Chapter 25
Thomas
It’s settled. Veritas and I will be leaving tonight for somewhere far away from here. My heart feels heavy as we go back inside, contemplating what this decision means. I’ll be leaving my family—possibly for a very long time. I want to cry and hug them and tell them I’ll miss them. Only I can’t. They can’t know I’m leaving. First, because they would probably try and keep me here. Second, because the less they know about where we’re going, the better.
I focus on spending time with them for the rest of the afternoon. I continue reading to Philantrius from a book we had begun during winter break. We order pizza and have a family game night, playing old-fashioned board games and cards until around 9:30 p.m.
Veritas begs off the last game like we planned, claiming she’s wiped out and wants to go to bed. It’s a school night for Philantrius, so she’s already gone upstairs to sleep. I convince Mom and Dad to play one more round of Colonize the Moon and then tell them I’m going to bed as well.
Tonight is Mom’s night to sleep in my room in case I wake up with a nightmare screaming—something that’s happened almost every night so far. But for our plan to work, Veritas has to spend the night in my room instead, like she did last night.
After our last game, I go to the bathroom to brush my teeth. A few minutes later, I come back down the hall to execute part one of our escape plan. Mom is at the dining room table cleaning up the game pieces from our last round of play.
“Mom?”
“Yes, hon?”
“Veritas must have forgotten tonight was your night, and she’s already sleeping on the floor in my room.”
“Oh, okay. Do you think we should wake her up so she can move to the other room? She’d probably be more comfortable in a bed instead of on the floor in that sleeping bag.”
“I already tried, but she’s really zonked out. Maybe we should just let her sleep there tonight.”
“Alright. How are you feeling?”
“Pretty good,” I lie.
“Come give me a hug,” she says. And I do. I give her a big hug and fight back the tears that are threatening to stream down my face.
“I love you, Mom.”
“I love you, too, Tam.”
I go by Dad’s office on the way back to my room. He’s busy typing away on his laptop.
“Goodnight, Dad.”
He stops typing and looks up at me. “Goodnight, son.”
“Can I get a hug?”
“Sure thing.” He gets up from his chair, comes over to the doorway, and we embrace. When we part, he puts his hands on my shoulders and looks me in the eyes.
“I know it’s been tough, but we’ll make it through this together, okay?”
I nod.
“Everything’s gonna be alright.”
“Okay, Dad. Thanks.”
I am about to leave the room when I turn around. “Hey, Dad?”
“Yeah?”
“I love you.”
“I love you, too, son.”
He has a smile on his face. We stare at each other for a few seconds. This is how I want to remember him—to remember us. Smiling and saying we love each other. I realize I forgot to tell Philantrius that I love her, but it’s too late to do much of anything about it now.
I head back to my room and suit up, taping up my camera and putting the hooded robe on that Veritas brought for me to block the GPS chip in the helmet. Veritas is already gone, but the lump in her sleeping bag looks so realistic that I tap it with my foot just to reassure myself. I arrange the pillows in my own bed to resemble a person as best I can and cover them up with my bedspread. After tossing a few things in a small backpack, I sling it over my shoulder, grab my cane, and then crack the door to peer down the hall.
The door to Dad’s office is still open. I can hear him tapping away on the keyboard. Further down the hallway, I hear the refrigerator door close. Mom’s probably making Philantrius’ school lunch for tomorrow. There’s no time to waste.
I slip out of my room and sneak down the hall to the back door that leads onto the porch. It squeaks slightly as I open it, and I cringe inside but don’t stop. I have no idea what I’ll say if I get caught sneaking out.
Closing the door as quietly as I can, I exit the screened door and hobble around the side of the house to the front yard, where Veritas is supposed to be waiting for me behind the Leland Cypress trees that line the fence. I catch a glimpse of her helmet in the moonlight as I slip behind the protective shield of densely-packed tree branches.
When I’m a few feet away from her, she gives me the thumbs-up sign. I reply with the same, and she starts leading the way to our rendezvous point, sneaking along the street, avoiding the light of the street lamps along the way. I get the familiar feeling of going to a reveal party or a freedom movement meeting. But the excitement is tempered by the knowledge that I’m leaving my family and everything I’ve ever known behind, with no clear idea of where I’m going or what the future holds. Thank God Veritas is here. I couldn’t do this without her. She’s the one bright spot in this whole mess.
Twenty minutes later, we’re standing outside a self-storage lot. The fence is fancy—not the chain-link variety. The bottom half of the fence is brick, with closely spaced vertical wrought iron bars ascending from out of the brick base to a height of about six and a half feet. There are spikes at the top of each bar to discourage any would-be climbers. As we approach a gateway that’s fashioned into the fence a robed figure steps out of the shadows on the other side, startling me. I jump back, almost losing my balance, and Veritas grabs my arm to steady me. The person on the other side of the fence punches in a code on the keypad and opens up the door for us to enter.
Once we’re safely inside, our guide locks the gate, holding up a single finger in front of their viewscreen, reminding us to remain silent. We’re led through a maze of storage units of various sizes until we come to a large unit with both a standard roll-up garage-type door as well as a smaller door beside it. Another code lets us in the smaller door. The guide turns to face us, points to their helmet, and then to an open locker along the wall. We dutifully remove our helmets, placing them inside. Only when our own helmets are safely locked away, do they remove their own.
Our guide has black, wavy hair, and his skin is dark, possibly of Indian descent. His eyes are serious-looking, and he has a thin mustache. He looks to be in his early twenties. “My name is Trillian. It’s an honor to meet you,” he says as he extends his hand in my direction.
“Thank you,” I say, somewhat confused.
He shakes Veritas’ hand as well as he continues talking. “The council wanted me to extend their deepest gratitude to you both. You’ve been through quite an ordeal—especially you, Thomas—and yet you didn’t reveal anything of real value that could be used to damage our cause. That’s quite impressive.”
“Thanks, but how would you know? I could’ve told the police everything and been released as a decoy or a spy.”
He chuckles.
“I like the way you think. Let’s just say that we’ve learned how to use all of the government’s surveillance equipment to our own advantage.”
“So that’s how you knew what they were planning to do with Thomas,” Veritas says.
“We’ll have plenty of time to talk about that on the road. Right now, the sooner we get out of here, the safer we’ll all be. Come on.”
He nods in the direction of a large object behind him that’s hidden beneath a tarp. Walking over to it, he quickly removes the covering to reveal a sleek, black hovercraft.
“Is that an RD-45?” I ask, impressed.
“Yes, it is, with a few added bells and whistles,” he says with a smile. “Take off your robes and put them in the trunk. There’s a new suit in the back for each of you. Change into it, then get inside the car. We’ve got to go.”
We take out the new suits, and I notice we’ve got new names, which is probably good since the police will be on the lookout for us once they discover I’m gone. Mine says, ‘Jack,’ and Vee’s says, ‘Jill.’
“Really,” I say, looking over at Veritas. “You’d think they could come up with something more original than ‘Jack’ and ‘Jill.’”
She laughs. “Looks like someone’s into nursery rhymes. Jack fell down and broke his crown, and Jill came tumbling after,” she repeats the lines from the poem as she steps in closer to me, putting one hand on my chest and looking up into my eyes, smiling. She’s whispering the last words like it’s a secret between just the two of us. I can smell her perfume, and I want to kiss her.
“Let’s go, guys, tick-tock,” Trillian reminds us.
Veritas finishes suiting up before I do and gets into the back of the car while I finish changing. Once I’m done, I start to get into the back seat.
“No,” she says. “Your leg. You should ride up front.”
“Not a chance. I’m not passing up the opportunity to sit beside you for a long trip,” I respond, to which she smiles.
“Well, at least scoot the front seat up all the way so you can have some more room.”
Trillian is waiting patiently in the driver’s seat, having already rolled open the exterior door. I finally manage to maneuver into place and shut the passenger-side door. As he depresses the power button, I feel a momentary floating sensation in my gut as the hovercraft rises up off of the ground and glides out onto the narrow lane that runs between the storage units. Trillian holds up a key fob and depresses the button, causing the storage unit door to roll down, and with it, I feel my own life has been split in two. There’s my life before on the other side and my life as a fugitive on this one. Minutes later, we’re cruising down some backroads I’ve never been on before towards our mystery destination.
“Here are your new helmets,” Trillian says as he reaches into the passenger floorboard and hands each of us one while keeping his eyes trained on the road. “They’ve been specially configured to disable GPS tracking, but they’ll fool any of the sensors we stop at along the way.”
“Exactly where are we going?” Vee asks.
“Freetown.”
“I’ve never heard of it. Where is it?” I ask.
“Never mind that. All you need to know is that it’s a safe place where you won’t have to worry about the police dragging you off to jail for another round of interrogation. You’ll find out all about it when we get there. It’s better for everyone that you don’t know any more than that for now.”
Veritas slides her arm under mine, interlacing our fingers as she leans into me and whispers, “I’m so glad you’re going to be someplace safe where they can’t hurt you anymore. And I’m very glad we’re going to be there together.”
“Together is nice,” I say, squeezing her hand.
As we drive into the night, I’m thinking about all I’ve left behind and wondering how this will all play out, inwardly grieving over the fact that I couldn’t even say goodbye to my parents and sister before I left. After an hour or so, I see a sign indicating we’re getting close to the Mississippi River. As I stare out the window, I wonder what my parents will think of me when they find the note I left underneath the pillows on my bed. I kept it short, not having time to write much. I simply wrote, ‘I had to go. I’m sorry. I love you all. I love you, Philantrius.’”
Despite the circumstances, the gentle hum of the hovercraft’s engine is relaxing, and I drift off to sleep before we get to the river.
