The Boarding School Experiment (24 page)

The rope jolted. They were messing with the anchor.

“A little faster now, Kaitlin,” I said. The rope jolted again, snapping against my glove. “Kaitlin, there’s a ledge to your right, I am going to put you down there. “Okay?”

“Okay.”

Thane reached me, and helped jerk the line to the right, giving Kaitlin no time to protest, we dropped her to the narrow ledge two feet above us. “Unhook and hold tight, Kaitlin.” I kept my voice low.

Kaitlin had been moving at a sure pace, doing great with her strong legs. Her hands patted the wall, gripping one of the roots. “I’d rather stay clipped in.”

I swallowed and dragged up one of Geneva’s sayings. “Suck it up, Kaitlin. We have to release you early and clip in Rhys before they dislodge the rope. He’s too close to them.”

Kaitlin froze a moment and let go suddenly, unclipped, and grabbed the wall.

“Rhys, reach out for the rope and clip in.” I tried to keep the urgency out of my voice, and to keep the volume soft.

Rhys hooked in and continued lowering himself using grooves and the anchors. The rope tightened and I was torn. He was secure and making great progress, but he was too close to the top. But if I lowered him with the belay device and the coordinator fully dislodged the anchor… The coordinator. The gun. I had no choice. He had to get away from them.

“Let go of the anchors and get in position, Rhys.” I said, “This will be fast.”

Rhys cursed but he held the rope as I’d shown him: one hand up, one at his hip.

I made an adjustment to the friction and Rhys came down in seconds. The rope came loose in his hands the second his feet hit the ledge. His body jolted, and Thane and I grabbed him. Under our feet, more pebbles fell away, pinging into the chasm. My heart pounded and I squeezed Rhys’s arms. Thank God.

I let out a breath and assessed our situation. The small ledge barely fit three of us, but we were secure for now, more secure than Kaitlin, who clung to the side of the wall.

“I’m going to talk you down now, Kaitlin.”

“Okay,” she squeaked.

“Thane’s really tall and he’s just below you. So listen to me and when you’re a little further down, he and Rhys will help you. Slowly lower to your knees on your ledge. Now place your right hand on the edge and lower your right leg. Find a groove with the toe of your boot?”

“I think I do.”

“Press into it. Now lower your left hand and hold onto the edge. Good. You’re doing great. Now put your left foot down. Two more inches. Got it.”

We went through the motions another foot before Rhys and Thane reached her and helped lower her to the ledge with us. We were all four shoved against the wall and couldn’t move, but it was the best position we’d been in since the finale ended.

I’d ignored The Scientist and Coordinator Steele above us while guiding Kaitlin down, but now I worried about their next move.

“The rope fell. We’ll never get back up.” Kaitlin said.

Her voice sounded more panicked than defeated, which was good.

“No one’s going to believe we didn’t use ropes,” Rhys said.

“They’ll believe the anchor failed.” I assessed the ice cavern. “Rhys, how likely is it that there’s another possible exit?”

Rhys rattled off probabilities, which weren’t horrible. I stared at the aqua ice, beautiful from here with the sun shining on it.

Thane shook his head. “Even if we can get from here to there, we’ll be wide open.”

“She’ll shoot us,” Rhys said, no doubt in his voice. “Or at us, to make us fall.”

Even if we made it across, I doubted our ability to climb the ice once we got there, not in real conditions, not without equipment. “Cave’s out.”

Thane said, “So we can either go up into the hands of someone with a gun, or down into the darkness.”

“No choice. I’ll lead and set the anchors. We’ll find a bigger ledge and wait them out. We don’t go back up when they call. We don’t respond.”

Kaitlin nodded. “Maybe someone will come looking for us.”

“I hope so. Now, as you lower, wait until I say so before you click on your headlamp. We want to conserve as much battery power as we can.” The thought of the lights going out fueled my own panic, so I pushed the image away, refusing to think that far ahead.

We began the slow descent. I used their names and advised them along the way. Thirty minutes later, the depth we’d reached limited the amount of sunlight getting through to us. We clicked on our headlights, and four circular glows softened the darkness.

Coordinator Steele’s voice reached us. “How many of you are still down there? Head back up now and we’ll give you some water when you reach the top. Or, you can scoop a nice handful of snow to eat.”

I held my breath, concentrating on the grey-brown earth in front of me and tried to keep my breathing steady.

A sharp flash of light cut through the darkness. The beam bounced against each wall as if searching for us. My fingers tightened on the anchor and I stayed still. “Hold, everybody.”

A glint flickered across my vision, sharper, different. I turned to understand the flash and my heart double-timed as I recognized the cause. The searchlight had reflected off an elongated, oblong mirror, maybe 15 more feet down.

“Answer me,” Coordinator Steele said.

I whispered the new plan to Thane, who whispered it up to Rhys and Kaitlin.

Light flashed through the cavern again. A sharp retort cracked through the air. Dirt sprayed out from the wall as a bullet furrowed into the earth above us.

I flinched in reaction, as if I could dodge bullets. Rhys cursed.

“Turn out your lights,” Thane said. They clicked theirs off.

“Don’t try to move.” The quiver in my voice undermined my sharp instruction. “Not without light.”

The Scientist yelled down from above, “Come back up now.” His voice sounded panicked.

Thane whispered with a forced rush of breath, “Turn off your light, Elena. It will give away our position.”

My fingers reached for the switch, but couldn’t turn it in the clumsy thick gloves. I’d tilt my head further into the wall. The earth would block the light.

“Turn the light off or I’ll climb down and do it for you.”

“No. Don’t climb in the dark.” My voice came out sharp, panicked, louder than I intended. No one should climb in the dark, not ever. I swallowed against the terror in my throat and flicked my lamp off. Grey turned to black. Darkness surrounded me, pressed in on my every cell. The blackness hid all the terrors lurking within inches of us. I shut my eyes and pressed my mouth into the back of my dirty glove, holding in the scream that built in my throat.

A thump, a scramble, and Thane pressed into me. “I’m here, it’s me. Shh. We’re okay.”

I angled toward him and he pressed me into the cold wall. We waited there in silence.

Movements came from above us, the sound of someone climbing over the ledge. Small sprinkles of earth fell past. Coordinator Steele shouted, “When I reach you, I will use the gun. I know how to climb and I have all the gear. Return now and we’ll consider another alternative.”

We stayed silent. Minutes passed and we held our position.

Then, with no other warning sound, we heard a deep female scream and felt a rush of wind as Coordinator Steele fell.

Screams falling through the darkness—my worst nightmare. My body jerked and I moaned into my glove.

Above us, The Scientist yelled down, demanding Coordinator Steele answer him.

Kaitlin said, “Oh God, oh God.”

Thane pressed into me. “Don’t look.”

“My fault,” I said.

“Shh. No.”

“I took too long and our batteries ran out. I just wanted to get pictures of the rock formations. And Dad said to hurry. And then our batteries ran out.”

“Shh, it’s okay. It was an accident. It wasn’t your fault.”

Thane clicked on my lamp. The glow lit the earth and his concerned face. I swallowed and breathed again.

“Coordinator Steele just dropped to the bottom of the cavern and I didn’t hear her hit.” Kaitlin sounded terrified. “How deep is this?”

“Miles,” Rhys said. “Could be miles.”

Kaitlin groaned.

“Elena, what are we doing?” The question came from Rhys and further yanked me into the present. “Should we go up now? I can’t hear The Scientist anymore, but if he’s still there, we can take him.”

Thane said, “We can’t go up. She may have given him the gun. Or, there could be a second gun.”

Kaitlin said, “I don’t know if I can climb that far. My legs are good, but my arms are shaking, hanging here like this.”

I whispered, “The semis aren’t far. I saw one. We can make it there. Rest. Think.”

“How far?”

“12 more feet, maybe 15, but we need more light to move.”

“Okay,” Thane said in a gentle voice. “Headlights on everyone. If we hear another shot, headlights off.” The lights clicked on and my breathing eased.

We went down slowly, and I prayed the flashlight beam hadn’t just reflected off a broken mirror, that the truck would be there or some solid piece of it.

The semi was even closer than I imagined. The tail end faced us with its yellow Alaskan license plate. The nose pointed down. Above the top of the truck and below the tires lay blackness. When it fell, the truck must have tilted, securing the sides into a narrower part of the crevice. The metal walls had caved slightly, locking the truck into position like a puzzle piece. I assessed the drop, maybe three feet to the two double doors, which were secured by an iron, L-shaped bar. We could use that bar.

Thane said, “My weight first, to test it.”

I wanted to protest, but he was right. I let him move past me, and did my best to shine my light in the middle of the doors.

Thane landed with a solid thunk. The semi stayed steady, wedged in tight. He waited for us to climb down to him then undid the bar and lifted one of the doors. Jumbled piles of luggage lay inside with roughly four feet of space on top.

Compared to hanging from roots and rocks alongside a sheer drop, the interior of the truck looked cozy. We eased into the space and I sank into the soft side of a roll aboard.

“Thank God,” Kaitlin said and lay flat on her back across two large bags. She shook out her arms.

Thane said, “Let’s go through the luggage and try to find something useful.”

Kaitlin ripped off her gloves and tucked them into her pockets. With Rhys’s help, she pulled into a seated position. “I hope we find mine. I packed these special pistachios we get from a deli on 42
^nd
. You’ll love them.”

Rhys moved to the wall. With one arm braced on the side of the trailer, he dug through the pile. “Priorities are weapon, water, warmth, then food.”

“We have to stay dry,” Thane said. “Though the weather’s above freezing, with it being this cold, you can still get hypothermia.”

“And light,” I said. “Someone may have a book light. That’ll help us find more stuff and conserve our headlamps.” Please let there be light.

Kaitlin nodded. “There’s one in my bag, if we find it.”

Thane glanced at each of us. “We’re fine for now: stable, warm, and we just landed on a pile of supplies. Okay?”

I swallowed. “Yes. We rest up. Regroup.” I tried not to think about The Scientist. I didn’t think he’d try the climb, not after what happened with Coordinator Steele. My mind shied away from the thought.

Rhys said, “And when we find a weapon, we climb back up.”

I pulled a maroon, solid-looking bag in front of me and adjusted my light.

Thane rose and brushed a hand over the back of my hair. “Above all, everyone has to stay calm, and we’ll get out of here.” He moved a few feet over so he could grab a bag.

“Mine, mine, mine,” Kaitlin said. “I see one of mine.” She sounded like she’d just been offered diamonds. She tossed aside several bags, dug into the pile and hugged a brown leather tote to her chest. After the hug, she unzipped the heavy zipper and dug out a large jar of pistachios and a chocolate bar. “Godiva.”

We gave up our searches and joined her. Kaitlin divided the food. The chocolate square melted in my mouth like heaven. We finished the chocolate fast, and took handfuls of the nuts back to our spots to eat while we worked. Even fighting with the split shells on the pistachios was a pleasure.

Rhys threw his shells through the open door. They landed with soft pings on the metal of the trailer. “We need a drink,” Rhys said, shaking the salt around in the bottom of the empty pistachio container.

The salt had dried my mouth too. “Surely some kid shoved a bottled water into their checked bag when they found out they couldn’t take it through security. I know I did.”

Rhys dug through a big blue bag, tossing aside someone’s high heels and strappy dresses. “We’ll probably find liquor. Don’t drink it. The alcohol will lower your body temperature. But save it if you find it and I’ll make us a nice contained fire.”

“If I promise to show you something really cool, will you two guys turn your backs for a minute and let me change?” Kaitlin was crushing some of her clothes to her chest as if we’d pry them from her.