers.
Emma jabs furiously at the car’s control screen; her fingerprints smudge the oils already there. A fat teardrop lands next to her hand, and another, and another.
Emma wakes up cold and stiff. At least it’s not snowing anymore. She drives carefully, watching for people, but it’s all empty, crumbling highways and rusted signs, including one she passes reading Welcome to Canada.
There’d been a border here once, just as there once was a border between the United States and Mexico; both had been long forgotten once the Collective came together, but that sign was still here, a reminder of old borders that no longer matter, cities that barely exist. The roads are all that’s left, crackling and crumbling as the force of nature reclaims them.
It’s just a chance, driving out here on a hunch, but Emma knows how strongly home resonates. Southard’s got to be out here.
Emma thinks of the home where she grew up with her mothers doting on her, her friends nearby, when her biggest dreams and worries had to do with school and space. Would she go back? Emma thinks of the house in the canyons, the one built by Abby and her mom, the one where her moms are now— is that home? She’s lived in so many places this year, they’re all blending together.
She shakes herself as she parks and exits the old, creaking vehicle, imagining herself triumphantly coming with Southard to New Bright City. She sets up the solar panel, heaves it and grunts, and thinks of defeating Vindication and not of how difficult this is by herself.
Emma sighs. This whole plan seemed a lot more glamorous when she first thought of it when she left. “I’m not useless,” Emma says to the empty road and field.
She’s going to find Southard, and then Deirdre and everyone will eat their words. Emma is a valuable member of the team despite what others may think. She doesn’t need to be on missions with everyone; she just wants them to see her.
Don’t you want powers? You could be a hero like your friends, a small voice inside her says.
Emma pushes the voice aside, trying not to think about what that would entail. She clears a flat area to lay her sleeping mat down. She’s got wood to gather for a fire and dinner to make. She doesn’t have time to worry about her abilities. She’s got this.
Emma sleeps when she’s tired, eats when she’s hungry, and is at the whim of no one. If she wants to drive recklessly and all over the road, she can. She makes her own schedule, is the boss of her own mission.
It’s only fun for a short while. Soon loneliness and guilt eat at her, and Emma keeps seeing Bells’ stricken face over and over again. For the first time in a long time, she’s truly and utterly alone, with the whole of the world in front of her and a mission of her own to pursue. Emma thought it would mean freedom, but she misses everyone.
At every spectacular view she thinks of Bells and how he’d love it; Abby would love the strangeness and stillness of the abandoned factories and would want to explore them; Jess would squeal about how cute those rabbits are. Emma misses Bells elbowing her when she sleeps, the way they chatted about anything and nothing, even the way he snored.
Emma hefts the solar panel back into the trunk one morning and it clunks loudly, as if it’s hitting another piece of metal. She fumbles around in the trunk until she finds a small case. Inside is a cracked tablet. She didn’t pack it; Bells must have snuck it in, hoping she’d find a way to message him on the encrypted channel. Or maybe he left a message for her. Either way, it’s broken now. There’s no point in wondering why he left it for her.
Emma takes a deep breath, focusing on the road and pushing those thoughts away. They’re better off without her, anyway.
A cold, sweeping wind rushes across the valley. The sky is clear for now; clouds are forming in the distance. It’s a good thing she’s charging the solar panels; it looks as though there’s another storm coming.
Havenstown is empty, and her arrival is anticlimactic. It’s filled with nothing but desolate buildings half-covered in snow. Emma tries hard to ignore her disappointment; it’s not over, not yet. Southard was definitely spotted near here. All Emma has to do is thoroughly search the surrounding area.
The back of her neck prickles. She should get going. Every instinct is telling her to leave, get out of the open, but not committing to a full charge could very well mean getting stuck in the storm.
“Hello?” Emma calls out.
Out of the corner of her eye, she sees something move. “Is someone there?”
Emma shakes herself, trying not to jump at shadows on the deserted street. Maybe it’s coming from a vantage point. Havenstown’s buildings sprawl as far as she can see, climbing even onto the high slopes of the mountain. Emma can see homes built on those steep slopes and even higher, accessible only by a winding road. She shakes her head. Ridiculous.
Snow is starting to come down now, and she wonders how the people would deal with it, whether they’d be able to access the town for food and supplies. She gets dizzy, trying to trace the road hugging the side of the cliff and almost misses the flicker of light.
Emma watches it carefully. Is that a cloud or a plume of smoke?
There’s that flicker again, almost like the gleam of cam-foil. Emma looks closer; there’s a perfect mirror of that exact tree line, just like at the Broussard’s secret farm. Someone is hiding here, in this ghost town in the middle of nowhere.
Emma continues on foot, trudging toward where she saw the light. If Jess were here, she’d know immediately where she was going, and if Bells… well, he’d do something amazing. He’s always got something up his sleeve. And Abby would have plotted the trajectory or pinpointed exactly where Southard’s hideout was based on the glimmer of the reflection of that holo.
Powers aren’t everything, Emma tells herself. The logical part of her says she’s being childish, that of course her friends love and appreciate her, but she’s tired, tired of being excluded, tired of being looked over, of being asked to stand back.
“No more,” Emma mutters angrily, and then promptly trips and falls face first into a snowbank. She dusts herself off and keeps going.
She has no idea how far she has to go. She should probably get back to the car and change out of these wet clothes before she’s too tired, but it’s not as if the car has any charge to run a heater anyway. As long as she keeps moving, she’ll be fine.
She hears something ahead.
“Patricia Southard?” Emma calls. “Is that you? My name’s Emma. I’m a friend. I’m not with the League,” she announces. Her breath blossoms into little clouds in front of her as she pants with effort, hustling up the hill.
As she gets closer, she can see a person’s shadow at the top of the hill. Emma waves, picks up the pace until she gets a little closer, and then stops.
It’s not a person.
A howl echoes in the air.
Emma freezes. She knows the stories of the wild animals that roam the Unmaintained lands, of the hordes of previously domesticated animals, dogs and cats and who knows what else, left to themselves to forage and hunt, gone feral over a hundred years. There are also animals that were always wild in this country: bison and wolves and bears and mountain lions and coyotes. But they all went extinct, right?
Another howl.
“No one knows for sure,” Emma tells herself. “The Collective tells everyone that the Unmaintained lands are unsafe, that there are creatures out here, but they’re just stories, lies from the Collective.”
More howls this time; whatever it is, there’s more than one.
Emma spots movement above her on the far snowbank: something that moves quickly, something that is decidedly not human or robot, an animal on four legs, with pointed ears and a tail pointed up. It raises its great head and howls again. Another beast joins it, and another, and they stalk forward.
“Wolf,” Emma says, laughing in spite of her fear. “Hi,” she says. “There are a lot of you, aren’t there?” Had they been following her? How long have they been watching her?
The largest wolf’s eyes are ice blue and gleam with intelligence. They all look hungry, snarling at her, and Emma shakes when she spots the teeth.
Teeth. Long and sharp and so many of them.
Emma stands tall, shaking, and she tries not to let them know she’s afraid. She has no idea what to do. Her mind spins in all different directions about how this is it, and she didn’t even get to say goodbye…
The largest one howls again and yips loudly.
“Heel, Star! You too, Baby!” calls a gruff voice behind her.
The wolves—dogs?—wag their tails, and they sprint to a bundled-up figure behind them. Their demeanors immediately become playful.
“Oh, come on now, you can’t have forgotten what a person looks like; they’re clearly not a rabbit, you silly fools,” the person says fondly to the wolves, patting them on their heads. The largest one stands to greet the person. On its hind legs, it’s as tall as the person is. It should be frightening, but Emma wants to laugh at the eager animal.
“You,” the person says. “Who are you, and why are you here? How’d you find me?” The wolves turn to look at Emma with a wary eye, and one of them starts snarling again.
Emma holds her hands up. “I’m not with the League! My name is Emma,” she says, and then fatigue and exhaustion take over and she loses her balance, falling forward.
Emma stirs. There’s a warm heavy weight on her, something fluffy like fur that’s moving rhythmically, and then something rough and wet drags across her face. “Eurgh,” she says.
“Eurgh is right,” says the voice next to her.
She opens her eyes wearily, one at a time. There’s a crackling fire and the smell of something savory and delicious coming from somewhere, and an old woman is regarding her curiously.
On top of Emma is one of the wolves, no, two of them. The wolf—or dog?—beams at her, tongue lolling out of its mouth and panting, and then licks her face again. It’s so strange that Emma just accepts it, as if she’s in a dream.
“You’ve been out of it the whole ride back. You don’t hardly weigh a thing,” the woman says gruffly. “You’ll need to change out of your wet clothes or you’ll get hypothermia. These are clean. There’s a bathroom in there.” She jerks her head at a small door. “Do you need help? Star, Yeti, come over here.”
The furry weights move off her, and Emma just stares, not really believing what she’s seeing. It feels as though she’s moving underwater, and she’s so cold and tired, and her mind is hazy. She moves on autopilot to the small cramped bathroom. The sweater and sweatpants are clean and dry, and a bit too big for her, but Emma is grateful to be out of her wet clothes.
She is immediately greeted by wet noses and eager dogs when she exits the bathroom. “Thanks,” she says hesitantly. Is she dreaming? That would make much more sense. She’s freezing to death out in the cold on a pointless mission gone wrong, and her mind is playing tricks on her.
“Rest.” The voice is gentle and firm.
Emma is gently bundled up in a blanket and tucked in and then she drifts off to sleep.
Emma wakes up again, unfathomably warm, but with a much clearer head. She jolts upright with alarm, the details of the foolhardy mission and nearly freezing to death in the search for Southard.
There’s a confused whimper next to her, and Emma almost startles again, seeing the wolf-like creature eye her curiously. She remembers them surrounding her, and Emma thought it was going to be like the stories of the wild creatures roaming the Unmaintained lands, tearing and ripping her to pieces. This one’s mouth is open, with the tongue lolling out in a comical way.
“You’re a dangerous predator,” Emma says. Saying what she knows calms her down, but the wolf’s tail begins to wag with so much enthusiasm that his entire body shakes. “You’re a wolf? A dog?”
Emma remembers that dogs had been kept as pets before the Disasters. Like cats, there are plenty of historical holovids of them floating around the Net, but unlike cats, who occasionally were still kept as luxury pets, there are only stories about dogs.
The wolfdog is making a sad, whining noise now and noses at her face. It’s soft and wet, and Emma laughs despite herself, throwing her hands in her face to stop it. Her hands touch the soft, warm fur, and there’s a happy rumbling noise of approval. “Okay,” Emma says, patting the creature on the head again, and he seems to smile, panting excitedly, and she keeps up the motion.
Emma sits back, petting the wolfdog and taking in her surroundings. She’s in a one-room cabin dominated by a woodburning stove in the center. There’s a bed filled with quilts, a desk cluttered with strange items Emma has no name for, and what looks like a bulky piece of tech, possibly a pre-Collective computer. A fire crackles merrily in the stove, lighting the place with a soft, amber light. A delicious smell wafts from a pot, and Emma’s stomach growls.
How long was she out? She vaguely remembers being found, waking up in the cabin, and changing into dry clothes, but barely remembers anything else, aside from an old woman and an improbable number of wolfdogs. Emma pulls the blankets around her and spots her clothes drying on a rack near the fire and the contents of her pockets carefully laid out on a side table.
The door opens, and with it a gust of howling cold wind rushes inside, along with a figure wrapped head to toe in a puffy coat and even more wolfdogs. It’s a chaos of noise and furry bodies and noses as they bound inside the cabin.
The one by Emma’s side lets out a joyful bark, and the others answer, excitedly dancing about the figure as layers are removed to reveal an old woman. Emma watches as she pulls a scarf from her face. Her glittering eyes regard Emma.
“You need to eat,” she says, stepping closer. Up close, Emma can see her face is gnarled with wrinkles. Wisps of flyaway hair frame her face. Across her face runs a wicked looking scar, branched and forked like lightning, so faded it’s almost imperceptible.
