The Legacy

. . .’
    The men looked at each other, shared a raised eyebrow, a wry smile. Then one produced a metal stick and dropped it in the water. Immediately Jake’s eyes opened wide and his body began to shake violently, his lungs expressing air in a loud howl of pain, until there was no more air, until the current had done its work.
    Silently, the men emptied the bath of water, checked the body was safe to move, then wrapped it up and took it down to the lorry.
    ‘You’re a fast learner,’ Jude said appraisingly as Sheila deftly navigated her way through the Underground security network to pick up a message in its inbox. Sheila shrugged but inside she was glowing.
    It was a few days later and, in order to make up for his broken promise, Jude had finally agreed to teach her how to use the computer. It had been a struggle – Jude’s computer meant more to him than anything and every time she hit the wrong key she’d seen him wince. But he hadn’t known how closely she’d been watching him all this time; hadn’t known that she’d already picked up a lot. All she’d needed was the opportunity to touch the thing.
    ‘Yes, I am,’ Sheila agreed with a little smile. She turned to Jude and studied his face briefly – a face that looked so like Peter’s except for the eyes. Peter’s eyes were intense, restless, always darting around. Jude’s were calm. In spite of her anger with him over not finding her parents, his eyes reassured her, they instilled confidence. She felt safe when he was around. She didn’t know why he always got so defensive about himself, why he always seemed to think that he was in competition with Peter. In her opinion Jude would win hands down. Peter was the sort of person who got you into trouble; Jude was the sort of person who got you out of it.
    Her brow creased in concentration she stared at the screen, trying to remember the next sequence – the sequence that would enable her to reply to the message. In spite of her protestations that computers were incredibly dull – protestations that were the result of her defences kicking in because she’d known so little about them, protestations that she kept up so that no one would suspect her intense interest – Sheila had jumped at the chance to use one for herself. She knew that Jude’s computer was a treasure box of information; through it she could communicate with anyone she wanted to, find out anything and everything. She’d watched him carefully for months, learning how to unlock its secrets, how to make it work for her. The fact of the matter was that she had a plan, a dangerous plan – one that still brought her out in goosebumps every time she thought about it. She knew Jude wouldn’t understand, would try to stop her if he got a chance, and this was the one thing that nearly made her change her mind several times a day.
    But she knew she had to do it. Jude might put up with the Underground, with its dank rooms and its meagre food supply, but Sheila had her sights set on a better life. She knew that this was not her destiny, that this life was not meant for her. She might have been labelled a Surplus, like Anna, but she knew that she wasn’t. She remembered her parents; remembered being told by them that she was Legal, that she was very special. She remembered the night she’d been taken too – she’d been at her grandparents’. Someone had called the Catchers and Grandma hadn’t had the paperwork. She remembered Grandma’s screams, remembered being taken by a man who smelt dirty and coarse . . . and then began the life that she should never have led. A childhood spent in Grange Hall, waiting for her parents to come, dreaming of the Outside, of a land of plenty where everything was warm and soft, where food was always available, where she could lie on a sofa daydreaming to her heart’s content.
    When she’d finally been rescued – not from Grange Hall but from Pincent Pharma, where she’d been sent to be a Valuable Asset – she’d thought that escape would lead her to a better life, not to the Underground. It was hardly any different from Grange Hall here – small grey rooms, chores, rules. There was no cruelty here, she wasn’t ill-treated on a daily basis and encouraged to hate herself, but still, it wasn’t the world she’d been waiting for – it didn’t even come close. She wanted her old bedroom, wanted the softness of her mother’s embrace, wanted all the food in the world and all the love to