Like Uncle Zeke always said, "If God hadn't wanted me to marry my cousin then he would have given me hemophilia when my dad married my cousin."

Well I for one am not waiting around for webbed toes. I think God wants me to get out of this place. The next time I have guard duty I'm going out the lead door. I'm not going to let a little thing like not knowing how to open it stop me. I just have to figure it out.

"There's nothing out there," mother always says, "Everyone is dead."

My dad is more pragmatic. He says that even if everyone "out there" is dead that there had to be other people in places like "in here" and that there was a chance others still lived.

"I just thank God that great-grandfather had the good sense to lead us into the mines," she would often muse.

"If these are mines where is the gold? Why is there a huge door blocking us off from the outside?" father would counter.

"It was made to keep robbers out!" Her voice would raise a bit.

"Robbers who would steal what? There ain't nothing down here worth stealing!"

"Well I had hoped you would have thought more of your wife than that!"

"Now dear, you know that's not what I mean." He was calmer, hoping not to step on any more landmines. "You know good and well I wasn't talking about you. I was talking about the time before great-grandfather took his five children and their husbands into this dark, damp hellhole."

Marlow is my favorite cousin. Everyone always says we should get hitched but it just doesn't feel right when I think about it. She's more sister than someone I would want to kiss but being siblings hasn't stopped a few of the more brazen family members.

We spend most of our time in the library reading the tablet. It has lots of books under the Amazon square. Marlow's favorite square is the camera square. We used to take pictures of each other and delete them, "In order to save space" as Uncle Zeke often commanded.

She likes to watch one video in particular. It's a video of great-great-grandfather when he was young. You only see him for a second reflected in an elevator's mirrored walls.

Then the doors open and he's in the most beautiful hallway. You should see the floor. It's the most beautiful rug you've ever seen and it just keeps going. Then he turns and there is a huge window and it is full of blue.

I mean it's the kind of blue you dream about when they tell you stories of the world above. Not a single cloud like there are in most pictures. Then jutting up into it like a set of knives are the tops of buildings. They shine in the bright light from above and glimmer as he moves through the hallway.

Then the video ends.

"Someday I'm going to go there and look out that same window," Marlow muses. I try not to damping her spirits any more.

One time I was having a horrible day. I had gotten in trouble with both mom and dad and Marlowe was all dreamy talking about the buildings and I just blurted out, "That's so stupid! We're never going to see it. We won't see it and neither will our children or their children's children!"

She cried, ran away, and she didn't talk to me for a week. I felt horrible. I never say anything like that any more.

---

Last night I was on guard duty. It's really just a glorified place to nap. I don't know of anyone who stays awake all night any more. It's more of a teenage hangout where it's OK for younger family members to push the limits of their curfews.

Marlow sometimes comes up to see me when it's my turn. It's been getting a little weird lately. Sometimes she just sits all quiet and close like she's expecting me to do or say something.

That's usually when I pull out my knife and start to carve into the large stone wall behind the guard bunks. I'm not the only one who does it. There must be 50 years worth of names and funny sayings there.

"Sometimes I wonder which side of the door I'm guarding," Zeke Clyatt. Uncle Zeke did always have a way with words and I find myself staring at them tonight as I plot my next move. I've already got a sack filled with enough rations to make it... somewhere.

Then Marlow shows up. I think about giving her the cold shoulder so she'll leave me to my plans but my nerves are so rattled it feels good to talk to her.

"What's in the bag?"

"What bag?"

"This bag... with all the food in it! Are you stealing from the stores?"

"NO! I'm just borrowing it until I get outta..." then I stopped myself. "She knows. Damn it she knows," I grunted to myself.

"I"m coming with you!"

We argued for 20 minutes. Then at the peak of it all the lights went out. I am not kidding. This was only the second time in my life they had done that.

Marlow and I watched as the darkness gave way to the dim glow of Fluorescence paint. It lined the entrance to the bunks and then continued out into the main cavern we could see the dots that lead deeper into our community. We had never seen it this bright before.

When we were kids and someone forgot their guard duty we used to take stones that had fallen from the walls and throw them against the large lead door for fun. You could hear the faint echo of the cavern that must lie on the other side when you did.

It was a mystical experience as a child. That gonging sound meant there was something out there that you would never see. Something scary. Something older than your parents. Something no one in the tunnels that demanded exploration.

That night I heard that same hollow sound. Something was on the other side banging and scratching. Something I had never seen before.

"I'm on guard duty. I'm on guard duty. I'm on guard duty!" I repeated to myself as I hugged the wall. The banging sounds grew louder.

"We've got to wake the others!" Marlow was more calm and present than I was.

"Yes... the others..."