Chapter 56 — The Last Seed Keeper

The handheld radio that Diem Quynh brought with her from Green Dome, which was silent for most of the journey because it was out of range of the relay stations scattered across Dong Tro, began emitting a faint buzzing sound on the fourth afternoon after leaving Trung Lo Station, when the group was close enough to catch the signal from the antenna on Green Dome's Filter Roof.

"There's a signal!" Diem Quynh shouted, hastily adjusting the tuner knob with hands shaking with excitement. The whole group stopped and gathered around her while the crackling sound gradually became clearer, interspersed with fragments of broken voices.

"...the group... Xanh... can you hear me clearly..." a familiar voice rang out through the noise, and Khe Mien felt her heart ache when she realized it was the voice of Tang Dieu Lam, her best friend, who had stayed at Green Dome when the group left nearly three months ago.

Diem Quynh quickly adjusted the frequency, and in the end, her voice became much clearer. "...Khe Mien, if you can hear me, please answer. This is Dieu Lam, calling from the Respiratory Station."

Khe Mien snatched the mouthpiece from Diem Quynh's hand, her voice trembling with emotion. "Dieu Lam! I heard you! We're on our way back, about five days away from Green Dome!"

There was a short silence because of the signal delay, then Tang Dieu Lam's voice rang out, carrying an undisguised relief. "Thank goodness we finally made contact! We've tried calling the relay station multiple times over the past two weeks with no response. Is everyone okay?"

"We're fine," Khe Mien replied, choosing not to go into detail about what happened at Vom Da through a communication channel she wasn't sure was secure. "A lot of things happened, I'll tell them all when I get there. How's the situation at the Green Dome?"

"There are many things," Tang Dieu Lam replied, her voice carrying a more complicated tone than Khe Mien expected. "Root Rot has been largely contained thanks to new spare parts for the Respiratory Station that the engineering team temporarily made themselves, but the Council is arguing fiercely about another issue."

"What's the problem?" Khe Mien asked, an uneasy feeling rising in her heart.

"There are rumors reaching the Green Dome about growing tensions between the Domes," Tang Dieu Lam replied. "Su Dinh Lam is using it to push harder than ever to close the Green Dome gate permanently, cutting off all communication with the outside except in absolute emergencies. He says the world out there is becoming too dangerous to risk any more trips."

Khe Mien exchanged a worried look with Bach Lam, who was standing next to her listening to the entire conversation. This was exactly what she had feared — that news of the growing unrest would be used as ammunition for arguments she had always opposed.

"What does Bien Ba Uy think?" she asked.

"He still maintains a neutral stance, waiting for your report before making a final decision," Tang Dieu Lam replied. "But I can tell you, Khe Mien, the pressure is great. Many in the community are starting to fear, and fear always makes people lean towards the seemingly easier side of safety, even when that safety is an illusion."

"I'll be back as soon as possible," Khe Mien said, her voice carrying a new determination. "And I have much to say to the Council, things that will demonstrate that keeping the gates closed is not the answer, but only a way of delaying the real problem."

"I believe you," Tang Dieu Lam said, her warm voice cutting through the noise. "Everyone here misses you, Khe Mien. Your father asks about you every day."

Mentioning her father, Khe Mien felt a strong sense of homesickness, mixed with a bit of guilt for making him worry for so many months. "How is my father?" she asked, her voice quiet.

"He's still working hard at the Respiratory Station as always, but I can see he's aged a lot since the day you left," Tang Dieu Lam replied, her voice also low with sympathy. "He doesn't talk much about his worries, but I know you know your father better than I do. How happy he will be to hear that you're okay."

"Please tell him that I'm coming home, and that I bring not only the seed but also a long story to tell," Khe Mien said, trying to keep her voice steady even though tears began to well up in the corners of her eyes.

"I will say," Tang Dieu Lam promised. "Please come home safely."

The conversation was gradually cut off by increasing signal interference as the group continued to move out of stable signal range, but what was said was enough to engrave in Khe Mien's mind a new anxiety, mixed with the joy of hearing the voice of a close friend after many months of separation.

"Su Dinh Lam will not be easily persuaded," Ngan The Binh commented when Diem Quynh turned off the radio to save the remaining energy in the battery. "Especially when he has new ammunition for his argument."

“We will need to present everything very carefully,” Bach Lam said, his voice thoughtful. "Not only the dangers we've encountered, but also what we've learned about why isolation is not the solution — about the Salt Dome, about the families who suffered at the hands of Confucius because no one outside was willing to speak up."

Diem Quynh, sitting next to the turned off television, spoke up with an unresolved worry. "Do you think Su Dinh Lam will accept to listen? Or has he already decided everything in advance?"

"I don't know," Khe Mien admitted. "But I think about what Five Smoke once said — that history only repeats itself when no one learns from it. If the Green Dome closes its gates out of fear, we will lose the very thing that saved us from the Root Rot — the ability to seek help, to find solutions, when the world within is no longer enough to save ourselves."

Kien, walking next to him, contributed with an increasingly obvious maturity. “I think it's important to include the hard parts, not just the successful parts,” he said. "If we only talk about the good Sand Dome and hide what happened at Stone Dome, people won't believe us when the truth comes out later."

"You're right," Khe Mien said, looking at him with respect. "The whole truth, no matter how hard to hear, is always better than a story embellished to make it more acceptable."

Khe Mien nodded, looking toward the horizon where, even though it was far away, she could feel the presence of the Green Dome waiting, not only with welcoming arms but also with a war of ideas that she would have to enter as soon as she set foot through the gate.

“We'll face it,” she said, her voice firmer than she felt in her heart. "One step at a time, as we have done with every other challenge on this journey."

In the following days, as the radio signal became more stable with every mile they approached the Green Dome, Khe Mien took the opportunity to contact Tang Dieu Lam a few more times, each time gathering a small piece of information about the situation inside — Bien Ba Uy had convened a special Council session as soon as the group arrived to listen to the full report, and Vu Dinh Khoat, her father, had voluntarily asked to be present at the meeting despite not being a main member. Council knowledge, something that rarely happened to him.

“He wanted to make sure you were heard fairly,” Tang Dieu Lam explained over the radio one evening, her voice mixed with warmth and concern. "I think he also wants to see for himself your safe return before any arguments begin."

Those words made Khe Mien's chest choke with an emotion that was hard to name, and she felt, more than ever, the weight of what lay ahead — not just a test of persuasion, but a moment that would shape the path of an entire community, and perhaps, the future of Green Dome's relationship with the entire world beyond the Filter Roof.

That night, when the whole group set up camp to rest, Khe Mien wrote in her notebook the last lines before they completed the return journey: *I'm about to go home, but home is no longer a simple shelter like I once thought. It is a place you must fight to protect, not with weapons, but with truth and faith that the portal to the world is still worth keeping, even though that world is becoming more complex and scary every day.*