“I’m hungry, Gabe.”
“I am too, buddy.”
“Can we cook up the rice now?”
“We need water to cook it.”
“Oh yeah, I forgot.” Bodge hung his head, his sad eyes fixed on his bandaged wrist.
“Well, what do you say we go look for water? Maybe even catch a rat to cook up too?”
“And find a new home?”
“Sure. Listen, I have an idea.”
“Yeah?” Bodge looked into his eyes, holding his gaze, and he leaned forward and spoke quietly.
“We need a way to make sure we’re not going around in circles, so why don’t we use some rope to mark when we get to the end of each tunnel. That way, we’ll know which ones we’ve been down, and which ones we haven’t.”
“You said we need to keep the rope, for emerging seeds.”
For a second, Gabe wondered what the hell he was talking about, then he remembered their earlier conversation: emergencies.
“Well, yeah, I did, but we’ll just use little scraps. We’ll make a hole in the wall and shove a scrap in, leave some hanging out, just an inch or two. It’ll be like a map to make sure we’re headed in the right direction.”
“But I thought we were just looking for a place to call home?”
Bodge’s inquisitive mind had caught him out. He didn’t want to frighten him by revealing he was taking him in the direction of the Gypsum Chamber. He thought if he gave Bodge a purpose, something to do, he would remain calm, distracted from his memories of the past and his fears of the future. Once they navigated their way through the tunnel that would take them around the Gypsum Chamber, their chances of running into Gang would rise considerably. Part of dealing with that possibility was the task of keeping Bodge calm, especially if he was going to get him to travel all the way to the Cotton Cave to deliver Soames’s message to Rosselli.
“Yes, Bodge, but we don’t want to go around in circles, do we? There’s no water in any of the tunnels we’ve been in, so we don’t want to spend our time searching them again.”
“Okay. We shouldn’t use a lot of rope though, in case one of us falls in a hole.”
“We’ll just use this.” Gabe held what had once been the leg of a pair of pants. “Do you think you could tear it into little pieces for me?”
“Yes,” Bodge answered, looking serious, the hint of a smile just under the surface of his studious concentration. He tore a piece of rope and held it up. “This small?”
“That’s perfect. You’re a natural.”
Now, the smile came through like sunlight bursting through a cloudy day. Bright and radiant. Bodge tore the length of material into pieces, then they left their temporary shelter, Gabe carrying their few possessions in the bag given him by Soames, Bodge holding the little stack of torn cotton in his unbandaged hand.
He told Bodge to stick close to him. Each time they came to the end of a tunnel, he instructed Bodge on how to carve a notch in the wall and jam a small piece of rope into it. By the fourth time he did it, Bodge had mastered the task, and Gabe let his thoughts drift to the far end of the SUIC, picturing the murky Cotton Cave and Leader’s nearby compound.
Gang had constructed a wall at one end of the Cotton Cave that ran twenty meters, blocking the interior of Leader’s compound from view. It meant there were only two ways into Leader’s personal chambers. One entrance was inside the Cotton Cave, and one was just outside, in a kind of antechamber right before the maze of tunnels like the one they were in now began. Both entrances had always been guarded by two of Leader’s strongest men when Gabe had been resident in the Cotton Cave. He wondered if that was because of Soames’s attack on Leader’s base.
He’d left the Cotton Cave soon after the gypsum wall had been completed, so he didn’t know whether Leader had sent more men into the Gypsum Chamber to mine the huge crystals. He doubted it, Leader couldn’t afford to lose fifteen men every twenty-four hours for the sake of a few walls, but you never knew with Leader, that was the thing.
As they explored the narrow tunnels over the next few hours, sticking small strips of cotton into holes chipped out using their rockknives, he felt the temperature increasing and the air getting thinner. They were getting close to the Gypsum Chamber, and Bodge was getting nervous.
“We should go back, Gabe. It was hard to breathe when I came through last time.”
“You came through there? Just how in the...” He was so incredulous he’d almost cussed. How had Bodge made it through the Gypsum Chamber?
“There was lots of ice, but it was hot in there. It burned when I breathed. I had to go quick.”
“That wasn’t ice, Bodge. What you saw were crystals.”
“Like diamonds?”
“You know the white wall in the Cotton Cave?”
“Yeah, I saw that.”
“It’s made from those crystals.”
“Really?”
“Yes.”
“How did they get them out of there?”
“Crossmen cut them down and carried them away.”
The mention of Crossmen dampened Bodge’s interest. “I don’t want to go back in there. I’m scared of that place.”
“We don’t have to go in there, there’s a tunnel around it. What do you say?”
“We still got a little water. Can’t we find more back the way we came?”
“We’ve been searching all day, and we haven’t found water or rats.” He didn’t know what he could say to his heavily-limping companion and, when Bodge looked like he was about to cry, he tried scare tactics.
“What was that noise?” He looked left to right, whipping his head about, trying to look as though he’d heard someone close by.
“I didn’t hear no splosion.” Bodge stopped, leaned against the wall, then sat down.
“Bodge, come on, get up. I think I heard someone. Gang must have followed the rope markers we left.”
Bodge told him he was imagining noises, and he knew there was no point in keeping up an act that obviously wasn’t going to work. The teenager’s instincts were good, and the more Gabe thought about it, the more he knew he would have to share part of the plan with him if he was to persuade him to take the risk.
“Hey, you know when I was talking to Soames? When we ate the rice?” He was going to add yesterday, but he didn’t know if it had been yesterday or not. “Well, he said after I left the Cotton Cave, things got to be okay around there.”
“Is that the white wall place?”
“Yes, that’s it. Where people live under the rock.”
“Yeah, I think maybe it is a nice place, a connumity.”
“You mean community?”
“That’s what I said.”
“If it was nice there, why didn’t you stay? You could have made some friends.”
“They wouldn’t want me there.”
“Why not?”
“Because I’m just dumb old Bodge. Nobody ever liked me. It would be like when I was a kid and the other kids used to call me names to make me fight them, then beat me up when I said no. I was scared to stay there, so I did what grandma said. I tried to find somewhere I could be on my own, and in the end I found you.”
“And you saved me, too. Don’t forget that. You’re brave, Bodge, you know that?”
“I ain’t brave, Gabe. I’m scared as a mouse in a kitten store.”
“You and me both, but we’ll be okay, because we have one another, right?”
Bodge nodded. He shoved the remaining scraps of cotton into his pocket.
Gabe would have to expose him to more fear. Lots more fear, if he was to save him. Not to mention risk. Sooner or later, they were going to run into Gang. It was a matter of when, not if. When that time came, he would likely die if he couldn’t defend himself. That meant one thing and one thing only: he had to get to the gun as quickly as possible. If he could do that, he could protect Bodge in the face of a Gang attack. A gun was no guarantee of safety, but it would be nice to be able to point something a
t Gang that would level the playing field.
“Some of the guys in the Cotton Cave are great guys. They would have liked you. I know they would. Even the ones who don’t want to make friends with other people would have left you alone.”
“But didn’t they get sent down here because they did bad things?”
“Well, yeah, but maybe they didn’t do the things they said they did.”
“I don’t know, Gabe. Everyone does bad things to me.”
“I haven’t done anything bad to you, have I?”
“No.”
“And they sent me down here for doing a bad thing, a very bad thing.”
“What did you do?”
“I didn’t do anything. They got it wrong, but that doesn’t matter.”
“You left the white wall place.”
“I left the Cotton Cave, yes. When I was there, Gang was mean to everyone. It wasn’t such a nice place then, but the people in the Cotton Cave, the ones who lived there, they weren’t mean. They were just trying to get by, like you and me.
“You could have been safe there. Once Gang stopped being mean to the Cotton Cave, you could have lived there just fine. I had a friend called Adams, and he loved anyone who could catch rats.”
He smiled to himself, reminiscing how Adams would hold the rats like they were steak fillets. Not like they were something to be feared.
“I can catch rats,” Bodge said, with a look on his face not unlike the one Gabe remembered on Adams’s. A proud look, an excited look.
“You sure can, and anyone who can is very important in the Cotton Cave.”
Bodge grinned, a far-off look in his eyes.
As they walked on into the darkness ahead, Gabe imagined what the Cotton Cave must be like without the fear of Gang disrupting it. He thought it would be almost tolerable. There were lots more insects and rats there, with it being close to the entrance. Once a person got used to eating things that offended their senses, they could be quite tasty. Even eaten raw.
“You know, Bodge, in the Cotton Cave, you can tell when it’s day or night above ground.”
“I know. I saw dust floating around.”
“That’s right. Light comes in from the shaft.”
“I think I’d like to go back there, one day.” The way Bodge said this was dreamy and nostalgic, and Gabe had to resist the urge to jump for joy. For one, he didn’t want a fresh lump on top of his head, and for two, because dreaming about something and having the guts to do it were two different things.
He decided to play it cool, without giving away that that was what they were doing right now: heading for the Cotton Cave.
“You know, Bodge, I don’t think it’s all that far away, but we’d have to go past the Gypsum Chamber, so I guess we won’t be able to go.”
Bodge stopped, stood stock still, and thought for a moment, using his bandaged wrist to wipe sweat from his face and neck.
“I can be brave. I think we should go to the Cotton Cave. I want to see Adams smile when I catch him a rat. I’ll catch him the biggest one down here. I’ll catch him one as big as a crocodile.”
“Well, in that case, let’s make a deal. We’ll both be brave, and even if we get scared along the way, we’ll keep right on going. That sound like a good deal to you?”
“Yeah.” Bodge stuck out his pinky finger, and Gabe intertwined his around it. He didn’t tell Bodge what Soames had told him: Adams was dead and gone. He didn’t want to say or do anything that might make Bodge want to break his promise.
Somewhere above and behind them, a low boom was followed by a long rumble. It could mean only one thing: part of the complex had come crashing down. He wondered whether that meant the end of Soames. He thought it probably did, and he let go of Bodge’s pinky.
“Come on my friend, let’s get going.”
“DO YOU REMEMBER THE breeze there?”
“Bodge, keep your voice down and your ears open.”
“But do you?” Whispering now. “Do you remember it, Gabe?”
“Yes, I do.” The breeze Bodge talked about, like the dim light, found its way down the only way into the SUIC, the long shaft down which they’d both been lowered. He thought that breeze was just about the best thing down here in the sticky, humid atmosphere, even better than the light that found its way into the Cotton Cave. That light let you see where you were, but the breeze helped you to forget.
When the wind blew hard above ground, enough found its way down into the SUIC that you could close your eyes and imagine you were on a beach. Except for the odor of unwashed skin, human waste, and the earthy, minerally smell that was ever-present.
They moved slowly, Gabe out in front. Suddenly, a thought struck him. All the explosions they’d heard, or at least most of them, sounded like they’d come from much higher up. The larger chambers – the Cathedral, the Water Chamber, even Leader’s compound – had higher ceilings than any of the tunnels. Had Gang found a way, maybe using a rope construction, to hoist themselves all the way to those ceilings? Was that the starting point for some of their digging operations? Certainly they hadn’t in the Cathedral. He suspected that had been where the major collapse had occurred, and he thought both Fifty-Eight and Soames had likely perished.
Perhaps the holes Gang were digging above the tunnels, like the one in which Gabe and Bodge and Soames had rested and eaten the rice, were being dug in the direction of the ceilings of the larger chambers.
It made sense, but it scared him. It would save them as much as several hundred feet of hacking their way vertically through rock, but it meant they were making a larger area above more unstable than they would be if they were digging straight up. Where smaller tunnels caused localized collapses, there was danger, but there was also a chance they’d be able to dig their way through. But if one of those large chambers fell in, it would bring down everything around it. The debris would be piled high. There would be no way of digging through it without more falling into the space you’d dug. It might be possible to dig under it, but it wouldn’t take long for the oxygen to run out. The narrow chutes that extended into the complex at various points, where air was blown in to regulate the temperature, wouldn’t provide enough oxygen to keep them alive. They needed the flow from above ground. If that flow was blocked, they would run out of air.
“Keep moving, Bodge.” The kid had slowed noticeably. He hobbled along, obviously in a lot of pain from his busted ankle.
The heat on his face told him they were right on top of the Gypsum Chamber. He couldn’t see it yet, as the tunnel veered sharply right ahead of them, but he knew once they turned that corner, they would have to move. Get to the tunnel and get through it and away from the Gypsum Chamber as quickly as they could. That wouldn’t be as quickly as he wanted, not with Bodge still hobbling, but he knew if they didn’t put distance between themselves and the Gypsum Chamber, their prospects wouldn’t be good. It was too hot, too hard to breathe. He was already wheezing.
He walked back, meeting Bodge halfway along the tunnel. He looked miserable in the light cast by the lighter, his lips pooched out, circles ringing his dark eyes.
“I’m thirsty, Gabe, and my head hurts.”
“It’s okay, buddy. I got you.” He fished inside the bag, found the bottle of water, and handed it to Bodge.
“You drink what you need, it’ll make you feel better.”
He watched Bodge sucking water from the bottle. When half of what was left was gone, he put out his hand.
“Don’t drink it all.”
“You said drink what I need.” Water dripped from his lightly-stubbled chin.
“I know, but if you drink it all, there’ll be none left next time you need some. You see?”
“Oh yeah. You’re smart.” Bodge’s eyes widened, and he let out a belch Gabe thought was almost enough to bring the tunnel down without explosives. Both men laughed. Their smiles faded instantly though, as they heard voices nearby. Screaming and cussing. Two men.
Bodge grabbed him, painful
ly tight, and he wriggled free, quickly reaching inside the bag and pulling out a rockknife. When he held it out to Bodge, he shook his head.
“Take it,” he hissed, forcing it into Bodge’s hand. “It’s not bad to hurt someone if you’re doing it so they don’t hurt you. You understand?”
Bodge gripped the rockknife without answering, holding it down to his side.
“Hold it up in front of you, like this.”
As he took the other from the bag and lifted it to demonstrate, two men came barreling around the corner, plowing into him from behind, and sending all four of them crashing to the ground.
HE WENT DOWN HARD, cracking his temple against the wall as he fell. He must have been knocked out cold, because the other three men were back on their feet by the time he grasped what had happened.
The two who’d knocked them flying had Bodge pinned against the wall of the tunnel. He saw each of them held a rockknife and knew instantly they were the weapons he and Bodge had been holding. One of them had torn a strip off their cotton rope, wrapped it around the jagged rock, and lit it on fire, turning it into a crude lamp. That told Gabe he’d been unconscious for more than a few seconds, and he gently touched his temple and discovered a painful lump.
Bodge stood with a thick forearm across his eyes.
He clambered to his feet. “Leave him be.”
Both men turned. As he expected, they had the mark of Gang on their forehead. A jagged pink scar in the shape of a cross. The rumor was that Leader used a gold cross he wore around his neck on a chain to inflict the damage. It was the first test of their obedience and loyalty: they had to submit to and withstand the pain of being branded. After it was done, once they were away from Leader, it was a reminder that they belonged to him. Each time they touched their head, to scratch an itch or to splash water on their face, they would feel the inch-and-a-half mark. If they caught their reflection in water, they would see it. And it would be there until the day they died. They could never escape Gang, once they were in.
The one with the rockknife-cum-rocklamp advanced on him. When the second man started toward Gabe, he fixed a wide-eyed stare on Bodge, then turned and ran. As he went, he yelled out, telling Bodge to run. He heard one of the men pursuing him throw down the rockknife, and moments later he was sent tumbling as the man launched himself into his legs.
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