When Gaz awoke hours later, a quick check of her watch told her it was nine in the morning. The candle was out, but she knew that Tara and Jason were on watch. She buckled her belt, slung low around her hips, her blaster within easy reach, and then slid out of her bunk, landing silently on the floor. She crept to where Tara was sitting, and tapped her on the shoulder lightly. She could feel the disturbance in the air as Tara nodded, and then got up for her turn to sleep. A minute or so later, she heard Tim dismiss Jason, and take the seat beside her.
"How long is the watch this morning?" Tim whispered.
She shrugged. "Not sure," she whispered back. "Dib said yesterday that he was going to send Mai out on a food run with a team. They should be back in a few hours." She pressed the illumination button on her watch, and the blue glow lit up the room eerily. "It's almost nine ten now, I'd say we're only on until waking hour."
Tim nodded, and the dim light went out.
"What time did I get in last night?" She questioned, her voice almost silent.
After a pause, Tim whispered, "I'm not sure, but it was only a little while after lights out. Maybe six thirty or so."
Satisfied with this answer, Gaz leaned back in her chair, letting her muscles relax. She listened to the even sounds of the room sleeping. By now, she could recognize each person simply by their breathing patterns while they slept. But since where everyone slept was routine, regulated by the hours of day, it didn't matter, because she knew where everyone in the bunker was at any given time during the night.
Her thoughts drifted, and she found herself wondering how life would be if the Armada hadn't come. She would have just graduated Hi!Skool, maybe be going on to college. In a way, she was almost glad she didn't have to worry about stupid things like that. Oh sure, she cold have easily gotten into any college of her choice, and her father's career would have ensured that it was well paid for, but what would she have studied? She wasn't cut out to be a scientist like Dr. Membrane, nor was she interested in being a weirdo paranormal expert, like Dib would have wanted to be.
She shook her head. None of that mattered now anyway. All that mattered was staying alive, a job which was becoming harder and harder. Food was scarce now. For the first year or so, Dib had set up a cloning process so that they could all have fresh meat, but something had gone terribly wrong, and the animals (not to mention those who had eaten them) had all fallen sick. There had been some theories as to why; some said it was because of the lack of sunlight from being hidden away in the underground storage room, others had said that something had gone wrong with the DNA chain from being replicated so many times, like a bad Xerox machine. But what really mattered was that there was no source of meat now, and many of the rebels were suffering from Iron deficiency, not to mention Vitamin C and B loss. They had been forced to scavenge for canned goods and preserves anywhere that food could possibly found, abandoned supermarkets, corner stores, even in the once-occupied houses, but now, even that was hopeless. The storeroom was running very low, and because they were required to forage farther and farther away from the base to find enough food, many teams were going out and not returning. To reduce the number of captures, they had decided that only two or three people at a time would go out to find food.
Gaz's stomach rumbled. There were scheduled eating days on every other day, but the adults often skipped when they could, in order to save the food for longer. The last meal Gaz could remember having was a sickly pigeon she'd shot when she was out on patrol, but that was three, maybe four nights ago. She sighed, still feeling guilty that she hadn't brought it back to the base for the children to share. The youngest child was a one and a half year old boy; his mother had been four months pregnant when they had gone into hiding. But she was small and skinny, and the effort of giving birth had taken too much out of her, sucking out what life she'd had left. But Dan was growing into a quiet, obedient, and intelligent little boy. He'd said his first words much earlier than any child they'd ever seen, but knew the importance of silence, only talking when it was necessary. The other children were Matt, who was three, Jean and Jack, five year old twins, David, eight, and twelve year old Min, who was Mai's daughter. Min was lucky; she was the only one whose mother was still alive and free.
Gaz sighed again, her conscience weighing her down like a lead brick. She grimaced as she tried to run a hand through her hair. It had been a matted mess of dreadlocks until she'd hacked it off with one of Shea's throwing daggers, and now it fell into her face, jagged and uneven. But she was used to it, better to have it short and annoying than to leave it long and let it be used against you as a tool to hold you down. She rubbed her cheeks with her hands, making a face of disgust at how greasy they felt, and wished she could wash up a little. But showers were few and far between.
Water was reserved for drinking before anything else, and it hardly ever rained anymore. When it did, more often than not it was harsh and acidic, the result of the final depletion of the ozone layer. When the Irkens had discovered how harmful the poisonous greenhouse gases that already filled the atmosphere were to the humans, they'd done all they could to finish the job the humans had started. Going out during the day was no longer an option, not for the risk of being seen, but for the simple reason that you would have skin cancer within minutes, the kind that worked within a week, slowly rotting your body from the outside in.
She tapped her foot restlessly against the table leg, grinding her teeth together. She hated being on watch. It seemed wrong to her to sit around for hours when she could be out doing something useful with her time. She would much rather be out on patrol, or on a food team.
She sighed. It would be a long day. The basic schedule for their hideout was to fall asleep at six in the morning, and wake at four in the afternoon. Food teams still went out during the day, but only until ten in the morning, when the sun was less potent. They were required to wear heavy clothing and use liberal amounts of the precious stores of sun block, and even then were only sent out when food was desperately needed. The rest of the rebels slept during the day, with two on bunker watch, two on upstairs watch, and one guarding the door, so the rest could sleep while the sun shone down.
Gaz started to relax in her chair, ready for a long night of doing nothing, when she heard a sound outside the door. Her body went rigid, and she nudged Tim in the dark, but he'd already heard it. They turned to each other in the dark, eyes wide.
"What was that?" Tim asked.
"I'm not sure…" Gaz strained her ears, listening for any sign of sound. It was quiet for a moment, but then, she heard it again. A wailing scream that was getting ever-closer. "But it doesn't sound human."
Her hand automatically flew to her blaster, feeling the soft leather of its holster against her fingertips.
"It's coming closer,"
"It wont get through the door," Gaz said firmly. But she stood up just the same, ready for action.
They both jumped when they heard the first door slam, and Gaz drew her blaster instinctively.
But neither were prepared when the door to the base to burst open, and two of the rebels rushed in, carrying a third between them. Gas grabbed a lantern from the table, turning it on and knocking everything else off the table. She handed the light to Tim, and helped set the masked figure on the table.
"What happened?" She demanded, turning to the two who'd just come in.
Tommy, a fifteen year old boy, pulling his mask off and threw it on the floor.
"She-she's not dead yet," he panted. "We were on a good run. We'd just found a store of canned vegetables in a basement on the lower South side when we heard the Voot runners. We tried to get out in time, but Mai took a hit to the torso."
--------------------------------------
And that is all for now, my friends. Dun dun dun, CLIFF HANGER!!
I know, not terribly exciting, but it's an update, so just dance, dammit.
J Thanks to everyone who's reviewed so far, you made my day.