Alight_ Book Two of the Generat - Scott Sigler Page 0,14
my shirt damp. I hope we can go inside and find some shade.
The warehouse is built from the same vine-covered stone that makes up the rest of the city. It’s tall and wide, with a peaked roof that faces our street. The vines are so thick they almost obscure two huge stone doors that look like they’re designed to slide apart. If those doors opened all the way, the shuttle could roll in with plenty of room to spare on either side.
Cornstalk statues rise up from the roof’s edges. This close to them, the vines look like old spiderwebs strung between the posts.
Bishop points to the base of the big doors. “Let’s try there.”
We walk closer. Through the thick plant cover, I see a person-sized door set into the big sliding one. How did he spot that?
Bishop rips vines, tosses them aside. He exposes a pair of familiar-looking holes in the small door’s frame. Spingate looks at me for permission; I nod. She inserts the golden tool and starts pressing jewels, trying to unlock it.
Several minutes pass. The heat pounds down. I’m getting bored, and so are the others.
“Spin, is that going to work or not?”
“Almost got it,” she says.
The door clicks, grinds inward. Dirt falls. Dust puffs. A stale smell billows out, carried on a wave of cold air.
Axe in one hand, flashlight in the other, Bishop enters, Coyotl and Farrar at his heels.
I stand alone with Spingate. She seems distracted, as if all of this wonder is lost on her.
“Spin, are you all right?”
She looks at me, forces a smile. “Yes. I just…I’m worried about Gaston. Something could happen to him while we’re gone.”
Not something could happen to the OTHERS, but rather, something could happen to HIM. I remember the way the two of them wrestled back on the Xolotl, laughing and playing. Different from how the others played. I feel awkward and uncomfortable talking about this. I’ve never kissed a boy—or a girl, for that matter—so I don’t know what I’m talking about, but it seems to me she really likes Gaston.
“Are you and he…um…more than just friends?”
She sniffs. “I think I love him.”
Love? I wasn’t expecting that. Love is for older people. But then, we are older. Aren’t we?
Could I fall in love?
I feel a surge of happiness. We’re starting a new world down here. We need love. We need people to…to make babies.
A rush of shame. Flashes of people in black uniforms hitting me, calling me evil and blasphemous. My skin suddenly feels hot, and it’s not from the sun. What did Matilda have to go through as a child? For the first time, I feel actual sympathy for her—and I hate myself for it.
“Em, are you okay?”
“Yes, sorry.” I wave at myself, trying to cool off my skin. “Gaston…does he love you back?”
Her eyes crinkle in a smile that owns every bit of her face.
“Well, when we were in the pilothouse, we—”
Bishop’s head pops out of the door.
“Em, you have to see this.”
—
No vines in here. Flashlight beams play off tall blue racks that stretch away from us, rise up to the slanted roof far above. White bins pack the racks, bins large enough for me to fit inside if I scrunched tight enough. The floor feels smooth, but is covered in dirt and bumpy spots.
A few blurds zip through the darkness, their presence known only by the buzzing of wings and high-pitched chirps. I try not to think that the bumps under my bare feet are probably blurd poop.
So dim in here, so many places to hide. I think back to the Xolotl’s long hallways, the shadowy places where the pigs lurked. I think back to Latu’s body, surrounded by bloody hoofprints.
I hate dark places.
Bishop creeps to the closest rack, axe at the ready. Nothing happens. He rests his axe against the rack, slowly pulls out a bin. Flashlight beams catch shimmers of movement: shiny little things scurrying off the bin, scampering away into the darkness. Some kind of insect, maybe.
Bishop places the bin on the dirty floor. On top of the bin is a profile of a jaguar, yellow and black. The jaguar’s eye is a clear jewel. Bishop stares at the bin for a moment, hands searching the sides, brushing away dust and dead bugs. He presses the jaguar’s eye. A click, then the top of the bin opens, two halves sliding to the sides just like the lids of our birth-coffins back on the Xolotl.