THE MOON DWELLERS

Book One of

The Dwellers Saga

David Estes

Copyright 2012 David Estes

Nook Edition, License Notes

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Discover other exciting titles by David Estes available through the author’s official website:

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The Evolution Trilogy by David Estes:

Book One—Angel Evolution

Book Two—Demon Evolution

Book Three—Archangel Evolution

For Adele. Just for being you.

Prologue

Adele

7 months ago

Hands grope, men shout, boots slap the rock floor.

Clay dishes and pots are smashed to bits as the Enforcers sweep recklessly through our house. There are more bodies in the tiny stone box that I call home than ever before. The walls seem to be closing in.

My mother’s face is stricken with anger, her lips twisted, her eyebrows dark. Like a wild animal, her teeth snap and snarl. I’ve never seen her fight like this. I’ve never seen her fight at all.

It takes three bulging Enforcers to subdue her kicking legs, her thrashing arms. For just a moment I am scared of her and not the men. I hate myself for it.

I realize my sister is by my side, watching, like me. I can’t let her see this—can’t let this be her last memory of the ones who raised us. I usher her back into the small room that we share with my parents, and close the door, shutting her inside alone.

When I turn back to the room, my mother is already gone, taken. Undigested beans from our measly supper rise in my throat.

My father is next.

The Enforcers jeer at him, taunt him, spit on him. As he backs his shoulders against the cold, stark, stone wall, five men corner him. Smart. They don’t underestimate him.

He makes eye contact with me; his emerald-green eyes are hard with concentration. Despite the inherent tension in the room, his face is relaxed, calm, the exact opposite of his eyes. Run, he mouths.

My feet are frozen to the floor. My knees lock, stiffen, disobey me and my father. I am ashamed. After all that my father has done for me, when it counts the most, I fail him.

One of the men lifts an arm and a gun. I hold my breath when I hear the shot, a dull thwap! that doesn’t sound like a normal gun. The man moves backwards slightly from the force, but his legs are planted firmly and he maintains his balance.

My father slumps to the floor. I feel my lips trembling, and my hand moves unbidden to my mouth. My frozen feet melt and I try to run to him, but a big body bars my way. I don’t think—just react. I kick him hard, like my father taught me. My heel catches the Enforcer under his chin and his head snaps back. Like most people, he underestimates me.

The next Enforcer doesn’t.

The Taser rips into my neck and tentacles of electricity slam my jaw shut. My teeth nearly snap off my tongue, which is flailing around in my mouth. They don’t take it easy on me just because I’m a kid, or a girl—not after what I did to the first guy. Still stunned by the Taser, I barely feel the thump of their hard boots as they kick me repeatedly in the ribs. My eyes are wet, and through my blurred vision I see the arcing nightstick.

Strangely, it feels like destiny, like it was always going to happen.

I hear my sister’s screams just before I black out.

Chapter One

Adele

My heart is alive again. Because I see him. I know I should hate him—everyone else around me does.

“Filthy mutt,” I hear one guy growl, “he should’ve stayed above.”

“Yeah,” another guy says, “I’m surprised he’s gettin’ his shoes dirty down ’ere with the rats.”

But for some reason I choose not to hate him. Not today. I need something to change my mood, something to bring me back to life. And he is the only option. It is the first day since arriving at the Pen that I consider suicide a viable option. Others think about taking their own lives on a daily basis—I hear their screams echo down the empty prison halls at night. And some of them have, even in the six months I’ve been here.

I am sitting in the yard when I hear the bell chime. The yard is what we call the expansive area outside the Pen’s main building, although I don’t know who came up with the name, because it makes no sense. There is no yard, just barren rock. Real yards—with grass, bushes, and trees—are magical places that don’t exist in our world.

The high fence surrounding the prison buzzes with electricity and threatens us with barbed wire. They made the fence easy to see through, so we can see our town, subchapter 14 of the Moon Realm, a glimpse of the freedom we don’t have. And the non-prisoners can also see us, the convicted.

A few months earlier I saw a young boy, no more than fourteen, go crazy all of a sudden and rush the fence, desperate to experience the outside world that only his eyes could taste. I was sitting right here when it happened. As soon as his hands touched the metal his body convulsed and he flew backwards onto the rock, his arm trapped awkwardly beneath his body. He didn’t die, but he can’t lift one of his arms above his head anymore. I see stuff like that happen all the time in this place.

The bell we call the death toll—an awful keening that shivers my bones. It is called the death toll because it only rings when someone dies, as if to remind us of our only chance of escape. Sometimes the death is self-inflicted; other times, not. It isn’t ringing now, and yet I can hear it. When no one else reacts I know it’s in my head. Perhaps it’s ringing for me. I could pick a fight with a gang, let them kill me, escape this prison the only way I know how.

But suicide isn’t me at all. Not really. I’m kind of a survivalist by nature. I think I get that from my dad. But I’ve been sentenced to life in prison. First in the Pen until I turn eighteen, which is just a few short months away, and then off to the Max, a maximum security adult prison, which wouldn’t be so bad if I wasn’t absolutely sure the food won’t be any better than that of the dump I’m in now.

Yeah, things in my life are looking pretty bleak. I feel…I feel lost. And alone. More alone than I’ve ever felt, which is a hard thing for me to admit. You’d think that staying six months in one place would be plenty of time to make some friends, but I can’t seem to. Other teenagers in the Pen manage to make friends—some even seem to like each other—but I pretty much keep to myself. I’m not sure if it’s a choice or not, but I certainly don’t make an effort to meet anyone. And I guess my stay-away-from-me-or-get-a-knee-in-the-groin vibe is strong enough that no one feels like trying to make friends with me either.

For six months my heart has withered away, slowly shriveling up and eventually dying, until I can’t feel anything. I mean, if someone pinches me it will hurt, but I probably won’t react. I find that the less emotion I put into life, the less the past seems to hurt. I can’t forget what happened, but I can try to not remember it. A subtle difference, I suppose. So I let each day slip by in a hazy routine; one where I sleep on my hard bed, eat the crap food they feed us, and perform the remedial tasks assigned to me, all the while generally avoiding raising my chin high enough to see anyone who I might one day call my friend.

Today I do look up. Grudgingly, maybe, but I do. First, when the bell tolls in my head. Then again when all the noise begins. After all, the racket is disturbing me. I am busy wallowing in self-pity, which I prefer to do in silence. The parade passes the Pen, just outside the fence, so close, making all kinds of noise, people cheering, drums thumping, dogs barking.