Awake

Chapter Fifty-Four - A Valid Point

They didn't hurry on their long walk back from the beach. They moved slowly as their rations reduced and their conversation swelled and died. They slept another night amongst the trees, round a campfire, watching the stars overhead.

They had found no sign of human life but, in the end, they thought it better that way. Better that they should emerge and rebuild their lives unhindered than become immediately subject to the ideas and governments of others, become immediately inferior, a freak show of these underground people.

Eventually, Nigs swore the valley swooping up to enclose them was the one where the door was situated and, sure enough, they found the gaping entrance set deep in the earth, an expectant mouth waiting to swallow them whole. They stood and watched it, none of them wanting to be the first to sacrifice what they had found.

"Into the lion's den?" Miriam suggested, eventually.

"Into the mouth of hell," Carmen muttered, but she was the first to step back over the threshold.

They closed the outside door behind them, locking it again. Jonathan pocketed the key. It took all six of them to open the internal door, pulling and scraping and throwing themselves at it until at last it ground inward, scattering them to the floor.

They were inside again, their brief respite over. Back underground, back in a warzone, back amongst their responsibilities and dangers and griefs. All the frantic hope they had nourished outside was cut off immediately.

There was a soldier waiting for them, a boy none of them knew. He cried out involuntarily when he saw them, his hands flying to his mouth, his eyes stark and staring.

"I know, we're alive," Jonathan smiled faintly. "Shocking, isn't it?"

The soldier recovered himself fast, throwing a salute in for good measure.

"You are to report downstairs immediately," he gabbled. "Commander Armstrong begs you to hurry."

"Commander Arm...Natalia," Jonathan breathed out, understanding. "What's going on? Has there been an attack?"

The soldier shook his head. "No, sir. Negotiations, sir."

There was something about the way he said the word that made it sound far more dangerous than any attack could ever be.

Natalia sat on her chair, straight-backed, glowering out into the room. Kaede sat beside her, her face blankly furious. Behind them amassed the ranks of the youth corps, all uniformed and divided into their groups, muttering amongst themselves. Opposite them, on the other side of the room, were crammed the soldiers from the sub-dwellings.

Natalia wondered if this was all of them or only a representation. If this was the full number of lives in Subterra now, there were far fewer than she had ever expected and, though they seemed terrifying in mass now, a fight would not be so impossible to win, if it came to it.

Emilia had the leading seat on their side of the room, with her husband on her right. She met Natalia's eyes across the empty space and there was something of regret in them, a friendly commiseration. Neither of them had wanted it to come to this.

Natalia glanced anxiously towards the door. She had sent a soldier up to the door, following careful instructions, in order to wait for Jonathan, should he return. She needed him now. She needed his help.

She looked back to Emilia, who was watching her carefully. Natalia nodded very slightly. Emilia stood up and the hall fell silent, all conversation dying away. Everyone was watching the young woman, as she turned to face the adults behind her.