Resistance (The Institute Series Book 2) (7 page)

“What happens if one of the panels break?” Drew asks.

“Someone fixes them. If we don’t know how, we learn from someone who can, or we fiddle with it until it works,” Mum replies. “That rule applies to everything. If it’s broken, fix it. If you can’t fix it, find someone who can. We have handy-man types but their list of jobs is always ridiculously long so we only ask them as a last resort.”

We drive out of the gravel driveway and onto the road. I look back at the property and while I can’t really see much through the big group of trees hiding the house from the road, the smoke from the chimney and the pathway from the road are clearly outlined. I can see why that house definitely isn’t the best hiding spot for a fugitive rebel group.

“How many of us are there?” Shilah asks.

“More than you would think,” Mum replies, but doesn’t elaborate.

“Well there can’t be too many. There’s roughly only 600 Defective people countrywide,” Drew says. “And of that 600, I think the Institute would have at least 200 of them.”

“While you are correct in saying we don’t have that many here, definitely not 400, you’re wrong in assuming that every statistic the Institute gives you is accurate,” Mum says. “1 in 5000 was a very broad guestimate that was made many years ago and never updated. There’s no telling how many of us are out there, but the statistics we have show that there’s probably a lot more out there than the government expects or leads us to believe. We’re finding Defective people in every city we go to for recruitment. How would that be possible if 1 in 5000 was correct?”

“Why wouldn’t they tell us there’s more?” Drew asks.

“What would the public do if they were to find out that say, one in fifty were Defective? Finger pointing, accusations, vigilante executions, maybe? The government doesn’t want to be responsible for that happening again. They can’t afford more lives lost. They probably don’t want us knowing that we are stronger in numbers than what they think either. Anything to avoid a war with us.”

“Is it one in fifty?” I ask. That would mean there could be 60,000 of us out there. That’s a big jump from 600.

“We can’t know for sure, but we are confident our numbers are in the thousands, even the tens of thousands,” Mum replies.

Maybe this is one of those things we shouldn’t really be discussing in front of Drew. Who knows what he might do with that kind of information. Although, I assume Mr. Brookfield would have the same stats, so maybe it’s not so important to keep to ourselves. Drew suddenly pinches his head, right at the bridge of his nose like he has a headache. “Sorry. Might have overshared a bit there,” Mum says, smiling a little. She was thinking the exact thing I was.

“What happened?” Drew asks. “When did we get in the car?”

“That is so cool,” Shilah says.

That
is
cool. I want to try it. But no one in this car knows I have the ability to do that, and if Mum can’t really control it, I might make someone forget their whole life or something. That wouldn’t be good. I’m under the impression this memory tweaking ability of hers can’t be reversed.

We continue to drive west. Sugar cane, corn, and wheat crops slowly minimise the farther we get, and dry land begins to fill the area.

“So where are we going?” I ask.

“I figure we’ll go to the most western point today. You’ll hardly ever have to come out here, unless you’re on food deliveries. We’ve taken over some old underground dwellings in the desert. Some people live out here full time; the ones who are too frail, young, or unable to do any of the hard work on the farms for any reason. It’s also our last resort if someone comes looking. They’re right on the border of the radiation barrier so it’s the safest place to hide. There’s still a number of decades left before it will be safe to rebuild on the western side of the boundary.”

“How long will it take to get there?” Shilah asks.

“About an hour,” Mum replies.

An hour? Just how big is this ‘compound’? When Chad told me the Resistance was set up at a compound, I figured he meant a single property on maybe an acre of land. Not numerous properties on numerous acres of land.

“So there’s really no military or anyone out here guarding the radiation zone?” I ask. “It seems pretty careless for the government to just let anyone wander into a radioactive wasteland.”

“I think they are of the mind that no one would be stupid enough to risk their health by coming out here. They don’t exactly have the funds or enough military for that kind of surveillance.”

Mum and Shilah exchange small talk in the front as we continue to drive. She asks him about his ability training from the Institute and how strong his ability is now. It’s really hard to hear them, even though I’m only two feet behind them in the back seat. I stop trying to listen after a while and just stare out the window, taking in the scenery of undiscovered land.

Mum pulls off to the side of the road, literally onto a dirt path covered in what looks like red dust or sand. I haven’t seen a tree for kilometres, everything is flat and dry. The road is bumpy to say the least. The four-wheel drive we had last night would be much more accommodating right now. We drive for what feels like an eternity. Being told, ‘We’re almost there’, numerous times is not helping. I think it’s been easily twenty minutes since Mum first said it.

She finally stops the car in the middle of nowhere and says, “We’re here,” gleefully as she gets out of the car.

The sun hits me as I get out of the car and my skin absorbs the heat immediately.

“Are you sure?” Shilah asks. There’s nothing in sight. I know she said the housing is underground out here, but where’s the entry? There’s flat ground for as far as my eyes can see.

“Just follow me,” Mum says.

We start heading north… or is it south? My sense of direction clearly hasn’t improved over time.

It doesn’t take long to suddenly feel like I’m overheating. I know the desert is hot, but this is … I shake it off and tell myself to stop complaining – I’m outside! I remind myself whenever I feel myself beginning to complain about anything, that it could be worse. I could still be stuck at the Institute where there’s no windows and constant artificial light.

We get to a wide ramp leading down to expansive glass panel doors. No wonder we couldn’t see anything when we got out of the car, the building is literally built
into
the ground.

“Pretty perfect hide out,” Shilah says in awe.

“Wait until you see the rest of it,” Mum says leading us down. She takes out a key from her pocket, unlocks the door and lets us in.

At first I’m amazed at what I’m seeing. Typical household furniture and appliances are placed throughout the cavernous structure. They look out of place because the walls, the floors, and the roof are made of rock. There is nothing between us and the earth that surrounds us.

I get an all too familiar sense in here though. One of confinement, of imprisonment, of the artificial lighting I was just thinking about. I must remind myself when it comes to working at the compound – don’t choose food deliveries or any other job that will send me out this way. As impressive as this bunker is, the architecture of it anyway, it won’t make a suitable home for me. We only just got here and the longer I stand here, the less cavernous it seems.

We’re greeted by a familiar face and a few unfamiliar ones when Cyrus walks in from a hallway that leads deeper into the cavern. Three kids are running circles around him, chasing each other and laughing. Strewn over Cyrus’s shoulder is a pink cloth covered in white milky vomit, presumably coming from the bright eyed, pudgy, and yet so adorable infant he’s holding. He’s not wearing the silly hat that he was last night and even though there’s pretty poor lighting in here, he looks remarkably younger without it. His clothes are still ridiculous though; the same tight pants and heeled boots but today he’s wearing a vest, with no undershirt.

The baby is staring at me. Piercing blue eyes that look too big for her head bore into me and I can’t help but smile at her. Mum and Cyrus exchange pleasantries but I’m distracted by the tiny human smiling at me while I pull funny faces.

“Would you like to hold her?” Cyrus asks. He startles me, I didn’t realise he was watching me. “Here,” he says, handing me the baby.

I hold her on my hip and start bouncing her around, quickly stopping after I recall the vomit covered towel on Cyrus’s shoulder. I continue to make funny faces at her and she reaches for my face, not taking her eyes off of me for a second.

“You’re a natural,” Cyrus tells me. He looks over to my mother, “Ready to be a grandmother, Seph?”

“Not even slightly,” Mum responds.

I hand the baby back to Cyrus. “I’m with her on this one,” I say. Cyrus just laughs.

“We won’t be here long,” Mum says. “I’m just showing these three around today.”

“Where are you off to next?” Cyrus asks. “Can I get a lift to the Fields?”

“Sure. I was going to show them the Fields this afternoon. Allira will be staying there with Ebbodine.”

I interrupt, “Okay, I didn’t know sleeping in a field was part of the deal. Is it too late to stay with you?” I ask Mum. Cyrus and Mum smile.

“That’s just what we call that area.” Mum replies. “It’s the main farming area. Your Dad and I are staying there at the moment too, but we’ll have to move to make room for Shilah. I don’t think any of the housing there is big enough for us.”

“Just let me know when you’re leaving and I’ll come with you,” Cyrus says.

“Will do,” Mum says before leading us down the hallway in which Cyrus appeared from.

“What are all of these rooms for?” Shilah asks as we walk past numerous doors evenly spaced along the hallway.

“These are all apartments. We think this place used to be some sort of hotel or tourist attraction. We’ve made some renovations to the place since we discovered it fifteen years ago, but it was abandoned long before that.”

“Fifteen years?” Drew asks. “Just how long have you all been here?”

Mum stops and turns to look at the three of us, unsure of what to say. I sense she doesn’t want to give too much information in front of Drew.

“The Resistance didn’t start out with the purpose it has now. It has always been a kind of refuge. It’s what the Institute should have been, what they claim they are. Our founding members were an elderly couple. They weren’t even Defective. They owned most of the land out here and had spent their entire lives farming it. When the Institute was built, they would get runaways from the city, from the surrounding suburbs, all looking for a place to lay low and hide. They knew that these runaways were Defective, but they didn’t care. With young people around, they didn’t have to work as hard. They were ageing and the farm had seen better days. This was twenty-nine years ago, just one year after the Institute was founded. Eventually, when the rumours spread about how bad it really was at the Institute, the ones they had taken in started going back into society and recruiting more of us. From there, it led to where we are today.” Mum leans in and whispers in my ear, “Do you think I gave away too much again?”

I give a little giggle and whisper back, “No. I think you’re all good.” As much as I’d love to see Drew all dazed and confused again, I think it’ll be good for him to know that this whole operation was built by two non-Defectives just wanting to help people.

“Okay, let’s keep moving,” Mum says, turning and walking farther into the cavernous structure.

We finally get to the other side, more glass panelled doors that lead to a large atrium. Light flows in from the roof to a paved courtyard with a single tree in the middle. It’s out of place, we’re in the middle of the desert, how is a tall green tree able to grow here? The roof is glass, and looking up, I realise just how far underground we are. It has to be at least twenty, if not thirty metres down.

“If anything was to ever go wrong, if we were found out or if we were to be invaded, this is where we are to meet,” Mum explains.

Shilah, looking at the tree just as dumbfounded as me asks, “How is this even possible?”

Mum just smiles. “Sunlight, water, the two essential things to keep trees alive,” she says with slight sarcasm.

“But the glass roof,” I say. “What if people come looking and discover it?”

“In the highly unlikely situation of that happening, we have Nina for that,” Mum replies.

“Did someone just say my name?” a voice says. I turn around just in time to see her appear. Not from a doorway but from thin air.

“Another teleporter like Ebbodine?” I ask.

“Not quite,” the woman replies before disappearing again. When she reappears, she’s standing next to the tree. She reaches out with her left hand and simultaneously, she and the tree disappear.

“She can cloak things,” Mum says. “Plus, the only way to see the glass roof would be from an aerial point of view or if they stumbled across it by foot. And the odds of that happening are ridiculously small.” The woman appears again, close to us. The tree remains invisible. “Nina, this is my daughter Allira, my son Shilah, and this is Drew.”

Up close I realise Nina is young. She can’t be much older than me. She has tanned skin and long brown hair, braided to one side.

“Welcome,” Nina says.