Chapter 7
2184 Words
Aren had barely touched the breakfast tray.
While the others marvelled at strawberries and warm bread, Aren sat cross‑legged on the carpet near the window, dismantling the toaster.
He hadn’t meant to. Truly, he hadn’t. He’d only wanted to look at it — at the strange metal box that glowed from the inside and browned bread without fire. But then he’d noticed the screws. And then the heating coils. And then the mechanism that pushed the bread up. And then the spring tension. And then the wiring.
And now the toaster lay in neat pieces around him, arranged with the precision of a surgeon’s tools.
Corin had given him a look earlier — one of those Elder looks that said Aren, please stop touching things — but she was busy with the children, and Aren’s curiosity was louder than her disapproval. Curiosity had always been louder. It was the reason he’d nearly been expelled from the pressure tunnels twice. It was the reason he’d once taken apart a moss‑light panel and accidentally plunged an entire corridor into darkness.
He held up a metal coil, eyes bright. “This is incredible,” he muttered to himself. “Heat without flame. Controlled. Efficient. Surface engineering is… elegant.”
He didn’t notice Rowan approaching until a shadow fell across the carpet.
Rowan stared at the disassembled toaster. “Please tell me that was already broken.”
Aren blinked up at him. “It was functioning perfectly. That’s why I needed to see how.”
Rowan pinched the bridge of his nose. “Right. Of course.”
Aren stood, brushing crumbs off his trousers. He was lean, soot‑streaked, and still wearing the patched work vest he’d used Below. His toolkit — an assortment of handmade instruments, some metal, some bone, some repurposed from old geothermal parts — hung from his belt, clinking softly as he moved.
He walked to the window.
And froze.
The daylight hit him like a physical force. He had seen the sunrise earlier, but only from the hallway, only briefly. Now, standing before a full window with the world stretched out below, he felt something inside him c***k open.
The sky was enormous.
It wasn’t just big — it was infinite. A vast, impossible expanse of blue stretching beyond anything he had ever imagined. It made the tunnels feel small. It made the geothermal chambers feel claustrophobic. It made every ceiling he had ever worked under feel like a lie.
The colours were impossibly bright. The greens of the trees, the reds of distant rooftops, the shimmering silver of cars moving along the road — all of it vivid, alive, overwhelming.
The buildings, the roads, the trees — they all existed without stone ceilings, without lanterns, without the hum of geothermal vents. The world breathed openly. Light fell freely. Nothing held the sky up.
Aren pressed his hand to the glass. “It’s real,” he whispered. “The sky is real.”
He had dreamed of it secretly for years, poring over f*******n myths, sketching imagined horizons in the margins of engineering diagrams. He had built crude models of landscapes out of scrap metal and moss, imagining what it might feel like to stand beneath an open sky.
But seeing it — truly seeing it — was overwhelming.
He felt guilty for loving it.
He felt guilty for wanting more.
Behind him, the Underkin murmured anxiously as Hale’s personnel moved through the hallway, preparing their “assessments.” The contractors’ radios crackled. Clipboards flipped open. Boots thudded. The atmosphere thickened with dread.
Aren ignored them for a moment, unable to tear his eyes from the world outside.
Then the door slammed open.
Councilman Hale entered with two security contractors behind him. His gaze swept the room, cold and calculating. He looked at the Underkin not as people, but as variables. As risks. As problems to be solved.
Aren didn’t turn. He didn’t care about Hale. Not yet.
Rowan stepped forward immediately. “Councilman, they’re still eating. Give them time.”
Hale ignored him. “We’ll begin with the adults. Separate them into groups of five.”
Corin rose from her seat. “We will not be divided.”
Hale’s jaw tightened. “You don’t have a choice.”
Aren finally turned.
He didn’t step forward. He didn’t speak. He simply watched Hale with the same analytical stare he used on machines — measuring, assessing, calculating. He studied Hale’s posture, his tone, the way he held his shoulders, the way his eyes moved. He catalogued every detail.
Hale noticed. “And who are you supposed to be?”
Aren answered bluntly. “Aren.”
Hale waited for more. Aren didn’t offer it.
Rowan stepped in. “He’s one of their engineers.”
Hale raised an eyebrow. “They have engineers?”
Aren bristled. “We built geothermal systems that kept eight hundred people alive for centuries. We maintained moss‑light networks, pressure tunnels, and water reclamation chambers. Yes. We have engineers.”
His tone was sharper than he intended. Corin shot him a warning look — the kind that said Aren, please do not antagonise the man who wants to put us in cages. Hale smirked. “Well. You’ll be useful to interview.”
Aren’s eyes narrowed. “Interview implies cooperation.”
Rowan stepped between them. “Councilman, enough. They’re not ready.”
Hale’s voice dropped. “They don’t get to decide readiness.”
Aren’s fingers twitched toward his toolkit. Not as a weapon — he wasn’t violent — but as a reflex. Tools comforted him. Tools made sense. People like Hale did not.
Rowan turned to Aren. “Stay with Corin. Don’t engage him.”
Aren nodded, though his jaw remained tight.
Hale moved on, barking orders to his personnel. The Underkin shrank back, frightened. Corin gathered them close, her presence steadying the room.
Aren returned to the window.
He stared at the sky again, letting its vastness calm him. The world outside felt enormous, terrifying, beautiful. It felt like possibility.
He whispered to himself, barely audible, “We are not primitive.”
He didn’t know if anyone heard.
But he knew one thing with absolute certainty:
He would learn everything about this world. Every mechanism. Every system. Every secret.
And one day, he would build something that proved the Underkin belonged in it.
Something undeniable. Something brilliant. Something that reached for the sky.
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Lira had been watching Aren dismantle the toaster from across the room, her hands folded neatly in her lap. She didn’t scold him—Aren’s curiosity was a force of nature, and she had long ago learned that trying to stop him was like trying to stop moss from growing. It simply wasn’t possible. Moss found cracks. Aren found mechanisms. Both were inevitable.
But she did worry.
Not about the toaster.
About Aren’s heart.
He stared at the sky with a hunger she recognised too well. A longing for something beyond the tunnels. A longing that frightened him. A longing that frightened her.
Lira understood longing. It had lived inside her since the day her husband died in the collapse years ago. She had poured it into her work—into tending moss farms, healing the sick, nurturing the children. She had become the roots that held their community together. When others faltered, she steadied them. When others broke, she helped them mend. She had learned to grow around grief the way moss grew around stone.
Now, Above, she feared those roots might not hold.
The Underkin were scattered across the hotel room, still tasting fruit and warm bread, still whispering about the sunrise. Their voices were soft, fragile, like seedlings emerging from soil for the first time. Some sat on the carpet, legs tucked beneath them, staring at the colours of the fruit as though they were jewels. Others stood near the window, blinking at the brightness of the world outside.
Lira moved among them, checking on each person with gentle hands and soft words. She touched foreheads, soothed frightened children, and offered quiet reassurance. She adjusted blankets, wiped crumbs from small mouths, and guided trembling hands toward cups of tea.
Plants had memory, she believed. And people did too. Trauma left marks like scars in soil. If not tended, those scars could rot. She had seen it happen Below—fear spreading like fungus, grief hardening like calcified roots. She was determined to help her people heal before those scars deepened.
But when Councilman Hale returned with his personnel, the air shifted sharply.
Uniformed strangers filled the hallway, their boots heavy, their expressions cold. Radios crackled. Clipboards snapped open. The contractors moved with the stiff, mechanical precision of people who saw the world in categories, not faces. Their presence felt like frost creeping across warm soil.
Hale’s voice cut through the room like a blade.
“Separate them into groups. Begin assessments.”
The Underkin froze. The children clung to their parents. The adults stiffened, eyes darting like cornered animals. The warmth of breakfast evaporated. The landing felt smaller, tighter, as though the walls themselves were shrinking.
Corin stood firm, refusing to be divided.
Aren bristled, his fingers twitching toward his toolkit.
Rowan defended them, his voice steady but strained.
Lira watched Hale with quiet intensity. She didn’t raise her voice—she rarely did—but her presence was unmistakable. She stepped forward, placing herself between Hale’s personnel and a cluster of frightened children. Her hands were gentle, but her stance was immovable. She was not tall, nor imposing, but she radiated a calm that made even the contractors hesitate.
“These people are not ready,” she said softly. “They need rest. Food. Safety.”
Hale barely glanced at her. “They need evaluation.”
Lira’s voice remained calm. “You cannot evaluate a wounded plant the moment it is uprooted. It must be given time to settle, or it will die.”
Hale frowned. “We’re not talking about plants.”
Lira met his gaze. “We are talking about living beings. The principle is the same.”
Her tone was soft, but it carried weight. It carried truth. It carried the authority of someone who had spent her life tending fragile things and watching them grow. She had spoken those words to grieving families, to frightened children, to dying elders. She had spoken them to herself.
Rowan shot her a grateful look.
Hale did not.
He turned away, barking orders, but his personnel hesitated. Something in Lira’s tone—gentle yet unyielding—made them pause. Even hardened contractors recognised conviction when they heard it. One of them glanced at her with something like respect. Another lowered his clipboard slightly, uncertain.
Lira watched a young girl bite into a slice of melon, her eyes widening with delight, still unaware of the growing unrest. Lira smiled, her heart warming. Food was healing. Food was connection. Food was memory. She had fed children Below during shortages, coaxing them to eat moss cakes and nutrient broth. Seeing them taste fruit—real fruit—felt like witnessing a miracle.
She approached Aren, who was still staring out the window, his face illuminated by the vastness beyond the glass. His shoulders were tense, his breath shallow, as though the sky itself was too large to fit inside him.
“You should eat,” she said softly.
Aren didn’t look away from the sky. “Later.”
Lira placed a hand on his arm. “You will need strength. Curiosity burns energy.”
He finally turned, offering a small, sheepish smile. “I’ll try.”
She nodded, then moved to help an elderly man who struggled with a cup of tea. She steadied his hands, whispered encouragement, and guided him gently. She wiped a drip from his chin, then brushed crumbs from his sleeve. Her movements were slow, deliberate, grounding.
But as she worked, her gaze kept drifting to the window.
The sky was beautiful.
But it was also dangerous.
The Underkin’s connection to the earth—literal and spiritual—was fragile now. She feared it might snap if they were not careful. She feared they might lose themselves in this bright, overwhelming world. She feared that Above would swallow them whole, that its vastness would uproot them entirely.
And yet…
When she saw Kesh laughing at the taste of strawberries, when she saw Aren’s eyes shining with wonder, when she saw Corin standing tall beside Rowan…
She felt something else.
Possibility.
Perhaps the roots of their people could grow here too. Perhaps the earth Above had memory as well. Perhaps they were not as fragile as she feared. Perhaps they were stronger than she ever realised.
Hale’s voice cut through her thoughts. “Assessments begin in one hour.”
Lira looked at him, her expression calm but resolute.
“We will be ready,” she said.
But inside, she whispered a prayer to the moss gods of the tunnels she still believed in.
Let my people stay whole. Let them stay rooted. Even in this new world.
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