Daeios 140 feet down, p.22
Daeios- 140 Feet Down, page 22
“The vomiting. It could be morning sickness.”
“This is the only time I’ve been sick since I’ve been up here.” I self-consciously put my hand on my belly. It doesn’t feel pregnant to me, but a little voice in my head says it could be true. I think of the rape and shudder in the cool morning air.
31
Once the rain stops we head to the oasis to clean up, get water, and retrieve the game from the snares. It’s as we near the water that I realize I used all of the wood in the night to assuage my fears, and the wood here is wet. We won’t have a meal today. When I tell Sister Grace, she just nods. We’re going to Daeios hungry. I don’t know if I could face it this morning anyway, skinning the game, cooking it, eating it, with my stomach so unsettled. The possibility that I’m pregnant niggles in my mind.
As we head toward Daeios, my determination to get my family and Julian out of that terrible place strengthens. Mother’s gun on my back makes me feel powerful. Touching the necklace fills me with her strength and love.
We stop along our journey to sit in the shade of a towering rock formation and drink water. We probably won’t find any more until tomorrow morning, after tonight’s rains. “How much further to the shelter?”
“Are we there yet?” Sister Grace says in a little kid’s voice and grins before becoming serious. “It’s still pretty far away. I hope we get there soon enough,” she says, unable to keep the worry from her voice as she looks at the graying light of the sky. “We’re not going to make it before it starts raining. The lightning is getting closer. If the wind picks up, we’ll be fighting blowing sand. Let’s go.”
By the time we near the shelter, the sand is pelting us and the rain is starting to fall in fat, cold drops. Sister Grace doesn’t have a rain poncho, so I forego donning mine. Fingers of lightning in the sky, thunder rolling overhead. But at least we might get to the shelter before the storm breaks loose.
The evil storm read my mind. The rain starts pummeling us, which at least wets the sand so it’s not sandblasting our skin and threatening our sight and ability to breathe. We reach the shelter soaked, winded, and chilled. We need to get out of our wet clothes and in front of a fire. But there will be no fire tonight.
The shelter is off the ground about three feet, a small cave. I poke my head and shoulders in, shining my headlamp ahead of me. It opens up some after I get through the narrow opening. It’s about the size of my three-man tent. No snakes, no animal poop, no standing water.
I pull myself through the narrow opening and Sister Grace shoves the bags through. They barely fit through the small opening. When she comes inside her teeth are chattering.
“We’ll have to get into dry clothes so we don’t get hypothermia,” I say.
“It gets cold in here. If we hold each other we’ll probably generate enough body heat in this small space to be reasonably warm.” Sister Grace wriggles around on the cave floor, removing her wet clothing and pulling a Daeios gown over her head. As much as I don’t want to wear a Daeios gown, I wiggle out of my wet clothes and slip one over my head to keep from getting hypothermia. I’m cold and wet, hungry and cranky. I’m having problems with my bipolar disorder. The depression is setting in, telling me I can’t do this, that I shouldn’t even try. After a few minutes, mania has chased depression away and has taken its place. My mind races with ugly thoughts.
The sounds of the storm are dulled by the small entrance. At least there’s that.
“We’re almost to Daeios. Phase one of your plan is almost complete,” Sister Grace says. The light from the headlamp shows her apprehension, and I try to smile.
I don’t want to talk about it. My paranoia is kicking in.
“Are you cold?” she asks.
“Yes.” But that’s not why I shivered.
We settle in, spooning, with Sister Grace behind me. She could choke me, smother me, without breaking a sweat. But I’m not afraid of her anymore. I fear Daeios and the Elders. I want to crawl out of this cave and run back to the Ritz-Carlton, where I’ll feel safe. My heartbeat is strange, fast and then slow, my brain manic and then depressive.
Soon I will enter Daeios and face my attackers. It’s the last thing I want to do. My body remembers the fresh wounds from the rape, I see their monstrous faces in mine, I hear their wild laughter. No matter how hard I try to breathe deeply, to fill my lungs with air, my chest won’t expand enough to let it in. I feel like I’m suffocating. The closeness of this small cave and its tight exit don’t help.
I have to find my family and Julian in that labyrinth, and I have no idea where to look. What have the Elders done to my parents for rescuing me? Are they hurt? Are they still alive?
I finally fall into a fitful sleep, dreaming I’m alone in Daeios, without my pack, and can’t find my way out. I can’t find my family or Julian. It’s pitch-black and silent as death.
I scream into the void, but no one can hear me.
I sit up in the morning, too fast. Head rush. The movement makes me dizzy; I’m going to puke. I put my hand to my mouth, gagging, not knowing what to do.
Sister Grace pushes me to the cave opening just in time for me to pop my head out and vomit to the side, my head and shoulders out of the cave and the rest of my body inside like a moray eel. When I stop shaking I pull myself the rest of the way through, kneel and vomit around the corner. As the retching subsides, I hold my hands on my abdomen. I feel the tenderness in my breasts.
I’m pregnant.
Tears beckon, and a lump fills my throat. I’ve never wanted children. But I want this baby more than I’ve ever wanted anything. No matter how I conceived it, it’s a precious life, and I am its mother. A spark of warmth fills my chest.
“Are you okay out there?” Sister Grace calls, her voice muffled.
“Yes,” I say, but I don’t feel okay. The risk of my task has doubled.
She pushes the bags out and then wiggles her way out of the opening. The sun has been up for a while now and it’s getting hot. It was so dark and cold inside the cave I thought it might not have come up yet.
“How much further is it?” I ask as we start today’s journey.
“Not far. A couple of hours, maybe.”
As we walk toward Daeios, it feels like something is stuck in my throat. I swallow hard, several times. I imagine my baby’s heart is racing in its chest, trying to flee from danger while I take it nearer. The thought that eyes are watching me makes my skin crawl as if I were ringed in writhing, venomous snakes. Is it my bipolar, or is somebody—or something—watching us? As we walk toward Daeios, I stop frequently to scan with my binoculars to try to lessen my increasing paranoia.
As we follow the sun, birds circle overhead—giant, black crows in full cry, their cawing grating on my nerves.
We’re going back to Daeios, and the closer we get, the colder my dread. I’m afraid that when I face my attackers, all the strength I have will leave me and I’ll melt into a puddle of revulsion and despair.
How will I face my abusers, the men who almost tore me apart?
My armpits are sticky, and I smell bad. The sour taste in my mouth makes me want to puke again. I’m returning to Daeios. I’m risking the life of my baby, not just my own life.
Can I do this? What if I don’t find my family or Julian? What if they rape me again? What if they hold me captive and take my baby when it’s born? I want to run away, to keep running until I’m on the opposite side of the earth. I feel faint, as if hands are squeezing my throat and choking the life out of me.
I take a deep breath and square my shoulders, fingering the sun pendant around my neck. A glance at Sister Grace provides me with a reassuring smile. I can do this.
Soon the first signs of Daeios show in the distance: the satellite dish and the radio tower. Most people wouldn’t see them until they were right in front of their faces. I wish I couldn’t see them now, that I was anywhere but here.
“Do you see it?” Sister Grace points.
“Yes,” I say, my tongue numb. A cold stone is tumbling around in my stomach, and my throat is closing up. Daeios. One hundred and forty feet underground. To face my attackers. To face the cold light that’s only a filament away from absolute darkness. I envision my family and Julian, trapped in Daeios under the Elders’ rule, and my resolve to find them builds. As does my fear.
“Sister Shea, I’m afraid for you. I can’t believe you’re so calm.”
Me? Calm? I must have a better poker face than I thought. “I have to do this, Sister Grace. I’m the only one who can get my family out of there. I hope to rescue Julian too. I need to find a place to set up so I can watch it for a while, try to find a way in. Can you stay with me long enough to get set up?”
She stands silent for a long moment. She lets loose a heavy sigh, her shoulders rising and falling with the lost breath.
“I will. But only because you’re my Spoon Sister.” She sports an impish grin.
I give her a grateful smile. “Where would you set up?”
“I think our best bet is to climb up on a rock formation. Watch from a distance first. That one over there should give us a good angle.” She points to a stand of rock that’s twenty or thirty feet high, east of Daeios, with a good view of its entrance. My stomach does a flip-flop.
The rock pile I climbed wasn’t far off the ground, so I sucked it up. This one is too high. Formidable. But it is the right location for us to spy without being seen if we crouch low on the rock. I do have climbing experience—the bare minimum to obtain my survivalist certificate.
Sister Grace notes my hesitation. “You don’t know how to climb?”
“I do, it’s just not my favorite pastime.”
“Let’s see what we’ve got to deal with.”
We walk around the formation and find the easiest route up will be on the side that faces Daeios. Of course. The rock formation is made up of several small sandstone boulders leading up to larger boulders, which should be an easy climb, even without our climbing ropes. But I’m shaking so hard I don’t know if I can keep my feet steady enough to keep from tumbling down. I take the binoculars off Sister Grace’s pack and try to get a look at Daeios. The angle’s not right from down here.
“I’ve done a lot of climbing. This looks pretty simple. I’ll climb up first and then belay you. Just in case. I’ve got carabiners in my pouch and I can tie you into a harness.”
I nod and swallow hard and we take off our packs. When she takes her rope off her belt, I notice that it’s been used before, where mine is straight from the store. Uncoiling the rope, she cuts off about half of it with her hunting knife. She has me tuck in my shirt as she folds the rope in half. Placing the halfway point at my left hip, she wraps the rope around my body and ties it off. Then she runs the ropes between my legs and runs them underneath the waist rope.
“Squat down so I can pull this tight,” she says. She has me squat two more times, each time pulling the rope tighter. She ties a square knot on my left side with a knot on either side of it. “And that’s how you create a Swiss Seat harness,” she says, holding her arms out like she performed an acrobatic feat.
I feel safe in this harness, but then again I’m standing on solid ground.
“I used to belay my little brothers like this.” She clips a locking carabiner to the front of my harness. “Now I need your rope.”
I bend down, the harness tugging at my thighs, and pull the rope from my drypack. She uncoils the rope and threads one end through the carabiner. “Hold on to these for a minute.” Placing the ends of the rope in my hand, she squeezes it for a moment. “I’m good at this, don’t worry. You won’t even need me. It’s a precaution so you feel safe. Now stand back a ways. I don’t want to kick rock down on you.”
She puts on the survival pack and takes the ends of the rope in her hand. She scales the rock in only a few minutes, kicking down a few small stones as she goes. When she disappears for a few minutes, the rope in the carabiner moves and twitches as she walks around on top of the formation. The eyes burrow into the back of my head and I turn to see if someone is approaching us from Daeios. When Sister Grace is at the edge of the rock, seating herself, with the ends of the rope on either side of her, I feel hot all over, a tingle in my scalp.
“Do you have it anchored on something besides you?” I call up.
“Yeah, I found a great rock to anchor it on. Come on up.”
I put on my pack and begin climbing, following the path she took as I watched her ascend. She takes the slack out of the rope as I climb. My foot slips a couple of times and I pause to balance myself, taking several deep breaths before moving on. When I stop to even out my breathing, she asks if I’m alright.
“Just a little shaky.”
“You’ve got this. You’re almost here,” she says, even though I’m not even halfway up the face.
I make it to the top, and she doesn’t have to catch me or support my weight. She helps me out of the harness. We situate ourselves so no one from Daeios should be able to see us on top of the rock, trying to avoid large movements as much as possible because that’s what will give us away—if they haven’t already seen us. We take turns looking through the binoculars, switching off frequently as our eyes become tired.
The first obstacle I’ll have to contend with is the fence. The razor wire flashes and glints in the sun, taunting me. “How do I get through that fence, Sister Grace?”
“Razor wire is nasty stuff. I helped my dad put ours up. Do you have wire cutters?”
“You have razor wire around your house? Or should I call it a compound?”
She rolls her eyes. “We were ready for shit to hit the fan. In the short term. Daeios was for the long term. Zombies would cut themselves to pieces trying to get over razor wire. Looters? They’ll go to the neighbor next door. You have wire cutters on that multi-tool?”
“Wow. Your family was way more survivalist than mine. I do have wire cutters. But they won’t cut through the chain-link or the wire. I was thinking I might have to dig under the fence.”
“I doubt if you can dig a big enough hole to get under it. You’ll probably run into caliche.”
Caliche is nature’s concrete; I’d forgotten about it. You need a jackhammer to get through it. “Okay, about the wire cutters?”
“You take your rope and cut it in two. Pull a section of the wire apart by pulling the ropes in the opposite direction. Then you clip the hog rings—the anchors—with the wire cutters. Wear your gloves to cut the anchors. Pull it down with the rope. Just a section wide enough to get over. I’ll leave the survival pack with you. Put the tarp and Daeios gowns over the wire. It’ll be less likely to cut you when it comes down. If you do get caught in it, stop moving and then back away from the barbs so they don’t cut you as bad. Then climb over the fence.”
That should be easy, my sarcastic inner voice says.
We’re silent as Sister Grace watches Daeios. It’s as she’s handing the binoculars to me that she freezes like a pointer when it sees a pheasant. “There’s an RV leaving Daeios. It’s coming through the blast doors.” She pauses, and my heart hammers in my chest. “The doors are closing. They’re waiting for the gate to slide open.”
“Can you see who’s in it? Is there more than one person?”
She’s silent for a moment. The hair is standing up on the back of my neck. “Okay, the gate is opening. Big hat and sunglasses. The windows are tinted. Here.” She hands the binoculars to me and I watch as the person waits for the gate to open. I only see a driver. Once the gate is open, the RV drives off and there’s not much to see, just a vehicle driving down the same road my family came in on. I watch the gate close, studying it as it moves slowly toward the fence post. The gate pauses for a moment before the mechanism locks.
I hand the binoculars to Sister Grace.
“Look at the gate.”
“It’s closed. What am I looking at?"
“That’s how I’m going to get inside the grounds of Daeios—I’m going over the gate where there’s no razor wire.”
32
Sister Grace guffaws, making me jump. My nerves are stretched to breaking point. “That would’ve been stupid. Taking razor wire down to climb over the fence when the gate has none. Next you can duct tape the lenses of security cameras if you can reach them.”
“The cameras inside Daeios were hidden, so I imagine these are too. I don’t think my entry is going to be a surprise.”
We watch until we notice clouds coming in. There’s no threat in them yet, but soon the storms will roll in and it will cool off. It’s time for us to climb down and head back to our shelter before the wind finds its voice and the rain starts falling. We pack up and Sister Grace ties me into a harness again. She belays me to the bottom of the rock formation and then follows, climbing down as sure-footed as an ibex. I’m shaky, and it’s from more than scaling down the height of the rock formation. I’m hungry.
We gather wood whenever we see it so we can build a fire. As we near our shelter, we hear an angry buzz. A rattlesnake is coiled up ahead of us, only a few feet away. I suck in a big breath. Sister Grace already has her bow stretched and an arrow pointed at it.
“Tell me, Sister Shea, is there anything you’re not afraid of?” she asks coolly, not taking her eyes off her target.
“I’ll have to get back to you on that,” I say, letting air rush from my mouth.
“Don’t move, Sister Shea. He can strike out a few feet. He’s furious.” I stay as still as I can, holding my breath and then breathing in and out through my nose as the snake coils and uncoils, rattling incessantly. Its black forked tongue darts in and out, moving up and down.
I want to scream and run away. The snake could lunge and strike. Sister Grace takes a deep breath and releases the arrow, shooting the serpent through the eye. It stops rattling, lying still.
She lays the survival pack on the sand and pulls out a tent pole, extending it. “Get your hatchet out. Hold this on the snake’s head until I chop it off.”
