Vasilisa –

After eating my meager breakfast of a single boiled potato, I had decided to slip out of the Embassy and watch the sun chase the moon across the sky. Sunrises usually comfort me, they provide warmth and light, and bring with them the promise of a new day. The sun has barely risen across an overcast sky when I shut the heavy door of the Embassy behind me, it hangs like a glowing orb against a blanket of gray, and the pale morning is still clinging to the chill of the passing night. The cold air stings my cheeks and each breath I take is marked by a puff of smoke.

I hadn't bothered changing out of Rose's jumpsuit which is made of a durable material, but despite its design, it's a poor insulator and I can feel the cold seep into my bones. I fold my arms across my body, my numb fingers finding warmth in the crooks of my arm, and make my way down a narrow dirt lane behind the Embassy. Piles of crumbling rock and overgrown weeds mark the path, and parts of it are completely overgrown. Everywhere there is a mixture of gray and green and brown, bits of life mixing with bits of destruction. I wonder what life at this compound had been like before the RPD investigation, I think about what kind of people had lived here, and how they might have loved each other.

I stop abruptly in front of a poorly constructed wooden fence that stretches out in both directions. The boards cling to each other, held together with rusted nails and bits of fraying ropes. The fence sways with each gust of wind, causing the planks to creak in a haunting lullaby. I peer between the slats, running my hands along the splintered wood, but the only thing I can see are patches of grass and dirt. I glance from left to right, searching for a gate or a gap in the fence large enough for me to slip through. My eyes eventually fall on a set of metal hinges and an iron latch a little further down. I pull on the latch, but it doesn't budge and my hands come away covered with flakes of rusted metal. Most of the compounds in NAAMA are essentially the same, but we don't have anything like this back home.

It's not home any more.

My curiosity gets the best of me, and after glancing in both directions to make sure no one is around to see me disturb the peace, I throw the full weight of my body against the gate. Having grossly overestimated the structural integrity of the gate, both it and myself crash to the ground with a thud. The fall should have at least stung, but I don't feel a thing, I'm too distracted by the scene laid out before me.

There are tall patches of grass and weeds in every direction, but the overgrowth isn't what sends my heart into overdrive. Mounds of hewn rock have been arranged in rows and columns, and each is marked with tiny script. I stare at the one nearest to me; it stands only a foot away from where I lay sprawled out on the toppled gate. The numbers, 11042021, have been crudely carved into it. I stare at the numbers intently, and suck in a breath of cool air when I figure out that the numbers are referring to a date. I clamber to my feet and rush over to the next stone.

11042021…

And then the next stone.

11042021…

Each stone bares the same date, and it doesn't take me long to realize that I am standing on the graves of the people who had once lived here. I sink to my knees in front of the nearest stone, the numbers blurring together as tears fill my eyes.

Who had been buried here? Men and women? Children and families? An entire village lies beneath me, with nothing to mark their existence, save for these lumps of rock. Had their deaths been quick? Had they been mourned? A million questions swirl within me, but they slip away after a few moments, replaced by a rush of anger and sadness.

Mikhail had said that the teachers here had strayed from NAAMA approved curriculum, that the citizens were learning. I realize that if any other investigator had been sent to apprehend Victor, our compound would have met a similar fate. It could just have easily been Adrian or Dimitri buried in the cold, hard earth. Rose's presence in my life had turned it upside down, but she had saved it in the process.

"Lissa?" a voice calls from behind me.

I quickly wipe the tears from eyes and turn to see Rose, standing in the gap I created in the fence. Her dark hair is still matted with dirt and blood, her skin marred with yellowing bruises and scrapes. She is paler and thinner than when I had first met her, and her dark eyes, eyes that used to light up with a fiery determination, are wide and haunted.

"How is your shoulder?" I ask getting hastily to my feet.

Dimitri must have constructed another sling because her left arm lays cradled against her chest, held up by strips of cloth and bandages. I brace myself for the answer, scared of what she'll say. The damage to her shoulder had been extensive to begin with, and I can only imagine what the impact of our escape would eventually amount to.

Her lips form a tight smile. "Hurts like hell, but I'm alive," she pauses for a brief moment, and her voice gets softer, "And I have you to thank for that."

"No," I say shaking my head, "We wouldn't have made it out of there alive if you hadn't done what you did."

She takes a few steps toward me, but stops in front of a grave marker. Her eyes narrow as she studies the inscription and I watch the cycle of emotions play out across her face; confusion, realization, anguish, outrage…

Her eyes flicker between me and the gravestone. "Are these…?"

I swallow hard and nod. "They're all dead."

Rose kneels in front of the stone, running her hand across it and tracing the numbers with the tips of her fingers. I stride over and crouch beside her. "How many people do you think have died since the Pulse?" she whispers.

"I don't know," I tell her simply. "Who knows how many people even survived it to begin with."

She draws back her hand, "I hate this," she growls under her breath. "I hate the Pulse, and I hate that instead of moving forward, we let Ozera push us back. I hate that we've lost so much, and sacrificed so much, but still live in a world where people can be slaughtered for what they know." Her fist clenches and unclenches in her lap. "There is so much hate; I'm filled with it, fueled by it even."

"Hate can be a pretty strong motivator," I say bleakly.

"Do you hate Victor?" she asks, her eyes darting away from mine.

A cold hand wraps itself around my heart. "I want to hate him…for what he did to my parents, for what he did to you…but I don't know if I do"

She flinches. "Is that why you didn't shoot him?"

"I did shoot him," I say defensively. "I just…missed."

She holds out her hand, "Give me the gun."

I stare at her with my mouth hanging open, but eventually recover from the initial shock of her request. "Why?"

"I want to show you something," she says, her good hand still extended toward me.

I remove the gun from its resting place in my pocket and place it gingerly in her hand. She begins disassembling the gun, and even with only one hand, she does so quickly and methodically. The metal parts lay sprawled out on the grass in front of her, and she selects a small cylindrical object and holds it in front of me.

"This," she says, her eyes narrowing as she studies it. "Is a fire-control system. It's meant to assist the shooter with hitting their target; it improves the accuracy of even the most inexperienced shooters exponentially. You were standing ten yards away, missing should have been impossible."

She mentions something else about a computer and a radar, but my mind is no longer in the present. I let myself fall away and conjure the image of Victor with a knife to Rose's throat, and remember the way the gun had felt in my hand. I had been shaking violently, but I had somehow managed to draw the gun from my pocket and point it at the man who raised me. I knew what shooting him would mean, and I had pulled the trigger anyways. I had every intention of killing him, but I hadn't.

"I wanted to shoot him," I admit. "Maybe a part of me knew that I couldn't do it though, and pulled to the side at the last second."

"You did the right thing," she tells me firmly. "Taking a life…it changes you, even when everyone around you is convinced that it was done for the right reasons, but is there really such thing as a right reason? And who are we to determine what that reason is, what qualifies as right and wrong? Victor is a bad man, who has done bad things…" Her voice trails off.

"Rose?" I ask concernedly. "What's wrong?"

"Nothing," she says evasively. She yanks a blade of grass out of the ground and starts examining it.

"He was in the jeep with you," I say, thinking back to yesterday. "He must have known we would try and escape."

"He sold us out to the Provincial Guard, even convinced them to let him interrogate me."

"He did what?" I ask, trying not to let my voice tremble.

"He wanted to know where you were, what you were planning," she says absentmindedly, her eyes focusing on the blade of grass. "His approach was all wrong though, he showed his hand too quickly, and skipped the whole good cop thing and went straight for the bad cop."

I furrow my brows in confusion, "Bad cop?"

"Never mind," she says, releasing the grass and letting it flutter to the ground.

I chew on my lip, trying to choose my words carefully. "You sound like you have a lot of experience with that sort of thing."

She lets out a humorless laugh. "You could say that."

"Rose," I say, wringing my hands together nervously. "When I was stitching you up, I noticed…well, you have a lot of scars. They're everywhere, your back and your arms…"

This time she rips a handful of grass from the ground. "My education was very hands on." She sprinkles the grass onto her lap.

A tiny gasp of horror escapes my mouth. "You mean they did this to you? Your instructors?"

"My classmates actually, during our study of interrogation techniques."

I stare at her in disbelief. "Why?"

"The human condition is complex. Some of us are more resilient than others. Some of us can spit in the face of danger, and some of us cower before it. Everyone is different, but everyone has their breaking point." I sit frozen beside her, and when I don't respond, she continues. "Our instructors wanted us to understand what it meant to teeter on the edge of that breaking point, so that when the time came, we would know how to push others beyond it." Her tone and expression are completely neutral, but the rest of her is shaking.

"So they tortured you?" I asked through gritted teeth. "Rose…I'm…I'm so sorry."

"Don't be," she says bitterly. "I wasn't completely blameless. For every scar on my back, I dealt out three others just like it. I was good at it…I was the best."

Rose squeezes her eyes shut, her whole face contorting with guilt and misery. Instead of wearing her heart on her sleeve, she wears regret. I reach out for her hand, tentatively at first, and then with more resolve. I take it in my own and squeeze it reassuringly. Her eyes don't open, but a single tear manages to escape and it slides down her cheek.

"You aren't that person anymore," I tell her, my tone urgent.

"How can you say that?" she asks, her voice barely a whisper. "You hardly know me." She slips her hand out of mine and brushes the grass from her lap.

"Maybe that's true," I concede.

"It is true," she says bluntly.

"Fine, we hardly know each other, but I can see you."

She turns her head, an almost amused look on her face. "I'm relieved to know your eyes are working properly."

"That's not what I mean," I tell her, rolling my eyes. "I see you, I see the person you really are, and I see the person you're trying to be. I see it, because I deal with the same thing every day."

She tilts her head to the side and stares at me curiously. "Deal with what?"

I let out a breath I didn't know I was holding. "Trying to figure out what kind of person I am, being at war with the way I am and the way I want to be."

"Victor was right," she says, her eyes returning to the headstone.

"Right about what?" I ask, scared what the answer might be.

"He once told me that I was drawn to you because I thought we were the same. He said: 'You want to see your own struggle mirrored in another human being. You've been alone all of your life, desperately searching for someone to understand you, and you think that that person is Vasilisa.' I didn't take him seriously, but now…I don't know, maybe he was right." She runs a hand through her hair in frustration, "It's kind of annoying actually, how perceptive he is."

A small, sad smile spreads across my face. "He's brilliant, and I think that maybe his intentions were good, but his execution was just…"

"Ruthless?" she offers.

I grimace, "Yes."

"What were his intentions?" she asks after a brief moment of silence. "You said that he was planning something."

I had yet to reveal the more intimate details of Victor's plan for me and for the Havens. Rose and Dimitri trusted me and hadn't asked why I was so desperate to leave the compound. They had never asked for an explanation and so I had never given one, until now.

"Victor believes that there are people out there, like him, intellectuals who have been gathering at the Havens since the Pulse. He said that they were capable of a rebellion, of bringing down the Executor and leading NAAMA out of the dark."

"Then why haven't they?" Rose asks incredulously.

"He said they were waiting for a catalyst, someone to motivate them to act."

"Him?" she asks, the disgust evident in her tone.

I fix my eyes on a point on the ground. "Me."

"You?"

"Me," I repeat, nodding my head up and down. "He said I was special, that even when I was little he could tell that I was different – that I perceived the world differently and that people were drawn to me. He wanted to teach me to be a leader, to nurture what he called 'gifts,' but my parents were scared. Even then, they knew how dangerous knowledge could be."

"So he had them killed," says Rose, the anger rising in her tone "And now you…what? You want to go to the Havens and be the person Victor molded you into?"

"It's not that simple," I snap, rising to my feet. "My parents died so that this version of me could exist."

"So you're going to honor their memory by doing exactly what the man who murdered them wanted?" she asks, struggling to stand up herself.

"Look around," I say, gesturing to the headstones. "Look at all the death and the destruction. These people are dead because they knew too much, when does it end? When all of the light and the logic gets sucked from the world like a vacuum? When do we get to stop paying for the mistakes of the people who came before us? I won't leave this world behind for the next generation; no child of mine will grow up fearing darkness because they know turning on a light is impossible," I take a breath, willing myself to remain calm. "And if that means being the best, most intelligent version of myself, and using the tools Victor gave me, then so be it."

My heart is hammering in my chest when I finish, I had finally accepted what my role would have to be in NAAMA's future. Coming to terms with my past and letting go of the life I could have had is something I hadn't known I needed to do until this moment.

Rose's expression remains impassive as she studies me carefully. "Okay," is all she says when she finally speaks.

"Okay?" I ask.

"I'm with you," she says, smiling meekly. "If you're going to save the world from stupidity, you're probably going to need my help."

Okey dokey, a lot of dialogue, but this conversation answered a lot of questions and set up the plot for the next book. Next chapter – getting to the Havens, final chapter – a sneak peak of the Havens! Again, I am completely taken aback by your responses to this story; your reviews make me so happy and inspire me to keep writing! A sequel is on its way; make sure that you're following me so you will be alerted when the new story gets posted.