Independent Study (The Testing 2)

Without waiting for agreement, I walk toward the cluster of trees. The gray cast to the bark speaks of the lack of revitalization in this area. But the state of the trees and other foliage does not hold my interest. Damone’s reddened face and angry eyes do. He goes still as I approach and says nothing as I walk around him to examine the restraints Will and Enzo fashioned. His arms are wrapped around the tree behind him and bound at the wrist with strips of sturdy brown fabric. The same fabric that Damone’s shirt is made of. Blood streaks his skin where it rubbed against the tree in his efforts to get free.

“What do you want?” Damone sneers. “Are you going to pretend to leave me behind again? We both know you can’t do it. Can you?”

For a moment, my knife stills. The urge to leave him and his insults behind is overwhelming. To do so would almost certainly keep him from a leadership position. I could prevent him from making decisions that would affect me, my family, and my country. I have only to walk away and betray everything that I believe in.

My knife slices through the restraints. Damone offers no thanks or show of gratitude as he stalks toward the skimmer. The anger I pushed aside returns. I take two steps and feel my foot catch. My knees and hands jolt with pain as I hit the unforgiving ground. Tears caused by my stinging palms, my anger with Damone, and my disappointment in my own desire to punish him prick the backs of my eyes. I ache for home. For my family. For Tomas. For people who love me. For people I can trust with my life.

But they are not here and I need to get moving. I push to my knees and realize whatever tripped me is still wrapped around my left ankle.

I reach down and find thin, pliable wire where I expected to find a vine or root. Carefully, I unhook the metal from my ankle and examine it more closely. No rust. No wear. Extending from where I sit to somewhere to my right. Sliding my fingers along the length of the wire, I follow it to its end, which is expertly secured around a small but sturdy bush.

A snare. A simple one designed to catch an animal bounding through this grouping of trees. If an animal steps into or puts its head through the loop and keeps walking, the loop will tighten. As it did around my leg. The more the animal struggles, the more tightly it is trapped. Only, instead of dinner, this snare caught me.

“Are you okay?”

I turn and see Enzo standing near a scraggly tree, looking at me.

“I’m fine.” I brush off my knees and glance around for signs of other snares. “My foot just caught on something.”

There. Sunlight glints off silver metal. Only, this time the snare is located on the other side of the fence. As I take a step toward the fence, Enzo says, “If we don’t want the other team to pull ahead of us, we need to get going.”

Enzo has a point. Still, I step toward the fence. “I just want to take a closer look at something. It’ll only take a minute.”

“Cia.” Enzo’s voice holds authority and a whisper of nerves. “There’s nothing we need inside the air force base. We need to go back to the skimmer. Damone and Will won’t wait around for us much longer.”

I look to the skimmer and see Will waving at us. Enzo is right. It is time for us to go. I cast one last look at the wire trap set on the other side of the fence before walking away. As we climb into the skimmer, I don’t think I imagine the relief on Enzo’s face or the tension that leeches from his shoulders. Being left behind is reason enough for worry, but does his concern indicate something more?

The rise of the skimmer and the roar of the engine pull my thoughts away from what lies behind and refocus me on the task ahead. “What did the last clue say?” I ask.

Enzo pulls a gray piece of paper from his pocket and hands it to me.

The end is in sight. The next stop is near. In the foundation of our Commonwealth you shall search. Look for the symbol of where you now live and find what you seek upon its perch.

The answer seemed straightforward enough. “The Central Government Building,” I say.

“That’s what we thought,” Will says, his eyes fixed firmly on the road. In the seat next to him, Damone sits with his arms crossed as he stares out the window. Saving him from the snake and choosing to keep our team intact were the right things to do, but by making those choices, it is clear I have also made an enemy. Then again, maybe he was always my enemy and I just didn’t know it. Even after spending an entire day with Enzo and Damone, I know little more than I did before about their families or the values they’ve been raised on. With Damone, I can make a guess. His willingness to get ahead at the cost of others must have been a skill he learned from his government-connected father or the teachers who helped prepare him for the University. But Enzo is a mystery. From the way the others treat him, I can guess his family is not connected to the Tosu government. Who they are and what they believe in, I do not know. But the worry that sprang to his eyes when I made a move to examine the snares makes me determined to find out.

By the confident way he directs Will through the scenery that changes from dirt and plants to roads, walkways, and small buildings, it is clear Enzo grew up nearby. Through the smudged skimmer windows, I study the landscape. The buildings and plant life surrounding the houses look well tended. More like the dwellings we create in Five Lakes than the ones I have seen in the heart of the city. Children stop their playing to wave as we drive past. Citizens on bicycles or the occasional motorized scooter steer down the streets as people hurry to whatever tasks await them.

The number of personal skimmers filling the roadway increases as the buildings grow larger and less spread apart. Some stand five or six stories high. Books tell us taller buildings once graced the city streets—some reaching hundreds of feet into the air—but they were too tall, too exposed to survive against the trembling earth and destructive winds. While the tallest buildings faltered during the final Three Stages of War, most structures in this city, while shaken and sometimes cracked, stood strong. Their smaller stature proved to be an asset. One a country could rebuild upon.

Will’s face is a mask of concentration, and his hands tighten on the controls as the streets become more crowded. He speaks only to ask Enzo when he needs clarification about the direction he is going in. Finally, I see in the distance the riverbank that signals our destination is near. The flowing river sparkles. A carpet of green, healthy grass frames the river on either side. “So we just need to find a picture of a balanced scale,” Will says once he safely steers the skimmer into a vehicle zone and turns off the engine. “Sounds easy enough.”

“Easy?” Damone shoots Will a withering look. “Have you been inside the Central Government Building? It’ll take a miracle to find anything in there.”

I hate to think it, but as we walk toward the Central Government Building, I realize Damone’s right. The United Commonwealth Government was officially created a hundred years ago in a large structure that sits on the east bank of the river. Two stories tall with circular walls and a low-domed roof, the building has a short but sturdy design that helped it survive the worst of the natural disasters with little more than a few broken windows. The lack of damage and the large rooms that can accommodate thousands of people made it an ideal site for th

e survivors of the war beginning to lay the foundation for a new country.

It is hard to imagine those first days when the earth quieted and people began to assess the damage. Corrupted rivers that caused illness or worse. Destroyed homes and a ground too contaminated for many plants to grow. A world filled with sorrow and fear. Instead of pulling closed the doors and cowering in the dark, people gathered here to pool their resources and restore hope.

I glance at the large square building on the land just north of the Central Government Building. Now named Tosu City Hospital and Medical Research Center. I don’t know what it was called then, but it was used as safe living spaces for those without homes or those too old, young, or terrified to be alone. An enclosed walkway allowed people to pass safely between the two structures without having to brave the chemical- and radiation-laced elements.

Leaders were elected. Laws made. Crews organized and sent outside to evaluate the city. Canned food was gathered and rationed. The dead found inside were buried in a crevice opened by an earthquake on the west side of the city. A group was formed to scout around the city for signs of still-living plants, animals, and people. Water was boiled and filtered. Even then, drinking the water made people sick, which prompted leaders to send the surviving scientists to the University labs. The scientists used the equipment there to run tests on the river, hoping to discover a way to make it pure once again.

One by one, buildings were repaired and deemed safe. Families left the safety of living with the entire community and moved into their own dwellings. Scientists found plants, like clover, that thrived in the damaged soil and began splicing their genes into less hardy vegetation. With hope, organization, and care, the world came alive again.

And it all started here.