The Seeds of Man

Chapter Eleven

Most of the gang were still asleep when Tre rolled out of bed, got dressed, and went looking for something to eat. Spartan though the hideout was, it felt good to be back, especially with about four tons of newly acquired weaponry stashed deep in the main mine shaft.

Now, looking back on it, Tre figured that finding the container had been the easy part. Then came the task of finding and buying the animals and wagons required to move eight tons of arms and equipment, a process that took the better part of two weeks. But that wasn’t all. Once under way, Crow’s bandits had to protect their wealth from other bandits—like the band of wild men who attacked the wagon train west of Soda Springs.

The men were mounted on good horses and naked to their waists, so as to show off the intricate tattoos that covered their arms and torsos. There was nothing subtle about the attack. Just wild screams followed by an all-out charge as groups of riders tried to surround individual wagons and cut them off from the rest.

Primitive though the strategy was, it might have worked had it not been for the fact that Crow’s gang was better armed. And they had learned something from the defeat in they’d suffered weeks earlier. Two of the wagons were armed with light machine guns, and once the tarps were removed, the wild men began to die. Horses screamed as they went down. Some of the riders jumped free but were torn apart as they tried to run. “Kill them!” Crow shouted. “Kill them or they will bring more bandits down on us.”

Horrible though it was, everyone knew Crow was correct. So Tre, Knife, and the scouts rode the fugitives down. Finally, when the bloody business was finished, all the attackers were dead. It would have been nice to bury the bodies and thereby erase all signs that a battle had taken place, but they lacked the time and manpower necessary to do so.

The final leg of the journey was arduous as well. After crossing the Caribou Mountains at night, they’d had to hide the cargo for three days while selling the wagons and buying mules. Once that task was accomplished, they still had to complete the trip to the mine, a nerve-wracking journey that left everyone exhausted.

That’s why Hog was the only other person present as Tre entered the so-called cafeteria. “Morning,” the cook said cheerfully. “The larder’s kinda low until we buy more food. But I can offer you some fresh cornbread and hot water for tea.”

“That sounds wonderful,” Tre replied. “Thank you.” After collecting his breakfast, Tre sat down at one of the wooden tables and opened a copy of The Three Musketeers.

Crow arrived three minutes later. That was a surprise since he rarely made an appearance before ten o’clock. His hair was tousled and the bandit leader was dressed in a tattered bathrobe and cowboy boots. “There you are,” Crow said as he dropped onto a chair. Then, having eyed the book, he nodded. “My favorite character is Aramis.”

“I like d’Artagnan,” Tre replied.

“Of course you do,” Crow said indulgently. “But you’ll have to put him on hold.”

“Why?”

“Remember the plan? The one you never stop needling me about?”

“Yes.”

“Now we have the weapons required to fight Voss. What we lack is the manpower. And for an effort like ours, we can’t hire people. Not if we want real change.”

“So we’ll recruit people.”

“That could work,” Crow agreed. “But it would take a lot of time. So I have something else in mind. An approach that will strike a blow for freedom, build our reputation, and provide us with the army we need.”

Tre slipped a scrap of paper into the book and put it down. If Crow was going to get up off his butt, that was a good thing. “Okay, what’s the plan?”

“There’s a tech lord named Jeremy Kimble,” Crow replied. “He runs a garbage mine in what used to be Idaho Falls. And from what I hear it’s very profitable. So much so that he has a hundreds of slaves digging the stuff out of the ground while more people work to clean and refurbish anything that still has value.”

“So?”

“So we could raid the place, free the slaves, and turn some of them into soldiers.”

Tre looked at Crow with a renewed sense of respect. “That’s why you hid half the weapons on the west side of the Caribou Mountains. Closer to Idaho Falls.”

Crow nodded. “That and the fact that it would be stupid to keep our arsenal in one place.”

“Okay,” Tre said. “That makes sense. We free and arm them. When do we leave?”

“Not so fast,” Crow replied. “Kimble will have plenty of mercs. You can count on that. And remember… Our army, if any, is off in the future. We’ll be outnumbered when we attack. Yes, our weapons will help to even the odds, but it will still be difficult.”

Crow smiled. “Unless the slaves revolt at the same time we attack, that is… Then things will be different. That would require putting someone on the inside, of course. A person who could lead the revolt.”

Tre looked around and realized that Hog was out of earshot and had been throughout. Crow had chosen to speak solely to him. Why? The answer scared him. “Why me?” Tre demanded. “Are you trying to get me killed?”

“No,” Crow replied gravely. “You’re my conscience. I need you. But you’re also the best man for the job. You’re smart, tech savvy, and people like you. Besides, I plan to send Knife as well. It will be his job to keep you alive.”

Tre noticed the use of the word “man” and wondered if Crow was pandering. If so, there was no sign of it in his eyes. “And the rest of the gang?”

“I’ll tell them when they need to know.”

Tre nodded. The security measure made sense.

“I’ll give you four weeks,” Crow said. “Then we’ll attack. Finish your breakfast, though… You’re going to need your strength..”

Tre, Knife, and Smoke left the next morning. The plan was for the men to leave their good weapons with Smoke once they reached the outskirts of Idaho Falls. Her job was to watch the mining operation from the outside and gather as much information as she could, intel she would pass to Crow when the rest of the gang arrived.

After the threesome made their way down out of the mountains, they followed Highway 89 north to Alpine, where they turned onto Highway 26 westbound. During the next couple of days they passed through Palisades, Irwin, and Swan Valley all without incident. Except for some grenades, or “equalizers,” as Smoke referred to them, they weren’t carrying military-grade weapons, because to do so might attract the wrong sort of attention—which was to say any attention whatsoever.

But they were still well armed, and that plus the way they carried themselves was sufficient to deter the drifters, highwaymen, and part-time bandits who made a living by preying on the weak. They arrived on the outskirts of Idaho Falls around noon on the third day. It wasn’t pretty. A firestorm had consumed the city at some point during the disastrous civil war. The result of a bombing mission, perhaps. Tre knew that both sides of the conflict had been guilty of targeting population centers. Not that it made any difference. What was, was.

That didn’t mean the city was empty of human life. Tre suspected that there were plenty of people living in the ruins, a fact that would make the next few weeks challenging for Smoke. But the scout was very good at what she did—and as hard to capture as the substance she was named for.

Unfortunately there was no way to hide and feed the horses that Tre and Knife were riding—which was why second-rate mounts had been chosen for the trip. So once a hiding place had been chosen and Smoke’s supplies were offloaded, Tre and Knife said good-bye and rode down Highway 26. The sky was gray, it was raining, and water was dripping off the brim of Tre’s hat. He was looking for the Hemmert Avenue exit, and as luck would have it, the lopsided sign could still be read. The moment they turned off the freeway, they were in Kimble’s territory—a fact that quickly became evident.

The techies came swarming up out of basements, storm drains, and bomb craters. There were dozens of them, all clad in soiled coveralls and wearing half-mask respirators. It was possible to see their eyes but not their noses or mouths as they closed in. “Stop!” one of them ordered, his voice partially muffled. “Put your hands up.”

Tre pulled back on the reins, looped them around the saddle horn, and raised his hands. Knife did likewise. That was the signal for the strange-looking soldiers to close in. They took control of the horses, confiscated the sacrificial third-rate rifles that both men were carrying, and ordered the prisoners to dismount. Tre had been expecting the trap, had knowingly walked into it, but was frightened nevertheless. He let that show. “Please,” he said, “don’t hurt us.”

“Don’t worry, boyo,” a voice said as Tre’s feet hit the ground. “We’ll be real gentle. Ain’t that right, Jack?”

“Oh, yeah,” a burly figure replied. “We’ll tuck you in every night.” That produced a chorus of guffaws.

“Put your hands on top of your head,” a third techie said. “Let’s see what you’re hiding.”

Rough hands patted both men down and located their knives. Tre was carrying a few matches, a snare, and a toy compass. That was all. “The rifles are worthless,” one of the men concluded. “They have sixteen rounds of ammo between them, and the paring knives are a joke. Not much of a haul.”

“Plus the horses,” a hopeful voice said.

“We can eat ‘em,” the techie behind Tre put in. “That’s all they’re good for.” And with that, he gave Tre a shove. “Start walkin’, boyo… The pit boss is waitin’ to see you.”

Tre stumbled forward. One boot landed in a puddle and water splashed. Everything seemed hyper-real: the raindrops on his face, the cloud of seagulls that rose from somewhere up ahead, and the sickly sweet smell of rotting garbage.

They came to a cyclone fence and a gate that swung open to let them pass. Tre saw rows of truck trailers off to his right and wondered what they were for. But his thoughts were cut short when one of the men shoved a gun barrel into his back.

The path was paved with objects that had been smashed down into the mud to form a mosaic of metal, plastic, and glass. Piles of reclaimed objects could be seen all around. Tre saw hills made out of electric toasters, metal chairs, and plastic toys. The latter came in a rainbow of primary colors and had survived more than fifty years in the ground without any signs of decay.

Then came an open area, more screaming gulls, and a sight unlike anything Tre had seen before. The pit was circular, thousands of yards across, and hundreds of feet deep. A blue flame was burning at the center of the open pit mine. It wavered as a breeze struck it, and Tre knew he was looking at methane gas being vented from deep below.

Farther out, around the perimeter of the pit, tiny humans could be seen. They were hard at work digging objects out of the matrix. Other slaves, men with baskets of junk on their backs, formed a line that snaked up the spiral road to a point off to Tre’s left. As they arrived, other people rushed forward to grab their baskets and carry them to a screening table. It was a vast enterprise, and Tre was impressed. “That’s far enough,” a techie said, and jerked Tre to a stop. “Wait here.”

So they stood in the pouring rain, taking all of it in, until a man without a respirator rounded a pile of scrap metal and limped their way. Damp hair grew in patches on his scabrous scalp, and an open sore was visible high on his left cheek. But perhaps the most noticeable thing about his appearance was the prosthetic leg strapped to his right thigh. There was no way to know for sure, but Tre figured that it, too, had been recovered from the dump.

“I’m the pit boss,” the man said. “Welcome to Kimble Enterprises. At least you look healthy. Not like the animated skeletons they bring me most of the time. In fact, given a bit of luck, you could last five or six months.”

At that point, the pit boss looked expectant, as if his cheerful assessment might be sufficient to produce some smiles, but none were forthcoming. “Okay,” the pit boss continued. “Our work force consists of diggers, sorters, haulers, and techs. Most people start out as diggers, and you’re most people, so that’s what you’re gonna do. There’s a lot of ways to get killed in the pit—so pay attention to what the other scabs tell you. Take ‘em away.”

As Tre and Knife were led down the spiral road, heavily laden haulers were traveling in the opposite direction with loads of artifacts on their backs. Most of the items were carried in baskets, but some were tied to pack boards. And the people hauling these loads were so tired, or so beaten down, that none bothered to look at the newcomers. Could they be transformed into an army? Not based on appearances. Tre felt his spirits sink further.

As the pit walls rose around them, plastic bags could be seen hanging like limp handkerchiefs from the dirt walls. The matrix around them consisted of partially visible bits and pieces, which, if excavated, might turn out to be something useful: a sled or a door or any of thousands of other items. Anything and everything that a throwaway society had chosen to discard because it cost less to buy something new than to repair an item that was broken. And for Tre, that was tantamount to a crime because it was his belief that whatever could be repaired should be.

Once at the bottom of the hole, Tre and Knife were given over to a section boss who was standing on a pair of thirty-inch-high drywall stilts. That gave him the techie a height advantage that allowed him to see what all his slaves were doing at any given moment. The boss was wearing a bush hat, a water-slicked poncho, and knee-length cutoffs. “My name is Sir,” he said importantly. “And you will do what I say. If you fail to do so, the penalty is death—and if you succeed, the reward is death. The difference being that the first will be more painful than the second. Do we understand each other?”

Both men mumbled, “Yes, sir.”

“Good. Off to my left you will find a pile of picks. Choose one and use it on the matrix. Our goal is to recover objects, repair them if necessary, and sell them. So if you damage an artifact, I will administer a unit of pain. Do we understand each other?”

“Yes, sir.”

“Excellent. Select a pick and go to work on the section of wall between the red flags. That is my section, which is to say the best section of the mine, so treat it with respect. Go.”

Tre traded sidelong glances with Knife as they made their way over to the pile of picks. They came in all sorts of styles and sizes. Tre assumed that most of the tools had been salvaged from the dump. He chose one that had what looked like a new handle. Then, conscious of the fact that Sir was watching, he followed Knife to the wall. Other slaves, about a hundred in all, were working in the area between the red flags. And some had things to say.

“All right. Some new meat…”

“Welcome to hell.”

And the ever popular, “Where you from?”

Tre figured the best thing to do was keep his mouth shut and get to work. So he watched to see how the others attacked the wall, saw that most of them hit high, and understood why. Were the slaves to undercut the wall, it would cave in on them. So the key was to spot a likely-looking object, sink the pointy end of the pick into the space between it and a neighboring item, and loosen both. Then, after a sufficient number of blows, he could pull the artifact loose. With that accomplished, it was time to throw the trophy toward the center of the pit, where the sorters would deal with it. Most of the sorters were women and children, all of whom were soaked to the skin and ankle deep in mud.

The work was interesting at first because Tre had never done it before. But it wasn’t long before the novelty wore off and the pick grew heavier. So time seemed to slow, and Tre was thinking about the cold rain when a bullet hit a scab working a few feet away. Blood splattered the side of Tre’s face as the body fell. The report was like an afterthought as a burst of maniacal laughter came over the speakers mounted all around the pit. “Oops,” the pit boss said. “The rifle was loaded. Silly me.” More laughter followed.

Tre looked up from the body to where another slave was standing. Their eyes met. “One per day,” the other man said. “At random. To keep us worried.”

Tre peered up through the rain. He couldn’t see the pit boss, but he could imagine the ugly piece of crap. What happened next was pure improvisation. “The Crow will kill him.”

The man frowned. “What?”

“Haven’t you heard? The Crow is coming,” Tre said mysteriously. “And he’s going to free us. So we can fight evil. Pass the word.”

And with that he turned away. Meanwhile, on orders from Sir, a team of four children had taken the body under tow and were dragging it toward the flickering methane torch.

What Tre estimated to be another hour passed before the sun descended below the edge of the crater and a klaxon sounded. That was the signal for the diggers to return their pickaxes, grab a basket loaded with artifacts, and haul it upward. Now that’s efficient, Tre thought. The diggers have to climb up out of the pit, so make the trip pay.

Once Tre and Knife reached the top and got rid of their baskets, they followed the stream of humanity through a maze of sorting tables to a primitive eating area. It was covered with a metal roof but had no walls. That meant it would be freezing cold during the winter.

The slaves were funneled past a table where hundreds of mismatched plates were stacked. The one Tre took was decorated with pictures of red peppers and a glob of dried food. He got most of it off with a ragged thumbnail.

Then it was on to waist-high metal troughs. Food, which had been transported in steaming wheelbarrows, was literally shoveled into the troughs from one side while the slaves passed down the other. There were no utensils, so the only way to obtain some food was to scoop it up with the plate. As Tre watched those in line ahead of him, he saw that some were very skilled at it. By using both hands and sliding their plates in under the gooey mess, they were able to maximize the size of their serving.

So Tre followed suit, was satisfied with the results, and followed Knife into an area furnished with crudely constructed wooden tables and matching benches. Then, having secured seats in a far corner of the area, Tre had the first opportunity to inspect the meal. He decided that the stuff on his plate could best be described as a sort of porridge. Eighty percent of it was oatmeal. But chunks of unidentifiable meat had been added, along with pieces of carrot, onion, and a scattering of peas, all of which tasted better than he thought possible. Maybe that was because he was so hungry. Having licked the plate clean, Tre went to work on his fingers. That was when Knife spoke. “So here we are.”

“Yeah, lucky us.”

“What now?”

Knife was older than Tre, so it felt strange to be in charge. But that was the way Tre wanted it. And if Knife had any qualms about the situation, he hid them well. “I stumbled onto something,” Tre said. “A technique we can use to stir things up.”

Knife listened as Tre told him about the conversation with the other digger. “So,” he added, “let’s talk Crow up. He’s all knowing, all seeing, and on the way. But here’s the key… We aren’t the source of this stuff. We heard it from someone else. Make sense?”

“Sounds like a plan,” Knife responded levelly. “I’ll talk it up.”

After returning their plates, they made it a point to mingle with the other prisoners. During one conversation, Tre asked another slave if the stories about Crow were true. That generated the inevitable response, “Who’s Crow?”

Tre replied that Crow was a freedom fighter, a man dedicated to freeing slaves and restoring the old constitution. It was impossible to know if the man would pass it along to others, or, if he did, how the story would evolve. All Tre could do was try.

Thirty minutes later, the klaxon sounded once more and a gate opened. That was the signal for the slaves to leave the eating enclosure and spill out into the area Tre had seen earlier. Judging from the barely visible yellow lines, it had been a parking lot once, and as people began to enter them, it became obvious that the long, narrow truck trailers had been converted into makeshift barracks.

Tre paused to look around. Surely someone was in control. There were techies up in the guard towers. But, while they were watching, there was no effort to direct traffic. So Tre stopped a man. “Excuse me… I’m new here. How does one know which trailer to sleep in?”

“You don’t,” the man answered succinctly. “Some people like to stay in the same trailer every night. Others prefer to rotate. And that’s fine, assuming people are willing to take them in. It can be difficult, though. Lots of trailers are open to members only.”

“Can I sleep outside?”

“Yes, but you wouldn’t want to. They turn the dogs loose at night.” And with that the man turned away.

It seemed that Kimble preferred to abrogate control wherever he could. The slaves weren’t wearing numbers, didn’t eat in shifts, and were free to sleep in any trailer willing to take them. But when dawn came they would still be slaves. It was an interesting system. “Come on,” Knife said. “We need a place to sleep.”

“Yeah, but I’m going to take a pee first and brush my teeth,” Tre replied. He couldn’t brush his teeth. Not really. But he could scrub them with a finger, which he did at one of the communal sinks. Then he followed Knife from trailer to trailer. The slaves in the third one agreed to take them in.

The interior was lit by a single lightbulb. And that meant Kimble had a source of electricity. The glow illuminated a long rectangular space with a narrow aisle down the center. It was six bunk beds long, which meant the trailer could house twenty-four people. Each bed was equipped with a thin pallet, a lumpy pillow, and two blankets. Were they infested with bedbugs? Tre figured they were but had no way to avoid them. Why didn’t the techies insist on a minimal level of cleanliness? As Tre rolled into an upper bunk, the pit boss’s words came back to him. “Given a bit of luck, you could last five or six months.”

That was the key, Tre decided. Rather than spend gold to care for his slaves, Kimble preferred to use and then dispose of them, much like the artifacts being mined from the dump.

It was a very different approach from the one Voss favored. Which economic model was superior? That would depend on the supply of slaves. When they were plentiful, and therefore cheap, Kimble would come out ahead. But when slaves were hard to come by, Voss would profit. That was what Tre was thinking about when sleep pulled him down.

The rain stopped during the night, a klaxon was heard, and the slaves had no choice but to roll out of their bunks. Then it was time to visit one of the latrines and shuffle off to breakfast. It was, Tre discovered, exactly like the dinner he had eaten the evening before. But the mixture was hot, filling, and reasonably nutritious.

Once the meal was over, Tre and Knife followed the rest down the spiral road to the bottom of the pit. The methane flame made a roaring sound as they selected their picks and went to work. Sir was a constant presence. And anytime he felt one of the slaves was slacking, his twelve-foot-long bullwhip would reach out to nip a neck, arm, or leg. That was nasty, but even worse was the knowledge that the pit boss was going to murder someone that day.

There were other hazards as well. Just before what Tre estimated to be noon, the people in the green sector broke into a pocket of gas. It had a rotten egg smell and was clearly flammable, because something set it off. The explosion killed two slaves.

Their fire-blackened bodies were still in the process of being hauled away when the survivors were forced to resume working. “It’s over,” one of the techies told them. “Get back to work.”

Later, at about one or two o’clock, Tre heard the gunshot that everyone had been waiting for. This time it was one of the sorters, a sickly girl of ten or twelve who had been coughing up blood. That was when Tre realized the truth. In addition to intimidating the slaves, the pit boss was culling the herd, killing those who were too sick to be effective. That meant it was important to look strong no matter what the truth of the matter might be.

The following day was punctuated by a cave-in that claimed a life in the yellow sector, and Tre’s team uncovered a cluster of fifty-gallon drums. They were oozing black goo, some of which was turning orange by the time a smoke-spewing tractor trundled down the spiral road and moved in to remove the containers.

But as the days passed, they began to blur and lost their individual identities, so that murders, explosions, and cave-ins no longer seemed unusual. Meanwhile, both Tre and Knife continued to spread rumors, or tried to, although it was difficult to tell if they were making progress.

After what might have been three weeks, Tre was working to recover a toaster oven when a rusty canister of spray paint came loose. Judging from the weight of it, the container was at least half-full, so Tre tucked the cylinder into the waistband of his pants and spent the rest of the day trying to keep it there.

Later, as the slaves were lining up for dinner, Tre found a dead spot. A place where the guards up in the towers couldn’t see him. That was when he spray-painted the words “Crow is coming” on a wall. There was no such thing as privacy, so other slaves saw him do it, and when one of them asked about Crow, Tre had a ready answer. “Crow is justice. Crow is freedom. Be ready.” During the days that followed, Tre continued to surreptiously spray paint walls and floors until the canister was empty.

Then came the moment he’d been waiting for, when a man with long, stringy hair confronted him in the pit. “Watch for the Crow,” the man said. “He’s a-coming, and when he gets here, he’ll be riding a horse that snorts fire.”

Tre battled to keep a straight face. “That’s right, brother. Watch the sky. And when Crow arrives, attack the guards.”

Tre returned to work after that and was still at it when the man with the stringy hair returned ten minutes later. He was accompanied by two techies. Both had guns drawn. “That’s the one,” Stringy Hair said as he pointed a filthy finger at Tre. “Take him into custody.”

That was the moment when Tre realized that the whisper campaign was not only working—but working so well that the people in charge knew about it. He made a conscious decision not to look at Knife. The other man was powerless to help him. All he could do was play dumb and hope for the best. “Why?” he demanded. “What did I do?”

None of the techies bothered to answer. They used a combination of shoves and proddings to direct him up the spiral road and past the shed where the pit boss sat on a stool. They ordered Tre to bear right. A path took them away from the pit and toward a concrete building. Guards stood to either side of the front doors and watched impassively as Stringy Hair led Tre inside.

Tre had never seen anything like the inside of the building. The lobby was two stories high and decorated with paintings, sculptures, and well-cared-for plants. Soft music filled the air and the concrete floor had been buffed to a soft glow. Stringy Hair paused to let the others catch up with him before leading them up a broad flight of stairs to the floor above. A hallway led through a gallery of black-and-white photos to a pair of wooden doors. Guards stood to either side of them, and one raised a hand.

That brought the entire group to a halt. Tre’s heart was beating like a trip-hammer by then, his palms were damp, and he felt light-headed. Stick to your story, Tre thought. That’s your only chance.

The waiting came to an end as the doors opened to allow a well-dressed woman to leave. She seemed to look through Tre as if he wasn’t there. One of the techies gave Tre a shove, and he stumbled forward. The office was huge, and an enormous window took up most of one wall. A man was standing in front of it with his back to the room. Judging from the way his arms were positioned, he was holding a pair of binoculars. Was he looking at the pit? Yes, that made sense.

Stringy Hair brought the party to a stop, where it was forced to wait until the man turned to look at them. He had short brown hair, a small, almost feminine nose, and even features. A pair of rectangular sunglasses hid his eyes. The frames were pink, while his clothing was unrelievedly black. Gold earrings dangled from both ears and his manner was unexpectedly polite. “My name is Jeremy Kimble. And you are?”

Tre saw no reason to lie. “Tre Ocho.”

“Okay, Tre,” Kimble said evenly. “Here’s the situation… Rumors about someone or something called the Crow are circulating among the slaves. And according to Ellis here, you know what’s going on. So who is the Crow?”

Tre was frightened and allowed it to show. “I don’t know.”

“I don’t believe you,” Kimble said evenly as he placed the binoculars on the desk next to a large bolt cutter. It had red handles and appeared to be new. “You told Ellis here to watch the sky—and attack the guards. Why would you say something like that if you don’t know the answer?”

“I h-h-heard it—that’s all. From another slave.”

“Who?” Kimble wanted to know. “Who told you such things? Tell me and spare yourself a great deal of pain.”

“A man,” Tre responded. “I d-d-don’t know his name.”

Kimble held the bolt cutter up for Tre to look at. “Have you seen one of these before?”

Tre’s mouth felt dry. It was difficult to speak. “Yes, yes I have.”

“Then you know what it can do. Grab his right arm.”

Tre tried to run, but the guards were ready. And judging from the speed with which they took control of him, Tre knew they’d done it before. “Now,” Kimble said, “tell me everything you know or I will remove one of your fingers.”

Tre thought about Crow, about Freak and all the others. He wanted to tell Kimble, but if he did, his friends would ride into a trap. Then they would die and any hope of something better would die with them. He felt light-headed, promised himself that he wouldn’t scream, and gave the only answer he could. “I don’t know.”

Ellis took hold of Tre’s little finger and pulled it straight out. Kimble opened the bolt cutters and took a step forward. Tre felt metal touch his skin. “Tell me.”

“I don’t know.”

There was a momentary pressure followed by a snapping sound as the tool cut through flesh and bone. Tre screamed, and screamed again as the finger hit the floor. Then he fainted.

The next few moments were spent in blissful darkness. Then the glass of water hit his face and he felt the deep throbbing ache where the finger had been. Kimble loomed in front of him. “That’s one,” the tech lord said. “So you have nine left. Who is Crow? When is he coming?”

Tre swayed, threw up on himself, and waited to die. “I don’t know.”

Kimble stared into Tre’s eyes, shook his head, and took a step back. “He doesn’t know. He’s like the rest of them. Put a tourniquet on the stump and send him back.” And that was when Tre fainted again.

When Tre awoke, he found himself lying on the ground and staring up at the sky. His right hand was throbbing with pain, and when he brought it up into his field of vision, Tre saw that the stump had been bandaged. He was looking at it and remembering the way steel cut through bone, when Sir appeared. He was on stilts, which meant his face was a long way off. “Well, look at what we have here,” Sir said. “A slave who’s lying down on the job. Get up, scab. You have work to do.”

Tre rolled onto his knees, managed to avoid using his right hand, and tried to rise. A wave of dizziness overcame him. “So you have a boo-boo,” Sir said sarcastically. “Big deal. Stand up.”

Tre tried again, made it to his feet, and swayed uncertainly. Then he spotted the pile of picks and lurched over to it. It took all his powers of concentration to select a tool and pick it up. From there it was a long walk to the edge of the pit and a slot between Knife and a slave named Will. “It’s good to have you back,” Knife said. “What happened to your hand?”

Tre took a clumsy swing with his left hand. The pick made contact but had little effect. “They cut my little finger off.”

Will said, “My God, why?“

“They wanted to know about Crow.”

“Did you tell them?”

Tre remembered the man named Ellis. Was Will a spy too? There was no way to know, so he answered accordingly. “No, I don’t know anything, so how could I?” Will nodded and returned to work.

Tre did his best. And the knowledge that the pit boss was constantly scanning the area looking for people to cull helped to motivate him. But his hand ached and Tre was worried about the possibility of infection, so he didn’t want to let it get dirty. That made the work more difficult. So he was grateful when the klaxon sounded.

The basket of artifacts felt unusually heavy as Tre carried it up the road to the surface. Once that chore was accomplished and Tre had his plate, Knife took care of loading it up. Then they went off to sit with their backs to a cyclone fence. It was difficult to eat left-handed but Tre managed to do so. And much to his surprise, he was hungry. Once they were finished, Knife pulled a rusty can out of a pocket. “I have something for you.”

“Yeah? What is it?”

Knife’s reading skills were limited, but he could puzzle out words. He pointed to the label. Tre saw the letters “T-U-R-P-E-N-T.” The rest was illegible. “Turpentine? What am I supposed to do with that?”

“Pour it on the bandage. Let it soak into the wound. That’s what Bones does. It kills the bugs. The ones that are too small to see.”

“The bacteria,” Tre said.

“Yeah. The bacteria.”

Tre was unaware of turpentine’s antiseptic properties but knew an infection could kill him. And the garbage mine was bound to be lousy with every type of bug known to man. So he nodded. “Pour it on.”

Knife had trouble getting the cap off. Once it came loose, he looked Tre in the eye. “This is going to hurt.”

“A lot?”

“As much as losing the finger.”

“Damn.”

“Yeah.”

“Okay,” Tre said as he braced himself. “Do it.”

Knife poured a generous dollop of the strong-smelling brew onto the dressing—and Tre uttered a barely muffled scream. Those seated close enough to hear looked but weren’t surprised. Rough-and-ready medical treatments were the only kind they had access to. It took the better part of five minutes for Tre to recover from the burning pain. Once he did, Knife was all business. “Do you know what day this is?”

Tre’s mind was on other things. He shook his head. “Today is the day before the attack,” Knife told him. “Tomorrow night. That’s when the gang will attack.”

Tre knew Knife was right and felt a sudden sense of concern. “So you think the other slaves will revolt?”

“I don’t have the foggiest idea,” Knife replied. “But we have to assume that they will. So we’ll have to leave our trailer, make a lot of noise, and try to lead them. It’s asking a lot, but I’m going to need your help.”

Tre’s hand was throbbing, but he nodded. “I’ll do my best. And if the others follow, I know where to lead them.”

“Where?”

“Straight to Kimble. Once we capture or kill him, the rest of this operation will crumble.”

The next day seemed to crawl by. Tre worked as hard as he could on the theory that the pit boss was watching from above. His hand continued to ache, but not as badly as before, and there were no signs of infection.

Finally, for what Tre hoped would be the last time, he entered the usual trailer. Knife had taken charge of the next phase, and Tre was happy to let him do so. Neither one of them had a watch, so they couldn’t be sure when the attack would come. All they could do was lie in their bunks and wait for the mortar bombardment to begin. But what if it didn’t begin? What if something prevented the gang from attacking? What if Crow left them to rot? He wouldn’t do something like that, would he? The waiting was pure torture and seemed to last forever. Then Tre heard it—a muffled explosion. The attack was under way!

“That’s it!” Tre shouted as he rolled out of his bunk. “The Crow is here! He’s going to free us! Follow me.”

Knife uttered a war cry as his boots hit the floor, and Tre opened the door. Cool night air flooded into the trailer as Tre made his way down the wooden stairs to the concrete below. The tower-mounted searchlights were on, and blobs of light began to roam the compound as a much-amplified voice boomed over the speakers. “Stay in your trailers! I repeat, stay in your—” The order was cut off when one of the watchtowers took a direct hit. There was a boom followed by a series of cracking sounds. Then the top half of the tower broke free of the rest and fell. It landed with a crash. Tre grinned. Smoke had been watching the compound for weeks, so whoever had been assigned to the mortars knew what to aim for.

But that thought was washed out of Tre’s mind as he heard a chorus of bloodcurdling howls and a pack of dogs surged out of the shadows. It was a threat he had neglected to think about, to prepare for, and now they were in trouble. Or so it seemed.

But Knife hadn’t forgotten. Slivers of salvaged steel appeared in both hands, flew through the air, and found targets. Two of the animals tumbled head over heels and fell dead as more missiles sought flesh. Tre heard a series of yelps as they hit and more dogs went down. The whole thing took place with such rapidity that only one dog was able to complete the attack. It leapt up into the air and was flying toward Knife when he stepped to one side and made a motion with his right hand. The animal’s forward motion did all the work for him. The resulting laceration was two inches deep and a foot long.

The beast hit the ground, rolled, and came to its feet. Blood ran freely as it crept forward and produced a throaty growl. Lips were pulled back to reveal rows of white teeth, but Knife was ready. “Here, doggy, “ he said, as he brandished a knife. “Come to Poppa.”

But before the dog could obey, Tre brought a three-foot-long section of rebar down on the animal’s head. The plan was to use it on techies, but the dog was a good target too. The impact produced a sickening thud. The animal collapsed. “Nice job,” Knife said as a mortar round blew out a section of fence.

“Crow!” a slave yelled. “The Crow is here!”

Tre heard the cry and knew it was time to act. So he shouted, “Let’s get Kimble!”

A dozen voices took up the cry, and as Tre began to run, others followed. Techies appeared up ahead and fired. Tre felt something nip his left arm and heard someone scream. Then he was there, striking at a guard with the steel rod and hitting the man’s head.

“Their weapons!” Knife shouted. “Take their weapons!”

Someone else had the dead techie’s rifle, so Tre took his pistol. “Gold!” Tre shouted. “Kimble has gold!”

Tre didn’t know how much gold Kimble had beyond the earrings he wore but figured the prospect of looting the tech lord’s headquarters would help motivate his fellow slaves. And he was correct. “Gold!” someone shouted, and the crowd surged forward.

As Tre led them between piles of artifacts, the pit boss appeared. He raised his rifle and fired. Something buzzed past Tre’s right ear. The pistol seemed to fire itself, and the pit boss looked surprised as the bullet struck his forehead. Tre was moving so fast by then that he was forced to step on the dead man’s chest as he kept going.

The building where Tre had been tortured was directly ahead, and guards were on the roof firing down at them. A woman stumbled and fell and a man tripped over the body as a slave fired. A techie fell back out of sight.

As the mob closed in on the building, a machine gun opened fire and cut a bloody swath through the crowd. The slaves answered with a no more than a dozen gunshots, but at least one of them was on target. The automatic weapon fell silent as a group of would-be looters surged past Tre and pushed the doors open. Their reward was a blast of shotgun fire that killed half of them.

Tre shot one of the defenders twice, saw the other fall, and waved the slaves forward. He expected to face at least two guards outside Kimble’s office, but the doors were open and the techies were nowhere to be seen. As Tre stepped into the doorway, he could see why the guards had been withdrawn. They, along with Kimble himself, were busy removing what appeared to be heavy boxes from a previously hidden storage area.

Tre raised the pistol. “Put the boxes down and place your hands on your heads.” One of the techies let go of a box and turned. That was as far as he got before a shotgun blast nearly cut him in two. A loud clacking sound could be heard as Knife prepared to fire again. But there was no need. The others did as they were told.

Kimble wasn’t wearing the pink sunglasses this time, and his eyes widened as Tre stepped forward. “So Crow exists?”

“Yes,” Crow said as he pushed his way through the crowd. “I do. Nice place you have here… especially for a dump.”

There was a moment of silence, followed by raucous cheers. An army had been born.