Rebel Bound: Rebel Bound, #1

By Shauna E. Black

She can survive the streets, but can she survive the rebellion?

 

It's been 11 years since a nuclear disaster drove much of the population underground, leaving Caelin and her younger sister Mardy topside. When a handsome stranger named Jate saves Caelin's life, he brings the sisters to rebel turf where plans are being hatched to conquer the Undercity. The rebels preach good life for the masses, and it seems Caelin and Mardy have found a safe haven at last.

 

But as Caelin is drawn deeper into the rebel's inner circle, Jate seems more determined to push her away. When Caelin discovers the harsh price of loyalty, the rebel's dream becomes a nightmare that sends Mardy on a dangerous mission to the Undercity. Caelin must determine who to trust before Mardy and the entire population of the Undercity are wiped out.

 

Finalist in the 2017 Wishing Shelf and DaVinci Eye Awards, IndieBrag Honoree, and winner of the 2018 LUW Diamond Quill Best Book of the Year!

• Language: English
• Publisher: Shauna E. Black
• Release date: Nov 22, 2017
• ISBN: 9781940855134

Book preview

To Dad

For all the Saturday afternoons we watched hokey

sci-fi movies together.

You’re my hero.

CHAPTER 1

I am a shadow, moving through the deeper darkness of the night. My sister read in a book once that the sun brings life. If that’s true, then my world is dead. I remember sunlight—a hazy dream that slips through my grasp as I try to hold it. It’s like the memories of frilly dresses, apple pie, and Mother, just another thing I lost in the explosion. Now darkness is the only protection I have left.

The quivering flame of a torch comes into the room beyond the closet door. If they see me, I might not make it out of this apartment alive. My stomach clenches around the thought, but my stomach is always upset anyway. There are three people, dressed like me in ragged coats with hoods pulled up to cover their faces. It’s meager protection from the cold and the radiation.

One person holds a torch in a gloved hand. The other person holds a pistol. It's an old-fashioned make, not like those the Coalition sentries carry. There's a good chance there are no bullets for the gun, but I can't bet my life on that.

Sweat from my palm seeps through my own thin glove and into the rope holding my broken kitchen blade to a makeshift handle. I hope I don't have to use it. Once, when a woman tried to steal a tarnished silver platter I found in a hotel, I sliced her hand open. I can still hear her scream, smell the tang of her blood. I had nightmares for days. But the platter bought Mardy an extra week in the shelter.

The three scavs are not being careful, but such a large group doesn’t need to be, especially with a gun. They are pawing through piles of trash, tossing useless items aside, holding others up to the light to examine them, and practically shouting to each other.

Hey! I found some batteries, a man says from the broken dresser in the corner. I wonder how I missed those.

The person in the adjoining bathroom scurries back through my line of sight to the dresser.

She has the hoarse voice of a woman used to yelling. They’re corroded. Won't do us no good. She slams the drawer, and the man yelps, yanking back his hand. He growls at her, but she returns to the bathroom with a casual air. Her boots crunch on the broken glass of the mirror.

Everything is picked clean in this place, another man says, the one holding the torch. He moves in and out of my sight as he lifts a child’s blanket off the bare mattress and sneers at it. Even the curtains are gone.

Then look harder! the woman snaps.

All three seem haggard in the glimpses I get of them, like the mangy dogs I sometimes come across on the streets—thin and worn. I wonder how long it has been since they stayed in a shelter. The thought frightens me. I don't want to get stuck topside again.

The man with the torch swings it around the room. The light stings, piercing my skull and amplifying my headache. I fight the urge to retch. Not now. They will find me.

The other man comes toward the closet. I cram myself harder into the corner of it. All the clothes are long gone, stripped by scavs soon after the mushroom cloud that changed the world. It happened halfway around the globe, but it affected everybody. Back then, the pickings were good. Papa brought home armloads of blankets and clothing that kept us in the shelter for months at a time. After eleven years, there’s not much left.

I can hardly breathe as the man’s fingers curl around the door. His other hand holds the gun. I can't throw up. I can't throw up. I repeat it like a mantra. But when has my body ever obeyed?

My stomach convulses suddenly, and I am dry heaving, the sound filling my ears with horror, but I can’t stop. The door jerks open all the way. The man stares at me. The other man with the torch appears behind the first.

Jackpot! the woman suddenly yells from the bathroom. I found the curtains.

The first man raises the gun. We found something too. A girl, hiding in the closet.

I fight to get control of my body. The retching finally stops.

Coming out of the bathroom, the woman holds up a dripping bundle. My heart plummets into my toes. This woman is thorough. She sees me, and her wide lips contort into a sneer that makes her look even uglier. Thanks for the goods, sweetie.

Curtains won’t get us much. The man with the torch frowns, peering at her bundle.

There’s a packet of pain pills inside, plus other stuff. She shakes the cloth at him, spattering water around the room. Lucky there weren’t enough water in that toilet to sop through or you’d be sleeping on the streets again.

The man with the gun grins. That’ll get us a week in the mansion! He turns to look at her, and I seize my chance.

I am already bunched tight. Now I use the corner to push off, uncoil my muscles like a spring, and leap on the man with the gun. I slash at his wrist with my knife, but it glances off the sleeve. He yelps in surprise, stumbling back. The man with the torch curses.

The first man is not as quick to recover as I am. I swing a leg behind his, knocking him to the floor with a thud. The woman grabs my knife arm, yanking me back. I spin to face her. She has dropped the bundle to the floor. I glance greedily at it, but she stands in the way. I spent all PM gathering that stash. The thought makes me angry, and I strike out at her.

She dances out of the reach of the knife, catching my arm again and yanking me forward, off balance. The man with the torch grabs me from behind, holding me in a grip surprisingly strong for one so scrawny. The woman delivers a kick to my belly. I double over, retching again. The man with the gun scowls down at me and swings the gun to bang me on the side of the head. I crumple to the floor, thinking that I was right after all. The gun had no bullets.

The room spins lazily around me as I listen to the sound of their boots clomp down the stairs. They probably figure I’m as good as dead, injured like this.

Darkness slowly returns. I struggle to get up, and the room lurches sideways, spilling me back to the floor. There is pain. So much pain. It throbs in my head in time with my heart, burns in the back of my throat, cramps my middle.

But I am used to pain. It is a constant presence in my life. After a time, I catch my breath, force the pain back. I push myself up again. This time, I stay up until the room stops spinning. I listen carefully for several agonizing moments. Their steps don’t return. They’ll be running to their shelter by now with their prize, glad to escape the AM and get a hot meal. I hope they choke on it.

I crawl to the spot where the woman dropped my bundle. The matted carpet is still damp. I want to cry, but my tears dried up long ago. I sweep my hand carefully across the carpet until I find my knife, then I struggle to stand. I catch my balance on the broken footboard of the bed. The darkness is complete again, unbroken by torches or candles. Not many scavs in this neighborhood. After this AM, and the spoils those three bring back, that will change.

There isn’t much time. I sense that AM is only a couple short hours away. I stumble to the corner of the room where I remember the man found batteries. The woman said they were worthless, but they’re better than broken wooden boards and easier to carry. I wrap them in the ratty blanket from the bed. At the window, I pause, scanning the street below. The sky is just beginning to brighten.

In the early days, Papa said you couldn’t tell AM from PM, the ash cloud was so thick. He said men ruined the ozone layer when they focused too much on their own anger and ignored the warnings of scientists like Mother. He knew the ash cloud would eventually disappear, but told me never to go into the light.

By the time his prediction came true, he was gone.

There is no one in the street below. Most scavs have already found shelter for the AM, whether in an underground basement they bribed their way into, or an elevator shaft, or even a closet. I think briefly about spending the AM here, in this apartment, but Mardy is waiting for me.

There’s more jagged triangles of glass in this window frame than the one I entered from below. I push at the shards with the blanket until they fall into the street with a crash. My small body slips easily through the opening even as I avoid the rough edges of glass that remain. It would be awful to get a cut now. I don’t have the pain pills to pay a doctor.

Outside, I shinny down the rusted fire escape to the broken pavement a story below. When I get down, I wait again, watching in both directions of the street before I venture out of the shadows. The light is getting stronger now, coming from the east where the killing orb of the sun will soon appear. I’m wasting time, but somehow, I can’t move. It feels as though someone is watching me. I scan the street again, looking more intently this time. I look up at the building across the street, examining each hollow window. And then I see him, five stories up.

He would be invisible if he stayed still. But another figure moves in the deeper darkness behind him, and he holds up a hand. The approaching dawn outlines his form, dressed in gray colors like a scav. But there’s something strange about his face. He has a blonde beard and mustache that glint oddly, as though his face reflects the light of the coming dawn. Then I realize he’s watching me from behind a clear mask of some sort. I wonder if he’s Coalition. Scavs don’t have that kind of protection.

I wait, watching him, but he does nothing. The sun will crest the horizon soon. I can’t disappoint Mardy.

Hoping the man will continue to do nothing but stare, I slink away through the shadows, headed for Lincoln Shelter. I glance back frequently, but never catch anyone following. Still, I vary my usual route, making sharp turns and sudden changes of direction just in case.

CHAPTER 2

The detours cost me time, and I arrive at Lincoln Shelter with only minutes to spare. The building’s gray pillars look diseased in the coming light of dawn. The concrete steps are broken and crumbling. Trees reach barren fingers at the thin covering of ash still stretched over the sky. But the proximity of the shelter to the river means it can access water, making it one of the best Coalition facilities in D.C.

There is a crowd of people around the shelter’s entrance to the left of the stairs, arguing with the sentry. He’s not letting anyone in. My breath comes shallow and fast as I join the crowd. I don't recognize this sentry. He’s dressed in a standard Coalition uniform, sleek dark blue with a clear hood that’s supposed to shield radiation. But I’ve seen sentries come down with radiation sickness just like the rest of us. The only difference is that they can afford to get a doctor’s help.

Sentries dress different from the soldiers that guard the Undercity. Their uniform is a throw-back to the World Coalition government that was formed a few years before the explosion. The title seems a misnomer now, since the impossibility of long-range communications cuts off the Undercity from any place further than twenty miles.

I shove my way through the people. None of them are offering scavenge, so they’re all just beggars. At least I have something. I only hope it will be enough.

Get back! the sentry says. He shoves at people with the side of his sonic rifle. Find shelter elsewhere! This door is closed.

Catching my balance from the jostling of the crowd, I pull the batteries out of the blanket and hold them toward the sentry. He doesn’t see me.

I have scavenge! It takes more than one shout for me to get his attention.

He scowls at me, then glances down at the batteries. There are five of them, double A and covered in white powder.

What is that radiation-rot? You think you can get in here with that?

Behind the sentry, in the shadows of the entrance, I see a table where another sentry, this one older and clean-shaven, sits accepting a can of tomatoes. Wimberly. He waves for the scav standing next to him to go in.

I pitch my voice louder so Wimberly will hear me. I ... I hoped the batteries might have a little bit of power left in them.

It’s AM, the sentry says. We’re closing. He reaches for the blanket. I pull it out of his reach. He examines my face, and his eyes take on a gleam that I don't like. Of course, I could make an exception. His lowered voice makes my skin crawl. Door duty gets pretty lonely. I could use some company. He winks slowly, and I shudder.

Rockland, send that girl over here.

The sentry, Rockland, glances back over his shoulder at Wimberly. She don't got nothing. Just some rotted batteries and a bitty shredded blanket.

I hold my breath as Wimberly stands up, crossing his arms over his chest. I'll be the judge of that.

Rockland scowls at me, grabs my arm, and yanks me through the door, sending me careening into the table. I drop the batteries, and they roll across the marble floor.

Watch it! Wimberly curses.

Rockland ignores him and goes back to yelling at the crowd as he starts to close the door against their protests.

Wimberly bends over to gather the batteries. I rub the new bruise on my hip where I banged into the table and glare back at Rockland.

Is this all you could find, Caelin? Wimberly asks. I turn back to him. He pinches some of the battery powder and rubs it between his gloved fingers.

I had some good stuff, but somebody else made off with it.

He looks up at me and frowns at the side of my head where the gun hit me. He reaches up as if to push back my hood, but I jerk away from him.

He sighs. I think we could get a little juice out of these, but I can’t trade more than one AM for you and Mardy. His expression turns somber. You have got to find something better tomorrow. I can't keep letting you in like this.

I nod my understanding, though I don’t know where else to look that I haven’t already tried.

Wimberly tosses the batteries and the blanket into a box at his feet. You know the drill.

I glance back at Rockland as he slams the door shut and engages the lock. Thank you, I tell Wimberly before moving off into the blessed darkness.

I walk through the old museum and stop at the restrooms when the nausea hits. There’s nothing to empty, but my body seems determined to try.

Afterwards, I clean myself up as best I can with the trickle of water from the sinks. Blood has dripped down the side of my face and dried there. I wash it off so Mardy won’t see, but there’s nothing I can do about the mottled bruising.

Lincoln Shelter is the best Coalition shelter in the city. They still have running water, serve two meals a day, and the restroom facilities are mostly clean. If I can’t find enough scavenge tomorrow, Mardy and I will have to move. I could try one of the private shelters, controlled by gangs, but they’re selective about who they let in. You have to find good stuff to impress them.

There’s a line of people going down the metal staircase into the shelter itself. I stand behind the man who got in with a can of tomatoes and wonder briefly where he found it. Food like that is hard to come by these days. Below me, the shelter stretches out in both directions, lit by sparse electric lights. The hum of a generator competes with the echoing murmur of voices. The smell of rot permeates everything, as though I am entering a mass grave. It always takes me a long time to get used to the smell after the dry air topside.

Pillars obscure most of the people seated on the concrete floor. They’re packed in tight, beyond capacity, but at least this many bodies generates some heat. I’m able to unzip my jacket, exposing the tattered sweater and faded jeans I wear beneath it.

Once I get down to the floor, I teeter my way through the knots of people. Some are sipping at bowls of watery soup, others talking softly. There are couples huddled together beneath a single rotted blanket, children whining for attention, and far too many people sitting alone staring at the graffiti on the pillars. Nobody pays attention to me. Though they sometimes move aside so I can pass, they don’t look up. The only way to maintain privacy in these close quarters is simply to ignore everyone.

Mardy will be to the left, beneath the stairs. There are fewer people here. It’s darker and smells of urine. I have to breathe through my mouth to avoid gagging. Once I find our space, I see that Mardy isn’t here. We’re lucky no one has crossed the wadded-up blanket on the floor that reserves our spot against the wall. There’s a small mosaic on the floor, made up of little bits of glass and plastic that twinkle in the wan light. I can't make out what it is this time, but I know Mardy will explain it later.

I step over the blanket line and squat down on the floor. The tools at my belt clink against the concrete. They’re all cobbled together from broken handles and rusted metal—a kitchen knife, a wrench nearly rusted through, a thin file I use as a screwdriver. There’s nothing valuable. I traded any of that long ago.

I let my head roll back against the wall. The cold seeps through my skull, eases my headache enough that I can handle it again. Lincoln Shelter has been our home for nearly a year now. Before that, we moved around from place to place, never staying anywhere more than a couple of months at a time. The best shelter was Dupont, where Papa placed us when we were first shut out of the Undercity right after the explosion. They had real beds there, and I actually went to school. I’ve heard a big gang controls Dupont now, one no lowly scav would mess with.

When I see Mardy making her way through the crowd, I sit up a little straighter and pull off my gloves. She is taller than I am, though her frame is skinnier inside the folds of her overgrown sweater. She has a round face with big eyes that make her seem even younger than her twelve years. Her long hair is woven back into a single braid. It would be strawberry blonde if not for the dirt caking it. I’ve told her several times how impractical long hair is, that it attracts rats, but she won’t let me cut it. She says she doesn’t want it to look like an axe chopped it off at the shoulders, like mine. 

She’s carrying two steaming bowls. My stomach rumbles as though waking up from a long slumber. The movement brings on the nausea. I get control quickly, but Mardy sees.

She narrows her