Rebel Young

Part 9

I took a step back to admire the damage we'd caused. The air around us was now filled with particles of white dust. We'd succeeded in creating a sizeable hole in the false wall. I poked my head through to observe what we'd uncovered. 

A set of stairs led further underground from the tunnel system. There was another false wall on the other side of the stairwell. Someone was definitely hiding something down here, but why would they go to all of this trouble?

I hesitantly climbed through the hole and waited for Jack to follow. He flicked on the torch and followed through before leading the way down the staircase. Our footsteps echoed eerily on the rough stones of the stairs and the torchlight was steadily dimming. We needed to find a way out soon, or we'd be exploring the underground passageways in complete darkness. 

The steep staircase ended suddenly in a heavy steel door. Jack knocked on the door and jiggled the handle. It was firmly locked. I pulled a lock-pick out of my pack and handed it to Jack. He knelt down and inserted the pick. Moments later the door swung noisily inwards.

"That was fast," I remarked.

"I've had practise"Jack grimaced.

I picked up the torch from where Jack had placed it on the ground and flashed it into the room we'd revealed. A table placed in the centre of the room was strewn with blueprints, newspapers articles and documents. The far wall was covered with photographs, intricate diagrams and maps. 

"What is this place?" Jack whispered.

"It looks, kind of like an, an office," I stuttered.

"Yeah, but why is it deep underground, and why was so much effort taken to hide this place?"

I took a step into the room and placed my hand on the tabletop. It came away clean, not a speck of dust. Someone had been here recently. Jack picked one of the documents and scanned his eyes over it. I glanced over at the maps on the wall. They were all of different areas in the city with streets and buildings highlighted. There was a list of coordinates pinned next to the map of the city centre. 

"Jack is your GPS back online?" I asked.

"A few of the functions. Why?" he responded.

"Would you be able to key in these coordinates?" I requested.

He walked over to stand next to me and scanned the coordinates on the wall. A few moments later we had our answer. 

"Why would coordinates to the Lab be on a wall all the way down here?" I wondered. 

Jack picked up a sheet of paper from the table behind us, skimming the words. 

"That's weird," he murmured before moving to scan another page. 

"What's weird?" 

"There's information here on the patrols and profiles on the city's Talented," Jack explained.

"Does that mean there's information on us in this room somewhere?"

"There's definitely something about me in here, but I'm not sure about you. We only discovered your Talents today, whoever it is that works down here can't be that efficient."

"Yeah, but I'm part of the patrols."

"Good point."

Jack and I spent the next half an hour trawling through the papers on the table. There was information about every single person in the city patrols and defence forces. Lists of coordinates that all led straight to safe houses, monuments and the homes of government officials.

"Why is all of this down here. It doesn't make any sense!" Jack growled. 

"Yes it does. The attack today can't have been completely random, something must have triggered it. There is information here on every form of defence the city has in place."

"I think you're on to something April, but who is responsible for this?"

"I don't know Jack, I don't know, but we're both tired and stressed out. Looking through all of this stuff isn't going to help us. We need to find a way out of here and into the fresh air, and I need to find somewhere to spend the night," I yawned.

"Fine, there must be an exit inside this room," Jack reluctantly conceded.

I picked up the torch and flashed it around the edges of the room. The light caught on a small protrusion.

"There," I stated. 

We collected our things and went over to inspect the wall. A thin ladder was concealed against the wall. I hooked my fingers into a rung at head height and began the climb into a small shaft in the ceiling. I was met at the top by a square metal trapdoor. I rammed my shoulder into it and pushed upwards. The heavy trapdoor grated open and suddenly I was out of the shaft. Jack followed through and for the first time in hours we both took a deep breath of clear oxygen. 

"I know where this is," Jack declared, "Come on, we're not that far from the Lab."

We didn't get very far before we were forced to hide in one of the narrow, dark alleys. The city as crawling with enemy soldiers. They were everywhere, like ants. The sun had set while we were underground, providing us with plenty of places to hide out of sight, but made it harder to see exactly where the soldiers were.  

"How far are we from the Lab?" I asked Jack.

"Only a few blocks," Jack replied.

Another group of soldiers marched past the cramped alleyway. 

"We have to just take our chances and make a break for it-" I started to say.

Jack suddenly grabbed my hand and started running. A shout sounded from behind us followed by the sound of a gun being shot. I felt a bullet narrowly miss my ear as we sprinted down the street. Several more gunshots sounded from behind us. Jack darted down an alleyway and pulled me in behind him. 

"The Lab is just down here, the passcode for the lock is 2303. I'm going to try and lead the soldiers away," Jack panted. 

"No Jack, I'm not leaving you out here alone," I responded.

"You have to, just go," Jack commanded.

Before I could say another word Jack disappeared back into the street. I cringed as a gunshot sounded in the distance. Turning around, I located the entrance to the Lab and imputed the code. The doorway opened and I took a shaky breath in before entering the Lab alone.