MiNRS (5 page)

Chapter Six

Orphaned

I slumped against the back
wall of the elevator as it descended lower and lower toward the bottom of the core-scraper. I wanted to order the doors to reopen, to let me get out and join my dad, or maybe to die fighting with him.

But I didn’t. I couldn’t. My dad had given me an order.

Why did he go back?

He was going to buy us time, he said.

Us.

What did that mean?

As the floors passed, more questions joined the ones already in my head.

Who would want to attack us?

Why?

Was I an orphan?

My mother had been killed right before my eyes. My father was heading back to the surface to fight . . . who? Pirates? Terrorists? Soldiers? Armed people with guns way bigger than the tiny pistol he’d grabbed from the bookcase. He knew he was going to die and he knew I knew.

Was Elena dead too?

What was the point of surviving if my parents, if Elena, weren’t there anymore?

Why would I want to live if everyone I cared about was gone?

I slammed my fist onto the floor.

The pain just made me more furious.

I slammed my hand down again and again and again.

Then I remembered dancing with Elena, her hands in mine, her face drawing toward mine just before the bombs separated us from each other.

I stopped punching the floor.

I did need to go back. I needed to find my father, to find Elena. Dead or alive.

Whoever needed help would have to help themselves. I was about to tell the elevator to head back to the surface when I heard a sound.

Sobbing.

It was just as I passed the twenty-eighth floor.

“Stop!” I yelled.

The elevator jolted to a stop.

“Twenty-eighth floor, and hurry!

The elevator began to rise when one more bang shook the building. The lights flickered on and off.

I could hear loud pings as something fell on top of the elevator, like pebbles. The roof must have been hit and was collapsing. The lights came back on, and the elevator rose again. I could hear the cries getting louder.

“We have arrived on the twenty-eighth floor,”
said the voice.

The doors opened just as a giant chunk of something smashed into the top of the elevator. The force threw me to the floor. I looked up. The ceiling was dented and bent in at the edges, like someone had stepped on top of a pop can.

The brakes squealed as the elevator tried to hold its position in the shaft. Whatever was on top was heavy.

I scrambled to my feet and stuck my head through the opening. The elevator had already slipped about a foot below the level of the floor.

Dark smoke thickened in the hallway, making it
difficult to see. I looked up and down the hallway for the source of the sobbing.

Leaning in a doorway a few feet away was Darcy Aveline, five years old. She was clutching a stuffed dog, crying. I wasn’t sure why she was down here alone. I’d seen Darcy’s parents blown up in the first attacks.

She stared at me, and her eyes grew wide. She stopped crying, but she didn’t move.

“Don’t be afraid,” I said. I was afraid. More smoke was rising up from the stairway door at the end of the hallway. I knew from our safety classes that smoke was just as deadly as fire, if not more so, and in about a minute Darcy would be overwhelmed. The elevator was our only hope to get out, and there was no way to stop it from sinking.

“Darcy,” I said, trying to sound calm, all the while holding the doors open with my shoulders. “It’s me, Christopher. Come on over. It’s going to be okay. We’re going to go down to the basement to play.”

I smiled. I hoped she couldn’t hear the panic in my voice as the elevator continued to slide. There was now just about a three-foot opening, and it was getting smaller and smaller.

“Darcy, we’ll have fun. We’re going on a treasure hunt!” I said. I reached into my backpack and pulled
out a chocolate bar. “Look, I even took some treats from the party! But we have to hurry or everyone else will find the treasure first!”

Darcy started to get up.

The elevator lurched. There was now just two feet between the top of the door and the top of my head. “Darcy, come on over. Hurry.”

I waved the chocolate bar back and forth. She was still walking too slowly.

Darcy continued to clutch the stuffed toy dog as she made her way closer and closer. The elevator was slipping. In just seconds there’d be no room left to save her.

“Darcy! HURRY!” I yelled. She stopped. I’d spooked her.
Idiot
, I said to myself.

She started to shake, and the tears welled in her eyes again. She took a step backward. One more step and she’d be lost.

I wasn’t letting someone else die.

I grabbed the doors with my hands and hurled myself out. I hooked my feet on the doors to stop from flying out completely. Luckily for me, Darcy was so shocked, she stopped.

As I lunged, I reached out and grabbed her leg.

She screamed and started to wriggle, but I held tight. She fell over.

“Darcy, we need to go!”

The doors now slammed into my ankles, then reopened. I ignored the pain and pushed and pulled my body back across the floor, dragging Darcy along. I could hear the groaning of the elevator.

I had to be fast. The doors smashed my knees and reopened again. I desperately pushed with my free hand to send us into the elevator.

The elevator creaked. I pushed and pushed on the smooth concrete floor. I could feel the backpack rub against the top of the elevator doorway.

Finally my legs dangled down, and the weight of my lower body pulled us through.

I fell back and pulled Darcy with me, just as the elevator lurched and dropped below the floor. Darcy landed on my chest and knocked all the air out of my lungs.

I gasped for breath, and Darcy continued to scream.

But we were alive.

Her stuffed dog wasn’t so lucky. One arm had been caught in between the floor and the elevator and was torn off completely.

Darcy stared at the dog. She screamed louder and hugged it close.

I gained my breath and then sat up. I hugged her.
“It’ll be okay,” I said. “We just needed to get away.”

She was shaking.

“Elevator, slowly head to the seventy-fifth floor please.”

The elevator headed down the shaft again, but not as slowly as I’d hoped. The brakes slowed us, but the growing weight of the debris on the roof threatened to send us crashing down.

Darcy held her dog and started talking between sobs.

“Friendly wanted to come to the party. Mom told me no. But when they were dancing, I came down to get him. Then there was a thunderstorm and smoke, and then I got scared. I was all alone.”

I hugged her again. She didn’t know how alone she was. How alone we all were.

“We’ll be okay,” I said. “We’ll be okay.”

As we descended, I listened as carefully as I could at every floor to see if anyone else was crying, or screaming or pounding or trying to hail the elevator.

I wouldn’t risk stopping the elevator again, but if I could figure out the floors with children or survivors, I could come back later.

I didn’t hear anyone.

“You have arrived at the seventy-fifth floor,”
the voice said.

The doors opened but jammed halfway, the top of the panels grinding against the sagging ceiling.

The hall was glowing red, and for a second I was afraid the room was on fire. My eyes adjusted. The only light came from the red emergency lights on the floor and ceiling.

The blasts from above must have triggered the seismic sensors in the floor, sending the tunnels into safety mode.

The elevator creaked.

I quickly ushered Darcy out into the hall. I could feel her tense as we walked into the semidarkness.

The light from the elevator spread out only a small bit, and it was flickering as more and more debris fell from the shaft.

I pulled out the flashlight my father had given me and flicked it on. No light. I shook it, but the light didn’t come on.

I stared at the bulb, which now seemed to be glowing faintly, but not enough to be useful.

“Dead batteries. Great,” I muttered. I flicked it off and tossed it back into my bag.

Luckily, I knew my way around.

The ceiling of the elevator groaned ominously. Another large chunk of concrete smashed into the roof.

I grabbed Darcy’s hand.

“Let’s go exploring,” I said in as cheery a voice as I could muster.

Darcy held on to my hand, and we began to walk slowly into the gloom. She continued to grip her dog, bits of stuffing falling out of the empty arm socket.

I held my breath as we passed under the teeth of the blast door, looking even more like a mouth in the eerie red light.

“Is anyone there?” I called as loudly as I dared.

I could hear shuffling and sniffling coming from the darkness up ahead.

“It’s okay,” I called. “It’s me, Christopher. Darcy is with me.”

“And Friendly,” Darcy said.

“Yes, all three of us are here, and I have some food and some water.”

“And some chocolate,” Darcy added.

A light shot up ahead, and a figure stepped out from the shadows. Instinctively, I pushed Darcy behind me.

It was Alek. He was holding a freshly lit flare and was shuffling toward me. He looked horrible, his face cut and scarred, bloodstains all over his shirt and pants. He took one more step, then teetered and fell over with a sickening thud. The flare skidded away on the floor toward the lockers.

I ran and grabbed it before it could catch anything on fire, and then held it high in the air.

The flare illuminated the terrified faces of a handful of my classmates: Finn, Jimmi, Mandeep, Pavel, and Maria. They huddled together against the lockers, some burying their faces in the uniforms.

There were no adults.

I held the flare higher, desperately looking for more faces, more kids, anyone.

Elena.

Elena wasn’t there.

Maria’s little sister wasn’t there.

There were no other kids Darcy’s age.

Maria saw Darcy, then began shaking her head, tears pouring down her face. “No, no, no,” she said. She slid down to the floor and buried her head in her hands. The others just rocked back and forth, not moving, not talking.

I heard my father’s voice.
There will be survivors. Keep them safe.

I knelt down to check Alek’s pulse. He was still alive, but covered in blood.

I took a deep breath.

“Okay, everyone. We need to get Alek to the infirmary. We need to find food, water, and shelter.”

No one moved. Finn pushed his face farther into the fabric of the uniforms.

The uniforms. That gave me an idea. At the top of each locker was a helmet, and each helmet had a battery-powered light.

Light wouldn’t make the situation any less serious. But it might help everyone feel less scared, myself included. I grabbed a uniform and laid it over the top of Alek’s injured body.

Then I ran over and grabbed a helmet and put it on. I flicked the switch on the front, and the room was suddenly bathed in light—at least the parts I pointed my head at. I took another one and put it on Darcy. Just to help lighten the mood, I even gave her one for Friendly.

“Friendly likes his helmet,” she said.

“That’s good. Now tell him we’re going on that treasure hunt.”

“He likes treasure, too!” Darcy said, actually jumping up and down.

Somehow, the light and Darcy’s enthusiasm seemed to focus everyone.

Mandeep reached up and grabbed a helmet from the locker behind her. She put it on Maria and adjusted the straps.

The helmets were way too big for most of us, but the
distraction of trying to stuff socks and shirts under the cap to hold them in place took everyone’s mind off the immediate danger. We still weren’t talking, but we were moving.

I could hear pings of more debris on the nearby elevators, and the smell of smoke grew stronger. We needed to move farther down the hall.

I turned back to Darcy. “I even have a secret map!” I said. “But I need some help getting sleepyhead over there. . . .”

“He’s not sleeping. He’s hurt,” said Darcy.

“Yes. That’s true. He’s hurt. But there’s a place down that tunnel where he can get better. And he does need to sleep. I just need some help to get him there safely.”

“This might help.” I turned to see Finn holding a tarp toward me. “We can put it under him.”

I smiled and put a hand on his shoulder. “Thanks,” I said.

Mandeep joined us. “I’ve seen my mom do this for emergency demonstrations.” We carefully slid the tarp under Alek, lifting his legs and shoulders as gently as we could.

Then we each grabbed a corner and started walking down the hallway.

“Does anyone know a good song we can sing for our
adventure?” I called out, again trying to sound cheerful.

Finn looked at Darcy and whispered something. “The one with the dwarves!” she called.

“Perfect! Heigh-hooooooo!” I said, and started marching ahead, gingerly keeping Alek’s head steady.

The elevator behind us collapsed under the weight of the concrete.

Darcy and the others turned around to look. I just belted out, “It’s off to work we gooooooooooooooooo!” even louder.

Chapter Seven

Aftershock

Alek, it turned out, wasn’t
as injured as he looked, at least not physically. He had gashes and burns on his face and arms, but these were pretty easy to clean up with the bandages and gauze in the infirmary.

That was the good news.

The awful part was that this meant most of the blood on his shirt wasn’t his.

Alek woke up almost as soon as we put him on a cot, but he didn’t say anything. There was a poster on the wall of the infirmary that showed a smiling miner in a hardhat, along with the slogan
WE ARE WHAT MAKES MELMING MINING GREAT. WE ALL WORK TOGETHER.

He just stared at the poster, rarely even blinking. He
did moan once when I bumped into his ankle—it was hard moving a patient in a mostly dark room—but that was the only noise he seemed able, or willing, to make.

Mandeep dressed the cuts on Alek’s head and put disinfectant on the rest of his wounds. She clumsily strapped a brace from one of the cupboards onto his ankle so he could walk.

“I think that’s how my mom does . . . I mean, did that,” she said, lowering her head.

We would have to walk eventually. Maybe sooner than we wanted. How much longer before the attackers started searching for survivors?

But right now it was the middle of the night, and what we all needed was rest.

Luckily, Darcy had fallen asleep, tucked up on a pile of uniforms on the infirmary floor, clutching Friendly in her arms. Mandeep had bandaged him up too.

Finn was asleep on the other cot. He’d cried himself to sleep, murmuring the names of his parents.

The others were leaning on the walls outside the infirmary, barely conscious of what was going on. The red emergency lights kept everything in a kind of surreal gloom.

I asked Mandeep to join me a little farther down the hallway.

“We need to start thinking about a plan,” I said.

“What everyone really needs is to get some rest,” she said.

I nodded. “I agree. I just meant that you and Finn and I are the only ones who are even talking. Everyone else is walking around like a bunch of zombies.”

“Can you blame them?”

I wasn’t choosing my words very well. “I’m sorry. I’m not trying to . . . It’s just that I think we need to get everyone talking.”

“Talking? Seriously?” She was annoyed.

“Yes, talking. It will actually help.”

“How do you know that?”

“The year my grandpa died . . . It was right before we moved to Perses. We were really close, but he’d lost his memory near the end. He kept referring to me as his long-lost brother, Ned. He died not even remembering who I was. That was hard. But what my parents always did, through all of this, was talk. They’d ask me questions about what I was thinking or what I was feeling.”

Mandeep relaxed her shoulders. I continued.

“Sometimes we’d just talk about nothing stuff, the weather or books, or the latest video game. It helped. We didn’t pretend Grampa wasn’t sick; they just didn’t let it become the only thing we talked about.”

Mandeep nodded. “Okay. Maybe that’s a good idea, but it’s going to be rough.”

“I know,” I said. “For all of us.”

Mandeep nodded, her eyes tearing up.

I walked up to Jimmi, Pavel, and Maria. Maria was still rocking back and forth on the floor, holding her knees in her arms.

Pavel seemed to be punching the wall, his knuckles raw and bloody.

“Anyone want a chocolate bar?” I said. I pulled a few out of my backpack and waved them around. “I grabbed a bunch on my way down.”

Maria stopped rocking and looked at me, her teeth gritted. “Are you joking?” she said. “My family, my sister . . . they’re all—”

“Dead,” I said, bowing my head. “I know. I saw my mom get killed. My dad is probably dead too. All of us”—I paused, to stop myself from crying—“all of us are alone now.
We
are all we have. And if we want to make it, if want to live we have to . . . to . . .” One of Elena’s favorite phrases, in her own voice, came to me. “We need to kick ourselves in our own freaking butts.”

“My sister isn’t dead!” Maria said, shaking. “She’s still up there with my mom and dad. They’re coming back for me.”

She knew better, but I let her say it anyway. It was no good having an argument.

“My dad
is
dead,” I said, knowing it was true. “And so is my mom. Whoever attacked us wasn’t out to take prisoners.”

We sat in silence for a long time after that. Then Jimmi said something that hit me like punch in the chest.

“You know, Nichols. Your dad and mom might be dead, but they were real heroes.”

Pavel stopped punching and turned to me, nodding, the light on his helmet bobbing. “My mom died shielding me and Jimmi from a bomb hit. I couldn’t move. Your dad grabbed us and threw us into the elevators.”

“He took a chunk of something right in the leg, shrapnel or something. But he kept going back looking for kids.”

“Alek was just wandering around up there. He was a sitting duck. Your mom led him through the smoke to the roof. She did the same for Finn and Mandeep.”

“We’re alive down here because of them.”

I couldn’t speak. I let images sink in. What would they do if they were still here?

“Thanks. That means a lot.” A lump rose in my throat, but I forced it down. “But do you know what they’d say right now? They’d say we have to think about each other.
We’re a family. If there are parents alive, and let’s hope that’s true, then we need to stay alive to help them, so they can find us. But if we are alone, we have to work together.”

Their headlamps nodded in agreement.

“So what do we do now?” asked Maria.

“Should we run?” Mandeep asked.

“Should we try to go back up top?” Pavel asked. “I’d love to punch one of those . . .” he didn’t finish but went back to hitting the wall.

“Yeah, should we fight?” Jimmi asked, reaching over and grabbing Pavel’s arm before he could throw another punch.

They were all looking at me for answers. “We rest. Jimmi, you and I can take the first watch. Everyone else, try to get some sleep. There are enough uniforms down here to bunch up as beds and pillows.”

“Maria and I will go get them,” Mandeep said.

I gave a quick nod. “Try to keep close together, and be ready to move at a moment’s notice. Jimmi and I will wake you if we see anything.”

Jimmi and I set ourselves up by the blast door, and listened.

Ten minutes into the watch, Jimmi had fallen asleep.

I was alone with my thoughts. Elena’s voice, the
image of my mom dying, and the new image of my mother and father being heroes . . . It was all too much. The sadness began to overwhelm me.

I put my backpack on my lap and began to rummage through it. I hadn’t told anyone about the map or the beacon. Not yet. Once I’d read the map and come up with a plan and a direction to go, I’d get everyone’s input.

The chocolate bars were the first things I pulled out. There were only ten or so, along with some energy bars my dad had thrown in. I laid them out on the floor.

Breakfast.

There would be more food down here, if it wasn’t spoiling with the main power off. I knew there was a cafeteria not far down Tunnel 1 that served lunches when the miners were on long shifts. I’d also look for that break room in Tunnel 2. We’d head there in the morning. I’d try to convince Alek to make the trip with us.

I took out the flashlight and flicked it on. The light was still pathetic. I banged it in my palm just in case there was a loose connection in the bulb or the battery pack. No difference. I wasn’t sure how I could recharge it. My dad hadn’t given me a charging cord.

I put it back in the backpack and reached in for the map.

There was nothing in the main pouch. I started patting the sides. In the back of the pouch there was a kind of hidden pocket, held closed by a clasp.

I undid the clasp and pulled out a thin red, leather-covered book.

And that was it. The backpack was now empty.

I held the book up and shone my headlamp at it.

Oliver Twist
by Charles Dickens.

Oliver Twist?
I shook the book but nothing fell out. I flipped through the pages. It was just a book, a normal book.

In a panic I ran my hands through the backpack. I held it upside down and shook it. I even turned it inside out.

Empty.

The fabric was just plain cloth, no map drawn on it or woven into it.

My heart was racing. My dad had given his life so I’d be able to find the beacon. And I’d lost the map? Had it fallen out when I was saving Darcy? If it was in the elevator, it was gone. The compartment was crushed. There was no finding anything in there.

I looked back at the book.

Why give me a book? Why this book?

I shook it again. I flipped through all the pages again. It was just a book.

I was so angry and frustrated that I grabbed the front cover and tried to rip it off.

Then I saw the handwritten inscription on the front page.

To Susan,

A gift for you and our new baby boy.

Read it to him at bedtime.

When he’s ready.

Jim

I ran my fingers over the script.

Tears ran down my cheeks. My chest heaved with sobs. Had my dad wanted me to have the book as well as the map? Was that a final gift? Was this backpack kind of a treasure chest? I wanted him there so badly right now to explain what was going on, to tell me what to do next.

I held the book against my chest, hugging it. I’d come so close to throwing it away.

Jimmi stirred a few feet away from me.

“You cool?” he asked, sleepily.

“Yeah,” I croaked. “Just bagged and sad and mad.”

I wiped the tears from my eyes and tried to avoid the light from Jimmi’s helmet.

“I hear that. Look, I caught some sleep,” he said. “You get a few winks and I’ll keep watch.”

“Cool.” I flicked off my helmet light. At least he hadn’t seen me bawling my eyes out.

I carefully placed the book back in the pocket of the backpack, bunched up some uniforms on the floor next to me, and fell asleep.