Z 2134

someone who could be seen as an enemy of The State. It was all a bit much.
    “I want to know,” she said. “The truth. What was my dad doing before…you know, before he got into trouble.”
    “You deserve to know,” Duncan nodded. “Would you like anything first? Sugar bread, or water?”
    Ana shook her head, then Duncan started his story.
    “Your dad came in here one day, slipped into a pew, and sat for a sermon — as if he’d been coming to church forever, even though he’d never been here before, and I’d not seen him other than as a wave across the street since I stopped working City Watch. Your daddy sat in the back pew, two behind where you were sitting beside Iris tonight. He listened to the entire sermon, then, when it was over, he didn’t want to leave. He stayed in his pew for several minutes until I was finished shaking hands, then when I approached him, he asked if we could speak, said he wanted to clear his guilty conscience.”
    “Why?” Ana raised her eyebrows. “What did he do?”
    “He said he couldn’t stand the horrible things he’d been forced to do in the law’s name. Your daddy said he wasn’t sure if there was a God, but respected that I did, then said it seemed hard to swallow, seeing as how there was so much sickness in the world, both in and outside The Wall. Your dad said that if there was a God, he didn’t want Him thinking he enjoyed doing what he had to do, and wanted a pardon if possible, at least until he could figure out a way not to do it any longer.”
    Ana said, “And you gave him a way?”
    “That I did.” Duncan smiled, then gestured around the room. “These fine folks, and many more who aren’t with us tonight, look to me. They trust I’ll guide them right, make the right decisions. I’m a man of faith, acting on my instincts and His guidance. I trusted your father the second I saw him, Anastasia, so I saw no reason to wait.”
    Ana leaned forward, starving for the rest. “Wait for what?”
    “I told him we were part of The Underground, and I told him in less time than it takes me to get my water hot. And your daddy never said a word. Not even when they tried to beat it out of his broken body.”
    Duncan paused, then tugged on his right ear and stroked the bottom of his chin, like he had a full beard instead of just two day’s worth of stubble, then he looked at Ana like he was about to say something she’d never forget.
    “Your daddy, Anastasia, he was a good man who did great things, things you won’t know about yet and maybe never will.” He shook his head without moving his eyes. “There are more City 6 citizens owing their lives to your old man than you can count, not that he was ever counting at all.”
    Duncan grinned, probably happy Ana wasn’t arguing her father’s merit, then continued. “Not only did your father never out us, he acted as a sort of double agent, feeding us information we couldn’t get otherwise. Jonah,” Duncan cleared his throat, “your daddy, kept the candle burning, making sure we stayed alive and that the movement kept moving.”
    Ana nodded her head, wanting to believe the man who had taught her to think and love, and to never cross a line once drawn, no matter how thick the mud at your ankles; the man who read her stories from books that no longer existed, and promised to never tell her a lie — even if it was the only thing that gave him breath, was the same man whose honor Duncan was protecting. If what Duncan was saying was true, then of course The State wanted him outside The Wall.
    It didn’t matter. Even if Duncan’s version of her father was the same man who had raised her, that man had murdered her mother. Ana still saw her father, standing over her dead mother, every night she closed her eyes.
    As an eyewitness, she had said almost nothing in the trial until she sat in the box and answered every question, true to her recollection, as the prosecution rattled them off, each a bullet tearing into her body and leaving its shrapnel in the rest of her life.
    “Why did he kill my mother?” Ana said, chewing her lip to not lose a tear.
    “He didn’t.” Duncan shook his head, his eyes now larger and somehow sadder. “I told you that. You didn’t mean to tell a lie, Anastasia, but you did. Your brain lied to you. Not your fault, since I’d bet my Bible and every verse in it that The City implanted a false memory, or several, inside that noggin of yours.” The pastor tapped the tip of his head