Grandfather (49 page)

The lights came on,
burning our eyes. I covered them until they were able to adjust. We
stayed against the wall, listening to the keys rattle.

“
Let’s go,” an unfamiliar
man’s voice said once the doors were open. He didn’t sound violent,
but we still didn’t move. “Hurry up,” he begged. “Or else we’re
going to get caught.”

Marley squeeze my
shoulder. Was it possible? I wasn’t going to wait around to see. We
hurried out of the cell, and a hand push me toward the door. Marley
and I left the room.

As soon as we exited, our
eyes completely adjusted to the light, allowing us our first look
at whoever had let us out.

It was a man who appeared
to be in his late thirties. He was dressed just like any other
soldier, which made me unsure if I could trust him or not. Yeah, he
had saved us, but my mind wasn’t working right at that
moment.

“
Hurry up,” he said,
leading us down the hall toward the elevator. I didn’t know what
else to do, so I figured it was worth a shot. In the elevator, I
looked out the glass. It was late at night. The city was dark. No
lights shined through the building windows. Nobody roamed the
streets below. The city was just as dead as before.

The elevator door opened
on the first floor. Wow, there was nobody at the desk. There was
nobody anywhere, not even security. What was going on?
Luck?

We left the building
through the front revolving doors, ran past the fountains, not
asking this random guy any questions. On the street, a long black
vehicle waited for us. The door swung opened by somebody inside
before we even reached the vehicle. We jumped in and the driver
sped away immediately.

I glanced back, expecting
to see soldiers running after us.

There was none.

“
You guys okay?” a man
asked straight away. It was familiar. I focused on him and was
thankful to see him.

Mr. Harrison had saved us
again.

He wasn’t his usual self.
He looked as if he hadn’t slept in days. His sobering eyes told me
he was having a rough time.

“
Seemed like the perfect
time to rescue you two,” Mr. Harrison said. “Belladonna is meeting
with all the soldiers. That and the curfew left the streets
completely empty.”

That explained a
lot.

I was about to ask
questions when something outside the vehicle caught my attention.
It was a huge hole in one of the buildings. A large pile of debris
sat just feet away.

“
There were multiple
explosions for no reason the other night,” Mr. Harrison.

We knew exactly the reason
for them.

“
Hundreds have died,” he
continued. “This Belladonna has taken control of everything. She
controls the food supply. If you don’t follow her rules, you don’t
get food. She . . . ” Mr. Harrison couldn’t even
finish.

“
It’s a mess out there,”
the man who had saved us said. “I’m Ethan by the way.”

We thanked him for saving
us.

“
He’s one of my men,” Mr.
Harrison said. “When we found out that the soldiers would be
meeting with her in the arena, I knew it was our best chance
getting you guys out.”

We thanked Mr. Harrison
too. Then, he asked about Ashton, wondering why he wasn’t with us.
It hurt too much to talk about it. I gave him one word.

“
Dead.”

Mr. Harrison was
silent.

“
This is terrible,” Ethan
said.

“And if anybody speaks
against her, as many have, she has them arrested,” Mr. Harrison
told us. “She controls the media so they have to pretend like
nothing is happening.”

“It’s like this in every
city in the nation,” Ethan added. “They’re much bigger than that
Grandfather.”

“She’s worried about the
lack of resources, especially the international food shortage. She
keeps telling people that she will fix it, but the transition will
be rough.” Mr. Harrison played with his beard as he kept his eyes
on the ceiling. They started to water. When he looked at me, I
turned away, not wanting to see him cry. I would’ve probably lost
it.

As we left the city
center, Mr. Harrison asked us more about what had happened, which I
really didn’t want to answer. It was too painful, but I managed to
do so.

“She was my momma,” Marley
said quietly once we had told him the entire story.

I could tell that it was
much worse than what Mr. Harrison was expecting to hear. “I’m
sorry,” he told us, knowing that wasn’t going to help anything. But
he tried. “These people will pay.”

“She calls herself
Grandmother,” Ethan told us. “Ironic.”

I agreed. I knew why. They
had the same ideas. But as she had said, they had different
outcomes and goals.

Mr. Harrison’s driver
drove us to a street bordering the wall. The buildings seemed
pretty old and unused. That was odd because I didn’t think old
buildings existed within the wall. Mr. Harrison explained that he
owned them and used to ship furniture out of them when he was
younger. The vehicle pulled into a huge parking garage and came to
a stop.

Mr. Harrison told us that
he, Mrs. Harrison, and even Olivia had been hiding out in the old
building with everything going on. They were pretty confident that
Belladonna or anybody would go searching his mansion.

Mrs. Harrison was very
happy to see us. “Dears,” she said, hugging both of us. “We have an
extra room, but you two will have to share.”

“That’s fine,” Marley said
quietly.

Attached to the parking
garage was basically a decent sized apartment. At least Mr.
Harrison had turned the old warehouse into a nice apartment. It
consisted of a rather large living room with very nice furniture.
Of course they would still have nice things. They could afford it.
There was a dining room, a full kitchen, and a hall with four
doors. Mrs. Harrison explained that three of them were rooms and
one was a bathroom. “My husband and I are in that one,” she said,
pointing at the door at the very end. “That one is
Olivia’s.”

Mrs. Harrison led us to
the one vacant room.

“
You see, my husband knew
that something was going to happen soon.”

I remembered him telling
us that.

“
Well, this is a part of
his operation. We call it the safe house.” Mrs. Harrison was about
to open the door to our room when the door next to us screeched
open.

Olivia walked out in a
robe, her hair wrapped in a towel. Her face brightened at the site
of us. “There they are,” she said. “Once again, your story keeps
writing itself.”

We didn’t really feel like
replying. She was just too happy for us at that moment. But it
wasn’t her fault. She didn’t know what we had just gone through. I
think she could tell that something was wrong because her
expression quickly changed.

“Stay here,” she said
slowly, rushing back into her room. We only waited for a few
seconds before she returned, carrying two notebooks and two pens.
She handed us one of each. “Before, I said that writing things down
can keep us sane. Most people use computers, but I find it more
peaceful to do it the old-fashioned way. Perhaps you’ll give it a
try.” She patted us on the shoulder.

“Thanks,” I told
her.

“Not a problem. I’ll let
you guys be alone now.” Olivia returned to her room. Before
shutting the door, she looked at us. “I’m so sorry,” she
said.

In our room, there was one
huge bed, one brown leather sofa, a desk, and a nice recliner
matching the sofa. The carpet was a royal red color, reminding me a
lot of their mansion. I pointed at the bed. “You take the bed,” I
told Marley. She looked as if she was about to argue, but decided
not to. Without saying anything to me or Mrs. Harrison, she threw
her notebook onto the desk and climbed into bed, facing away from
us. I put my notebook down too.

“Are you guys hungry?”
Mrs. Harrison asked.

I was hungry, but I don’t
think I could have stomached anything. Mrs. Harrison didn’t argue
when we refused.

I lied down on the couch,
knowing that I wasn’t going to be able to sleep. I had too much on
my mind. But I tried anyways. Two hours went by, and I still wasn’t
asleep. I looked back at the bed. Marley’s eyes were closed. I
stood up.

“
Marley,” I whispered,
seeing if she was actually sleeping. She didn’t budge. On the other
end of the room, I noticed a familiar box with a small hole on the
top of it. It was a TV, but I wasn’t about to turn that on even
though I wanted to see what the news was saying. That would wake
Marley up. My eyes landed on the notebook. Thinking of what Olivia
had told us, I sat down at the desk and opened up the notebook to
the first page. Things definitely didn’t feel too sane, so maybe
I’d do what Olivia suggested.

I started
writing.

And that’s what I’ve been
doing for the past few days now. That and bugging Mr. Harrison
about going to the mountain to see if anybody had managed to
survive. I know that it’s unlikely anybody is alive, but I still
have to see for myself.

He understands.

Mr. Harrison is working on
something. He won’t tell me what it is yet. He says that we need to
rest and mourn before jumping into something new. I’m kind of glad
he’s doing that because I’ve definitely needed the time. And I know
Marley does. She’s spent most of her time in bed. Occasionally
she’ll come out and talk to us, but she doesn’t say much. I’m
really worried about her. I’ve been trying to get her to laugh or
something. I’ve not been successful.

I was eventually able to
watch the news. Mr. Harrison was right, there was nothing bad about
Belladonna on TV because reporters know they’ll be arrested. They
keep talking about the shortages, especially the food shortage,
reporting that Belladonna has a solution.

Nobody knows what’s going
on.

Mr. Harrison did say that
he plans on meeting up with somebody in secret so that he can learn
more. Apparently, he has a contact that knows more about this
stuff.

Another thing, Olivia is
really happy that I’ve been writing in this journal. And you know
what, she’s right. This notebook seems to be keeping me focused.
But more importantly, I think that one day, I will let her write my
story. Writing this makes sure I don’t forget all the details. I’m
pretty sure I’ll never forget.

I still have a hard time
falling asleep at night. I can’t quit thinking about Edgar and Mae
. . . Belladonna and Robert betraying us. I can’t quit thinking
about Ashton and all of the people that lost their life down there.
I just don’t see how we can win, even though Mr. Harrison says
there’s hope. He tells me that it’ll be easier to find people to go
against Belladonna because nobody likes her. She’s not trying to
hide what she does like Cornelius did. The only problem is how
we’re going to get people. Everyone is afraid of her, so they do
exactly what she demands. Even if we do find people, we don’t have
a hidden place under a mountain like we did before. I guess that’s
just something that Mr. Harrison will have to figure
out.

Mr. Harrison talks to me a
lot, afraid that I’m gonna lose it. He tells me that there have
been several people like Belladonna, called dictators. Mr. Harrison
told me that he heard that there was a man named Hilter or
something like that. Mr. Harrison said that he controlled all of
Germany, and that one day, he lost, like all dictators eventually
do. I don’t know if this is true since all history books were burnt
in the regions. Nobody knows the truth about our history. But it
still gives me hope that Belladonna will lose just as this Hilter
guy lost. And I’m determined to make it happen. I don’t know what
somebody like me can do, but I will make sure it happens.
Belladonna and Robert will pay for betraying us. Belladonna will
pay for killing those I learned to care about. I will make sure
that her power is destroyed as Grandfather’s was destroyed. I plan
on writing it all down, because it really does help. Hopefully I
live through whatever I’m about to go through. So whoever you are
reading this, if anybody at all, wish us luck.

We’re going to need
it.

. . .
To Be Continued

Carsyn’s journey is just
getting started. Flip to the next page for a sneak peak
of…

The Grandmother
Society

∞

Book two of the Infinity
Trilogy

Stay updated at
www.anthonywadej.com

Chapter One

S
oldiers stood on every corner, wearing face masks, machine
guns in hand. They didn’t say a word. They didn’t smile. They did
nothing but stare straight ahead.