But I was done listening. My fingers had found something solid. The plastic piping I’d scavenged for my tree but found no place to put. I grabbed that chunk of tubing now and I swung it around my head, forcing the two of them back.
Zee raised her club, brought it down, but I blocked her and pushed her away from me. Then I cast aside the tubing and plunged back into the snow. I dug and thrashed and then my hands were upon it. The nail gun. Clamped in my fist.
Zee was bearing down on me again, but I had that gun in my hand and I lofted it toward the crown of the fake tree and I let the nails fly.
Metal on metal. Sparks on fire. And boom. Just like that, the drum blew wild and flaming, and it filled the clearing with light. I watched the fire zip over the cables, searing the night sky as if welding it shut.
Everything glowed, then exploded. I buried my face in the snow and listened as the world snapped and crackled. And when I could see again, the canopy was a fiery web above me and the whole forest was burning.
Every last tree.
I’d never seen anything burn like that. The trees caught alight like that’s what they’d been put on this earth to do, just to spark up the night and flame on and on. No smoke. Not yet, anyway. Just balls of red and gold that swelled and spiraled and breathed heat down billowy upon us.
Flames streamed down the trunks of the trees, and soon we were surrounded by fire. I was sweating inside the thick coat, and I yanked down the zipper and crawled out of the purple fuzz as I scrambled to my feet. I shoved the nail gun down inside the back of my pants and pushed forward through the melting snow.
Zee and my mother had charged to the edge of the clearing, but they’d stalled there. Nowhere to go but straight forward. Into the fire.
“Come on,” I screamed, but they couldn’t hear me above the roar of the inferno. So I grabbed their hands and pulled them along with me, deep inside the tangle of flames.
We plunged through the burning forest, and as bright as it was, it was impossible to see. I lost my grip on Zee’s hand and got behind her, pushed her before me, the three of us stumbling single file toward the cold blackness that waited at the edge of the trees.
As we ran and tripped and breathed in the ashes, my chest wound up and my eyes got blurred. And I panicked. Because I’d killed them. Each one of them. Each one of those beautiful trees. Except for one, I kept reminding myself. Except for the one locked in the Orchard, on the far side of the hill.
Zee’s coat caught fire and I had to yank it off her, unpeeling the bulk from her skinny body, then throwing the coat in front of us, trying to beat back the blaze.
I lost track of them both for a second. I called out. Screamed Zee’s name. Then a tree crashed down and knocked me backward, igniting the shirt on my back.
I rolled in the snow and I steamed and fizzled. Then I saw Zee. Out in the clearing. I staggered blind. Lurched forward.
And finally I broke free.
“What have you done?” she kept screaming, beating me with her bare hands as I crawled onto my knees.
“Stop,” I called, trying to breathe again. I glanced back into the forest, and the only thing that wasn’t burning was that crappy metal tree in the center. The tree I’d built too fast.
“You burned them, Banyan. Killed them. All of them. After everything we’ve done.”
“No,” I said. “There’s more. There’s more.” I stood, grabbing her hands and pinning them beside her. “In the Orchard. We have to get to the Orchard. And then I’m getting us out of here. All of us.”
She got a hand loose and swung her fist but I blocked it. She tried to say something but then started coughing, her lungs shredded and smoky. And when she finally stopped choking she just stared at me, her lips trembling and her eyes wide.
“We can’t let them have it, Zee. We can’t let them do this. They do just what they like. With all of us. You get in their way and you’re nothing. And as long as they control what grows and what doesn’t, people can’t ever be free.”
“There’d be trees, though. Blue skies and clear water. Fruit growing everywhere. Air I could breathe.”
“Trees won’t grow everywhere if only GenTech can grow them.”
“But how do we do it without them? You don’t know what you’re doing. You can’t grow these trees with a hammer and nails.”
“We’ll try,” I said. “We try so no more people get killed for some experiment. So no more people have to suffer.”
Zee fell to the ground and put her hand on her chest, her throat twitching. “My lungs,” she croaked, tears in her eyes. “I can’t do it. I can’t go back.”
“I’ll keep you safe,” I said. “And we’ll get trees around you. I promise.”
“Why?”
“Because you’re my sister. And I won’t leave you behind. Not if you’ll come with me.”
She grabbed my wrist and stood beside me and I held her then, her hair soft on my face as she sobbed and shuddered.
“But I need that key,” I said, staring back into the flames. “I need the Creator.”
“She’s there.” Zee pointed and I spun around.
And there she was. Halfway up the damn hill.
I scrambled up the slope as fast as my legs would carry me. I didn’t pull the nail gun out. It was no use. I couldn’t pull the trigger. Not on her. Not now.
She was moving pretty quick. But I was so much quicker. I was gaining on her, a few steps closer each time she glanced back to check. I lunged at her. Wrapped my arms around her waist to tackle her. She pulled the electric tag from around her neck and went to hurl it at the snow.
We fell bundled together, my hand locked on her wrist as I pushed her beneath me. She threw the key as best she could and then rolled on my back, beating me as I dug my hands through the snow, searching.
I found the plastic tag and shoved it down the side of my boot, ignoring the woman slapping and screaming at me, her face all wet and stretchy.
“You need to come with me,” I told her as I staggered to my feet. “I’ll get you out of here, I swear it.”
“To do what?” she shrieked, her voice wretched. “To burn like everything else?”
“No,” I said, and I leaned into her, taking her shaky, wrinkled hands in mine. “To regrow the world. That’s what you want, isn’t it? But not just for GenTech. Not like this.” I jutted my chin in the direction of the compound. “Those bodies in there are people. They’re somebody’s sister or father. They’re somebody’s son.”
She stared at me and I had no idea if she was buying it. But it was too late now. My diversion had done its trick. And up on the ridgeline, the agents were lined up and panicked, pointing their gloved hands and their stupid hoods down at the fire that was rolling below them.
Zee scampered up beside us and we hunkered down in the snow, watching the agents above. I heard gunshots on the other side of the hill and felt my insides crawl. What was Frost doing? What had happened down in the bunker? Was Alpha free yet? Or was it too late? Would I always be too damn late?
“What now?” Zee said.
“I’m getting over that ridge.” I pulled out the nail gun and balanced it on the snow, aiming up at the agents. “You with me?”
“I’ll come with you. But you can’t shoot your way through them. Let me talk to them.”
“No,” my mother said. “I’ll talk to them.”
I stared at her.
“Your father was right,” she said. “You’re more free than he ever imagined. But if you want to break him out of here, then you’re going to need my help.”
“You’ll betray GenTech?”