“Who the hell are they burying?” he says. We stare at each other, not knowing what else to say.
“There you are,” Crab says. We peek over the edge of the table and watch Crab throw his shovel onto the ground.
The two men who carried the body throw aside what remains of their food and stand. “You take that end,” one tells the other.
“Why should I touch the head?” his workmate barks.
“He won’t bite.”
“You take the head then,” he says, and the other man is forced to swap ends.
“One, two, three,” he says, grimacing, and they lift the man by his arms and legs, swing the body, and launch him into the hole where he lands with a crack.
Crab twirls the end of his beard around his finger. “Shall I fill it in?” he asks, nodding at the grave.
“Well, we don’t want it stinking.”
“Doesn’t seem much point if you’re gonna have another delivery for me any day.” Crab picks up his shovel and sticks it into the heap of loose earth.
“Not your place to keep track of these things, Crab,” one of the men says. Crab snorts and covers the dead man with earth. The two deliverymen head back.
“We should’ve run from Sequoia ages ago,” Silas whispers.
“The back gate gives us an escape route. We didn’t know about it until now.”
Silas rubs his head with both hands. The two men are out of sight. If we want to catch them and make it through the door before them, we have to run.
We pick our way through the junk, veering to the right to bypass the men. It’s so dark it’s difficult to see where we’re going, and we’re sprinting so fast, I stumble several times and my boots clank against old metal pipes. Finally the wall appears, and we slam against it, almost knocking ourselves out. I use my hands to feel for the open door. Silas points at it about fifty feet away, but we’re too late. The men saunter out of the scrub and seconds later slip though the door, slamming it behind them. We run and I try the handle. “Locked. We’ll have to climb over the wall,” I say.
“I’m not sure it’s possible,” Silas says, and I’m about to argue when there’s a bang and he crumples to the ground.
I scream and jump just in time to dodge the gravedigger who is aiming his shovel directly for my head.
“Drifters!” Crab yells, grappling for my facemask. I kick him in the chest with both feet and knock him to the ground, giving me a few seconds to grab his facemask. I pull it so hard the tubing comes away from the airtank, and he lashes out. But he isn’t as adept at breathing as the others, and after a few seconds he stops fighting, hacking instead, as the sinewy atmosphere attacks his lungs.
“Give me my mask, you dirty br-brat,” he sputters.
I dash to Silas, refit his facemask, and shake him violently. “Wake up.” I lift his head to see if he’s been injured, but I can’t see much in the dark, and suddenly there’s a rustle behind me and my own facemask is pulled off. I jump up and turn, and as I do, Crab, who looked done for only moments before, puts his hands around my throat. His eyes bulge as he squeezes.
Neither of us has enough air, and together we crumple to the ground.
His hands are clamped so firmly there’s no way he’s letting go. It feels like he might snap my neck. I dig my nails into his hands and scratch his face, fighting, fighting for life. And then a shadow appears above us.
Silas.
Crab releases me and tries to scurry away but Silas has the shovel. Crab covers his eyes with his hands, as though this will protect him, and Silas smacks the shovel against Crab’s head. Crab doesn’t utter another sound and drops to the ground. I shudder and stare at Silas.
Silas throws me his facemask, then retrieves mine and puts it over his own mouth and nose. “He’s dead,” I say.
Silas lifts Crab’s head. “Yes,” he says. A dark, thick liquid oozes from his head onto the earth. A stabbing of regret trickles into me, but I sweep it away: it was him or us. Right?
“No one can find him,” Silas says. He pulls me to my feet.
“What does it matter?” My throat is still stinging.
“They’ll suspect us. I don’t want to be next.”
I bend down and lift Crab’s legs. Silas takes his arms. Blood drips from the gravedigger’s fractured skull.
Quickly, we carry Crab to the hole he dug himself and throw him on top of the other body. “I’ll get the shovel,” Silas says. I stare down at Crab, lying cheek to cheek with the other dead man, their limbs bent all out of shape.
Silas begins filling the hole as soon as he returns, and when his muscles ache, I take over. We work like this until we’re done. “We’re murderers,” I say, wiping my sweaty hands on my trousers.
On our way back we use stones and loose earth to cover the track of Crab’s blood. “Let’s stash the airtank. We may need it later,” Silas says, leaving me by the wall for a few minutes while he finds a good hiding spot.
We still have the problem of how we’re going to get into Sequoia. There don’t seem to be any cameras at this rear exit, but there’s the glass on the wall; it won’t go unnoticed if we turn up to breakfast gashed to pieces from climbing over it.
“Alina,” Silas mutters. He’s on his knees. “A way in. Or out,” he says. I squat next to him and look.
Someone has furrowed a narrow tunnel underneath the wall.
“Can you fit?” I ask.
Silas answers by crawling into the tunnel headfirst. He has to wriggle from side to side to get through, but he does it, and soon after I am through, too, covered from head to toe in dirt. “Hopefully the flood lights are still off,” Silas says.
Tonight we have achieved nothing more than killing a man, and as we head for the cabin, one word repeats itself in my head:
That is what I have become.
32
QUINN
I’m awoken by arguing. “Quit nudging me!” the boy groans from his cell.
“But you won’t stop snoring,” the girl says.
“I can’t help it.”
I turn over on the hard slab of concrete. They’re standing face-to-face and grappling with each other through the bars. The girl sees me watching and stops.
“What did
“Nothing,” I say. “But seems like that’s enough here.” The girl squeals with laughter. She hits the boy as she continues to titter. It’s not a genuine laugh: she’s hysterical. “Is there a way out?” I ask. There’s a sliver of a window by the roof, but that’s about it.
“I wouldn’t try to escape, if I were you,” the boy says. He pulls up his shirt to show me his chest, which is covered in bruises.
“Maks?” I ask.
He nods and puts his hands between the bars to pull up the back of the girl’s shirt. Her skin is crisscrossed with red welts. “He beat me and whipped her,” he says. “Because we stole an airtank. That was it.”
I dry heave. I miss Bea, but thank goodness I didn’t bring her here.
Keys rattle in the lock and Maks pushes open the door. The boy and girl scuttle to the backs of their cells and watch as he approaches me. “Exciting news. Vanya’s forgiven you, which means you have a busy day of exams ahead.”
“Exams?”
