Brothers Read online

  My stomach convulsed, and I threw up over the man’s feet and Mum’s clean carpet. My mum…still standing hunched by the door, not looking at me.

  The man gave his boots an impatient shake and dragged me onwards, saying nastily, “Waterproof and washable, unRegistered Child. Do your worst.”

  We were almost to the front door, and all my struggles were achieving nothing. I was just a short, skinny thirteen-year-old.

  “Dad!” I screamed. “Dad, help me! Help me! Mum! Do something! Do something, please!”

  She did. She began to cry. Great shaking sobs, her head still down. Still not looking at me.

  “Mum!” They were dragging me down the steps. “Dad! Dad! HELP ME! HELP ME! DAD! DAD!” I was shrieking it at the top of my lungs. He had to help me! He had to! He was Dad! Any moment now! Any moment he’d come sprinting out of the house and give it to these men! He’d save me!

  “DAD!”

  But they were opening the rear door of the car…grilles covered the back windows…one guy got in…they pushed me after him…the other guy got in beside me…“DAD! MUM! HELP ME! HELP M…” The door slammed shut.

  Mum still stood in the doorway, still hunched, still shaking. Dad must still be sitting like a statue in the lounge. It was true. I was unRegistered. They’d lied…my whole life.

  The car started. Clipboard man was the driver, the other two were in the back, sandwiching me.

  “Joe!” Finally, I heard someone calling my name—Daisy came rushing out of the door. Mum grabbed for her but missed. Daisy leaped down the steps and ran towards the car, but we were pulling away. She chased after us, yelling all the time: “Joe! Joe! Where are they taking you? Joe! Bring him back. Bring him back!”

  But of course the men just drove right on.

  K

  I glanced at my rucksack, placed carefully out of the way at the edge of the forest, and drew a deep, steadying breath. This was it. My exact body weight in pork was strapped into the driver’s seat of the battered old car. The seam of the hydrogen tank had been weakened, just enough. Oh Lord, let it be just enough! Everything was ready. This was the moment I’d been saving for and planning for and praying about—on and off—since I was thirteen years old and had finally accepted that the beautiful, deadly call to the priesthood really was stirring in my heart.

  If I did this, there was no going back.

  If I did this? I shook my head, a slight snort of laughter escaping me. I might stand here and indulge in a few moments of solemn, doubt-ridden angst, but there was no real question that I was going to do it.

  Now I just had to wait for the Fellest road to be clear, ease the car back onto it and set it going. Two sets of headlights were currently in sight, though, so I’d have to let them go by. The obvious thing would have been to wait until the middle of the night, of course, when there was no traffic—which was precisely why I wasn’t doing that.

  No one would be suspicious of a crash at barely quarter past eight in the evening.

  JOE

  My parents hadn’t just lied. They’d done nothing. Nothing to save me. Some people fled to Africa with their unRegistered child, didn’t they? Saved them.

  But they hadn’t saved me. They’d just said nothing and waited for the knock at the door. Lied and so not even given me a chance to try and save myself.

  I was too young, of course. To have any real chance on my own. I was so obviously preSort-Age. But at least I’d have had a chance. Except…I’d have had to take Daisy with me, wouldn’t I, or they’d have taken her in my place? And Daisy was even younger and more noticeable than me.

  Mum and Dad should have arranged it. Taken us both. So much safer with adults along.

  But they hadn’t. They’d just waited.

  What chance did I have now, trapped in the back of this car, being driven straight to the Facility and their precious hospital-grade Lab?

  The answer to that question caused panic to rise up and choke me, so that I could hardly think at all as the car sped out of Salperton and into the forest.

  Get it together, Joe, I told myself. Get it together and try to think.

  I had to escape. I simply had to, or I was dead!

  I eyed the two EGD men. I didn’t know much about the EGD, but from the civilian cut of their uniforms—as opposed to military—I’d a feeling they were EGD inspectors, not Facility Security Guards. Maybe even Facility Guards didn’t relish dragging one hundred percent normal, healthy kids to their deaths.

  What sort of pistols did they have? Probably nonLethal. The last thing they’d want to do was kill me. Not outside of the Lab.

  Could I grab one, and… But they were watching me. And there were two of them. Even if I actually somehow managed to shoot one of them, the other would overpower me. And the driver would just drive right on. And I couldn’t get to him because there was a sliding Perspex window, like in a taxi.

  Going for the guns was no use. And I couldn’t think of anything else.

  Was I…really going to die, tonight?

  K

  This was it! No headlights in sight. Sitting awkwardly in the lap of pork-me, I drove back onto the main road, scrambled out and readied the carefully crafted brace for the accelerator. Steering wheel first…the road was dead straight here, going along to a bend with a fantastic outcrop of rock that ought to be more than a match for the hydrogen tank’s dodgy seam. Lord, let it be so!

  I fastened the bungees to the wheel, then, holding the clutch down very carefully with one hand, I wedged the brace into position. The engine rose to a scream.

  Get ready… O Lord, grant me success!

  I scooted back to arm’s length…then snatched my hand clear.

  The car took off with a squeal of tires, the driver’s door slamming shut under the force of its acceleration. I just remembered to dart back into the forest and take up position behind the nice explosion-proof tree I’d picked, before peeping out.

  The car was heading straight down the road, not veering much yet. Thank you, Lord.

  Looking good…

  Wait…it was starting to drift slightly. Oh no! Would it reach the crag in time? Because if it didn’t explode…

  Lord have mercy, if it didn’t explode, my whole family and half the people we knew would die.

  Lord, please keep it on the road!

  JOE

  I was shaking, vibrating like a train speeding over cross-tracks. I’m going to die tonight. The words kept running through my mind. I’m going to die, I’m going to die… clackety-clackety, louder and louder, roaring in my ears like a run-away train…I’m going to die, I’m going to die…and I was stuck on the tracks in front of it, helpless, couldn’t get away…I’m going to die, I’m going to die, I’mgoingtodie, I’mgoingtodie, ’mgoingtodie, goingtodie…

  “Y’know,” remarked the man who’d grabbed me in the garden, dragging me slightly from my daze as I waited to hear what he would say. “I really hate it when the parents don’t even tell them.”

  “Really?” snorted the big man. “You prefer it when they go crazy with fear the moment they set eyes on you?”

  “Huh.”

  They were talking like I wasn’t even here. But then, if I really was an unRegistered child, I was nothing. Just spare parts. That’s what the law said. Somewhere, a precious Registered child urgently needed something I had. Otherwise they wouldn’t be taking me at this time in the evening. Making the Dismantlers do overtime. How much overtime? How long would it all…take? But what did that matter to me? I’d be unconscious the moment they got me in that Lab, and I’d never wake up again.

  The shaking got worse. I could feel a sob trying to force its way out and wrestled furiously with it, trying to hold it down. I wouldn’t cry in front of these horrible men! I wouldn’t. I wouldn’t.

  “What an idiot!” The muffled shout came from the driver in the front. The other two guards leaned forward, peering through the windscreen, and I couldn’t help looking too. We were approaching a bend in the road, and
a car was coming up to it from the opposite direction, at tremendous speed. We could see the headlights flicking through the trees.

  “Sheesh, he’s asking for it.” The words had barely left the big man’s mouth, when the oncoming car overshot the corner and smashed headlong into a tree, spun viciously, kept going and slammed side-on into a rocky crag.

  “Phewww,” breathed the back door man, “that’s got to have hur—”

  He broke off as a massive explosion sent a shockwave smacking into us, making us swerve clear across the road and narrowly miss a tree ourselves.

  Hydrogen tank.

  As the driver, gasping, wrestled us into a straight line again, I blinked rapidly, the intense white of the explosion still hovering, ghost-like, in my vision. It all seemed unreal. Whoever was in that car was dead. Right before my eyes.

  Clearly, I had no monopoly on death, this evening.

  The driver said something, but I couldn’t make it out. The noise of the explosion still rang in my ears.

  The big man leaned forward and slid the Perspex back. “What?”

  “I said, ‘Should we stop?’”

  Yes, stop! My heart leapt. Maybe, just maybe, I could—

  “And do what? Give first aid? They’re ash.”

  My heart sank again.

  “We’re not doing anything?” said the driver.

  “Just call it in on the hands-free and let the emergency services deal with it.”

  And suddenly, right then, I saw my chance. I’d have been terrified to do such a thing normally, but…risk dying right now, or die for sure in a few hours time.

  I snatched the big man’s gun from his holster with my cuffed hands—“Hey!”—his big paw was reaching, but he was too late.

  Because I’d pointed the gun straight through the open Perspex window, at the back of the driver’s head, and pulled the trigger.

  K

  Wow! What a bang! That worked so well! At any rate…well enough. The tree could have ruined everything, but it hit it so hard. I leaned against my protecting trunk, giddy with relief…or possibly the explosion.

  Time for me to get out of here. A car was already approaching the scene of the crash. No doubt they’d stop and call the emergency services.

  I couldn’t help feeling sorry for all the people whose day would be ruined having to attend what they’d believe to be a fatal accident. But there was nothing I could do about that.

  Anyway, it was Margo and my parents for whom my heart ached most.

  Oh, they’d guess I wasn’t dead. But getting the news, out of the blue like this, well, it would be just as though I were.

  That was the whole point, of course.

  Real tears would keep them safe.

  JOE

  The gun made no sound, but the driver slumped over the wheel, the car accelerating…both the guys in the back were yelling, but of course they couldn’t do anything.

  I dropped the nonLee pistol and buried my face in my legs, locking my arms around my knees as tightly as I could…wait for it…

  The front of the car twisted and slid. The man’s weight must be turning the wheel. Turning it far too fast. The right side of the car rose up, making my stomach lurch, and then it was rolling along the road, side over side…at least, that’s how I interpreted the crazy motion…gravity kept flipping… the men grunting and gasping…

  We must have gone right over about four times when the car suddenly stopped dead with the most appalling jolt. My arms were almost jerked loose, and a couple of heavy limbs smacked into my back as the men were flung against their seatbelts.

  A long, long moment of motionlessness, in which my head kept going round and round in a very unpleasant way, then the car toppled, crashing down onto its wheels, right side up again.

  For several long seconds, I couldn’t quite move. Even though I’d known we were about to crash, I still felt stunned. Reeling.

  No, this was my chance. My only chance. Move, Joe!

  I forced myself to sit up and look around. Back door guy was slumped in his seat, blood running down the side of his face. Unconscious? Big boss guy was stirring feebly, but no threat yet. A tree must’ve stopped the car, because the roof had been crushed right down across the middle, leaving no gap between it and the solid part under the Perspex window. I could just glimpse the driver, slumped over the wheel still, but there was no way to get into the front.

  Unbuckling the lap belt, I reached my hands across Unconscious Guy to open the door. But when I pulled the handle, nothing happened. Had the crash jammed it?

  Gingerly, I leaned across Big Boss Guy and tried that one. Oh no. They were locked! And grilles covered the windows. Which meant…which meant I still couldn’t get out! I’d still be sitting here when the police and ambulance arrived, and they’d probably take me straight on to the Facility! Or maybe they’d have to take me to hospital first and give me a clean bill of health and then take me there.

  No! No! Please, no!

  I grabbed the door handle and yanked on it as hard as I could. Then I turned around and tried to get my feet against the other door, to kick it. It didn’t move, but I kept trying. And trying.

  Until hands closed around me.

  “You little…” Big Boss Guy’s voice was hoarse and furious. “You’re not going anywhere, get that? Get it?”

  He tried to drag me back into the middle seat, to buckle the lap belt around me again, but I struggled violently.

  Help me! Help me! I was screaming it in my mind, but who to, I’d no idea.

  I had to get the door open.

  Somehow, I had to!

  K

  I peered from the undergrowth at the crashed car. My heart pounded like mad, half from the sprint through the forest to get here and half at the thought that ‘my’ crash might have caused this one. But surely this car was driving along just fine right after the explosion, having safely corrected its swerve? Then, suddenly, it just flipped and went rolling down the road like a ball…until it also hit a tree.

  Lord, please don’t let this be my fault!

  The worst thing was, I could not show myself. Too many lives would be lost if I did. I couldn’t even call for help, since I had no phone. I wasn’t sure what I actually could do; why I’d come tearing over here like this, except that I’d been driven by some immense sense of urgency.

  Admittedly, the thought of just walking away and leaving injured people was almost unbearable. But how many members of the Salperton Underground would die if the Verralls were unmasked as Believers?

  My agonized thoughts checked as I made it close enough to get a look at the vehicle. The hairs rose slightly on the back of my neck. Although it bore no logo, I knew what it was. Only one organization used normal cars with grilles over the back windows. And only for one purpose.

  UnRegistered Child transportation.

  Was there a kid trapped in there? A frightened kid?

  Actually…I was even closer now…there seemed to be a fight going on in the back seat. Two figures were struggling together. One very big, one much smaller.

  Lord, what do I do? What do I do?

  But I knew: I simply could not walk away and leave a child to that fate. No matter what.

  Lord, show me what to— Ah-ha, I see it!

  Checking my balaclava and gloves were in place, I dropped to my hands and knees and crawled over to the vehicle. Gently, I eased the back door open a fraction. I slipped one hand into the crack and ran it up the edge of the door until I found the child lock. Snapped it into the ‘off’ position. They’d surely think the crash had done it.

  Leaving the door ajar, merely resting in place, I crawled carefully back to the cover of the forest.

  Lord, let it be enough.

  JOE

  I wasn’t going back in that seat! I wasn’t! He could kill me right here! Right here! I got in a punch to his nose, which already looked like it had connected with something during the crash, and he jerked away, swearing.

  I scooted back in
to Unconscious Guy’s lap, trying to put my back to the door, so I could kick the monster in the head…but when I pressed against the door, it swung open, and I almost fell out.

  Open? Open!

  Yes, yes, yes!

  Kicking against Big Boss Guy simply for purchase, now, I dived headfirst out into freedom…

  “No, you don’t!” A strong hand gripped my ankle.

  I scrabbled at the ground with my cuffed hands, desperately seeking something to hold onto as he started to haul me back in. My free foot finally landed a good kick…where, I couldn’t see, but his grip loosened. I kicked again…and suddenly I fell to the ground.

  Pushing up on my skinned palms, I staggered to my feet, booting the door into the guy as he tried to climb out, then I turned and stumbled into the forest.

  Come on, Joe, run.

  While he probably wasn’t in much better shape than I was, his legs were a heck of a lot longer. But my head was steadying, and my legs were moving a little better. I held up my cuffed hands in front of me, trying to protect my eyes from branches and twigs.

  At the top of the slope, I risked a look back, then paused.

  In the light from the burning car, I could see Big Boss Guy standing, bent over beside the crashed EGD car. It looked like he was busy being sick. Hah! No way would he be following me now. Well, not quite yet.

  I’d just turned to make the most of his vomit-paralysis when a gloved hand slid over my mouth, and a strong arm immobilized mine.

  “Shhh!” someone whispered in my ear. “I’m not your enemy!”

  Who…it must be the driver! How had he woken up already? I rammed my heel into the guy’s shin as hard as I could and twisted free—started to run. He followed me.

  He was fast, too. I thought nonLee made people feel awful when they woke up? How could he chase me like this?

  And he was catching me! Panic exploded inside me. After all this, they were still going to drag me back there and kill me!