For a second I think I see panic on Julian’s face; it flashes there like a warning. Then it’s gone, replaced by a sternness I have seen in his father. He nods once, curtly, and stands, begins pacing the room. I take a perverse pleasure in his agitation. He was so calm at first. It’s gratifying to see him lose it just a little: Down here the protection and certainty offered by the DFA mean nothing.
Just like that we are on opposite sides again. There’s comfort in the morning’s stony silence. It is how things should be. It is right.
I should never have let him touch me. I shouldn’t have even let him get close. In my head, I repeat an apology: I’m sorry. I’ll be careful. No more slipping. I’m not sure whether I’m speaking to Raven or Alex or both.
The water never comes; neither does the food. And then, midmorning, a subtle change in the air: echoes different from the sounds of dripping water and the hollow flow of underground air. For the first time in hours, Julian looks at me.
“Do you hear—,” he starts to say, and I shush him.
Voices in the hall, and heavy boot steps—more than one person is approaching. My heart speeds up, and I look around instinctively for a weapon. Other than the bucket, there isn’t much. I’ve already tried to unscrew the metal bedposts from the cots, with no success. My backpack is on the other side of the room, and just as I’m thinking of making a dive for it—any weapon is better than no weapon at all—locks scrape open and the door swings inward and two Scavengers step into the room. Both of them are carrying guns.
“You.” The Scavenger in front, middle-aged, with the whitest skin I’ve ever seen, points to Julian with the butt of his rifle. “Come on.”
“Where are we going?” Julian asks, although he must know they won’t answer. He is standing, keeping his arms pressed to his sides. His voice is steady.
“We’ll be asking the questions,” the pale man says, and smiles. He has dark-spotted gums, and yellow teeth. He is wearing heavy military-style pants and an old military jacket, but he is a Scavenger beyond a shadow of a doubt. On his left hand I see a faint pattern of a blue tattoo, and as he steps farther into the room, circling Julian like a jackal looping around its prey, my blood goes cold. He has a procedural scar, too, but his is terribly botched: three slashes on his neck, red like gaping wounds. He has tattooed a black triangle between them. Decades ago the procedure was much riskier than it is now, and growing up we heard stories about the people who weren’t cured at all, but turned crazy, or brain-dead, or totally and utterly ruthless—incapable of feeling anything for anyone else, ever.
I try to fight the panic that’s building in my chest, sending my heart into a skittering, erratic rhythm. The second Scavenger, a girl who might be Raven’s age, is leaning in the door frame, blocking my exit. She’s taller than I am but thinner, too. Her face is heavily pierced—I count five rings in each eyebrow, and gems studded into her chin and forehead—as well as what looks like a wedding ring looped through her septum. I don’t want to think about where she got it. She has a handgun strapped to a belt hanging low on her hips. I try to estimate how quickly she could have it out and pointed at my head.
Her eyes flick to mine. She must interpret the expression on my face because she says, “Don’t even think about it.”
Her voice is strange and slurry, and when she opens her mouth to yawn I see it is because her tongue is glinting with metal. Metal studs, metal rings, metal wires: all of it looping on and around her tongue, making her look like she has swallowed barbed wire.
Julian hesitates for only a moment more. He jerks forward—a sudden, wrenching movement—and then recovers. As he passes through the door, flanked on one side by the pierced girl and on the other by the albino, he goes gracefully, as though he’s strolling to a picnic.
He does not look at me, not even once. Then the door grates shut again, and the locks click into place, and I am left alone.
The waiting is an agony. My body feels like it’s on fire. And although I’m hungry, and thirsty, and weak, I can’t stop pacing. I try not to think about what they’ve done with Julian. Maybe he has been ransomed and released after all. But I didn’t like the way the albino smiled and said, We’ ll be asking the questions.
In the Wilds, Raven taught me to look for patterns everywhere: the orientation of the moss on the trees; the level of undergrowth; the color of the soil. She taught me, too, to look for the inconsistencies—an area of sudden growth might mean water. A sudden stillness usually means a large predator is nearby. More animals than usual? More food.
The appearance of the Scavengers is inconsistent, and I don’t like it.
To keep myself busy I unpack and repack my backpack. Then I unpack it again and lay its contents on the ground, as though the sad collection of items is a hieroglyph that might suddenly yield new meaning. Two granola bar wrappers. A tube of mascara. One empty water bottle. The Book of Shhh. One umbrella. I get up, turn a circle, and sit down again.