Eleven, Twelve ... Dig and delve (Rebekka Franck Book 6) (12 page)

But, he wasn’t that lucky. No, instead, it had lead right into this huge cave where everybody else was. At least he thought it had. Somewhere in between where he left Brian and his arrival in the cave, he had blacked out. He had no idea if he had walked in the same tunnel; he believed he might have been walking through several of them, but he wasn’t sure. He also thought he had been walking in a pool of blood in one of the tunnels, but was certain it had been all in his imagination, as was the blood on his shoes.

It’s all in your head, Thomas. You know it is.

As he walked closer to the flock, he spotted the girl. She was sitting on the floor squirming and twisting her body, looking like she was about to scream if he came any closer.

He felt the pen in his pocket, and wondered if he should stab her right away. Just walk up to her and stab her. But, what good would that do him? She’d be dead, yes, but he’d still be stuck down here and everyone would be really mad at him, maybe even kill him for what he had done.

It wasn’t a good solution.

He thought of what Brian had said, and decided to go with his plan. Even though all of the people in front of him looked like stabbed corpses, he spoke to them like they weren’t. He was getting better at ignoring all those small reality-slips.

“We found water,” he said.

“Thomas?” Rebekka Franck asked.

“Yes. It’s true. Brian and I found water.”

“Thomas, what is that on your shoes? Is that blood?” she asked.

The girl whimpered again. Thomas, all of a sudden, remembered the sound from when she had been in his house, tied to the bed. He looked at her and saw blood running from her forehead into her face. He imagined himself using the axe, dividing her face into two pieces. He imagined the sound of her skull cracking.

Like the sound of a watermelon falling to the ground being divided into a thousand pieces.

He remembered it well from when he had done it to Rikke. He remembered the sound so vividly.

“Thomas, do you have blood on your shoes?” the annoying Rebekka asked.

Thomas looked down. Yes, he had blood on them, but he had been soaking in blood, hadn’t he?

“Where did it come from?” Rebekka asked.

Thomas could feel how the tension was tightened in the cave. Everybody who was awake was staring at him, waiting for his answer.

“Brian says anyone who comes back with me and helps to dig will be allowed to drink from the water,” Thomas said.

“Thomas, did you kill Michael West?” the handsome David asked.

Thomas opened his mouth to speak, but couldn’t get a word out. He had no idea what to say. The fact was, he might have. He didn’t remember.

“So, who wants to go back with me and get water?” he asked. “Brian told me he thinks he can find a way out, but we need many hands to dig. Everyone willing to work for him will get water.”

Rebekka Franck stared angrily at Thomas. She took a few steps towards him. All eyes were on him now.

“So, you’re saying that not everyone will get some of that water, is that it? Only those willing to work?”

Thomas nodded. “Yes. Those were his words.”

“So, what about the people almost dying here? Those that are hurt and sick from thirst. They’re not able to work and dig. Shouldn’t we help them first? Make sure they survive?” Rebekka asked.

Thomas took a step backwards. The small skinny woman scared him a little. He pictured himself grabbing her neck and snapping it. Like a match you could break with just a finger. It would be that easy. She was small. So why did he fear her? Why did she frighten him?

Thomas wanted to run away. It was getting dangerous for him here. He took another step backwards, but walked right into David who grabbed his arm. “You’re not going anywhere, buddy. You’re staying here with us.”

37

W
E DECIDED TO
tell everybody what had happened to Michael West. I wasn’t sure it was a good idea to scare people further, but they saw David carry him away. They knew something was wrong, and the incident with Thomas made them start questioning what was going on.

We gathered everyone in the cave and David put Thomas on the ground, while keeping an eye on him.

“Michael West was killed inside of one of the tunnels,” I said.

Murmurs spread in the flock. Almost all of them were awake now. The only one still drifting in and out of consciousness was Afrim’s mother. She didn’t seem any better at all. She was heavily dehydrated and needed water. She had lost a lot of blood.

Mrs. Sigumfeldt looked at me. “Killed? But…but…what on earth do you mean?” She looked like she was about to cry, but restrained herself.

“He was stabbed to death. We found him in his own blood in the tunnel we came through,” I said.

Mrs. Sigumfeldt gasped and put a hand over her mouth. “Oh, my God.”

“We believe Thomas Soe did it. He came through the tunnel, had blood on his shoes, and didn’t deny it when we asked him.”

“What do you have to say for yourself?” David said.

Thomas Soe looked baffled. It was like he was trying to speak, but couldn’t. “I…I don’t know what to say.”

“That’s not an answer,” Mrs. Sigumfeldt yelled. She got up on her feet. I was impressed with her agility all of a sudden. Maybe the adrenalin caused it. She was awfully interested in this Michael West’s death. As far as I knew, Michael West had been nothing but a stranger to the neighborhood. A bypasser at the wrong place at the worst possible time.

“Did you kill him?” she asked.

“I…I swear, I…I don’t know,” Thomas said.

What kind of a weird answer is that? Either you kill someone or you don’t. Is he playing us?

“What do you mean you don’t know?” I asked. “Are you denying it?”

“Yes.” He looked up at me. He seemed confused. “I didn’t do it, okay? All your sudden questions took me off-guard. Of course I didn’t kill the guy. It’s ridiculous.”

“How did you get blood on your shoes, then?” Sigurd Bjerrehus asked. He too was on his feet, looking agitated.

Lars, the school librarian, stood up as well. “Leave the poor guy alone. He probably got blood on his shoes by walking through the tunnel, just like Rebekka and David. Or are we to assume that you killed him too?” He pointed at my shoes. I looked down and noticed they were soaked in blood, as were the bottom part of my pants.

“You two came through the same tunnel with blood on you. David is even the only one of us who has a knife. Why are we not accusing any of you?” Lars continued.

He did make a fair point. The rest of the group seemed to think so as well. They looked at us accusingly.

“How do we know you’re not just trying to cover up by blaming someone else?” Mrs. Sigumfeldt said.

I looked at David. “They’re right,” I said. “We don’t know if he did it. As a matter of fact, it might be any of us in here, right? I mean, who hasn’t left the cave to pee or to get a few seconds of privacy?”

Everyone looked at each other, then back at me.

“If Thomas Soe didn’t kill Michael West, then who did?” Sigurd Bjerrehus asked.

I inhaled and looked at David again. He shrugged.

“I’m not waiting here to find out or to become the next victim,” Lars said, and walked over to Thomas. He reached down and grabbed his hand, then pulled Thomas up. “You said you found water. Lead me to it, and I’ll work for you. I’ll dig till my hands bleed if it means I get to drink all the water I want. At least I’ll be doing something. I do not intend to stay here and wait for starvation or one of my neighbors to kill me.”

On that note, Lars and Thomas left us. I looked at the rest of our group. “Anyone else who wants to go, you’re free to do so now,” I said.

No one did. “Okay. So here’s the situation. We have some food, not much. About twelve cans of tuna, a box of oats, a packet of crackers, some broken cookies, and a little water. If we’re smart about it, we can survive on it for a long time. The important thing is to remain positive. Don’t lose hope. I know they will be looking for us. I know they’re digging for us right now. We just have to be very patient. But the fact remains that even if we’re super-optimistic about things, the best you can say is we’re in deep shit. The only thing we can do is to be strong, super-disciplined, and united. We have to stick together through this, and help each other out the best we can.”

On those words, I handed out the water and food, rationing it so there would be enough for several days. It was getting late. The first day in the mines had almost passed and I had a feeling it wasn’t the last. As people dozed off after having eaten small rations of tuna mixed with water and crackers, I looked at what was left. Almost all the water was gone already. Rationing it further would keep us alive for a few days, maybe. But no more than that.

Day 4

October 9
^th
2014

S
URVIVAL OF THE FITTEST

38

I
WAS SO
unbearably thirsty. So hungry it literally hurt. The emptiness in my stomach felt like a fist pushing downward. It was painful. I had given most of the water to the sick people, thinking I could better manage with no more than a few sips a day. By noon the fourth day under the surface, we had run completely out of water, even though I had rationed it well. I was so hungry I had even considered trying to catch a bat and eat it, even though I knew they could carry all kinds of diseases. We hadn’t seen any of them in a very long time.

There was a great sense of powerlessness among us. We didn’t know if we were being rescued or what was going on on the surface because we didn’t hear any noises from machines or anything. We had tried to find a way out through the tunnels, but hadn’t succeeded, and as the hours and days passed, we became too weak to try anymore. We were even too lethargic to get on each other’s nerves. No one bothered to fight. Every now and then, someone went into a panic, but it was getting more and more rare. We simply didn’t have the strength.

Prayer helped us get through the day. We had started a prayer group for those who wanted it. Most of us did. It became the highlight of the day. It was a good way to get some of the anger and frustration out. It started on the second day when Afrim had fallen to his knees and cried out, “God, please help my mother! Please save her!”

Compelled to show compassion, David and I had kneeled as well. Afrim’s mother started mumbling in Albanian, lying pale and weak on her back. We joined in. It didn’t matter that we had different gods. Soon, others joined in, and little by little we started having prayer sessions every day at noon before I served the day’s only meal. It became a daily ritual for everyone. People of different faiths, on their knees, in repentance and desperation, praying and whispering. Some were crying. I know I was from time to time, thinking about my family. Others were mystified, as if they couldn’t quite believe they were on their knees, begging God to rescue them. A God they, until a few days ago, weren’t sure they believed in.

On the fourth day, right before prayer and lunchtime, David was sitting next to me. He was feeling weary. I could tell by looking at him. He kept closing his eyes and leaning his head back. No one wondered about Michael West or what happened to him anymore. At least no one spoke about it. We were way too focused on merely surviving. We hardly went into the tunnels anymore. Since no one had eaten or drank much for days, it wasn’t like nature called us to step out. We stayed close together; everyone was instructed to never leave the cave and go into the tunnels alone, even though I couldn’t help wondering if the killer could still be among us.

Sometimes, we could hear the ground rumbling and thuds from dirt falling to the ground inside the mines. The smell from the corpses nearby was getting bad. So was the smell from all of our bodies in the cave…our fetid unwashed bodies. It was constantly cold in the cave, the temperature remained about eight degrees Celsius (46 degrees Fahrenheit) all night and day, Kenneth, the engineer, told us. With no food in my stomach, I soon started to shiver with the cold. David put his arm around me and tried to warm me. I felt like I could hardly move. My legs were hurting, so was my stomach, and I couldn’t stand the feeling of thirst. I was amazed at how fast the body reacted to these dire conditions…how fast I became affected by it.

“We have to do something,” I said to David. “We’ll die from dehydration. We need to get some water somehow.”

We hadn’t seen or heard anything from Brian, Thomas or Lars for several days, neither had we heard anything from the surface, except for those sounds people now and then imagined hearing.

“Did you hear that?” they would say.

I would always nod and smile and assure them it was most certainly the rescue team working to get us out of here, then tell them to just be a little more patient. I felt it was my job to keep up their spirits in a place where hopelessness and anger otherwise ruled.

It was getting harder and harder to stay positive. I missed my children like crazy and refused to accept never seeing them again. I kept going through my last conversation with Sune in my mind over and over again. We hadn’t left of on good terms. He had been annoyed with Julie, and that bothered me. Every now and then, I would sob and wish I had told him I loved him, or had even been able to say goodbye to the kids. Did they know how much I loved them? Had I told them enough?

“What do you suggest?” I asked. The fatigue overpowered me again, and I had to close my eyes. It was the dehydration doing this to me. I knew it was, but I couldn’t help it. I tried to fight it, but all I wanted to do was to sleep. Sleep and dream that I was back with my loved ones, hugging and holding them in my arms and never letting go.

“We could try and go back to where we found the food. See if there’s more. Maybe if we look again, remove some more debris, rocks and planks, something will show up,” David said. He had brought this up before, but every time we had tried to find our way back, we had ended up getting lost in the tunnels.