Rebel Bound

by Shauna E. Black

  Trees reach their branches high until they’re almost touching the ceiling far above, and up there, on the roof, are windows. They look out on the sky, on the sun. It shines through the ash cloud in patches, making a constant kaleidoscope of light that’s ever shifting, ever changing the patterns it creates on the leaves below.

  I shrink back against Jate, wondering how these people can walk so blithely into the light without radiation suits.

  “It’s okay,” he soothes. “It’s metaglass with a protective coating so the radiation can’t get through. I know you’ve seen the dark domes topside. Now you’re looking at them from the other direction.”

  A group of soldiers appears behind us. People watch them in alarm, moving out of the way.

  “We’ll split up,” Jate instructs, all business again. “You’re looking for a young girl, this woman’s sister. She’s a little taller, blonde hair cut to her jawline, big eyes and freckles. Whatever we do, we need to stop her from discharging the nerve gas she’s carrying.”

  The soldiers enter the room, spanning out and sending the civilians scurrying for cover.

  “I’ll go this way,” Jate says, waving a hand to the left. “You try over there.”

  I nod and jog off in the direction he gave me. I feel exposed in the glow of the sun, as though the light will scald my skin. But it doesn’t hurt. It’s warm, welcoming, inviting.

  The shrieks and gasps the soldiers elicit fades behind me. There’s a pathway suspended high above where people jog past. I hear the laughter of children, and I gape at them. There are so few kids topside.

  One child runs across my path, chased by another. They tumble to the green grass in a section between pathways. I think of how wonderful it would be to run and play in the sunlight. How can the Impartialists presume to take that joy away from these people?

  I glimpse a bit of strawberry blonde through the leaves of a tree and break into a run, turning down a connecting path. I’m almost directly under the fan humming softly on the ceiling above when I come out of a cluster of bushes and find her.

  Mardy crouches on the ground surrounded by purple flowering bushes out of sight of the many people strolling through the park.

  She looks up at me in surprise, fingers hovering over the ring on the cylinder at her feet. I stare at it. The markings seem sinister now. The metal glints like malice in the brightness of the sunlight.

  “Caelin!” she says. “What are you doing here?”

  “Give it to me, Mardy.” I manage to keep my voice steady without allowing my quivering fear to escape.

  Mardy's eyes dart around the park. “Are you alone?”

  “Jate’s with me. He told me that’s not sleeping gas. It’s something that might kill these people. You need to stop—now.”

  She frowns, creating a little crease between her light brows. “Deice said Jate is a traitor, just like Ryanne. Jate wouldn’t tell you the truth.”

  “I believe him.”

  “Why?”

  My mind works furiously, but I can’t come up with a logical explanation.

  Her pert mouth droops into a frown. “You shouldn’t trust somebody just because you like them.”

  “You’re one to talk!” I retort. “Lucio isn’t Papa.”

  She sucks in a sharp breath.

  I hold out my hand, beckoning. “Give it to me, Mardy.”

  She shakes her head slowly. “We made oaths, Caelin. We can’t disobey Lucio. He’s been good to us. I don’t want to betray him.”

  “Was he good to Ryanne?” I ask bitterly.

  A shadow seems to cross her expression. “Lucio did what he had to do. He needs loyal followers.”

  She reaches for the ring, and I launch myself at her. She’s ready for me. I quickly realize I underestimated how much Mardy learned from Deice. She shifts, twisting out of my way and throwing a leg out to trip me. I stumble into the grass, but the soft surface doesn’t hurt my hands, just sends a jolt through my left arm. I jump back to my feet to find Mardy crouched, hands raised.

  “I don’t want to fight you, Mardy,” I say.

  “Why?” Her grin reminds me too much of Sloan. “Are you afraid you’ll lose?”

  She comes at me in a rapid attack, feinting to the side. I don’t buy it. I swing my right arm, aiming for her middle, and she grabs my wrist, yanking me off balance. She slams her other hand into my left arm, and I fall to the ground in agony.

  The screams and shouts of civilians are reaching us. Mardy looks up, noticing it, and scuttles back to the cylinder. I force myself to move through the pain, climbing to my feet. Running in a drunken line, I charge into her from behind, bowling her over. Mardy hits the ground hard, her head bouncing on the brick of the path.

  “Caelin!” she moans, clutching at my sleeve. Then her eyes roll back into her head and she slumps into unconsciousness.

  I scramble off her. What have I done?

  I shake her shoulder. “Mardy? Mardy!”

  Blood starts to trickle from under her head, and the sight of it sends uncontrollable shivers running through me.

  “Mardy!” I scream. “No! Mardy!”

  I’m only dimly aware when Jate and another soldier stumble into the clearing. I think I hear the booming cough of a sonic gun, see people running past us, clutching children, screaming. There’s the sharp sound of glass breaking.

  Jate gathers Mardy into his arms and yells something at me. All I can see is the pool of blood left on the brick path.

  “Come on, Caelin!” Jate’s voice finally penetrates the fog in my brain.

  I look up at him. He’s holding Mardy at the edge of the clearing. Her head rolls back on his arm, bleeding from the temple.

  “We have to get her to a doctor!”

  “The nerve gas?” I stammer. My tongue feels thick, useless.

  “Moreno got it, but Deice is putting up a fight, and Lucio’s troops are headed this way. We need to retreat now or we’ll be trapped.”

  I swallow hard, pushing myself into motion. My arm throbs. I hope I haven’t broken it again. I stumble after him as we wind our way back through the park. The place is in chaos, the quiet peaceful atmosphere shattered. Members of Jate’s SWAT team usher people to the exits. Panic reigns.

  Outside, we meet more soldiers. They enfold us in their numbers, rushing us to safety behind blockades.

  Mardy is laid out on a stretcher and taken to one of the trains with others who are hurt. They won’t let me board the train with her. Jate grabs my shoulders before I can take a swing at the soldier blocking my way.

  “Stop, Caelin!” he shouts. “Just stop.” As I quiet down, he grabs my good hand and pulls me away. “I know another route to the hospital.”

  CHAPTER 28

  I pace back and forth, back and forth, never more than a few steps from the hospital door. The walls are white here, the way I remember a hospital is supposed to look. It seems drab and hollow after my stay in Dupont’s hotel.

  My arm is back in a cast. The doctor tsked over the foolishness of getting into a fist fight right after the cast was removed. My fall broke it again, and this time it will take longer to heal.

  People pass along the corridor, giving me curious looks. I’m still dressed like one of them, but I don’t feel like I belong here at all.

  The door opens.

  “Caelin?” a man in a lab coat asks.

  I leap to the doorway. “Is she awake? Can I see her?”

  “Yes. Come in.”

  We enter a long narrow room, a tunnel now set up as an infirmary. There are beds along the walls on both sides, leaving an aisle in the middle. The man leads me to the far end of the room to the bed where Mardy lays.

  She looks pale, a bandage wrapped around her head, covering one eye and the cut where her head hit the bricks. The purple colors of a bruise peek out from under the bandage. I feel horrible looking at her injuries, knowing that I caused them.

  “She has a pretty good concussion,” the medic says, “but if we keep her qui
et, she should be fine in a few days.”

  He leaves to attend to another patient, and I perch on the end of Mardy's bed.

  “How are you doing?” I wonder if she hates me for what happened.

  Mardy’s weak smile dispels my fear. She reaches out to take my hand. “Things are a little fuzzy from right before I hit my head. They told me that grenade was filled with a poisonous gas. I was being an idiot and you knocked some sense into me. Is that right?”

  I can't keep the tears back anymore. “Mardy, I am so sorry.” I hug her awkwardly, and she pats my back.

  “I’ll forgive you, if you’ll forgive me,” she mutters into my hair.

  As I pull away, her expression becomes frightened. “What will Lucio do to us after this, after we failed?” Her lip quivers. “I don't want to end up like Ryanne.”

  “You won't!” I say firmly. “We're safe here. Jate is protecting us.”

  Mardy’s fingers find the spot on her chest where her implant was. There’s only a bandage there now.

  “They removed it. Lucio can’t hurt you now.” They still haven’t taken mine out, but Jate promised they would soon.

  When I think about Jate, I hear footsteps coming down the aisle. I turn to see him approaching. The hair is swept back from his forehead, eyes twinkling behind the long lashes.

  “Hi, Mardy. How are you?” he asks.

  “I'm doing well enough,” Mardy says.

  He takes her hand and gives it a squeeze. “Well, that’s all we can ask for. I'm so glad.” He crouches beside the bed, almost on a level with her. It reminds me of Lucio, always pulling a chair up to my bed when I was recovering. I quickly dismiss the comparison.

  “Do you trust me now, Mardy?” Jate asks.

  Mardy looks at me with her one good eye. I nod. She looks back at Jate. “I think so, although I'm starting to believe that I trust people too easily.”

  “That's a rare quality. Don't wish it away. It's part of what makes you who you are.”

  Mardy smiles at that.

  “We’re going to take good care of you, Caelin and I. Now get some rest. We’ll be back to visit again soon.”

  I give Mardy another hug and kiss her gently on the cheek, then I leave the infirmary with Jate.

  “Where do you want to go? What do you want to see?” Jate asks.

  Now that I know Mardy is okay, that she has forgiven me, I feel free and lighthearted. “Take me to a park.”

  Jate smiles and leads me through the maze of the Undercity until we come out in a tunnel filled with green light. This park is not as big as the Smithsonian. I can see across it to the other side. There are clumps of bushes and rows of plants that people are tending with hoes. A lone tree stands in the center, stretching green leaves toward the skylight and the breeze of the fan.

  It’s AM. The sun is brighter than any electric light could be, even partially hidden behind the ashes in the sky. Children laugh and play in the park, families together, happy. This is something I want to preserve.

  “Those skylights are just black domes topside,” I say. “How does the light get through?”

  Jate tilts his chin up to the ceiling. “That’s metaglass, stronger than steel. When they built this place a couple of years before the explosion, they put a protective coating on it that blocks the radiation. The filter makes the metaglass dark. If you looked through it in the AM, you’d be able to see a little of what’s down here.”

  I turn to him in surprise. “They built the Undercity before the explosion? How did they know they’d need it?”

  “There were indications—countries that refused to join the World Coalition and disarm their nuclear weapons. This place was built as a precaution. They just didn’t realize they’d need it so soon.”

  We walk to a bench twined with ivy leaves. I touch one of them. It’s soft against my fingertips.

  “I always hoped Mardy would make it to the Undercity someday,” I say, “but I never really believed I would.”

  Jate rubs his hand on my right shoulder in slow circles. “It’s like seeing it for the first time, watching you enjoy it so much,” he says.

  “You grew up here, safe.”

  Some of the good humor leaks from his expression. “That safety came at a cost. My dad was in Civilian Defense. He got an invitation to the Undercity, but nobody could bring more than one kid, not even the highest officials. He made the decision to split up our family. I’ve never quite forgiven him for that.”

  “Is he still alive?”

  “Yeah. He’s the president’s head of security now. I don’t see him much.”

  “Is that why you left the Undercity?”

  He rubs a toe in the grass under the bench, pushing back the blades until they spring upright again. “I’m Special Forces, Caelin. I was recruited to go undercover and bring down the Impartialists. I set up my gang so Lucio would be drawn to me, and it worked. I just wish I could have brought him in.”

  “Have the Coalition soldiers had any luck uprooting him?” It feels strange to talk about soldiers as though I’m on their side.

  Jate shakes his head. “Lucio’s still got control of the east tunnels. Deice and the others broke through our line and made it to Lucio, but we’re working on a plan. We still have some people on the inside that Lucio doesn’t know about yet. We’ll uproot him, eventually.”

  He squirms uncomfortably, and I realize he can’t talk about the details.

  I tilt my head up. The touch of the sun on my cheeks makes me feel guilty for enjoying it while so many people are still stuck topside. “Will they ever let scavs into the Undercity?” I don’t realize I’ve spoken aloud until Jate puts his arm around me and gives me a quick squeeze.

  “We let you in.”

  “That’s not what I mean.” I try to keep the annoyance from my tone. “Lucio talked about everybody having the privileges of the Undercity. Was that something you never believed in?”

  The silence hangs heavy between us. Jate takes a deep breath, looking around at the people walking past. His fair skin is flushed, shadows hood his eyes.

  “I wasn’t lying when I told you that Lucio and I both want to save the topsiders. It’s the method we disagree on. I think it can be done by working within the bounds of the current government, persuading the Coalition to change their policies. Lucio simply wants to take over. He ran for president, in our last election, and lost.”

  I suck in a startled breath. “Lucio was an Undercitizen?”

  “A very prominent one. The topsiders weren’t part of his platform, back then. But he had a lot of radical ideas, like those implants, to give him control over the population.”

  I touch the bumps on my collarbone. I hope they’ll take it out soon.

  “Most people recognized that in voting for him, they would lose freedom the Coalition was founded on. When Lucio lost, he went topside and started gathering a force among the scavs. My father realized the danger, even though he was opposed in Parliament. He sent me undercover to see what I could do. I failed.”

  His last words are so quiet I scarcely understand them.

  I cup his chin in my hand until he looks up at me. “Lucio hasn’t won yet,” I say. “You stopped him from hurting all these people. You saved my sister. You saved me.”

  His mouth quirks in a lopsided smile. “You’re giving me too much credit. You did most of that, yourself.”

  I pull his arm a little tighter around me. “Let’s not argue about it. Not right now.”

  He plants a kiss on top of my head, then shifts, standing up. “I’ll be right back.”

  He strides toward the tree in the center of the park. There’s something red in the branches peeking out between the green leaves. He reaches up and plucks it off, then jogs back to me.

  He rubs it along the side of his pants and holds it out to me on his palm. It’s an apple.

  “A promise is a promise,” he says.

  I study the apple. It’s round and full, not shriveled and pocked like the ones he
gave me before. The skin is a rosy color swirled with bits of green and yellow. Slowly, I reach up and take it from him. He crosses his arms over his chest and tilts his chin down at me.

  “This time, I’m going to stand here and make sure you take a bite!”

  I laugh. It feels good to laugh, and it makes me think of Ryanne. I push away my last memory of her and focus on the good person she was—the way she twined arms with me, how she always seemed to know what I was thinking, her smile, her laugh. It makes me sad, but there is joy threaded in there too. I realize that I’m a better person because I knew her.

  I close my eyes and bring the apple to my lips, smelling its fresh tang. I open my mouth, take a bite that snaps and crunches in a satisfying way. Flavor explodes on my tongue. And the taste is sweet.

  THE AUTHOR’S MESSAGE TO YOU

  I hope you enjoyed reading Caelin’s story as much as I enjoyed writing it.

  Do you want to read more? Find out how Mardy spent her time in Dupont Shelter! When you sign up for my online eClub, you’ll get an exclusive novella only available to subscribers! Plus, when I have great news to share or another book coming out, you’ll be the first to know! (Don’t you feel special?)

  Sign up here: http://smarturl.it/dystopian-eclub or on my website: http://shaunablack.com

  IF YOU HAVE A LITTLE time, can I ask you for a favor? Will you write me a quick review? Here’s the link: http://smarturl.it/rb-review

  Just state your honest opinion about Rebel Bound in as few words as you like. That’ll help the book bob to the top of the vast book ocean and give other readers a heads-up of what to expect. I knew I could count on you!

  ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

  If Caelin and I have one thing in common, it’s our fierce independence. However, a book is not created in a vacuum, and I have some folks to thank for their unfailing support and cheerleading efforts.