“That’s impossible.” I stretch myself across the container and peer into the glass. My eyes fog over. Tears drip in a steady stream from my face to the slick surface of the stasis pod. Without sound, my heart liquifies and pours from my eyes.
I hug the cold iron foam of the pod and imagine it as the warm embrace of the only girl who has ever made me laugh. “I’m sorry for leaving you,” I whisper.
“Calli,” Neca’s gentle voice startles me, “what happened behind that door?”
There’s nothing left to hide. I had only held back the truth for Zorrah’s protection. And now here she is, buried in a hole in the ground.
I start with Instructor Turon, and I tell Neca everything. I tell him about the dimension Turon called Nirvana. I tell him about how Toltec had thought Zorrah dead. I pour out both my grief and my fear. Toltec could be anyone, even Turon. I didn’t know what to do. I had no choice, so I left Zorrah in a stasis pod in the basement of the academy.
I end by emphasizing I’m just as shocked as he is to find Zorrah here. “Turon said he’d tell me as soon as she had recovered.”
We both stare at the tiny opening in the pod for several seconds. Neca breaks the silence, “Do you think she’s had time to heal?”
“I don’t know. Turon said it could take weeks. Wait, you’re not thinking of—”
Neca’s eyes begin to water. “What are we supposed to do?”
I shake my head. “We can’t wake her up. We don’t know how. If she’s not ready, it could kill her.”
Neca nods, then straightens. “If Centavo is in charge, he’ll watch over her.” A firmness enters his voice. “We should be happy for her. She’s gotten out. And you know what else this means?” He looks me in the eyes. “Turon is working for the resistance on the inside.”
This time, I want to believe him for Zorrah’s sake. But there’s too many unknowns. “Turon could have been found out. Someone else could have moved Zorrah. Even if Turon did it himself, who knows what his motives were? He could still be Toltec. Now that he’s got Zorrah alive, he’s had a change of plans.”
“Why can’t you except the obvious?” Neca asks.
“I can’t allow myself to believe in something simply because I want it to be true.”
“You should have stopped at ‘I can’t believe in something,’” Neca shakes his head. “You can’t believe in anything, can you?”
I grit my teeth. I can tell I’m doing it again. I’m hurting Neca deeply. I don’t want to, but there’s no choice. I think of the most truthful answer I can manage, “Not yet.” I try to cushion the blow with a smile, but I know it just adds to his disappointment.
“You and I,” he gestures between us, “we could have been special together.”
“Maybe,” I nod.
Neca says, “I hope someday we get the chance to fight together again.”
I turn away from him and run my hand along the length of my braid. “If we ever find the way out of here, we will.”
“That’s not what I meant.”
“What then?” I ask.
“I’m staying.”
“Wait,” I shake my head, “you’re what?”
“I’m joining the resistance here and now.” Neca holds up the page of my mother’s book. “Centavo’s given us a personal invitation, both of us.”
I gawk at him, speechless, heart aching.
“This is our ticket out.”
I find my voice, “You can’t. What about the others? The twitch? You’ll die. We all would.”
“If what Turon says is true, we don’t need the academy. We don’t need the regime. We only need a simple plant, and who knows more about plants than you?”
“Turon’s a liar.” As I say the words, I realize I don’t believe them.
Neca raises a brow. “You’re sure of that?”
“It doesn’t matter. I’m not leaving my brother. Never.”
Neca deflates. He knows there’s no point in arguing about Olin. The two of us have to stay together, above all else. “You’re right,” he sighs. “I’ll help you find the way out.”
“Together we have to—”
He shakes his head and starts plodding toward the opposite end of the shaft. “No, I can’t.” The finality in his voice is like a fist to the gut. But as long as we’re moving in the right direction, there is always hope.
It takes fifteen minutes to reach what looks like a dead end. The shaft is more or less straight, the cell Neca and I had awoken in being the only diversion. “Now what?” I stamp my foot in frustration.
Neca hesitates, then inches closer to the end of the tunnel. He reaches out to tap the rock wall with the chemical stick. When he does, the stick passes through it without a sound. Ripples extend outward as if the wall were liquid instead of rock. Neca steps back. “I think this is where we say goodbye, Calli Bluehair.”
Distracted by the oddity in front of me, I pass my own chemical stick briefly through the wall. Only after I realize the wall is some sort of projection mimicking its surroundings, do I focus on what Neca had said. “You could help me find the others.”
“You can’t stay. I can’t go,” he winks. “You’ll find them. I’m sure they’ve only been knocked out. They’re probably already looking for you.”
“For us,” I correct him.
“You’ll think of something. Tell them you saw someone dragging me off. Or tell them the truth—that I never was cut out for the academy, and when I saw a chance to sprint past the PNR, I took it.”
“Point of no return,” I say the words out loud, testing them on my tongue. I shake my head. “That’s not what this moment is. You know that, right?”
He smiles. “You never know for sure until you cross it.”
Thanks so much for taking the time to read this scene of Boundaries, Season 2 of The Green Ones. I’ll be publishing FREE daily scenes from The Green Ones until…I die…or something terrible happens. Seriously, I’ve got over 100 scenes written so far, and I’ll be writing more until the story reaches its natural ending. You are totally welcome to read the entire story for FREE! If at any point you decide you would rather finish the story in ebook or print format, just click the buttons below and you can do that as well. If you enjoy reading the serial releases, BUT you would also like to support me as a writer (my kids need wine!) please subscribe to my premium content for bonus scenes, exclusives, and insider access to my process. And of course, I’d be grateful if you would share this post with any of your reader friends who you think would enjoy The Green Ones. Happy reading!