The Detainee Page 21

  “Okay!” she croaked. “Clancy, come on, open this door.”

  “We’re playing games?” I asked.

  “Yeah! Why not?”

  She came up with all sorts of suggestions—demons and dragons, hopscotch, musical chairs (or “musical sacks,” with her doing the singing)—stuff I thought was stupid even when I was a kid.

  At first Gordie and me wouldn’t have anything to do with it. Just sitting in the corner, feeling uncomfortable, making snide comments about the others as they scooted up and down and around the cell, but eventually they dragged us in.

  I gotta say, that was one of the most enjoyable nights of my life. We played games, giggled and laughed, sang songs, everyone just mixing in. When the time came to leave, to go back up to the living area, it was one helluva jolt to be confronted by the prospect of locking those two in again.

  I turned to Jimmy, to Lena, but they both avoided my gaze, like they didn’t want any part of my dilemma. In the end, I just did it without saying nothing, as if it was my duty and that was an end to it.

  On the way back up through the tunnels the conversation inevitably turned to what we were going to do with them. With every day it was becoming more obvious that we couldn’t keep them prisoners forever, but what alternatives did we have? Let them go free? Go back to the Camp? We might be able to trust them now, but a few weeks or months down the line—who knows? The only other possibility seemed to be to just unlock them, let them live down here with us and maybe keep a guard on the entrance or something.

  “So they can go wherever they like?” Delilah asked.

  “I don’t know. What d’you think?”

  She shrugged. “I dunno either.”

  “I trust Arturo,” Jimmy said, “but I don’t know about Gordie. He’s a real tough kid. I’d hate to think what he’s done.”

  I nodded my head. I didn’t say anything, but the day I told Arturo and Gordie about my life with Mr. Meltoni, some of the things I’d done, they came back with a lot of stuff about raids on the Village. I guess Gordie said it to impress me. That’s just the way he is. But for every story he had, Arturo almost matched it.

  “What d’you think?” I asked Lena, realizing she hadn’t spoken for a while.

  She paused for a moment, then sighed. “I don’t think we have a choice.”

  “What do you mean?”

  She tilted her head back the way she sometimes does, as if she’s somehow looking up at the sky, to her spiritual home. “If we’re going to go forward, if things are going to improve . . . we’ve got to trust them.”

  I guess I don’t do it very often when Jimmy and Delilah are around, but I gave her a hug and kissed her too. She was right, and the fact that no one spoke, that we all fell to a nervous silence, only went to confirm it.

  Not another word was said till we got back to the living area and bid each other good night. A little later Lena and I made love. It was as if we needed it to give us courage, to pass strength back and forth between us. Afterward we lay in silence, our arms locked about each other, both too afraid to put into words what we could see coming at us from out of our individual darknesses.

  The following morning, after a brief conversation with Lena and Delilah, I went down to tell the kids what we decided. I guess I was feeling pretty pleased with myself in a way. It’s always nice to be the bringer of good news. I kept imagining what their reactions were going to be: little Arturo’s excited face, Gordie’s inevitable suspicion. But when I got to the cell I found it open and both of them gone.

  “Shit!” I cursed, the irony that I’d been about to tell them we were letting them out immediately striking me.

  I turned and started to run back up to the living area, cursing myself for having missed the fact that they’d been planning an escape, that maybe they’d used last night’s games to gain some sort of advantage.

  “Dammit! Dammit!” I shouted, already imagining them back over in the Camp, telling others about us.

  I turned a corner, was about to shout a warning to Jimmy as I passed his workshop, when I heard laughter coming from inside.

  I changed direction, shoved the workshop door open, and found him and the kids sitting in front of his computer.

  “What’s going on?” I demanded.

  “Hey, Big Guy!” Jimmy cried, apparently oblivious to the tone in my voice. “I got it going!”

  I paused for a moment, my anger subsiding, then sidled over to stand behind him. It wasn’t exactly a thing of beauty, what with wires and bits and pieces hanging off all over, but he was right: he had gotten it working. There was some game on there he was trying to teach the kids how to play.

  “Cool, huh?” he said.

  “Jimmy!” I muttered, out of the corner of my mouth. “What about them?”

  He glanced up at me, a little surprised. “We’re letting them out . . . Aren’t we?”

  “Yes, but . . . I thought . . .”

  I stopped in midsentence, not wanting Arturo and Gordie to begin their freedom on such an obvious note of distrust. Though to be honest, I don’t think they’d even noticed I entered the room, so excited were they by the computer. Jimmy was going through it with them, step by step, giving them a basic lesson, and they were picking it up real fast. Playing the game in no time at all, destroying everything in sight, the irony of them committing such wanton destruction in a cyberworld apparently lost on the three of them.

  I don’t suppose I’ll ever get any use out of it, but I gotta say, I could still appreciate the achievement. A computer working in the tunnels. I wouldn’t have thought it was possible. For a while I just stood there, staring at this further miracle, smiling at the miracle maker and occasionally acting out the role of diplomat when the kids started to fight about whose turn it was.

  “I got these to go through yet,” Jimmy told me, indicating a box beside him.

  I peered inside. “What are they?”

  “Hard disks, cards, flash drives. Found a whole load of them. No label on them for some reason.”

  I nodded my head. I mean, it might as well have been a pile of kindling for all I knew, but I didn’t have the heart to turn down the heat on his enthusiasm.

  “Have you told them what the deal is?” I asked.

  “Yeah, yeah,” Gordie said, rather dismissively, his eyes glued to Arturo’s efforts on-screen.

  I sighed to myself. “Okay, then. I’ll go and work out some kind of rotation.”

  I stood there for a few more moments, then, feeling a touch redundant, left them to it.

  I mean, I had it in mind to strike the fear of God into them before releasing them. Leastways to try. Mr. Meltoni always used to say: “Mankind understands the concept of fear far better than that of morality.” He reckoned that was what was wrong with the Ten Commandments: Moses got so loaded down with the tablets, he forgot the big stick.

  So, yet again, life in the tunnels has changed. The idea of having someone up there, guarding the entrance, making sure the kids didn’t try to escape, was abandoned almost immediately. Sitting up there for hours on end—it just ain’t practical. All we can do is keep an eye on them, never let them out of our sight. Mind you, I gotta say, that first week or two was far from comfortable. No one slept that well. You had the distinct feeling that you were living life on two levels and the top one was decidedly fragile. There were a couple of false alarms; everyone rushing around one day, going crazy, convinced they’d got out, only to find them down in one of the flooded tunnels skimming stones across the water.

  Yet slowly we’ve begun to relax, to hope we can trust them. Okay, so Gordie’s pretty difficult at times. You ask him to do a chore, and if he thinks it’s below his dignity, he’ll tell you to go and screw yourself or something. But we get around it. As for Arturo, well, I gotta say, the little guy’s developing a way about him that’s pretty hard to resist. You can’t believe what he’s been through, he seems that unaffected. He’s starting to capture a few hearts, and none more so than Delilah’s. Sh
e’s lost all hostility toward them and now treats them like family. Gordie won’t have a bar of it, but she loves to get her arms around Arturo and give him a hug. Tell the truth, I don’t think they got any more interest in leaving this place than we have. Life in the Camp’s pretty tough. They told us a lot of stories; about De Grew, how he went crazy when the medical warehouse was raided. Lena wasn’t the only suspect. All sorts of people were questioned, tortured, and killed. Wastelords as well as kids.

  They also came up with some stuff even Lena was surprised by. Apparently, one of the reasons De Grew gets away with so much, why those on the Mainland turn a blind eye, is cuz he’s in league with them. He don’t run this place in spite of the Mainland, but for them, with them creaming off the major portion of the profits.

  Ever since we freed them we keep the lights on all the time. Even when we’re sleeping. Originally for security reasons, but now just cuz we prefer it that way. The only real setback we had, the only occasion when I wondered if we really knew what we were doing, was the night I caught Gordie up at the entrance looking like he might be on his way out.

  You get a kind of sixth sense about somebody trying not to make any noise. If he’d walked past Lena and me normally instead of creeping I probably wouldn’t have heard him. As it was, I not only woke up but had the presence of mind not to move or alert whoever it was.

  I waited till the footsteps were some way off, till I judged they were almost at the end of the lit section of the tunnel, then turned to see Gordie making his way up toward the main hall.

  I gave it a couple of moments, managed to extricate myself from Lena without waking her, then went to follow. I mean, I could’ve stopped him then and there, but I wanted to see where his free will would take him.

  Fortunately for me he was carrying a candle, which made it easy to follow. All I had to do was stay in the dark and creep along behind that flame. He went through the main hall and then, just as I feared, up toward the entrance.

  I waited till he was actually at the door, then snuck up behind him.

  “What you doing, Gordie?” I asked.

  He turned to me, at first a little taken aback, but then got this expression of real defiance about him. “Just looking.”

  “This time of night?”

  There was a long pause. I didn’t want to know this, not after everything we’d been through. I bent down to take a quick look out through the cracks and got a real shock. There was a fog out there. For the first time in ages. Somehow he’d known, he’d been woken by its call, like a werewolf being summoned by the full moon.

  “You want to go out? Is that it?” I asked.

  He shrugged, but didn’t answer.

  “You could be over there right now, huh? Full of that stuff De Grew gives you? Burning and killing? Is that what you want?”

  Still he didn’t answer, but he had a look about him that damn near frightened me to death. As if bubbles and flames hadn’t been his only addiction, that it was the pleasures of blood and carnage he was really missing.

  “Why go over there, Gordie? We can make it easy for you. There are old folks here. Why don’t you go down and chop up Jimmy or Delilah? Or me? I mean, why not? We’re just the same as them.”

  He looked at me and for the first time I saw that kid with real hurt in his eyes. As if he couldn’t believe I’d think that of him.

  “We’re just the same, Gordie,” I repeated. “If you got to know some of them, they’re just like us.”

  I don’t know if I imagined it or not, maybe I did, but as I stood there staring into his face, I swear I saw that moonlight in his eyes finally disappear. Something else triumphed over it. And I tell you, I pray to God it never ever burns again.

  I put my arm around his shoulder and led him back down the tunnel, and for once he didn’t seem to mind; the two of us returning to our beds without saying another word.

  I never told anyone. Not even Lena. I kind of figure it’s our secret. I know it hasn’t been easy for him, that he’s probably still got a few more demons to show the door. But ever since that night, the disappearance of that look in his eyes, I’ve felt I could trust Gordie. That he’ll be there for us. Which is just as well, cuz the way things are, I got this feeling that we’re going to need every little bit of help we can get.

  CHAPTER SIXTEEN

  In the light of the sheer malevolence of those searching for us, I guess it sounds pathetic, but I’ve started to increase the difficulty of my workout. I mean, I don’t think I’m imagining it, I do feel better. There seems to be a difference in the amount of breath I can get into my lungs, in how long my limbs take to tire, in my overall stamina. Mind you, how fit this renovated old body can get, I just don’t know.

  Occasionally the kids make their way down and ask if they can join in. Gordie tries to show off, to prove how strong he is, putting too much sand in the drums and barely being able to scrape them off the ground. While Arturo merely talks a good game, without ever doing anything. I guess the thing is, weightlifting’s too disciplined for kids of their age. They need to let their energy off all over, like bees darting from flower to flower.

  Jimmy’s still letting them play with his computer, but since he started to go through that box of disks, they’ve had to pick their moments. Games are starting to take a backseat. The little guy’s getting that look about him again, like he’s becoming filled with the color of obsession. One night I was awakened by this rumbling beneath us, deep down in the bowels of the tunnels, even a bit of vibration. I knew at once what it was, that a major stretch of tunnel had gone down, and the following morning I went down to ask him if he’d give me a hand making good.

  The moment I walked into his workshop I knew I had no chance. He was crouched over his computer like some crazed gnome, a look of furious concentration on his face, punching the keys so fast you could barely see his fingers.

  “Jimmy—” I started to say, but he immediately told me to shush, which I didn’t altogether care for.

  He continued to patter all over that keyboard, changing sequence, backtracking, sighing, starting all over again, then eventually slumped back and gave a cry of frustration. “Dammit!”

  “What’s the matter?” I asked. He didn’t answer, just sat there glaring at the screen as if he was about to punch it and I began to get a little irritated. “Jimmy?”

  He shook his head, making that little clicking noise with his tongue he’s so fond of. “Look!” he said, indicating the blank screen.

  For a few moments I stared, not sure what I was supposed to be seeing. “Yeah. Nice color,” I commented. “Bit like the sky.”

  “No, Big Guy! . . . Watch this.”

  He started hitting keys again, over and over, and for a while nothing happened, then he got this screen full of endless code and finally a sign saying: “Access Denied.” I nodded my head, trying to look impressed. I mean, like I told you, this stuff don’t mean a lot to me.

  “What is it?” I asked.

  “I don’t know!” he shouted, throwing his hands in the air.

  “Oh,” I said, finding it impossible to keep the disinterest out of my voice.

  “No, no, Big Guy! Don’t you understand?” he groaned. “I don’t know! . . . Me! There’s nothing I don’t know about computers. I mean, they get more and more sophisticated, but the basic principles remain the same. But this . . .” He paused, again shaking his head. “I never seen anything like it. I been trying to get into it for days.”

  I shrugged, still not seeing the significance of what he was saying.

  “The only thing I do know . . .” he continued, ejecting the disk and holding it up for me, “see that small mark there?”

  I squinted, just about able to make something out, then nodded; more to please him than anything else.

  “That’s government-issue,” he said, looking at me, expecting some kind of reaction, though for the life of me I didn’t know what.

  “You mean . . . some kind of . . . classified information?�
� I ventured, suspecting I was making a fool of myself.

  “Could be.” He nodded, much to my relief.

  “In the garbage?”

  “Wouldn’t be the first time. Stuff gets stored, departments get reorganized; before you know where you are someone has a clear-out and things that shouldn’t go missing disappear.”

  I turned and frowned at the screen. “What could it be?”

  “I don’t have the slightest idea,” he said with a sigh.

  For several minutes I stood watching his fingers chattering away with those keys, trying this, trying that, cursing at whoever had programmed the thing. It was like a fight, only one of the contestants had long left the ring.

  “No good?” I asked, some of his frustration beginning to rub off on me.

  “I got to try to break it down somehow but . . . I don’t know if I’ve got the necessary technology.”

  He jumped up, starting to search through all his various bits and pieces for inspiration, and at that moment, Arturo and Gordie entered.

  “Sorry, guys,” Jimmy said. “No games today.”

  But for once the two of them weren’t interested in playing on the computer. Instead, Gordie kind of nodded toward the door, indicating he and Arturo wanted a word out in the tunnel.

  “What’s up?” I asked.

  “There are others,” he said.

  I paused for a moment, having no idea what he was talking about. “What?”

  “There are others in the Camp who want to get out. Lots of them.”

  For several seconds all I could do was to stare at their anxious little faces as they waited for my reaction. Before I could recover, Arturo started to reel off a lot of names, mostly boys, occasionally girls, and one person who Gordie had to remind him was dead.

  “You want them to come live here?” I asked.

  “Yes,” Gordie told me.

  “You’re kidding, right?”

  “Why not?”

  I made those kind of huffy-puffy noises people do when they think the answer to a question’s so obvious it doesn’t need verbalizing. “Any number of reasons! It’s too much of a risk. Especially the way things are. We don’t have enough food,” I said, like that was just for starters.