Chapter Thirty-three

Flashback

"How did you know we've been using that tunnel?" Linda asked Spilker and Gates as the guards prepared to lead us to the Crank pits. The thought of what we were about to be faced with terrified us; we'd all seen the horrors the Flare unleashed, though this was the first time we would be faced with it since arriving at WICKED. And, as Linda said, there was the question of how our use of the tunnel had been discovered. Had one of the other girls in our dormitory let something slip? If so, who? My friends and I had always been careful to cover our tracks, make sure we left no incriminating evidence at the end of each night's foray into Group A. But maybe we hadn't been careful enough.

"Never you mind how we knew," Gates retorted. "All that matters is that you broke the rules and need to be taught a lesson." She turned to the guards who had captured us. "Right, take them away. And we'd better make sure none of the other Group B subjects can get into that passage, especially given what we've got planned for the laboratory where it emerges."

Before any of us could ask about whatever it was WICKED had planned for the laboratory, not that we would have received a particularly informative answer, the guards took us by our arms and began to escort us in the direction of the Crank pits. We tried to resist at first, terrified at the thought of being forced near those whose humanity had been destroyed by the Flare. We had good reason to be afraid; Cranks, particularly those in whom the Flare had reached an advanced stage, were like all the nightmares of childhood combined. And, unlike the horrors found in storybooks, they were all too real, all too capable of killing us. As Immunes, we had nothing to fear from the Flare virus itself, but our immunity wouldn't protect us if the Cranks decided we might taste good.

Needless to say, our resistance proved futile, for the simple reason that we were kids and the guards were adults. And so we were led deep into the bowels of the complex that was both home and prison to us. Presently, we found ourselves in a darkened tunnel, seemingly endless blackness which added to the terror we were already experiencing. And then I heard it, a burst of manic laughter that could only have come from one of the Cranks. I shuddered, imagining the horrors that awaited me at the end of this journey. Thanks to the pitch dark of the tunnel, I couldn't even see my own sister, though I knew she was there, as were Indira and Sonya. Harriet and Miyoko were still trying to evade the guards who had been sent after them - at least I hoped they were - and Flossie had been taken somewhere to watch our punishment on a screen since her lack of immunity meant it was too dangerous to send her to the Crank pits.

The Crank pits. We were halted in front of a chained and padlocked gate and, after one of the guards had shone a flashlight in our faces, presumably to check that we were all present, another walked over to the gate and removed the padlock and chain. I heard the clank of metal falling to the floor, the sound echoing in the tunnel. The guard who had unlocked the gate pushed it open, then turned to us.

"Get through there," he said, pointing in the direction of the gate. "And let this be a lesson next time you're tempted to break bounds."

My friends and I exchanged glances in the light of the guard's flashlight. None of us wanted to set foot in the hellhole which awaited us, but we knew there was no way we could avoid doing so. If we refused to go through the gate willingly, there was no telling what WICKED might do. But an organisation who thought sending kids into a place filled with crazed maniacs was an appropriate punishment was probably capable of pretty much anything. Presently, Indira took a deep breath and walked through the gate, followed by Sonya, then Linda. Deciding I would rather be with my sister and my friends than alone with the guards, I followed.

As soon as we were all inside the Crank pits, the gate was padlocked again and the guard with the flashlight took up position, shining the beam in our direction. Not that it did much good; the blackness seemed to swallow it up. The guards were talking and, as we stood there, we heard a little of their conversation.

"How long should we give them?"

"As long as it takes for the lesson to sink in. A couple of hours should do it."

"And the other two?"

"Same for them - if they're caught."

"What do you mean "if they're caught"? Do you think two seven-year-old girls can hide from our guys forever?"

That was as much as we heard before other sounds caught our attention, sounds which seemed to be coming from the other side of the fence that lined both sides of the path on which we stood. And then we saw them coming towards us. Cranks. Dozens of them. An insane mass of beings who used to be human until the Flare virus started destroying their minds. Now they were like something out of a nightmare, driven by madness, eager to tear us limb from limb. Fortunately, we had the fence to protect us from these horrors, not that it stopped them from trying to get to us; several of them reached through the bars with their grasping hands, many of which were missing at least one finger. And all the while they screamed and shouted, though most of them had reached the stage where they were no longer capable of any form of meaningful conversation.

Then, amid the nightmarish clamour of the Cranks, I heard one of them utter five words. "Have you seen my babies?" The speaker was a young woman, her eyes bearing the same empty look as the rest of the Cranks, though she was cleaner than some of the others, many of whom looked (and smelled) like they hadn't washed for some time. "My babies," she went on. "They've been stolen from me! I want them back!" And, with that, she flung herself at the fence and started attacking it. "Where are my babies?!" she screamed, tears pouring down her face. "Give me back my babies!"

She continued like this for several minutes, ranting and raving about "her babies", demanding to know where they were, pleading for them to be given back to her. Not that this meant anything; chances were she was just another Crank who had strayed onto WICKED's property and ended up in the pits with others infected with the Flare virus. She probably didn't even have any babies, but, in her insanity, she believed she did and she wanted them back. And she was completely fixated on these almost certainly non-existent babies to the point where her Flare-addled mind could focus on nothing else.

For the rest of our time in the Crank pits, we kept as far away from the seething mass of ruined humanity as we could, watching them with a mix of fascination and horror. I could only pick out a few individuals, one of them being the woman who kept screaming for "her babies". Apart from her, the following stood out. A middle-aged man who was stark naked, having apparently abandoned his clothes in a fit of insanity. A dark-skinned woman who wept and giggled alternately; it must have been her I heard laughing while I was being led towards this hellhole. A teenaged boy with brown hair who kept repeating the words "I want my mom" over and over. I knew this didn't mean anything - he probably didn't realise what he was saying - but hearing those words made me think of my own mother and how she had been murdered by WICKED. Even after more than a year, I still missed her. More than anything, I wanted her to come and get me, and Linda and Neil, away from here, but I knew I would never see her again.

At some point - I can't say when because we had no means of keeping track of time - the gate was opened and Harriet and Miyoko were roughly shoved in with the rest of us. Then, before we could even think about trying to escape, the gate was slammed shut and its chain and padlock replaced. The guards took up their positions once more, not that we had any way of getting out of here until they released us; the gate was impossible to climb and, even if we could get over it, doing so would only land us in even more trouble than we were in already. It was hard to imagine a punishment worse than the Crank pits, but WICKED were probably more than capable of devising one if they had to. So we just had to sit tight and wait until our two hours were up.

Two hours feels like a very long time to children, especially if they have no way of knowing how much time has passed since they were thrown into a nightmarish prison. I was beginning to think the gate would never be opened, that we would be left here for the rest of our lives. And, given how young we were, that could be a long time yet. Unless the Cranks could somehow breach the fence and get to us, in which case we wouldn't have to worry about how long we would be stuck down here; even unarmed, they had the advantage in terms of numbers and six pre-pubescent girls probably looked like a tasty snack to some of them. I tried not to think about this, but it wasn't easy when those who might be planning to add me to the menu were only a few feet away.

Eventually, however, the gate was opened and one of the guards turned to us. "Your time's up," was all he said. We immediately rushed towards the gate, not wanting to stay in this hellhole a moment longer, but, before we could set foot out of the Crank pits, the guard stopped us. "Not Harriet and Miyoko; they haven't served their full two hours. The rest of you will come with me."

Leaving Harriet and Miyoko in the Crank pits, Linda, Indira, Sonya and I followed the guard as he led us back to the Group B sector. None of us spoke the whole way, the memories of what we had seen weighing heavy on our minds. The Cranks, once human beings like us, now reduced to the level of wild beasts. I felt a mixture of pity and revulsion as I thought of what I had seen, pity for those who had fall victim to the Flare virus, revulsion at the thought of what it had turned them into. Never before had I seen so many Cranks in one place and I hoped I would never have to do so again.

The guard escorted us as far as our dormitory, at which point he turned to us. "Well," he said, "I hope you've learned something from your little adventure, namely that rules are not to be broken. And, if you ever need reminding of that, we can easily arrange another trip to the Crank pits. Is that understood?"

Needless to say, none of us wanted to go back to the Crank pits, so we quickly mumbled: "Yes, sir." The guard nodded grimly, apparently satisfied that we had learned our lesson, then turned and walked away, heading back to the Crank pits where Harriet and Miyoko were still imprisoned, locked in with several dozen Flare-infected maniacs. As soon as he was out of sight, we went straight to our bunks, waving aside the usual clamour of questions from the others. We didn't have the vocabulary to describe what we had seen in the Crank pits and, even if we could have put it into words, we didn't want to talk about it.

My sleep that night was restless, my dreams filled with images of the Cranks as they pressed against the fence, reaching for me with their grasping hands. At one point, the naked man succeeded, seizing me by the back of my shirt and pulling me towards himself. "Mmm! You're a tasty morsel!" he said, an insane grin on his face. "Come join us on this side of the fence!" I screamed and struggled to break free, but he was much bigger and stronger than me; I couldn't possibly hope to escape . . .

The next thing I remember is opening my eyes to find Linda looking down at me. "Are you OK?" she asked, sitting down on my bunk. "You were screaming in your sleep."

That must have been what woke me up. I pulled my knees up to my chest and wrapped my arms around them, trying to dismiss the nightmare I'd just had from my mind. But it wasn't easy when it had been triggered by something I had seen in reality only hours before. "I - I had a bad dream," I said, my voice choking. "I was back in the Crank pits. One of them grabbed me! I . . ." That was all I could get out before I broke down sobbing. I felt Linda's arms around me, heard her whispering to me that I was safe, that no Cranks could get me here. I even heard her say she would look out for me, just as she had on the Berg which had brought us (and Neil) to this place. Before WICKED stole our original names (Karla, Robbie and Vanessa) and named us Linda, Neil and Jenny.

I looked up at Linda, my face stained with tears. "Will we always be together?"

"Of course we will. I'm your big sister, so it's my job to protect you."

"When are we going over to Group A again?"

Three months had passed since the night of the Crank pits, during which our little group of explorers had steered clear of the tunnel. We hadn't even gone into the closet where it emerged into our dormitory, much less made the journey through the hidden passage that led to Group A. But now, with the memory of the punishment we had received for being out of bounds beginning to fade, I was starting to think it might be time to try the tunnel again. Apart from anything else, I wanted to see Neil and I had a feeling Sonya wanted to see Newt. And the only way either of us could see our respective brothers was to sneak into the sector where most of WICKED's male subjects lived.

"We're not," Linda said shortly. "You know what happened last time."

I did, all too well. But, maybe if we were careful not to get caught this time, we would be all right. Besides, I only wanted to see Neil. We could go straight to his dormitory where I could spend a few minutes looking at him as he slept, then head back to Group B; there would be no exploring. But this wasn't enough to persuade Linda. "I know how you feel," she told me. "Neil's my brother too. But WICKED must be watching us, waiting for us to break the rules again. And I'm not going back to those Crank pits." Her tone was so decisive that I gave up trying and turned to the rest of our little group, hoping at least one of them wanted to give the tunnel another try.

Harriet and Miyoko shook their heads, as did Flossie, the only one out of the seven of us who was not immune to the Flare. Fortunately, though this wasn't known until much later, Immunes, in addition to being unaffected by the Flare virus themselves, could not pass it on to those who lacked the factors which caused immunity, so there had been no danger of her catching it from those of us who had been in the Crank pits. Anyway, four members of our little gang were out as far as sneaking over to Group A was concerned, which only left two more.

"What about you?" I asked Indira and Sonya.

They said they were up for it and the three of us agreed we would go through the tunnel that night. So, telling ourselves that we were going to be careful from now on, we spent the rest of the day looking forward to the time when we would set foot in the tunnel once more. Thoughts of the Crank pits and the horrors within occasionally crossed my mind, but, terrifying though that experience had been, my desire to see my brother was stronger. To my young mind, it felt like a lifetime since I'd last stood by his bunk, looking down at his sleeping form. Not to mention that I hadn't even spoken to him since we were brought to WICKED's headquarters. And Sonya, the only member of Group B apart from Linda and myself with a brother over in Group A, was in the same position.

That night, as we had done several times before, Indira, Sonya and I entered the closet where the tunnel emerged into our dormitory. I pressed against the false wall and waited for it to open up, revealing the passage concealed within, but nothing happened. I pressed harder. Still nothing; the wall remained as solid as it appeared at first glance. Even when Indira and Sonya tried to help me, it made no difference. "Why won't it open?" Indira asked, grunting as she pushed against the wall in a vain attempt to make it give way. "It always did before."

After giving the wall a few more tries, we were forced to admit defeat and climbed out of the closet, shaking our heads to let the others know we'd had no luck. "The wall's been locked," I said by way of explanation. "We can't get it open." I gave the closet a rueful look, then headed back to my bunk, as Indira and Sonya did likewise. That was it, then. No more night-time trips through the tunnel. And no more sneaking over to Group A unless we could find another route. Which meant I would probably never see Neil again, not even standing beside him while he slept. WICKED had robbed me of even the limited contact I'd had with my brother since we arrived at their headquarters.

In fact, though we didn't know about this at the time, the hidden entrance had only been locked from our side. It was still possible to open it from inside the tunnel, not that this made any difference to us. And there was little doubt in my mind who had ordered the false wall locked; Gates had said something about making sure no-one else from Group B could get into the tunnel.

Since there was nothing else I could do, I decided to get some sleep and hope things would seem better in the morning. Not there was much chance of that in my situation. At seven-and-a-half years old, I'd seen what WICKED were capable of and I had a feeling things were going to get even tougher in the years to come.