Page 64 of The Godhead Complex
Orange took her binoculars back from Miyoko. “It won’t last longer than a day. This skirmish will be over by sunset or tomorrow’s sunrise.”
Minho had to agree with her, especially from what he’d heard about the people in this city of Gods. Lacking weaponry and its people unskilled in the ones they had.
Dominic held up his knife like a candle. “I just want to point out that I was the only one who voted to go home.”
“What’s going to happen . . . ,” Sadina asked in a whisper, walking slower than the rest of them.
Minho certainly didn’t love the answer to that question. He could only think of two possible outcomes, and figured he’d better be honest with her. “Either the Remnant Nation will take over the city of New Petersburg and kidnap the Godhead or the Remnant Nation will take over and the Godhead will be dead.”
The group got quiet.
War raged on in the distance.
Their building had as many bedrooms on the upper floors as it did safety pods on the floors below, and it didn’t take Ximena long to find the small room that had belonged to her mom. She sat down on the bed and looked out the window at the dusty sunset, wishing she could go back home and tell her Abuela about everything: Kletter dead, her mom and Mariana buried on the island of the immunes, how she couldn’t bring herself to tell Carlos until she knew more.
Until she had a plan.
Estar entre la espada y la pared,her Abuela would say. She was in between the devil and the deep blue sea. A rock and a hard place. Ximena wanted to run back to her village, through the desert and the littering of dead jackrabbits to her home and curl up in her favorite blanket and just mourn everything. Drink tea with her Abuela and spend time with those in the village who she had left. But that wasn’t a solution, it was what her mom would call escapism, and she knew that. The world wouldn’t get any better by people hiding under blankets.
That was one of the few pieces of advice from her mom that still stuck in her brain. As soon as Isaac said the words out loud confirming her mom’s death, it was as if all of the precious memories had evaporated in an instant and Ximena couldn’t grab on to anything.
Carlos appeared in the doorway. “You disappeared right quick?”
“Yeah. I’m just tired.”
“You’re disappointed.” He wasn’t wrong, but he didn’t know the full extent of that disappointment, and she wasn’t going to share it all just yet. She knew that once Carlos found out the truth that his grief would overwhelm him to a point of no return. It wouldn’t just be sorrow for Mariana’s death but also for the life they’d planned to have. The baby. Everything. He’d be inconsolable.
Ximena spotted a water container on the dresser and handed it to Carlos. “For the red clover flowers you picked.” Although she knew Mariana would never see the sweet sentiment that Carlos brought for her, hope was important to Carlos.
“Thanks. Hey,” he said excitedly, tipping the water at her like a toast. “Got the dispenser fixed.”
She didn’t know what the dispenser was, and she didn’t care. “Good job.”
“You coming down for dinner?” The words reminded her of her mom, finally, and she was glad for it.
“You’re calling lunch dinner now?” she asked. “You’re working for the Villa one day and they got you changing already.” She suddenly remembered Kletter’s skeletal body and thought she’d probably never eat again.
“Yes, at the Villa it’s called dinner and at the Villa we respect tradition.”
Ximena gave him her best sarcastic smile. “I don’t care if it’s lunch, dinner, breakfast, supper. I’m not hungry.”
“Okay, but don’t miss the dispensing,” he said. “I know it sounds lame, but this is history, they started working on this before you were even born.”
Ximena nodded. She tried a more genuine smile for Carlos and his work, but she knew all too well the things that had started before she was born. Not a single one of them good.
Ximena tried to portray excitement to Carlos when he showed her all the hard work he’d put into the hydraulic thingy, even if she didn’t have much belief in the Villa anymore. As far as she was concerned, working for the Villa was like working for the devil.La hierba mala nunca muere, Abuela would say in defense of the villagers who did just that:the devil looks after his own.But Annie Kletter was something worse. She’d failed to protect the people under her wing.
But Carlos beamed with pride. “You’ll see. The whole Villa will see today. It’ll work, I know it will.” She’d never seen him so taken by one of his own achievements.
She responded half-heartedly. “I’m glad you could fix it, if it means there’s hope for the future.”
“This isn’t just hope for the future, Ximena, if this works—it’ll fix some of the errors of the past.”
She had no idea what he meant. As they left and walked into the main lab, she saw another young girl her own age, with Professor Morgan. It shocked her so much she almost stumbled. Ximena felt an instant connection to this human standing in front of her, merely because they were the same age. How silly, yet how remarkable a feeling.
“Ximena, good morning,” Morgan said. “Before you do rounds in the basement, I want you to take Jackie here and put her in a safety pod down with the others. She’s healed enough that she can reunite with the group.”
Dios mío.She was one of the immunes.“Sure,” Ximena said, and her eyes landed on Jackie’s grass-braided bracelet. Exactly like the one she’d found near the scene of Kletter’s murder. “Where’d you get that?” She checked her back pocket, half-expecting it to be gone, stolen. Still there.
