“Try to keep up,” Felix said with a laugh. I turned and could still see his feet near the entrance.
I spoke with urgency. “Ugg. Guys, please hurry. There’s something out there.”
“I’m going,” Scarlett replied, though I was relieved her voice was muffled. Like she’d moved ahead.
As the minutes ticked by I continued to hear those two in the tunnel. Often they’d chat like they were old friends on a pleasant walk.
“How’s the baby?”
“Is your back okay?”
“Did you wear your comfortable shoes?”
And all manner of similarly unnecessary questions and answers. My only consolation was they were getting very difficult to hear. I stopped spinning my staff long enough to look after them. They were a pinpoint of light. That made me very happy.
When I turned around the drone had moved about half the distance closer to me.
“What are you?”
That got its attention. The ball hovered to a position just outside my reach, as if I’d wanted to harm it.
“Who’s driving you, little lady? Is it one of those nasty Sisters?” I figured it was. I wasn’t going to let them forget what they were doing to me.
The drone remained stationary. It seemed to work by shooting jets of air through a series of holes on its outer shell. I could feel small blasts of air each time it repositioned itself, which happened in small increments even as it tried to remain stationary.
“Well you tell your friends that the joke’s on them. I’m going to take the help I’ve been given, and I’m still going to find your elder women. Then we’ll see who’s tossed into any blue hologram torture devices.”
I intended to poke fun of Xandrie. I still couldn’t understand why she was so mean about the whole thing. I felt sorry for her and even felt a little guilty for putting her in a bad spot. I would have done anything to help her make things right. At least right up until Scarlett and Felix climbed out of that truck.
That’s when it dawned on me I already was. I came in and ruined things for her. Now I was cleaning up her trash. The two things that didn’t fit right in a society built around religious order of young women with a sacred duty to obey the rules.
“Ha!” I didn’t even try to follow her rules. I laughed inside as I thought of Alex trying to follow those rules. Would he have to wear a skirt?
I was still laughing when I noticed motion away from the shiny orb. It was to my left and my heart lost its grip and fell into my gut when I realized who it was.
The Saints were marching toward me.
Saint Valerie was in the lead; dozens of dirty white skirts followed.
5
“Oh, God. Run!” I said it, though it was impossible for any of us in the tunnel.
“What is it?” Felix yelled back.
I spun my staff until it was nearly a solid blue circle in front of me. I had time to strike a couple of the dead bodies, or the drone, or I could just get into the pipe.
Live to fight tomorrow, my sensible inner me said.
I stopped the spin, gripped the fiery blue metal bar, and jumped head-first into the concrete tunnel. The staff rattled with a metallic chime as it struck the ground under my hand. I threw it forward ten or fifteen feet so I had free hands to crawl after it.
I had about sixty seconds before I heard mindless yelling behind me. Something got into the tunnel not long after I did.
“They’re following me,” I said in definite panic.
I got to my staff and threw it ahead again. I got it about twenty feet on that toss.
In the second or two it took to get moving, something caught my foot.
I couldn’t look back. I pulled away, feeling the creature’s grip fall away.
I didn’t care how much it hurt my hands or knees; I scraped my way along the tunnel until I was almost at my weapon. I was closer to my two companions. They were also huffing along, though I knew I would reach them after only a few more throws. The light made distance very hard to judge.
Something grabbed my foot again. Then the other foot.
“No,” I shouted.
The grabbing hands made me lose my balance and I fell forward on my chin. In my panic I pulled my left leg out of the grip and tried to kick at the hand holding the other foot.
Its grip momentarily weakened but didn’t let go completely. I used that second to get a better grip with my hands so I could pull myself closer to the staff. I screamed in pain at how heavy my pursuer made my leg.
The staff beamed at me. I strained another foot and got my fingertip on it.
“You can do it, girl,” I heard a voice inside my head cheer. I didn’t want to flub it, like I’d done on the climbing wall back in the Complex.
“I got this,” I yelled, dragging the deadweight the last few inches. I gripped the staff and rolled myself inside the tight space. The hand didn’t let go, but did re-grip me as I changed my own position.
I got a look back down the tunnel as my staff was still brightly lit. The man holding my leg was dressed in dark sheets, like he’d stripped them from one of our bunks. I couldn’t tell what it was, but they had white blotches where their sheets met their throats. Those reflected my light just below their ferocious teeth.
There were a couple more behind the first. The Saints were back there too, but didn’t crawl as fast the ones right at my heels.
I swallowed hard at what I needed to do. I thrust the staff with a hard poking motion right at the dead man’s eyes. He was drawn by the light and looked up as it came at him. I struck his teeth just below his nose, shattering them.
My stomach wasn’t pleased, but I had to do it again.
Another poke.
I struck the cheek as one of the following men clawed and shook his mate. I heard and felt the staff crunch but it didn’t sink in like I needed it to do.
“Come on,” I shouted, noting a rising stench washing over me as more bodies filled the tunnel.
The third time all the stars lined up and I sank the pole right where it needed to go. The man seemed to freeze, as if I’d pulled his plug, then slump in place.
I yanked the staff and did the same thing to the next one crawling over the fallen man. I got lucky and hit him square between the eyes, but low enough the tapered end of the staff went through to its brain. The squish sound was disgusting as I pulled it right back out.
“This isn’t right,” I said to myself. I thought of Reba and my friends. They were probably jogging or eating or sleeping comfortably. All without the kind of threats I was facing.
Felix must have heard me because his sarcasm came across in his response. “Complain at the head office.”
He laughed a few seconds later, I assumed because he thought he was being funny.
“Which way do we go?” Beyond Felix I saw my flashlight moving around in a wild fashion, then disappear like it had been shut off. A couple seconds later she shined it right in my face.
“Got it,” she shouted. “It drops down to another tunnel.”
“Just go!”
I’d been backpedaling from the two dead men, though more pushed at the bodies to get through the blockage. That wouldn’t stop them for long. Nothing we had could.
“Hurry, child,” Felix yelled.
I got on my hands and knees again, waiting for the grabbing to happen. Felix stood in a hole as I looked ahead.
“I’m here. Go!”
I sent my staff skidding ahead and shuffled behind it. It came to a stop right by Felix’s head and I caught up a moment later. Scarlett had moved a metal grate from the bottom of the tunnel and a few feet below there was a cross tunnel with a bright light coming from the right side.
“We’re almost there,” he yelled. “Close the vent cover.”
I jumped down in the hole, sure as the sun I was going to turn around and see the maniacal people chasing me.
“Oh, God!”
I was right. I had just enough time to yank my staff in a weird way so it m
ade the ninety-degree angle turn. I lifted my hand to try to slide the grate back over the hole. My blue light captured the high-speed race between my hand and the face of a Saint. It might have been Valerie but it didn’t really matter. She slammed into my hand, forced the grate to slide away from the hole, and then fell down the hole with me.
I hit the concrete and saw the sunlight of the exit.
Weight smashed me from above as a second woman pushed herself into the hole as well.
I waited for the bite I knew was coming.
So close, I thought.
Chapter 8
Scarlett grunted as the blue flash of my staff flared. I heard a squish and the zombie on top of me stopped moving. In the darkness of the tunnel I couldn’t see the liquid dripping onto my neck and right shoulder, but it burned.
Another primitive grunt followed.
“Come on,” she yelled. “You have to help me, here.”
Though it couldn’t have been easy, she’d managed to lift the body by angling my staff so I could scoot out.
I slid myself from underneath with a grim smile. The next one above it reached for me, but when I got out the twisted pile of bodies shifted so she fell to the wrong side. A small victory, but the white blotch on the man in the hole above indicated more were on the way.
“Go!” I shouted, hoping I didn’t have to say it twice.
Scarlett dropped my staff and hobbled ahead toward the light at the end of the tunnel.
I’ve heard that before.
I couldn’t dwell on the past, in the moment. I caught up with Scarlett just in time to see Felix help her out of the tunnel. Her dress was a mess, as I expected. We weren't outside but back in the junction with the many tunnel openings. On the far wall, alone and with light burning bright down at the end, was our escape.
“That one, go!” I shouted.
I stood there while they made their way out the last length of the vent tube. Alex—safey—was mere yards away.
I stood there with my staff ready for whatever was going to crawl through the opening. I had enough time to notice we'd come from a different direction than the one I'd gone in. I wish the dead people would get lost in the maze.
But the first one appeared and gave me a silent jaw-wide-open growl. I poked the staff where the sun doesn't shine. It went through his mouth and he stopped moving.
I backed away at the horror. Another was behind that one, pushing the first one out.
I ran and hopped into the next tunnel, anxious to seal this place forever.
Felix pulled me out a few moments later and we all turned back to the grate. I gripped the metal covering and swung it shut, but it only took a couple seconds before the first face appeared behind it. I must have gone slower than I thought through the last part.
“Lock it, Elle,” Scarlett said as if to scold me.
That’s when we all looked at each other with realization.
“There’s no lock?” Scarlett said, sounding much less sure of herself.
“No, it rusted away.” I craned my neck, attempting to see out of the hole. The numerous bags surrounding the hole we’d dug earlier made that impossible.
“Alex! Wen!” I shouted.
I looked at my new companions. “They were here when I came into your bunker. I need to find them.”
I felt the first nudge against the metal bars. I leaned with as much force as I could, confident I could hold it for a little while. We needed a way to keep it shut for good using more than the plastic bags all around us.
I glanced at Scarlett and Felix, knowing neither of them could do what I was about to ask.
“We have to find something to block this tunnel. I’ll go. But you two have to hold them back while I let go.”
They both stared at me like I was speaking a foreign language.
“Come. Here.” I motioned toward the grate, now teaming with several bone-thin hands in between the slats.
“But they’ll bite us,” Scarlett offered as she held my light—still on—at her side.
“They can’t get you through the metal. You’ll be fine,” I replied, not having any clue if what I said was true. It didn’t look like anyone could get bitten—unless for some reason they stuck their hands through the bars.
Felix slid down the pile of bags and returned to the entrance of the tunnel. At first he tried to tie a bag on one of the bars, but the dead grabbed it each time he placed it through.
He looked at me, defeated.
“Good thought,” I said with a weak smile.
He leaned heavily on the grate and we both waited for Scarlett.
“You promise they can’t bite?” Her eyes were watery and grave.
“Yes. You’ll do great. I need to find some rocks or something to set against this. You’ll be fine if you just keep them from coming through. And I’ll trade you for my light.” I smiled to reassure her.
Silently I cursed because there were more of those monsters in the tunnel than there were just a minute ago. Soon even the three of us together wouldn’t be enough to hold them.
As if to agree with me, the bars jumped. Scarlett let out a girlish yelp, but to her credit came down and leaned against the growling pack. She handed me my light, which I promptly put back on and turned off.
“I’ll be right back,” I said, stepping away from the vent cover. I waited to see if my weight was what was holding it back, but the pair of them were able to keep it closed without me.
I shot up the incline of bags, thinking back to the first time I came out of the hole for the sun room in the Complex. I’d found a similar hill to ascend. I expected something similarly impressive when I got out, but it was the same grotto filled with an untold number of colorful plastic bags I’d left behind. The only difference was the shadows on the surrounding walls—they’d shifted over the course of the day. And, of course, my regular companions were gone.
“Alex!” I screamed. “Help!” I added, as if that word alone would cause him to charge in to save me.
I struggled through the bags around the hole we’d dug, then got my footing and went straight to one of the walls of rock nearby. I searched for a rock big enough to be useful in blocking the entrance but small enough I could carry or at least roll it over there. Of all the debris strewn against the wall, I saw nothing close to what I needed.
I’d been gone for maybe sixty seconds when I heard Scarlett screech. I would have written it off had Felix not also started to cry out for me.
I picked up a rock not much longer than my forearm and ran toward the shouting. I was intending to get a start on—
I dropped the rock as soon as I saw them.
“Hold them back!” I shouted. I stumbled down into the pit and threw myself against the portal. It didn’t close all the way because an arm hung out the side.
Felix and Scarlett were soaked with sweat.
“You couldn’t hold them?” I scolded. Then, feeling sorry for them, “We’re going to have to run. We can’t keep ‘em in. There aren’t enough rocks close by. Do either of you happen to know how to get somewhere safe?”
The only place I knew about was miles away on the other side of the river, and I wasn’t sure I could lead them back to the Complex even if we had to.
“Sweetie, we’ve been living in that jail for a very long time. I can’t even remember how many years it’s been since I’ve seen the sun. Scarlett has been with me almost as long.”
That jogged something in me. “Is it your baby?”
Felix laughed. “Now that’s hilarious.”
I wanted to see if Scarlett found it funny, but she wasn’t laughing. Her focus was on the arm hanging from the side of the door. Its owner was somehow pushing the gate open, an inch at a time.
“Okay, you two run and I’ll hold it as long as I can. My friend Alex is around here somewhere. He can help. If you find him, tell him to come back for me. I’ll try to catch up.”
“But where should we go?” Scarlett asked.
The grotto h
ad one exit, but it split into two paths once clear of the inner chamber. I could send them back to the dam, where I knew there was trouble, or I could send them to the right—and into the rocky terrain above the bunker of the sisters.
I had to tell them something.
2
“Go left, to the bridge,” I ordered. If Alex and Wen weren’t here, I figured that’s where they would go. Maybe they wanted to get help from the people we’d found on the far side of the river.
Both of them looked at me for too long.
“I said go.”
“What about you,” Felix replied, sounding hurt.
“I’ll catch up. You have to go, now. Please.” The grate bounced a few times in rapid succession but I held it.
“Thank you, Elle,” Felix said, sounding completely defeated.
Scarlett smiled and allowed herself to be led up the bag hill by the elderly man. When they got to the top I noticed he walked with a hunch, dropping him to about the same height as the shorter girl helping him along.
“Don’t be late,” he shouted back before he was out of my sight.
“I’ll try,” I said to myself.
In moments the only sound I heard was the moans and shuffles from the tunnel. My worst fears were confirmed when I peeked at the arm again and it was clear of the grate all the way up to its shoulder. The force of the crawlers behind the leaders was so great they were being pushed through the exit.
One simple lock would end the threat. I couldn’t even use my staff to wedge it closed because there was nothing but bags beyond the door.
A particularly forceful shove spit out the head of the man on the side. The metal cut into his ashen gray skin between his shoulder and head, but he didn’t seem put out.
“You guys are ruining my life,” I shouted.
My spear was heavy in my hand as I tried to keep that vent door closed. I tried to poke it through the slats to dispatch one of them, but I couldn’t get enough leverage without letting go of the door. I struck something inside the tunnel, but I wasn’t able to confirm I killed anything.
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