PODs (19 page)

Month Twelve

“Do you think they’ll keep us together?” Katie asked, biting her lip.

“What do you mean?” I asked, watching Faith crawl through the living room. Her chubby legs shuffled across the carpeting, her arms so fat her elbows disappeared in the rolls.

“I heard they’re making camps, like little villages. The people from the PODs will be assigned to camps. Everyone’s talking about it online. Do you think they’ll keep everyone from our POD together?”

“Well, I don’t know, but if it’s true I’m sure they’ll keep us together. Why else would they put us in the same sub-POD?”

“I hope they do. I’m not ready to start over again.”

I smiled and gave her a quick hug. “Me, neither.”

Tiffany scooped up the baby from the floor and bounced her on her knee, smiling at her giggles. Drool dripped from Faith’s mouth as she chewed on her fingers. Tiffany reached over to pick up the tiny nail clippers, and in that millisecond of distraction the baby flung her hand out and grabbed Josh’s cup. Juice spilled down his shirt.

“Dammit!” he shouted, bolting upright from the couch.

“Sorry—” Tiffany started.

“Keep that little brat away from me!” Josh yelled.

Faith started to cry.

“Great, now we have to listen to her wail for an hour. That’s just fantastic.” He stomped into the bedroom.

I got up and sat down next to Tiffany, grabbing a baby wipe to dab at the spattering of juice on the couch. “Don’t worry about him. He’s an ass. Isn’t he, Faith? You dumped that juice on purpose, didn’t you, huh? Smart little girl.”

The baby stopped crying, and gave me a dimpled little grin. Tiffany laughed.

I smiled and patted Tiffany’s shoulder.

Her eyes grew serious. “She doesn’t bother you, does she? When she cries and stuff?”

I shook my head. “No. You know we all love her.”

“I keep thinking about how she’s my only family now. My parents won’t ever get to meet her. She’ll never know her grandparents. They would’ve doted on her.”

I reached over and gave her hand a squeeze. “We’re each other’s family now, and she is going to be spoiled rotten. And after we get out, we—”

A loud thud by the door made me jump. The chute. “Oh!” I made a silly face at the baby. “What’s that? Huh? What’d they send us?”

I walked over with a cold dread congealing in my belly. It was too early for another blood check. No one was expecting more books; we were still in the middle of the current batch of classes. According to the gossip online, it had been weeks since any POD had been cut off from the main, but it was never far from my mind…from anyone’s.

My fingers shook as I reached out to open the hatch. Grabbing the cool steel handle, I took a breath to steady myself. “You’re being silly, Eva,” I whispered.

The door slid open quietly. The acrid disinfectant smell hit me, taking my breath for an instant. I pulled out the container, which felt empty.

I unsealed the lid and reached in, feeling paper. It glided across my finger at the wrong angle. I jerked my hand back and looked at the deep paper cut. “That can’t be a good sign,” I murmured.

“What?” David asked behind me before wrapping his arms around my waist and kissing the back of my neck.

“Oh, nothing. We got something from the main POD.” I reached in and snatched the red paper out of the basket. “It says there’s another systems check later today. What does that make? Three this week?”

“Something like that.”

“I wonder what system needs checking three times in a week,” I said, squeezing a paper towel over my cut finger so I didn’t have to look at the grotesque red ooze. “And why are they sending this message through the chute? They could’ve just e-mailed it out.”

“Don’t get paranoid, Eva. Things need checking.” He turned me around and pressed me against the wall, the chute’s handle digging into my back. He leaned down and his mouth moved over mine. My insides did cartwheels and butterflies flew around, tickling in some private places.

I planted my hands on his chest and gently pushed him away. “Are you trying to distract me?”

“Is it working?”

“Yeah, kinda.” I smiled. I loved the taste of him. “It’s been a year that we’ve been down here, David.”

“I know. It still doesn’t mean anything is wrong.” He bent his head and kissed me lightly.

“Why do you think we haven’t heard anything about getting out of here?”

“Have I told you you’re a worrywart?”

“Yeah, yeah.”

Month Fourteen

It was the day the last assignments for the current batch of courses were due—our final exams for the modules. We uploaded them through the online classrooms and waited for the next batch of books and course assignments. Additional MREs arrived weekly to supplement our dwindling supplies. But when the container shot down the chute that day, hitting the metal wall with a loud clang, it was empty except for our blood test kits.

We pricked our fingers, completed the tests, and tossed them inside like usual, except for Josh, who left his bloody gauze and lancet on the kitchen table.

Tiffany made a face. “Gross. Clean up after yourself.”

“It’s just a little blood. You clean it up.” He flicked his hand, dismissing her.

“I don’t want to go anywhere near your bodily fluids.”

“Just pick it up, man. Why do you have to make everything so difficult?” George sighed.

“Fine.” Josh stomped over to the table and swiped the items into the garbage.

“Thank you.”

Josh grunted in reply.

After our blood work was completed, we hung out, waiting for the new coursework. It never came. Everyone seemed relieved. I was worried.

“Maybe we’ve just finished it all,” Katie said. “We’ve been down here more than a year. They probably only brought enough materials for a year and that’s it.”

“You’re probably right, kiddo.” I didn’t believe it for a second.

Month Fifteen

It happened.

The PODs Open

It may be hard for an egg to turn into a bird: it would be a jolly sight harder for it to learn to fly while remaining an egg. We are like eggs at present. And you cannot go on indefinitely being just an ordinary, decent egg. We must be hatched or go bad.

~ C.S. Lewis

“
W
ho ate all the damn strawberries?” Aidan yelled. “I was saving them for my cereal.”

“I did. Use the banana,” Josh said.

“A banana isn’t a strawberry. I marked the container with my name. You’re a jerk—”

The container hit the metal wall of the chute with a crack. I always jumped when it did that. I hated it. It reminded me of the banging and crunching we’d heard when Cam’s sub-POD was cut off from the main.

“It’s not time for our blood checks,” I said.

“Maybe it’s strawberries. I’d really like some strawberries… Josh,” Aidan said, an edge to his voice.

“Drop dead,” Josh replied, never looking up from his computer.

David got up from the table where we were having breakfast. Taking the container from the chute, he pulled a manila envelope out of the basket.

He dumped the contents on the table for everyone to see. Inside were ten name badges, one for each of us. Our photos—except Faith’s—and names were printed on one side; the other had barcodes. David scanned the label on the envelope, his face growing pale.

“What’s it say, David?” I whispered.

“‘The seals to each sub-POD will be broken tomorrow morning. Do not attempt to leave your sub-POD. Officers will give residents directions and escort them to their appropriate area topside.’
That’s all it says.”

“It’s over,” Tiffany murmured, pulling the baby close.

“Hot damn! Finally, I’m free of this tin can,” Josh jumped up and hurried to the guys’ bedroom.

Well, at least Josh is happy. Why aren’t the rest of us? I thought we’d be excited. But instead everyone looks…anxious. What will we find up there? What has the world become?

“Well, guess we should start packing up our stuff,” Aidan said.

“Yeah, I guess so,” Seth agreed, rising slowly from his seat, rubbing his hands up and down his thighs.

One by one, everyone walked to their sleeping areas and started packing their belongings—except me. I sat in the living room alone, flicking the corner of my name badge with my fingernail. The lanyard wound so tightly around my fingers they turned red.

My insides were quivering, jittery. Something wasn’t right. For fifteen months we’d all looked forward to the moment we could leave, but now that the time was here it felt… wrong.

I longed to feel the warmth of the sun on my face, to see it shine brightly in the blue sky instead of the simulated light of the POD windows. I wanted to feel cool blades of grass beneath my bare feet, the autumn rain on my face. I was happy at the thought of hearing birds chirping in the trees early in the morning, and the songs of crickets and bullfrogs at night. But no matter how much I looked forward to those things, I couldn’t stop worrying. Something was going to happen to shatter our happy little family. I could feel it in my gut. It twisted and churned in my stomach, like a tumor growing until it made breathing difficult.

Standing, I scrunched my toes in the chocolate-colored carpeting and stretched, trying to shake off the uneasy feeling. I walked toward the girls’ bedroom to pack, turning my badge over and over in my hands, when I saw it. In the lower left hand corner I saw a label—A23S2. I remembered the conversation I’d had with Katie.

“Do you think they’ll keep us together?”
she’d asked me.

I had told her they would. At the time I’d believed it.

“David?”

“In the bedroom.”

“Can I see your ID badge?”

He handed it to me and continued to throw his things in his suitcases. I held them together, a lump forming in my throat.

A48S1.

They didn’t match.

I handed his badge back to him and went down the hall to the girls’ bedroom.

“Tiffany, can I see your and Faith’s badges?”

“Sure. What’s up?”

“I’m not sure.”

Faith babbled happily in her crib, playing with a toy. I smiled and tickled her under her chin, then wiping the drool on my pant leg. She grinned at me. Tiffany stopped packing and handed me their IDs.

I looked closely, reading and rereading the information.

A45S9 on both. Tiffany’s and Faith’s matched. Mine and theirs didn’t.

My heart dropped. That’s when I knew. “Oh, no,” I whispered.

I looked at Katie’s—A03S10. Ours didn’t match, but hers and Jai Li’s did.

“Crap, crap, crap. They can’t do this.” I wasn’t aware I’d said it out loud until David touched my elbow.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothi—”

“Eva, don’t say
nothing
. I know you. Something is wrong.”

I swallowed hard. “Uh, can you just help me get everyone into the living area, please? I promise I’ll tell you.”

“Sure.”

When we’d all assembled in the living area I showed everyone the numbers on their badges.

“So?” George asked.

“So, what’s your number, George?”

“A23S2.”