CRYERS (7 page)

Surprisingly, Trot asked the most
intelligent question next. “If you’ve already been to this island, why did you come
back to Burn? If the people there are so accepting, why come back to the likes
of Lode and all them other mean folks?”

“Them mean folks can be taught to
think different...eventually. When they stop fearing each other, maybe they’ll
start working together. That’s the way things used to be….Hopefully it can be
like that again someday.”

“Like it was when there were
cities?” Trot asked.

Lawson shrugged and they continued
toward the hills. Cobe wanted to ask why the lawman allowed people to be hung
and cut. He also wanted to know why his parents had to die. But deep down, Cobe
already knew the answer: Lawson kept the order. He saw justice—however cruel
and wrong—served. He worked under Lode. That confused Cobe more than anything.
Why had Lawson abandoned those misguided ideals and left? Why had he helped
them escape Burn, instead of taking them back to hang?

The closer they got, the more
unusual the hills became. They weren’t like any other hills Cobe had seen close
to Burn, or any of the others they’d travelled along and over in the last two
days. It seemed more like one low-sloping wall running north and south forever.
It wasn’t a difficult climb to the top. The ground was hard and nothing grew out
of it. Trot, still sitting on Dust, saw what lay beyond first. He made a
gasping sound. Willem ran ahead of his brother and whistled, as he had a habit
of doing when something impressed him.

Cobe caught up and stood next to
him, taking it all in. The hill was one big wall that stretched all around them
in uniform circle. It wasn’t until they reached the top that Cobe was able to
make out its massive size. A copper smudge sunset hung directly over the far
side, threatening to sink into the black shadows of a crater wall—five miles,
if not more, away. It was hard to judge the distance of such a massive thing
from so far away. The remaining day cast a weak crescent of light on the side
the four were standing on. The hill dropped before them, steeper on the inside,
into a confusion of twisted shadows. At the bottom, Cobe saw the beginning of
what looked like a giant sheet of black. If it were earlier in the day, and if
the sun were able to shine through the clouds, Cobe would be able to see it
more clearly for what it was: water. A still lake of liquid sitting three miles
across.

Trot wrinkled his nose. “Smells
like farts.”

Lawson spit onto the gray ground. “Water
will do that when it sits too long in one spot.”

“Why have we come here?” Willem
asked.

“This is the place where we’ll find
your payment onto Victory Island.”

Cobe shook his head. “Books? Down
in all that shit?”

“We’re not going into that
shit…we’re going beneath it. Welcome to Big Hole.”

2269

1,742 meters beneath the surface of what once was Dauphin

253 kilometers northwest of
where Winnipeg, Manitoba once stood

It had been almost two full
centuries since Lothair started counting the seconds of his new life— all
6,275,664,007
of them. He was still
keeping track of time, along with a few other things. Lothair had written 1,612
novels. He’d taken them from rough draft through to fully-edited versions—in
his mind—fit for publication. Lothair doubted there were any publishers left
above to print his stories, and even if there were, he knew none of them would
take him on. Lothair’s words and sentences were perfect, his grammar flawless.
He had written tales of suspense, epic fantasy, romance, and science-fiction,
but none of it had
feeling
.

People were murdered; they fell in
love and got married. Some of these people cheated on their spouses, and they
were murdered again. They sailed the high seas and travelled beyond the stars.
They rode horses into the sunset. But not anywhere in those 702,836 estimated
pages was there a hint of author’s voice. Lothair
knew
this. He wasn’t needy or vain—those were emotions he no longer
remembered. His stories would never sell because they lacked
human
feeling.

Lothair wrote novels, composed
music, created a dozen new languages, and researched all the fields of science.
Another part of his brain trained on the time. Lothair did all of these things
and more.

He had no other choice.

When he let things slide, the
hunger would press at his gut like a stone. When he wasn’t solving mathematical
equations and philosophizing about ancient life in Egypt and Rome, Lothair
wanted to eat his hands.

He needed to keep busy.

Lothair’s books had no voice. His
songs, though melodic, lacked spirit. The emotional part of him was two-hundred
years dead. If he was capable of feeling sadness, he might have cried.

Lothair Eichberg had no soul.

They walked along the crater’s edge
until they come across a rusted bar of metal sticking six feet out of the
ground. It was bent halfway up, leaning out and away from Big Hole. Cobe watched
as his brother poked a finger through one of the holes that ran along its
length every few inches. The metal was an inch thick, and Cobe couldn’t imagine
any force strong enough to put the unnatural bend into it. There was an old
bucket hanging near the top, banged in with a dozen dents, but still able to
hold water. Lawson filled it halfway with one of the three remaining leather
canteens. Dust began to drink from it noisily.

“Dust here can’t make the trip
below, so I had to find a way of keepin’ him up top—nice and safe while I was
away. There’s tons of scrap metal down the sides if you dig around some. Found
the pail about a quarter-mile down my first time. Been pickin’ for crap ever
since. But the good stuff is down under the water…the
real
good stuff.”

Willem was sitting cross-legged on
the ground. He picked nervously at the hard earth. “How long we going to be…away?”

“A few hours, providing the bunch
of you listen to everything I say and don’t go wanderin’ off.” Lawson looked
directly at Trot. His fat face was sweaty, his eyes fear-filled. The lawman
thought again, and filled Dust’s water bucket all the way to the top”

They started down slowly, mindful
of the steepness in the gathering dark. Cobe grabbed Trot as his foot caught on
a rock, stopping the man from plunging over head first. Trot thanked him and
started to slide down on his rear-end.

“How we gonna see down there?”
Willem asked. “We ain’t got no lanterns…not even a gawdamn torch.”

“There’ll be light.”

Cobe reached for his brother’s hand
and helped him along. “It’s alright. I’ll be with you the whole way.”

They descended another half-mile.
It was almost fully dark now, and the stench from the sitting water below had
become overpowering. Cobe plugged his nostrils with his free hand and pitied
Willem for not being able to do the same.

There was a conglomeration of
twisted metal below that the lawman was headed for. “Careful now; things can
get tricky if you don’t watch yer step.” Tricky was an understatement. They
climbed down into the maze of ruined metal. It was rough and pitted through
with rust, tearing at their dirty clothes and scratching at exposed skin. Lawson
spoke quietly of what they were descending through—listing off words Cobe had
never heard before: girders, support beams, buttresses, and rebar. It meant
little to him and his brother, and it probably registered even less with Trot.

“Cities were all metal and concrete
back then,” he explained. “Buildings reached high in the sky and burrowed deep
down in the ground.”

Willem grumbled. “Who’d wanna live
in the ground…gawdamn rats is who.”

Trot squeezed under a wrinkled
sheet of brown iron, following the boys and Lawson into spaces he wasn’t
entirely sure he could fit through. “Please don’t tell me there are rats down
here.”

“Rats are the least o’ yer worries,”
Lawson said, from somewhere deeper down. “Here it is…the opening.”

Trot squeezed into a narrow hollow of
earth with the others, where there was just enough room for the four to stand.
Lawson had to slouch over, however, where jagged remnants of concrete and
shards of heavy metal screening poked through. Their eyes adjusted to the dark,
and Cobe watched his brother sink to his knees. His face was lit in a weak
purple glow, his eyes wide and unblinking. He was crouched in front of an
opening in the dirt wall. Cobe kneeled down beside Willem and peered into a
three-foot high square passage leading into the light.

Lawson spoke, causing the boys to
jump. “It’s the only way in or out that I’ve ever found. Don’t be afraid;
there’s no one and nothing inside. The place is too well-hidden. Them folks
that once lived inside, below and above, have long since passed on.”

Cobe could feel a slight waft of
cool air pushing against his face from somewhere beyond. It smelled foul, but
nowhere near as bad as the water sitting outside. He ran his fingers along the
inside of one of the crumbling concrete walls. Bits gave way in small pieces. “We’re
gonna squeeze through there? You sure it won’t fall in on us?”

“It’s held up for centuries, maybe
longer…I reckon it’ll hold for a few more hours.” He pushed between the boys
and started through on his hands and knees. “It ain’t far.”

Cobe went in after Willem. He could
hear Trot behind him, panting like a trapped dog.
Ain’t far
was two minutes of claustrophobic scrambling that felt
more like two hours with Trot breathing hard on his heels. He finally spilled
out of the tunnel, and would’ve fallen face first into the ground—four feet
below—if Lawson hadn’t picked him out of the air.

“Easy now,” Lawson whispered, even
though he’d assured them no one was inside. He reached in for Trot and helped
the jiggling mass of panic out and down to his feet. “There, that wasn’t such a
hard thing to do, was it?”

None of them answered. They were
studying their new surroundings too intently. Cobe had never seen anything like
it. The walls of the hallway were white and curved outward. Metal pipes ran
down the length both ways as far as he could see, bundled with other strange
cords that looked like smooth ropes, but of varying colors.

Willem touched the wall and looked
at his brother. “Feels warm almost, like wood, but hard like rock. Where the
fuck are we?”

The more scared Willem became, the
more he swore. Cobe could think of a few choice words of his own, but was too
dumbfounded to use any of them. Trot was staring at the curved ceiling,
marveling at the single strip of dull, mauve light. It flickered, like a fire
would dance, but without throwing heat. He reached up to touch it and Lawson
smacked his hand down.

“If you don’t know what it is or
how it works, don’t touch it. Don’t touch
any
gawdamn thing down here.” Trot began to whimper. The lawman patted his
shoulder. “Ain’t yer fault, Trot. I should’ve left you up top to keep Dust
company.”

A tear fell from Trot’s eye. He wiped
it away quickly, hoping the others—and especially Lawson—wouldn’t notice. “I’m
sorry. It’s just all so strange…there ain’t nothing like this back in Burn.
I’ll do what you say. I’ll stay close and won’t touch nothing no more.”

Lawson started down the hall. Cobe
and Willem asked more about the lights and the odd tangles of narrow ropes tied
in with the pipes. He shrugged and kept moving. “It would take a lifetime or
two learning how places like this worked. There’s light, it’s warm enough, and
the air is fit to breathe. That’s all you need to know.”

It started to feel like an unending
dream to Cobe the farther they went. The tunnel curved this way and that. People
had built this, he thought, hundreds, if not thousands, of people.
Where had they found all the material? Where
had they all gone?

The circular passageway came to an end and merged with a rectangular
one. Lawson pointed to a sign above and behind their heads. It indicated a name
for the area they had just travelled through. He told them all to remember
where they were, in case any of them became separated from the rest. Cobe
studied the words:

LEVEL A SUB-JUNCTION 12

EMERGENCY EXIT
B

He didn’t know what they meant, and since the lawman
was the only other one that could read, he couldn’t see the point of anyone
else even looking at them—unless they committed the sign’s shape and letters to
memory. Willem might be able to do that, but not Trot.

There were doors lining this hallway, spaced on either
side, twenty feet apart. Willem tested the metal handle of one and Lawson
snapped at him. “If you don’t know where it goes, don’t touch.”

The boy asked, “You know where they go?”

Lawson shrugged. “Some. Most are locked.”

“Maybe there’s food inside this one.” Willem ran his
finger along the faded black letters set in the center of the door that read
JANITORIAL.

“No food,” the lawman answered, and walked on. They
turned a corner and he stopped at the first door to their right. Lawson gripped
the handle tightly and there was a click. Cobe heard a hissing sound as the
door popped open an inch. Lawson removed his hand and it continued to open
slowly outward on its own accord. Willem swore and Trot made a squeaking noise.

“How’s it doing that?” Cobe asked. He peeked into the
widening space. “There someone on the other side?”

“Ain’t no one in this place no more,” the lawman
replied. Cobe noticed his hand was now resting on the handle of his gun.
No one that you’re aware of
.

They entered a small, dimly lit room. The door started
to swing back closed all on its own. There was another hissing sound as it
sealed itself tight. The lights grew a little brighter. There was a desk on the
far side with a rotted corpse sprawled over the surface. Trot pulled on the
door handle, attempting to get out, but the door wouldn’t open.

“Relax,” Lawson said. “That thing’s been dead for
years.”

Willem crept forward and stared at the grisly remains.
It was more bone than anything, with a few bits of dried flesh clinging to the
ribs and leg bones. He touched the skin and it flaked away like dried paper.

“What did I tell you ‘bout touching things?” Lawson
asked.

Cobe stood behind his brother. “Is that a howler?”

“It was.”

Cobe’s eyes were drawn to the grotesquely long nails
on its fingers and toes. They were long and curled in, like gray talons. There
were little chunks of matter surrounding the thing’s head, and larger pieces
littered the floor directly beneath. They looked like balls of dust sitting in
a pool of dried blood.

“What…happened to it?”

“I blew the side of its head off a long time ago when
it tried to tear my throat out. That crap on the floor is what’s left of the
brains.”

Cobe and Willem stepped back at the same time. Even
after so long the air still smelled slightly rotten. Dead things never stop
stinking, Cobe thought. Lawson stepped around the desk and went to a second
door behind an overturned chair. He squeezed the handle and the clicking,
hissing process started again.

“You come here a lot?” Trot asked nervously.

“Only when I need supplies.” He tapped the holster at
his side. Supplies, Cobe gathered, meant guns and ammunition. “Don’t go
worrying yerself. I ain’t seen another howler down here since that first time.”

Cobe recalled an expression his mother used to say:
There’s a first time for everything.
His
heart felt heavy as he remembered the sound of her voice. Another thought came
to him:
if something happens once, it can
happen again
.

They entered another long hallway with doors on both
sides. There weren’t handles on these ones, only small squares set into the
center with a series of small buttons. Willem went to touch one but remembered
the lawman’s warning. Lawson looked at the boy with a half-smile. “Go on…give
it a try.”

Willem touched
a button—the one dead center labelled ‘5’—and it beeped. He jumped back and Lawson
made a low grumbling sound. The noise when he laughed sounded painful to Cobe.
Lawson pressed some more buttons and a female voice spoke:

“Incorrect.
Please enter your six-digit access code again.”

Trot spun in a
circle and almost fell looking for the voice’s source. None of them—save maybe
the lawman—knew it had come from the tiny round grill below the numbers pad.
Lawson punched in six more random numbers, hit the red button marked ENTER on
the side, and the voice spoke again.

“Incorrect.
Please enter your six-digit access code again…Warning—This is your third and
final attempt.”

Lawson looked at Cobe. “You give it a go. Punch some
numbers.”

Cobe pressed
the numbers one through six and hit ENTER, as the lawman had.

“Incorrect.
Please seek an ABZE representative for further assistance.”

“Who’s Abzy?” Trot asked.

Lawson shrugged
again, implying he didn’t have a clue. Cobe suspected he knew more but couldn’t
be bothered trying to explain it to the simple-minded man. There were more
letters stamped into the metal above the keypad—once black, now faded gray—that
Cobe hadn’t noticed before:

AARON, JAMES,
D. – ATLANTA, GA

“Is this where people used to live?”

“It’s where they came to rest,” Lawson answered
solemnly.

Trot was twisting the rope around his waist. Sweat
glistened in rings under his eyes. “These were homes?”

“Resting places…as in, it’s where they put people
after they died…in a sense.”

Cobe didn’t like the sound of that, and Willem asked, “What
do you mean
in a sense
? Yer either
dead or you ain’t.”

“You would
think so,” Lawson answered quietly and started down the hallway. They passed
more doors with identical keypads set in the middle and different names stamped
above.