Below the Surface

And then it happened. “Get down!” Wyatt shouted, grabbing me and pulling me under the table as a sound like a thousand trains barreling toward us deafened our ears. Earthquakes were common in our part of the world, but this was far louder and more violent than anything I’d ever heard before. Wyatt attempted to shield me with his body, and I clung to the pedestal of the table, but the earth lurched below our knees, sending both of us flying. I landed on my stomach and felt the bone of my wrist crack under me, as the world detonated around us. “Nahanni!” Wyatt cried. “Cover your head!” Rocks, shale, dirt, and debris rained down on me, as I lay, clinging to the stone of the floor that kicked and bucked like an untamed horse. I heard the walls of tunnels collapsing, and the ceiling of the cafeteria crashed down twenty-five feet from where I lay, burying people under a hail of concrete. From everywhere around me came screams of terror and pain. People crawled and stumbled past me, fighting the shifting ground, frantically calling the names of family members, shouting orders, weeping hysterically. It seemed like the end of the world. And then, as suddenly as it had begun, everything stopped. Wyatt picked himself up off the debris-scattered floor and hurried over to me. He was bleeding from multiple cuts and covered in a thick layer of dust. “Are you OK?” “I’m fine,” I said, slightly stunned. “Just my wrist.” “Call your uncle’s headquarters. We need a rescue team and medical unit down here. I’ll go see if I can help.” I followed his eyes to the devastated cafeteria. Those who had been sitting on the sides were now pinned by their arms or legs under slabs of concrete, while others stood there gaping in a state of shock. Wyatt didn’t wait for my response. Within seconds he was shouting orders to those who weren’t seriously injured and trying to lift the concrete and pressed-earth slabs off those who were. There was no signal in my wristband phone. I’m no physicist or engineer, but I knew the communication network in our underground world operated via a complex system of relays that boosted and fed signals from one to the next, often around tons of solid rock. In history class, I’d read that the world above ground used satellites for such things, but of course, we were far too deep in the earth for any such signals to enter or exit our system, especially with the signal blockers, scramblers, and other anti-detection devices that had been installed years ago to keep the research base secret. Our underground network was a primitive, early twenty-second-century system, but it worked well enough for our needs. Although my phone was dead, I knew the car phone’s stronger signal would probably work, so I got up, climbed over a pile of rocks, and headed toward it. People were still running everywhere, screaming and calling out to one another. Blood streamed down the faces of those who had been hit by falling rocks. A crate of chickens, probably earmarked for tomorrow night’s dinner, must have broken open behind the cafeteria because several terrified hens were racing along the corridor, squawking and fluttering frantically. It was utter chaos. I reached the car, dusted earth off the radio, and pressed the button that would link me directly to my uncle’s headquarters. “Morgann here,” answered a gravelly voice with a heavy French accent. “It’s Nahanni,” I said urgently. “I’m in West Laurine, at Riverside, with Wyatt and a lot of injured people. We need a rescue unit and medical team.” “Konradin tried calling you.” “My wristband’s dead. I’m in Corridor 2 near the cafeteria. It collapsed during the quake and there are people buried in there.” “There were tunnel collapses all over the system,” grumbled Morgann. “I’ll send down a team, but you and Wyatt need to get back here fast. Someone will get you in a hovercar – I don’t know what condition the corridors are in. Tell Wyatt not to be a hero. We need him back here. That’s a direct order.” In front of the ruins of the cafeteria, Wyatt was marshaling the crowd that had gathered around him. He had organized the uninjured into teams and sent someone for a doctor and first aid supplies. Already the dead and dying were being dragged out from under the collapsed roof. Forty minutes later, I was tearing old clothes into bandages with my left hand and teeth when Charlie Stillwater appeared. Instantly, I knew something was even more seriously wrong than we had thought. Stillwater wouldn’t come to get us in person under any normal circumstances. My first thought was that something had happened to my uncle. “He’s fine,” Stillwater reassured me. “But you need to come back with me immediately.” A medic knelt beside Wyatt and took the bandage out of his hand. Wyatt got to his feet and noticed the members of the Elite Guard, fanning out to help. “Who’s at the command center?” “Konradin and Morgann,” Stillwater explained. “I brought down a full unit to supervise things here, and some more medics from the Laurine Hospital are coming. We have to go. I’ll explain on the way.” “All right,” said Wyatt, as we followed Stillwater to his hovercar. “We had an earthquake, and there’s extensive damage. What else?” “Kal,” Stillwater said in a low urgent voice, and I noticed for the first time how pale he looked. “We think... there’s been a breach.” Wyatt stopped dead in his tracks and stared at him in disbelief. So did I. “No,” I said stupidly. “No. That’s impossible…” To everyone in the hidden world of underground Tanháia, a breach meant only one thing. Our years of secrecy had ended; someone from outside had finally gotten in; we’d been discovered. And that meant that we were as good as dead. All of us.