Meet Me in the Future Read online

  “Is that why you killed the other negotiators who came up here?” Arkadi asked. “You feel we’re complicit?”

  “The whole country is complicit,” he said.

  Arkadi understood the true gravity of the situation then. “I have to go now,” she said. “Dog’s hungry. I’m hungry. Are you hungry? I can bring you something in a few hours, if you want me to come back? It’s up to you.” Dusk was settling over everything. She didn’t want to make that walk back among the gouges in the ground and mangled bodies in the dark. And she certainly didn’t want to stay out here until the next sunrise in an hour.

  “Leave the dog.”

  “If I leave the dog I’ll need something in return.”

  “Then go. You’ll get nothing from me.”

  “Before I do,” Arkadi said, “I want you to know that even though you’re holding this building, and some people got shot early on, I know lots of unexpected things happen in these kinds of situations. It’s confusing. There’s a lot of panic. It happens. But you let me get up here. You’ve kept cool and calm since then. That counts for a lot. Let’s work together to get you all out safely now, all right?”

  No response. Arkadi dusted her trousers off and rose slowly. She gave the dog a pat. She raised a hand to the soldier, as if they were old friends. “If you want, we can talk again. If not, they’ll send someone else up here, probably. But if you request me,” and she dropped her voice, “if you request me, me and the dog can come back. And I can bring you something. Anything you like?” Arkadi stared again at the faceless suit. Nothing.

  Arkadi turned, patting the dog again as she did, to remind him that even if he didn’t care about her, shooting her might upset the dog. It was tough to turn her back on him, but it showed trust. She felt his stare, anticipating the bullet.

  “Butterscotch candy.”

  “Butterscotch candy,” Arkadi said, and she knew which of the soldiers this likely was, then, because one didn’t develop a taste for butterscotch anywhere but the southern continent. “You be here in an hour to talk again, and I’ll work on getting that. All right? And you can feel free to contact us any time, you know. We’re monitoring the frequencies. You can talk to me whenever you want. But I’ll do my best to get that for you.”

  The soldier nodded. It was enough.

  Arkadi tensed as she walked away, and forced herself to loosen up. Confident, carefree. People asked her often how she did it, putting herself in front of people who wanted to kill her and dozens more besides, but it was just like theater. She played the part of somebody confident, somebody smarter and greater than herself, and she became that person.

  When she crossed back into the confines of the camp, the first person to run up was the dog’s trainer.

  “Mavis, come!” the woman barked, and the dog loped over.

  “Mavis was a hit,” Arkadi said, but the trainer just frowned at her and strode back to the kennels with her charge.

  Revlan met her at the command tent. “Anything?”

  “I’m alive,” Arkadi said. “The dog’s alive. Nothing’s blown up yet. He wants butterscotch candy. But I figure you were listening in.”

  “How many in there?”

  “Don’t know,” Arkadi said. “Only saw the one. But based on our conversation and how things went down, I suspect it’s the only one.”

  “What did he say?”

  “Just get him some candy.”

  “You were out there an hour and that’s all you have? Candy?”

  “Better than you’ve done,” Arkadi said. She jabbed a finger at Maradiv, who was lingering just inside the command tent. She recognized his nervous hands. “Get me some candy.”

  “That will take days,” he said, moving away from the tent. “Maybe longer. Does anyone on this continent even make it anymore?”

  “You’ll find out.”

  Revlan ushered Arkadi back into the command tent and said, “Perhaps I haven’t communicated the gravity of this situation.”

  “It’s been communicated,” Arkadi said. She pointed to the squiggling lines surrounding the Red Secretary. “I think you took out the rest of the soldier’s squad when you blew the escape tunnel, if they were ever there in the first place.”

  “How can you possibly know that? I was monitoring your communication. He said nothing to indicate—”

  “She’s alone,” Arkadi said, pulling out her notebook. “I know which soldier this is, and she’s very green. She opaqued the door before she turned on the canons. She did that so she didn’t have to look right in my face as she did it. If there was someone else operating those defensive weapons, they wouldn’t need to put that kind of distance between me and them. She had no demands. She said there were no hostages. She’s alone.”

  “You have a plan, then?”

  “There’s shielding on the door, but I can get her to turn it off, maybe for a few seconds only,” she said, “but I need that dog again, Mavis. And I need at least two excellent snipers in place.”

  “We already have snipers—”

  “Excellent ones,” Arkadi said. “They should only fire if they have a clear kill shot when she opens the door. If they don’t have a clear kill shot and she lives, we’re all dead, along with the rest of the province, because she’s going to slam that shield back up and go blow up the whole site. So they better be good.”

  “And if you’re wrong?”

  “About what?

  “If you’re wrong that she’s alone?”

  “Then we’ll certainly all die, whether your people are good shots or not.”

  “I’ll have a squad ready to back you up once the door is open and shots are fired,” Revlan said.

  “That’s nice, but probably not necessary.”

  “I’ll get them as close as I can,” Revlan said, “but you’ll have maybe two minutes on your own between the kill shot and their arrival. Stay down and stay out of the way. They’ll go in and clear it. Remember to keep your hands clean. We’re short three negotiators now, and we don’t need you consigned to the fire with the rest of us if you do violence.”

  “We’ll all go to the fire eventually,” Arkadi said. “I’ve been doing this a long time. I know my limits.”

  “Good,” Revlan said. “When are you going back? It could be a long time before we have the candy.”

  “I need her to sit until sunup in an hour,” she said. “She says she has no hostages, but she doesn’t need them. The Red Secretary is her hostage, and she knows it. You still have people on the frequencies?

  “I do.”

  “Have them reach out to her across all six channels every ten minutes or so. If she starts feeling lonely I want her to hear a friendly voice. Have them call me up if she calls in.”

  “What are you going to do for an hour?”

  “Take a shit. Then take a nap.”

  “You can’t be serious.”

  “I almost got shot out there,” Arkadi said. “It’s a wonder I didn’t shit my pants.”

  Revlan escorted her to the lavatory pits and the temporary showers, and she took advantage of both. Arkadi waited until Revlan was gone before she gave in to the shakes. They were bad this time, so bad her teeth chattered. The first time it had happened was a year into the ceasefire, when she had talked a soldier down from killing a couple of government people in Yorusiv. The soldier had killed one of the hostages outright, just as Arkadi had arrived. She really had shit her pants that time, just as the soldier was coming out. He had raised a weapon to the head of the last hostage he was taking out with him, and there Arkadi was, five feet from him with no way to stop him from killing the hostage, killing her, and then killing himself. Negotiators could talk, but they weren’t allowed to maim or kill unless they wanted to end the war in the incinerators with the rest of those who had had to deal out violence during the war. At best, she might have been able to disarm him. But there wasn’t time to think. She had done everything right, talked him down, told him how it would go, but people were unpredicta
ble. Rogue soldiers especially.

  Arkadi found a cot in the med tent and threw her arm over her eyes and let her mind gnaw away at the problem of the Red Secretary. She needed the shield to come down, and that meant giving up the dog. She pulled out her notebook again and doodled in the pages next to her notes on the squad. One of the soldiers she had researched was a rookie kid named Soraya Te Kovad. Had grown up on a farm: pack of spotted gizzles, pack of ostriches, pack of dogs. Family farm blown up early in the war. They had lived in a suburb of Kovaaya. In Kovaaya, most people worked at the candy factory. Butterscotch, of course.

  It was easy to know a kid on paper. Arkadi had gotten to know each of them in doing her research, but it was always jarring to meet them in person. She imagined them all very differently in her head. Seeing the kid walk out of her head and into the world was like watching a dream come to life.

  And now Arkadi would have to be complicit in the death of that dream.

  She must have slept, because Revlan woke her.

  “They’re on frequency four,” Revlan said.

  Arkadi followed her to the command tent. Maradiv and another soldier were there, huddled near the radio, which was spitting red sparks and blue auroras from the tinny cups affixed to its exterior. Arkadi wondered if the enemy magics like this would eventually just die out on their own, sputtering into the ether like these things.

  “She’s here,” Maradiv said.

  “What’s happening over there?” Arkadi said into the radio.

  “Need you to come back up with the candy,” the soldier said. Her voice sounded tinny, far away. Definitely a bad radio. It needed to be recharged.

  “Still working on getting you that candy,” Arkadi said. “We’ve only had a couple of rotations of the sun since—”

  “Bring the dog up here,” the soldier said.

  “I told you,” Arkadi said. “I need something in return.”

  “I’ll talk to you, then,” she said. “Up here.”

  “I need a show of good faith,” Arkadi said. “I’m here with all these good soldiers down here. Now, I know you were overwhelmed when those first couple of negotiators showed up. Split-second decision, right? You felt you were in danger. But you haven’t hurt anyone else since then, and that counts for a lot. You talking to me and the dog—the dog’s name is Mavis, by the way—that counts for a lot. If we can end this now, that’s going to count big.”

  “I’m not coming out.”

  “Just a good show for these people,” Arkadi said. “I know you’re hungry. I expect you grew up pretty hungry there outside Kovaaya. You have sisters, brothers, who worked in the factory? Or could you spare any after all that work on the farm?”

  Silence. Spitting sparks.

  Arkadi waited, though Maradiv and Revlan looked increasingly concerned. Arkadi had pushed her hand when she was well away from the defensive guns. Not that it mattered if the kid blew the station. But Arkadi didn’t think she was at that point yet. A lot relied on gut feeling, as a negotiator. Too much.

  Then, from the radio, “I’m sorry.” It was difficult to judge the tone. Did her voice break? Had Arkadi struck a nerve?

  “I’ll bring Mavis up there,” Arkadi said gently. “You and me and Mavis will work this out, all right? We are in a good place. You’ve handled yourself really well, Soraya. I’m coming up.”

  Arkadi strode out of the tent, heading straight for the kennels. The trainer saw her coming and put her meaty hands on her hips.

  “Alive,” the trainer said.

  “My goal is to bring everyone in alive,” Arkadi said. “Including the dog. But if I don’t get the dog, we all die, all blown up to bits. Understand?”

  “I nursed this dog from my own tit.”

  “I’m sure that’s a euphemism. I understand.”

  The trainer grunted at her and called Mavis over. The big dog rambled to Arkadi’s side. This time, the trainer knelt next to the dog and said something to him that Arkadi did not hear.

  “I have to go,” Arkadi said. “There’s an unstable soldier up there.”

  “Go,” the trainer said.

  Arkadi called Mavis after her, and they began the long trek across the rutted ground between the camp and the Red Secretary a second time. The sun was high in the sky, and the wind had died down. She never thought she’d miss the wind, but as she sweated it out under the heat, miss it she did.

  When she arrived at the doors this time, palms out, the door went transparent immediately.

  The soldier stood dead center in the doorway this time, stance wide, just a few paces from the entrance. She shifted her weight from side to side, the only indication of mood that Arkadi was going to get.

  “This is Mavis,” Arkadi said. “Mavis, this is Soraya.”

  “How did you know my name?” Soraya asked.

  “I know your squad, remember?” Arkadi said. “I want this over as much as you. I want you to go home. Come on out, and I’ll ask if you can ride out with Mavis. Mavis hasn’t hurt anybody, and you’ve cooperated well since I came up here. That counts, remember? I’m going to put in a good word. Sometimes it helps.”

  “I want to burn everything down,” Soraya said.

  “I know,” Arkadi said. “Some days I do too.”

  “How will you go on living with that?” Soraya said, “Once all the rest of us are dead?”

  “I don’t know,” Arkadi said. “I’m still not sure how long any of us are going to survive the peace. Funny, isn’t it? You go all this time fighting the war, thinking it will get you, but it’s the peace that’s killing us, isn’t it? I don’t want peace to kill you, Soraya, not after the war tried so hard to, and failed.”

  “How does this go?” Soraya said.

  Arkadi spoke slowly, softly, “You turn off your suit and kick it to your left. I’ll walk ten paces back here with Mavis to give you some room. You put your left hand on your head and use your right to turn off that blast shield over the door. Be sure you’re not carrying anything in either hand. Just go slow, slow, slow. All right? When the door’s open, you drop to your knees. Keep your hands out. You’re going to see some soldiers coming up the hill to meet us, but that’s all normal. They’ll have weapons drawn, but that’s just protocol. None of them wants to hurt you. These are kids, you understand? Some haven’t done violence to anyone. We can still save some of them. But you’ve got to help. They may handle you a little roughly when they secure you, but I promise, no one wants to do violence to you. Once you are secure they will take you back down the hill with me and Mavis and we’ll have some of that butterscotch candy if it’s in yet, all right? I want to make sure this goes just right, so go ahead and repeat that all back to me.”

  She did.

  Arkadi nodded. “Great, all right, go ahead.” She started to back away, ensuring that the snipers would have a clear shot once the shield went down.

  Soraya powered down her armor and released it. The whole glittery mess of it retracted down into itself, pooling around her feet. Underneath, Soraya was a skinny wisp of a girl in a soiled tunic, all lanky arms and legs and bony knees. It was clear she hadn’t eaten well in a long time, far longer than she and her squad had been on the run. Feeding the soldiers during the war had been difficult enough. Trying to feed them without the help of the enemy food trains they had ransacked all during the war was even harder. There were blackened circles under her eyes, bruising her already dark skin. Her hair had grown in a little, but didn’t yet cover all the scars on her skull.

  From her research, Arkadi had known the girl wasn’t more than seventeen or eighteen, but it was clearer, now. She wasn’t a monster or an alien, outside of the suit. She was just another terrified, exhausted human being: a terrified, exhausted human being turning around to switch off the shield over the door, the only thing keeping her alive.

  The shield went down.

  The girl began to turn again.

  Arkadi should have been stepping back. Stepping away.

  Instead, she said,
“Cover!” and she stepped between Soraya and the light and rushed toward her, arms outstretched.

  Mavis the dog reached Soraya before she did, throwing open his paws and enveloping her as he had been trained to do to protect those under fire.

  Arkadi did not see the shots, but she felt them as she tumbled into Soraya. A fiery hammer whumped into Arkadi’s left shoulder. The dog yelped.

  But Arkadi did hear the crack of Soraya’s head on the floor.

  Arkadi rolled off of Soraya. Mavis still clung to Soraya with his front paws, though there was blood on his rear legs. Soraya’s hand was out, reaching for something. Just a few inches from her grasping fingers was a weapon, neatly hidden under the discarded suit.

  “Don’t!” Arkadi said.

  Soraya raised her head. Her eyes were unfocused. “You lied,” she said. Blood bubbled from her nostrils.

  “I said nobody wanted to hurt you,” Arkadi said. “That was true. Nobody wanted this.”

  “It’s not for you,” Soraya said, and pointed.

  Arkadi followed her arm and saw another soldier on the platform overhead. The soldier tried to bolt, but stumbled.

  He was going to run off and blow up the whole Red Secretary. The team wasn’t going to be fast enough to stop him.

  Arkadi crawled over Soraya and grabbed the weapon with her good hand. She fired at the platform, a wild smear of lights. The soldier rolled up just as she fired again, and then her fire hit him. He tumbled over the railing and crashed to the floor ten paces away.

  Arkadi dropped the weapon. Blood ran down her arm. She turned, terrified, staring at her bloody hands.

  She raised her head . . . and saw the dog trainer already inside the building, crouching over Mavis the dog.

  It should not have surprised Arkadi that the trainer would be first on the scene. Her gaze locked with Arkadi’s, but Arkadi could read nothing in the woman’s expression. Then the trainer was moving again, back down the rise as Revlan’s promised cleanup squad rolled into the room like a tide, precisely two minutes after the shield had gone down.

  Arkadi sank to her knees. She clutched at her shoulder as blood pumped over her fingers. A medic near the back of the mass of soldiers rolled her onto a stretcher. Arkadi watched the fallen weapon kicked about the floor, sliding in the dust made muddy with blood.