Mina
stood at the door for some time after the Angemal had driven off. There was so
much to do, and yet she couldn’t bring herself to move. Turning from the door
would put the gears in motion, powering the future machine that would lead to
her flight, and she felt, her downfall.
Why did I choose this?
She couldn’t answer herself, so instead she turned away from her door
and headed downstairs to retrieve her newly-made allies. She wondered aimlessly
whether their brief stint in the lockers had driven any of them insane. If this
had indeed happened, her money was on Kat, that whiney Empirian… or perhaps
the Dauern.
“Rise and shine,” she called as she slid open the cabinets. Harata
was first, his tense frame nearly springing from its confinement.
“You were going to tell them,” he raged, standing inches from her,
breathing heavily in her face. “You opened the door. You were going to show
them!”
“I did what I had to do,” Mina replied coolly, her empty eyes pointed
straight at his. “I could have opened any of the freezers. Why do you think I
chose yours? Hm? I knew you’d be able to keep your head and hide. Those men
wouldn’t have walked out of here without looking in at least one. I left you
space to hide, and you did.”
Harata stood speechless, still breathing heavily, unable to think of what
to say. By now, the others had emerged from their macabre hiding place. They all
looked shaken, all but Blue, who of course managed to look as though he’d had
quite a relaxing time waiting for doom to arrive. They looked dazedly around the
room, no one speaking. The air seemed to weigh a thousand pounds.
“They’ll come back,” Mina said finally, in a tone dripping
resignation. “The Commander will realize. We’ll have to go soon.”
“Did they say-“
“Doesn’t matter. They didn’t find a thing, not even on the grounds,
but it doesn’t matter. This guy finds everyone. He’s like a god.
He’ll realize, so we have to go.”
“Where are we going?” piped Chieko.
Harata shot a desperate glance at Blue, who remained frustratingly
silent.
“Look,” Mina said suddenly. “You guys have got to be hungry by now.
You can’t go upstairs, in case they have the place under surveillance, but
I’ll bring down some food and a map. You can plan while I get ready to leave.
Okay?”
The Clanless quickly agreed, and Mina strode away. He turned to the
others, realizing that he should say something to reassure them. It seemed
impossible to think of anything, as though someone had cut all the language from
his brain.
“Everybody ok?” was all that he could force himself to say.
I’m scared, Kat thought desperately. Pride would not allow her
to say anything but, “I’m fine.”
Ayame and Blue nodded, while Chieko said,
“I’m ok, but that was kinda scary.”
“We’ll be away from here soon,” the Clanless said.
“Why does Mina think the HeadHunters will catch us?”
“I don’t know, but they won’t. They were right here and didn’t
find us.” He wished he could believe his own words.
Mina returned with the maps, and all the food she could find in her
little cabin.
“Might as well eat it,” she said somewhat regretfully. She left
immediately after that, muttering something about “things to do”.
Blue, Harata and Chieko huddled around one of the maps, while Ayame and
Kat sat silently at opposite ends of the room, not looking at one another.
After some time pondering the map, the Clanless looked up at the
Night’s Herald and queried,
“What about going north? There’s not much up there, but-“
“Well, weighing our options, it looks like it’s north or south. The
way north does offer the most cover, but we’ve got to keep our Task in mind.
What can we accomplish up there? There are still four of us to be found.”
“We seem to be doing ok finding each other. The way south gets
populated pretty fast… I think that we have a better chance of shaking the
HeadHunters if we keep to the woods.”
“We’re not going to shake the HeadHunters. It doesn’t really work
that way. They don’t just give up after a while.”
“It’ll still be easier for us if we kept a low profile. A more
populated area means a greater chance of getting spotted and turned in.
Besides-“
“It just feels right to go north.”
“Yeah.”
“Let’s do that, then. We can head toward Kitaka’en. It’s the
largest northern city. If we get near there and it feels wrong, we can head east
or west then. How’s that?”
“Sounds fine.” In truth, Harata wished they had a more solid idea of
what they were doing. It seemed that from the moment they’d boarded the train
in Mianuus, they’d totally lost control. He found himself wondering if
they’d ever had any control in the first place. He realized that he hadn’t.
The thought left him awash in despair. Beside him, Chieko was chattering away.
“I’ve never been to Kitaka’en. I’ve always wanted to see it. Do
you think it will look like Mianuus?”
“I don’t know,” Blue answered patiently.
“It’ll be cool to find out. Are we going to walk all the way
there?”
“That’s right.”
“How long will that take? Really long?”
“About a week and a half or two.”
Harata left Blue to answer Chi’s incessant questions. He crossed the
floor to where Kat was sitting, trying to ignore the guilty tug that told him to
talk to Ayame instead.
“How you holding up?” He asked the Empirian softly, in what he hoped
was a friendly manner.
“I’ll be fine,” she answered rather coldly. She’d been nervously
toying with the food in front of her, not eating anything. Harata fished for
words.
“It’s ok to be scared,” he said. “This is scary for all of us.”
Kat didn’t look at him, her soft brown hair falling around her
downturned face.
“I left Mianuus hoping for a change in my life. I guess I got it.”
After she said this, the Empirian fell silent, refusing to say anything more.
After a time, the Clanless gave up and walked over to Ayame.
“Hey kiddo,” he said, feeling himself ease into the comfort he’d
developed while speaking to her. “Your necklace is fixed.” He handed her the
pendant on the silver chain.
“Thank you,” she gazed up at him, truly grateful. “Where’d you
learn to do that?”
“You learn to fix lots of stuff in the place where I grew up. There are
no stores or anything… nothing like Mianuus. If you want something, you pretty
much have to make it yourself.”
They chatted idly about life in the Otherlands for a few minutes. Ayame
felt that she could be taken that far away by his words. She could hear the
tropical birds calling and smell the light, loamy wind as it drifted through a
tiny village. In a place like that, she thought, everything you own is
truly yours. It was a universe away from the stench and pain of her own life.
She wanted to listen forever, to slowly drift away to that world of dreams.
Mina returned to the basement, shattering the illusion.
“Well, I’m ready to go,” she announced. “There doesn’t seem to
be anyone around, so we’d best get a move on… unless you want to wait.”
“No…” Harata ventured cautiously. “I don’t want to risk
thrashing around in the dark another night. We’ve got a couple of hours of
daylight left. I want to get to the northern side of the railway tracks around
dark.” He fell silent, acutely aware of all the eyes on him, riveted, waiting
for him to continue, to divulge the plan.
“Blue will go up front. Everyone else will stick with him. I’ll go
last, covering our trail. That’ll take some time, so once you guys get across
the tracks, someone will need to stay behind so I know which way everyone
went.” Harata looked at them all. Who could he trust to stay back? Mina and
Kat were obvious negatives. Try as he might, the Clanless simply couldn’t
trust Mina. He felt that somehow she still owed her loyalty to the Angemal, and
would betray them at the soonest opportunity. Kat was far too unstable, and it
was quite possible that she would try to run. Blue would have to stay with the
others, to ensure they wouldn’t try to break away. Ayame… of course he could
trust her, but something in him really didn’t want to burden her with the
responsibility. She was still recovering from the assault in Mianuus, and should
she be captured by the HeadHunters, she’d be killed as soon as they were
finished asking questions.
“Chieko,” he turned to the GelbFaust, whose cheerful green eyes
brightened even more. “Can I trust you to do that?”
“Yes!” she piped back. “Please, I want to help… I’m a
Champion.” She grinned openly at Harata, who let a slight smile tease the
corners of his mouth, thankful that the GelbFaust girl was so naïve.
“That settles it then. We’ll make camp tonight about a mile from the
tracks- say, about here.” He pointed to a spot on the map. “We’ll need to
set watch at night, but we’ll work that out later. Mina, you’re ready?”
“As I’ll ever be.”
“Then we might as well go.”
With those words, everyone rose to go upstairs. It was then that the
Clanless realized that he’d truly shouldered the responsibility of leadership,
come what may.
