Suddenly she leaned down and pressed one of the caps on the toilet’s base that covered the screw holding it to the floor. Tim and I shot each other lightning glances as Ms. Strepp stepped back quickly… and the painted brick wall opened smoothly and turned, revealing a perfectly hidden narrow hallway.
“What I had been expecting” had taken a left turn back when she locked us in the bathroom. Now, as she stepped through the doorway into an inky darkness, I had no idea what to think. Cooler air wafted toward us from the opening, and her calloused white hand motioned us to follow her. Maybe she was taking us to be eliminated. Maybe we’d been left behind because we had no value. Maybe we were going back to prison, like the Crazy House.
There was no way I’d be the fraidy-cat and make Tim go first, so I stepped boldly into the darkness, praying that nothing would spring out at me. I was glad when I felt Tim’s warmth close to my back.
She pushed the fake wall closed and we were in darkness. Absolute, utter, creepy, no doubt spider-filled darkness.
17
AUTOMATICALLY I BLINKED AND OPENED my eyes wide but couldn’t see a damn thing, not even my hand two inches from my face. I heard a click and one dim, bare bulb cast a completely inadequate fuzzy corona of light that illuminated precisely nothing. But my eyes adjusted rapidly, and I could make out… a worn rope ladder hanging against a dank brick wall. It led up maybe ten feet, maybe a hundred. No way to tell.
Ms. Strepp took hold of one side of the rope ladder, jerked her head at me, and said, “Up!”
Yes, climb up to hell, Cassie, I thought, but made my face blank, refusing to show fear. Grabbing hold of the dirty ladder, I cautiously put one foot on the bottom rung, testing to see if it would hold my weight. It did.
Rung by rung, I climbed up into nothingness. Once I glanced down and saw Tim holding the other side of the rope ladder, looking up at me. Though he wasn’t Nate, he was a friend, and I was glad we were together. The air grew warmer the higher I climbed and then suddenly as I pulled myself up another rung my head banged hard on a ceiling.
My breath hissed in as I swallowed a cry of pain. What had been the point of this? My anger rekindled and I glared down the ladder, knowing they couldn’t see me.
“Are you okay?” Tim asked, having obviously heard the dull thunk of my skull.
“Yes,” I said, tight-lipped.
“Push upward,” Ms. Strepp ordered.
I lifted one hand and pushed. Nothing happened. Gritting my teeth, I lowered my head and pressed against the ceiling with my back. Something moved a bit, so I gathered my strength and pushed again. It was a trapdoor leading into… yes, that would be more utter darkness. A musty smell floated down and surrounded me like smoky gray fingers. I climbed to the next rung and ga
ve a big shove, and the trapdoor rose and flopped over with a loud bang! Instantly, fine dust roiled out of the opening, making me gag. I closed my mouth and held my nose shut.
I didn’t have to be told: I climbed up the last few rungs and pulled myself through the trapdoor, which was about three feet square. I uncoiled myself slowly, not knowing if I would hit my head again, but finally I was standing upright. Tim’s head and broad shoulders were barely visible, coming through the trapdoor. Ms. Strepp followed him and once she was up I heard another click and a single lightbulb hanging down on its cord cast a circle of light around us.
Blasé resentment faded as I stared around, stunned. One by one, more bare lightbulbs flickered on. Click, click, click.
“Jeez,” Tim said. “What the hell is this stuff?”
“Where are we?” I blurted at almost the same time.
“In a place no one in the world knows about except me, and now you two,” Ms. Strepp said, barely above a whisper.
18
BECCA
THE SUN ROSE AS WE, Squad Six, reached the top of the hill east of the camp. We made our way through the trees, avoiding stepping on branches, not touching anything, trying to leave as few marks in the snow as possible.
We were an hour in and I’d already learned some important things. Like, when you’re the advance scout, no one has gone before you to tell you about the dangers. You find out by surprise! Word to the wise: Always look up, because mountain lions apparently like to lurk in trees.
Another thing I’d learned was that kids could be trained to be tough, fearless, grade-A soldiers and still manage to be a bunch of little shits.
By mid-morning I was convinced that Strepp had given me the Squad Least Likely to Survive. This was probably yet another of her incessant tests—testing my leadership skills. Leadership is basically being able to convince people to do what you want. I’d been great at that since I was a little kid. But these guys were, so far, resistant to my charm.
One boy, Mills, seemed to resent the fact that I was younger than he was, and female. I figured I would have to take him down, hard, in the very near future. So there were perks to being a leader.
Another boy, Levi, was a sweet fourteen-year-old who shouldn’t be here or allowed around weapons. He seemed to live in his own world—sort of loping along, talking or singing quietly to himself, occasionally pointing out a pretty bird or a beaver or something. Of course I’d taken him aside and had the “Be silent or we all die” talk, but its effect was already wearing off.
Bunny was tall, tough, and strong, and I was happy to have her. But she had a hair-trigger temper and saw danger everywhere. More than once I’d had to knock her rifle down because she’d been about to shoot at, like, a woodpecker or something. “Guns are loud, Bunny,” I’d hissed, and she’d nodded curtly at me like, Yeah, but, woodpecker!
To top it off, there was Jolie, and I only knew her name because she had spelled it into my hand. Jolie was deaf. I hadn’t realized it for a while because she looked totally badass. Her head was shaved except for a long blue Mohawk running from her forehead to the nape of her neck. Her ears, nose, and one eyebrow were pierced, and her collar covered most of a tattoo on her neck. It was only after she had ignored my whispered commands a couple times that I had grabbed her shoulder. She’d whirled on me, knife in hand, black eyes blazing.