Strike

by Jim Heskett

  An urge to leave the meeting pulled at him. To sneak out of the dorms and hurry over to the warehouse to check on her. Or, maybe doing so would cause more harm than good.

  The guerreros on either side of him cast looks down at his nervous knee, but they said nothing. Somewhere, a clock ticked. Each second moved him closer to a full-out panic attack. How long could he sit here, doing nothing? And, what was there to do? With no battle today, he had no legit access to the battlegrounds.

  “When I met Hamon,” Paulo said, standing at the front of the room, “he told me it’s not about any single person. It’s about the team functioning as one. This is what makes us successful. Anyone who puts the team below their own priorities isn’t the person we want leading us. That’s the person who will sacrifice our collective good for personal glory.”

  On the board, Paulo wrote the name Rosia. Yorick swallowed hard. But, when he thought about it, she was a perfect candidate to be leader. Bold, brash, fearless, calculating. Willing to take risks. They would win a lot of battles under her leadership. But she wouldn’t want it.

  And nominating her wouldn’t matter if she was in an interrogation room right now, staring at Wybert’s painted face as he raved and ranted at her. Soon, heads would turn, looking to check her reaction.

  “How many are we going to consider?” Yorick said, waving a hand at the five names up there. A few of his teammates threw looks at him. Maybe they thought he was upset about his name not being there. But he was only stalling for time. Yorick had expressed total disinterest at leading the team. He’d told Hamon that several times.

  “I think we have enough,” Paulo said. “We can start discussing the strengths of each.”

  “But,” Yorick said, and then he didn’t know what else to say after that.

  The door at the back of the room opened, and Rosia’s head poked inside the door. Yorick breathed a sigh of relief like a balloon deflating.

  He smiled, and she tried to offer it back to him, but she didn’t seem okay. She seemed rattled. As she entered the room, Yorick met her eyes and waved a hand in front of his crotch. She cocked her head, confused, but then she nodded. When the guards had noted she was not present after gym time, he’d told them Rosia was having “woman” problems. It’s not as if members of her own team would run to the guards and inform them she’d been suspiciously missing, but having a unified story was for their protection, too.

  Yorick got up from his chair and moved a row back where there were two empty seats together. He slid into one, and Rosia joined him. Her chest was heaving, but she kept her chin high and breathed through her nose, trying to keep it under control.

  He wanted to wrap his arms around her and shower her with kisses. The thought that he might never see her again filled him with a strange sensation he couldn’t quite name. But he had to hold it inside. Even though they were surrounded by allies, no one could know about their underground adventures. Not yet. Again, for their own protection.

  “If there are no more nominations,” Paulo said, “I will call for an initial vote. Then, we can start the rounds of discussions.”

  He pointed at each name and asked for hands to raise. According to the rules, each person could vote three times in the first ballot. Yorick voted once for Paulo, once for Rosia, and for an older member of the team named Ophelia.

  Rosia didn’t vote at all. She kept her eyes forward, breathing, trying to calm herself. Yorick was dying to ask her for details, but it would have to wait. Whatever happened with that mysterious cellar door, she was here. That was all that mattered.

  The door at the back of the room opened again, just a crack. Yorick’s eyes shot open wide when he saw Tenney, the bearded, muscular farm worker who’d approached them at the play. He leaned into the door. Yorick mouthed the word no, but Tenney waved a hand, insistent.

  Yorick and Rosia stood from their seats and scurried across the room. None of the Blues said anything, but they knew how dangerous this was. Farm workers were not allowed anywhere near official guerrero business. Not even allowed on this floor of the dorms. If a single guard saw Tenney, they would probably shoot him on sight, then hang his corpse up as a scarecrow in the fields.

  Out in the hall, Yorick couldn’t keep it in. “Are you loco?”

  Tenney looked left and right before answering. There weren’t any guards around, but they did like to stroll through the hallways from time to time.

  “Not that I know of,” he said, “but you might think I am when I’m done telling you what I’m going to tell you.”

  Rosia crossed her arms. “What are you talking about?”

  “I saw you,” Tenney said, flicking his chin at her, “sneaking to the battlegrounds earlier.”

  “You didn’t see anything,” Yorick said, narrowing his eyes.

  Tenney raised his hands. “Easy, amigo1. I mean you no harm. I would never endanger your efforts.”

  “Our efforts?” Rosia said.

  “You are starting a rebellion, right? First, the chip, and now you’re sneaking around places you’re not supposed to be sneaking around.”

  Yorick and Rosia shared a look. He could see in her eyes she didn’t know how to proceed with Tenney. He seemed trustworthy, but they barely knew him.

  “Whether we are or not,” Yorick said, “what does that have to do with you?”

  Tenney grinned, showing a set of teeth surprisingly white and straight for a field worker. “You’re not alone. I’ve organized most of my serfs in the fields. We’re going to have a revolution of our own.”

  Rosia’s face brightened, and Yorick knew what she was thinking. That with the support of the farm workers, they could go from investigating doors with carved circles to outright revolt. To toppling the guards and taking on Wybert head-on.

  And Tenney had said my serfs. He fancied himself their leader. Maybe he was, or maybe he wasn’t, but this whole thing was loco. Too much had happened in the last few days, and Yorick’s brain was a lightning storm. He couldn’t think straight.

  “No,” Yorick said.

  Rosia and Tenney both gave him the same look.

  “What?” Rosia said.

  “It’s too early,” Yorick said. “Whatever you think you’re going to do, Tenney, please don’t do it yet. Too much is unknown. We’ve only made a tiny bit of progress. It’s not enough.”

  Tenney grinned. “We know what we need to know. That Wybert’s time is over, and we’re going to burn this place to the ground.”

  “What can you do with the chips?” Rosia asked. “You said we could do great things with them.”

  “I don’t know for sure,” Tenney said. “They’re obviously important. I’ve seen how Wybert will kill to keep them a secret. I’m surprised he didn’t execute you for attempting to steal one. If we have them, then we gain power. We get leverage.”

  “Maybe,” Yorick said. “Or, maybe they appear valuable because Wybert makes it look that way. Maybe you ambush some guards. Maybe you break into the Quartermaster’s storage room and steal a few dozen chips, and then you find out Wybert has a thousand of them in his sock drawer, and it doesn’t matter. All your power evaporates.”

  Tenney took another look around as a door opened down the hall. “I have to go. But I will say this: it is not too soon. It hasn’t been too soon for years. I thought it would be nice to have the guerreros on our side, and you two seemed like you could be trusted. But, whether you help or not, we'll set fire to the whole pinche2 system around here. Nothing is going to stop us.”

  Before Yorick could respond, Tenney turned and bolted for the stairwell. The door had shut behind him before Yorick could even let out his breath.

  1 Amigo: friend

  2 Pinche: f*cking

  Chapter Seventeen

  When Yorick rolled over, he felt Rosia’s absence. Her side of the bed cold, her pillow with no indentation. He blinked and looked around to find her hovering in the corner of the room, staring out the window. Arms crossed, a little fog from her breath spreadin
g a circle on the window with each exhalation. Goosebumps dotted her flesh. Her eyes were blank, unfocused on some point in the distance.

  From this height, they could see for a hundred kilometers in several directions. All the way to the mountains. In the winter, snow capped their jagged peaks. Sometimes, animals filled the valley below, and they would study the contraband books to find matches for these wandering beasts. This is how they had come to know of moose and bear and elk and wolf. They knew of rabbits because the plantación was lousy with them, and had been for years. The little pests sneaked in when the gates opened and then they spread like weeds.

  Yorick and Rosia had learned some of these foreign words before, in their youth education programs in the classrooms above the cafeteria. But those days were long ago. Any regular education they received now, they had to steal from gossip and secret books passed between dorm dwellers in the middle of the night. Guerreros didn’t need education about animals, only battle.

  Yorick could tell by the faraway look in her eyes that Rosia wasn’t animal-spotting out the window this morning. She’d filled him in on her adventure during dinner, and the whole episode both terrified and excited him. He’d told himself he would sleep on it and have a brilliant plan when he woke. But, no such genius thrived in his brain this morning.

  She offered a meek smile. “Did I wake you?”

  “No, but I knew you weren’t here. You weren’t here when I went to bed last night, either.”

  Her head drifted back to the window, eyes trailing around the blue sky. “Do you wonder what’s on the other side of those mountains?”

  “Sure,” he said as he scooted up against his pillow. “I try not to, though.”

  She winced and crossed the room, then slid next to him on the bed. Her cold lips kissed his cheek. “Sorry I didn’t see you before bed. I was walking laps in the gym last night. Burning off energy.”

  “What’s keeping you up?” he asked.

  “What happens if we get everything we want?”

  He shrugged. “That would be great.” When she frowned at him, he cocked an eyebrow and said, “That would… not be great?”

  “I mean, what happens if we get everything we want, but we’re still not happy?”

  Yorick chewed his lip. “Like if we lose by winning?”

  “Yes.”

  “Only the stars know,” he said. “I think that’s a problem for our future selves to worry about.”

  “Maybe so.”

  “What’s on your mind?”

  “Tenney.”

  Yorick nodded. “He’s a large guy. Got those biceps like bales of hay. When he gets on your mind, I’m sure it’s hard to see around him. And he probably doesn’t budge when you tell him to.”

  “That’s one way of putting it.”

  “I can tell you idolize his…” he paused, searching for the right word.

  “Bravado?”

  “Yes. Bravado. But, he’s going to get us all killed. He and a hundred farmers intend to raise up their hoes and pickaxes and take on fifty guards armed with automatic weapons, plus those same pickaxes will magically pick off the snipers stationed on top of the walls? It’s a fantasy.”

  She puffed her cheeks as she blew out a sigh, rubbing her hands up and down the exposed flesh of her arms. “I’m not sure our plan is a winner, either. How are the odds better when it’s the two of us invading the mansion? How many can we expect to take down?”

  “There’s only one person we need to target. Let’s go tonight. After everyone is asleep, we’ll retrace your steps, but we’ll find an unlocked door down there in those tunnels. There has to be at least one.”

  She dimmed her eyes at him. “You didn’t answer my question.”

  “I don’t know, Rose. But we can’t take Wybert head-on in an open-field war. Think back to military tactics classes. They’re a superior force in arms, leverage, and systems.”

  “With the farmers, we have the numbers.”

  “That’s not good enough. It won’t work, and you know it.”

  She stood and strode away from him, her hands clasped behind her back. “We should go. We’re expected on the battlefield in an hour, whether we have a new leader or not.”

  “That reminds me,” Yorick said as he sat up and rubbed the sleep from his eyes. “I talked to Paulo last night when you left after dinner. We didn’t get a chance to tell you.”

  “Yes?”

  “It’s you. Our new leader.”

  Rosia turned and cocked her head at him. “Me?”

  “You. You just need to go to the meeting room on the sixth floor and accept.”

  A mix of expressions traveled across her face. Hope, fear, elation, panic. Yorick had trouble keeping up with them.

  “How many ballots?” she asked.

  “Three.”

  “That’s it?”

  He nodded. “There wasn’t even much debate. Everyone wants you. You’re it.”

  In the end, she inhaled deeply through her nose and nodded. “Okay. I understand.” Then, she returned to him and leaned down. Her hair spilled in front of her face, and the way the light cut across her dark strands of hair made Yorick’s heart thump and his loins burn. He’d always thought of her as beautiful, but sometimes, he couldn’t stand it. Like she belonged in a class all to her herself.

  “I need you to be my rock,” she said as she took his face in her hands.

  “Your rock?”

  “Keep me grounded. With all that’s going on. You know how I get carried away.”

  With a grin, he slid a hand up her thigh, and she batted it away. “We don’t have time.”

  “As your rock, I’d advise you to reconsider that.”

  Rosia rolled her eyes and tried to conceal the smile on her face, but it didn’t work. “Later.”

  “You promise?”

  “Yes, I promise.”

  He stood and held out a hand, which she took. He pulled her close and kissed her. “I can live with that. Okay, let’s go meet your loyal subjects, commander.”

  Chapter Eighteen

  When Rosia knelt and opened the secret door in the warehouse by flicking her finger under it, Yorick burst out laughing. Such a simple thing, and he hadn’t been able to see it. A latch, underneath the bottom lip of the door.

  “I would have found it,” he said.

  Rosia offered a pitying smile. “Sure. Sure you would have.”

  She stood and kissed his cheek, and then he pulled her close and wrapped his arms around her. He didn’t know who was shaking worse: her, or him. But he knew the anxiety would not get better anytime soon. Not with what they were about to undertake.

  But he was glad to be here with her, doing this crazy thing together.

  Earlier today, in her first outing as the leader on the battlefield, Rosia had been electric. Elevated. Everyone had thought Hamon capable, but Rosia was something special. She managed to maintain control over every member of the team, guiding them through the foxholes, while still ending up at the top of the Blues leaderboard. And she’d eliminated pendejo Diego within the first five minutes of the round. Not quick enough to send him to last, but he ended up second to the bottom of the Red ranks. Standing near Wybert’s podium, the fury on cheating Diego’s face made all the struggle of the day worthwhile. Diego was almost always among the top finishers.

  Yorick had placed third, a respectable number. And, best of all, since the Blues had won the day, none of them would be erased from the team; no one cast aside like a broken rifle. Even their newest members, from the ones on the team only a few weeks to the standby who’d been elevated to full member status yesterday, seemed to thrive under Rosia’s new leadership.

  She opened the door, swinging it up. It creaked as it moved and the thin rays of light pushed down into the darkness below. Yorick swallowed, feeling woozy. She handed him a small flashlight which he tested by screwing and unscrewing, turning it on and off.

  “You ready?” he asked, his mouth dry.

  She n
odded. “We catalog the numbers on the doors as we go, remembering where we are. It’s dark down there.”

  “Okay.”

  “It’s disorienting down there.”

  He lifted the pen and a small pad of paper from his pocket. “I got it. I’m ready.”

  She pointed back toward the south-east. “The mansion is that way. We keep track of our position and move closer to the building. If we get lucky, we find a door that’s unlocked. We sneak inside, try to find Hamon, and learn what we can. If there’s a way to take out Wybert, we have to be willing to do it. No hesitation.”

  “I like it,” he said, trying to grin and show no fear. Of course, he knew she didn’t believe it for a second. “I’m willing to do what it takes, but we need to actually get to it. We don’t have unlimited time.”

  Paulo and some of the others had agreed to cover for them if anyone questioned where they’d gone. Yorick couldn’t prove it, but he suspected Paulo knew most everything already. The kid was smart. Although Yorick had implied he and Rosia were going off to spend some alone time somewhere they weren’t allowed, he didn’t think Paulo bought it. Either way, Yorick trusted him, and Paulo knew enough not to ask questions.

  They’d spent a lot of time earlier waiting for blind spots in the guards’ rotations to sneak onto the battlefield. Paulo’s excuses wouldn’t keep inquisitive guards away for long.

  Rosia gave him another quick kiss on the cheek and then dropped into the hole. He listened to her feet clank onto metal grating below, and then he crouched beside the entrance. Like slipping into the great unknown. The stark blackness of the tunnel shook him. He couldn’t remember being in such utter lack of light ever before. Wybert liked to shine lights from the walls on the interior, even late at night. Sometimes the lights crawled over their dorm window, brilliant blasts of white shaking them from sleep. A reminder who owned them and their lives.

  Yorick let his feet slide down, then he let go of the edge and dropped to the bottom. He felt the difference in temperature. Air drafted along the tunnel, whisking up his body and out the open door above his head.