Which was probably a good thing, because I was lost for words. I had no idea what to make of Jet or whatever he said. But I did know he was dangerous and the sooner I got away from him the safer I would be.
We left the area that fell into the mole peoples’ territory. Jet stopped again suddenly. “This is the end of the road. Last chance to be personally escorted home.”
It could have been another trick. It couldn’t be so easy to get away from Jet and the horrible people he associated with.
Too easy.
Way too easy.
“I’ll be fine,” I replied, trying to keep my voice from wavering. I wanted to run for freedom but instead settled for being ready to spring. I wouldn’t be able to physically fight Jet, but I might be able to outrun him.
“Okay. Stay safe, princess. Feel free to visit anytime.” Jet shrugged and turned, walking back the way we had come with nothing more being said.
He didn’t even look back.
The shock of the whole day came crashing down on me like a lead weight. All the emotions I had been holding back threatened to overwhelm me before I could properly deal with them.
I started running.
Putting all my pain and anger into each step, I ignored all the burning from my limbs. I would seriously pay for the exertion later, but for now, I had to get away.
There was no place safe anymore. I couldn’t pretend I was running toward a haven that would cocoon me from the harsh reality of the world. I wasn’t that naïve. But I could return to the places most familiar to me and find Oliver.
I was still lost in the streets but I managed to find a few places I remembered from earlier that morning. Had it really only been a day since I set off? Time seemed to stand still underground as if it wasn’t a part of the world. An alternate universe that existed beside the one the rest of us lived in.
My body couldn’t maintain the pace and slowed down. By the time I recognized the shelter, it was dark. If it wasn’t for the few lights burning inside, I would have missed it altogether.
“Everly, thank God,” Oliver said as he spotted me. He was lingering at the shelter doors, his eyes scanning the room for familiar faces.
“Oliver, where have you been?” I asked, remembering the reason why I had set out so far that morning.
“I’ve been helping people all over the city. I’ve been looking for you for hours.”
I went to hug him with relief, but I stopped myself at the last minute. We weren’t people that hugged. We were friends, best friends, but we hadn’t overstepped the invisible line of more.
“You are never going to believe where I’ve been,” I said. “I’ll tell you everything, but let’s find a place to stay for the night first.”
Oliver nodded and waited while I got a small amount of food from the hall. They had cut their portions again, offering little more than a handful of cereals. The little girl I had met earlier filtered into my mind. The food was definitely running out. It wouldn’t be long before the starvation would truly set in.
I ate before I left the shelter, fearing someone would fight me for the meager serving. Oliver said he had eaten while waiting for me so he was ready to go when I was.
We walked around the streets until we found a quiet place. It was the basement of an apartment building. It didn’t look like anyone had discovered it yet, there were no signs of life or death through the windows.
I shoved a chest of drawers against the door once inside and took in the two rooms. They were tiny by any standards but they were relatively clean. Nothing was actually clean anymore.
Oliver was keen to hear about my day as we settled onto the floor. There was a couch in the room but it was full of mildew, ready to kill anyone who dared disturb its mold.
Launching into my tale, I saved the most startling part of my story until the end. I wanted to savor the look of surprise and utter shock I would surely receive with the big finale.
“…there were adults down there. Not many, but enough to know it wasn’t a fluke that they were alive,” I finished.
Oliver didn’t disappoint. His mouth hung open as his mind reeled with the news and all the possibilities it held. “Are you sure they weren’t spirits?”
I nodded eagerly. “They were real people. Jet could see them too. He said they’d never gone above ground since the Event. How do you think that’s even possible?”
He was quiet for a long time as he thought it through. I’d had all day to mull over the adults but he was still getting used to the idea. If I had told him I saw a rainbow unicorn he couldn’t have been more surprised.
“It can’t be possible,” he finally replied. “All the adults died. They’re all gone. Are you sure it wasn’t some kind of a trick? Jet isn’t the most reliable of characters, and these mole people, I don’t know what to say.”
I replayed it all in my mind, trying to work out if perhaps there was something I had missed. Could they have been playing a trick on me? Orchestrated it with nothing but smoke and mirrors to make me believe the impossible was, in fact, possible?
No matter how many times I went over the minute details I saw, there was no way I could see the trick. The adults had been walking around in the cavern, the whispers of their conversation had drifted up toward my ears, and they had interacted with those around them.
They had to be real.
There was no magic involved.
“It wasn’t a trick. They were real, Oliver. You have to believe me.”
His lips curled into a smile. “Of course I believe you. It’s just them I don’t. Adults alive, it’s a lot to take in.”
“It’s a sad testament to our world now that your statement is actually true. It is a lot to take in.”
“It certainly is,” he sighed.
Silence settled upon us as we let it sink in. Now I wasn’t in desperate fear for my life, I could truly mull it over. Somehow, there were adults still walking this earth that managed to survive the Event. When all the other adults were killed, they managed to stay alive for more than a year longer.
But they had never been above ground since it happened. If they had done nothing else in order to stay alive, then surely there had to be something in that.
Something above ground had killed the adults.
That was the only conclusion I could muster. Nobody knew what had caused the Event and nobody knew why it had only taken the adults. Everyone under the age of eighteen at the time was untouched. Their grief and confusion were their only wounds.
When the realization that they were all gone had fully set in and the deep-seated panic had really started, it was the seventeen year olds that worried the most. Those with birthdays approaching nearly went mad with the question mark over what would happen to them when they turned eighteen.
Nothing happened.
Whatever had caused the Event didn’t seem to linger to take those who grew older. It appeared that we wouldn’t be struck down when we turned into adults. It took only those unfortunate enough to already hold that status.
Which was a good thing, really. I wasn’t far off turning eighteen myself. I wasn’t worried about losing my life when that day arrived. But I did worry about it every other day. If I survived to eighteen I would consider myself lucky.
Many did not get that privilege anymore.
“What do you think it means?” Oliver asked, pulling me from the swirl of my thoughts.
I shrugged, because I really didn’t have any answers. Nothing that would really explain how it was possible. “I don’t know. But I think it’s wrong to keep them hidden away when we need them so much.”
“Could they really do anything up here? You said there weren’t many of them.”
“It doesn’t take a lot of people to make a difference. Sometimes even one person is enough.” I stared at the wall, trying to make everything fit together in my mind. All I could find were jigsaw puzzle pieces that didn’t fit together.
The seeping mildew on the wall made a butterfly patt
ern when stared at for too long.
“What about if they die above ground?” Oliver pondered. “That’s got to be a big risk. If they managed to stay alive this long, they wouldn’t want to put everything at stake.”
“They don’t all have to come up at once,” I mumbled.
I wasn’t heartless, I knew how terrifying it would be for the adults to take that leap of faith. The threat of an instant death was enough to make them run back to their safe cavern and live out their life there.
But there was a whole population that was dying on a daily basis from things that could be avoided. If the adults took some control, showed that we weren’t alone, they might be able to change things.
Perhaps it didn’t have to be like this.
That was what I hoped the adults would truly believe in – the mission to save the children that were left. If they didn’t survive, there would be no more. Repopulation wouldn’t be possible when everyone was dead.
“How do you think the children would react?” I asked. We had focused on the adults, but there were many more things to consider.
Oliver didn’t need to think about it. “The hopeful would believe their parents would be next to return. The hopeless would think they were an illusion.”
I had to agree.
Chapter Twelve
Oliver left early the next morning, insisting he had more people to help and would return before nightfall. We were to stay in the basement until it no longer felt safe.
Or the mold killed us.
With the whole day stretched out in front of me, I knew what I had to do. There were so few things I was certain of anymore, so many promises that had been broken to ensure everything I knew would never be stable again.
But there was one thing I knew for sure.
Jet was lying.
He had known more about the adults, and the mole people themselves, than he was letting on. For whatever reason, he was keeping their secrets and did not care enough to share them with me.
But I needed to know. I had to know everything he did, otherwise my curiosity would eat away at me forever. There was no way I was going to be able to simply walk away and forget about what I had seen.
Finding the mole peoples’ territory was tricky but I knew I had to find it. I retraced my steps through the destroyed and desolate landscape. My studious eyes watched for every movement, anything that could tip me off to someone’s presence. I wasn’t going to be taken by surprise by the mole people again. It only took a slight twinge of my arm to remind me all over again.
I stuck to the shadows, conscious of my footsteps that were too loud at times. My shoes were a size too big, flopping with every step and making it worse. What I wouldn’t have done for some fluffy slippers – comfortable and stealthy.
The set of stairs that led into the underground tunnel came into view in the distance. I hadn’t noticed it the day before but it was almost completely circled by buildings. The district looked to be some kind of commercial area before the Event. Whatever offices the buildings once held were long departed.
I snuck as close as I could while staying sheltered by the debris and remaining walls. If I were to go any further, I would be too exposed, potentially sacrificing myself again. Another beating would be a lot more painful than the previous one with all my fresh bruises.
Trying not to use my sore arm, I climbed up to the second floor of the nearest building and sat on the edge. My feet dangled over the ledge as I positioned myself so I could see the tunnel entrance.
What I had wondered yesterday while being dragged underground was how had I been surrounded so quickly by the mole people? They hadn’t come up from the tunnel or I would have seen them. So they had to have a secondary way of getting in and out of the underground.
No matter how many times I scanned the area, I couldn’t work it out. There had been dozens of people around me when I was caught. They had to come from somewhere. If I was going to find Jet and catch him unawares, I was going to have to figure it out. I did not fancy the idea of being captured again just to speak with him. He might not let me go another time.
“Hey, you’re the girl from yesterday.” The female voice startled me, sending me vicariously close to the edge of the building. I went to jump up but she sat beside me before I could. Blonde hair instantly caught the midday sun as she moved, her bright blue eyes surveyed me curiously.
“What do you want?” I asked, keen to get it over with. Just because she looked friendly, it didn’t mean she was. I had been caught out before and suffered the consequences.
The girl shrugged. “I don’t want anything. Why, what do you want?”
“Nothing.”
She smiled before holding out her hand. I looked between it and her eyes, wondering for a moment what she was up to. I couldn’t work it out. My hand met hers cautiously, shaking it.
“I’m Aurelia,” she said before releasing my hand. “Jet said your name is Everly. Is that right?”
“Everly, yes.”
“It’s nice to meet you. Although… I didn’t think I’d see you back here again. Not after what Perry and her friends did to you.” She pointedly looked at my arm. “Sorry about that, by the way.”
My hand was rubbing my sore shoulder before I realized I was doing it. My eyes searched the area behind us, not only looking for an exit but to make sure Aurelia was alone. “I didn’t exactly make friends with Perry.”
Aurelia laughed, it seemed genuine. Her wispy golden hair shook with the movement. “Nobody makes friends with Perry. I think Jet is the only one she tolerates.”
“She mustn’t know him very well then,” I said before I could stop myself. I wasn’t going to engage in conversation with the girl. I was planning on being polite and then leaving.
“Perry knows Jet very well. He’s not that bad. He let you go, after all.” She nudged me with her shoulder, making my body go rigid. She must have noticed as she pulled back quickly but didn’t say a word about it.
Perhaps she wasn’t as bad as I thought.
“Jet only let me go because he didn’t know what else to do with me,” I pointed out. It wasn’t like he had any rope to tie me up with that time.
“Now it sounds like you don’t know Jet very well. He doesn’t ordinarily let people leave the underground. He knows what would happen if someone said something they shouldn’t.”
“So there’s been others that were taken down there?”
Aurelia nodded. “A few. Perry puts them to work… unless she doesn’t like them. Then I’m not sure what happens exactly. But we never see them again.” She said the words so casually it was difficult imagining she was talking about murder.
Death had a different definition these days.
So did denial.
“Were you one of those people? One that was allowed to stay?” I asked. Aurelia didn’t seem like the kind of girl to live in an underground cavern. She seemed too full of sunshine.
“Kind of. Perry is my sister.” She laughed at my stunned reaction, the sound echoed in the destroyed office block. “She tolerates my presence. As long as I don’t get in her way, she doesn’t bother with me.”
“Have you lived in the tunnels since…”
“Yeah. Perry and I were home when it happened and we just… started running. We hated leaving our parents but they were gone, it was too late for them. We ran down into the tunnels in case worse was coming. We never really came out again.” Her eyes drifted off to the sky as if she could see the memories playing out above us. They probably were, for her.
She was lost in a silent reverie, it seemed wrong to interrupt her private memory. I stared out too, waiting for her to return to me and our conversation.
I kept an eye on the tunnels, watching for movement. Nobody came or went down below.
“So how do you know Jet?” Aurelia suddenly asked.
“He kidnapped me once,” I said bluntly. There was no point sugar coating it. I was certain Aurelia wasn’t oblivious to his dishonorable
activities. She probably knew more about them than I did.
A smile spread across her lips, revealing her white teeth. She probably glowed underground. “That sounds like Jet. So he’s let you go twice? He must like you.”
“Actually, I escaped myself the first time.”
“Impressive. I bet he hated that.”
I couldn’t stop the chuckle escaping from my lips. “No, I don’t think he liked it much.”
“He’s nice once you get to know him,” Aurelia said, seriously again. “It’s amazing what he does for all of us. We never go hungry because of him.”
My mind thought back to all the boys in his gang, how they would go out on raids for supplies. Was he acting on a much larger scale? Stealing enough for everyone I had seen underground? “He steals food for you all?”
Aurelia shook her head, blonde tendrils bouncing. “Only sometimes. He showed us how to grow food. We have a whole garden bed that we use to grow fruit and vegetables.”
“Underground?” I couldn’t fathom the concept. Sunlight was the key ingredient in getting anything to grow. It wasn’t like they had any of that down below.
She gave me a sly smile. “There’s a lot more to those tunnels than you realize.”
I didn’t press her for more because I knew I wouldn’t get it. Aurelia had probably already told me too much, the others could do unfathomable harm to her if they knew about it. I certainly wasn’t going to tell on her.
Instead, I returned to the original subject. “So how do you know Jet?”
“He saved my life once.” Her gaze went skywards again. “I got lost one day and couldn’t find my way back to the tunnels. Perry had told me not to go out by myself but I didn’t listen to her. It got dark and I was so scared. Until Jet found me. He helped me find Perry and lied for me.”
So some girls Jet played good Samaritan to and others he tied up and tortured. I wondered what criteria he used to ascertain which way he would go. Or perhaps there was no thought to it at all, he simply reacted according to his mood. Maybe when he saw me he couldn’t resist harming me. Perhaps Aurelia was cuter, bringing out the protective side of him.
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