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She sat up, looked at the barred window. Nope.
“Down here. Under your bed.”
She leaned down, then rolled to the floor and reached to the wall.
There. A hole.
And reaching through the hole, a hand.
“Judah?”
“It’s me.”
She touched her fingers to his, the hole big enough to put her entire hand through. Somehow the touch of his hand, rough as it was, warmed her entire body. He gave her hand a squeeze, then let go.
She pulled her hand back through, then pressed her cheek to the floor, trying to see in the blackness. She barely made out the outline of his face.
“Are you okay?” he said.
“Where were you?”
“Number eighty-one tried to escape today. He was on the welding crew, so they took us all for questioning.”
Her breath caught. “Are you hurt?”
“Not much. But good news—tomorrow I’ll be on dig crew again.”
She shouldn’t want to cry with relief, but…
“What happened to Eighty-One?”
“He is in the infirmary. My guess is that by the end of the week he goes off the ship in a bag.”
She closed her eyes. “Vikka and Twenty-Seven took my dinner.”
“His name is Zurab. He’s Georgian. The potatoes have wire worms, so they saved you from dysentery.”
Oh.
“Listen, I need your help. The other twenty-three, the guy before you, was a friend, and he…he hid something in your container. I don’t want you to get caught with it.”
What?
“What is it?”
“It’s blasting powder. They use it to get through rock. I steal a little at a time in my hat.”
Brilliant. And, “That’s dangerous.”
“What are they going to do, kill me? I’m already a dead man in here.”
“I don’t want to hear that.”
Silence. “That wasn’t defeatist. I know my fate, and I’ve made peace with it. But that doesn’t mean I am planning on sticking around, waiting for it to happen.”
“Take me with you?”
“Absolutely. If and when I blow up the ship, you’ll be the first to know.”
