The Secret Citizen (Freedom/Hate Series, Book 3)

by Kyle Andrews

  “Damnit,” she said under her breath. “Damnit. Damnit. Damnit.”

  “We can do this,” Tracy told her, stepping forward and running her hands over the locks.

  “How?” Rose asked.

  “Tools,” Tracy replied. She then turned toward the army of people standing behind them and yelled, “We need tools! Blowtorch! Sledgehammer! We need to get through this door, now!”

  The people started talking amongst themselves, trying to come up with a plan. Among them, one voice rose above the others, in the back of the crowd. It was a man, yelling, “I know where to get help! I'll get tools!”

  Presumably, the man raced off to get the tools they needed. Rose couldn't actually see who had made the offer or what happened to him next. What she did know was that she wasn't going to stand there and do nothing until someone came to help her. She had to at least try to get through the door on her own. She needed to do something.

  She gripped the rebar in her hand as tightly as she could, staring at the locks. She kicked at the door, but it didn't even budge. She swung the rebar, but she only hurt her hand while the locks remained unharmed.

  “Help me,” she said to Tracy and some of the other people nearby. “On three, kick this damn thing down.”

  Tracy moved aside and allowed two large men to take her place. Rose counted down from three and the they tried to kick the door down, but it didn't move. The people who had closed off that entrance never wanted anyone to come through it.

  They kept trying to get through, beating on the door with feet and shoulders. Trying to pry their way in with the rebar. It might have been five minutes or an hour before that man came back with tools. Either way, it was too long. People could have been suffocating inside the Garden and Rose was helplessly beating at a door with a useless metal stick.

  When he returned, the man had a blowtorch which cut through the locks in a matter of minutes. Once they were taken care of, the rusty door still fought against being opened, but the people eventually won out.

  Rose stepped through the doorway, into the familiar tunnel that led from the bank entrance to the Garden. She looked toward the bank and saw the ladder leading down from it, twisted amongst a pile of debris that had once been the bank's basement. Immediately, her mind went to the guard who stood watch over that entrance and she knew that there was no way that Wally had survived the attack. She had seen his face every day for years, but would never see it again. Her stomach started to turn as her mind drifted toward dark thoughts. How many more faces had she already seen for the last time? How many of her friends were burning alive?

  She could have drowned in those thoughts, but she pushed them back and locked them up. There was no time for her to crumble now.

  “Let's go,” she said, fuming with anger as she hurried through the tunnel.

  Under her feet, she could feel small chunks of cement. As she got closer to the Garden, those chunks grew bigger and bigger. Finally, she was stopped in her tracks by the sight of the tunnel ahead, which had collapsed, blocking the entrance to the Garden.

  Smoke was creeping through the mess in front of her. The screams from inside the Garden were louder than ever, made even worse by the echo of the tunnel.

  “No,” she said to herself, refusing to give up.

  She climbed onto the pile of debris and started to dig, giving no thought as to how they could possibly clear the way and get everyone out of the Garden before it was too late. All she knew was that she had to try.

  Panic was ruling her. It was sloppy and it was dangerous. She knew that she had to regain her composure if she wanted to prevent all of those other people with her from dying in another tunnel collapse.

  Taking a breath, she turned and said to them, “Take the torch and go back the way we came. Get to the fence around the hospital and get through it. Take half of the people here and go, now! The other half, start digging. The people in there will be looking to this exit. We need to get it clear.”

  She had no idea what she was doing. She didn't know if she was sending people off to their deaths, or condemning others to die with her in the tunnel, but there was nobody else to give the orders. Aaron could have been dead for all she knew, and whether there were other members of Freedom there with her or not, she was the one standing at the front of the line. She was the commander of this army.

  27

  Justin woke up with a mask over his face, breathing oxygen from a tank. He was on the ground, in an area that had much less smoke than where he had been before. His head was throbbing. His mouth felt as though he'd been eating cotton.

  As soon as he remembered what had happened, he sat up and pulled the mask off of his face.

  “Take it easy,” said a man who looked as though he were all of seventeen years old. But who was Justin to judge?

  “The girl?”

  “She's okay. She's with her parents.”

  “I need to help...” Justin said, starting to pull himself up, but the other guy put a hand on his shoulder and tried to hold him down.

  “You're not helping anyone if you have to be pulled out of there again,” the man said.

  “What's going on? How long have I been out?”

  “You've been out for maybe ten or fifteen minutes. What's going on is... All Hell broke loose. But we're getting some of the fires under control. Should at least buy us some time.”

  Justin pushed the man's hand off of his shoulder and stood up. For a moment or two it seemed like he might wind up back on the floor, but he managed to stay standing.

  Looking around, Justin realized that he was in a hallway. There was some damage to the walls and some broken glass from doors and windows, but otherwise, it wasn't too bad. It was a rarely-used section of the hospital, connected to the main building by a long breezeway, with sturdy doors on either end. It was filled with offices which were rarely used because there was too much exposure to the outside world. But exposure didn't seem to matter anymore.

  There were other people on the floor, being treated for smoke inhalation and various injuries. Triage. Justin would be damned if he was going to remain there with the weak and sickly, while others fought to save lives.

  Turning back to the man, Justin asked, “Where are the hospital patients? I have a friend with cancer. I need to help her.”

  “I don't know where they are now, but the patients are being taken care of. There's nothing that you can do for them. You should rest.”

  Resting wasn't an option. Leaving that man behind, Justin started walking back toward the Garden's lobby with no clear plan in mind. All he knew was that he was sick and tired of losing. He was sick of having things taken from him, and he was sick of being unable to put up a fight.

  He felt weak and nauseous. Though he hadn't gone far, he was out of breath. Despite this, he pushed forward, because as bad as he might have felt, there were others who were feeling much worse. He would gladly battle a headache if it meant saving a life.

  When he opened the door that led into the main building, a rush of smoke blew past him. He was instantly standing in the middle of chaos as people struggled to put out fires and help the injured.

  “You shouldn't be here,” Simon yelled as he rushed past Justin.

  The tech specialist sounded strangely commanding. His sleeves were rolled up and his brow was bleeding. The man that once seemed so small and nerdy to Justin now looked like a soldier in the middle of a battlefield. Everyone did. Everyone was.

  Justin walked next to Simon, feeling as though he had missed the first two acts of a movie and was trying to jump in at the end, but there was no time for catching up, so he asked, “What can I do.”

  “You can go back to triage. Help take care of the injured.”

  “I can do more than that.”

  “I don't know what to tell you,” Simon said to him, stopping at a door and studying a beam that had fallen across it, blocking entrance. “I'm not in charge. I don't give orders.”

  As Simon grabbed the beam and tr
ied to move it aside, Justin helped him. Moving the beam wasn't hard, but avoiding the debris that fell from the ceiling afterward was a little bit more difficult.

  Simon moved to the door, pulling a key from his pocket.

  “I need to do something,” Justin told him more firmly than before. “Just tell me where I could be useful.”

  Simon pushed the door open and then stopped, looking Justin in the eyes. He finally said, “Aaron has crews putting out fires in the main areas. We have crews working to clear exits. We have people taking care of the injured and transferring hospital patients... Maybe someone there can use your help.”

  “They're fighting the fires in the main areas. What about the residential areas?” Justin asked.

  “I couldn't tell you. I just know what Aaron told me and what I've seen.”

  Justin nodded and said, “Thanks.”

  Before he could think about what he was doing, Justin was running toward the residential section of the Garden. He could barely breathe and he was coughing so hard the he felt like a lung could come up at any moment, but he needed to run. He needed to get there.

  It took him a while to realize exactly why he was rushing toward the residential area. At first he thought that it was just because there might be people there, trapped in their rooms. But the closer he got, the more he remembered the rest of that day and he realized that he was rushing toward someone specific.

  Libby's room was his destination. Ammo was last seen sleeping on her bed, and while most people would probably call him crazy for putting a dog's life ahead of his own, Justin needed to save his dog. He'd already lost both of his parents. He'd lost Uly and Libby. His only sanctuary in a crazy world was burning around him. He had lost every future that he had ever dreamed of for himself. His life was starting to feel like a never-ending series of losses and failures. He couldn't even save Nina before he passed out. Fortunately, better men were there to help her when he failed.

  But Ammo was his. That dog was his family. His friend. His home. Ammo was the only piece of his life that remained and if he died, then what?

  By the time Justin reached Libby's room, he was wheezing and coughing up black mucus. His eyes were burning. The hallway around the room was on fire. Smoke would have filled the entire area if a section of the ceiling hadn't fallen away, allowing the smoke to rise to the next level.

  Inside the room, Justin found Ammo sitting on the bed, panting. His tongue was hanging out and he turned toward Justin, but the dog didn't move.

  “Ammo, come!” Justin demanded.

  Ammo stood and licked the inside of his mouth. He walked in circles on the bed and sat down again.

  “Ammo! Come! Now!” Justin called, smacking the side of his leg.

  But the dog was stubborn. His tongue bobbed up and down as he continued panting.

  A poster that belonged to one of Libby's roommates caught fire and fell off of the wall.

  There was no time for playing games. Justin needed to get Ammo out of there. He walked to Ammo and grabbed the dog's collar. He pulled on it, but the dog didn't move. He pulled harder, but Ammo planted his feet.

  “Damnit, Ammo! Come on! You need to come!”

  Justin put an arm around Ammo and he could feel the dog shaking. Ammo was terrified, but he wasn't willing to leave that bed. Why wasn't he willing to leave that bed?

  Justin's eyes were filling with tears, which he attributed to the smoke and dust that was being kicked up. He was shaking nearly as hard as Ammo was and pleading with Ammo, “Please! Please come with me!”

  He grabbed the collar and pulled again. Ammo fell onto his side, still unwilling to walk with Justin.

  “I need you to come with me!” Justin yelled at Ammo, which made the dog shake even harder.

  He couldn't understand why this dog wouldn't leave a burning building. Instinct should have kicked in and the dog should have made a run for it long before Justin showed up, but he was determined to stay there. He was determined to wait for Libby to come home.

  As soon as that thought struck Justin, his heart sank. The tears flowed more freely. The desperation grew into an even sharper pain.

  Finally, he told the dog, “She's dead.”

  As the words left his mouth, Justin knelt on the floor so that he could look Ammo directly in the eyes and he told him, “She's not coming back. You have to understand that. You have to let her go. Please let her go. Please come with me. I need you.”

  Ammo leaned in closer to Justin and sniffed his face. He then started licking the tears off of Justin's cheeks.

  In the hallway, something fell. A wall or a ceiling. For all Justin knew, the floor had fallen into the basement and he was trapped there. Ammo looked toward the door and then to Justin.

  Holding onto either side of Ammo's face with the dog's big ears flopping over his hands, Justin once again demanded, “Ammo, come!”

  The dog hopped off of the bed and spun in a circle around Justin's feet, the same way he would whenever Justin came toward him holding the dog's leash. It meant that Ammo was excited to be going out. In this case, it probably meant that he was excited to be getting out of the burning room.

  Justin got to his feet and moved toward the door. The walls around him were on fire. His head was spinning. For a moment, it felt as if he were going to pass out again, but he managed to stay conscious and moved into the hallway, turning in the direction from which he had come.

  Ammo turned in the opposite direction, still panting and dancing excitedly.

  “This way, boy,” Justin told Ammo, but the dog wouldn't follow. Instead, Ammo took several steps down the hall and stopped to see if Justin was following him.

  This wasn't the same thing that he had done in the room. He wasn't refusing to get out of the building. This was quite the opposite.

  Ammo let out a bark and spun in a circle again. He jumped up and ran a few steps down the hall before turning around once more.

  It was Justin's turn to listen. After glancing over his shoulder at the hall that he'd walked down only moments earlier, Justin decided to trust Ammo. He followed the dog and together they started to run through the abandoned hallways of the Garden.

  Moments later, Justin heard another crash from behind him. This time, the whole floor shook. When he turned around, he could see a cloud of dust pouring through the hallway. The ceiling had collapsed. Ammo must have heard beams creaking or smelled a fire that Justin couldn't see. Either way, the dog had saved Justin's life.

  28

  Rose's muscles were aching. Her hands were bloody. The handkerchief that she had tied over her face wasn't doing much to keep her from breathing in dust. Sweat was dripping into her eyes, but she never slowed down. She refused to allow her own discomfort to stop her from getting through that rubble and opening the door to the Garden.

  She didn't know how much time had passed. It didn't really matter. It wasn't as though she were concerned with curfew at this point. She didn't care if HAND sent an entire army after her. All she cared about was getting inside the Garden, and getting her people out.

  She and those who had volunteered to help her had formed a line through the tunnels, passing the larger chunks of debris from hand to hand, getting them out of the way. Some had been sent to get lights, tools and water. They returned with all three, but Rose never stopped to drink or take a lantern. She let the others handle all of that while she just kept grabbing pieces of the fallen tunnel and moved them away.

  Seeing the tunnel destroyed hurt her. Each time she picked up a piece of cement, a brick or a beam, she thought about the people who had touched those pieces last. The people who had put them in place. Earlier members of Freedom who had built this tunnel as a means of escaping the outside world. It was supposed to lead to a sanctuary where people could feel safe from the authorities. Where they could speak their minds. Where they could find food when they needed it. Shelter from the storm.

  But there was no escaping the authorities. They were a cancer that might have starte
d out as nothing more than one stray cell, but they polluted everything. They multiplied and spread into every corner of the country. Hiding obviously hadn't worked. Now the disease that plagued Rose's world had spread into the heart of her people. Only decades after the authorities began to seize power, they had reached a point where stray cells were all that remained of liberty.

  What would happen to the people of the Garden now? Would they get scared and scurry back to their safe lives, keeping their heads down and playing along with whatever they were told to do? Would this attack scare them away from demanding freedom?

  The question lingered in Rose's head as she worked. It angered her, driving her to push herself even harder. Digging through that rubble was her way of telling the authorities that they wouldn't keep her from her people. Wherever the members of the Garden moved next, she would be there. Whatever tunnel needed to be built in establishing their new home, she would lay the first brick.

  She felt isolated as she dug. She wasn't alone, but she felt alone, and that kept her feeling uncertain about the other members of Freedom. How firmly would they stand? How willing would they be to commit? But there came a moment when Rose was handing off a piece of wall to Tracy that she stopped to realize that Tracy didn't need to be there. This wasn't her home. She could have been eating dinner under the covers of her nice, warm, safe bed at that moment, but she wasn't. And neither was the stranger behind her. Or the one behind him.

  For as far as Rose could see, the tunnels were filled with people who were standing with her. Working with her. Strangers who could have been members of Freedom from other bases, or just random citizens off of the streets.

  She took a moment to take a breath and glanced down at the ground. There she saw a copy of that newspaper that Tracy had shown her earlier. She couldn't take her eyes off of it.

  Tracy handed Rose a bottle of water while others moved past them to keep working. As Rose drank, Tracy said, “I asked him who the secret citizen was. Collin, I mean.”

  “And?”