Gabe clenched his fists and turned his gaze onto the man in front of him, wondering how far Bodge had fallen, wondering if he’d even survived. His reason for carrying on might be gone. He’d promised to protect him, and he hadn’t even been able to get him through the Cathedral.
“Help me, Gabe.”
Bodge was alive. There was pain in his voice though, he hadn’t escaped injury. He heard him suck air through gritted teeth. Tears pricked the corners of his eyes, but he didn’t blink. If he blinked, he’d give the subhuman in front of him time to charge him and send him tumbling after Bodge.
“It’s okay, I’ll get you out of there.”
“Not without my help, you won’t,” the Crossman hissed.
“Who are you?”
“My name is Fifty-Eight. I’ll help you get your friend out of that hole, but if you want to live, you must turn around, go back.” His tone was less aggressive now; Gabe even heard a hint of a plea in it.
“There’s nothing for us back there. We just want to find water and shelter. We’re not looking for trouble.” He hated how powerless he felt, how weak he sounded, but he didn’t want to fight this man. He was around the same age, height, and build as him, but he was a member of Leader’s ranks. He would fight tough, he would fight dirty, and he would fight to the death. Having the cross burned into their skin seemed to give them a small piece of Leader’s brutality. He couldn’t, wouldn’t think the pleading tone of the man in front of him reflected any kind of weakness.
“Gabe, help me,” Bodge yelled.
“Tell your friend to close his hole,” the Crossman spat, his head whipping from left to right, listening.
“It’s okay, Bodge. Just hang on.” What was he listening for? Why was he worried about Bodge making noise? He saw that there was a cave behind Fifty-Eight. Why was he here, so far back, surviving in a cave, when he could be near the White Wall, eating rice and lording it over Regulars?
“If you go on, you’ll die.”
“Why?”
The man shook his head and turned away.
“You’re alone?”
“Does it matter?” Fifty-Eight stepped toward him. He held his ground, his heartbeat throbbing in his ears. There could be others, hiding in the cave behind Fifty-Eight, ready to attack them. This could be an ambush. It didn’t matter that he had nothing. Where Gang was concerned, the thrill of the kill was usually enough. And they did have something: the water bottle. A prize to be proud of down here. Maybe he was working out how to get to Bodge to retrieve the bottle that had gone over the edge with him.
Fifty-Eight turned and stepped into the cave. A few seconds later, he reappeared, carrying a coil of rope made from the cotton clothing all subs wore to enter the SUIC. He held on to one end and threw the rest over the side, and Gabe heard an ow as it hit Bodge.
“Tie it around your waist,” Fifty-Eight called, shielding his mouth with his hand to direct his call directly down to Bodge. “Help me pull him up, and let’s be quick about it.” He backed into the cave, extinguishing the lighter so he could grip the makeshift rope with both hands.
Gabe followed him. He was wary, but he didn’t get the sense there were other Gang nearby, and he thought if Fifty-Eight was pulling Bodge up to take the bottle from him, he was either playing a dangerous game, or he was confident he could beat someone with more muscle in one arm than he had in his entire body. What he couldn’t figure out, was why Fifty-Eight was alone. Gang usually traveled in pairs, sometimes, on rare occasions, groups. It was unheard of for Leader to send his men out alone, especially to the farthest reaches of the SUIC.
He sat down in front of Fifty-Eight, and between them they hoisted Bodge up and over the ledge. The lighter revealed no serious injury. Just a swelling right eye, and various scrapes. He trudged dejectedly to stand on the other side of Gabe, away from the Crossman.
Gabe detected a slump in Fifty-Eight’s shoulders, an air of dejection.
“You’re hiding, aren’t you?”
Fifty-Eight stared at him for a few long seconds, then nodded.
“Why?”
He fixed Gabe with an angry glare and spoke in a haunted whisper. “He’ll kill everyone. I’m trying to tell you, but you don’t want to listen. Leader is going to kill everyone with his plan.”
“What plan? What are you talking about?”
“You don’t know?”
“I’m scared,” Bodge said. “I want to go.”
Gabe ignored Bodge, but Fifty-Eight nodded at him. “You should be scared. He wants to go up, but it’s too dangerous.”
“Up?” Gabe asked.
“He has Gang digging up. But they put in bombs, the World Alliance, to stop people going up. Leader thinks they can go around the bombs, but they can’t. He’s just killing Gang, to show he’s in charge. He’ll bring the whole place down and kill every one of us.” His sentence ended with a strangled sob, the kind of sob a man makes when he’s trying desperately to hold it in, and Gabe waited a moment, allowing him to regain his composure, before speaking.
“He doesn’t know you’re back here?”
Gabe had thought the rumbling earth and the dull thuds were being caused by the humans above, not the subhumans below. That maybe his son was up there, alone, in the middle of another war. He’d put the thought to the back of his mind. What happened above ground could be of no consequence to him down here, but this news sent adrenaline coursing through him.
Fifty-Eight shook his head.
“What’s your real name?” Bodge asked innocently.
“My name is Fifty-Eight,” he said, meeting Bodge’s eyes, daring him to challenge his Gang credentials. Bodge immediately looked down at the hole he’d fallen into minutes earlier.
Gabe wondered: could a man who was hiding from Leader really call himself a member of Gang? He decided the worst thing he could do was ask, so he asked something different.
“What happened to Fifty-Seven?”
“I killed him.”
As Bodge took a step back, Gabe took a step forward. “You were afraid he’d report you for disobeying Leader?”
Fifty-Eight nodded. “At first, it was okay. No one died in the first two months. The bombs started about thirty feet above the tunnels, and most people dug at the same pace. During the third month, twenty men died. They were the strongest men, the best Diggers. Now, more are dying every day. Every time there’s a boom, every time the earth shakes, two more are gone. He doesn’t care about anyone but himself. He knows digging up is never going to work, and he knows everyone in Gang knows it too. He’s testing our loyalty, to make sure his position is safe. He knows we’ll never question him, and he knows we’ll never dig up and out. Even if we did, they’d have soldiers waiting to kill us. He’s playing a power game, and it will end in disaster. He’s going to kill everyone, including the Regulars, just to prove he controls things down here.”
Gabe took another step toward him as he fixed his gaze on his earth-blackened feet.
“Does he have Regulars digging, too?”
“No, you don’t understand. Regulars aren’t digging, but it doesn’t matter, they’ll still die if the whole place falls in on them.”
“What happened to Fifty-Seven’s light?”
Fifty-Eight stuck a hand in his pocket, brought out a second lighter, and flicked it to life without saying a word. Gabe didn’t give himself time to doubt his instincts. He darted forward and tore the lighter from Fifty-Eight’s grip. He staggered back and stumbled into Bodge.
“Bodge, jump,” he yelled, and the two men leapt from the ledge, Bodge trailing the cotton rope behind him as they fell into the darkness below.
IT HAD BEEN ONE HELL of a gamble.
Fifty-Eight could have grabbed his wrist and beaten him to death with his own hand, and Bodge would likely have stood and watched, frozen in fear, or turned and fled the confrontation.
But Gabe took a chance, hoping he’d fall no farther than Bodge had when he’d stepped off the ledge in panic. He tum
bled head over heels before finally coming to rest on his side, winded, gasping for air.
He sucked air past aching ribs, hoping none were fractured. The pain gradually subsided as he lay still, listening for any sound that might indicate Fifty-Eight coming after them. He ran his tongue over his teeth, looking for gaps or any that were loose. He found none, and he heard nothing to make him fear retribution from Fifty-Eight. The man’s spirit was broken. He wouldn’t want to make a racket scrabbling down the loosely-packed rock to go after them, for fear of revealing his position to Gang sent to look for him. If they found him, Leader would set him to digging again, or worse. Gang was brutal, but Leader was a totally different proposition. Gabe wasn’t sure how many of Leader’s rules Fifty-Eight had broken, but even breaking one could be fatal, and Gabe thought he’d probably broken several – by disobeying Leader’s orders, by hiding from the rest of Gang, and by killing Fifty-Seven – if what he said was true.
Bodge hadn’t hesitated when Gabe told him to jump, launching himself from the ledge, and now he could hear nothing to tell him he’d survived the fall.
“Bodge, are you okay?”
A low groan came from nearby, followed by a groggy assessment of his condition. “Hurts.”
“What hurts, Bodge?”
“I broke everything.”
He was so used to being encircled by darkness that it took him twenty seconds to remember the lighter – his prize for taking a risk so great – and flick it to life. Bodge was ten feet away, his right arm folded under him, his entire body weight on it. A one-inch gash on the left side of his forehead oozed blood down his cheek. It glistened against his dark skin.
“Did you get knocked out?”
“Don’t know.” Bodge sat up, holding his right arm awkwardly against his body. He dabbed at the blood on his cheek, looked at it with wide, fearful eyes, and wiped it on his pants like it was acid burning into his fingers.
“What hurts?”
“My arm, and my ankle. I busted ‘em.”
This was bad news. Seriously bad news. He needed Bodge in one piece. If he’d broken his leg, he wouldn’t be able to climb, or even walk, and he certainly wouldn’t be able to flee if they were confronted by Gang.
“Stay right there. I’m going to help you.”
He got slowly to his feet, flexed his arms and legs, checked his own head for blood. All clear, apart from bruised ribs.
He made his way carefully across the gravelly, sloping ground to Bodge. Holding the lighter close to the hand that had been pinned under his body, he saw that the wrist was already beginning to swell.
“Can you bend it?”
Bodge pulled his hand away as Gabe gingerly flexed his wrist. “Ow, Gabe. Why’d you do that?”
“Sorry, I’m just trying to help.”
“I don’t mean my hand.” Bodge’s brow furrowed as Gabe untied the knotted rope from around his waist.
“What do you mean, then?” He tore a square of cotton from the rope and dabbed at the cut on Bodge’s forehead, relieved to see it wasn’t deep.
“Why did you steal the light? I mean why did you steal the light.”
“Because we needed a light, and now we have one. You don’t like the dark.”
“But he’s a Crossman, he’ll come after us and hurt us.”
“He’s not Gang, Bodge, not anymore.”
“He had the cross right on his head. I saw it.” A matching pair of tears made tracks down Bodge’s cheeks.
“He had the cross, but he’s not Gang, and he’s not coming after us. He’s just like us, trying to find somewhere safe.”
“But what if other Crossmen come after us?”
“Bodge, I told you. They’re not coming after us. Christ, listen to me, would you?”
“Sorry.” Bodge’s head dropped, his chin on his chest, his eyes wet with tears as he cradled his broken wrist.
“It’s not your fault. You’re scared, I get it, but we’re okay.”
“You promise?” He looked at Gabe, his eyes puddles.
“Yes. Right now, I promise.”
“And you won’t leave me?”
“I won’t leave you, Bodge.”
“But why did you steal the light?”
Gabe tipped his head back, exhaled slowly, and counted to ten. “You heard what he said. Leader is trying to dig up and out.”
“That don’t have nothing to do with us though, do it? We’re just finding a place to live, where it’s safe.”
Gabe looked up into the gloom. “You think you can climb?”
Bodge didn’t answer.
“What’s wrong, Bodge?”
“I lost the bottle.”
Gabe looked around and spotted it on the edge of a wide, dark hole. He eased his way to it, being careful not to slip on the loose rock, fearful of knocking it over the ledge and out of reach. He managed to retrieve it and made his way back.
“Can you climb out of here, or do I have to pull you out?”
“My arm hurts.”
“I guess that means I’ll have to pull you out, huh?”
Bodge nodded and wiped a dirty hand across his eyes, smearing his tears with dust.
GABE SCRABBLED UP THE precarious scree, small rocks coming loose under his hands and feet and tumbling down past him. Once he was out, he held up the lighter to satisfy himself that Fifty-Eight had left, then threw one end of the rope down to Bodge.
“Tie it around your waist and wait for me to tell you what happens next.”
“Hurry, Gabe. I’m scared.”
Even before Bodge had finished his sentence, a rumble came through the ground. It felt like a tremor, a minor earthquake, but now Gabe knew it for what it really was – a sign that Fifty-Eight could be right, that Leader’s plan would at least put an end to many, if not all, the members of his gang. Since Gabe had emerged from his catatonic state and found Bodge nursing him back to health, he’d heard several of those explosions. Some were distant, others sounded like they came from nearby. Their refuge had crumbled as a direct result of a bomb detonating, he was sure of it, and now he looked up into the spiraling blackness of the Cathedral above him, hoping an avalanche of rock wasn’t about to crash this party.
He knew he couldn’t stand around for long. He had to get Bodge out of the hole and get them moving, in case the noise they’d made brought Gang to check what was going on back here. He found two large, relatively smooth rocks and looped the rope around them in a figure of eight, before calling out a warning to Bodge and beginning to heave, keeping his eyes on the makeshift rope and pulley system, praying the friction didn’t wear through the cotton or loop over either of the rocks. With a lot of grunting and perspiration, he managed to haul Bodge out of the hole.
For a time, they sat motionless, Gabe letting the burning sensation in his palms subside, Bodge whispering about how his ankle and wrist hurt real bad. Between them, the small glow of the lighter felt like a connector, binding them to one another.
When eventually they rose and made their way out of the Cathedral and back into narrow, humid tunnels, they did so in darkness, despite Bodge pleading for light. Gabe explained that they had to preserve the lighter fuel. They couldn’t even burn pieces of the rope for light, because they had to make sure they had enough to get out if either of them fell into another hole.
They walked slowly through the darkness, Gabe in front, Bodge behind, his uninjured left hand on Gabe’s shoulder. Every so often, Gabe stopped, listened to make sure he couldn’t hear Gang close by, and lit their surroundings for five or ten seconds. It was one of those times that Bodge managed to snag them a meal, when the lighter surprised a rat that was close enough to grab, and Bodge removed his hand from Gabe’s shoulder for the first time since they’d left the Cathedral, stooping with lightning speed to grab it, forgetting all about the pain in his busted ankle for the time it took them to divide and swallow the gristly meat.
After several more twists and turns, they found themselves in a steeply-ascending tunnel
. They heard no sounds above that might indicate digging, so Gabe hurried up the incline. When they came to the end of the tunnel, the ground leveled out and they stopped.
“You okay?” Gabe asked.
“I don’t want to walk no more. Why can’t we just find a place to stay? I’m tired, and my arm hurts, and my leg hurts. I think I have blisters, too.”
“You can stay here if you like.” Gabe spat the words into the darkness, and immediately regretted saying them. Bodge was afraid, and in pain, but he’d saved Gabe’s life, he’d jumped into the hole when told without questioning it, and he’d followed him blindly through these tunnels, with at least one broken bone. He reminded himself that, as big as his companion was, he was still just a kid, a vulnerable kid, who needed looking after.
That was why he was here: to look after Bodge, to help him find somewhere he felt safe, somewhere he could make a life for himself. But things had changed. Leader had his men digging up, setting off explosions. What if, on the other side of those explosions, there were no more bombs? What if, once the bombs had been detonated, the way was clear? Could they dig all the way to the surface, through two miles of earth? And, if so, could he find a way to be there when they made it through? Did he have a shot at getting out of this place? Of freedom? Of seeing the sun and feeling its warmth on his skin? Of seeing his son?
“You promised you wouldn’t leave me. I don’t want to be on my own.”
“I’m not going to leave you. You think maybe you could move a little faster, and we’ll find somewhere to rest?”
“I’ll try.”
“Okay, buddy. I’m sorry I yelled.”
“I was tired, that’s all, and my foot hurts.”
The relief in Bodge’s tone made him feel human. Being labeled subhuman and cast into this hot, dark misery took away a person’s humanity, but taking care of Bodge, helping Bodge, brought a measure of humanity back that he thought he’d lost during his years of surviving down here.
Two Miles Down Page 4