The Alliance Read Online Free Page A

land—“it could knock out half of our hemisphere.”
    “How . . . how do you know about this?”
    He shrugs. “I probably read more than I should.”
    I glance away from him and stare at the field, where his ruined plane is backdropped by the chiseled mountain peaks,piercing through the sea of softwoods as if from a volcanic eruption. “You think this—this bomb is why you crashed?”
    “We can’t really call it a bomb, because there’s no obvious detonation. But, yeah—that’s a pretty likely explanation, if everything else is off the grid too.”
    “How do we fix it?” I ask. “How do we get it all back?”
    He turns and I glimpse his eyes again—a brilliant hue that seems to mirror the entire spectrum of the wide Montana sky. “That’s the thing. If I’m right, then . . . we don’t.”

Moses
    W E CREST THE BEND and the log schoolhouse comes into view. Buggies identical to Leora’s are tied to posts in the front yard, but the horses are all different shades of brown, white, and black, which seems about the only way to tell the buggies apart. An unpainted wooden swing set and teeter-totter are the only recreational items on the playground. There is no flagpole with stars and stripes snapping in the wind. From what I’ve read (or absorbed through reality TV), this is an intentional omission. Mennonites, Amish, and Quakers aren’t very patriotic, since they don’t believe in war. Kind of funny that I landed here, considering I’m a third-generation son of war.
    I look over at Leora. “Will you have to introduce me?”
    “Think you introduced yourself just fine when your plane crashed in our field.”
    “I guess I made quite the entrance.”
    “You could say that.” She meets my eyes but doesn’t return my smile.
    “How old are you?”
    She grips the reins. “Nineteen.”
    “Most Mennonite girls married by your age?”
    “No. Least not the smart ones.”
    Her voice is flat and hard. If I was hoping to see her stammer and blush again, like she did when I cussed, that won’t happen. I admit I’m flirting, but I’m not trying to come on to her. I haven’t had time for such things in a year. Or even the desire to pursue. All that I left behind before Aaron and I deployed.
    Leora suddenly leans forward, her profile blocking the sun like an eclipse. Her eyes are squinted, as if her glasses aren’t thick enough or maybe there’s just too much light to take it all in. I don’t want her to see my face until I’ve distanced myself from that day in the desert, so I take careful breaths and look out the buggy’s window at the long lane fenced in with this slew of cookie-cutter log cabins, except that some are two-story and others—like Leora’s—only one.
    There are no attached garages, of course, because nobody has cars around here. But each cabin has a barn and chicken coop made from wood treated to match the houses. An immaculate garden also seems part of the communal package—acorn and butternut squash vines spreading across the ground, the fruit’s thick rinds ripening to orange; cornstalks decorated with thick, tasseled ears—along with an adobe-style greenhouse that must be used to preserve some of the more sensitive vegetables from the impending frost that my Idahoan grandfather complains can assault this region well before fall begins.
    Just before the schoolhouse, on the other side of the lane,a pavilion with a cement base looks big enough to hold a small concert or a roller-skating party. Inside the pavilion, stacked like a giant’s Lincoln Logs set, are timbers so massive, a forklift would have to be used to move them. A tangle of power tools—their neon extension cords snaking back to a large generator—are laid out, along with some hard hats and goggles. Beside this, there’s what looks like a warehouse. I sit up higher on the bench seat, trying to get a better view of this bulk food store Leora mentioned earlier, which could be so crucial for the community’s