The next morning, the horrors of yesterday seemed almost like nothing but a distant nightmare and it took me a while to realise that everything we'd been through had actually come to pass.
Back then, by the way, this happened to me quite often… Waking up in the morning, thinking that my life in the forest must have been just some weird elongated dream and expecting to see my sister sitting in our tiny kitchen with her breakfast...
Only to find out I was lying on a sofa in a wooden cabin, living under someone else's roof, wearing someone else's clothes and surrounded by endless trees.
On top of that, the forest was awfully quiet and after spending most of my life in a cramped house in Swansea, I found that, strangely, it was the absence of noise that kept me lying awake the whole night.
I found the rest of the company in a much better mood.
No one but me and James knew anything about the true nature of our adventure and all the three remaining outlaws were preoccupied with laughing at something they were watching on one of our three wonderful channels. I even briefly tried to join them before realising that no amount of Captain Bokbok would help me forget the explosion, the smoke and El's blood spreading over the table.
“Tony? Is everything alright?” I could hear Will's voice next to me. “I don't want to sound rude or anything… but you look like shit.”
“Yeah…”
“Do you want some coffee or some tea?”
I didn't get a chance to answer him because, whether he'd heard us talking or simply just woken up, James opened the door leading up to his room and sauntered on into the kitchen. “That's gonna be hard to do. We're out of coffee as far as I know.”
“Morning.” William turned to him. “Are we really out? I think I checked the box yesterday and it was nearly full.”
“But it's not now,” James tried to tell him. “I don't know what happened. We can always ask the Rebels to give us supplies upfront. We were about to head into the sewers to visit Elskan anyway."
“Were we?” I asked.
“Of course.” the outlaw glared at me. “Because he stayed in the town overnight? To sort something out?”
“Oh, yeah... Of course we were.” The last twenty-four hours have been a little too hectic for my taste. I almost forgot the lie we told everyone in the camp to explain El's sudden disappearance. “Of course we'll go and visit him.”
It took us a while to finish our food and get ready. We also made sure to pack some of his personal things. Spare boots, toothbrush, clothes... I couldn't imagine how long it could take to recover from an injury like that. A month, half a year, or even longer?
I've never seen anyone get shot before.
“We should have told Mark about this. Don't you think?” During our ride through the forest, I decided to divulge something I've been thinking about during the night. “He's a doctor. He should be sitting in this car with us.”
“No offence, but you are already one more person than we ever wanted in on this secret. If it turns out to be more than just a scratch, we'll have to find someone. Just not yet.”
“You said you had a sister too,” he added after a moment's delay.
“I do. She's a…” I tried to throw him the bait, to see if he knew anything about the nature of Sam's work. There was no reaction. “She lives in the town.”
“Then I'm sure you can imagine my situation. All we want to do is to protect her.” He looked out the window and seemed to be watching me in the reflection. “Elskan seems to trust you, so I'll try to do the same. Just don't mention anything to anyone, no matter how well we know them. That's how we managed up to this point.”
The rest of the way passed by rather quickly. We exchanged the quiet comforts of the trees for the hustle and bustle of Nederstone and soon the familiar sight of the old pub presented itself again.
We paid no mind to the two or three patrons drinking downstairs. An acknowledging nod from Mary behind the bar was all we needed to pass through up to the second floor, and the next moment James was knocking on one of the doors.
It was El's wife, Anne, who opened it and just by the look on her face we could tell something was very wrong.
“James!” she beamed when she realised who we were. “Thank god you are here!”
We exchanged a single glance. Was Elskan's injury somehow more severe than we'd expected? Had his condition worsened throughout the night? What happened? Without another word, James squeezed past her into the room.
I was a little slower and made sure to politely take off my shoes before we entered, and thanks to that I got a little more information.
“The idiot wouldn't lie down!”
“Excuse me?” I stopped.
“He wouldn't lie down the whole night! If he doesn't bleed out, I'll murder him myself!”
After that I wasted no time in following James into the main room, left the tamping little woman behind, and went in search of our friend.
Somehow he was up and about, walking around the room without his shirt on and holding a bloody bandage to his fresh wound. All to the greater distress of his wife.
“Ah, my outlaws!” he exclaimed the second he saw us in the door. “Don't even take off your shoes. I'm gonna get dressed and we're off to visit the Rebels.”
The whole situation was so bizarre. As if it was just another morning in the camp.
“Can you tell him something?” Anne pleaded with James. “He needs to rest and sleep and all he talks about is how he has to go outside and talk to some mad terrorist.”
“Yes!” El's voice could now be heard from the bedroom. “I couldn't sleep the whole night so I've been thinking and now I have to talk to Einstein.”
James rolled his eyes in disbelief. “You know how he is when he gets something into his head. Let me try something.”
He disappeared into the bedroom and we heard him arguing with the other outlaw.
“Hey, buddy. You feeling alright?”
“I'm feeling great! A breakthrough, James! Finally, a breakthrough.”
“Yeah... you got shot yesterday. Do you remember that?”
“A scratch!”
“But shot nonetheless. Listen-“
As this exchange unfolded we've been waiting for the results in their tiny living room and uncomfortable silence took place.
“So... what are you going to call it?” I tried to break the ice and gestured towards Anne's belly. “I mean him. Or- or her, of course. Do you know the sex yet?”
She found my clumsiness funny, fortunately, and smiled. “I do not know. We wanted to keep it a secret as long as we can and even if we didn't, it's not easy to find a reliable doctor these days. I think it's better this way. Only a couple of months and we'll get the best surprise gift ever.”
I could do nothing but agree with that.
Without any warning Anne lowered her voice and her tone changed.
“So what were you three doing yesterday?”
It was a turn in the conversation I hadn't expected and out of the blue I felt as if there was a stone lodged in the back of my throat.
“I have nothing against this new lifestyle they've chosen,” Anne assured me. “We all do what we have to to survive. It's just the way the world has turned out. They try to be really transparent about it too. It's just... I know they don't tell me everything every time. My husband got shot yesterday. So what happened to him?”
This was an awfully dangerous territory and I wasn't sure what to confess and what to deny.
“We were helping a group of people here in the town-“
“The Rebels. I know about them,” she interrupted me immediately.
“Oh, well... we wanted to get some food for them, basically, and Foxglove found out and-”
“Wait- Foxglove?” she stared in surprise.
Fortunately, the two outlaws decided to join us at that exact moment, before I could spill any more secrets.
“We came to a kind of an agreement.”
“Yes. I'll be back in an hour. I promise.” El kissed his confused wife on the cheek and made for the door.
“I'll get him back as soon as I can," James grimaced. "It was the best I could do.”
“Just stay safe, you two,” she smiled kindly, instantly passing over the news she'd just learned from me. I was sure El was going to have his share of explaining to do later.
“One hour!” James reminded her with confidence for the last time before we stepped out into the hallway and the door closed behind our backs.
“One hour is all I need. If we get a move on we might even swing over to the camp and check up on the boys.”
“You're gonna rip something and it's gonna start bleeding and I hope you have a really good explanation when we come back and you're going to have to show it to Anne.”
“I don't,” El just shrugged. “And that's a problem for future Elskan anyway.”
“I hate you...”
“It's gonna go smoothly. Trust me.” He grinned with confidence.
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“No way!”
“Please?”
Not even half an hour later, we were standing before the cheesed off Rebel leader, covering in face of her wrath.
“I'm not letting you in and I'm definitely not letting that bloke out!” Tommy cut him short. “He's like seven feet tall and I'm pretty sure he could crush your head like a peanut without even trying.”
“We managed to beat him once and we could do it again,” the outlaw proclaimed with confidence, forcing me and James to exchange a quick, worried look. His hunched posture and pained groans accompanying every move spoke for something else. “Besides, I think we deserve some little bonus after our last adventure.”
Using his injury as leverage was a filthy tactic. A filthy tactic that seemed to work, though, because Tommy frowned and glanced down to her feet.
“How is it looking? I'm- I hope it doesn't hurt or anything…”
“It was just a scratch, just like you said,” El assured her, clearly in horrible pains. "How is our prisoner doing, by the way?”
“We ended up closing him up in a tiny maintenance room that used to serve as my bedroom.” She looked at us strangely. “He's got his own bed, unpaid room service and a free meal every day... A much nicer treatment than he deserves, if you ask me. Other than that, he seems to be just sitting around, staring at the walls and brooding or something.”
El rubbed his chin in thought. “I'd really like to talk to him.”
“Talk to him? Even if I let you down there... We've been trying to do that for hours. He's more likely to break you in half than to open his mouth.”
“We'll see about that. I think I have something that might persuade him to communicate.”
Tommy wrinkled her nose. “If you're counting on your personal charms, I don't mean to put you down, but I don't think it's going to be enough.”
Nonetheless, the Rebel ended up leading us down into the twisting tunnels of her underground. A young red-haired woman stood guard and stepped gingerly aside when we approached.
“I'll give you a few minutes to try and get him to talk about whatever you want. I have to admit I'm curious myself,” Tommy said, whipping out the keys. “If it doesn't work, I don't have the time to sit here and wait half an hour for some miraculous resolution, so you better make it fast.”
With a loud click of a latch, a small window at the upper part of the door opened and we could see a grey outline of our prisoner sitting alone in the darkness, staring down the wall in front of him. He appeared sullen, no doubt plotting some ingenious escape and an act of immediate revenge.
When he saw who came to visit him, his eyes lit up with new life.
“Ah, my brave captors.” His voice just dripped with sarcasm. “Tell me, how does it feel to be just a lapdog in someone else's game?”
“As long as the lap stays safe and warm,” Elskan shrugged.
The prisoner snorted, “Figured as much.” There was a moment of uncomfortable silence as he looked at each of us in turn with undisguised menace in his eyes. “What do you want from me?”
“Just a little bit of cooperation.”
“Maybe think of that beforehand the next time you beat someone up and lock them in the sewers.”
“It's not like we had any choice. We were doing what we were told.” James decided to butt in, and the man turned his head and pierced him with his eyes.
“As I said... lapdogs.”
“We're here to talk about your inventions.” El didn't let his attitude deter him. That seemed to have been a mistake, though. The man just stared at him, blinked a few times and then shut down completely, turning back to his empty wall. “I want to know more about the way you made them and more about the way they work. What did you use to put so much power into such a tiny set of batteries? And why hasn't anyone done it before you?”
Einstein mumbled something under his breath and our friend inched closer to the door in hopes of getting some crucial information.
“Excuse me?”
“I said bugger off!” the prisoner flared up. “You won't get anything out of me!”
“Well, that's too bad...”
Whatever plans Elskan might have had for this conversation were falling apart faster than the Pennard Castle. This must have been the worst-case scenario. He turned away from the door as if to leave, then stopped as he pondered something. “I was just hoping maybe you could help me with the bomb that's currently lying on a table in my room. I've been tinkering with it a bit and from what I've seen it's some pretty impressive stuff. Revolutionary, I would say. Most of them blew up along with your home, of course, but... I was lucky enough to save this last one.”
That made the man look up again. There was clear disbelief in his eyes, so El pressed the matter a little further.
“At a first glance everything seems perfectly normal. You have the batteries set in the middle, the inductor connected to…” El explained each part of the mechanism in way too much detail for him to have made anything up, and way too expertly for me to remember his words, and it quite quickly became quite clear that he'd caught the man's attention again. “To an untrained eye, it almost looks like some unfinished school project, if you don't mind me saying so. And yet, when you press the button, the released power is almost unbelievable. So what is it? Some new material? Or something to do with magnetism? An arc reactor? Or maybe it's just some tiny and insignificant detail that no one has thought about before until you came along...” he pressed his face close to the tiny window in the door. “How exactly does it work?”
We all held our breath as Einstein stared at him with silent malice. He stood up, snorted, then moved closer to the window to face him.
“Open that door and come inside.”
With a satisfied grin, Elskan turned to the rest of us and held out a hand as if waiting for Tommy to lend him the keys.
“What?” she gasped, realising what he was about to do. “You've gotta be kidding me. He's obviously pissed at you and you're hurt… he's going to kill you!”
“Just five minutes, mom,” El teased her.
“And you two are okay with this?” she turned to me and James and though neither of us were exactly stoked with the situation, there was not really any way to stop him and so, opening the door, El stepped into the improvised cell to talk to the brawny madman.
“Fighting against the system seems to be taking its toll on you,” the man immediately remarked when he noticed El's condition.
“Nothing we can't handle. Just a little run-in with the army.”
“They do that to you,” Einstein nodded. “Now listen to me...”
They ended up being locked up in there for more than half an hour, whispering to each other and questioning their strange designs in ways I wouldn't be able to explain to you even if I'd heard them.
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And at the same time, unbeknown to any of us, a good dozen or so armoured cars with orange and purple designs stopped by one of the lesser known entrances to the underground. Armed men in helmets and heavy boots poured out in several rows, and one of them dashed forward towards the hidden door in the alleyway. A quick inspection of his surroundings and a single nod to let the rest of them know the coast was clear was the only command they needed. They all knew what they came to do here. Cocking their rifles and equipping themselves with powerful torches, the foxes entered the convoluted tunnels of the town's sewers while their angered leader waited in his impenetrable fortress for the report of a successful mission.
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The time for lunch came and went, and when El finally found us sitting at one of the tables in the spacious underground dining hall, he was just beaming with new energy.
“I think I've finally got it, guys.”
James smiled as he twirled an empty glass in one hand. “Your fool's quest is complete. And we should get going again. I told them to pack you something for the road.” He gestured over one shoulder with a thumb.
“That's awfully nice of you,” El allowed. “We should hit the road if we want to be on time. I want to get started on my new project as soon as I can.”
This seemed to catch James off guard. “Uh, nope… You promised you'd be home in an hour or so. And by home, I mean the one you have in the town!”
“Come on, James! I don't mean to toot my own horn here, but I might be on the verge of a scientific breakthrough of some epic proportions!”
“Sure you are. I think you might be exaggerating that just a little. A teeny tiny bit.”
“Give me one more hour in the camp and we can go back. I just want to look at the thing. A few minutes to tweak some things; maybe a few hours… It works! You've seen it.”
James and I exchanged a careful glance.
“It doesn't work. What we saw was a failed, potentially dangerous prototype of whatever insanity you decided to create. How long did you sleep last night?” he changed his tone.
“I didn't,” El answered cheerfully.
“Oh god…”
“I'm not one of those idiots who thinks sleep is for the weak or anything. I just couldn't do it.”
At that moment, a light tap on my shoulder made me look up and face Ashley standing right by me and smiling awkwardly, with the Rebel leader at her back. She gave us a little wave.
“Hey. So, how'd it go?” The two women took their seats at the table and Tommy stretched out and yawned. “A busy night… You've never been to our mess hall before, have you?”
“Not yet. Thank you for hosting us,” James replied while El picked on the more interesting of the two topics.
“Einstein was surprisingly cooperative once he found out we hadn't, in fact, destroyed all of his incredible work.”
“So, did you learn anything about his past?” Tommy's eyes lit up with excitement. “Something about the reasons he had to do what he did, or about his assistant?”
“Oh- I didn't think to ask about that.”
“What? So what were you doing?”
“Just… chatting him up, I suppose.”
Tommy stared at him for a moment, as if wondering whether he was just being weird or straight up lying to her, then relaxed. "Well, at least you have the energy to do it. That's good. I wanted to talk to you about some additional side quests.”
“Umm…”
“As soon as you're feeling better, of course! I would- I'd be lying if I said I wasn't worried yesterday.”
All the while Ashley seemed to stay back and listen in on our conversation, no doubt wondering what the hell we were on about. She didn't take any part in the last couple of our adventures and, understandably, didn't know anything about the Red Church either. While no one was paying any attention to her at the moment, I was fairly sure she'd get her explanation later.
“We didn't even take any time to ask you. How about you and your walk back home? Did everything go fine?”
“After we split up everything got incredibly hectic, of course, and I had to go a little out of my way to make sure no one followed me and use one of the older, less explored entrances, but I'm pretty confident it was worth it. We got away with all the loot and the foxes have no idea!”
That's when a deep, echoing rumble could be heard above our heads as the ground shook beneath us. When we looked up, Tommy laughed.
“That was pretty omino-”
Then, without any warning, all the lights went out.
There's something so primal about the fear that grips you in perfect darkness. It's not even about the danger, more about the sudden sensory deprivation. Your heart begins to pound, all your senses sharpen, panic rises within you as your breathing grows more and more shallow.
A muffled scream sounded from afar, and I could feel someone clutching my hand.
“Now don't worry.” Tommy tried to calm everyone down. “This happens down here from time to time. We just need to wait for someone to fire it back up.”
This didn't feel right, though. I couldn't explain it to you if I tried, but there was something in the air. As if the walls were pressing down on me. The screaming in the distance grew louder.
“One day I had to walk blind all the way from my office down to the actual maintenance room because there was no one around to help me,” she went on, oblivious to what was happening. “That was scary-”
“Quiet!” someone barked.
We could all hear it now; the loud voices and the countless feet stamping and running on the concrete floor.
“W- What is-”
Now something crashed, the sound travelling through the enclosed space sounding so loud as if a bomb had gone off and muffled voices could be heard over the sounds of confused Rebels, obviously shouting.
“-is Foxglove! Everyone down on the ground! Now!”
All we could do was to sit there like a bunch of frozen statues. Was this real?
“We have to get out of here,” James whispered, his voice strained with shock.
“No, I-”
Something slammed on the table and Elskan stopped Tommy before she could continue. “Yes. We have to get out. Now! Do you know the way?”
“I- This was not supposed to happen-“
“Do you know the way?”
For a while, the only thing I could hear in the darkness was her frantic breathing and rhythmic thumping in the distance. I couldn't decide whether it was the sound of dozens of people running for their lives or my own heart racing up my neck. The lack of light made the scene seem almost surreal, like some fever dream.
Someone switched on a torch on their mobile phone, we gathered everyone who happened to be in the hall and only moments later the whole group started moving, following the Rebel leader down the narrow main corridor. We couldn't run, which made the going painfully slow and utterly terrifying. Like a nightmare where your legs don't work fast enough to escape the monster.
One by one people joined us as we fled and in the end there might have been about fifteen or so of us shambling on to the rescue. More confused Rebels streamed past us, fleeing in panic in one direction or another, not even noticing their leader.
Suddenly, as we turned around a corner, I was nearly blinded by a bright cone of light and a man, barking for us to stop, blocked our way.
“You de-” the soldier yelled. In the split second, I could see the barrel of his gun pointed straight at my chest before it flew upwards as El kicked up, grunted and fell back onto us when the pain of his recent injury caught up with him. James shouldered past him, tearing the weapon out from the man's hands and aiming further down the corridor to fend off his mates.
“Drop it!”
A sound of heavy plastic hitting the floor echoed through the underground.
“Okay, now run!” he turned back to us. “Run!”
Everyone turned around to go back the way we'd come from, and Tommy darted into a nearby door, dragging the rest of us along. I simply followed the people in front of me through a maze of concrete corridors and long-forgotten cellars. The rest was a blur of black and white tunnels drifting past my face. For a long while, the only things I could make out were shadows and uncertain shapes, and I was sure if I somehow managed to trip and fall behind, I'd never be able to find my way out.
I was still holding Ashley's hand, so that was one person I wasn't about to lose.
“We have to help everyone!” Tommy shouted at the top of her lungs, though no one responded and she didn't bring it up again. We all knew it was impossible.
Our rush retreat came to sudden a halt. Being at the very end, I didn't understand what the problem was at first, until I took a better look around me.
We'd never been to this part of the underground before.
The walls were made of moss-covered bricks that seemed to be crumbling before our very eyes. The wooden beams that supported the ceiling were so rotten it seemed as if they might fall down at any moment, and most importantly the floor- the floor was flooded. In the light of the phone I could see Tommy standing up to her knees in the water and the rest of the group watching on in despair.
It was a dead end.
We were trapped.
The lights and shouts that had followed us a for a bit were nowhere to be seen or heard now and as far as I could tell they had to be a long way behind our backs, but for the moment we seemed to have an even bigger problem.
“Where's James?” Elskan was the first to notice. “James!” he shouted into the darkness in desperation. “We have to go back!”
“He was the one who said we had to run!” Tommy argued with him. “I don't even know where we are now. He could be just behind us, trying to catch up.”
“Or he could be lying in some hole with both of his legs broken and screaming for help.”
“We have to backtrack anyway, don't we?” I tried to calm them down a little while my heartbeat ran at full speed. “We need to find a way around this water, so we might still run into him at some point.”
“Where did you see him last?”
“I have no idea!” I confessed to him.
“Then we can't leave without him.”
“But we have to!” Tommy urged, stomping back to the front of the group to inspect the path we'd come from.
I could see Elskan didn't like this situation one bit. He was clearly on a verge of making a proper complicated decision, fidgeting in place, his eyes darting to us and back to the entrance into the dark tunnels. I'm pretty confident he would have turned around and gone in search for his friend all by himself, terribly injured or not, if I hadn't decided to speak up.
“Some of us have families waiting for us out there.” I kept it as vague as I could. “Do we really want to lose any more people than we already have?”
He seemed to grasp the meaning rather quickly as he turned around, and some of the fire in him must havve diminished.
“Right…”
“I think I know where we are now,” Tommy announced, seeing that we were all in agreement again. “We never use this part, obviously, but I think I can get us out of here. The bad news is I have no clue where exactly we're gonna resurface and we'll need somewhere big and safe to hide and figure out what to do. Anyone's got any ideas?”
It was good to hear Tommy being her confident and courageous self again and though she spoke more to her Rebels than to the two of us, El and I exchanged a long, knowing look.
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We must have given the two brothers a heart attack.
Will met us halfway through the woods as a kind of a frontal scout, swinging a heavy piece of wood he'd picked up along the way and ready to bash each of our heads in. He dropped it as soon as he saw us.
“It's you! What the hell happened? Your laptop started blaring, and we heard half of the traps going off at once!”
“They attacked the sewers,” I blurted out. Once out of my mouth, the words sounded so strange. Almost surreal.
“They?” the young outlaw watched wide-eyed as about a dozen or so strangers poured into our camp. “Who are they?”
“Who do you think?” Elskan hobbled past him, wincing with every step. “We need everyone in the kitchen. Where are the rest of you?”
I've never seen the camp in such a rush before.
Rebels and outlaws, all of us gathered in the one room filled to bursting with bodies. By the time I joined the gathering, my usual place at the table was already taken, so all I could do was to squeeze in between two strangers by the door. The two young brothers, no doubt curious as to the whole situation, pushed their way through the crowd to join me. I could see no trace of Mark, though I spied Ashley leaning against the refrigerator.
“Where's James?” William asked me, raising his voice to be heard over the murmur of a dozen people crammed into the tight space.
“We have no idea. He probably stayed in there.”
“Well… shit.”
“Yes.”
A young woman with short hair and glasses poked me in the back. “Excuse me. What is this dump supposed to be?”
“That's a long story.”
“We live here,” Manny butted in without any semblance of shame, to the Rebel's astonishment. That's when Tommy clapped her hands to get everyone's attention.
“Alright, everybody. Calm down!” she called out. “What happened is terrible, and I know we all need our own time to deal with the situation. There will be plenty of opportunities for that tomorrow. What we need right now is to focus on the immediate future.”
A strange chill seemed to pass through the crowd at her words, as if only now the shock and the confusion following the initial attack subsided and the full weight of the situation dawned on the few of her people that were left.
“Can we go back now?” One of the slower individuals asked.
“First things first, we need to get you all to safety. The underground is gone, unfortunately, and I know that for some of you that means no more food and no more roof above your heads. Those of you who have a family and a home to return to, I will be quite glad to help you get there. Those of you who don't… I- we'll figure something out.”
Tommy cleared her throat.
“I- I don't know what more to say, honestly.” She raised a hand to cover her mouth in sudden emotion. “I'm terribly sorry, but it looks like our resistance is-” Her voice broke. “We are finished-”
The leader of the Rebels finished her speech and sat down on a chair with her face hidden in her hands and a sudden discussion erupted among the small crowd of her subjects. I parted with the brothers to move closer to Elskan, who was leaning on the table, trying to speak to Tommy and holding his side with a pained expression. His fresh wound must have burst open during our escape, because I could see blood staining his shirt through his fingers again.
“What about the tiny rich guy?” I could hear him throw away whatever caution he had left. Then again, I suppose there was no reason to keep the inner machinations of a group that no longer existed a secret. “Could he help you?”
“I doubt it.” Tommy shook her head, watching him through her fingers. “He's more like a divorced father to us. Funds our actions, but ask him for anything greater than that and he chickens out. I'd bet he's burning every single connection he's ever had to us as we speak.”
“Then you have to run.”
She looked at him with a mixture of defeat and resignation. “Run?”
“If we act quickly, I'm sure we can get you out of here.”
“And where would we go?”
“We can't just run away like cowards!” a familiar voice boomed right into my ear as Ashley crept closer to watch over my shoulder. “This is not just about Foxglove versus the people of the town anymore. They destroyed everything we built. And now, I'd bet, they have our friends and even our families locked up down in their stupid dungeons. We can't just leave them in there like that!”
She couldn't know what she did, but something about what Ash said must have struck a chord for Elskan. He folded his hands on his chest, thinking, and the Rebels stirred. It was clear we were slowly nearing some important decision.
“I mean...” Manny's voice sounded from across the room. Quietly, as if he didn't actually want anyone to hear him. “We've gone up against them a few times before.”
All the courage seemed to go out of him when every head in the room turned in his direction.
“I- I mean... erm...”
“He is right.” His brother came to his rescue. “In those few instances we've managed to stand our ground pretty well. How many people in this town can boast with that?”
“Would you do it?” Not wasting a single second, Tommy clung onto the hope they were giving her. “You managed to do the impossible before... Would you help us get them back?” She spoke more to the two of us than to the young ones. But Elskan shook his head.
“You people are not thinking rationally. The only logical thing to do here is to run.”
“Maybe it's not the time for rational decisions.” Tommy looked him in the eye. “They have your friend too, don't they? Are you going to abandon him?”
“Of course not!” he exploded in a sudden outburst of unspoken frustration. ”I'm not going to leave James to those bastards! We'll get him back, of course. We will…” Panting and calming back down again, he looked over our heads in thought. “I need to take care of something, if you'll excuse me.”
As he retreated into our room to patch up his wound and likely find some easy and reliable way to contact his wife, we left El to brood and think things through in solitude while the rest of us huddled together in a close circle.
“So…” William asked as he looked us over. “Are we doing this?”
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