“We got a cherry one, just come out of the oven,” the man said.
“Cherry’s my favorite,” Nate said, and the man lowered his gun and opened the door wider.
One by one we appeared from behind shrubs, cars, and a broken wooden fence. The man blinked, but let us all in.
“Why didn’t you tell me the code?” I hissed at Nate when we were inside and following the man down his cellar steps.
“I didn’t have to,” Nate said in surprise. “I’m here.”
Making a mental note to destroy that lame argument later, I watched as the man knelt before a cabinet and opened its bottom door. It was full of home-canned peaches, green beans, peppers, and so on, the jars clean and shining, labeled carefully.
The man did something inside the cabinet and it swung open slowly. He went through first and clicked on a light to reveal a small room, maybe ten by eight, with two rough wooden bunk beds, a small table and chairs, and a big map on the wall showing all of section E. There was a dot at the very top of the map showing where we were, and other dots labeled as cells.
“You all wait here, and I’ll get some food,” the man said, leaving us and shutting the cabinet door.
“Look,” I said. “These cells are connected by lines.”
“Roads. Trucks have to ship stuff,” Nate said.
Mills looked closer at it. “No—roads are marked differently. These lines don’t connect every cell—just a small number of them.”
“Maybe they’re cells who are friendly to the Resistance,” Levi said.
“Huh,” Bunny said, and nodded. “It’s nice to know we’re not alone.”
And that seemed like the most profound thing anyone had ever said.
33
“SO IS IT MOSTLY TRACTORS you build here, or combines, or what?” I asked. It was early afternoon—the six of us had basically eaten and then crashed last night, and it had been almost noon when we woke today. I felt amazing—clean, fed, and rested. I couldn’t remember the last time I
’d had all three things going for me at one time.
Nate and I were wearing typical cell clothes—T-shirts that said UNITED MANUFACTURING, and basic blue coveralls over that. The other four members of my squad had been content to stay back at the house, watching Cell News and eating again.
“Tractors and some attachments, like disk harrows,” the man said proudly. We hadn’t exchanged names or anything else, nothing we could be questioned about. “Plus we rolled out cotton pickers last year, and word is we’re going to add a silage machine next year.”
“I saw some of these tractors at an ag cell,” I said. My parents had had an ancient model. When that broke down, we’d used oxen—Ed and Ned. When my dad killed himself, Cassie and I let the farming go.
“Yeah?” The man looked pleased. “I never knew what happened to them after they leave here. I figured they probably all went east to the big city.”
“What big city?” I asked. Nate touched my hand with his as if to say, Be careful.
“I don’t know,” the man admitted, looking truthful. “It’s just an idea I had. I don’t know if anything like that exists. You know, you hear rumors.”
“Yeah,” I said.
I’d never had a tour like this of another cell, and it was interesting and infuriating. Interesting because they had schools and grocery co-ops and other familiar things, and because everything was manufacturing oriented instead of farming oriented. Infuriating because I’d somehow forgotten how the United stuck their name all over everything and took all the credit.
THE UNITED NEEDS YOU TO DO YOUR BEST! was one of the most common factory signs. DON’T MAKE EXTRA WORK FOR YOUR NEIGHBOR! said another. HEALTHY UNITED WANTS TO SERVE YOU! They really stuck out after we’d seen the signs at the not-cell. This place had United Eyewear, United Shoes ’n’ Boots, and United Car Repair.
All I wanted to do was run through the cell, ripping down sign after sign—which would be a dead giveaway that the Resistance existed. So I imagined ripping them down and stomping on them, and that was almost as fun.
“For ten bucks I’ll rip these signs down and run over them,” Nate had murmured, and I’d blinked in surprise at how similar our thoughts were.
The three of us stood and watched as a shiny new yellow tractor rolled onto a big shipping container. The man glanced at us and said, “We’ve… we’ve built some flaws into the tractors.”
I stared at him. He was taking a huge chance by telling us this. If we were captured and tortured, I might offer this up to protect my friends. My sister. Tim.