Vagrancy

by Stacey Mac

  The door swings open on its hinges and our visitor makes his grand entrance, his foreboding glare sweeping the room. “Initiate G00163, report!”

  I feel my face flush with embarrassment. For the first time, I am thankful that our ‘names’ in Galore are vague, because every single pair of Galore eyes in this room are now darting around rapidly, trying to find the unfortunate initiate that owns this unfortunate UIC.

  I move forward swiftly, and the eyes begin to snap towards me. This maze of cots seems to have more corners than usual, and so by the time I reach Dean, who waits in all his menacing glory at the door, everyone is staring at me.

  “Out you go.”

  I hurry out and turn the corner. He follows immediately and closes the door with a bang.

  “What the fuck was that?!”

  Dean shrugs, unabashed, chuckling. “I was worried you might ditch me, so I thought I might come and drag you out, kicking and screaming.”

  “Kicking and screaming would have been cooler,” I grimace, scrubbing a hand over my face.

  “I also had to provide a cover for you, seen as you are not supposed to be outside your dorm after hours anymore. This is another one of those times that you should thank me.”

  I grin in spite of myself. “Probably, but I think I’ll save it for a time when I don’t want to break your face.”

  He shakes his head in mock horror and begins walking past me, towards the stairwell. “So unladylike.”

  I roll my eyes. “My mission in life. Where are we going?”

  We have reached the stairwell when he turns around and faces me again. “About that, I need to know if you can keep a secret. I want to show you something I found, but I need you to keep it to yourself.” His eyes darken in that way they do when he is deadly serious.

  “Okay.”

  “Okay,” he parrots, and walks on.

  When the night air finds us once more, it carries a draft of heavy sleet, and despite my warm jacket, my bones feel like they are splintering.

  “Move quickly,” Dean whispers into my ear after we pass the night workers at the door, “and try to look remorseful and scared…you’re in trouble, remember?”

  But all I can think is that I’m very cold, and I need to get inside before I freeze and wrap myself in blankets, and the only look I can muster is a frostbitten, squinty-eyed one as I try to stop ice from stabbing my exposed face.

  Dean grabs my hand once we’ve rounded the Compound’s anterior and pulls me as best he can against the weather. It feels like we have been running forever when finally, thankfully, there is a misplaced mound ahead. It protrudes from the ground seamlessly, unexpectedly: a bunker. On the other side there will be a door, and on the other side of the door there will be shelter from the cold.

  Dean must decide that the date/mission is futile, because he is dragging me around the mound and then through the hidden door and we jump a short way down onto the dirt floor of the bunker. A singular solar lamp ignites.

  I shake uncontrollably. My arms wrap desperately around my torso, trying to coax warmth from my body.

  “You okay?” Dean asks, pushing back the hood of his green jacket.

  “I’m f-fine.”

  “Sorry, I didn’t think much about the weather.”

  “Where exactly were we supposed to be going?” I ask him, pushing back my own hood and shaking out my hair.

  “Here, actually.”

  I look up at him, “Why here?”

  He gives a quick nod at something over my shoulder. “Take a look.”

  To understand the significance of what’s behind me, you should know that bunkers like this have been carved into the earth all over Galore. There are enough to shelter more than our entire population. They are only good for hiding; they are designed to keep you alive until it is safe to emerge again. The trapdoor is made of wood and could be easily kicked in if someone found it; but the mounds are perfectly camouflaged by mud and moss and grass, so finding them isn’t easy. The caverns inside are lined with supplies; gallons of water, non-perishable foods (supplied by yours truly and co.), and basic first aid. Suffice to say that I am familiar with the general layout of a bunker.

  I turn to look into this particular bunker, and instead, what I see is an arsenal.

  There are firearms packed into old, disintegrating wooden crates that are marked with the faded words: Andy’s Foodworks. Grenades almost overflow from sacks that hang from nails on the cavern’s clay walls.

  “Wow,” I say, “impressive.”

  Dean only nods. He is looking around like I am. The bunker space is almost full with artillery, taking up almost all of the floor space.

  “I have never even seen half of this stuff,” I tell Dean conversationally, seen as he still hasn’t spoken. There’s a lot to look at, I guess. More guns than I’ve ever seen. And powerful ones, at that. In the free world, there was nuclear and biological warfare and scientists who spent their lives creating more efficient ways to obliterate everyone and destroy the planet. Now, we have little to no resources or expertise for building fire arms or missiles, so the majority of our arsenal has been saved or just recycled – like everything else. So I recognise the machine guns, and the ammunition, but I’ve never really seen them until now. In fact, I don’t think I’ve ever seen a real grenade either, let alone hundreds. The ones we use in the compound are little more than Molotov cocktails.

  And Dean is still not saying anything.

  “So I guess Council is keeping war supplies here at the compound now. Pretty strange. Is that what you wanted to show me?” It is a strange choice for Council to make; it is stranger still that Dean should feel the need to drag one of the only non-gun enthusiasts through a blizzard to see it.

  “No,” Dean says then, finally.

  “No?”

  “No, it isn’t just this one. Almost every bunker in Galore is filled to the brim, same as this.”

  “Huh?” I ask, dumbly. “All of them? No. Maybe two or three would, but obviously not all of – ” and it occurs to me at this particular second that I’m puzzling over the wrong question. Those conspiracy theories from earlier resurface. “How would you know what every bunker in Galore looks like?” I ask. “How would you even know where every bunker in Galore is?”

  He scoffs incredulously. “Is that really the first question that comes to mind? And no, it ain’t just two or three, it’s every bunker I’ve found. So I think a better question would be: why is Galore stock piling firearms and explosives that aren’t supposed to exist? Or where did they get them from in the first place?”

  “No, not this time. You asked me if I can keep a secret and I told you I can. If you wanted to show me…whatever this is, then you should have been prepared to explain yourself. So speak.”

  He appears to be chewing on his tongue, deliberating.

  I decide to help him out. “Why don’t you start with the bunkers, how did you find them?”

  He adverts his eyes, sighs, turns away. “I’ve been locating them at night, or at least on the nights I haven’t been with you.”

  “Just you?” I press. “Or do you have some helpers?”

  He turns back to me and his eyes narrow, and that evening with the-secret-stairwell-conversation dangles between us.

  “Look,” I say, sighing, tired, “I get that you are obviously up to something that I’m not supposed to know about, and I don’t know why you are telling or showing me anything at all, but I know that I don’t want to cause you trouble, so why don’t you just explain yourself as best you can.”

  He still looks unconvinced. Not dubious, really, but sort of…unsure…of himself. “You should know, the things I don’t explain are for your benefit, not mine.”

  “I don’t speak Resolute code, but thanks anyway.”

  He grins. “I found this bunker, and it struck me as odd that Galore would use the compound as an armoury, and better yet, that they would leave it mostly unguarded. I figured there had to be an explanation. When I fou
nd other bunkers, closer to town, they held just as much equipment as this one. To tell you the truth, I haven’t found every bunker, but I’ve found enough to assume that the reason they are unguarded is because they are all armouries, and that Galore simply does not have enough man power to guard them, especially with training in session and a recent deployment.” His voice has become hurried, edgy.

  I really don’t know what to make of it. “This equipment is more advanced than what I’ve seen before. Is it like this in the other bunkers?” I ask.

  Dean nods. “I don’t know where these supplies came from, or how they were built, but from what I can tell, it isn’t public knowledge. It seems like your leaders are hiding it.”

  I shake my head, “It doesn’t make sense. If Galore suddenly acquired a whole lot of ammo, why would Council keep it from us?” And then, something hopeful occurs to me. “Do you think Mission Retrieve soldiers are carrying this sort of equipment with them?”

  Dean shakes his head. “I’ve checked out about fifteen of them. All of them are just as full as they were when I checked them before the campaign was even drawn.”

  That hope turns to poison in me. So many powerful weapons, but it seems likely that my parents will still be carrying crudely made rifles, knives, and molotovs. “So, then, what is it all for?”

  Dean grimaces, “That’s why I brought you here. Why do you think Galore would be packing enough weaponry to take out an entire sector in one showdown?”

  I frown. How would I know? “I’m a grazer, Dean. My daily concerns usually revolve around milking goats. Why don’t you tell me?”

  “Because I’m a Resolute, and this isn’t my sector. But I’ve come to find that the general population in Galore are annoyingly patriotic and their loyalty clouds their judgment. You, however, seem pretty unconvinced, so I’m asking you. What do you think?”

  “I think…” I think he’s nuts. “I think they got their hands on some powerful stuff, and they are hiding it, lest some nosy Resolute goes poking around the sector. What do you think?”

  Dean shakes his head in disappointment, “I think you could do better than that.”

  The words remind me of a trainer. Last year, in survival, a trainer asked me what I’d do in the event of eating a poisonous plant. I knew there was a perfect answer to this question, but I couldn’t call it back from my memory, so I’d told him that I’d try to vomit the poison out of my system. He had given me this same look of dissatisfaction. You can do better than that, initiate.

  And so I get the feeling that I’m being tested. For what – I don’t know. But as he waits, he stares, and in that stare is a sort of pleading. He is waiting for a specific reaction, wanting it, and I don’t know what to give him.

  We stare each other down, a ritual of ours, and I try to guess what he tries to tell me.

  Eventually, he rolls his eyes. “Forget it.”

  I laugh. “You really love working the mysterious thing, don’t you? Just tell me your theory.”

  He walks forward and picks up a grenade. “You know what, I don’t think I will.”

  Well, whatever reaction he had hoped for, it wasn’t this. He spins the grenade expertly on his open palm. He isn’t looking at the deadly explosive in his vulnerable hand, he looks around him, brow furrowed. He is edgy, disquieted. I can see that, to him at least, this bunker is something deeply disturbing, and I suddenly feel a little sorry for laughing in his face. It is uncomfortable to feel like the more rational one. He has never been anything other than irritatingly sure of himself. It is sort of funny, an awkward kind of funny, to see him freak about something so very unlikely: a child scared that the sky might fall.

  I sigh. “I’m sorry. I agree, it is strange, but I honestly don’t think that this means anything. I think they got their hands on all of this, somehow, and they’re stockpiling it,” I kick a burlap sack at my feet as I say it, and then realise how idiotic that was, given that I don’t know its contents.

  Brooding, Dean collapses to the cold, hard ground of the bunker, and leans back on his hands. I follow him to the floor because I feel awkward standing over him, and copy his position. From this angle I can see the faint gap that outlines the trapdoor, revealing the darker night. It quakes again and again, fighting its hinges as the blizzard outside continues. My body shudders.

  “Cold?”

  “A little.” I kind of half expect him to take off his jacket and offer it to me, and perhaps he thinks about it, but we aren’t the type. Instead, he shifts closer to me, and our shoulders and arms and hips and thighs are pressed together.

  I watch him swallow something he means to say. His eyes are ablaze with…What? But then it’s gone, and his shoulders slump, dispirited. “Anyway, this isn’t the only reason I brought you here. I figured you’d want a breakout tonight.”

  “Sure, only I would have preferred not to die in the snow.”

  “If you do, I’ll leave you here and claim no responsibility.”

  “Always the gentlemen.”

  We are quiet again for a measure of time.

  “You don’t have to mope about winning in your exam you know, you could be proud.”

  There is a witty, albeit, bitchy retort on my tongue, but I figure it will start another circular argument about my non-soldierish qualities, so I just nod instead.

  “The other girl is fine, by the way. She wasn’t hurt badly.”

  “I know.” I had, in fact, checked on Desiree after dinner tonight, from afar. She was chatting with some friends, smiling, eating, walking etc. In other words, my enviable combat dexterity hadn’t rendered her handicapped. So I needn’t worry.

  “I got a status two,” I blurt out of nowhere, not remembering making the decision to say it.

  “I know.”

  “You know?”

  He raises an eyebrow, questioning. “It’s an exceptional result.”

  “Right, only they gave it to a non-exceptional soldier. And they intend to put my non-exceptional ass as close to the frontline as you can get without actually being a fronter.”

  “I reject that your ass in non-exceptional,” he says, smirking hugely.

  I roll my eyes, “Highly inappropriate, trainer…and off topic.”

  “Fine. So you’re worried about being too close to the frontline? Fair enough.”

  I shake my head. “It isn’t just that. I’ve just been thinking too much.”

  “Yeah, you seem to do that a lot,” Dean says, watching me intently. “What about?”

  I sigh. What about? About mortality, and trains. I’ve been thinking about what it would be like to just be a person with choices, like the ones my parents had before the world turned on itself. My parents, I think about them almost constantly, and in the moments that I forget, it is both a relief and a betrayal to them, opposite ends of magnets that I can’t reconcile.

  I look at Dean, trying to smile. “I keep thinking about how much I hate this particular life.” I fail to look uncaring, and my eyes cloud over.

  Dean looks suddenly miserable. “You’re right, you do think too much.”

  “Remember what you said? About vagrants? I think you were right. Vagrancy is the only form of freedom we have left.”

  There is silence, undiluted.

  Fingers take my chin, pulling my face around. The shadows, ever-present under Dean’s eyes, are now darker. His brow furrows and the tendons in his neck tighten. Those eyes, green like tree leaves filtering sunlight, dwell.

  I wonder what it would feel like if our foreheads touched, if my fingers touched the back of his neck.

  “I’ve also been thinking that you’ll go back to Resolute soon, and I don’t want you to.”

  It falls out, just like that. I smile, though it doesn’t serve to break the tension, which in this moment is great. For a moment he just looks at me; at my hair; at my chin, which he still touches. My hand finds his cheek; stubbled, strong.

  “What if, for now,” he says, “you just stop thinking?”

&n
bsp; I feel his breath hit my fingers, and I do what he says, for once. I stop giving a fuck, and I do what I want to do.

  I kiss him and he tastes like freedom. He feels like running, like I could take a train out of the station to someplace where a first kiss might not happen in an armoury. So I press my lips into his more firmly, I gather his hair between my fingers, smiling when I feel his arms encase me, his lips push back, and I quietly wish that wherever he goes, he lets me go, too.

  It is not me who breaks away first. I duck my head, and he plants a small kiss on my forehead.

  I smile at his shoes while he brushes away my hair, and then I say: “Can I ask you an embarrassing question?”

  I can almost feel him smirking, though I still can’t look.

  “What is it?”

  “What’s your name?”

  He laughs, and it is the kind of laugh that I have to look at, because I know that not to see it would be criminal.

  “Dean Mason,” he says. “Though you can’t have my middle name, I’m saving it for marriage.”

  Chapter Fourteen

  The dawn following the best night of my life was swallowed with the first round of casualties.

  Only twenty-six. Twenty six known deaths out of hundreds, but I still wondered if one or two of those twenty-six were mine. The council members came and spoke and left quickly, and the assembly sighed with the familiar weight of purgatory – we will now wait for the individuals to become known, and knowing comes in the form of your relatives’ lasting possessions, if there are any.

  When it is safe to do so, my eyes find Dean’s, standing with his initiates. He grimaces, shakes his head a little, tries to convey that it won’t be them, that the odds are in my favour.