Elite

The fingers of sleep still gripped Sylvie in their embrace when the camp came to life with the first sign of morning. The ache of dreams left undreamed confirmed that their stay had been a short one. Sylvie dragged exhaustion-leaden feet to the pocked red metal of the truck and resumed her position propped up against the side.

The dawn found her contemplating her late night conversation with Jack as she watched the group prepare themselves to leave. She scanned the sea of faces and found that each one was as equally unfortunate as the last. Crooked noses, eschew grins and a variety of other inadequacies only made her more sure of what she already knew: the faults she saw didn’t make them special.

It made them ordinary.

And ordinary was the very last thing that Sylvie ever wanted to be. There was a reason that this kind of existence had been left in the past and as a member of the Elite, Sylvie was part of the future.

She had just about perfected the little speech she had prepared for Jack just as he bounded up into the truck along side her. “Morning Princess,” he said, dropping a small bundle into her hands. “Here’s some food and water. I wanted to make sure you had some since I won’t be riding with you today.” Sylvie fumbled for something to say, but her little speech was already blowing away in the wind. “I’ll see you when we stop,” Jack continued. “Try to get some rest. There will be a lot to do once we arrive.”

Without waiting for a response, he jumped down out of the bed and closed the noisy gate behind him. Sylvie sat for a moment in stunned silence before the roar of the truck sent the hush scurrying away like Jack. Left alone with only her thoughts, Sylvie turned her attention to the bundle Jack had dropped into her lap.

Wrapped in the blanket she had slept on the night before was a canteen of water and a pouch of the same kind of suspicious meat he had offered her the day before. Letting out a defeated sigh, she lifted one of the leather like strips to her mouth and took a bite. It certainly was not Jules’s stew, but it would hopefully quiet the rumble of her empty stomach.

She washed down the dry ration with a deep pull on the canteen and spread the blanket out in sliver of shade cast by the cab of the truck. Laying her body across it, Sylvie stared up at the cool blue of the sky and waited anxiously for the clouds above to take recognizable shapes. It was an old game she had not played since she was little.

Since she lost her mother.

The realization jerked her upright, sending the fluffy white puffs back into obscurity. An ache that stretched forward and backward as far as the eye could see radiated through her body, making even her fingertips tingle with the painful sensation.

How could she have allowed herself to grow so comfortable—so at ease—in the Rebel’s care? And with such little effort too? She had hated them her entire life and they had somehow managed to soften her with common courtesies and a decent meal. How foolish of her to forget, even for a second, who they were!

The Enemy.

The simple fact that she was with them at all proved that beyond a shadow of a doubt. Pulling her knees into her chest, Sylvie buried her face into her crossed arms and silently vowed not to make the same mistake again.

She spent the rest of the morning in quiet hostility that only grew with every bump that tossed her around the bed of the old truck. She was practically seething when the small convoy rolled to a stop late that afternoon. The slow, methodical way the Rebels filed out of the trucks made it clear this was not just a temporary break.

They had reached their destination.

A long low building sprawled out toward a dense tree line in the distance. The sky above it was marked in metal by some sort of twin scaffolding rising up from the grassy field nestled inside the expanse. The old ruin was surrounded on three sides by slabs of broken cement almost completely obscured by the advantageous undergrowth.

With her meager blanket bundled underneath her arm, Sylvie jumped down out of the bed of the truck and studied the shuffling around with reaffirmed eyes. She had to decipher which ones would prove helpful and which would use her interests against her.

Sylvie took a step toward them ready to find out when a hand clamped down on her arm. “Where ya headed, Princess?” asked Jack, seeming to materialize out of nowhere.

“If you must know,” she snapped, pulling out of his grasp. “I was going to look for Jules. ” Sylvie knew she was treading on thin ice with her presumption, but if Jack was going to continue to call her Princess, she may as well act like one.

“Let me find her for you,” Jack said, unruffled by her yet again. He swiveled his head side to side examining the crowd for some sign of his admirer, but snapped to attention at the sound of raised voices.

Sylvie followed his sharp stare to find a group of men exiting the old building. They called out words of greeting to the new arrivals and Sylvie watched as Doc was pulled into a bear hug by a large man in front. He was shirtless and his large chest showcased swirls of black ink that wound their way up his neck to the bald flesh of his scalp.

Body art was not an uncommon sight in New Eden—the Elite were always looking for ways to stay stand apart—but Sylvie had never seen anything like this before. Where back home, a tattoo could be altered or erased completely with nothing more than a mental command, here marks like his were permanent; they were forever. It somehow made her sure that he was someone to take seriously.

“Wait here,” Jack said, as the tattooed man swept the crowd, his gaze finally falling on the two of them a little too intently for Sylvie’s comfort. But rather than flinch away, she glared back, sizing up the undoubtable threat he poised.

Jack made short work of the distance between himself and the menacing man who finally looked away once Jack reached him. The two of them launched into a heated debate, but only broken pieces of it made their way to Sylvie’s ears. Eager to know more, she slipped through the throng of people who busied themselves unloading the trucks until she was close enough to everything.

“I don’t care what you say,” the man growled at Jack. “This is on you.” He threw his hands into the air dismissively. “Everyone in Sector C was relying on you and you let us all down.”

Sylvie felt her skin prickle at the name Sector C. She had heard it mentioned a million times before, but it had always been in the comfort of her home—surrounded by the safety of what she thought were unbreachable walls. Hearing it now made her skin cold despite the lingering heat of the day.

She was in Sector C.

The realization took the wind right out of her lungs and for a moment all Sylvie could hear was the drum of her own heartbeat pulse in her ears. It was so loud; she almost missed Jack’s heated reply.

“Don’t make this about Sector C, Rex,” he said. “This is about Addy and you know it.” Jack pointed his finger precariously close to Rex’s face, emphasizing his words. “No one told your sister to come. We all knew she wasn’t ready.”

“You were supposed to look out for her!” Rex countered. “But you were too worried about your puppet to take care of your own.”

It took Sylvie a minute to realize that the puppet he was referring to was her. Indignantly, she took a step toward them, intent on pulling some strings of her own, but thought better of it. They had yet to see her lurking there in the shadows and she wasn’t ready to give up her anonymity just yet. Especially not when she was the topic of the conversation.

“I didn’t have a choice,” Jack said. “Your intel on the Elite was wrong. The Hub was not deserted. She was there and she was not alone.”

“Davis,” Sylvie whispered to herself. Even though the Rebels did not mention him by name, there was no denying who Jack meant. A tiny sting of guilt took her by surprise when Sylvie realized she had not even considered what might have happened to him that night. He had obviously not been taken like her, so Sylvie could not help but fear a much more severe consequence. Even by New Eden’s standards, Sylvie had always seen Davis as soft—but when matched with the Rebels, she didn’t see how he stood a chance.

“Her companion overpowered your sister,” Jack continued, his claim immediately taking Sylvie by surprise. “I had to leave her behind.”

In all the years she had known him, Sylvie had experienced an array of emotions towards Davis, but pride had never been one of them. At least not until now. It was a welcomed change and while his actions may have no bearing on her own situation, it made her more sure of herself knowing that whatever the Rebel’s plan, they had been unsuccessful.

Satisfied with at least that knowledge, Sylvie turned away from the dueling pair expecting to sling back off to where Jack had left her unnoticed. But swirling on her heels, Sylvie found herself face to face with an unfortunate roadblock.

“What are you doing here?” Jules demanded, her pretty features knitting into a blanket of nervous questions. She shot a look over Sylvie’s shoulder spotting Jack and Rex still deep in their heated debate and any lie that Sylvie could have told evaporated under the heat of her returning stare. “Eavesdropping will only get you into trouble around here,” she said, taking Sylvie’s arm in her hand and ushering her away.

“It’s also the only way to get any answers!” Sylvie snapped back. She pulled herself free of Jules’s grasp and smoothed her hands down over her hopelessly rumpled clothes and tried to regain her composure.

She knew that lashing out was not the answer—especially given her circumstances—but she did not appreciate being reprimanded. Least of all by someone meek and guileless like Jules. She couldn’t even manage to tell a silly boy that she liked him. What could she possibly understand about how to act in Sylvie’s situation?

“There are other ways,” Jules said softly. She clasped her discarded hand with the other and held them self-consciously in front of her.

“Like what?” Sylvie asked. “No one here is going to help me.” She meant it as a challenge, but she never expected Jules to rise to it.

“What do you want to know?” she asked. Her head was bowed and she talked mostly to her chest, but Sylvie had heard the offer loud and clear.

“You’re going to answer my questions?” Sylvie asked a bit sardonically. “Why would you do that? We aren’t exactly on the same side, you know?”

“But that doesn’t mean we have to be enemies,” Jules replied. Sylvie was about to say that was exactly what it meant when Jules fixed her with a piercing stare. “Instead we can help each other.” Sylvie had no idea how she could do anyone any good in her current state, but she refused to let the opportunity pass her by.

After all, what did she have to lose?