by Martha Adele
“Hey!” a male voice cries out in what sounds like joy. We turn to our left and see two guys around our age walking toward us. The same voice chuckles. “Are you guys new here, or have I just never seen you before?” He extends his hand toward Logan and smiles at us all. “My name is Caine.” He nods over to the slightly taller boy beside him. “And this is Grayson.”
We all shake hands and introduce ourselves. Grayson seems slightly on the quieter side, while Caine seems to be a social butterfly. Caine points around and names a bunch of people that I doubt will ever want to talk to us and acts like this is just one big welcoming party.
After a minute or two of Caine’s sarcastic babbling and sneering, he realizes that he hadn’t let us get a word in. “Oh man! Sorry, I should shut up.” He smiles and lets his nose scrunch up as he tilts his head. “I just get really excited. So you guys are from Bestellen?”
His question feels like a jeer.
Logan nods in response. “Yeah.”
Caine crosses his arms and smiles at us again. “Are you all from the same state?”
I shake my head, and Sam explains. “I’m from Bouw, Mavis is from Bloot, and Logan is from Minje.”
Grayson and Caine both glance at each other. Grayson chimes in before Caine has the chance to blab off. “Were any of you affected by the bombings?”
The three of us jerk our heads back to him and mutter the same question in unison, “What?”
Sam raises his voice a bit to be heard over the hallway commotion. “What bombings?”
Both Grayson and Caine look to each other with wide eyes in disbelief. Caine turns back to us and tenses up a bit. “You don’t know about the bombings?”
CHAPTER SEVEN
Logan
I scoff. “What are you talking about? What bombings?”
Grayson and Caine exchange another look. Caine’s crossed arms tense up with the rest of his body, and Grayson looks at us with a certain sort of sympathy.
“You …” Grayson pauses and clears his throat. “You don’t know about the bombings?”
All three of us shake our heads.
“No, we don’t. Spit it out!” Sam growls.
Caine smirks. “Um, well, as you might know, Bergland and Bestellen have been at war for a while. Recently, a few of our bombs reached Minje and Bouw.” He looks past us and scrunches his nose at Mavis. “None in Bloot, though.”
Mavis, behind me, shifts her briefcase from one hand to another, muttering something under her breath.
I shift my focus from her back to the nonsense Caine is telling us. “What are you talking about?” I ask. “We haven’t been bombed.”
Caine squeezes his lips together and tilts his head. He squints at me, like I have just said something idiotic. “Um … yeah you have.”
Grayson loosens up and smacks Caine in the chest with the back of his hand. “Hey, what if they didn’t live near any of the bombings?” Grayson turns back to me. “You live in Minje, right?”
I nod. Unlike all of Caine’s sneers, Grayson’s words come off respectfully.
“Do you live near the middle or southern ends of the mountains?” Grayson asks.
My heartbeat grows louder in my head as I nod again. “Yes,” I tell them. “At the southern tip.”
Caine smiles and clears his throat nervously. “That sounds like the section that was bombed a couple months ago.”
“Two months ago,” Grayson corrects.
Two months ago?
The mountains?
Is that not … No, it couldn’t be.
I shake my head and try to ignore the thoughts running through it. I take a deep breath and allow the question to escape my mouth. “Did you bomb one of our mines?”
They nod their heads and look to Sam. Caine uncrosses his arms and smirks over at Sam. “And you, you said you were from Bouw?” His smile grows even more smug as he folds his hands behind his back.
Sam nods.
“Do you live anywhere near the northeastern region?”
Sam nods again. His eyes grow bigger than I have ever seen them as he hesitantly answers Caine, “Yeah.”
Caine opens his mouth to say something, but Grayson nudges him. Grayson shoots him a look saying something along the lines of “Be gentle.”
Caine nods to Grayson, then looks back to Sam. “We bombed that whole region just a few weeks ago.”
“Wait.” Sam holds up one of his hands to Caine. “What did you bomb?”
Grayson and Caine turn to each other and mutter something.
Sam clutches his case with both hands. As his right eye begins to twitch, he stutters out, “A … a market?”
Mavis and I glance at each other, then back to Sam, Caine, and Grayson.
Caine nods his head, and Grayson gives Sam a nervous look. Grayson clears his throat again. “I think so. I thought you guys said that you didn’t get bombed?”
Sam’s eyes dart to the floor, then back and forth rapidly. He drops his briefcase to the floor and clenches his small and bony fists, though they are nowhere near as bony as Mavis’s.
Mavis sets her briefcase on the floor also and touches Sam’s back. She lets out a soft question, “Hey, are you—”
Sam’s eyes dart up and over as he grits his teeth at the two boys. “You! You people killed my dad!” He rubs his eyes with the palms of his hands and groans. “I can’t believe it! I thought it was a workplace accident!” He sucks in air and spits it out, seemingly unable to get his anger under control.
I watch as Grayson’s eyes flick down to Sam’s pocket. My eyes follow his gaze to the top part of a vial sticking out.
Grayson holds up his hands to show he isn’t a threat to Sam, and he slowly speaks in a low and authoritative voice. “Hey, buddy, do you want to pull out one of your vials? One of the ones in your pocket?” Sam looks back to Grayson angrily, but concerned, as if he can’t control himself. Grayson gives Sam a soft smile. “The medicine will help you feel better, and then we can talk.”
Sam looks down to his pocket and pulls it out. He stares at the vial for a moment before sticking it into his leg. Sam’s eyes close, and I watch the medicine drain from the clear glass tube. The vial empties itself completely and appears as if there was nothing there in the first place.
Sam pulls it out of his leg and walks over to one of the hallway walls. He lies up against it and slides down, just as Mavis did in the meeting room when she was injected.
Grayson looks around the hallway as he walks over to Sam. “It was a small dose. He should be able to talk and comprehend everything as he regularly would.” Grayson brings Sam’s briefcase over to him and sets it down beside him. “This sort of dose is just to help calm you, okay?”
Sam nods. He takes a deep breath. “It did.” His eyes appear too heavy for him to hold up, but he keeps trying anyway. “This doesn’t change the fact that …” Sam takes another deep breath and forces out the last few words, “You people killed my dad.”
Grayson slides down the wall beside Sam and takes a seat. He sighs. “I’m sorry, Sam. This is war, and in war, deaths are almost inevitable. I am so sorry that your father was one of them.” Grayson sighs again, this time looking to each one of us. “Truly, I am.”
“Wait,” Caine says, butting in. “How are you just now finding out about this? What did you think happened?”
Sam slowly raises his head and gives Caine a look that I can’t describe. If I had to, I would use the phrase “Shut up, you idiot.” But I don’t think that phrase does this look justice.
Sam scoffs. “Nobody knew it was a bombing. We were told there was an incident in the marketplace due to someone not doing their job right. They said that because of that one person, we lost many loved ones.” He weakly shakes his head and lets out a mixture of a sob and a growl. “It’s not my fault no one told me the truth.”
One, two, three.
One, two, three.
One, two, three.
I rub each of my fingernails over and over again as I try to keep myself from squeezing my eyes shut to blink. I consider using one of the few pocket-sized vials that the nurses gave me for my “moderate OCD,” but I don’t need them. I don’t. The longer I rub my nails, the more I realize that I focus on doing this whenever I am nervous. But why would I be nervous?
Oh yeah …
I choke back the tears and force out the one thing I feel I need to say. “Your bombs killed my dad too.”
Grayson, Caine, Mavis, and Sam all look to me at once. Mavis looks down to my hands and watches me rub my nails while Sam meets my eyes. Both he and I force our tears to stay in our eyes, but we can’t help but let a few escape. Memories of my dad come flooding back—him telling me about my mom, him telling me about his childhood, his hugs, his stories of his times in the mines, even his corny jokes.
Mavis steps over to me and swallows. “What?”
I nod, keeping myself calm, and stand straight up, not falling under the weight of pain like I did the first time I found out Dad had died. “Yeah. My dad died in what I thought was a mining accident two months ago in the same place that you guys said you bombed.” I chuckle, trying to ignore the feeling of a knife twisting and turning inside my heart. “I guess it wasn’t an accident, huh?”
“Oh man.” Grayson shakes his head in what looks like sorrow. “I am sorry. Again, we aren’t aiming for innocent people. I am sorry that this happened.”
“Oh yeah?” I scoff. “Then what were you aiming for? A marketplace?” I gesture to Sam. “Filled with people just trying to earn their way? A mine? Filled with people doing the same? What’s next? Have you guys aimed for a hospital yet?” I clear my throat and swallow back what I can.
“Hey,” Caine defensively stammers, “we … we weren’t aiming for innocent people. We were aiming for—”
“Did any of you know your country was at war?” Grayson interrupts.
The three of us remain quite. The more I think about it, the more all of the signs point to a war. The way they were easing back on our rations, the abundance of officials, the early curfew …
“Why would the government hide a war from us?” I ask.
Sam and Mavis give each other a look of disbelief and confusion, just as another question comes flying out of Sam’s mouth. “And how come you guys are bombing us? We haven’t done anything!”
Caine squints at me and scoffs. “Really? Nothing? You guys don’t know anything?”
Sam slowly stands up and gives Caine the awful glare that I can’t describe. He crosses his arms and opens his mouth to say something; but before he can, a blaring alarm wails through the hallways, along with the white lights above us changing to a deep orange.
Everyone around speed walks through the hallways and past us.
Mavis tightens her grip on her case and shouts over the alarm, “What’s going on?”
Grayson hands Sam’s case to Sam, then yells something at Caine. Caine nods and stands in place even though the people rushing through the hallways make it hard for him.
Grayson turns to Sam, Mavis, and me. He barks orders over the sirens to follow him, so we do. Caine stays behind us the whole time to make sure none of us get stranded while Grayson leads us through the chaos. It feels like hundreds of people jog down the stairs beside us, trying to get through. Too many people to count.
Through the halls, down the stairs, into another set of stairs, down those stairs, and into a large room lined with bunk beds. The alarm is much softer in this room; and the orange lights have gotten gentler, warmer in tone, and more bearable. The room goes back as far as I can see and turns both ways at the end. We follow Grayson and walk through the lines and lines of beds and boxes, turn right, and walk through more lines of beds and boxes, then turn left and repeat the process.
As we walk through, I see a few men here and there who are wearing the same electronic wristbands that Emily Hash and Major Mason had, the hologram bands. Before I get the chance to ask about the men, Grayson looks over his shoulder at me and announces that we can stay with Caine and him for now.
We pull over to the right and stop on a few open beds. Caine passes Sam and walks over to one of the bottom bunks. “Here, Mavis, you can go ahead and have my bunk until you are assigned one.” His smirk changes into a wink and makes everyone uncomfortable.
Mavis gives a shy smile and sets her case onto the ground. “Thank you, but I think I am okay right now.”
Caine is taken aback by her “No, thank you,” but he nods it off and turns back to the Sam and me. “The bed is open for either of you if you want.”
“Thanks,” I answer, not ever considering his sarcastic pity offer.
After a moment or two of watching people file into the bunker, Sam catches my attention. His twitching seems to be getting a little worse.
He brings the palm of his hand up to his eye and rubs as he squeaks out. “So is anyone going to tell us what is going on?”
Caine chuckles, earning a glare from Grayson. Caine raises his hands in playful surrender and backs off to go sit on his bed.
Grayson shakes his head and turns back to Sam. He points to the overhead speakers above us. “That siren? That’s our ‘bomb threat’ alarm. Whenever that alarm goes off, everyone immediately comes down to these bunkers and prepares for the worst. Nine times out of ten, when that siren goes off, we are bombed.”
Caine, lying back in his bed with his hands behind his head, retorts, “You know how you said Bestellen hadn’t done anything? Well, guess who forces us down here at least three times a week?”
“Shut up, Jacobs!” Grayson growls at Caine. “It’s not like it’s their fault. For goodness’ sake, they didn’t even know about the war!”
Caine lies in his bed, silent, but unaffected. His smirk remains resting on his face.
“I’m sorry about him.” Grayson scratches the back of his head and stares at the ground. He takes a deep breath and looks back up, past me, and then to Mavis. “I know you must have some questions. Are there any you want to ask me?” He moves his focus from Mavis to Sam to me.
When our eyes meet, Caine sits up on his squeaky bed and points around. “Those guys standing around the room will take attendance once the doors close and help keep everyone organized.” He turns to us. “Just in case you were wondering.”
The three of us ignore Caine and turn back to Grayson. Before anyone gets to ask a question, an announcement by a woman’s voice comes from the overhead speakers. “The doors will be closing in five minutes.”
Grayson glances around to the people flooding in and takes a seat on the bunk above Caine’s. “Once those doors close, they don’t open until the threat is clear.” He gestures forward to the empty set of bunks in front of him. “You guys can take a seat if you want. No one uses those.”
Sam and Mavis take a seat on the bottom while I take a seat on the top. The view from this height is better than the view from the floor, but not by much. I can see that there is a lot more people than I originally had thought and that this system is actually really organized. Everyone seems to have their own set of beds and know where they are to be going, which is really impressive for such a large number of people.
The woman’s voice echoes through the halls once again. “The doors will be closing in four minutes.”
I watch as many of the people settling into their assigned quarters talk, just as they did back upstairs by their sleeping quarters, as if nothing is wrong. I have to wonder if what they are telling us is really true. Who is in the wrong? Bestellen? Or Bergland?
“The doors will be closing in three minutes.”
The first bomb drops seconds after the announcement finishes. I feel the sound of the explosion in my stomach and chest. Everyone on the top bunks hops down an
d sits with the person on the bottom bunk. I follow their lead.
“The doors will be closing in two minutes.”
The second, third, and fourth bombs drop. Each explosion is louder than the other. I feel the ground shake and hear the walls of the bunker crumble. I look around to see Sam holding Mavis in his arms; both of them have their eyes squeezed shut in terror. I see Grayson and Caine sitting in the bottom bunk and staring at us. I look around and see that no one else in this room besides us three seems to be nervous.
More bombs drop. More terror enters.
“The doors are closing. The doors are closing.”
The doors close.
More bombs drop, and a low murmuring floats through the room as we wait for the threat to end.
“Hey,” Grayson whispers, “guys, you don’t need to worry. This bunker, along with the rest of Bergland, was made to shake and sway with any sort of attack or natural disaster.”
Mavis is quiet. She remains still, with her head in Sam’s lap. Sam’s head rests on Mavis’s back as he takes large, loud, and deep breaths. Both of them hold their hands over their ears, trying to block out reality.
“What about escape routes? Just in case something does happen?” I ask Grayson. Caine raises one eyebrow at me and smiles, and I can’t figure out why.
Grayson nods. “There are exits—”
He is interrupted by another bomb but continues as if nothing happened. “There are several exits in each branch of the bunker, as well as several for every branch on every floor. If you can imagine a way out, we have it. We even have one running underneath one of our mountain’s rivers.”
Another bomb drops. Sam’s breathing is heavy, but steady. Mavis’s is short, quick, and shaky. “How did you make all of these tunnels? All of these rooms? Floors? How have you powered all of this?”
This time, Grayson chuckles. “The tunnels are just old mines that we have added on to and perfected, just like most of the rooms and floors we have. We get our power from a few devices that we have placed in our mountains’ rivers and waterfalls and a few of our windmills that are hidden throughout the mountain ranges.”
