by Harper North
“We were cut off from everyone for a reason,” the woman says, pulling against Sky’s grasp. “People fight. It’s best to avoid most of them.”
Cal clears his throat from the side of the room as the last of the tear gas fades. “You haven’t been avoiding Elysian Beach. You were taking our food.”
The woman flinches. “We need to eat and have maintained no contact with your people. Trouble finds those who associate with others.”
“You sound the way I used to be,” Sky says. “But trouble finds us all in the end. What’s your name?”
“Betty,” the woman says. “What else do you want?”
“What is this place?” I ask. “What’s under that big metal panel? And where do those cables go?”
“We don’t know,” my prisoner says. “No one knows.”
“The terminals might know what’s here,” Emma says, pacing around the gathered prisoners. She keeps her automatic rifle out and visible.
“Perhaps it’s a weapon,” Cal says. “I didn’t want to say anything before and get everyone panicked, but since I’m not in charge any—”
“Can it, Cal,” Steven says, jerking his arm. “And I say that with love.”
“Or a way to power this part of the underground,” Talen adds. He blinks. “I sense a lot of magnetic fields here that I can’t explain. We’re under something big.”
“Then it might be interesting,” Emma says. “Do you have a way to power up the terminals so we can have a look? We promise that we just want to go through any information that might be on them.”
“We do not power anything around here,” Betty says, eyes widening. “That would draw attention to this place, which I’ve spent the last two decades protecting. Our families fled down here sixty years ago to escape the EHC. We found this place, and it needs to remain a secret. If you truly mean us no harm, then tell no one.”
“There must be a way to power this place,” Steven says. “But we’re not going to hear about it from her. Let’s look around. Only a few of us need to guard these folks.”
I look to Sky and then Emma, who both nod. “Okay,” I say.
Dwellers and Originals scatter to the edges of the room, their flashlight revealing crates of all shapes and sizes. Cia raises her weapon as Betty’s people shift nervously.
“Don’t move,” I warn them. “Lacy and Talen here can incapacitate you with their minds. And, trust me, it’s horrible.”
Of course, they’d have to really try to hurt us for me to give either Aura the nod to go that far, but Betty doesn’t need to know that. Not until we know more about Betty, anyway.
Betty shakes her head at her people while our team goes through the surrounding crates. Minutes drag out as people throw straw to the floor, and at last, a Dweller man shouts, “Generators. We have old hand-crank generators that look like they’ve never been used.”
* * * * *
Setting up everything takes a while. Emma has to tour the area, finding outlets and wires, and then those of us lucky enough to be enhanced get to haul the generators up the spiral stairs to the terminal room. The other fighters move the homeless to the other side of the big room, where they sit like hostages. All the while, Betty hollers at us to stop.
“Do not power anything! We don’t know what’s going to happen!”
“She’s probably crazy from spending so much time in the dark,” Sky grunts as we haul one of the massive generators up the stairs.
“These people could have used these,” Emma says from the top of the stairs.
Cal’s voice bounces up the stairwell. “Then maybe they wouldn’t have had to steal!”
“Stop!” Betty hollers again, voice echoing from the basement.
Sky and I reach the top of the stairwell and finish carrying the generator to the terminal room. Lacy and Talen are already inside, messing with cords. We plug in the machine and Talen and Lacy position themselves near it, ready to crank.
“It shouldn’t take us long to charge it,” I tell them.
“I agree,” Emma says.
Lacy winks. “Not with our strength.”
Talen cranks on the generator until it roars to life. The lights flicker on, and the air reeks like ozone for a second. Sky clicks his flashlight off.
Emma powers up one of the old computers. I link my hand with Sky’s, enjoying the short break. Lacy and Talen continue to work as we watch Emma take a seat in front of the computer terminal. She clicks on icon after icon, pulling up old data files and numbers.
“You think Cia’s doing okay?” Sky asks me. We left her with a group of Dwellers, guarding the homeless people.
“She’s doing great,” I say.
“Hmm…” Emma closes a folder. “It seems there’s a lot of code on this computer written in a language I haven’t seen since I was my father’s lab assistant.”
She clicks another icon and scrolls through a list of text files. Meanwhile, Lacy and Talen switch places and Lacy works until she mutters something about the battery being fully charged. They leave the big metal box to hum.
Emma sucks in a sharp breath. “Oh my god.”
“What?”
“This file. It has my grandfather’s name. Edward Nejem.”
A shudder passes over me, and I exchange a glance with Sky. Edward Nejem was the founder of the EHC and had helped put us Dwellers in the mines. He even tried to go after Emma to eliminate those who evolved naturally to deal with the surface radiation. Emma sits there, dumbfounded for a moment, before clicking on the first file.
“This is an EHC facility?” I ask.
“Perhaps. Maybe a forgotten one,” Emma says, leaning forward. “‘Information file. Exodus Protocol Facility. Human survival plan.’” She runs her finger along the tiny text. “‘Plan 442B34. In the event of EHC failure, the Exodus Protocol shall be initiated, and the lottery system used to select two hundred subjects. This facility will be staffed with security to ensure crowd control and orderly operation. Tear gas has been provided for this purpose.’” She pauses. “There’s not much else here. Edward Nejem was part of a group named the Exiles. This doesn’t say what that means, either.”
“This doesn’t say what this protocol even is?” Lacy asks. “That’s stupid.”
Emma closes the file. “There must be more here.”
We wait as she looks. I’m tempted to check on the fighters and the homeless, but this is too interesting. Emma clicks through more files, most of which are about the lottery system and the code for it. With each file, Emma takes another breath. Frustration builds. Her shoulders rise. “A lot of Exodus Protocol files have been deleted, according to the logs. My grandfather wanted to hide something. I might be able to recover them, but it will take time.”
Absorbed in her task, she continues to search the computer. I don’t dare interrupt her.
But then she finds another file, reads, and begins to shake. The text is so small I can’t tell what it says. I tighten my grasp on Sky’s hand.
“Emma, did you find something out?” Sky asks hesitantly.
She says nothing.
“Emma?” I ask.
“This is tense,” Lacy whispers.
She’s right. The air’s thickening.
Emma pushes her chair away from the terminal.
“My grandfather—” she chokes out, and then she rises from her chair and hurries out of the room.
The four of us eye each other in shock.
“What was that about?” Lacy asks.
Emma doesn’t return. Sky eyes the computer and frowns at me, holding my hand so tight he’s cutting off the circulation. “We should read and find out.”
Part of me wants to follow Emma, but her reaction tells me she wants to be alone. So I take her seat, which is still warm, and read the contents of the file.
And as I do, my throat goes dry and my pulse roars in my ears. I understand why she took off. If I found out my family committed mass murder, I would, too.
“What does it say?” Talen as
ks.
I have to push the words out. “This says the Dwellers lived in surface settlements in the early days after the Flip. But they revolted against the oppression. Edward Nejem made a weapon that destabilized the areas where the Dwellers lived, but without knowing, he weakened the atmospheric magnetic field in the process. Earthquakes and radiation forced the Dwellers underground. And that site where we first met Talen? That used to be a Dweller settlement.” My mind flies back to those constant earthquakes and that terrible heat.
“What?” Sky asks, putting his head on my shoulder. His touch does nothing to comfort me now.
“The Flip shouldn’t have made the world this bad. But Emma’s grandfather did.”
CHAPTER 4
WE STAND THERE, silent, for what feels like an eternity. Sky and I study each other, and he lifts an eyebrow. Lacy whispers something in Talen’s ear.
“I have to follow her,” I say.
“Wait,” Lacy says. “That should be Talen and me.”
“Why?” Sky asks, lowering his brows at her.
Lacy and Talen exchange a glance. “We know what it’s like, to a degree,” Talen explains.
Oh. To be connected to something horrible. That would have been Elias’s department—I know he felt shame for being a Noble class surface guy—but he’s not here.
“It’s not the same,” I tell them. “Sky?”
He frowns. “She might not like being confronted by a lot of people right now.”
So it’s up to me. Exiting the room, I leave Sky behind, as much as I don’t want to, but I hear him following me from a distance once I enter the round hall. The distant mutters of the fighters down below float up through the main chamber inside, and I find Emma on the catwalk, above the giant lid, gripping the railing and looking down at the metal expanse. She doesn’t look up as I approach.
“Emma,” I try, then lower my voice. “Emma. Nobody blames you. We know you never liked your grandfather. And he didn’t mean to wreck the world… did he?”
She’s silent, tightening her grasp on the rail, and I fear she’s going to try something stupid. Instead, she snaps her gaze to me. “I knew that he helped create the EHC, but not this. He and his coworkers came down here and made viruses that kill in minutes. Laser weapons, too. And worse. Edward’s crown jewel was called the Destabilizer. He moved it through underground tunnels and meant to use it to break up miner settlements. He was desperate to stop a budding war between the miners and the rest of society. Whatever. His weapon interrupted the Earth’s magnetic field, hurried the Flip, and allowed more radiation to reach the surface. When my grandfather realized his mistake, he worked on modifying humans to remain on the surface. The miners had to go underground. He stopped rebellions, but not in the way he thought.”
Emma sounds blank and dead. Not like the intelligent, caring woman I know.
“You knew your grandfather dealt with miner rebellions?” I ask. She’d never mentioned that fact. Of course, who wants to talk about the sins of their ancestors?
“My father mentioned it back when I was a lab assistant, yes. There was almost a war that threatened the cities being built back in the Flip days. I knew my grandfather stopped the fighting, but I didn’t know how. Father never wanted to talk about it. Now I know why.”
I stand taller. “The truth is we don’t know the whole story. He might not have been the only one who made the weapon. We don’t know about this group he was with that worked on this Exodus Protocol backup plan, or even what it is. And a bunch of people ruined the world.”
“He was the key player.” She speaks it out into the big room like she’s confessing.
I’m running out of stuff to say. I can’t deny what we saw. “Come on. It’s a ton to think about.” I tug on Emma’s sleeve.
She whirls on me and pulls out of my grasp. I let her. Emma storms past Sky, who’s standing in the doorway, and goes back to the generator room.
After unplugging it, she waves us to the stairwell. “We need to check on things.”
I follow Emma, who flees down the steps until she bumps into Steven.
“Now you’ve done it,” Betty shouts from the other side of the big room. She sits with her fellow prisoners against the far wall, under the watch of Cia and three Dweller guards. “Someone will see the electrical signature you just sent out.”
“It was a generator,” Emma snaps. “We never drew from the main grid.”
I let my jaw drop and look at Sky. He does the same to me. Even Cal and a few of the Dweller fighters flinch.
Betty goes silent. Cal and Steven turn to us while Cia runs up to Sky. People shift. Exhaustion fills the air.
“Everyone,” Steven says, keeping Cal in his gaze. “We’re all tired and need to discuss what to do next. We should go and take a break. Now. We’ll leave our strongest guards with these folks. You three, remain at your posts.” He looks to the three Dwellers, two men and a woman, who nod. “We’ll relieve you when we return.”
Emma sighs. She’s first back up the steps. I let Steven lead the way—it’s clear he wants to take some charge in spite of his earlier words—and he takes Cal with him. As we exit, Betty starts hollering at us again about how we’ve ruined everything. Her voice echoes through the facility.
In the end, we go back to the first corridor, which leads to the caves. All we find is a large, round chamber close to where the traps were located. Steven motions for us all to sit.
Cia waves us to the far end of the cavern, turning her flashlight up to point at the jagged ceiling. Sky and I sit side by side, opening cans of beans, while Cal gets directed to a corner. The fight’s left him, but Steven keeps a close eye on him. Emma takes her side of the chamber, and as if sensing her change, others stay away, though Lacy and Talen sit near her. My stomach turns with the tension she gives off.
Steven paces around. The silent message is clear. We need to figure out what to do next.
“Okay,” I start. “We don’t know what this place is, or why it’s here, but it has to do with the EHC.” I explain everything I know, leaving out the part about Emma being related to one of the creators. She’s had it bad enough.
Steven looks at me in wonder. “There’s something under that metal lid. Perhaps it’s the weapon this Nejem guy used.”
My mouth’s gone dry. I’d been afraid of that. Now I understand why Emma was staring down at the lid. “If it is, it needs to stay put.”
I won’t let the world get any more screwed up. Thanks to us, Cho and his people got to finish what Edward Nejem started. Unlocking the weapon might even make the underground unstable, too. It has to stay a secret. Why did Steven have to talk about it?
“But this Protocol was Edward Nejem’s backup plan for something,” Sky says. “It might not be the weapon.”
I give him a silent thanks.
“It could be another weapon,” Steven says. “We should guard it. Emma, you need to work on unlocking those files. We need to know for sure.”
No response at first. Then, Emma nods, her voice once again hollow. “I will.”
At least Steven is stable. Cal, however, gets up and paces.
“This is more reason than ever to eliminate Reinhart and his rats,” he snarls. “Could you imagine a weapon like this in their hands? They would destroy not only Cho and his people, but Elysian Beach and everyone else who could threaten them.”
My stomach turns and threatens an upheaval. He’s right. “Look, we don’t know what’s under that lid, or what this Protocol is, or what Edward wanted to do here. Until we do, we shouldn’t go after them yet. We should just guard this place and keep the people safe.” Walking around the seated fighters, I move to face Cal. “We need to think this out.”
Cal glares at me. “That young man is not your friend. Stop defending him. Or is that because you’re a fellow Destroyer?”
Wow, he’s observant.
At his words, Sky gets up, walks across the chamber, and joins me. “Listen to Fin. We’re hidden here, and we have
time to let Emma poke around those files some more. Once we know what’s here, we should act.”
“Cal, that might be a good idea,” Steven says, putting his hand on the other guy’s shoulder. “Don’t fall apart. Breathe.”
“But they told us about a tunnel we can use to get back to the railway,” Cal says. “Reinhart and his goons won’t know we’re coming after them so quickly. This is our chance.”
“A tunnel?” I ask, almost choking on the words. I hadn’t expected to go after them this quickly. I can’t see another friend die, even if it’s Elias, and I wait for Sky to back me up.
But he doesn’t.
I’m just as alone as Emma must feel.
“One of the young men told us about one,” Cal continues. “We can leave as soon as we’re rested. They won’t know we’re coming, and we can catch them off guard.”
“Wait,” I blurt. “We don’t even know where they went. How do we know they didn’t plant more bombs along the way?”
“We know how to find and disarm them,” Cal says. He sounds more level. Like he’s making more sense. I scrutinize the other fighters, all thirty of them, and a few of the former EHC prisoners nod.
“He’s right. We do,” a former prisoner says, rising. It’s a man who, if I remember right, was once a police officer on the surface. His mustache bristles. “The worst that will happen is we’ll block the tunnel again when we disarm them.”
I’m losing, so I grasp Sky’s hand, silently begging him to back me up.
“Maybe Cal’s making sense,” Sky says. “Whatever this weapon is, it’s locked, and we can leave Emma here to figure it out. Most of us can’t help with that.”
Emma finally speaks. “Yes. I can stay here and work on this on my own. With a few guards, I’ll be fine.”
“What about Cho’s group?” I ask. “There are more of them than there are Reinhart’s people, and they could come back to Elysian Beach through the hidden cave tunnels. That’s how they left.”