The sun was now well past its peak in the sky. Darkness was falling fast. With the night vision goggles, I’d be able to see if anyone was coming around in the dark. Before returning to the house, I drew my machetes and held them in front of me. I had to be ready for anything. But was I ready to kill? I thought about my stepfather’s sons, and how long it had taken to wipe their blood from my hands. That wasn’t in cold blood, I told myself. That was different. I am not a murderer. Crows cawed, sounding like “Bury dead! Bury dead!” For now I ignored the dead—the living were more dangerous. If people were watching, if my stepfather were waiting, they’d be hiding in the woods.
What if this had been just an ordinary day and I’d been getting ready for school? My two stepsiblings would have taunted me for having to go to public school while they stayed home. “You are the eyes and ears for all of us,” my stepfather would tell me as a warning, so I wouldn’t forget my duty was to not make friends nor do well in classes. It made him angry that I had excelled in English, since that made the teachers notice me.
“Hide your intelligence,” he had instructed me. What made him happiest was when everyone called me the “weird kid.” When I was “invisible” to the other students, someone they would have the most intimate discussions around without even caring if I had overheard. My friends were my favorite novels, in which I’d discovered people I could relate to, such as Ralph in Lord of the Flies or Peter in Cue for Treason or Peeta in The Hunger Games. All unlikely heroes, all boys I wanted to be just like.
Each time I learned something new—what each family did for a living, who was building pools or buying cabins or leasing speedboats—I made notes in my little journal. I’d also discovered who had fallout shelters, though most were just remnants of the Cold War era.
Once in the roost, I rested my bag at my feet. The sun was nearly down, and the night was coming fast. I closed my eyes, drinking deeply of the crisp night air. My stepfather would have scolded me if he were here. You have no plan.
“I had a plan,” I mumbled out loud, “but it doesn’t look like the soldiers killed you.”
A MILITARY MEAL HELPED stave off hunger, and a sleeping bag draped over my shoulders held the cold at bay. I’d replaced the stone ceiling I had watched for the last thirty days with stars. I made a mark in my notebook for every star I counted. Before the world fell, my mother spent her nights telling me, “You’re weak and can’t protect me.” Not long after she’d married my stepfather, she offered no more hugs goodnight, no bedtime kisses on my forehead. She spent her attention on my crying sister.
Curiously, my sister cried a lot. She was the only one born both of my mother and stepsiblings’ father. Surely, she was his favorite—she was the only one he visited each evening.
Howling wolves snapped me from my memory. The pack spoke to one another as they hunted, their calls surrounding me. Crickets, frogs, even the wind bristling against leaves pushed heavily on me. Inside my shelter was silence, my beating heart the only noise. Out there on the roof, I was deafened by memories.
I couldn’t stay awake all night. My mental strength would wither without proper care of myself. I lay back against the surrounding wall and forced myself to look at the stars. As the wolves howled louder, I howled back at them. Silence. Then the wolves called back to me, and I was no longer alone.
Chapter Three
I discovered I’d fallen asleep when a piercing scream jerked me awake. The world was a deep blue, except against the horizon peeking through the trees, where the sun glowed orange and yellow. Again, a shriek. The loudest noise in thirty days. My hand instinctively grasped my machete, but from where I sat, the better weapon was the slingshot or rifle. Another scream. This time I recognized the sound. A girl, helpless for sure.
When the screaming turned constant, it became a voice turned into a weapon. A hope that someone would hear and come to the rescue. A chance that the noise would scare off an aggressor. At times I had drawn that weapon, useless as it was.
I peered through binoculars and scanned the woods. At first, nothing. Then I spied a skirmish in a clearing just a hundred yards away. Weird. A group of men were dragging a girl toward my home. Three men to be exact. None of them were my stepfather.
One held the girl by her wrists. The other two were so close to the girl that if I’d tried to take them out with the rifle, I could have easily have hit her. She was fully clothed and trying to bite them. One of the men wiped his face as though she had spit on him when she stopped screaming.
The one who had just wiped his face shouted, and I could hear him clearly. Not words. Just a voice. He seemed to be shouting at Machete Man, who gripped the knife as if an invisible barrier existed between him and the girl. I considered trying to help her, but that would have exposed me. My stepfather was cunning at setting traps like this.
The girl stared at the man holding her, but he ignored her. Her trembling lips moved fast—she was begging for her life, no doubt. Most striking was the bloodstain on her right shoulder. She was hurt. And I recognized her from school. Kady. Kady Tremblay. I knew everything about her family. Hers was the only family I hadn’t reported to my stepfather. I owed her. A month into the school year a group of boys—all her friends—had decided to make an example of the “weird kid.” Tom, the football hero, was the leader and the one who had made a big scene of it. They took me out back of the school to beat me up, all four of them. The first punch was the hardest to take. I wanted to fight back. I could have killed them—which was why I didn’t fight back. My stepfather didn’t want me training to fight, and he didn’t know how much I had learned by listening and watching. I practiced in secret when everyone else was asleep. The weaker he thought I was, the stronger I’d be when the world fell.
After the fight, I discovered that Kady had heard about her buddies’ plans. That was why she’d run out—she wanted to stop them. Yet when the small crowd of kids stood around cheering, she had acted no differently than any of them. But afterward, when they’d all gone home, she came back to see if I was okay. She even took me to her house and patched me up. That’s when I had learned about her fallout shelter. Hers was the only shelter I never added to my stepfather’s map. My thank-you gift to her.
I lowered the binoculars. Did I want to get involved? My training told me no. Kady was just a casualty. Hundreds of “Kadys” probably shared her fate. The memory of her soft fingers on my wounded face made me reconsider. I donned the rucksack and strapped on my machetes. I scrambled down the ladder to the living room. Slipped out the front door. And as I ran to the clearing, I drew the machetes. But was I ready to kill? No. They were just creeps. I put away the machetes and drew my baton. A quick flick and the telescopic rod extended a full three feet.
Another scream.
I ran faster.
I entered the clearing. Held my chin up. I wanted to look confident, like someone who could easily take out these men. Inside my head, I had doubts. Three of them. Bigger than me. Two held menacing weapons—more dangerous than the baton I had in my hand. In the center of the clearing in the woods, a strong, burly, bearded man twisted Kady’s hand behind her back. Kady was on her knees, hunched over the grass with her head facing down. The skinny man with the machete held his weapon above his head. He gripped the knife as though his training was from too many horror movies. His technique was all wrong, the angle easy to block or dodge. The third man, short and pudgy, stood off to the side a little, holding a shotgun.
“Do it! Stab her stomach!” the bearded man yelled. He must have been yelling that all along. Probably because he knew if the skinny man didn’t do it, he’d have to.
Skinny Man shook his head, his eyes moist, on the brink of tears. The one with the shotgun just looked away. Had they caught her trying to scavenge from them and were preserving their survival by killing any potential competition? It’s what my stepfather would have done.
“Stay back!” the bearded man shouted when he saw me, his voice shrill.
“Ethan!
” Kady screamed. Hearing my name spoken out loud after silence for so long made me pause. When I faltered, she sobbed, “Help me! Please!”
The bearded man turned and raised his backhand to slap her. I moved in. Hit him hard behind the knee with the baton. He keeled over. I swiped into his chest with my fist and reset into a fighting stance. Staggered my feet. Held my baton like a sword. The other two men didn’t move.
Breathing heavily, the bearded man said, “Get him!”
Shotgun Man pointed his weapon at me. His hands shook, and he closed his eyes. He had as much chance of hitting his companions as he did me. I rushed forward, bringing the baton down on the muzzle, forcing it to the ground. He fired, and mud and gravel sprayed everywhere. My backfist slammed across his face. He toppled to the ground, landing hard on his back.
The men stared at me and then at each other. Each of them seemed hopeful the other would take me down, but none was brave enough to do it. My blood was on fire with adrenaline. My eyes were wide and must have looked crazy. My teeth gritted as I snarled. I must have looked like a wild animal. I had to end this now, or take a chance and flee. Was I a lion, or was I a mouse?
Before I acted, Kady clawed the man holding her across his face. He let her go, keeling over with a yelp. Kady grabbed my hand and we dashed into the woods. At first we headed in the direction I had come from, toward my shelter, but when the adrenaline rush ended, I thought more clearly. I needed to know what supplies she had, without her knowing what I had. I changed direction toward her home.
“Where are you taking me?” Kady whimpered as she pulled free from my grip. She rubbed her wrist where I had left a red mark.
“Home. Your home,” I said in a calm voice.
She seemed to digest this as we stood in the woods awhile. With a nod, she started walking. I wanted to know who those men were, and why they wanted to kill her. But her pained expression told me she wasn’t yet ready to talk. Nor was I, as I realized fully that the world had finally become a place without the old rules. A place where everything I had been taught finally made sense.
Chapter Four
As we climbed down the ladder into Kady’s underground bunker, she stopped weeping. At the bottom of the ladder, a six-foot-long hallway faced us. Kady walked into the darkness, and I stayed at the ladder where a little light shone down. I squinted but couldn’t see all the way inside. She hadn’t ignited any lamps, but I smelled something strong. Not burning lamp oil. Not even the same humid, putrid stench like that in my shelter. A floral scent like the one my mom always brought into the house. Had my mom made it to my shelter, it probably would have wound up with that scent as well.
“Your clothes, I ca—” Kady started to say. She stopped and swallowed hard.
I walked up to her and, as my eyes adjusted to the darkness, saw her hands were shaking. Was she afraid of those men, or was it me she now feared?
“Thanks,” she mumbled, as if knowing my thoughts. “They were going to k—”
Her voice cut off and she leaned against the wall. Her hand covered her mouth, and tears emerged in her eyes again. I wanted to comfort her, but I just didn’t know how.
“I have food,” I said, as if that fixed everything. What I wanted to say was, No one followed us. You’re safe.
“Give me your clothes. I can wash them,” Kady told me, a steadiness now to her tone. I watched her body posture soften.
“How are you going to wash them?” As I imagined an old washing board, Kady flicked a switch. A soft hum sounded and lights came up.
“Electricity,” she said as she walked farther inside.
I kicked off my shoes and entered what looked like an underground house three times the size of my shelter, with a living room and a kitchen separated by a pass-through. I spied a couch and coffee table facing a big-screen TV.
“Don’t even think about sitting on anything until you shower. You can wear one of my dad’s robes until your clothes are clean.”
“How are you powering all this stuff?” I asked, almost speechless that even after the Fall there were still the haves and have-nots.
“A generator. When the batteries run low, it kicks in.”
Bet that’s how the men found you. I took mental note. A generator creates exhaust, which would have clued in anyone happening by. As I started piecing all this together, Kady extended her arms to me. I backed up a little, unsure what she wanted.
“Your jacket. You can toss your other clothes into the hallway when you’re in the bathroom. It’s the first door on the right.”
I slipped off my machetes and coat and handed her only the coat.
“We’re going to have to talk about who those men were.” My voice was grainy and low, a little rusty from not being used in so long. I had this urge to say, “I am Batman,” but doubted she would have found it funny.
She nodded and carefully took my coat without upsetting any of the dirt from it.
I went to the bathroom where I could learn if she’d been alone. Beside the sink, I found one toothbrush. Inside a closet were towels and boxes of “girl stuff.” I assumed Kady had a storage room somewhere with more. My stepfather had never planned to take my mom with him into the shelter when the end came—I knew this because he hadn’t stockpiled anything for her.
I quickly wrote down everything I saw: Two towels, one bath and one face. Make-up. (I didn’t know what any of it was, so I just wrote “make-up.”) Toothpaste, one toothbrush, and mouthwash. Lastly, I found a curler and a blow dryer, and recorded these items, too. I reasonably assumed she’d been the only one using the shelter.
As I put the notebook into my pocket, I wondered where the water was coming from. I noticed a small septic tank beneath the toilet.
Kady banged on the door, interrupting my observations.
“Don’t flush too much toilet paper down the toilet! The septic tank will clog, and then I’m screwed!” After a brief silence, she then asked, “Are you done taking off your clothes yet?”
I removed my clothes and passed them through the door so only my arm showed. When she took the clothes, I retrieved my arm and realized my notebook was in my jeans pocket. I’d have to remember anything else I found, instead of writing it down. The shower started automatically when I climbed into it. The warm water was completely invigorating as it washed the sweat and grime off me. I just couldn’t believe how decadent this place was, and could only guess that her parents really had no concept of what the end of the world was going to be like.
Had those men wanted her shelter?
AFTER I HAD TOWELED off, I took a good look at myself in the mirror, surprised at how much muscle I had lost. My living off MREs with very little exercise for four weeks had taken its toll. Still, I had a solid frame and I was quick. What I needed most was more exercise.
“You about done?” she asked, after rapping on the door outside.
“I need the robe,” I said, trying to sound tough to hide my embarrassment at being naked.
She laughed, and at first that made me mad. Did she do that to purposely make me feel stupid?
“Just use a towel. I have the robe for you out here. I won’t peek, promise,” she said in a way that made me feel as if we were back in high school.
After wrapping a towel around my waist, I grabbed my machetes. When I opened the door, more smells wafted up my nose. It smelled like food, and I wondered what rations she’d been living off. If she had a grid, she must have had a fridge. I needed to write this down.
Around the corner in the living room, I took a seat on the couch. I watched her through the pass-through, cooking at a stove. That’s when I noticed—she was clean. I mean, clean. Her hair was combed straight, except where it curled halfway down her back. Her nails were long and painted, and she’d redone her makeup.
“You’re staring,” she said with a curled upper lip. She tossed my notebook to me through the pass-through. “What’s with all the dots and dashes?”
I wondered how much she had gleaned from it, and
if that made her a problem for me. “That’s how I take notes. One day all this will be important.”
“With dots and dashes? Riiiiight. How did you survive?” she asked, rolling her eyes. Then, with a kinder voice said, “I mean, I’m glad and all, but how?”
My stepfather trained me to never give away information. Kady’s shelter may have been a palace, but when the generator ran out of gas, it would be a death trap. Clean air required vents. My guess was that any air vents in here were run off electricity. Mine were, too, but electricity from the hand-pump generators that I wound every day. Cranking them was probably the only thing that kept me from completely wasting away.
“Are you alone? Where’s your family?” I asked, knowing I needed to be in charge of questions. I discreetly wrote one generator.
She lifted the lid off the pot and stirred whatever was inside. It smelled good. She grabbed a ladle and filled two bowls. Two utensils. One to stir and one to scoop. She’d also made enough for leftovers. She hadn’t changed her ways since the end had come.
“I don’t know. No one was home when the emergency broadcast came. Remember when I was the one protecting you?” Her words trailed off with a quiet snort, and I wondered if she wished the world still worked that way.
She placed a bowl before me on the coffee table and rested the other on her lap. She sat beside me. Tears occasionally fell from her eyes, and I could see she struggled to maintain her composure. I probably should have reached out and touched her shoulder. Comforted her. Isn’t that what a person did in times like this?
“I guess we’re even. I’m also alone,” I told her, remembering my mom once telling me that shared experiences were a good way to build trust.
Children of Ruin Page 2
