Chloe, I wish I had known you better, I wish you hadn’t gone out this way. Alice always says she wants to be buried beneath a great tree when she dies, so she can be a part of what keeps it alive. I remember you said you thought it was a beautiful sentiment, I hope I did right by you.
Mia sat against the wall that looked at the big willow tree she had spent the morning digging beneath to bury the two they had lost. Her and Ann had gone after Chloe, they had found the house where they had been taken, but they were too late, Maggie was there, Jake and Chloe gone.
She didn’t see it happen, but when they finally caught up, the two were dead. Maggie charged into battle without hesitation she killed the remaining men, suddenly Saoirse was in her ear and Maggie was off in one of the SSNY SUVs. The whole thing went by so quickly her emotions couldn’t keep up until they hit her, all at once.
As she processed them, she kept coming back to this feeling, this feeling she had gotten since they had arrived in the abandoned town, that Nina was there somewhere. She only felt it more after talking to Nat, the bond of siblings had to mean something.
She couldn’t say it to Nat, but she cared about Nina deeply. She had tried to push her out of her mind, tried not to think about what the massacre had meant in regard to her. Tried not to think, that even if she had survived…
She knew Nina had been going through something, it was always written on her face. She had no idea what losing your whole family could do to a healthy person, let alone if they were going through things already, she was worried and she wanted to be there for her, despite never having been before. She couldn’t find her though, and suddenly felt she was further away than ever before.
She continued these thoughts waiting for the Color Guard to come pick them up and take them to their safe house, one that they assured wasn’t compromised. Ann had been doing the communication, she had seemed to be alright that morning, either that or she was just better at hiding it.
The trucks of the Color Guard rolled up, just a few battered Toyota’s with rust that showed they had seen many winters. Out of the first truck, a dark-haired, broad-shouldered man with a well-kept beard came from the driver’s side. Opening the passenger door, a tall woman with black hair exited the vehicle as well. The pair wore red shirts tucked into dark trousers.
Ann walked up to them and said a few words that Mia couldn’t make out, she motioned for them to come, and Mia stood up and walked towards the trucks. The man introduced himself when they all got close enough, “I’m Gustavo, but you can call me Gus, this is Emilia,” he said, gesturing to the woman, she gave them a thin smile.
“Hi, I’m Saoirse and this is Nat and Mia,” Saoirse said to Gus. Mia and Nat both gave forced smiles.
“Great,” Gustavo said with an animated gesture, he turned to Ann, “and who is the one injured?” he asked her.
“Nat,” Ann said and turned towards her, “I kept it together with steri-strips, but she needs stitches.”
“We’ll have all you need at the safe house,” he paused, “come, I’d prefer not to linger much longer.”
They piled into the truck, Saoirse and Nat picking the second one, Mia sat with Ann and Paul in Gus’s. It had bothered Mia that Gus had seemed not to care of his fallen comrade, before she could think to say anything Ann already did, “What about Jake, did you not want to pay your final respects?”
“Dear, it’s not safe, Jacob will always be there, we will pay our respects when our cause has succeeded, he’s not the only one we’ve lost, he’s not even the only one we’ve lost today,” Emilia answered bluntly.
Ann made a dismissive noise and turned to look out the window. The ride was long and quiet. Mia sensed eyes on her in the rear view mirror several times, it seemed their new friends didn’t fully trust them yet. They drove through the rolling hills on the crumbling highway that snaked through them. Mia thought perhaps the scenery could make for a good painting.
Abruptly, the truck dove off the road down a steep hill through the trees into the forest they had been driving above, at the end of the road, she saw a steel door affixed to the base of a cliff.
“If this place is compromised, it will be the least of our concerns, you all should be safe here,” Gus commented, as the steel doors opened slowly and ominously before them.
Passing through the doors they rode on through a dark tunnel before the room expanded into a massive well-lit cave. The trucks parked at the entrance and Mia exited the vehicle taking in the massive room. The space was segmented into different sized rooms that branched and connected at random, some sitting completely alone with only a single door attached. High above the room a massive flag hung over the space, red and white stripes interrupted in the corner by a blue square filled with white stars, the flag of the old United States.
It was the one thing that always had bothered Mia about the Color Guard, especially those of the younger generation. They all seemed to fetishize this warped perspective of what the continent had been like before the war despite having never seen it. They were utterly convinced what they had been taught about it in the SSNY was lies, a valid thought given the propaganda machine that was their education, but they refused to examine any nuance.
Gus noticed her eyeing the flag, “This is an old US military base, there are even some planes here we’ve been trying to refurbish. Soon we will bring back the democracy of their time, a free and equal society!”
Mia scoffed, mostly to herself, but Gus noticed, “I forgot, you anarchists think the state is evil, but you fail to grasp you’ll never be respected on the world stage without one! How do you expect to advance the human race in your isolated communes? You can’t.”
“Joining the global system of capital is not advancement, its regression,” Mia countered, “Your worldview is simply too small to see what we can do as a collective, what we have done!”
Gus opened his mouth to retort but was cut off, “Gus, please, I’m not in a mood to listen to you argue about political theory, let’s just let them get packed up and they can go back to the mountains,” Emilia said curtly.
“Back to the mountains, we only just got here, I thought you wanted our help!?” Mia said incredulously. She couldn’t go back, Nina was here somewhere, she had to find her!
“You’ve already caused us enough trouble, killed enough SSNY operatives for them to have a full-scale national funeral, in just a few days you’ve set our movement back even further than before,” Emilia was losing her cool demeanor, “I knew letting these anarchists into our struggle was a bad idea Gus, I told you,” she turned to Mia and the others, “fix yourselves up and leave, you’re lucky the old-guard still thinks fondly of you, for some reason. I guess failure creates friendship.”
With that she turned and walked away, Gus looked at the group, “I’m sorry, I may disagree with you, but I still believe civil discussion is the solution. That being said, I’m not looking to pick a fight with Emilia. The med-room is over there,” he gestured to one of the larger free-standing structures with a red cross over the door, “Then leave, take one of the trucks to Erie, your boat is waiting there. Goodbye friends, I do hope the next time we meet it is civil.”
With that Gus followed Emilia away, disappearing among the labyrinth of structures in the massive cave. Mia sat in a state of incredulity for a few seconds before Saoirse tapped her on the shoulder, “Mia, we’re going to patch Nat up, c’mon.”
“Yeah… ok,” Mia said slowly.
“I didn’t realize there was so much animosity between us and them,” Saoirse said.
“We have our… differences of opinion, its why our collaboration was so limited, its why Jake and Chloe are such a big loss…”
Saoirse sighed, “We still have Maggie.”
“If we ever see Maggie again, I don’t know how to get in contact with her.”
“She knows how to contact us, I’m sure she will.”
Mia hesitated.
“What?” Saoirse asked, noticing she was going to say something.
“It’s just… nothing…”
“Seriously, what is it? You’ve been taking this harder than anyone else.”
“Can you keep this from Nat?”
“Why?”
“Just, please, I’d rather tell her when I’m ready.”
“Fine, but I’ll hold you to telling her.”
“It’s her sister.”
“Nina?”
“Yeah, Nina… I need to find her.”
“Yeah, and Nat wants to too, what’s the big deal? Why can’t you tell her?”
“I just don’t want to worry her, I just know Nina has been dealing with… some things, and I don’t want Nat to be overly worried.”
“But you are?”
“Yeah, it’s been so long since I last saw her… I just… I just want to be there for her, you know?”
“Yeah, I get it,” Saoirse looked towards Nat, she was being guided into the med-room by Ann.
The two stood in silence.
Saoirse broke it, “I already promised Nat, but I’ll promise you too, we will find Nina. Nat’s strong, I can’t imagine her sister isn’t too.”
Mia nodded and suppressed the urge to cry.
* * *
Getting back to the AAC was simple and uneventful. Few words were shared between the group and most of the crew on the boat left them alone, knowing what had happened. Upon their return, Saoirse and Nat slipped off to a room that had been set up for them in their temporary stay. Ann and Paul also left for their own room leaving Mia alone and with the expectation she would give report on what had happened.
When she entered EMS, she felt the familiar smell of hiking equipment wash over her, it wasn’t a particularly good one, but familiar and still comforting after everything that happened. Most of the details she had already sent by message to the scouts but giving the report to Greg had become a formality that everyone respected. Greg kept track of the details to keep track of any potential patterns emerging.
The old man was in his office when Mia knocked on the door.
“Come in,” Greg’s muffled voice came from behind the door.
Mia opened it revealing a small office filled with papers, tablets, computers, and all sorts of different knick-knacks that to the untrained eye was a disorganized mess but Mia knew that he knew where every little thing was in that room. On the back wall was a flag split into triangles of green and black with a silhouette of a pine tree in the middle.
“Mia,” Greg sighed, “I read your report, I’m so sorry you had to go through all that.”
“I guess it’s to be expected, we are going up against a force that indiscriminately kills people…” Mia trailed off.
“Not a day goes by where I wish we could’ve convinced them not to side with those philanthropists,” his voice stung with bitterness. He paused and changed his tone to be softer, “I felt as though you left something out, your writing, it felt like you were purposely omitting something around this sister of the girl you brought back.”
“No… not really.”
“You want to find her don’t you, you didn’t want to come back.”
“Um… yeah…”
“I can get in contact with the people I know inside the SSNY, I’ll see what I can find.”
“Thank you, that means a lot.”
Mia went to leave.
“Mia,” Greg said.
She turned and looked.
“Her full name is? You didn’t put it in the report,” he said.
“Oh, Nina Palmer, I don’t know if she has a middle name,” Mia answered.
His calm demeanor twitched for a second at the sound of the name, Mia noticed, she risked the question, “What is it?”
“Probably nothing, a coincidence I’d assume.”
“What?” she realized as she said it, they had the same last name, “Oh, you’re probably right, just a coincidence.”
Greg muttered to himself before speaking up, “Mia, would you introduce me to Natalie, allow me just to make sure.”
“Of course,” Mia said to him.
“Great, regardless of our relation, I’ll try my best to locate her for you, I can see it in your face how much you want to see her again.”
“Thank you.”
With that Mia exited the office and returned to her room, after the exhaustion of the past few days, she fell asleep almost instantly.