First Girl Read online

  Gabi ran her fingers along the glossy tapestry. From a distance, the images had always frightened her, but up close there was only the intricate crosshatching of jewel tones, diving over and under each other like rainbow-hued dolphins. She became aware of the soft kiss of a breeze across her ankles and looked down to see the bottom edge of the tapestry billow outward from the wall. Gabi inched toward the far edge, slipped behind it, and followed the rougher textures of its back until she felt the breeze on her ankles again. Plastering herself against the wall, Gabi smoothed her hands across the concrete and found a crack that traced out the shape of a slender rectangle.

  Gabi’s breath came fast as she fought for air under the shroud. She groped outward and down, just inside the periphery of the crack until her right hand encountered a scooped-out section of concrete no bigger than a walnut. Gabi ran her finger along the inside of the cavity, which was smooth but for a small raised bump. Biting her lip, Gabi pressed it and the rectangle of concrete gave an inch along one side. She nudged it with her shoulder, and the rectangle gave with a click. Harsh light hit her in the face as she tumbled into a sterile passageway lined with doors.

  Gabi knew that corridors like this one extended out from the central body of the temple like rays from the sun, but she had thought they were only accessible by passcard as a precaution against raids by Tribesmen. It had only been eighty-six years since the Gathering In, when Congress was restructured into an executive council overseeing every branch of the Unitas Fellowship. This was why the Corrections Facility took up at least half of the temple complex. Some branches, like Alder, covered many former states, and that meant a lot of documents to correct. The other corridors were taken up by the translation offices where her dad worked, distribution facilities, and additional space for all the paperwork involved in running Witness missions and getting the Returned settled. That gave Gabi a fifty-fifty chance of being in the right place. She moved forward, matching her silent footfalls to the stilted rhythm of her breath, peering at the placards on each door that indicated what lay behind them.

  Her shoulders relaxed as she scanned the first placard, which read “History Archive, 1500–1800, C.F. #82.” C.F. stood for Corrections Facility. She had to suppress the urge to venture beyond every door, but she didn’t have much time, and there was still no guarantee that the archives she sought were in this corridor. The first segment of the passage was dedicated to history, right up until 1 P.G.I.—post–Gathering In. Next came doors dedicated to Civic Life and Government, followed by Domestic Infrastructure, Agriculture and Food Systems, and Security and Defense. Gabi couldn’t see the end of the angled hallway to tell how many doors lay ahead, so she moved to the center of the corridor, picked up her pace, and swiveled her head side to side to assess both rows of doors at once.

  Literature—the hall had several of these doors, broken down by genre—Languages, Technology, Education, Sciences. Gabi staggered to a halt. She wiped her moist palms against the wool of her skirt and withdrew her father’s council passcard from her waistband. Sam had never told Gabi not to use his passcard, but it was understood. Thou shalt not steal. With the flexible logic of a thief, she figured the best way to justify what she was about to do was to make good use of the spoils. Her father never used his passcard on Saturdays anyway, as work-related activities on the Sabbath were frowned upon. Sparing a glance at her watch, Gabi slipped the passcard through the door scanner and heard a click as a light above it glowed green. Sam Lowell was one of the only councilmembers with unlimited access to the temple complex. She could go anywhere in here. If she’d been a little less terrified as she pushed the heavy door open, she would have been giddy with freedom.

  An overhead light powered on and illuminated the sterile, windowless room. It had low ceilings, a long, narrow shape, and none of the candlelit ambience of the temple sanctuary. A small screen and panel of buttons beside the door indicated that the humidity and temperature of the room were strictly controlled. Fortunately the room was laid out in typical library fashion, books and periodicals arranged according to the Dewey Decimal System. This made what she sought easy enough to find, and within minutes Gabi had seated herself beside a pile of marine biology texts. Another glimpse at her watch told her she had twenty minutes to cram as much information into her brain as possible and get back to her seat before anyone noticed she was gone. She didn’t know exactly what she was looking for, but the fact she’d dared so greatly already made the caper worthwhile.

  The pictures in the larger texts included underwater photography, scaled drawings, and illustrations of biochemical processes. While fascinating to look at, trying to absorb that level of detail was overwhelming, so Gabi looked for books more closely resembling the ones on offer in her own school library. Cursing herself for not having thought to bring a bag so she could “borrow” some of the books and take her time going through them, Gabi flipped through the pages as quickly as she could, her eyes drying out from her reluctance to blink.

  She scanned until an odd image in one of the books caught her eye. It was a finely detailed drawing of the bones of a huge hand. She checked the cover of the book, which read, Aquatic Mammals: Origins, Biology, and Behavior. What was an illustration of a human hand doing in a book about cetaceans? She turned back to the drawing and looked at the caption, which read, “Whale appendage, skeletal drawing.” Gabi traced the fine bones on the page with her finger.

  “Impossible,” she whispered. “No wonder these books needed correction.” Still, she couldn’t resist reading the long paragraph under the subtitle “Evolution of Whale Anatomy.” According to the book, studies of whale skeletons revealed vestigial hind limbs with feet and toes, as well as fully articulated hand bones within the casing of their front flippers. This pointed to a land-dwelling whale ancestor that later evolved into an ocean-dwelling species.

  Gabi’s finger rested on the word evolved as she spoke it in the quiet room. “Evolution” was classic Old Science. The word and any of its variations had fallen completely out of use since the Gathering In. There was a time, in early P.G.I., when evolutionary theory was used as fodder for jokes, though the consequences of believing it had been dire. People were still dying from the Divine Wrath unleashed upon them for their distrust of the Word and devotion to the inventions of the human mind.

  Yet something about seeing Old Science in the dry language of academia, accompanied by drawings as detailed as any she had seen before, spurred her on. Gabi grabbed another book and then another, riffling through them to read what other scientists had to say about whale evolution. Aside from variations in presentation and word choice, the books were unanimous. Whales had once dwelled upon land.

  “Yeah, and the earth is flat,” Gabi could imagine Mathew scoffing, yet her pulse quickened as she heaved another huge text onto her lap. Last one, she vowed. She still had to put everything back and return to her seat in time for the reading of the translations, when her empty chair would be more noticeable.

  The tome creaked when she opened it, pages cascading over one another in a tidal shush. It was the same Old Science perspective as far as Gabi could tell, licking her index finger for traction as she flipped through the chapters. But then, just as she was about to close the book, there it was. A close-up photograph of an actual dissected whale flipper, the thick rubbery skin peeled back to reveal the features of a huge, five-fingered hand. Gabi blinked to make sure she wasn’t hallucinating. On impulse, she tore the page from the binding.

  As she did, an alarm shattered the silence, and Gabi’s head exploded in pain. She screamed and clapped her hands over her ears, looking wildly around. She slammed the book shut and shoved it off her lap as if it were on fire, kicking the pile of textbooks away from her. There was a narrow space beneath a nearby bookshelf, and she jammed the volumes into it as well as she could. She’d been caught, and Gabi knew she should stay and face her punishment, but the attack on her senses unleashed a survival instinct that overrode her conscience.

 
; She dashed to the door and swiped the passcard through the scanner, and the green light flashed. Gabi shoved it into her waistband and wrenched the door open, hurrying toward the secret entrance. Perhaps the temple was being evacuated and she could slip in unnoticed? Gabi would be on all the security cameras, of course, but at least an undetected entrance would buy her some time to prepare to meet her fate.

  Gabi had ignored the threat the cameras posed before the alarm went off, since they only powered on when an alarm was triggered. No inch of the complex was immune to the roving eyes of those tiny devices, but power reserves to keep them running all the time weren’t available. Now, with the alarm exploding her eardrums, Gabi felt the cameras’ sharp eyes all over her.

  As abruptly as it had begun, the alarm went quiet, and Gabi was left with only the echo of her thudding heartbeat in her ears. As she stumbled out from behind the tapestry, the sanctuary was empty. She clenched her fists in indecision, overwhelmed by the proportions her small caper had taken on. A crackling sound drew her attention to the stolen whale-dissection photo clutched in her right hand. Despite the consequences she faced, Gabi couldn’t bear to part with the image. That photo held something for her, and she couldn’t let it go until she knew what it was. If the authorities demanded she surrender it, she would, but not until then. Gabi folded the page carefully and slipped it into her waistband in front of the passcard, which had glued itself to her clammy skin.

  The sanctuary still vibrated with the strains of hymns and the shouts of Messengers in trance, but the arrangement of chairs now resembled the epicenter of a bomb blast, suggesting that everyone had fled in a panic. Determined to get the worst over with, Gabi hurried across the room and out through the inner doors, which were now thrown open, so she could hear the roar of a crowd coming from the plaza outside. Even from the vestibule, she could sense the fellows’ fear and confusion, feel their disorientation at being thrust from the womb of union into the bracing light of a winter’s day. Gabi regretted causing their distress, but she had finally met the part of herself that could do, however briefly, and she would treasure that glimpse for the rest of her life. Composing her face into a semblance of calm, she pushed open the outer doors of the temple.

  “Gabi!” The shout came from somewhere in the crowd, whose backs were all turned toward her with necks craned to see whatever drama was unfolding across the plaza. One by one, they turned as Mathew shouldered his way through them to grab her up in a hug. “Where have you been? Where did you go?” he shouted, his face red with windburn and emotion. The gold flecks in his eyes blazed down at her, and Gabi was rocked by the quake of fear in his voice. Mathew was never afraid.

  He was more than a head taller than she, so Gabi’s face was completely buried in the starched front of his dress shirt as he squeezed her, the small buttons tattooing her cheek. “Mmmfffnnn,” she mumbled through the press of fabric. “Gfffrrrmmee!” Gabi jammed her hands under Mathew’s armpits and was finally able to work free by hitting his most sensitive tickle spots. She knew she should feel bad for worrying her brother, but in his worry, he was breaking their unspoken pact to treat each other as equals. So Gabi was out of his sight for a second. So what?

  The crowd had quieted near where she and Mathew stood, and many of the fellows watched them with odd expressions. Mathew noticed the crowd too, and moved so his back shielded Gabi from their probing looks. “Gab, you need to come with me. Now.”

  “What? Why?” Was Mathew charged with bringing her before the council? Did he already know what she had done?

  “Come on.” Mathew grabbed her wrist and towed her through the crowd as whispers rose up around them. Normally Gabi would have been able to hear every word they uttered, layered one atop another in a complex melody, shaded by feelings only she could decode. But the entire situation was so unfamiliar, so bizarre and out of step with the normal rhythm of life in Alder, that Gabi could barely manage her own careening emotions. It was all she could do to keep up with Mathew’s strides as he hauled her along. Was he really so eager to bring her to justice?

  As they broke through the front of the crowd, Gabi saw her father standing by the entrance to the Care Center, surrounded by a cluster of executive councilmembers and a stout security officer in her maroon-and-blue uniform. Officer Katz was in her forties with plump cheeks, carrot-colored hair, and an efficient manner. Her expression, which drew her features together into a florid pinch, made her almost unrecognizable, though not nearly so unrecognizable as the face her father turned to Gabi and Mathew as they approached. It was a face in pieces, though in an instant the look was rearranged into her father’s normal placidity as he strode toward them.

  “Thank God, Gabriela, you had us worried sick!” He hugged her and pulled back, frowning. “Where did you go?” So he didn’t know, at least not yet. Gabi’s plan had been to confess the moment she was questioned, but the sooner she admitted to what she had done, the sooner they would take the photo from her.

  “I—I got mixed up in the crowd with everyone leaving so fast.”

  “Gabriela, you know that when you hear the alarm, you are to remain where you are and wait for your brother or me to find you. Crowds are unpredictable, and in your condition, you could be seriously injured!”

  Gabi’s face heated. Her father and Mathew had no idea what she was capable of. She could feel Mathew’s agitation behind her and the weight of something unspoken tightening around them. She looked at her brother over her shoulder and saw that his eyes were not just worried, but red and puffy around the rims.

  “Mathew? I’m sorry I worried you, I—”

  Mathew shook his head, staring past her at their father.

  “It’s not you,” he mumbled, looking young and lost.

  “Gabriela,” her father said, grabbing her around the shoulders. “Your grandmother is sick. She had a heart attack when the alarm went off.”

  Gabi’s legs gave out, and she sagged against her father as a sucking blackness opened up under her feet. She went down into it, her head growing light and beginning to detach from her body like a helium balloon from a tank. The hatch in the corner of her mind beckoned her toward it. Her father tightened his grip and pulled Gabi close, resting his chin on the top of her head.

  “I know, sweetie, I know, but you have to breathe, okay? Breathe.”

  Gabi squeezed her eyes shut and shook her head. She didn’t want to breathe. She didn’t deserve it.

  “Come on, Gab,” Mathew pleaded. Sam gave her a little shake.

  “Gabriela, your Gram has been taken up to the cardiac wing of the Care Center and is getting the best medical help possible. She needs you to be strong. I need you to be strong, okay? I can’t manage everything at once.”

  Her father’s voice held a note of desperation that tugged Gabi up from the blackness. She’d done enough harm. The least she could do was spare her father more pain because of her selfish whims. She willed her legs to bear her weight, braced her hands on her knees, and dragged in a few ragged breaths.

  “That’s my girl,” Sam said. “Mathew? I need you to look after your sister while I go upstairs. Take her back home for her medicine and get the two of you something to eat. I’ll call soon with an update.”

  “No,” Gabi wheezed, “I’m not going.” She needed to see Gram now, to confess and apologize before security discovered her crime.

  “Gabriela, you can’t miss your medicine,” Sam ordered. “Go home now.”

  Gabi had already lost track of the lies she’d told that day. The next came as easily as if she were the gifted Messenger her father wanted her to be. “I have my medicine with me. I carry it in case I get held up at school or something. It was Gram’s idea.” This last part was true, at least. Grammy Low had tried several times to get Gabi to take her pills with her to school, to no effect. Gabi knew that to be seen with the pills would confirm her weakling status beyond all doubt and make her even more of a target for bullies.

  “Brother Sam? We have a few more questions
if you don’t mind.” Officer Katz looked at Gabi kindly over the rims of her reading glasses. “You okay, honey? We won’t keep him long.”

  Sam drew off his own glasses and rubbed his face roughly. He didn’t just look rumpled, Gabi thought. He looked old.

  “All right, Gabriela, you can wait in the lobby until I’m done with Officer Katz, then we can go up together once the doctors give the okay. Mathew, I’d still like you to go back to the house and get a few personal items for Gram and check on things. Can you do that?”

  “Yes, sir. But I can see her when I come back, right?” Mathew blinked a bright sheen of tears from his eyes.

  “Of course you can, son. Come on up when you get back.”

  “Brother Sam?” Messenger Nystrom had joined Officer Katz, hovering like a noxious vapor. “We need to confirm the cause of the breach and make a statement. People are very upset. They need to know if it’s safe to go home.”

  The crowd had grown as it pressed in on the drama being played out in front of the Care Center. Sam turned to Gabi as Mathew set off toward Cambium Terrace.

  “Wait for me inside, okay? I won’t be long.”

  Gabi nodded, hating herself anew for the many ways she had violated her father’s trust that day. And the day was far from over.

  Chapter THREE

  THE CARE Center was as familiar to Gabi as her own house. She’d visited often with Gram, and to get checkups and oxygen treatments. Then there were all the rushed midnight trips when she woke up wheezing and couldn’t get her breath. The matrix of emotion within the Care Center was complex, as though the entire spectrum of human experience had been condensed into one building, then thinly clouded by an antiseptic veil. It gave the place an aura of mystery that the rest of the world, which constantly blared out its secrets at Gabi whether she wished to know them or not, sorely lacked.

  There was more bustle than usual on the wards, with clusters of scrub-clad Care Center nurses and Minders collected in pockets along the halls, talking in whispers and shaking their heads. Gabi was surprised to see so many Minders on a floor where none of the Returned received care. She had seen at least eight of them roaming the halls with territorial vigilance since she’d stepped off the elevator. Two more were stationed outside a room that had to be Grammy Low’s. Nothing could mask the sweet spiciness that trailed Gram like a weather system, or the slow, deep life rhythm that pulsed out from her center. That rhythm was fainter than usual, though, with a small stutter to it that made Gabi’s blood ice over.