Among the Free

Chapter Nine

Luke kept his promise and stood up to leave the shed as soon as he'd heard the end of the boy's story.

"Well, uh, good luck," he said awkwardly. "Keep warm."

He waited for a second, half hoping the boy would say, Hey, why don't we stick together? Be a team? But Luke and the other boy hadn't trusted each other enough even to tell their names; Luke had no doubt that the boy would turn him in to the Population Police if he ever had a chance. So why did Luke's heart ache? Why did he suddenly feel so lonely as he moved toward the door?

I like being on a team, Luke thought. Even at Population Police headquarters, where he never saw anyone but Nina, he'd known he wasn't completely alone.

He was now.

Luke peeked out into the twilight gloom, then eased out the door and pulled it shut behind him. The merriment in the party house had gotten so raucous that he could hear shouts and bursts of song even through the thick walls.

Should I go try to join them? Luke wondered. Nobody wanted to get rid of the Population Police more than I did.

But Luke couldn't quite picture himself striding over to the house, thrusting open the front door, announcing himself to all those strangers who might or might not be on his side.

What if they've got no more loyalty than the boy in the shed?

Luke could imagine the room falling into a horrified silence, someone rushing over to beat him up. To kill him. He was still wearing a Population Police uniform, after all.

Luke stepped into the shadow of the woods and, despite the cold, took his shirt off. He shoved his arms through the sleeves backward, turning them inside out, and pulled the front panels of the shirt together that way. It was hard buttoning the shirt back up from the inside, especially with his fingers going numb in the cold. But he felt better with the hated Population Police insignia hidden.

Luke heard a door opening behind him, so he crouched down in the weeds and looked around. It was only the boy creeping out of the shed toward the party house. Luke watched, wondering how the boy intended to get any food from a closed-up house filled with people. The boy sidled up to a window that was missing several panes of glass. Some of the panes had been replaced by plastic and some by squares of cardboard. The boy pushed at one of the cardboard squares, squeezing his fingers under the bottom.

Even from a distance, Luke could see the triumphant smile on the boy's face. Luke imagined that the boy must have reached his hand into a bowlful of some great delicacy— raisins, maybe, or almonds. And then the boy's expression changed.

"Ow!" he howled.

He seemed to be trying to jerk his hand back, but his hand was caught somehow. The front door of the house opened and a horde of men rushed out, screaming, "Thief! Thief!" They circled the building, pulled the boy away from the window and threw him to the ground. Now the shouts were jumbled: One man growled, "There's Mary's cloak that was stolen," and everyone else seemed to be shouting, "Population Police! We'll show the Population Police who's in charge!"

"No, wait!" the boy shrieked. "I'm on your side! I'm the kid who risked his life refusing to shoot the old woman! It's because of me you got the gun—"

"We'll show you the gun!" someone shouted, and then everyone stepped back as one of the men pulled a gun out of his pocket and held it up in the air, where it glinted in the last rays of sunlight.

The man pointed the gun straight at the boy, making everyone else laugh. He stepped forward, pretending to be about to shoot, then lowered the gun at the last minute. He did this two or three times, and the men around him laughed all the harder as the boy squirmed on the ground in terror.

"Enough games," the man said, raising the gun yet again. "And enough of the Population Police, I say."

This time he cocked the gun and aimed carefully.

This is real, Luke thought. This is really going to happen.

"No, don't!" he screamed.

The man with the gun looked up, startled. His eyes searched the darkened woods. And then he aimed the gun at the tree where Luke was hiding and began shooting.