This Conspiracy

Chapter 14

Author stuff: Wanna know a fun fact about me? I used to be able to juggle. I wasn't really good at it, but three scarves? Super easy! Now I just kind of sit around, knitting, sewing, and writing, waiting for the next comic book convention to come around. And I haven't been to one of those in over a year.

This has been a very weird time.

Anyway, juggling these different characters and their POV has been interesting and is making the story move a lot more slowly than I initially remembered.

Chapter 14

In Which Some Things Are Lost

It started raining again the next day. The rain had slowed sometime around mid-evening, lightening to a drizzle and then a mist, but the sky had apparently not had enough. It continued on.

Gally kept the Builders busy, despite the weather. It was no time to be lazy, after all. In Archie's opinion, he took his job as Keeper way too seriously. Still, it was better than doing nothing. He felt bad for the Track-hoes. Their entire job was based on the weather.

It had to be boring.

"Watch your fingers, Greenie," Dave said. "Don't want to lose them."

"Thanks," Archie said, moving his hand out of the way of the saw blade.

"What are you thinking about?"

"How much it sucks to not be able to do anything right now. I mean, one day, yeah that's fine. But two? Nuh-uh, can't do it."

"Yeah, Gally won't ever give us a rainy day off. There's always too much to do. And some things are going to need to be rebuilt after this, so we'll be extra busy until the next Greenie."

Archie nodded, helping Dave to balance the plank of wood he was supposed to be sawing. He was surprised that Gally hadn't said anything about their talking. It was a distraction from their work, after all.

"What are we working on anyway?" he said.

"A temporary shelter for the Gardens," Dave said. "There was a Gathering yesterday. Gally'd brought it up a couple of times in the past, but Nick didn't want to waste the materials. There was a big push for it last night, especially from Zart. It usually doesn't rain as much as it did yesterday – and today, for that matter. Having a temporary shelter will help the Track-hoes and the Glade. We might be able to save a lot of the vegetables, unlike last time."

"It was bad the last time it rained? I know a couple of the Cooks mentioned losing the celery, but..."

"We lost a lot, actually, and had to depend on the supplies from the Box. We still do. I'm glad Nick finally conceded. I'm not sure how long it'll be before we have to move to canned foods."

Archie wrinkled his nose at the thought. Something told him that he wasn't the biggest fan of canned foods.

"And by that look I can tell that these shelters seem like a good idea," Dave said, chuckling.

"Yeah."

"Good that. Now, all we have to do is finish building them."

. . .

It took them another day and a half to finish up the shelters, and by that time the rain had stopped. The Gardens, in the meanwhile, were a mess. Most of it could be salvaged, thankfully, but the tomatoes and the turnips – oh no, the horror! – they'd planted two weeks ago were goners. He watched as the Track-hoes did what they could.

"We'll have these for next time," Gally said, patting one of the posts for the shelters.

"Don't think it's rained this much in a long while," a Builder named Stephen said.

"How much do you think we got?" Dave said.

"More than enough. Shuck, I'm just glad the Glade didn't flood."

"Could you imagine if the Glade flooded? We'd be doomed. I mean, we can't go out into the Maze, especially not at night." The group all shuddered at the thought of the Grievers. Archie saw Gally reach up to brush the hidden scar. He wondered if it still ached from time to time. Had the rain bothered it at all? Old wounds and scars were said to do that.

He had yet to actually see a Griever – no one had taken him to the viewing glass – but he'd heard them out in the Maze at night. Their shrieks rattled the marrow in his bones and chilled him to his core. If they looked as bad as they sounded, he didn't think he actually wanted to see what one looked like.

"Right," Gally said, "we need to inspect all of the buildings with the Bricknicks. See which ones just need repairs and which ones may need to be rebuilt entirely. Good that?"

A round of "good that" from the Builders rose up in agreement. They broke apart into groups. Archie was sent with Stephen and Andy – a Bricknick – to inspect the Blood House and the chicken coop. One of the walls was starting to rot, but that was something they'd been keeping an eye on anyway. And part of the roof needed to be patched where it had started to leak during the rain.

By midday, they'd reported back their findings to the Keepers and broke for lunch. There wasn't quite as much work as they thought, which meant the Builders would be helping the Bricknicks with repairs until something came up.

He was placed on the team to work on the Blood House. It was a laborious task, but it was an easy one. They spent the rest of the day planning out who was going to be doing what – he would be on the roof, much to his displeasure. But he was one of the smaller Builders, so he would have to make do.

The next day, they got to work. Archie was sure he had worked his muscles before coming to the Glade, but the work he was doing for the Builders was one that strained them.

He'd been the first sent up – which terrified him to no end. Working on a rotting roof was not his favorite thing. It took a lot of balance and trust in the Gladers holding onto the safety lines. He felt ridiculously stressed about the latter part. He was still relatively new to the Glade, and he was just getting to know everyone.

The Glader manning his line was a Bricknick named Ash. He was a scrubby faced boy with dark hair. Something about him didn't feel quite right, but the way he joked with the others and how at ease everyone else was with him made him unsure.

And he managed the line a bit better than some of the other Gladers who nearly slipped and were injured. The most Archie had were a few splinters from when he slid down the roof while tossing down one of the planks that served as a base for the shingles the Builders made from ramshackle leftovers of plywood they'd cut to make other things that could serve no other purpose.

It was probably nothing to be worried about.

Author stuff cont'd.: My new manager starts this week, which means I get to move back into the sales office after a year and a half of being the sales coordinator here. I'm not sure if I'm excited or anxious.

What am I listening to? My Year in Mensa

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