Текст книги "The Wounded"

Автор книги: Lauren Nicolle Taylor

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Текущая страница: 8 (всего у книги 17 страниц)

Gus kept powering headfirst while the three of us stood back, taking in this foreboding building.

“DING!” The sound made us all jump out of our skin, and Gus paused momentarily before he climbed the wide, stone stairs and turned around to glare at us. The great wrought iron arms of a clock clicked into place, and it dinged another ten times.

My hand found Joseph’s, and we stared at the birds startling and resettling like they had heard this a million times before.

Gus stood at the top of the stairs. The dark, wiry man stood out against the light sandstone, with his hands on his hips, grimacing. “Hurry up!” He stomped his foot, and we ran-walked over to him.

We passed through brass doors that screeched across the tiled floor, pushing broken glass and debris with it as it folded in. I blinked several times at the vast, open ceiling. It must have once been covered in glass, but now all you could see were steel girders cutting the sky into six even pieces, shooting light down across the mosaic-tiled floor below.

We were in the middle of a circle with dark tunnels bordering the central part. Names and times were depicted on boards over each entrance. We were in a train station.

“What are we doing here?” I asked, my voice echoing out across the space.

Gus scratched his head, pointing at each tunnel and repeating the numbers aloud as he was reading. “Damn it. Was it four or fourteen? I can’t remember.”

The rest of us glanced to each other, shrugging our shoulders. Had Gus finally lost it? He wasn’t making any sense. He just kept shuffling around in circles, pointing at each entrance and then rubbing his forehead anxiously.

His hand dropped to his side, and he itched his pant leg nervously. I thought maybe he was going to explain what the hell was going on, but then he cupped his hands to his mouth and screamed, “Salim!”

The name, chant, or whatever it was, bounced off the walls and came to rest in the silent minutes that followed.

I moved closer to Joseph. The other Survivor with us side stepped closer too. Something was moving towards us from tunnel fourteen. It was a scurrying, swishing noise, sort of sporadic, stopping and starting. As it got louder, I stepped backwards, the entrance shrieking now, and I put my hands to my ears at the noise, which sounded like fangs, spit, and fur.

Yellow eyes appeared in the black of the tunnel, accompanied by yawning mouths that screamed and jostled, occasionally turning and snapping at each other.

Joseph squeezed my arm a little too tightly. I pressed my toes into the red and yellow tiles, ready to run. Then Gus slapped his thigh and laughed. “Fourteen! Fourteen! I always get it wrong.”

*****

He looked pretty normal, except for the fact that as he started clapping his hands in a slow, steady rhythm, streams of monkeys spiraled around him in a circle. I tilted my head and stared at his intricate hair, knotted into tiny bumps all over his head like little, round hedges. He stepped out of the darkness, a gleaming white lab coat thrown over his shoulders, and smiled. Giant, white teeth glistened against his dark lips.

Gus threw his hands in the air and walked towards the dark-skinned man. “Salim!”

“No,” I managed meekly. But Gus walked straight up to the man and opened his arms. The man whistled thinly, and the monkeys started scaling the columns of the central space, looking like a swarm of cockroaches, whooping and screeching as they went. One stayed with the man, jumping onto his forearm and perching on his shoulder, wrapping its striped tail loosely around the man’s neck.

Gus and the man hugged, and the rest of us were at an absolute loss for words.

Joseph recovered quickly and muttered, “Cool,” under his breath. I had no reaction other than to stare with my mouth open. Apella and Alexei were right after all. There were people, or at least a person, in this city all along.

Gus and the man, who I assumed was Salim, broke apart and turned to us. Salim stared down at us. He was as tall as Joseph and had a royal air about him. But he had a monkey sitting on his shoulder, and that was all I could look at. I wanted to say, ‘Do you realize there’s a filthy primate bouncing up and down on your nice white coat?’ but I couldn’t find any words for the circus I’d walked into. He stepped toward me and stared at my hands. I nervously put them behind my back, and he arched a bushy, grey eyebrow at me before clicking his tongue. The monkey on his shoulder screeched, jumped down, and scampered towards me. I pointed my toe out at it, trying to fend it back, but it went straight for my hands, pulling them in front of me and glaring at me with hard eyes like yellow candy.

Salim’s eyes widened when he saw my tattoo, the one I’d almost forgotten was there.

“What’s this then? What have you brought to us, Gus?” he asked in a very considered tone, bordering on condescension.

“They’re escapees, her and the boy,” Gus said dismissively.

Salim laughed loudly, the sound booming along the walls and hitting me in the face like a suffocating pillow. “No one escapes. Banished? Yes. Escape? No.”

It was Gus’s turn to be condescending. “You’ve been underground too long, old friend.”

Salim’s laugh cut out as suddenly as it started, and the monkeys began banging at the walls frantically. It was an erratic, earsplitting drumming, which sounded primal and deathly. The old man tightened his fist, the tiny pockmarks scattered across his cheeks stretching as he raised one hand in the air. It was suddenly quiet, but the temporary kind of quiet.

“Why are you here?” he asked, mindlessly stroking the tail curled over his shoulder. I tried hard not to gag.

Gus cleared his throat. “We are here to seek refuge.”

“For how long?”

“Indefinitely.”

Joseph and I both slumped noticeably. He squeezed my hand and looked out at me from beneath his dirty blond hair. The disappointment in his eyes darkened them to a murky sea-green. There was a storm in there. Any chance we had of getting back to Deshi just flapped and flew into the sliced-up sky.

Salim and his people welcomed us into their world. They squashed us into their small society and asked for nothing in return. They could see how broken we were.

Sadness was our dominant feeling. It surrounded the entire dim space. Each of us suffered from sudden and unexpected loss, which had driven an uncomfortable and permanent wedge into our hearts. The Survivors had been taught to accept death, but the violent murder of three hundred of its citizens was too many charms to kiss, too many broken hearts. It was drowning them. At night, it reminded me of my first night at the Classes, only over and over. People sobbed into their rolled-up jackets. Nightmares pushed unnatural screams out of strangled lungs. Emptiness weighted the air.

I squatted down at the entrance to our allocated quarters, letting the thick blanket curtain, secured by clothes pegs to a metal line, hide part of my face. From here, everything looked half-enchanted/half-soggy with moss. The people of Monkey City had literally carved a life out of solid rock. Chipped-out, small living caves beneath the train tunnels. We were at the top of a tiered area, which fell away like giants’ steps to the water canal running through the middle. The space was unnervingly circular, which gave me the creeps. Hollows carved into the rock glowed golden with candles and solar lanterns. It was a like a huge, black beehive, gone damp and moldy with age.

These people were not unlike the Survivors, less brave perhaps. Kind of guarded and dirty, but they had the same feel about them. They moved with purpose, they had their jobs, but unlike the Survivors, their sole purpose was to live and go unnoticed. Except for the monkeys. They were super-intelligent but aimless. This led to extreme naughtiness. They were territorial, they stole, and they screamed as you walked passed them. The only place they weren’t allowed to roam freely was the infirmary.

I turned inwards, letting the curtain close, and gazed at my two boys sleeping. The coolness of the underground lair caused Joseph to pull his blankets up under his chin. Orry was wrapped tight as a mummy in the carrier. He was getting too big for it, and I’d already removed the top half. Soon his feet would be hanging over the edge.

I left them.

Tiptoeing along the curved path, I glanced down. Rash was down there somewhere, bunking with my father. Pietre and Careen were there too. They were always easy to find. You just had to follow the screaming, the tinned goods hitting the rock with a dull clang and rolling down, down to the canal. Careen couldn’t get away from him now. I shook my head, feeling my hair move in one big clump. I refused to wash in the black water and had become pretty filthy.

I walked towards the cool light pouring from the infirmary entrance, feeling the sadness dragging me down.

*****

She was clinging to life like a drowning spider. And she looked like one too, her frame so thin and angular I was sure I could just grab one of her arms, pull, and it would snap off in segments. But Alexei wouldn’t let her go. Hessa wouldn’t either.

The infirmary was the only place I could escape those damn monkeys, but I didn’t like being in there. I didn’t know what to say, how to act. Apella was not one for jokes. Alexei was kind of losing it. Matthew was trying, but there was nothing he could do. He kept saying it too, like he thought I was going to ask him to tell me something different. I wouldn’t. There was nothing.

It was such a contrast to the rest of the place. The floors and walls were covered in bright orange plastic, colorful, patterned shower curtains were strung up between the beds that had been scavenged from the city’s dilapidated hospital. There were the shiver-worthy beeps and blips I’d never get used to. Each machine was hooked up to solar batteries, rusted around the edges from use. This was their hospital: rust, leftovers, and shower curtains.

I dragged my feet towards the bumblebee curtain. They were z-z-zing around a daisy with a face, which was weird, but weirder still was the big smile. I wouldn’t be smiling in here.

I took a deep breath and, on cue, Apella started coughing, a deep, rattling cough that ended in a gag.

I stalled. I wasn’t scared of sick people, but I always worried my presence just made it worse. I wasn’t cheery or medical, so I couldn’t help in that way. All I could do was stick my pointed nose in and talk nonsense.

I was about to turn around when I saw bare, caramel-colored little feet poking out from beneath the curtain. They inched forward, and a small, perfect face pushed into the curtain shrouded by plastic bumblebees. I gasped.

Hessa laughed and stumbled forward until all of him was revealed. He was walking. I felt a swell of pride. He shuffled towards me, arms out in front like a zombie from one of the horror movies Joseph had shown me on the reader, and made a lunge for my legs, wrapping both his arms around me. I brought him up to my face and gave him a squeeze. Deshi, I wish you had seen that, I thought as I nuzzled my face into Hessa’s huge mass of curls, letting a tear get soaked up in his hair. “You clever boy,” I whispered. “Your father will be so proud of you.” Your mother would be too.

They’d heard me, so I swept back the curtain like I hadn’t been about to run. Apella smiled weakly and went to pull the oxygen mask off her face with her white-as-a-sheet arm. I put my hand up to stop her, but she did it anyway.

“When did this start?” I asked as I placed Hessa on the ground and watched him totter towards Alexei, his hand reaching out for the bed frame.

She coughed again. “Yesterday,” she croaked. She was so sick but when she talked about Hessa, a little shine sparked in her eyes. “He’s so…” She started coughing really hard this time, barely able to take a breath between. She gagged like her stomach was about to come out of her mouth. I grabbed the bowl, and she spat more black stuff into it. I couldn’t believe how much had come out of her since that day. It was almost like there was more black in there than Apella. It scared me, even though I knew it was coming. It was going to win eventually.

“I know,” I said, beaming and trying to hold onto this sliver of good that lay at the bottom of a dusty bin of darkness. It was grubby, this hope, it was small, but we had to lock our fingers into it and not let go.

A kind nurse came in and took the bucket I was holding. She started to speak, her words foreign and rough sounding. I gave her a confused look and she started again, speaking in a language I could understand. “Your mother is no… not… no good.” She frowned, her pale skin wrinkled around her cloudy eyes.

I just let it sit there. The words. I put my hand over Apella’s and tried to force some of my life into her.

I couldn’t believe we’d been here six weeks already. I couldn’t believe some of these people had lived down here their whole lives. It was so dark, so dirty. They were like moles. Kind-hearted but quiet, afraid of the light, or maybe of what might be up there.

We all pitched in, dragging batteries up to the surface to be charged, hunting, and scavenging. Our time on the surface was minimal though, as it was not safe. The monkey people didn’t seem to mind it. They tried to avoid going up if they could, their skin pale and grimy, their eyes silver and watery in the sunlight. They didn’t talk much either, not to us anyway. They had fires near the canal, drank and sang with each other, but when we tried to approach, they got kind of quiet. I didn’t think they minded our presence, but they seemed shy, happier to converse with the monkeys than with us.

“Where are you going?” Joseph asked as he collected a pot and some dirty mugs to take down to the canal to wash. Orry was with Odval for a play. Even he seemed bored with his surroundings. He was cranky and grizzly. I was glad he was out of my hair for a while. I kind of wanted everyone out of my hair for a while.

I shrugged, pulling my sneakers on. “I dunno.”

His voice was like a hammer to my ears. “Are you going to eat something?”

I grimaced, stalking to the corner and grabbing a can. I violently poked two holes in the can of tomato soup with a screwdriver and drank the contents, with Joseph staring down at me with an amused expression.

“Are you going to wash those?” I snapped, pointing at a collection of dishes in a tub by the wall.

“Mmhm,” he nodded, putting his spare hand up to grasp my waist.

I swiped my mouth with my sleeve and darted out of his way. He frowned.

“What’s wrong with you?” he asked, surprised.

I stared down at my feet, trying to think of a nice way to say he was driving me crazy and I needed some space. Instead, what came out was, “You’re just really annoying me right now.”

He laughed but, when he saw my face, he stopped. “Why, what did I do?” he asked, confused.

I looked up at his beautiful face and softened for a second. I knew it wasn’t fair but before I met him, I was very used to being alone. Even in the forest, I’d had a chance to get away from everyone. Here, we were always in each other’s space, squelched together with nowhere to run. The softening only lasted a second because in that moment, it wouldn’t have mattered what he said… everything he said or did was irritating me.

I reached my hands up and put them on his shoulders. “Nothing. I’m just going nuts in this place. I need some space. From everybody. I feel like if you stand there looking at me any longer or tell me to eat or do something, I’m going to say something I regret,” I said.

He pursed his lips for a second, and then his mouth cracked into a grin. “You know, you’re kind of annoying me too. Why don’t you get out of my space for a bit?”

“That’s all you’re going to say?”

He parted the curtain and turned back to answer. “At least you warned me this time, before you went all crazy on me.”

I smiled and threw the empty can at him. It bounced off his elbow. “Ouch!”

As soon as he left, I felt his absence like a sharp sting.

Lunch with Rash was always pretty entertaining, lunch with Rash and Essie even more so. I didn’t know her very well, she was quiet, but I liked the two of them together. It brought a bit of light to this shadowy world.

Today he was juggling cans of beans and trying to hold a conversation at the same time. It led to dented knees and lots of laughter, especially from Essie. She was a giggler, and every time Rash dropped a can and swore, her whole body shook with little fits of high-pitched giggling. Orry was standing between my knees, swaying back and forth.

“You coming up to the surface with me tomorrow, Soar?” Rash asked in a strained tone as he tried to concentrate on the cans flying above his head.

“Yep. Wouldn’t miss it,” I said, my eyes moving in circles, tracking the cans and putting bets on which one was going to hit Rash in the head. Kidney beans, definitely. I smiled to myself.

A can rolled behind me, the crunch of a foot stopped it from rolling over the ledge.

“Ahem!”

Rash’s concentration lapsed, and the cans tumbled towards his face and crotch. I tried to hold it in, but when one landed square in his lap and his face scrunched up as he rolled over the ledge, I burst out laughing. It was made worse by Essie, who giggled and then hiccup-burped. Rash shouted from up from the lower level, “What a lady!”

Even Orry’s eyes lit up. He clapped and held his hands up like he wanted me to pick him up. Arms swooped in from behind me, and I realized Orry wasn’t looking at me.

“Darling boy, miraculous grandson of mine,” Pelo exclaimed as he lifted Orry over my head and into his arms. I hunched my shoulders, trying to not to get upset. It was my fault anyway. I’d allowed Pelo to spend time with Orry. They’d bonded or something. My mouth was a flat line, jealousy carving an unflattering wrinkle in my brow.

Rash’s head popped up, just his eyes, like a toad above pond water, and then he scrambled over the ledge. He grabbed Essie by the waist and squeezed. She jumped and then smacked the side of his face. I liked her.

Pelo opened his mouth to speak, my ear inadvertently closing over as the air rushed over his lips. Then Careen bashed into him from behind, clipping his shoulder. Essie stared her down like she was hoping she’d burst into flames. It was unnecessary. Careen was already on fire. Her face was red, and her eyes intense. She grabbed both my shoulders and shook me.

“I’m going to kill him!” she shouted.

Pelo took a step back, Orry still in his arms, “Is it all right if I take Orry for a walk?” he appealed, snatching at this opportunity. Careen’s fingers were still digging into my shoulders. She was ignoring everyone. I nodded to Pelo, who strode off quickly with my son on his bony hip.

“Did you hear me?” Careen hissed. Her face was red and blotchy, like she’d been crying.

I put my hands on her hands and pulled them off me. “What’s he done now?” I asked, rolling my eyes. Pietre was still being as difficult as he possibly could. The only time he managed to be halfway decent was when I brought Orry to him. Other than that, he scowled, swore, and treated Careen like dirt. If he weren’t already injured, I’d punch him. In fact, I wasn’t sure I cared about his leg any more. He needed a good punch. I squeezed my hand into a fist.

“He’s just… well… he’s just being Pietre,” Careen said as she flopped down next to Essie, who surreptitiously shuffled a few inches away from her. Careen’s nostrils flared as she glanced down at Essie, but she didn’t say anything to her. She focused her hurried talking in my direction.

Careen wasn’t easily rattled, but she was at the end of her patience with him. She prattled on about every insulting thing he’d said to her in the last twenty-four hours, my face getting tighter, and my heart angrier with every venom-dipped sentence she recalled. “He kicked me out, Rosa. I don’t know what to do. I think I love him or at least, I used to. It’s like when they chopped off his leg, they took the good parts of him too,” she said sadly. I waited for the weirdness to come. The part where she flicked off her seriousness and said something strange. A few seconds later, she swung her head towards Rash and asked, “Did you cut your hair? It looks darker.” I clenched my teeth together, straining not to laugh. Rash took one look at Careen and chuckled whole-heartedly.

“Sure Red, I’m like the reverse Samson. The more you cut off, the darker and more powerful I become!”

Careen looked at me confused, and I just shook my head. There was no explaining Rash.

Once Rash had calmed down, he draped his hand on Essie’s knee and leaned his head down to her rounded shoulder. “Soar?”

I was gazing distractedly down at the black water canal. It looked like oil, chopping and moving as the current carried it swiftly through the underground town and out to somewhere else. I wondered where it went. Did it look black on the outside?

“Soar!” Rash yelled out, his hands to his mouth, the name bouncing of the walls, “oar… oar… oar.”

“What?” I snapped.

He leaned back from me, but in a comical way. “Whoa. No need to get snarky. I just thought…”

Careen was staring at the ground with her head in her hands. She was exhausted. Sometimes I wished Rash could be serious for just one second. Living like this amplified everyone’s characteristics. I hated that the things I loved about people were turning on me.

I sighed. “You just thought what?”

He waggled those dark eyebrows of his and said, “Let’s make Pietre a leg.”

*****

As soon as he said it, my mind started whirring. Complicated cogs ticked over as the design stretched and grew in my mind.

“Could you?” Careen squealed, grabbing my head in her hands and squishing my face.

A monkey scampered past, clinging to the very edge of the stone ledge. A flash of yellow fur and a tail. I shuddered. Anything to get me out of here for a while.

“I think I probably can,” I said through squashed lips.

“What are you doing?” I asked, a little scared of the answer.

Joseph looked up at me from the corner of the room. He was crouching down, sweeping up a mess of broken plates. “Nothing. Just dropped some plates.”

“Joseph, don’t do that,” I said, creeping up to him and putting my hand on his shoulder. He tensed for a second, but then he relaxed and put his head to my hipbone.

“I’m just frustrated. How long are we expected to live like this? I miss Desh, and I’m worried about Apella. This just isn’t what I expected. It’s not what I want.”

I picked up the piece of wood I’d been carving. It was pretty close now. Unfortunately, I’d had to spend a lot of time staring at Pietre’s other leg to get it right. I even joked that I could glue some hair to it to make it just right, to which Pietre scowled at me nastily and spat on the floor. “It won’t work,” he’d said.

It would work.

Rash brought me back a pile of leather belts the other day, and now I had to work out how to make a harness.

I placed the wooden leg down and grabbed Joseph’s hand to pull him up. I tugged, but he was so damn heavy. I fell back against the wall. “Geez, it’s like you’re made of lead.”

Joseph stood and moved to where I was, with my back against the wall. He placed his hands on either side of me, blocking me in.

“I’m sorry, about Deshi. I wish there was something I could do,” I whispered. My breath quickened, my chest rising and falling unevenly, like the breaths of a willing, dying animal.

He smiled sadly. “You’re doing it. You and Orry lift me out of my sadness just by being here.”

I reached up on my tiptoes and kissed the corner of his mouth. He moved his head and our lips collided, then opened, then devoured. I hoped he knew… he was doing the exact same thing to me.

*****

My shirt was lifted up to my chin, and half of Joseph’s buttons were undone. But that was where it had to stop. With only a blanket separating us from everyone else, that was as far as I was willing to go. But it was torture. I got the sense that Joseph didn’t care as much as I did about who heard us, but he respected my wishes, drew back, and composed himself.

I pulled my shirt down and heard Joseph audibly groan. I flicked him a grin.

“Man, this is getting difficult,” he said, re-buttoning his shirt. “Maybe we should get another pass to the surface, find that building again…”

I blushed. “Shhh! Someone will hear you.”

He grinned at me from the bed, that beautiful grey tooth seeking me and glowing. He reached out and grabbed my hips, dragging me towards him. I made a pathetic attempt to struggle because really, I was quite happy to be dragged. He lifted up my shirt and kissed my belly button. It frowned back at him. I giggled loudly.

“Shhh! Someone will hear you,” he said mockingly.

I grabbed both his hands and threw them off. “Right. No more. I’m going for a walk.” He started to stand. “Oh no. You stay right here. And clean up that mess,” I said with a wink.

He smiled at me. At least for now. His mind was on lighter things. “Don’t be long,” he called out to me.

I stuck my head back through the entrance and said, “I’ll be as long as I want.” He chuckled as he turned back towards the broken ceramics, kittens with their faces slashed in half.

*****

I stayed on the upper level, walking past several lit entries. The occupants tipped their heads but didn’t offer any other greeting. The line of dwellings ended, and several tunnels presented themselves. I picked one. Two steps in, I walked passed a monkey sitting like an old man, leaning against the slime-covered pillars that rose to the ceiling of the tunnel in dark, tarry arches. It shrieked at me. My foot shot out to the side, and I kicked it before I could stop myself. The kick made a hollow sound against its ribcage that echoed down the piled stone arch. The monkey gave me this chilling, knowing look and smiled at me, its white fangs just begging to sink into my calf. It leaned back on its haunches, readying to attack, when it heard, “Teck, teck, teck.” It looked up, and I swear it grumbled before it scampered away.

I sighed in relief.

“That is no way to treat your hosts,” a carefully accented voice uttered behind me. I jumped.

“Well, shrieking at me and crapping near where I sleep is not the nicest way to treat a guest either,” I replied as I turned to face Salim.

He nodded but didn’t respond. We’d been here for months now, and this was the first time I’d crossed paths with him. I’d seen him talking to Gus, walking gracefully past the others like a surveyor, a conqueror. It was so dark in this corner that all I could really see was his white coat and his teeth when he opened his mouth. Right now, he was smiling at me.

“May I see something?” he asked as he came towards me, coasting over the stones like he was barely touching them.

I squinted as his form moved closer. He was so All Kind apart from that voice. That voice was like fabric tearing and glasses clinking together. It was altogether foreign and totally fascinating. “I guess,” I said as he snatched up my wrist, running a rough thumb over my pulse line. I wanted to pull back, but something told me not to.

A shaft of light ran over my skin from his torch. “Hmm, interesting.” I tugged back, but he gripped me tightly. “You’re a Coder.”

“A what?” I snapped as I withdrew my hand sharply.

“Come with me,” he said excitedly, ignoring my question.

I shrugged and followed his disappearing form down another tunnel as five monkeys fell into line behind him, padding noiselessly like trained soldiers.

*****

I put my hand to the wall, and it came back green and slimy. I shuddered. I really shouldn’t have been following this strange man down a dark tunnel, but something told me he wasn’t a threat.

“Excuse me, but what did you mean by Coder?” I shouted at him.

He was shuffling through the shady cavern, shoulders hunched and focused. My voice seemed to frighten him, and he turned to me, startled.

“Hush. We’re nearly there. Come, come,” he beckoned.

We came to a door, which he opened quickly and without ceremony, ushering me to go in first.

I stepped in and he followed, snapping the door closed, lighting candles and turning on solar lanterns as he went. Each section of wall in this small, grey room was plastered with pictures, scraps of paper, and barcodes. My eyes rolled over each crazed depiction, and I took a step backwards. One of the monkeys hissed at me, and I glared back.

“What is this?” I asked, although I could tell. This was an obsession.

“This is my life’s work,” Salim said absently, patting one of the monkey’s heads a little too hard. I forced myself not to shake my head in pity. This room was the inside of an insane man’s mind. “I’ve been studying the codes. I’m close, so close now.”

I sat down on a metal table and took a deep breath. “Close to what?”

He looked confused for a second, and then he swept his arm around the whole room. I followed his movements, noticing the label of a creamed corn can stuck on the wall next to a bunch of numbers. “The answer,” Salim said exultantly.

I put my hands on either side of the table and gripped the undersides. This man was crazy. Being stuck underground for this long had driven him nuts.

But he was harmless, and I spent the afternoon listening to his theories about the Coders, the links and meanings between the numbers on the different codes. He viewed the Superiors as Gods and believed that when he cracked the ‘code,’ he and his people would be let back into the Woodlands.

“Wait. What do you mean, let back in?” My heart was beating fast. A new truth opened up another paper-cutting file in my head. “Salim, what’s your full name?” I asked, my voice trembling.

“Salim Sekimbo,” he said proudly, with his arm across his chest in salute. His coat slipped down a little and the faded lines of a barcode blared at me like a warning.

“You’re a Superior,” I said as a statement and a question, because I really wanted to be wrong.

He nodded. “Abel is my brother,” he muttered with a sour expression on his face and turned back to a stack of papers, shuffling through them, looking for something.