Evolution (30 page)

Jonas hesitates, eyes locked with mine.  He breaks my
gaze and looks at Apollon.  He nods.  "We're still going
south," he says.  "That's where the river's taking us. 
There's no stopping that.  But it won't hurt to find Eden's tower along
the way."

Won’t it?  Can’t it?  A flood of panic rises in
me.  I’m about to take everything back.

Jonas eyes swing back to me.  "If that's what Fate
wants, it'll be there."

There’s a finality to the words.  Decision done. 
Fate will decide.  But can I trust Fate to take care of us?  Any city
we go into could be a death sentence.  It's not a smart decision. 
Fate.  Is there even any such thing?

Jonas must sense my hesitation.  He gets up and heads
outside.  "It's done," he calls back.

Yep.  Decision final.

We've lashed together a mess of floatable scrap salvaged
from the ruins, making our raft several times larger than before.  Some of
it, at one point, might have even been a boat.  Apollon has packed mud in
the center and fashioned a little tent of blankets around it.  He assures
us that we can have a campfire right there in the middle.  I, on the other
hand, do not think this seems like the wisest of ideas, but he insists it's OK,
saying it worked for Huck Finn, whoever that is.  I suppose if our raft
catches fire there’s plenty of water around to put it out.

We float out into the river once again, guiding our little
craft with oars that actually work.  The sun is setting behind the western
bank of trees.  A still, quiet evening.  The river's hand pulls us in
and flings us onward, but aside from the initial lurch I have the feeling that
we are just drifting lazily down the darkening channel.

Nighttime on the river is mysterious and beautiful.  We
can cover more ground if we travel at night, and we also have a much better
chance of seeing any city we might pass.  Apollon gets our fire
going.  Miraculously, it stays where it's meant to.  He takes the
first watch while the rest of us sleep curled up around the edges of the
fire.  I still end up sharing packs with Jonas, because one of our
bedrolls was used to make the tent.  I fall asleep snuggled against him,
deeply enjoying the comfort of his breath on my neck, and how right that feels.

When I wake in the middle of the night, Jonas is gone, and
Apollon is climbing in with me.  "I'm not sleeping with Jack,"
he mutters quietly.  I just laugh, half-asleep, and snuggle into the crook
of his arm.  I don't wake again until the early hours of the
morning.  Apollon and Jack are still sound asleep.  Jonas has been on
watch for the longer part of the night.  He must be exhausted.  I
quietly climb out of bed and go to relieve him.

"Your turn for some sleep," I murmur, coming up
beside him as he turns to me.

He just looks past me and smiles.  "Maybe I'll
wait."

I glance back, remembering the situation with the
packs.  I don't know that Jonas and Apollon would fit in the same pack,
and somehow I have trouble imagining either of them curling up with Jack. 
I give Jonas a crooked smile.  "I guess that was to be
expected.  Sorry."

He smiles back.  A bit of firelight reaches to touch
one side of his face.  "It's OK.  I'm in good company."

The little flutter inside me is unexpected—or maybe it's his
words that are unexpected.  Jonas has never been so warm to me before, so
inviting.  I meet his eyes and there's this little spark that is not from
the fire.  It sets an inferno burning inside me.  I feel dizzy,
sucker-punched, full of confusion.  But I don't want it to stop.... 
Jonas is the worst of drugs for me.  I'm an addict.  His poison is in
my veins and I don't think I'll ever be clean.  Just the tiniest taste,
and I can't pull away.

He offers a quiet laugh at my silence, his smile
increasing.  "Did you sleep well?" he murmurs.  He moves
closer to me, maybe so we can hear each other without waking the others, or
maybe unconsciously, the way I catch myself leaning closer to him.

"Yeah."  I turn a touch away from him,
angling my body toward the ribbon of water before us.  Dawn is just
breaking in the east and the river is revealed in colors of heaven. 
"Like a rock.  All this traveling is tiring, huh?"

"A bit," he agrees, considering the water. 
His eyes move to my face, and his hand to my hip, one finger hooking up under
the bottom of my coat into my belt loop.  He tugs me closer.  I
stumble a small step toward him.  His other hand reaches behind me and
comes back with a handful of fur.  "You're shedding."

I snatch my fur away from him and start stuffing it back
into my coat, but he hasn't let go of my belt loop.

"Do you really still need all that?" he
asks.  "It's not that cold here."

It's not, but it could just be a warm spell.  I give
him a sideways look.  "I'll get rid of it when I'm ready."

"And when will that be," he says,
"Stinky?"  The taunt in his voice is not even close to
malicious, and something about the reference to the first day we knew each
other sends another wave of warmth surging through me.  It solidifies
something.  Our journey together.  Our bond as family.

I quit stuffing my fur back into my coat and throw it at him
instead.  He starts laughing, and instead of just batting it away, he has
hold of my hands.  We wrestle with each other, giggling, until he grabs me
and pulls me hard against him, pinning my arms between us so I can't accost him
anymore.  I yelp at the unexpectedness of it, but then we're just looking
into each other's eyes, breathing a little too hard, our faces playing smiles
that are only shadows of the emotions inside.

Apollon coughs, a fortunate but undesired interruption, and
rolls from his pack, staggering to his feet.

Jonas releases me and I step back.

My blonde friend yawns and stretches, and pretends like he
doesn't know what he's interrupting.  "Seriously?" he says to
Jonas through another yawn.  "You're still awake?"  He
looks over at Jack, who is sleeping like a baby.  "Ah. 
Well.  Here, get some rest."  He leaves the pack turned down for
Jonas, who glances at me, then accepts the offering.

Apollon, always thinking about food, says, "Time to get
some breakfast."

I'm still not sure what he's up to, but he messes around
with some of the things in Jack's plastic box, tying a tiny metal hook onto a
piece of the string.  Then he sticks some of his saved—and smelling—rabbit
guts onto the metal bit, and dangles it into the water.  He's fashioned
the other end to a stick that he secures onto the deck of our raft.

"Uh... fishing?" I ask after a moment.

He nods approvingly.  "You finally figured it
out."

"I just don't see how a fish is going to find your
little hook in all this."  I make a sweeping gesture of the river.

He shrugs.  "We'll find out."  Then he
glances back at Jonas' still form, looks at me, and rolls his eyes.

I narrow my eyes at him.

"Idiot," he says very quietly, shaking his head.

"I am not," I protest, just as quietly.

"You absolutely are," he whispers, leaning toward
me.  We're sitting cross-legged at the front edge of the raft. 
"I've already told you, you're going to end up with a broken heart. 
I
know
, Eden.  I'm trying to look out for you.  I don't know
why you won't trust me."

I give him a sad look.  "I do," I say. 
"I trust you."

"Then why aren't you listening?"

My forehead scrunches up pitifully before my
even-more-pitiful answer:  "I'm trying."

Apollon sighs.  There's a little rustle of blankets,
and he turns his head to look toward Jonas.  His eyes glaze over with an
idea.  He reaches toward me, his arms finding my waist.

"Um.  What're you doing?"  I press my
hands against his chest, pushing back gently.  I keep my voice low, but
clearly my face is written in horror and confusion.

He gives me a look that says 'duh'.  "I'm saving
you from your little crush," he murmurs, pulling me insistently toward
him.  "I refuse to watch you crash and burn."

Somehow I keep my arms and feet between us.  "I'm
not taking advice from you," I protest.  My voice climbs a little
louder than I intend it to.  "You're worse than an alley cat! 
What do you know about love!"  I cringe inwardly, even as the word
comes out of my mouth.  Even as I realize how audible it was on the quiet
river.

What Apollon does makes it worse.  Or better.  I
really don't know, but I'm pretty sure I want to push him off the raft. 
He gives me the sultry look, his voice taking on that quality, but also pitched
loud enough to be heard.  "I've never wanted to change that
before," he says.  "But for you, Eden... you make me want to
be... I don't know.  Different.  I feel so... right... when I'm with
you."

There is a span of horrible silence while I gawk at him.
 Another barely audible rustle of blankets.  I think I want to
cry.  Instead, I jab Apollon hard in the gut.  He muffles the sound
of his pain and narrows his eyes at me.  Mingled with the frustration in
his look, there is acceptance.  Forgiveness.  He doesn't have to say
to me that pain sometimes serves a purpose.

I look away from him, into the water.  I hate him for
this, but even so I'm thankful for his attempts to shield me from myself. 
I'm thankful that in all this world there is someone who cares if I get
hurt.  Tears catch on the brim of my eyelashes, but I'm not sure if
they're about losing a lover, or gaining a friend.

Apollon reaches over now with one hand and brushes my
cheek.  I look at him, and his blue eyes are full of understanding. 
He regrets that I'm hurting, but he still believes he's done the right thing.

Maybe he has.

I laugh softly through my nose, watching the water
again.  Who's to say that he's done anything other than pissed Jonas
off?  But then, which of us knows Jonas better?  That is a very
good—and very complicated—question.  I can't answer it.  Apollon
can't answer it.  There is one person who will answer it, and that will
come in time.

We're quiet and still for a long, long time, watching the
water lap around the raft, watching the sun take wing in the sky.  In the
silence, I breathe and try to let this all go.  I think of Fate.  I
imagine giving myself into her hands.  At some point, as we wind down the
river, I feel the release of it.  Whatever happens, happens.  It's
all exactly like this river.  We'll be carried somewhere by forces we
can't see, but can maybe sense.  We'll do our best to survive.  And
in some moments, we'll stop and see the beauty of it all.

I reach down and trail my fingers in the cold water, trying
to see through the murkiness to what might be below.  "It's so
pretty," I say softly.  "So... mysterious."

I don't look at Apollon, but I can hear the grin in his
voice when he answers.  "It is," he says.  He lays down on
his belly so he can peer into the river.

I stretch out beside him and we're like kids trying to see
the bottom of a well.  I wonder what could possibly be down there.  I
wonder how many lives this water has touched.

Next to me, Apollon murmurs, "'The face of the water,
in time, became a wonderful book—a book that was a dead language to the uneducated
passenger, but which told its mind to me without reserve, delivering its most
cherished secrets as clearly as if it uttered them with a voice.'"

I lift my head to look at him.  "Who was
that?"

A moment later, he pulls his eyes from the water and looks
at me.  "Mark Twain," he smiles.

"And who was he?" I ask, leaning on one elbow.

Apollon just shrugs, his smile broadening.  "I
think he must have been a friend of the river."

There are things I'm getting used to.  I'm getting used
to the feel of moving down the river.  I'm getting used to the taste of
fish.  I'm getting used to Jack's counting and humming.  I'm getting
used to passing endless banks and forests without so much as a glimpse of
anything that might be a city.  Jonas' distance—I am not getting used to
that.

He's so perfectly polite to me.  There are occasional
smiles.  Joking around, even.  The difference is hard to put my
finger on.  It's there, though, in between us, like the little space
between our bodies when we sleep in the same pack.  It's in the silence
where there used to be words.  In the look I can't read but can
feel.  It's in me, drenched in longing I wish I was brave enough to put
away.  Lost in thoughts that are more twisted than the river.

Something is missing.  I want to fight the pain with
activity, but there's nowhere to go, nothing to do.  I pace our
raft.  I count nuts with Jack.  I volunteer to skin, gut, and cook
every stinking fish.  Apollon tries to soothe me with tales, but sometimes
he looks worried.  Maybe he's thinking that he was too late.

We've decided to keep going—day and night, I don't know
why.  We stop so seldom, but one day we are forced to seek shore to pass
an epic storm.  It's only rain, but it's freezing.  I stand in it for
too long, wanting to be soaked.  Apollon yanks me out of it, back to our
little fire, where he throws a blanket over my head to shield me from the rain,
and also uses it to rub down my arms.

"You really are an idiot," he mutters as he
attempts to dry me off.  "Who do you think you are?  King
Lear?"  I ignore him and stare into the flames.  I can feel
Jonas looking at me from across the fire.

Luckily, I don't get sick from my little moment of madness,
but about a week later, Apollon does.  It's not bad—a cold.  We push on,
insisting he stay in bed.  I force him to eat fish broth, and he laughs
about how he liked it better when I fed him rat broth.  We're all getting
tired of fish, not that any of us ever liked it.  I have a feeling,
though, that he's trying to distract me, despite being ill.  It doesn't
work very well, not with Jonas glancing at us occasionally, his thoughts
carefully shielded behind his eyes.  It's the one time, when he thinks I'm
not looking and I see him swallow—that's the time that gets me.  I look away,
trying to think of other things.  But I'm thinking of Jonas, of his
loyalty to Apollon, and how I would love him just for that, even if... 
even if.  The thoughts won't seem to go away, so I subvert them. 
Maybe it's not loyalty.  Maybe it's just that it's not that big of a deal
to him.  I hold fast to the decision that was, at first, Apollon's. 
It has become my own, despite my heart's resistance.  I will walk this
thick path of torment, and one day I will see clear sky on the other side. 
I'm resolved.

One day, the pain feels like it falls flat on its
face.  Oh, it's still there, but it's horizontal.  I focus even
harder on things to do.  I whittle a stick into a sharp point, not that I
know what I'm going to do with it.  I get Jack started on
sorting
the
nuts.  I make a necklace out of fishing string and metal bits.  I sew
a hole in Apollon's pant leg.  I clean more fish.

I watch the shoreline at night, waiting for my moment. 
Now, desperately compelled to do something,
anything
, the fear and
disgust I felt after George’s death is giving way to a kind of reckless
abandon.  If only I had something to use it on.  "Where are all
the cities?" I complain.

Jonas snuffs air out his nose in answer.  He says
nothing about Fate.

The days move on and on, turning to weeks, possibly
more.  I lose count.  Then there's one afternoon when it's suddenly
so warm that I want to take off my coat for the first time in as long as I can
remember.  I unfasten the buttons and peel it off.  Wads of fur come off
with it, and some, sticking to me, suddenly release and float into the subtle
breeze.  I look up, and Jonas is watching me from where he sits.  He
blinks, and there's no comment.  I don't say anything.  I shake my
coat out and watch what's left of my fur land in clumps on the water.

Jonas turns his face away, like he's busy watching our
course.

I toss my jacket down and sit on the other side of the raft,
picking little bits of rabbit hair off of my arm.  There are more ruins
coming up along the shore, but I'm not really interested.  We've seen a
lot of broken down buildings, and to be honest, they creep us out. 
Perhaps we should be searching through them, but none of us really want
to.  Especially not Apollon.  So, looking behind us, I watch them
drift away.

Only a moment later, Apollon is yelling for oars.  We
leap up and get them, straining to see what's going on.  Ahead in the
river, there's something.  A broken span.  Huge.  It hangs
diagonally into the river and the current whips around the place where it
breaks the water, sending a splash of white froth tossing on the air.

We're paddling to get out of the way of the rough place,
aiming to pass under where there is a clear path.  Still, I can't help but
gawk at the structure—another something from our Forefathers, no doubt. 
Our stupid Forefathers.

"Is that... a bridge?" I ask as we get
closer.  I try to imagine what it would take to build a bridge across
water this wide.  It hits me.  How could they possibly do that and be
stupid?

We manage to clear the bridge, passing through its
shade.  It's not that big of a deal, but I'm shaking like we've narrowly
missed death.  A moment later, I realize that it has nothing to do with
the river.  The adrenaline moving through my veins is something else
entirely.

I join Apollon where he sits on one corner of the
raft.  As I cross my legs and take a seat next to him, I say, "They
weren't stupid."

He looks at me, his face shadowed with his own dark
thoughts, and says nothing.

"They were amazing," I say.  "They did
all sorts of amazing things.  Sentries, even—they're amazing. 
Stupid, but amazing.  Their
design
is not stupid.  It's just
the way that they act.  So how can they be both things?"

His eyes scan my face, searching, like they will find an
answer there.  Finally, he looks away, his thoughts drifting out over the
muddy water.  He's quiet for a long time, his fingers playing over the
cargo pocket on his pants, and something flat inside.  Finally he says,
"Stupid by design."

The words, sinking in, feel like a betrayal.  I shake
my head, wanting to refuse the idea.  "How could they—"  My
voice cracks.  "How could the Forefathers do that to us? 
Why?  Why would they?"

Apollon manages the slightest shake of his head.  He
doesn't seem to have an answer, or want to find one.

After a long time, it's Jonas' voice that answers, from
across the raft.  "Maybe they didn't want us to be OK."

I look over my shoulder at him.  He's turned
away.  He flings a stick out into the water and watches it move away on
the waves.

I turn back to Apollon.  "Do you think that's
true?" I ask.  My voice demands an answer from him, but before he can
form one, I ask another question.  "That thing we found—what was
it?  It bothered you.  Is that because Jonas is right?"  My
eyes flit to his pocket, realizing what is inside.

Apollon takes his hand away and sighs—a long sigh, like he's
tired.  Like he's thought about this time and time again, and one more
time is just too much.  "I don't know," he says, finally. 
"The thing... it's something I've read about.  I didn't think it was
real.  But just because it exists—physically, I mean—that doesn't mean it
can do all the things people claimed it could."

"How do we find out?"

"I wish Miranda was here," he says, which is a
very odd thing for Apollon to say, indeed.  "She'd know more. 
She might understand it.  It doesn't do anything, as far as I can tell...
but it could be broken.  I mean, it's older than old.  From before
the Turn, presumably."

For just a moment, thinking of Miranda takes my mind off of
these questions.  Instead, I'm worrying about my friend.  Does she
even exist anymore?

"It doesn't make sense," Apollon says, looking at
Jonas.  "I mean, we could probably come up with all sorts of
conspiracies.  It would seem that we've been in some sort of prison, and
the Forefathers are out there laughing at us.  Only, I don't see any sign
of them, except maybe that hand that Eden told us about.  I just... I
really don't get it."

Jonas turns around and considers Apollon. 
"Sometimes people are not understandable.  Sometimes they're just
evil, and there's no reason for it."

Apollon shakes his head.  "Evil usually has it's
reasons."  His eyes dart to me, "I mean, take Eden for
example..."

"If I had a rabbit, I would whap you with it."

"I'm sure you would," he agrees, his face melting
into a smile.

Jonas turns away and looks back out over the water.

Like that, our serious conversation is over—mostly because
none of us want to continue thinking about it.  Apollon and I banter for a
while, and Jack even joins in by laughing at us.  He sits back, holding
his ankles, and listens, and laughs and laughs.  Life continues.  We
float onward.  The bridge, the choppy water, and all the questions are
behind us.

***

It would seem the warmer weather is not an anomaly.  I
wear my coat at night, but by late mornings, I'm fine without it.  The
landscape along the river is changing as well.  The trees are
different.  There's green that is not pine.  One evening Apollon and
Jonas sit together at the front of the raft, and I can hear their words drifting
back.

"I don't know how much more south we can possibly
go," Apollon says.  It sticks in my head.

"I'm guessing not all that far."  Jonas
sounds uncertain.  "This world is big, but there's an end to it down
there somewhere.  Eventually, we're going to hit ocean, aren't we?"

I glance at their backs.  Apollon is nodding.

I work on scraping the scales from our dinner, and
consider.  What if we go all the way to the end of this river, and there's
no city?  Is that Fate trying to tell me to leave it?  To give
up?  Or do I continue... on land, I guess, in whatever direction we may
go, and take the first city I find there?  Do I even believe in this
invisible string that’s dangling me along?

I'm restless, now more than ever.  I want to do
something, but I'm worried about the driving force behind it.  Why do I
feel the need to do this thing?  Couldn't we really just be happy to build
our own little camp somewhere and live, as Jonas would say, in freedom?

For long moments my thoughts wander back to Outpost
Three.  To the people I would, in hindsight, call friends.  The
people who fixed themselves to me by some invisible bond.  Would I know if
they were dead?  Feel something?  Or would I just go on?  It
seems so long now, and half a world away.  This river does not flow back
the way we came.  Even if it did, it's a miracle that we made it through
all those cities.  We'd have to try to go around them to get back to the
Outpost.  Would we even be able to find the way?  Part of me is
starting to come to terms with the fact that Outpost Three is lost—if not to
the world, then at least to me.  But yes, most likely, to the world. 
There's a sorrow deep inside at this thought, but far down and bottled
up.  It's just something I can't hold onto anymore, yanked from my
hand.  I feel like I'm watching it fly away, too.  There are so many
things that we can't hold on to.

Grief swells inside me, like it might rise up.  I allow
myself to feel it briefly.  I look out on the water, where the sun is
reflecting, and I think of Oscar.  For one tangible instant I feel like we
are together—like I have transcended space and time, and I am where he is, or
he is here with me, or we are together somewhere where we once were.  All
these things—the river and trees, the cities, the Sentries—they are just
things, but we are what's real.  The things evaporate, and the barriers
between us are nothing more than ghosts.

I stumble out of my ponderings when I've completed skinning
and gutting the fish.  But I'm still feeling torn.  I feel duty-bound
to try to save the Outpost, even though it is almost certainly too late. 
Whatever strange force is inside me, it still compels me toward that course of
action.  But entering a city again is not a smart idea, and will endanger
all of us.  George flashes through my mind, a warning.  If I was
smart—if I thought about this logically—I would want to avoid the cities
altogether.  Consider the lives of my friends.  Care for, protect,
what I have.  The guilt that comes along with that idea is hard to
bear.  I find myself digging through my pack, finding my otter ring. 
I slip it onto my index finger and fiddle with it for a while.  I feel
like part of me is trying to apologize for the things that have happened, or
that will.

My fingers caress the ring, and I'm still deep in thought as
I roast the fish quietly.  We sit around our raft fire and eat in
silence.  Darkness is quickly descending around us.  I consider again
and again, staring into the flames.  Night on the river feels like a
different kind of place—one that magnifies meaning, demands deep answers to
every question.  The sounds of water and fire mingle, waves lapping, the
pop of the logs.  It's peaceful.  We could go on like this
forever.  We could be happy.

For the first time, I think I'm certain.  In my mind I'm
forming words, figuring out how to explain my change of heart.  I toss the
bone portion of my dinner over the edge of the raft, lick my fingers clean,
then turn back to my friends.

"The box," says Jack softly.  "It's all
a box."

I frown at him, but Apollon and Jonas stand up and follow
Jack's gaze ahead of us.