by Chris Babu
Alex and Charlie must have already gone through. Would they attempt to lock them in? As foolish as they were, they knew they had no chance to finish the Initiation without Drayden or Catrice to solve the brainteasers. At least one of them. Alex and Charlie must have closed the door to keep the vermin from escaping into the tunnel.
“Fifty feet!” Tim shouted.
Drayden’s legs burned from the exertion. He panted, his ankle throbbed, he was pouring sweat, and he’d been bitten more times than he could count. But he was going to pull through to the end. He would beat this challenge. Ten yards.
A sharp pain cut into Drayden’s thigh right above the knee. He swatted down reflexively, and knocked the angry black rat off his leg. “Crud!” he cried out. He soccer kicked the rats in front of him, sending them flying, then stomped his way to the door. He pushed down on the handle and shoved. He fell through, pulling Catrice with him. He released her hand and spun around.
She ran right into him, hugged him tight, and buried her face in his chest.
CHAPTER 14
Drayden held Catrice tight, savoring the moment. It felt so good to hold someone, and to be held.
Catrice released first.
Sidney, and then Tim, tumbled through the door. He slammed it shut.
The rats and cockroaches that escaped into the tunnel disappeared into the darkness.
Alex and Charlie sat on the tracks, having already removed their shirts, shoes, and socks. They’d propped their flashlights up, bathing the tunnel in light. Bloody bites dotted both boys, mostly around their ankles and calves, and also on their hands. They cleaned the bites with the antiseptic wipes.
Drayden, Catrice, Sidney, and Tim slumped over with their hands on their knees, their chests heaving.
Tim rested his hand on Drayden’s shoulder. “I admit that was horrendous,” he said, “but we made it. Better get these cuts cleaned right away. Hey, Alex, you still like rats?”
“More than I like you,” Alex said without looking up.
The surge of adrenaline dissipated in Drayden’s body. For the first time, he really felt all of the stinging bites. His ankles and calves throbbed, and the cuts on his hands stung as he removed his backpack. The pain wasn’t the problem, it was the potential infection. Even a cut from something clean could kill you if it became infected. If a filthy rat’s mouth, teeming with diseases, produced the wounds, how could they possibly survive? They might all be dead in a week.
“I can’t believe the Bureau would expose us to rat bites,” Drayden said to Tim. “What sort of challenge is that? Test how strong our immune systems are? What does that have to do with bravery or intelligence? It’s total shkat.”
Tim shook out his hands. “Yeah, that wasn’t cool at all.” He searched for a hidden camera or microphone. “Hey Bureau, not cool!” he bellowed.
How could the Initiation Council be watching a bunch of kids suffer like this? These were adults, some of whom probably had their own children.
“I don’t think the Watchers care.” Drayden shook his head.
“Try the wipes,” Charlie said. He sniffed one. “We don’t have anything like this in the Dorms. They smell funny, I think they’re medicated or something. The bites feel better right away.”
Drayden flung off his shoes and bloody socks, and tore off his sweaty shirt. He counted eight bites on his legs, and five on his hands and wrist. Two red spots on his stomach the size of dimes puffed out like the king and queen of pimples. “What the hell are these?”
“Cockroach bites,” Alex said.
“Man,” Drayden said. “One time when I fell back there I got a cockroach right in my mouth.” He spat again. “I almost puked, like that time we ate the rotten egg at your house. I gagged a few times.”
“Ha, I remember,” Alex said. “You shoulda’ chomped down and ate it. Lot of protein in those buggers.”
“Dude,” Tim said with a grimace, “you’re disgusting.”
Drayden scrubbed his ankles with the first wipe, which formed lathery foam on each cut. Charlie was right. The pain dissipated instantly, and the bleeding stopped. He closed his eyes and released a slow breath.
He’d known the Palace would offer a better lifestyle. It was one of the reasons he’d entered the Initiation. But he’d always maintained that the Palace couldn’t be that much better than the Dorms. Resources were limited in all of New America. That position was becoming untenable. The Bureau continued to reveal superior technology and luxury—computers, batteries, flashlights, working pencils, and now these miraculous wipes.
Drayden wrapped gauze bandages tightly around his legs and hands, covering every cut, then secured them with tape. With the urgency of the situation over, he became acutely aware that he was shirtless in front of the girls. He blushed. His long, skinny limbs and bony chest drew a tough comparison with Charlie, who was all chiseled muscle. Even Tim and Alex were more muscular than he was. Drayden dressed as speedily as he could.
“Charlie, how’d you get so big on the Dorm diet?” Drayden asked. “You sneaking an extra food allocation or something?”
“Ah, mostly from lifting weights. I’m also an only child, and my parents spoiled me. They let me eat whatever I wanted, even if it meant they didn’t have enough. Your parents starve you or something? You’re so skinny if you turned sideways and stuck your tongue out, you’d look like a zipper.”
Drayden cracked up. “Where do you get all these one-liners from anyway?”
“My old man. He’s got a zillion of ’em.”
“Hey, you guys?” Sidney asked. “You mind walking down the tunnel a bit so Catrice and I can take off our shirts and treat our bites?”
“No, I think we’re good here.” Charlie howled and high-fived Alex.
Sidney glared at him, her hands on her hips. “Beat it, Charlie.”
“Let’s go, you flunks,” Tim said. He strapped on his backpack. “Time for a bathroom break for me anyway.”
“Me too,” Drayden said. “We haven’t seen a clock in a while. Wonder how we’re doing on time.”
The boys headed down the tunnel. Charlie draped his arm around Tim’s shoulders. “Tim, let’s not do that again with the rats. That sucked.”
Drayden grew hot in the face. Was Charlie just messing with his head? He’d long been best friends with Alex, Drayden’s former friend. He seemed to like Catrice, and now he was buddying up to Tim?
After fifty yards, they reached the red glow of a clock: 04:47:16, 04:47:15…
“Approaching halfway through,” Tim said. He walked over to the darkness of the uptown tracks to relieve himself.
Drayden headed for the One Line track, brightened by a grating to the street above, to do the same. When he returned, something caught his eye on the tracks.
It was a playing card.
Someone on the street must have dropped it through the grate. He picked up the card and flipped it over.
The queen of hearts.
A lump formed in Drayden’s throat, the card reminding him of his mom. He’d never played cards with anyone else. That time at age eleven when he fought for his life with an infection, Mom had occupied him with endless games of gin rummy, pinochle, and blackjack. He wiped his watery eyes with the back of his hand, thankful for the darkness of the tunnel. He didn’t want anyone to notice his tears. He slid the card in his back pocket.
Sidney and Catrice caught up and the pledges continued walking the dark tracks, guided by their flashlights.
“Eighteenth Street is the next station on the One Line,” Drayden said. “Hopefully the Bureau will give us a break there. After that is Fourteenth Street, a major station on the Two-Three Line. Since they’re alternating, we should expect an intelligence challenge.”
“I thought about locking you all in the rat room,” Alex said, “but I needed you for the intelligence tests. It’s not lik
e Charlie’s gonna be solving them. He’s dumber than a…dumber than…”
“Dumber than a bag of hammers,” Charlie offered. “Dumber than fried rice. About as sharp as a marble. Dumber than a—”
“We got it, Charlie,” Drayden said. “Wow, Alex. Admitting you need us for the intelligence challenges is about as close as you get to a compliment.”
Charlie sighed. “I don’t know, you guys. The challenges are getting tougher. I can’t imagine what could be harder than that rat and cockroach pit we went through. The Initiation was exciting at first, but now it just sucks, you know? Charlie kind of wants to go home.”
“I know,” Sidney said. “I’m kind of jealous of the kids who didn’t enter. They get to graduate tomorrow and receive their jobs, even though the assignments stink.”
Home did sound pretty sweet right now to Drayden.
Alex and Charlie sped up, marching ahead of everyone else again. Tim and Sidney walked a few yards ahead of Drayden, chatting. Sidney laughed and punched Tim in the shoulder. Tim made a goofy face back.
Drayden watched them, feeling warm inside. Tim was his most charming when he was just himself, rather than angling to impress girls by being “macho” Tim. Drayden was thankful now that Sidney had entered. She was a tad emotional during the challenges, but it was gratifying to have someone else around who appreciated and believed in him.
A hand touched Drayden’s shoulder. Catrice shined her flashlight up under her face so he could see her.
Even covered in tunnel dirt, sweat, and rat bites, she still managed to look pretty. Though aiming the flashlight under her chin made her resemble a demon goddess. He chuckled to himself, acknowledging his own dorkiness. He bit his lip so he wouldn’t laugh out loud.
“Hey,” she said. “Thanks for helping me back there. I wouldn’t have made it otherwise. I couldn’t move, I froze.”
Drayden held his flashlight the same way, under his chin. “You’re welcome. I was really scared. Holding your hand helped me too.”
“And thanks for pulling that cockroach out of my hair.” She flipped her hair to the other side of her head. “That was going to be my final moment. The first person to ever die by cockroach.”
Drayden yearned to tell her how beautiful she was, and how he felt about her. Butterflies flitted in his stomach. He stared too long without saying anything. “Yeah, well, it’s a good thing it was just that one. Two cockroaches, and you were on your own.”
Catrice feigned shock and slapped Drayden on the arm.
They walked side by side. Though his body was banged up, the Bureau hadn’t defeated him yet. He’d confronted one of his worst fears with the rats, and survived. Something else happened in that challenge. He’d already decided to focus on passing the Initiation rather than worrying about impressing Catrice. But in the rat pit, he hadn’t been trying to win her over. He’d legitimately tried to help her. And worrying about her safety allowed him to ignore his own fear.
That last thought struck him as both fascinating and satisfying. Maybe that’s how Tim was always so brave, since he constantly looked out for Drayden. Caring about someone to that degree and protecting them refreshed Drayden’s soul. Perhaps he didn’t need to be so afraid anymore.
On the surface, it didn’t make sense that Catrice had entered the Initiation. She seemed to have everything. Brilliant, beautiful, both parents. Back in the Dorms, she certainly could have married anyone she wished. She may have longed for a chance at a decent career and a better life, but most people didn’t risk the Initiation for that. She’d rebuffed Charlie when he’d asked. Either she didn’t want to tell Charlie, or didn’t want everybody else to hear. Drayden turned to ask her about it.
“Catrice, why did—”
“Station!” Charlie yelled.
“I thought you said there wouldn’t be a challenge at Eighteenth Street?” Charlie said to Drayden. They approached a staircase straight ahead, rather than off to the right where the platform should have been.
“I said I hoped there wouldn’t be. They’re getting closer together now, I guess.”
Charlie sulked. “Awesome.”
“Catrice?” Drayden asked. “Can we team up again on this next test?”
“Of course,” she replied.
Tim ascended the stairs into the light with everyone else in tow. They stopped to scan the heavily modified space.
It was a narrow, elongated room, barely resembling a subway station. Only two rows of steel pillars supporting the ceiling remained. Even the ceiling itself was white. In other stations it was open, exposing pipes and vents. The floor covered the tracks, and the room ended with a back wall, way down the station. Normally, tiles covered the walls and platform floor. Here, however, the walls were painted white, and the floor was cement.
“Hmmm,” Charlie said, scratching his head. “It’s a room. Looks like it ends about halfway up the station.”
“Let’s go then,” Tim said, lacking his usual enthusiasm, “get this over with.”
Fifty yards away, something sat in the back of the room, before the wall.
Charlie took the lead. Ten yards away from the wall he stopped, his muscular arms extended. “I don’t like the looks of that.”
A few objects rested atop a picnic table, all of them small. One stood out—a shiny black box.
What was that? Another computer? Drayden couldn’t tell.
A deafening, metallic, screeching noise erupted behind them.
Drayden covered his head with his arms, and spun around in alarm.
A steel wall crashed down from the ceiling, slamming onto the cement floor with an epic boom and a billowing cloud of dust.
Drayden covered his ears, though only the echo reverberated throughout the chamber now.
The steel wall had trapped them in the room, now roughly forty feet long by twenty feet wide.
“What the hell is going on?” Sidney asked, her voice quivering. “Is that part of the challenge? Was that supposed to happen?”
“I’m sure there’s instructions.” Tim stormed impatiently toward the table with the others trailing him.
“Hey look, there’s a door behind the table,” Charlie said. “It’s white so it doesn’t stand out, but it’s there. Guess that’s our way out.”
Alex flicked him on the arm. “I’m pretty sure it’s locked, chotch. I think the idea was to trap us in here.”
“Yeah, I know. I’m just saying, assuming we pass the test.”
Drayden examined the table, which contained a strange assortment of items: two short, thick strings held up by clamps; four boxes of matches; and the shiny box-like device. A miniature silver box sat atop the larger black object’s base, and the same string jutted out from the silver box.
Drayden didn’t dig the sight of that shiny box either.
A clock above the table ticked down: 04:39:21, 04:39:20…
Tim picked up a note on the table and read. “Search your heart and mind when death is on the line. Prove your ability to manage situations with life or death consequences. To advance, you must survive this challenge.” He paused, and raised his eyes to the others.
Drayden shuddered. Survive.
Tim continued. “On the table are two loose wicks held up by clamps, each taking exactly one minute to burn. They do not burn evenly, but they take precisely one minute. A third wick, also one minute in length, is attached to a silver detonator, which is attached to a bomb. You must light the wick attached to the bomb. In exactly forty-five seconds, you can pull out the detonator, disarming the bomb. You must measure exactly forty-five seconds using the two loose wicks. If the detonator is pulled before forty-five seconds, the bomb will detonate. After forty-five seconds, the detonator will lock in, and cannot be pulled out. In that event, the bomb will detonate fifteen seconds later. If you successfully disarm the bomb, the door before you will open. If you
do not, you must seek cover. Whoever survives may continue the Initiation. You will have five minutes to prepare, at which point the wick to the bomb must be lit. If it is not, you will all be exiled. The clock will begin counting down momentarily. Good luck.”
“Oh my God.” Sidney covered her mouth with both hands.
The clock began counting down from five minutes.
Tim, Sidney, Charlie, and Alex stared at Drayden with pleading eyes.
He shook his head and looked down.
Tim clapped his hands. “Drayden and Catrice, get to work!”
Drayden pulled out his paper and pencil, as did Catrice. They knelt, facing each other.
“Catrice, I have no idea.”
Her lip trembled. “Me either.”
There’s a trick. What would Mr. Kale say? State what you know. Two wicks. Each takes a minute. Nope, that’s two minutes. Light both? Guess when they’re three-quarters done? No, it has to be exact to the second.
Catrice perked up. “Light one wick at both ends.”
“Yes!” Drayden said. “Good. They don’t burn evenly but that won’t matter. They’ll meet in the middle at exactly thirty seconds.”
“Four minutes left!” Tim yelled.
The others had pretty much abandoned participating on the brainteasers, Drayden noted.
“Lighting the other one when it’s done doesn’t help,” Catrice said. “That would just give you a minute and a half.”
Drayden’s shirt soaked through with fresh sweat. “What happens if we light wick two at the same time as we light both ends of wick one?”
“I don’t know, it’ll be done in a minute, that doesn’t get us anywhere,” Catrice said.
Tim gently tugged on the wicks and Sidney tested the matches. Charlie touched the bomb.
“Get away from that, you flunk!” Alex snapped. “It might explode.”
“Three minutes!” Sidney screeched, both hands in her hair.
“Dray,” Tim said, wringing his hands. “Dray, I know you guys are doing your best, but we’re going to need a minute to set up for this one. Deciding who’s lighting each wick, all that. You got this, bro!”