by Blair Drake
Reese clapped his hands once, startling Raven. She jumped back and blinked.
“Great, let’s go. I’m ready.”
“Fool! That mouth will get you in trouble,” Endel said, pointing a long, crooked finger at him. “You’ll never make it far. Not in the condition you’re in.”
Reese pushed his tongue deep into the side of his cheek as he always did when Lalane was giving him shit.
“We don’t have time, Endel,” Raven said quietly. “He’ll be stuck here otherwise.”
Reese’s jaw dropped. “Stuck? No way. What’s the deal with this portal?”
“It only opens when someone new comes through on the other side of the city where I found you. It causes another opening on the opposite side of the city and acts as a means to escape. You can only come through on one end, and leave at the other end.”
“Great. It’s open then. Let’s go. How do I find it?”
Endel sighed. “What makes you think you can walk out this door and find a portal, yungin’?”
“Yungin’?” Reese whispered with a frown, turning to Raven. She shrugged.
Endel went on. “You don’t even know what it is or what it looks like. You don’t even know what’s on the path between here and there, never mind how long it’s going to take to get you there safely. And there are minefields for you littered all along the way. No, you’re as good as dead! It’s too risky,” he said shaking his head. Then he pointed to Raven. “And he’ll be the death of you. I won’t risk it. Take him back to where you found him. I’ll make sure there is enough food and clean water for the both of you.”
“We don’t have time,” Raven protested.
“Doesn’t matter. Look at him. He’s a mess. The portal will be closed before he’s ready.”
Panic hit Reese hard in the chest. “What do you mean closed? Why do you think I won’t get there in time?”
“Because you’re a cocky, yungin’,” Endel said pointedly. “You think more with a trigger finger than with your head. I’ve seen more than a few just like you in my time. It’s always the same. Only Raven listens to me. Most of the time.”
Raven’s shoulders sagged at his sharp tone. “What would you have had me do?”
“Leave him where he landed,” Endel snapped. Then he grunted and muttered something inaudible under his breath as he paced the shop.
Reese hadn’t really paid attention to the items on the shelf until now. Clothes that looked like they were worn hundreds of years ago were hung up on the wall. An old-fashioned dress with about a hundred buttons hung on display with a hat that looked ridiculously big, and gloves that looked as if they’d been white but were now turning yellow with age.
There were gadgets that looked odd and made no sense to Reese in glass cases filled with little gold gears and wheels of different sizes. Then his eyes fixed on a case at the end of the room containing watches. Curious, he moved toward the case to have a better look.
“Hmm, you like those, huh?” Endel said in some creepy voice as if suddenly he’d turn from mean old grouch to opportunistic salesman.
Reese shrugged, but he kept his eyes on the case.
“Don’t touch them. You’ll break them.”
“What makes you think that?”
“Did you ever wonder why the watch on your wrist doesn’t work?” Endel asked, tilting a wiry gray eyebrow up in challenge.
His hand instinctively went over the watch he wore on his other hand that was covered by the cuff of his sleeve. “How’d you know I had a watch?”
Endel rolled his eyes and turned to Raven. “You bring me this and you expect me to help him?”
“You can.”
He shook his head, then turned to Reese as he placed his long, thin index finger against his chin and scrutinized Reese once more.
“There isn’t time.”
“There is,” Raven insisted.
“Time for what?” Reese asked.
“The portal will close. You need to get to the other side of the city before it does,” Raven said.
“But…I came down…” He tried to keep up, but none of it made sense. Everything he’d seen since coming into Endel’s shop had been surreal, but Reese figured there had to be an explanation for it. The tunnel he and Raven had traveled in must have led out of the school basement and underground to another building. But how could he have spent four years at the Cliffs and not known this place existed?
“I see your mind spinning,” Endel said. “It’s too much for your feeble mind to handle.”
Irritation coiled in his stomach, but he gathered up his strength to keep it down. “You’re calling me feeble?”
“You’re right. Stupid fits you better. You don’t know where you are and you don’t know where you’re going. And what’s worse, you don’t care. The only reason you made it this far is because this little girl saved your hide and kept you hid. It’s what she did, didn’t she?”
The surge of anger he’d felt moments ago with Endel’s insult suddenly faded to realization. Raven had been the one to get him here. Reese hadn’t known where he was going. By what Raven and Endel were saying, if he’d gone out searching for answers on his own, he would have been in danger. Only now did he believe it. Sort of. How could he?
“You said the only way out of the city is to travel to the other side and go through a…”
Endel stretched his neck as if to hear him better. But Reese felt foolish saying the word as if he believed it. He still wasn’t sure he did.
“A what, yungin’?”
“A portal. I mean, if it’s just sitting there, how hard could it be to just run to the other side of the city and leave?”
Endel sputtered. Then he shook his head with disgust. “See what I mean? I’m wasting my time. Your stupidity alone will get you killed before you even make it to the end of the block. And I’ll put money down that you won’t even make it that far. You think you’re going to make it to the portal without any help?”
Reese’s eyebrows stretched on his forehead. “Thanks for the encouragement.”
“I’m not here to encourage you. You need a lot more than that, yungin’,” he said. “You can and need every bit of strength you have to harness your energy. You have sparks flying out all over the place. You can’t even see it, but it’s there. You’re practically glowing and you don’t even know it.”
“What are you talking about?”
“I can feel it every time you react to something I say. You’re a dead giveaway. Say you make it to the portal. You get to the end of the city and you find the way out. If you’re here the way you say you came, then you have it within yourself to do it. I’ll give you that. But if someone finds out who helped you, you’re putting their life in danger, too.”
Reese glanced at Raven and the meaning was clear. “Maybe I should go alone then.”
“There you go. More stupidity.”
Endel rearranged some papers on the counter. Reese didn’t know if they were important or if he was merely busying himself with the task so he wouldn’t reach out and grab Reese by the throat. His irritation was multiplying tenfold. Not unlike it was with his old man for leaving before he was sent away to boarding school.
“You just said— What the hell am I supposed to say?”
“Nothing! And even if you do that, it doesn’t make me any less right about the stupidity part,” Endel charged.
“You just said I had it within me. Okay, I’m a fast runner. I’m top on the track team at school. I can—”
“Yungin’, are you listenin’? Open your ears. Are you hearing yourself?” Endel pointed at the closed door that led to what looked like a sidewalk and street. But it occurred to Reese that he had yet to see a car drive by. “Out there are minefields. Lots of them. They have different forms and they come out of nowhere. They may as well have your name on them.”
“Minefields?”
“Yes. And you won’t see them. You won’t know who is your friend or foe.”
“May
be you’re not,” Reese challenged.
Endel’s lips thinned to an unnatural state. Reese had a feeling he’d just pissed off the guy royally.
“You think I’m steering you wrong?”
He felt Raven tense by his side. “Maybe we should go, Reese,” she said quietly.
“No.” Endel laughed, throwing his head back just enough so Reese could see his thick neck. “You don’t walk through that door with someone and expect to just walk away. That’s not the way it works.”
“But you said—” Raven started to say, but Endel cut her off.
“If you’d bothered to listen to what I have to say, you wouldn’t be here at all. You would have waited for me at the city limit like always and told me about this yungin’ and his plight. I always come. There would have been time to make a decision. But you didn’t listen.” His anger rose with each word he uttered.
Raven’s eyes filled with tears but she didn’t shed any. “You would have said no.”
“Which means you’re challenging me, too.”
“I didn’t mean to. I…I’ve been here a long time, Endel.”
He sighed as if the weight of Raven’s words dragged him to the dirty floor.
“Follow me, the both of you. And don’t touch anything.”
They followed Endel to the back of the store to a set of stairs that led to more concrete. Reese wanted to run. This was wrong. He didn’t want to follow Endel. He didn’t want to stay here or stay at the Cliffs. He wanted to be free of it all. But he felt powerless to stop himself following the one person who not only seemed to despise him, but could help him escape this nightmare.
Chapter 3
They’d walked down several flights of spiral stairs before they reached a landing with a door. He’d thought Endel would be huffing and puffing from the long journey down, but he seemed unaffected. Reaching into his jacket pocket, Endel pulled out a long key, slipped it into the lock, and then turned the key just a fraction of an inch before Reese heard a click. The door seemed to open on its own after that and Endel walked through it.
Reese glanced over at Raven who stood practically on top of him at his side as they entered the dark room.
“Have you ever been here before?” he asked over his shoulder.
She shook her head.
“Good to know,” he said sarcastically.
Raven looked up at him with doe eyes. “What’s so good about it?”
He shook his head. “Never mind. Do you see another way out of here? You know, just in case,” he whispered.
“There’s only one way in. And only one way out,” Endel said, flicking a light switch on the wall that barely ended up illuminating the space in front of them. “And to answer your question, she never needed to come down here before.”
His heart pumped furiously inside his chest as they continued their way down the narrow shaft. Reese had to duck his head a bit to keep from hitting it on the ceiling. They walked until the ceiling got higher and then they stepped into a wide open space. Endel flicked on another switch on the wall. As each light popped on, Reese heard an instant buzz of energy flowing through the room.
“Wow, what is this place?”
The lights were still dim and Reese wondered why there was such a need to conserve on light in a place where there was no natural light to make up for it. He blinked his eyes to help focus. The room was cluttered with odd objects he couldn’t make out. In the center of the room was a tall column about six foot thick that went from the floor to the ceiling which was about forty feet high by Reese’s estimation.
Endel turned and pierced Reese with a stern gaze. “You can look, but don’t touch anything. You’re not ready for this. “
“So you’ve told me.”
Reese glanced around and saw a multitude of electronic devices that were pulled apart as if someone had been working on them. In a glass cabinet to his left, there were metal pieces stacked up like pancakes on a plate. As he took a closer look, he realized they were gold gears of different sizes.
“Where are we?” Raven asked.
“It’s an old energy room,” Endel said.
“Energy for what?” Reese asked.
“To power the whole underground city.
“This powers the entire underground network? You’re seriously skimping on your electric bill. It’s so dark down here.”
Endel glared at him. Reese had a feeling he was going to have to get used to that.
“This room used to power only a small section of the underground until the network became too large and the city grew beyond its capacity. They moved the main generators to a new location.”
“What are we doing here?”
“If you can handle yourself here, then you may have a chance at harnessing your own energy enough to get you past the epicenter of the underground city. That’s where all the energy is made and when you’ll feel the pull strongest. That’s where you’ll trip up the most and find yourself exposed the most. Unless...”
“Unless what?”
“Nothing. If you don’t master your energy here, it won’t matter what happens out there.”
Reese’s gaze landed on a large metal door that seemed almost hidden into the wall. But now that he’d seen Raven pull at a doorway like it appeared out of nowhere, he wondered if this was the same type of hidden door. “Is this the way out?” Reese asked.
“I already told you. There is only way in and only way out. You’ve already flunked your first lesson.”
The large clock on the wall had the wrong time. He glanced at the watch on his wrist instinctively, already knowing it didn’t work, but not having anything else to gage it by. Time seemed to be moving backwards, not forward. It was either an hour before homeroom or well into the evening. He didn’t know. His stomach wasn’t growling, something that always hit him right before lunch. But he didn’t feel hunger at all.
“Is that clock right?” he asked.
Endel ignored him as he searched one of what looked like twenty or so drawers in an old metal cabinet.
Reese stared at the clock. The secondhand seem to be stuck on the same number, bouncing up and down on the seven where the hour hand was, without moving beyond it.
“I told you,” Raven whispered. “Time is just time.”
“Don’t waste your breath, little one. He’s not listening,” Endel said, continuing to search one of the drawers that looked as if it were filled with metal pieces of junk.
Reese squashed down his irritation. Whatever was happening here was getting old. He had to get back to class if he was going to finish school, graduate and get the hell out of the Gray Cliffs Academy for good.
Instead of fuming, he glanced around the expansive room. In the center was a tall column with spiral wiring wrapped around it from floor to ceiling. Funny shaped light bulbs encircled the very top of it and the very bottom. The pendant lights attached to the ceiling above them were lit dimly and hung halfway from the ceiling to the floor, keeping the ceiling dark and ominous. He couldn’t make out any details past them or guess just how high the ceiling was. The whole room had a burnt odor that made him want to cover his nose. Yet he couldn’t make out just what it was or where it was coming from.
“How old is this place?” he asked.
“Your questions are only going to get you in trouble,” Endel said. “It’s much better if you use your energy to listen and take in every detail I give you from here on out. You’ll need to remember all of it. Every detail. And there’s a lot of it. So don’t waste your breath or mine on questions that have no relevance to your one goal which is getting you to that portal.”
“Yes, sir,” Reese said. He held himself back from the typical sarcasm he normally used when being dressed down. It wasn’t so much that he didn’t like Endel. He was a bit weird, almost like some street guy begging for change. He remembered years ago being in the city with his mother and seeing a line of street bums sitting against the hotel they were staying at. His mother had been frightened and b
ecause she’d been frightened, he was to. But Reese wasn’t frightened by Endel now. He wasn’t exactly sure why. For all he knew, Endel was searching those drawers for a gun or a knife to kill him and Raven. Yeah, the guy was weird, but that didn’t mean he was a murderer.
“There is a tunnel on the other end of the underground city. That’s where you’re going to get out.”
Reese glanced at Raven who was sitting on a wooden crate.
“Is that all? How hard could that be? We just walk through the city real quick and get to the other side. I’m a runner. I can do that. What about you, Raven?”
“You’re a runner. Really?” she asked, her eyes wide with interest.
“Yeah.”
“Shut up,” Endel said.
“Wha…what did you say?”
“Reese,” Raven said in a low voice. “Just listen.”
“For someone who keeps acting like such a smart guy, you talk an awful lot of stupidity. You think it’s that easy to just run your way through the city and get to the portal because you’re a runner? If you think it’s that easy, then go ahead and do it. You’ll be dead before the hour.”
“Endel, please,” Raven pleaded.
He grunted something under his breath with Raven’s plea, and then sighed. Endel pointed to Raven. “This girl has stuck her neck out for you. Don’t you think if it were that easy Raven would’ve done it already for herself? You think she wanted to stay hidden in that cold tunnel? This same type of stupidity is what got a lot of yungins just like you killed already. They thought they could go it alone. They were cocky. They ran.”
Endel drew out the last word, mocking Reese. As much as Reese wanted to snap back at the way Endel was treating him, he bit his tongue. He didn’t know where the hell he was and it was clear he wasn’t going to get back to the Cliffs the way he got here.
Endel dragged a metal stool out from underneath a table and groaned as he slowly eased onto it. “They thought they had all the answers,” Endel said solemnly. “But they were just yungins full of ego with their chests puffed out as if they they knew better. They knew nothing.”
