Legion Lost (2 page)

“I’m
so sorry, Mrs Ghosh,” Mumma says to the lady. “My boys are trouble when they
all get together. But my daughter is much more agreeable, as you’ll see.”

I
want to ask Mumma who this woman is and why she is joining us for dinner but,
after my mother’s compliment on my excellent manners, it seems like a rude
thing to do. As I cross the room to join Vinesh on the floor, I wonder if
that’s exactly why she said it. Pranjal is small and skinny like me—you would
hardly guess that he’s a full year older—and I think we must look odd sitting on
either side of a stocky, muscular guy like Vinesh. He slings a strong arm
around my neck, pulling me in to muss my hair with the knuckles of his other
hand. I squeal playfully for a moment, but stop abruptly when I see Mumma
glaring at me over the top of Mrs Ghosh’s tiny head.

“Can
we have some peace to eat, please?” Mumma asks, quiet but firm as always.

The
four of us lean in to receive our rice bowls, mine steaming the hottest of all.
We bow our heads respectfully as the older women settle to join us for the
meal. Mukesh chews thoughtfully on his first spoonful before he suddenly asks
the question that’s on my mind.

“So,
why is Mrs Ghosh here for dinner and not Bhadrak?”

He
says it with a mouthful of rice, and sticky white particles come flying from
his lips, exploding in all directions. Mumma is not best pleased, but she
clears her throat and answers him with elegance all the same.

“Bhadrak
was called to the security council about some issue or other,” she explains,
“and Mrs Ghosh has travelled here from a neighbouring tunnel. We’re offering
her our hospitality, so chew your food properly and take off that hat.”

Mukesh
does as he’s told, mumbling bitterly, but the old woman holds out her hand with
a throaty chuckle.

“Please
Bandhula, you mustn’t make such a fuss,” she says with a strange, off-putting
grin. “Boys will be boys, after all.”

I
don’t think I’m imagining the fact that she looks at me when she says this. For
one horrible moment, I think that she’s about to tell everyone about my
embarrassing identity crisis from earlier today. Mercifully, she starts to eat
her rice instead. Still, I can’t shake the feeling that her presence in our
home gives me. Something bad prickles the thin hairs on my arms, and I tug at
the sleeves of my shirt, feeling colder by the moment despite the hot food in
my belly. When I look down into the empty centre of the space between us all,
I’m sure I can feel Mrs Ghosh’s beady eyes fixed on the top of my head.

“Excuse
me, Mrs Ghosh,” Vinesh says with a thoughtful hitch in his tone. “Did you say
you came to us from another section of the Underground?”

The
old woman shifts her cross-legged frame and I freeze, disturbed by the sight of
something black and shiny clinging to her ankle.

“That’s
right, dear boy,” I hear her say.

“Did
you come in by a connecting tunnel?” Vinesh continues.

Ghosh
shifts again, giving me a better view of the device strapped just above her
shoe. It’s a box about the size of a packet of matches, but it’s made of pure
black plastic, save for one cube where a tiny red light flashes out every few
seconds.

“No
my dear,” Mrs Ghosh answers. “I came in overland.”

“What?”
I say, suddenly looking up. “How?”

“That’s
not your business,” Mumma snaps, clearly outraged at our prying. “How dare you
lot ask Mrs Ghosh such personal—”

Her
next words are drowned out by the blast of a siren. It blares so loud that I
feel as though a needle’s pierced my ears. In the midst of the emergency alarm,
movement starts all around me. Vinesh pulls me to my feet and Pranjal struggles
to get up swiftly on his other side. The door to our room flies open with a
clang and my eyes are suddenly on Bhadrak’s face, flushed and wide-eyed in
panic. He bursts into the living space, finding me first amid the chaos.
There’s a pang of sudden sorrow between us, like he’s apologizing for something
I have yet to discover is wrong.

“We’ve
been infiltrated!” he shouts, his voice strained and teary. “The soldiers are
pulling people
up
! We’ve got to run before we get arrested!”

This
is the nightmare we all share in the dark of the Underground—the day when the
government above will find the rebels in hiding, those who declined to live by
its new laws. I feel as though my heart has stopped, yet every sinew in me is
also screaming with the urge to run. From what and to where, I cannot imagine.
I can only trust that Bhadrak will guide us all to safety.

“I’m
afraid running isn’t an option,” says a shrill, amused voice that carries above
the alarms.

The
old woman who calls herself Mrs Ghosh is on her feet. In her hands, there is a
gun. She gives me that creepy smile that makes my insides squirm, then turns to
Bhadrak with a practised grace. She fires her handgun before the word
no
can even begin to form on my lips, and then she takes off running and vanishes
out into the corridor. In the same moment that she passes Bhadrak, he crumples
to the ground, his face a picture of anger and shock. Something within me
breaks and a wild, unstoppable shaking fills my every muscle.

Bhadrak’s
shirt is already starting to soak up the blood.

Mumma’s
trying to tell us to give Bhadrak some air, but all I can do is clamber towards
him as the sirens continue to blast. He starts to splutter when Vinesh runs out
to find help, trying to shake his head as if he wants to stop him going. My
eldest brother, my protector, reaches out a hand and tugs hard at my T-shirt,
the one that used to be his about a decade ago. His brown eyes are brimming
with water, so wide that they glisten like pools of darkening fear. I can
hardly stand the sight of his face when he’s in so much pain, but the force of
his grip tells me that I have to be beside him, as close as he wants to pull
me.

“There’s
a tunnel at the top of the Atrium, in the guard’s office,” he breathes, gasping
between every other word. “You take the keys from my pocket. And the cutters . . .
Wire cutters in my pocket.” He stops to cough once more, but this time drops of
blood form on his lip. “When you get up to the surface, head to the fences and
cut your way out. Run, my sister. Run.”

Shock
has me in its grip. The emergency alarms died somewhere during Bhadrak’s words,
but I didn’t even hear them halt. He’s dying. My brother, who lies here holding
onto my arm, is dying right in front of my eyes. I stumble back a little as Mumma
suddenly forces her slender hand into Bhadrak’s pockets, seeking out the key
and the cutters that he described. She forces them into my hands, which are
shaking so hard I can barely keep a grip on the tools. Bhadrak puts one hand on
mine and the shaking worsens, tears stinging the whole of my face as I threaten
to burst into sobs.

“You
heard him!” Mumma shouts. She grabs my chin and forces my face to hers. “You’re
the fastest of us all! Go to the tunnel, open it up, and cut the fence on the
surface for the rest of us to follow!”

“But . . . ”
I stammer, looking between her and Bhadrak. His expression is one of
unthinkable agony as he strains to push me away from his side.

“Go!”

His
yell turns into a mournful cry as Mukesh and Pranjal pull me to my feet, throwing
me out of the door and into the madness beyond it. The whole of our section of
the Underground is running for its life. I’m immediately swept into the flood
of people heading out of the accommodation corridor towards the Atrium. I want
to tell someone else about the key, let another person run up to open our
escape route, so I can return to Bhadrak and find out if Vinesh got him a
doctor, but no-one will stop to listen in this chaos. All I can do is do as
I’ve been told, and pray that the section will all escape from the soldier
threat.

At
first I don’t see any soldiers, but as we draw nearer to the Atrium there’s a
sound piercing the air every few moments that fills my heart with dread.
Gunshots. Single shots, like the one that’s killing my brother even now, are
ringing out from all directions, causing screams and cries wherever they hit.
There aren’t many of the soldiers, clad in all-black fatigues, but there are
enough to send my community into a wild fracas. Some of the bravest are trying
to wrestle the guns from the hands of the government-trained thugs, whilst
others are attempting to run back against the tide of people who are flooding
the Atrium in their desperate attempt to escape to the surface.

For
perhaps the first time in my life, I thank the powers that be that I am short,
skinny, and entirely unremarkable to look at. I pass like a shadow through the
crowd without catching any soldier’s eye, keeping low and struggling along
until I reach the ladders that lead to the higher levels. People are at their
wildest here, pulling one another off the ladder so that they might be the
first to reach safety, but I leap onto the back of a tall man who’s just lost
the struggle to get onto the structure. My quick hands and even quicker feet
help me to scurry up the rungs like a rat, before anyone can so much as grab my
ankle. The higher I climb, the louder my heart beats in my ears.

A
shot to my right deafens me, such a shock that I could almost have let go of
the rungs and fall back into the clamouring mass. I see the soil scatter beside
my head where the bullet smashes into the earthen wall, and I climb on,
terrified and desperate to be out of the range of whoever has spotted me from
below. I’ve never scaled the whole ladder of the Atrium in one go, right up to
the security and medical departments on the top floor, and my body burns as I
scramble off the rails and onto the topmost corridor. I glance around,
petrified by the sight of yet more soldiers streaming in from my right, using
cables and wires to lower themselves into the Atrium. Below me, the people of
the Underground are beginning to ascend the ladders, looking for the hope of
escape.

The
guard’s office is the place where a watchman usually sits to stop this kind of
thing from happening. It’s off to my left, in a section of the top level that
has yet to be infiltrated by soldiers. I dash across the dark space, hoping
that my enemies are too busy descending into the madness below to see me. The
key and the cutters are heavy in my trouser pocket, bashing against my leg with
every footfall that I take. When I reach the door marked for the watchman, I
smash through it shoulder first, letting it swing wide as I search for the
tunnel door that I’m supposed to unlock.

The
body of the guard that should have been on duty stares at me with vacant eyes.
Blood still pours from his throat even though he must have been dead for the
whole time that the soldiers have been filtering in. My stomach feels like it’s
turning inside out as I suddenly lurch forward and vomit all over the floor,
retching until I can hardly breathe. I clutch at my chest, horrified by the
heavy, wet tips of my long hair as they catch in the pool of sick before me. I
throw my hair back over my shoulder, calming my heart and trying desperately to
stick to Bhadrak’s plan.

Fumbling
in my pocket for the key, I find the door in the top corner of the ceiling. A
stack of cabinets serves as a staircase to reach it, so I scramble to the top
of them and put my shaking hands to the best use I can. The sounds of gunfire
and shouting outside are getting louder and, now and then, I see a figure dart
past the office door, so fast I can’t tell if they’re friend or foe. When the
key turns the right way, the door to the tunnel comes swinging down, and I
stare up into an earthy shaft with no sign of light ahead. I put the key back
into my pocket and gulp down a few breaths.

This
tunnel leads to the surface.

I
was born in the Underground, four years after the rebels began hiding there,
and I’ve never set foot above the earth in all that time. I’ve seen pictures in
books, and drawings on the walls of scavengers, like Bhadrak, who have been up
there in order to bring us the things we need. Now, it’s my turn to be the one
who’s needed. I have to follow this tunnel and cut the fence above ground, no
matter what stands in my way. I stare into the darkness ahead again, a
cavalcade of horrible thoughts entering my mind. It’s possible that there are
more soldiers waiting at the other end of this tunnel. It’s possible that no one
else below is going to get out, even if I do clear the way. It’s possible that
Bhadrak is already dead.

“Hey!”

I
snap my head down to the door of the office, where a soldier stands with a gun
in his hand. His face is covered by a balaclava that leaves only a pale strip
of skin visible around his eyes. They shine like sapphires. His expression is surprisingly
young, and he looks as confused as I feel. He could have just shot me instead
of shouting to get my attention. But he didn’t, and that’s his mistake for me
to take advantage of.

I
shoot up the tunnel and scratch my way through like a rat, my skinny frame
fitting through the curves and narrow stretches with ease. I almost smile at
Bhadrak’s ingenuity for knowing I’d be the best person to do this task, but the
memory of his watery eyes and the blood on his lips stops any joy from entering
my mind. Then I picture the guard, his throat cut, following the sight of my
brother in my memory, and I force myself to switch it all off. All that matters
is reaching the surface and cutting the fence. Lives depend on me.