Tunnels 02, Deeper

blood on her hands. It was a broadsheet celebrating some sort of event -- she'd seen them before in the Colony. The main picture was of a woman, with four smaller images, vignettes of different scenes, around it. Elliott scanned them quickly before something caught her eye.
    There was a sixth picture at the bottom that looked as though it had been added later, since it was sketched in pencil. She looked askance at it.
    It was the spitting image of Will -- although he looked all cleaned up in the picture, with neatly cropped hair.
    She peered more closely at it, bringing her lantern to the paper. It was Will, but there was another detail that caused her to suck in her breath. He had a hangman's noose tight around his neck. The other end of the rope was curled up above he head to form what was very clearly a question mark.
    And there was also a shadowy, less clearly defined figure behind him, which vaguely resembled Cal. While Will had the desperate look of the condemned, this second figure smiled serenely. The expressions on the two faces were totally out of sync, and the combination quite unsettling.
    She studied the rest of the page, lingering on the central picture of the woman, then read the name in a swirling banner at the very top.
    Sarah Jerome .
    Elliott immediately bent over the body, pulling the head around so she could examine the face. Despite copious amounts of blood from the head wound, she could tell right away it wasn't a Limiter.
    It was a woman!
    With long brown hair that had been swept back.
    There were no female Limiters. That was unheard of -- Elliott, of all people, knew this.
    She realized who was before her. Who she had killed.
    Will and Cal's mother. Sarah Jerome.
    She pushed the head to the side again, thinking she should hide it in case any of the boys wandered over.
    "Need any help?" Will called out.
    "No," Elliott replied, "just stay put."
    "it's a Styx, isn't it?" Will shouted, his voice a little tremulous.
    "I think so," Elliott called back after a slight pause.
    She hesitated, looking at the blood-soaked head, weighing up whether she should tell Will. With a pang of recollection, she thought of her home back in the Colony. She remembered the heartbreaking moment when she'd been forced to leave her own mother, knowing in all likelihood she would never see her again.
    Filled with indecision, Elliott regarded the piece of paper once more. She couldn't keep this secret to herself. She couldn't live with it on her conscience.
    "Will, Cal, over here!"
    Will came jogging over, with Chester following behind. "You really nailed him," Will observed, eyeing the body with some trepidation.
    "You might want to look at this," Elliott said quickly, thrusting the bloodied broadsheet into his hand.
    He scanned the sheet as it flapped in the wind. Recognizing the sketch of himself at the bottom of the page, he shook his head in disbelief. "What is this?" Then his eyes alighted on the name at the top. "Sarah... Sarah Jerome," he read out loud. He turned to Chester. "Sarah Jerome?" he said again.
    "Not your mother?" Chester asked as he leaned in to see the broadsheet.
    Elliott kneeled down beside the body. Without saying a word, she very gently turned the head, pushing the damp hair aside to reveal the face. Then she stood up. "I thought it was a Limiter, Will."
    "Oh! It's her! It is her!" Will exclaimed, glancing between the broadsheet and the body on the ground. He didn't really need the picture; the similarities between his own face and hers were remarkable. It was as though he was seeing his reflection in a dusty mirror.
    "What's she doing down here? And why was she carrying that?" Chester asked, pointing at the rifle.
    Will shook his head, overwhelmed. "Get Cal," he said to Chester as he stepped closer to Sarah. Squatting down by her shoulder, he put out a hand to touch the face that was so very much like his own.
    He drew it back as she gave a small moan.
    "Elliott, she's alive!" he gasped.
    Then her eyelids flickered but remained shut.
    Before Elliott could react, Sarah's mouth opened and she drew a breath.
    "Will?" she asked, her lips moving weakly, her voice so quiet that he could barely hear it over the desolate howl of the wind.
    "Are you Sarah Jerome? Are you really my mother?" he asked in a cracked voice. His emotions were in a complete tumult. Here he was meeting his biological mother for the first time, yet she was dressed in the uniform of the soldiers who were after him. And in the picture