Immurement: The Undergrounders Series Book One (A Young Adult Science Fiction Dystopian Novel) (2 page)

He hesitates. “Did you … see everything?”

I give a somber nod, the full significance of my admission not lost on me. No one has ever witnessed a sweep, and lived to tell about it, that is.

“What happened?” Owen’s voice is thick with emotion.

I take a deep breath to calm my racing heartbeat. If I can make him understand what I saw, maybe I can persuade him to do something. “I was staked out near some rocks, not far from Sam. There was this whooshing sound, and all of a sudden Sam keeled over. I jumped up and spun around and that’s when I saw the Sweeper ship. Next thing I know, this telescopic tube thing shoots out and suctions onto him.”

Owen rubs a hand over his taut jaw and waits for me to continue.

“It swings back for me, so I duck down and take cover. The tube rams into the boulder I’m hiding behind—makes this high-pitched grinding sound. Then all of a sudden it goes limp and the ship takes off.”

Owen looks across the canyon, the violet shadows beneath his eyes illuminated in the sun. “I saw the ship leave the canyon. I didn’t know they had Sam.”

I grab Owen's sleeve. “Don’t you see what this means? The Sweepers aren’t invincible. They make mistakes.”

He ignores my brilliant insight, kicks at a clod of dirt. “Did you get a look inside?”

I shake my head. “Tinted glass. All I caught was
TerraTechno
on the side of the tube. But I found a dart they fired at me buried in my pack.” I pull it out and hold it up, but he turns away, balling his hands into fists. He’s smoldering mad at me for taking such a huge risk. But I’m ticked at him too. I survived a sweep and he won’t even give me credit for pulling off what no one else has ever done before. I suck on my bottom lip for a minute, stoking my frustration. “Prat needs to know about this. He could rally the Undergrounders, come up with a plan. Seeing
you
won’t.”

Owen narrows his eyes at me. “Don’t be ridiculous! Prat wouldn’t know what to do. He’s got us all plucking chickens and filtering water, like we’re knucklehead Girl Scouts on a camping trip.” He scrubs his hands over his face. “You’re right about one thing. We’ll never be free until we find a way to stop the extractions. But you need to be patient.”

He stands, slings his gun over his shoulder, and looks out over the canyon awash in half-shadows. “It’ll take more than just us. The camps have to unite. The Undergrounders need a real leader. One who’s not afraid to do what needs to be done.”

I pat Tucker on the head and get up, an uneasy feeling creeping up my spine. I thought all that sneaking out had something to do with a girl. But now, I’m not so sure.

Back in our bunker, I heat up last night’s rabbit stew on our wood stove. I add some dehydrated potato slices and carrots, and give the stew a hearty stirring. I miss Ma’s cooking. Our food unit is chock-full with five years’ worth of dehydrated supplies in sealed plastic tubs, but most of it tastes like chalk. Prat’s supplies are a whole lot better—some highfalutin’ NASA MREs, but he’d rather hoard them than share with us.

We’re an odd bunch, the ones who made it. Preppers stockpiling for Doomsday, mountain men with beards like rugs, Prat, our wuss bunker chief, who grew up rich, but he’s not anymore I suppose, unless you count his twelve-hundred-square-foot custom-built steel bunker with solar-powered lighting. His parents even sprang for the two-hundred-year warranty, for what that’s worth now.

Mason says he’s a Marine
,
although I’m not so sure. He’s a newcomer to our camp and nothing about him adds up. Then there’s us of course, the Connellys, garden-variety suburbanites, grateful our neighbor took us fishing up here and gave us a tour of his bunker. He never showed up after the meltdown. Da says he’d have wanted us to have the place, but I think he’d hate nothing more than to see us holed up here scabbing off all of his hard work. He only brought us here to stick it to us. He wasn’t the sharing type either.

My mouth waters as the aroma of real meat fills our-eight-by-forty-foot recycled shipping container. I glance across at Da slouched in a chair, eyelids drooped, clutching a sock in one hand. A halfhearted gesture at getting dressed. He’s wearing the same stained sweats he’s slept in for months, snoring like a woodpecker. Of course there’s a fresh batch of beer fermenting in the corner. Apparently he hasn’t been sleeping all day.

For the most part, Da’s always too drunk to care where we’re at. Drinking’s all he’s really cared about since Ma died. Jakob told me the other Undergrounders are secretly hoping the Sweepers extract him before he does something to endanger the entire camp. Which seems harsh for Septites, although I kinda get it. The greater good principle and all that. But Da will never get picked up. The Sweepers only come for the young.

Owen sets out spoons and plastic tumblers of water on our camping table and I fill two bowls of stew.

Owen slurps a spoonful of broth. “What did the Sweeper ship look like up close?”

“Long, gunmetal gray body, shaped like a bullet. Like I said, I couldn’t see in. The glass looked weird, like it would glow in the dark.”

“Mason says it’s to absorb radiation.”

I throw Owen a disgruntled look. “How would
he
know that?”

“He knows a lot about military stuff. He taught us how to defend the bunkers properly, didn’t he? How to secure an area, identify escape routes, assess a threatening situation. He knows what he’s talking about.”

I roll my eyes. “I think he makes half of it up.” I study a piece of carrot in my bowl, my insides working their way into a familiar jealous knot. Owen and I grew close after Ma died—Da being mostly out of it and all. Until Mason came along.

“How old do you think he is?” I ask.

Owen shrugs. “Dunno. Twentyish. He doesn’t talk much about himself.”

I chase the last piece of rabbit around my bowl. Mason’s tight-lipped about most everything, including his large stash of weapons. Which is why I’m suspicious of him—ripped like no man I know, surly, with dark, brooding brows and the biggest feet I’ve ever seen. I’m sure they never made shoes that size before the meltdown. I don’t trust him, or his wife, Kat. When they first arrived, I tried to befriend her, but her glassy eyes look right through me like one of us isn’t there, and it gives me the creeps.

I take a swig of water. I hope I’m wrong about Mason. Maybe he
was
in the Marines. How else would he know the windows in the Sweeper ships are designed to absorb radiation?

Inside Prat’s spacious bunker Jakob pats a spot on a metal bunk beside him. A fluttery feeling races through my ribcage as his steel blue eyes appraise me, unsmiling tonight. Even Big Ed looks unusually somber. He nods at me as I pass him, his cowboy hat with the snakeskin band crammed on his head, balancing out the grizzled beard that sprawls from his jaw.

Big Ed’s the oldest person in our camp, and the wisest. Kind of like having a live encyclopedia around when you need to know something. He was living off-grid for decades before the meltdown. Next to Jakob, he’s my closest friend. He listens to what I have to say like it’s important, which is more than Owen does. His left hand is all messed up and Da says it’s an old bullet wound. He’s convinced Big Ed’s on the run. Not that it matters anymore. We’re all running now.

I glance around the room and frown when I see Frank, the bunker chief from Sam’s camp. “What’s Frank doing here?” I whisper to Jakob as I slide onto the metal seat next to him.

“Must be about the sweep,” he says, fiddling with the trucker cap in his lap. His parents stare with drooped lips at us from across the room and we instinctively edge an inch or two away from each other.

Prat barely acknowledges us with a curt nod before he calls the meeting to order. “Frank Packer has joined us tonight,” he announces. His pale, protruding eyes scan the room as the Undergrounders murmur a greeting. “As you all know, Sam was extracted a week ago.” Prat runs a finger around the inside of his collar. “Frank thinks one of us had a hand in it.”

The collective hiss of breath around the room sends a shiver down my spine. For months now, there have been rumors of Sweeper snitches in the camps. It’s ludicrous of course. Why would anyone help the Sweepers?

Frank slides forward in his chair, arms barred across his chest. “Tell ‘em straight, Prentice.”

Prat rubs his hands down his shirt. His eyes flick nervously around the bunker. “They’ve seen more ships. Frank thinks one of us is a snitch.”

I look around at the stunned faces, lips slung wide in silent protest.

“This is baloney!” I say, jumping to my feet. “How dare you accuse anyone in this camp of being a snitch if you can’t prove it!”

Frank leans over and rummages around in his pack. He pulls something out and tosses it onto the table. “We found this close to where Sam was extracted. Zero-two-five on the handle.”

My insides turn to ice. It’s a hunting knife with our bunker code on it.

Frank peers around the room, slit-eyed. “Belongs to someone in this room.”

Mason snatches up the knife and holds it under the light. There’s an uncomfortable moment of silence, then everyone is talking at once, shouting at Frank, arguing with one another, faces twisting like ghouls in the subterranean light. Mason spins the blade back across the table to Frank, his dark, canopied brows drawn tight. I bite down on my bottom lip. There’s no mistaking the curved antler handle on the knife. I sneak a glance at Owen. He gives a subtle shake of his head. When I look away, Kat’s glassy eyes lock with mine.

“Dang knife means squat.” Mason slams his fist hard on the steel side of the bunker. “Sam could have helped himself to it—he hung out here plenty.”

“The kid weren’t no criminal,” Frank growls. “It’s folks from this camp what can’t be trusted.” He takes a step in Mason’s direction. “Strangers what have no business being here.”

Prat runs the tip of his tongue over his colorless lips, throws a skittish glance around. The clan women shrink back, eyes wide with fear. For once, I’m with them. The stale air in the bunker reeks of mutiny. I can hear my heartbeat ringing inside my chest like a fire alarm.

“The knife’s mine,” Owen says, breaking the white-knuckle silence.

I gasp, vaguely aware of my nails slicing into flesh. Jakob lets out a muffled yelp. “Sorry!” I mouth to him.

Frank turns to Owen, a vein bulging in his temple. “So you’re the scumbag got him extracted.”

Owen pumps his fists at his sides, and I sense what’s coming. I slide forward on the bunk so I can grab him before he takes a swing and starts a war.

“Sam was Owen’s friend,” I say. “He would never betray him.”

“Sam and I went hunting together last week,” Owen says, after a long pause. “He lifted my knife on accident.”

“Well whadda ya know, Frank?” Mason bars his arms across his chest, a smug expression on his face. “There’s a simple explanation after all. Looks like you owe us all an apology, you two-faced snake!”

I can almost hear the charged air snap. Frank wheels and reaches for Mason’s throat. The muscles in Mason’s arm inflate and his meaty fist connects with a crack. Blood spatters from Frank’s face over his shirt. He moans and staggers backward clutching his nose. Undergrounders scramble left and right. Jakob's mother lets out an ear-piercing scream, sending the rest of the clan women into a frenzy.

Prat yanks open a drawer and fishes out a ratty towel. “You’d best get going now,” he says, tossing it to Frank.

Frank presses the towel to his nose, his eyes flickering with rage. “This ain’t over, not by a long shot. Someone’s gonna pay for what happened to Sam.” He hurls the bloody rag across the room at Prat, and then reaches for the ladder leading up to the entry hatch.

He’s halfway up the first rung when Mason pounces on him, slams him up against the bunker wall like a bear with a kill. The clan women scream again in unison. Mason leans into Frank’s twitching face. “Threaten me or anyone in this bunker ever again, and I’ll rip you limb from limb and feed you to the Sweepers.”

“Let him go, Mason,” Owen says, laying a hand on his shoulder. “If we turn on one another now, we lose everything we’ve built. The entire Undergrounder network.”

Frank glares at him. “You’ve already lost it.”

“Don’t do this, Frank. We’re not the enemy,” I plead.

“Long as you keep a Sweeper snitch in your camp, you are.” Frank shoves past me and throws Owen a jagged look. He adjusts his pack over his shoulder and quickly disappears up the ladder. A moment later, I hear the hiss of the pneumatic lift strut as the hatch opens and then closes.

Mason scowls across at Prat. “You shouldn’t have let him spring that on us.”

Prat slams the drawer shut. “A man from his camp was extracted. He wanted answers, and he’s entitled to them.”

“Just remember who calls the shots around here,” Owen replies.

Prat squints in Owen's direction, a wary look on his face.

Owen turns to Mason. “Frank’s camp will be up in arms now that you’ve rearranged his face for him. There’s no telling what he’ll say happened. One of us will have to go up there and reassure them we had nothing to do with Sam’s extraction.”

“I’ll go.” The words are out of my mouth before it registers that my lips have moved.

Jakob turns to me, a startled look on his face. “It’s too dangerous,” he whispers. I know what's going through his mind. It’s going through mine too.
The Sweeper ships.

I take a deep breath and remind myself that there are worse things than dying, like living in the dirt for the rest of my life. “I’ll take my chances,” I say, fighting the quiver in my voice.

“You can’t go with her,” Mason says to Owen. “If Frank’s camp is after blood, they’ll start with yours.”

I flash my brother an awkward grin. I’m trying not to gloat, but this is my chance to show him he’s not the only one who isn’t afraid to do what needs to be done.

Big Ed winks at me. “No better woman for the job. Count me in.”

I smile back at him. It’s just the kind of thing he would say because he’s Big Ed. We both know Owen should be going. If things turn ugly, he’ll know what to do. I’ll be learning on the fly, but no one else seems inclined to step up.