by Jason Letts
“Don’t you ever feel like you were meant for something more than this? I mean, I won The Shadowing. I’m supposed to be doing something important. But now I’m just down here, so far down even the sun can’t touch me,” he moaned, kicking at the jutting iron ore with his boot.
Perhaps it was because of Neeko’s bare honesty, but Kevin cut his next swing short and let the axe flop weakly against the gravel below their feet. He took a deep breath and sighed, his dimples catching the candlelight.
“Who says we’re not doing something important? Without somebody doing exactly what we’re doing, none of our Savior’s plans would be possible. We’re lucky to be doing this, lucky to be a part of something that matters,” Kevin said.
Kevin’s response stunned Neeko. He hadn’t expected to get through to him and certainly didn’t expect to get such a different perspective on the menial labor they performed.
“But we’re not even using our powers. This isn’t who we are. Anybody could be down here swinging this axe and it wouldn’t make any difference at all. The web didn’t send this to me so I could let it go to waste,” Neeko argued.
Exercising his power, the dim light passed through him and he seemed to disappear. Despite Neeko’s sincerity, both Kevin and the other man found something to laugh at.
“The web? There’s your problem. When’s the last time you saw the web? Listen to the prayers. They’ll tell you it’s gone. All we have left is our Savior, and he’s the key to a better existence for all of us.”
Kevin lifted the axe and took another swing, chipping away at the stone. Neeko reappeared in the same spot, hanging his head. He took a half-hearted swing and then stepped to the side. The ore, smooth and twisted like a small animal on hind legs, looked ready to be extracted.
“You didn’t used to think that way,” Neeko said to Kevin at last. “Nobody did. Then everybody got swept through with these crazy notions when they took us. I don’t get how being a part of something means stepping on everyone around you.”
The third man ducked in between then and dropped to his knees in front of the metallic chunk. He sawed his hands back and forth, working them into the metal without producing any kind of sound. Neeko looked down at him while he worked and then brought his eyes back to Kevin. It caught him off guard to find him staring directly at him.
“It’d make a lot more sense if you’d just look into his eyes and see what he knows. You missed something, hiding within your shadows, when he was trying to show you the way. No matter how tight a hold we try to keep on it, the world changes fast. What we believe is just the bridge that gets us from one day to the next, and there are just as many bridges as there are days,” Kevin intimated.
“I guess,” Neeko mumbled, and then he heard the chunk of ore fall onto the ground. Setting the axes down, all three of them strained to hoist it up and dump it into the cart. They gasped for breath after it spilled over the edge and clinked against the pieces of ore and stone as it settled.
Now that the cart was full, Kevin reached for a piece of string dangling down from a hook on the wall near the candle. Giving it a tug, a bell rang at the top of the shaft. Neeko took a quick look at the rope tied to the front of the cart and then returned to his axe.
“Are you sure it’s tied tight?” the third man asked.
“No different than last time,” Neeko said, just as the rope became taut and the cart started lurching up the slope. As it rattled its way up, the three men turned to the end of the tunnel and the different colored deposits peeking through the earth.
“Which one should we go after next?” Kevin asked.
“How about that one?” the third man answered.
Then a strange sound hit their ears, high-pitched like the call of a bird. But it was a scream, and the cart started racing back at them, picking up speed with its heavy load.
“Look out!” the man yelled, diving to the side and taking Neeko with him. Kevin dove flat against the wall as the cart flipped from the edge of the tracks and slammed against the bottom of the tunnel. By the time everything settled and they picked their heads up, they could hear faint shouting up above.
“What was that?” Neeko growled, brushing himself off and inspecting the wreckage. It had been a miracle they hadn’t been crushed. But in an instant he was following his companions as they raced to find out what had happened.
A few minutes earlier, Mary hoisted a heavy piece of chopped wood onto a stack that stretched along the wall outside of the forge. Sliding it into place, she picked a splinter from her hand, wiped her forehead, and looked at the black smoke rising from the chimney into the cloudless sky. Over closer to the mountainside, pulleys attached to large wooden wheels fed rope along the tracks into the mines.
Behind her, Jeana Ipswich cleared her throat to urge Mary out of the way. Turning around, Mary gave her a sly smile and breezed past. As Jeana set her log on the stack, Mary returned to the pile several yards away near a freshly cut stump and one of the pulley wheels. A longhaired man operated this nearby wheel, and Mary tried to feel for his gift each time she crossed toward his side.
Keeping her eyes on him, she lazily grabbed a log and lifted it onto her other arm. Breathing deeply, she waited for his gift to make itself known to her through the faintest vibrations of feeling. But concentrating proved difficult, both because she was tired and because she had other things on her mind.
“She’s out there, you know,” she snickered devilishly to Jeana.
“You don’t know that!” Jeana snapped back before hustling to grab another log.
Mary sauntered forward, displaying a satisfied grin. She had few pleasures in this dreary life, but goading Jeana about her children was one of them. In some roundabout way, she thought she was following Mira’s orders by reminding her mother about her. She knew guilt was probably the least effective tool to get through to Jeana, but it was too much fun stoking her ire.
“Yes, I do,” Mary insisted as they tossed their logs on the stack. “But I’m surprised you don’t. All mothers have a connection with their daughters, don’t you know?”
“What would you know about being a mother, chickpea? Your womb’s about as active as a hibernating bear,” Jeana growled, leaving Mary behind.
Chuckling to herself, Mary jogged to catch up to Jeana.
“I know a few things. First of all, mothers don’t abandon their daughters. They’re supposed to take care of them, not throw them to the wolves and then join in on the snacking. Doesn’t that sound right to you? It sounds right to me,” Mary mused.
“How can you say that?” Jeana howled, aggrieved to Mary’s delight. “I did everything I could for that brat and then as soon as she could she turned right around and stabbed us right in the heart. Right now there’s a knife in my heart that she put there.”
“That must make it hard to find fitting clothes,” Mary giggled, again running to rejoin the source of her amusement. “But don’t you think you should cut Mira some slack? She didn’t spurn you on purpose. It was hard for her to adjust, what without a gift and all.”
“You don’t think she’s got a gift?” Jeana glowered, full of scorn. “She gobbled up fifteen years of my life! I’ve never seen anyone with a stronger gift than that.”
Mary leaned against the stack of wood, feeling like it was time to take a break. Closing her eyes, she checked to make sure no one else was in earshot. The closest other person was the man by the wheel. She felt like calling out to him, but she couldn’t figure out why. But with the coast clear, she became emboldened to take her rouse one step further.
“What about Clara then? Does she mean nothing to you just like Mira? What if she were right under your nose, not more than a ten-minute walk from here? What would you do?”
Jeana stopped and gave her a funny look, much different than the previous flares of her temper. Mary imagined she must have though she was crazy to ask such a thing. Jeana eventually shrugged and shook her head, answering calmly and straightforwardly.
; “I’d leave her well enough alone. People should be allowed to live their lives without other people putting their thumb down on them all the time. If she made it this far, she probably doesn’t need me to get in her way.”
Jeana’s newfound composure unnerved Mary, who easily grasped a reason to disagree.
“But that’s exactly what’s happening to us here in this camp! How can you say people should be left to live on their own when you happily submit yourself to the willy-nilly wishes of ruthless taskmasters? You hardly know what you’re saying.”
“Do I?” Jeana prodded, assuming Mary’s condescending smile and forcing her to recoil. “I know exactly what I’m saying. If I do the work I’m told, I’ll be rewarded by our Savior. It’s that simple. With all of us here together like this, I’ll become more than I ever thought possible. And that’s something you should be able to appreciate, chickpea. How could you survive without this place? You’re about as helpless as a fish out of water.”
The last of Mary’s amusement dropped from her face like a falling star.
“That’s not true. Take that back.”
“What’s not true about it? You and your thick-throated friend make a good pair. You were always stuck in her shadow, now it’s just a wonder you still manage to fit in there even though it’s become so small.”
Mary gritted her teeth and took an angry step forward, but Jeana held up her hands to ward her off. Knowing she would fall asleep at their first touch, Mary restrained herself even as her frustration bubbled over.
“There’s lots I can do, and it’s way better than putting people to sleep too. If you only knew what I’m capable of then you’d stick your finger in your eye and wait for better luck in the next life.”
“Oh, is that so?” Jeana giggled maliciously. “Well, why don’t you go ahead and prove it?”
Feeling the heat from the spotlight, Mary froze. Her eyes darting around, there had to be something she could do to prove herself. Nothing would hurt more than Jeana’s smug gloating if she came up empty-handed.
“I got it! You see that guy over there by the wheel. I know what his gift is, and I’m going to make him use it on you. You have no idea what’s coming, but you’ll be sorry soon enough!”
Jeana crossed her arms, goading her on. Mary immediately turned and started walking toward him. Her steps were slow; she needed time to think, to figure out what her feeling meant. But it was so hard to focus when she felt so agitated. It felt like a sneeze, that itchy feeling scratching at your lungs. Could he make her sick? How would she even convince him?
In another instant, the longhaired man spotted her approach. Putting his gloved hand on the wheel’s topmost hold, he appeared to be annoyed. Was it the germs in the air? Bacteria?
“Hi. That woman over there told me she’s never been sick in her life. She says she can’t get sick no matter what. Can you give her a cold or the flu or something and prove her wrong?”
Just then the bell rang at the top of the mineshaft, and the man prepared to crank the wheel and draw the rope through the pulley.
“What makes you think I can make her sick?” he asked, diffusing displeasure while he worked the wheel.
“Because that’s your gift, the germs in the air. You can control them.”
The man shook his head and kept cranking the wheel. Flustered, Mary looked back at Jeana, who chuckled to herself. Mary tried to double-check her sensing. It felt like a million tiny lives all clamoring together. She knew she had it right.
“You can’t lie to me. I know who you are. There’s no use hiding,” she sniped.
The man shook his head again. He looked at her as he pulled the wheel through another rotation. When his arms came back up, he tugged on his sleeve, revealing countless fluorescent specks covering his forearm.
All at once they jumped out at her, causing Mary to scream and shove the man away. He lost his hold of the wheel and it began to spin violently in the other direction. He tried to catch it but it knocked his hand. The sound of a crash came from the mine, and the rope stopped feeding through the pulley.
“What did you do?” the man yelled, taking a threatening step forward.
“What did I do? It was your fault! I wasn’t just going to let those glowing germs get all over me!”
They stared each other down as people from the surrounding area started to converge on the scene. Mary, still feeling like her worth was on the line, refused to back down. The vibrant neon bacteria spread from under the man’s gloves up his arms and onto his face, giving him a grotesque and horrifying appearance. It looked like he would attack her, and Mary didn’t know what she would do if he did.
“What’s going on here?” Gloria bellowed, jogging over from another mine.
When Mary looked in her direction, she felt a pair of gloves push against her shoulders. Knocked back on the ground, her only instinct was to scramble up and push back, but Gloria was already there before she could do anything.
“This idiot tried to sabotage the pulley,” the man claimed, pointing at Mary.
“I was not! You attacked me, just like you did a second ago, ya gooney loon.”
“Shut up, both of you!” Gloria roared. “If anything happened to the ore…”
But Gloria trailed off when Neeko, Kevin, and the tan man jogged out of the mine. Neeko looked shaken up, but none appeared any dirtier than usual.
“What the heck happened up here? You trying to kill us?” Kevin yelled at the longhaired man, momentarily distracting him from his vicious glare at Mary. Just then Will raced up from down the hill to join them.
“It wasn’t me!” the man said to Kevin. “She came up and started pestering me while I was turning the wheel. Then she freaked out and knocked me away from it.”
“You’re such a liar! You can’t just make stuff up like that! You were being careless because you wanted to get my attention. Then you got angry and dropped the wheel,” Mary covered, getting to her feet.
“Everybody shut up!” Will shouted at the top of his lungs, getting in between Mary and her adversary. Watching Will force the wheelman to back down brought a smile to Gloria’s face.
“Is the mine cart OK?” Gloria asked.
“It jumped the track but shouldn’t be too hard to fix,” the tan man answered.
“Good, then let’s get back to work,” Will ordered. “You guys get back down there and get the rig repaired. You mind your own business and focus on your job here on the wheel. And you get back to stacking the firewood. If anybody causes anymore problems, I’ll have Gloria slap you across the face,” he threatened to Mary.
Mary looked over her shoulder to give one more piercing glare to the wheelman. Things hadn’t turned out how she wanted at all, and now she had one more enemy to worry about. His eyes still raged against her.
“Don’t think I’m done with you! You’re in trouble when mealtime rolls around again. Oh wait, you never eat. I’ve noticed!” he shouted.
Mary looked away so no one could see her eyes grow large and her mouth drop open. The shock unsettled her, but all she could do was walk away. It was only a small measure of relief when Will tried to cover over it.
“Hey what did I just say! Get back to work! Another word out of your mouth and it’ll be your last.”
Will and Gloria shared a concerned look. She seemed to be enjoying the moment, but he looked away to those dispersing. He watched Mary rejoin Jeana by the woodpile. Mary loathed the smug look on Jeana’s face, but she refused to give up the high ground.
“There, look what I did.”
“You didn’t do anything close to what you said. I’m fine. It’s my husband you almost killed,” Jeana growled.
“You mean you almost killed him. We’re all a part of this together, remember?” Mary needled, nonchalantly grabbing another piece of wood and brushing by her on the way to the stack.
Will turned from the wheelman and started down the hill to his crew hacking through the brush below. After only a few plodding steps down,
he noticed the sound of someone following him. He hung his head a bit, cursing his awful luck and wondering what she wanted now. Hoping to get it over quickly, he turned to see Gloria hustling to catch him.
“You really sorted them out,” she cheered, smiling and hiding her gooey hands behind her back.
“Thanks. We should probably get back to our stations. Don’t want to fall any further behind,” Will said flatly.
“Right,” Gloria readily agreed, nodding firmly. “But don’t you think that was a little strange though?”
“A scuffle or an accident? They both happen all the time,” he snapped, starting to turn away.
“No, what he said about how they never eat. I can’t think of a single time they even tried to get their hands on any food at mealtime. We shoulda buried those girls months ago,” she reasoned.
Alarms went off inside Will, but he stuck to his calm, disinterested demeanor.
“There are plenty of scavengers and thieves. I don’t think those two are any more clever.”
Gloria tilted her head back to think.
“I don’t think so. That just doesn’t add up for me. Something strange is going on with them.”
“It’s probably not worth the trouble. There are much better ways to waste time around here,” he quickly concluded.
“You’ll see! I’m going to get to the bottom of this food situation. Prepare to be impressed!” she gloated, flashing one more big smile before spinning around and hiding her hands in front of her.
Will watched her walk away, emitting a crushing groan as soon as it was safe. He dragged his hand down his dejected face before plodding down to his crew.
Chapter 5: The Ghost
As Mira strolled along the beach to the boatyard, a tiny breeze rippled through the grains of sand beside her. Whipping along the dunes in the most minuscule dust storm, Clara accompanied her sister on a search for clues about the ship and its mission.
