The bunker's two large halls—the caverns—are set aside for the people.

Anything beyond them is barred. It is the realm of the machines—tireless and unfailing.

The Manuals of the Bunker, Vol. 1, Verse 22

I touched the bruise Frankie's spade had left on my temple, and my fingers came away bloodied.

Groaning, I got up and looked around. The mounds were deserted. Frankie and Carp were gone. So was my apple. And my dignity.

Assholes.

Not even Jasmine had cared to check on me.

I should go straight to my dad and rat on them. After all, my father was the foreman, which placed him above Frankie.

But that wouldn't restore the apple. And it definitely wouldn't restore my dignity.

Nor would it fix Jasmine and me.

But then, had she ever cared for me? I had thought she did.

Anyway, my dad kept telling me that you can't guess a woman's mind. He was probably right—men were easier. 

And easy company was what I needed now. I'd go to Ed, my cousin. He shared my feelings about Frankie and would lend me a commiserating ear.

A whirring sound from above cut these plans short. Against the glare of the lamps, something descended towards me.

A rusty, rivet-studded metal claw the size of a man—the crane's grapple. It was closed, its three fingers touching each other at their tips. It stopped a few inches short of the ground, hanging in the air before me.

I didn't hesitate and climbed it, placing a foot between the fingers with practiced ease. With a jerk and the rattling sound of moving chains, the grapple rose.

Moments later, my upward motion stopped at the height of a ladder hanging from the cabin. I clambered over and ascended its metal rungs one step at a time. Keeping my gaze ahead, I never looked down—I hated heights. At the top, I reached a door. It stood open. I pulled myself in and closed it behind me.

The craner was perched on his seat, a hand on the controls beside him. He smiled at me from the myriad of wrinkles that covered his face. "Hey, Tim."

"Hey, craner."

"You look like shit. Are you okay?"

I felt like shit, too, so I nodded and winced at the pain the movement caused in my temple.

"It looked as if you could have used some help down there. But I was too late. I'm sorry." He pushed a black lever forward. With the groan of ancient metal, the cabin started along its track.

I closed my eyes and took a deep breath, just to be rewarded by the mental picture of Frankie's buttocks rising and falling in their happy rhythm amid the pumpkin and rhubarb green.

I opened my eyes to flee the image. "Frankie's a jerk."

"You might have a point there."

Frankie would regret this day. Somehow.

"But don't judge Frankie so harshly," the Craner said. "When the old foreman died, he had hoped the bishop would make him foreman, yet your father was chosen. That must have pained Frankie."

Trying to calm my angry heart, I unclenched my fists and leaned out to watch the scenery below us. We had crossed the edge of the compost mounds and were now moving along the swamps—four rectangular squares where the wastewater from the upper cavern and from ours seeped through grass, roots, sand, and dirt. The craner had told me it was collected by the Engineers' machinery, somewhere down below, to be pumped back to the upper cavern.

In three of the squares, puddles of water between green shrubs and grass reflected the light from above. The one square farthest away from us was a dark pit. The crane had dug it out, piling up a hillock of dirt and mud along its edge. My father and the craner had blocked the water from going into it and were trying to clean it.

"We won't be able to fix that one," the craner said. "It doesn't drain as it's supposed to, so there's less water being filtered. And the bishop's not happy about that."

That wasn't news to me. My father had already mentioned it. The bishop had ordered him to report at the temple in the upper cavern a couple of days ago, questioning him about the diminishing amount of fresh water being pumped back up into the tanks.

"The machines are unfailing," I said, remembering the lines of the Manuals.

The craner huffed, but he said nothing.

With a shudder, the cabin changed direction, and we moved towards the village. Before us, the ground rose through small, terraced gardens. The incline ended at the chutes on the right side of the cavern and the houses on the left. From this vantage point, the fat lamps suspended from the ceiling looked like upended mushrooms. Their light made the fine mist in the air glow, something you couldn't see from the ground.

A trembling of the cabin ripped me out of my thoughts.

"An earthquake," the craner said. "They're quite frequent these days."

"The bishop says they're made by the birds of doom stomping the surface, trying to get into the caverns to eat us."

He laughed. "Nonsense."

"The Manuals warn us of the birds." I didn't like people scorning the holy books and the Church. I hoped to become a priest. It was rare for one from the lower cavern to enter the ranks, but it might be possible if I studied the Manuals hard enough. That was at least what one of the priests told me.

I would be able to apply when I was twenty—two years from now.

"Don't believe all that's written in the Manuals." The craner held a finger to his lips. "No matter what the bishop says, there's nothing evil about birds. They used to live on the surface before it became poisonous. They're like our chickens, but their wings are strong enough to fly... to soar." He raised his hands as if about to take flight.

The thought of one of our fluttering chickens soaring made me chuckle. "That's hard to imagine."

He leaned forward, resting his arms on his spindly legs. "Do you want me to let you in on a secret?"

He had this habit of telling me secrets. Nothing momentous, not the secrets and treasures of the bishop's Shrine, but tidbits he had learned from his dead grandfather. Most of the time, they were but follies, but they always gave me a little thrill.

I nodded. "Sure."

He reached into his shirt and pulled out an amulet hanging from his neck by a brown piece of string. It was rectangular, the size of two fingers side by side, and it bore a picture in the color of fresh blood on a black background. It showed an animal with a fierce-eyed head and a pair of wings. The creature hovered above tongues of red that were licking its tail.

I knew what this should be. "Is this a bird?"

"Yes, that's a bird."

The animal's one visible eye glowered at me. Its menacing stare made me shudder. "The bishop says they're evil. They're forbidden creatures. You should get rid of this thing. It will bring nothing but trouble."

"Don't worry. You're the only one visiting me up here. So no one knows about it... except you." He winked at me. "And it's not true. Birds are not evil. They used to be a token of freedom and beauty. This one in particular. It's called a phoenix. A bird rising from the ashes. It's supposed to represent us, the bunker people, as we return to the surface."

I shook my head, fending off the craner's words. They were so dark and heavy. I wondered how the cabin could bear them without being ripped from its track above. "Don't say this. The surface is barren. This is blasphemy. The Church would have you executed." I had enough of the man's forbidden secrets for today.

"The Church doesn't know a thing. My granddad once told me—"

"Where are we going?" I craned my neck to get a glimpse at the ground below. Unwilling to hear more of his old man's fantasies, I was trying to change the topic.

He took a deep breath, audible over the whirring noise of the cabin's motor. "Okay, no more secrets for today. Where do you want to go?"

"The smithy!" I said. Ed would be working there at this time of the day.

"Fine. We're almost there, anyway."

A pale wisp of smoke rose from the chimney of the smithy and drifted towards the ceiling. The only stone building in our cavern, it was located a few minutes' walk away from the village to prevent the sparks of its fires from reaching the straw huts.

From our vantage point, the village stood bright against the slate-colored rock of the wall behind it. Beyond the last hut, a stair zigzagged up along the chutes, climbing to the top cavern. A group of people was on its bottommost steps, descending towards the village. One of them wore a long cape of yellow.

I recognized the color of the Church in an instant. "Wow, there's the bishop! He's visiting our village."

"I wonder what his yellow lordship is seeking down here." The craner pulled the lever, and the cabin came to a halt. "I bet he's up to no good, as always. I'll drop you off here."

"Why won't you recognize the Church for what it is?" Anger drove my question. "It has created this world and is holding it together."

"If you say so." He pulled another lever, and the door at my side opened.

As I left the cabin, I looked back at him. "Thanks for picking me up."

He lifted a hand in farewell. "No probs, kid. I'll be down at the swamps. Come see me when you know what that old, yellow booger wanted."

I didn't reply—he liked to call the bishop names, and it was best to ignore him.

I jumped from the grapple before it reached the ground, shouting for my cousin. "Ed! Ed!"

"Tim?" Ed emerged from the smithy, holding a rod of metal with a small wheel attached to its end.

"The bishop's coming to our village!" I stopped two steps short of him, grinning. "I've seen him coming down the stairs."

He scratched his double chin. "The bishop? What is he doing here?"

I had hoped for more enthusiasm—the bishop ruled both caverns, and he was about to pay us a rare visit. "I don't know. Let's go and see."

"I..." He looked at his contraption and gave the wheel a spin.

"Your machine thing can wait."

He loved to tinker, and I knew it wouldn't be easy to pry him loose.

"But my master..." He pointed his thumb at the smithy.

"Is he awake?"

The old smith spent most of his time drunk, stoned, or asleep, letting his apprentice do all the work.

Ed shook his head.

"So, let's go!" I took the rod from his hands and leaned it against a wall.

"Okay." He wiped his fingers on the black apron spanning his rotund belly. "Let's see what the guy in yellow has to say."

Ed shared the craner's views about the bishop.

I ignored him and led the way, running, eager to see what this was about.

When we arrived at the edge of the village a minute later, Ed was panting.

We found the main square crowded, with the people standing around one of the huts. There were at least twenty—probably the whole village. Most of them stood silent, a few whispering.

The house they stared at was my father's.

The bishop's guards were stationed at the door and faced the villagers with stolid, unmoving expressions. Two of them held batons of dull metal—one tall and bald, the other wiry and bearded. Their captain stood between them, with a gun holstered to the blue ribbon he used as a belt. That was Captain Wolfe—everyone knew his compact, muscular frame and his short-cropped coppery hair laced with silver. He was the bishop's right hand and the enforcer of the Manuals' rules.

What were they doing here? My dad was not in view, nor the bishop.

The two might be talking to each other right now, inside the house. Whatever it was, it had to be important.

Maybe, my father would ask the bishop if I could join the priests.

One of the onlookers moved, approaching the guards. It was Frankie, still holding a shovel. His shaved head gleamed in the lamplight.

He stopped two steps from Wolfe and planted the top of his tool on the hard, dry ground.

"Sir, can I help you?" Frankie asked.

The captain took him in, his face unmoving. Then he shook his head.

I suppressed a grin as I watched Frankie retreat and join Carp, who loitered at the fringe of the square. That might teach him. My dad was meeting with the bishop, and the guards didn't want his help.

Ed pulled my sleeve. "There's Marge. Come."

She was his mother—and kind of my mother, too, since my mom's death. We walked up to her.

She had her gaze on my father's house but turned towards us at Ed's whispered greetings.

"What's going on?" I asked her.

"Oh, Tim." Her words were hushed as she pushed me towards the edge of the square.

Confused, I yielded.

She shoved me behind one of the buildings and held me by my arms. "Abraham, your dad..." Her voice was still a whisper as she stared at me, eyes wide open. "They've arrested him and are questioning him right now. You need to leave."