A shudder ran through her. “Yes.” After all this time, hearing his voice made her cry.
“It’s all right. It wasn’t your fault I died.”
Milly said nothing.
“I have but one question for you, and then you’re done, one way or the other,” the voice echoed through the stillness.
Milly said nothing.
“There may come a time when it is necessary to give your life for another, for the common good. The needs of the many are greater than the one. But, someone may also give their life to save yours. Sacrifice everything they are to ensure you live on, and that you fulfill your destiny. Do you understand?”
“Yes.”
“Who do you choose? Who would die for you?” Jerome said.
Milly started to say Peter, then remembered the start of the test. She’d already chosen Peter. If she chose someone else, she might get to start again, reset things and fix her mistakes. Who to pick? Mom. Tell Jerome mom and start again, but what if it didn’t work that way? What if that was the test, accepting who you are, and not letting failure dominate your decisions? Showing compassion and making sure the right thing is done? You don’t get a reset in life.
“Peter,” she said.
The world blinked out.
Milly came awake face down in the snow. She rolled over, spitting ice and gasping for air. Tye lay beside her, and next to him was Robin. She didn’t see Tester. Pepper and Turnip waited beside her, watching. “It’s OK,” she said to the animals. Pepper rushed forward and licked her face and Turnip mewed.
None of her weapons were returned, and all her possessions had been taken. She wore clean jeans, a white sweatshirt, boots, and a heavy green army jacket.
Snow came on hard. The back of the guard station rose up behind them, the rear door of the building closed. They were on the inside of the brown fence. No soldiers were visible, as if they’d abandoned their posts. Tye checked the door and found it locked. The road they’d been on continued upward into the mountains before them.
“Everyone all right?” Tye said.
“Any sign of Tester?” Milly said.
There was none.
A signpost stood beside the road with an arrow pointing north, and above the arrow, Argartha was printed in clean white lettering. Atop the pole a camera rotated back and forth, watching, reporting.
“We might as well get going,” Tye said. His feet sunk deep into the snow as he walked down the road. Robin followed.
Milly looked down at Pepper and Turnip who walked beside her. What choice did they all have? They only had one way to go, and that was forward.
“You think Tester got kicked out?” Milly said.
“Seems like it,” Tye said. “Though it could be he’s just on a different path like Ingo. Perhaps he’ll be waiting for us when we get there.”
“Maybe,” she said.
They walked all morning, and most of the afternoon, following the road up into the mountains across the expanse of Fort Hill. The snow got deeper the higher they went, and wind tore at their every step. They saw nothing except white and the tops of trees; there were no animals, soldiers, or people of any kind. The snow came on harder, and they slogged blindly forward, Tye leading and the others following in his footsteps.
“Stay close,” Tye yelled through the maelstrom.
The snow let up as the sun fell, and the three remaining members of the original fellowship came over a rise and a valley stretched out before them. They saw nothing but mounds of snow on the floor of the vale below.
“Are you shitting me,” Robin said. If Argartha was out there somewhere, it was still a long way off.
“Wait, do you see the pattern?” Milly said. The mounds of snow below were in ordered rows, like someone had built neat piles every twenty feet. In the center of the valley, one of the snow mounds had an open front, and someone sat before a fire, light spilling from a snow-covered structure. The flames glowed in the dusk of the falling sun as the snow backed-off.
The path was clear, even if what they were heading toward wasn’t.
“Let’s go,” Tye said. “This is it.”
Chapter Thirty-four
Year 2076, Fort AP Hill, Virginia
Tye’s toes were frozen, the tips of his fingers ached, and the fire in the distance still appeared far off. They’d made their way down the hillside into the valley, but with no frame of reference in the white world, they’d greatly underestimated the distance. The company waded through waist-high snow for two hours as they fought toward the glow of fire, the gray of dusk hiding the blizzard. They’d been given no supplies when they were unceremoniously dumped in the snow, and Tye’s stomach rumbled. Milly and Robin walked before him, and they stumbled and fell as the wind and ice pelted them. Pepper was a giant snowball, and Turnip’s head was a white orb with black diamonds for eyes. Both animals walked beside Milly, struggling through the deepening snow.
Tye’s spirits rose when darkness settled over the valley and the storm let up. Stars peeked through holes in the thinning cloud cover, and it looked as though the storm had blown out. The glow of the fire grew closer, and the pop and crack of wood burning, and the deep scent of smoke was like coming home to the Womb.
“Oy, there,” Tye yelled through the wind.
A man sat beside the fire and lifted an arm, beckoning them to come to him. Tye doubled his pace, and when he reached the old man he looked up and smiled. “You’re not from around these parts, are you?” he said.
Tye laughed. “No sir, we sure aren’t.”
Behind the old man an open bay door revealed a large garage
