Free The Undertakers by Ty Drago Page B

hear her crying.
    â€œNice job, Red,” one of the card players taunted.
    â€œYeah—swift move!” added the other.
    â€œThat’s enough,” said a third voice, and the two of them instantly went quiet.
    I looked back at the doorway.
    Helene was gone. Tom had taken her place.
    He pointed a finger. “Come with me.”

Chapter 12
    The Shrine
    So—word is you tried to bail on us,” Tom said as we walked side by side through the Big Room.
    I grimaced but didn’t see any point in denying it. “I guess so.”
    â€œWell, I don’t blame you.”
    â€œYou don’t?”
    â€œHey, after the day you’ve had?” he said.
    â€œI wanna go home, Tom.”
    â€œWell, we’ll talk about that. But first, why don’t you let me show you ’round a bit more. We’re a pretty amazing operation.”
    I shrugged unhappily. “Okay.”
    Tom grinned as if my answer had sounded a lot more enthusiastic than it was. Then he made a sweeping gesture with his arm, motioning toward all the activity around us. “Know what these kids are doing?”
    I shook my head
    Tom pointed. “Those dudes over there are cutting wood for building materials. We’re trying to break this place down into smaller sections a little bit at a time. It’s a privacy thing. Now, over there—those dudes are upgrading our wiring. We got piles of electronics already, with more getting hooked up all the time. But we keep popping fuses. And those dudes—we call them the Hackers and the Chatters. The Hackers run all our computer jobs, anything from legit stuff to breaking into secure systems. The Chatters—now, they’re the communication pros. They keep us linked with the Undertakers out in the field.”
    â€œAnd all the Undertakers are kids?” I asked.
    Tom nodded.
    â€œBecause they’re the only ones who can See the Corpses?”
    â€œThat sorta is the main qualification for membership.”
    â€œBut my dad could See them.”
    Another nod. “Yeah, but he’s the only adult who ever could. We don’t know why. The rules about Seeing are pretty mysterious, although it looks like it runs in families. If one kid in a family gets the Sight, odds are good that the others’ll get it too, sooner or later. Steve thinks it’s a gene.”
    I knew a little something about heredity from science class. “So you think I inherited the Sight from my dad?”
    â€œIt’s one theory.”
    â€œThen why’d I only start Seeing them today?”
    â€œGirls start Seeing around eleven,” Tom explained. “Boys around twelve. Might have something to do with the start of puberty. Nobody knows for sure—yet. But we’re working on it. The real worry is that the Corpses are working on it too.”
    â€œWhat’s that mean?” I asked.
    Tom smiled thinly. “You think it’s a coincidence that you ran into so many of them this morning? That you bumped into the woman in the Laundromat that Sharyn decapitated? Doesn’t it kind of seem like they’re everywhere around you?”
    I blinked. “I guess so…”
    â€œThe Corpses have been watching you.”
    A chill raced down my spine. “What for?”
    â€œBecause they knew your dad could See them—was, in fact, the only known adult who ever could—and they wanted to know if you’d start Seeing them too. So they set things up to stay close to you, just waiting for today to come along.”
    â€œOh,” I replied. “Then I guess I’m lucky that Helene was there.”
    Tom’s smile widened. “That wasn’t luck either. I sent her there, Will. We knew you’d turned twelve, and we figured that you’d probably get the Sight sometime in the new school year. So Helene went into your school undercover, with orders to keep an eye on you. If you rolled in one day with the Sight, she was