Grandfather (33 page)

Whispers turned into
shouts.

“
He’s back!” a man
screamed.

“
What are they wearing?” I
heard a woman whisper. Yeah, we looked just like one of the rich
people.

Belladonna and Edgar
rushed in our direction. We met them next to Marley and
Mae.

“What were you thinking?”
Belladonna asked in a harsh tone far from her normal soft voice.
“We’ve been worrying. You put yourself in so much
danger.”

“I’m sorry,” was all I
could say.

“Yeah, we’re sorry,”
Ashton added.

“We’re fine,” Marley said,
Mae’s arms still wrapped around her. “We’re back now.”

“Should have known,” Edgar
said, shaking his head. “Should have known you’d do something
stupid. Actually think I did know. Just didn’t believe
it.”

“Stupid?” Ashton said. “It
may have been stupid, but look what we started.” He pointed at the
radio. Belladonna and Edgar looked at it and back at us.

“It was you?” Edgar
asked.

“Ashton did it,” Marley
said. “It was amazing!”

“But you could’ve gotten
yourselves killed!” Belladonna yelled, her eyes hardened, her lips
tight, her body trembling.

Wow, I was actually
surprised. She looked like a completely different person. I had
been expecting Edgar to be the angry one But no, he was more happy
that we were alive than anything. Out of all people, Belladonna.
Wow.

“Belladonna,” Edgar said,
placing a hand on her shoulder. “They were safe.”

“Only because
Cornelius
had
to
keep them safe,” Belladonna said. “Imagine if Cornelius got the
safe opened. I can’t even imagine. The entire plan would be
ruined.”

“But it didn’t happen,”
Edgar snapped. “Hell yeah it was stupid. They’re back now. Safe is
still locked. Time to put it behind us. We don’t even have a plan
yet.”

Belladonna still didn’t
seem too happy, but she didn’t say much more.

“You guys know about the
interview I had to do?” I asked, assuming they did since they knew
that Cornelius had no choice but to keep us safe.

“Yeah,” Edgar said. “We’ve
been listening to everything.”

“You guys are celebrities
now from the sounds of it,” Mae said.

Belladonna seemed to let
some of her anger go after taking a few deep breaths. “What you did
was dangerous,” she said. “It was absolutely ridiculous of
you.”

“And it had better not
happen again,” Mae said. “I’ve been up every night
worrying.”

“Yes,” Belladonna said.
“But with that said, I do have to agree that things are changing
for the best because of your visit to the city. And now,
Grandfather has been officially exposed.”

“People are questioning
the walls,” I told them. “I saw it on the TV.”

They looked a bit
confused, so I figured they hadn’t heard anything about that, which
made sense since they didn’t have a TV. I told them about the man
on TV wondering about the outside and the man and the woman being
arrested at the fundraiser for asking me questions about the wall
and the outside.

I was sure to speak loud
enough for everybody in the dining hall to hear. Everybody’s mood
lifted, including Belladonna’s. A sly grin appeared on her
face.

“Perfect,” she said. “The
rich turning against one another.”

“Like a civil war,” Edgar
whispered.

“And a civil war would
make it harder for Grandfather to rise up,” Belladonna
said.

It was exactly what I had
been thinking.

She looked at Edgar, her
facial expression becoming very serious. “This is our time,” she
said. “It’s time to act while they’re weak.”

Edgar nodded. “Got a hell
of a lot of planning to do.” They sure were right. Something needed
to happen soon, before Cornelius had a chance to switch things up
in his favor. We all took a seat so that we could catch our breath.
Belladonna and Edgar stayed standing, discussing what an advantage
they had.

Glancing around the hall,
I still didn’t see Robert. “Is Robert not here?” I asked
them.

Edgar shook his head.
“No,” he said. “We’ll talk about it later. Got to get going.” With
that said, Belladonna and Edgar left to discuss their plans while
we stayed to listen to the radio.

The press was saying
exactly what we wanted them to say. The news team talked about how
an unknown source “handed” them the recording and letter. I laughed
when they didn’t mention it being chucked at the woman.

All that matters was that
people were questioning Cornelius’s trust and the previous
president’s death. But nobody was sure if Cornelius was involved.
One woman stated that she believed Cornelius was involved since the
vice president was. “How could Cornelius not know what his own vice
president was up to,” was her argument.

“The kids are missing now,
too,” a man added, turning the focus to the fundraiser. “President
Cornelius has been notified as to what’s going on. He’s refusing to
talk to anybody until tomorrow evening while he ‘figures out what’s
going on,’ as he put it.”

“And he has no idea where
the kids are?” a woman asked. “Kidnapped again?”

“They could be with
Grandfather for all we know!” another woman screamed.

“Which could mean they’re
with Cornelius.”

“It’s working,” Marley
whispered into my ear.

I patted Ashton on the
shoulder. I knew he wanted to take Grandfather down more than
anybody. He may have just started the revolution. We listened to
several other stations. The different broadcasts were all saying
the same thing. None of them knew what to do other than wait until
Cornelius spoke to everyone.

We also heard the bad side
of everything. The explosion was mentioned, and everybody was
scared. “People are already rushing to their homes, afraid to
leave,” the reporter said. “We’re hoping we can shed more light on
things, and perhaps whatever this explosion is can be
stopped.”

But eventually, the
excitement caught up with me. I was exhausted. I hadn’t been able
to sleep in peace for days. I departed the dining hall for my
bedroom door. Edgar rounded the corner just as I was about to enter
my room. He stopped me. “Busy few days you just had,” he
said.

I agreed, hoping he
wouldn’t keep me much longer.

“I had a feeling you might
go,” Edgar said. “After the announcement of your
parents.”

The excitement of getting
away from the city and the news over the radio had distracted me
from the whole reason I went into the city: to find out about my
parents. “I still don’t know,” I told him.

He looked disappointed.
“Carsyn,” he started slowly, placing a hand on my shoulder. “I hate
this for ya. I really do.”

“I was just hoping he
actually knew something about them. I knew it would be dangerous,
but I thought it would be worth it.”

Edgar was silent for a few
seconds. I reached at the necklace around my neck. I had nearly
forgotten about it. I took it off and showed it to Edgar. He had,
of course, heard about it through the radio. He took and examined
it.

“We’re gonna find out
sometime,” Edgar said, smiling. “I’ll help you do it,
too.”

Edgar continued to
surprise me with his sincerity. I only expected that out of
Belladonna. I looked at the space where his tooth used to be. He
still looked a bit creepy, but I was starting to see him as normal.
That was a huge step for me.

“Thanks,” I told him,
actually meaning it. If I was going to figure out about my parents,
I was going to need all of the help I could get.

Edgar left me alone to go
in search of Belladonna. My room was old and plain, just as I
remembered. It was just so different than the room I had been
staying in. Here, there was no television, no marvelous view, no
nothing. Well, the room did have something.

Safety.

I got out of my suit,
wondering how angry Cornelius was. I imagined his nostrils flaring
and his eye twitching worse than ever.
That thought satisfied me.

I held the necklace in
front of my face, watching the light sparkle off it. Would I ever
get my questions answered?

Chapter
Fourteen

E
verybody was asking us questions about Cornelius and the city
the next day. It was just as annoying as everybody wanting to take
pictures of us at Mr. Harrison’s fundraiser. We couldn’t get away
from them.

Well, there was
one
place we could go,
and that’s exactly where we went.

“I’ll never see it the
same way again,” Marley said as we gazed out at the city from the
ledge.

The Presidential Tower
looked so different from the hill. It was hard to believe that just
a day ago, we were at the very top. It was weird looking at the
tower knowing that Cornelius was probably somewhere inside. He had
probably already kicked every piece of furniture possible. Man, I
was loving it.

“
What do you think he’s
planning?” Ashton asked.

That was a great question.
He was a smart man, so we knew he was planning some sort of excuse.
At least I assumed he would try to find a way out of blame. Perhaps
I was wrong. Perhaps Cornelius would embrace the fact that he was
the Grand Imperial. I mean, what could people do? I guessed they
could’ve rise up against him, but that would take some time. It
didn’t matter, because something told me Cornelius wasn’t going to
embrace any of it. He had been trying very hard to keep anybody
from knowing that he’s the leader. He wouldn’t give up that
easy.

“
I don’t know what he’s
planning,” I said. “But it’ll be something good.”

“
You think he’ll get out of
this?” Marley asked in surprise. “Are you serious? There’s no way
he’ll get out of this one.”

“Maybe,” I said. “But I
think he’s smart enough to do so.”

Ashton agreed. “But I
still think that now the idea has been planted there will always be
a lot of people who don’t trust him. That’s good enough for me. I
mean, it’s not going to be easy for Cornelius anymore.”

“But it’ll be easier for
us if others don’t trust Cornelius,” I said.

Ashton and Marley agreed.
As Belladonna had said, it was like a civil war within the wall.
The rich people were going to be split. And that was going to put
more stress on Cornelius. Sure, it would be great if Cornelius
couldn’t find an escape route. But if he did, at least things
weren’t going to be as before.

I saw that Edgar was
waiting beside my door when we returned. He looked at us with an
eyebrow raised, his face covered with curiosity. “Where did you
guys come from?” he asked.

“
Oh,” I said. “Um . .
.”

“
We just been walking
around,” Ashton answered.

“
Yeah,” Marley said, a
little too quickly.

I guess we weren’t
prepared to be asked that question. But Edgar didn’t seem to care.
He shrugged it off.
“Been waiting for a
while,” he said. “We want to talk to you three.”

We didn’t know what they
wanted out of us, but we went with Edgar to the meeting room where
Belladonna was already waiting for us. She seemed impatient and
relieved when we finally walked in. Beside her was Mae. She no
longer had bags under her eyes, which made sense now that she knew
her daughter was safe.

“
That took a while,”
Belladonna said slowly, no longer looking angry. Perhaps she’d
slept it off.

We all took a seat at the
sofas. “I hope you slept well,” Belladonna told us.

“I did,” I told her,
meaning it. Ashton and Marley assured her they did too.

“Good,” Mae said. “Much
safer here than there.”

“Hell of a lot safer,”
Edgar added, grunting loudly.

“
Anyways,” Belladonna
started. “Last night was so hectic that we didn’t get much time to
talk about everything that happened.”

We should have known
that’s what they wanted. So much
was
going on the previous
night.

“What we really want to
know,” Edgar started, taking a seat on the couch across from me,
“is if Cornelius said anything that might help us out.”

Belladonna agreed
apprehensively. “With all that is going on, everything is about to
come crumbling down. We’ll be making our move very soon.” It seemed
as if they were always talking about how we’d be making a move
soon. I really hoped it was true this time. I didn’t see why not.
Grandfather would be vulnerable.

“Sent Robert out to gather
others,” Edgar said. “While you were gone, he overheard that there
was a group of rebels who don’t like these new laws of Grandfather.
Gonna try to get them here.”

“We’re going to need
numbers,” Mae added. “An army.”