The Command Center’s name is much more impressive than its actual purpose. It sounds like it should be akin to a war room, with hi-tech monitors, and holographic maps, and all the bells and whistles. In reality, it looks more like an under-decorated study.

One big circular table sits in the middle of the room, surrounded by six worn-out executive chairs. A television screen is mounted on the wall opposite the door, and there’s a little wireless switch that allows you to connect a tablet screen to the TV and give presentations. But besides that, the only other feature of the room that isn’t standard is a whiteboard that takes up an entire wall and three milk crates full to the brim with extra dry-erase markers.

Dad used to say that the room was less of a command center, and more of an office conference space. When Dad told me that, I laughed. Not because I had any idea of what an office conference space was supposed to look like, but because he just seemed so proud of the joke.

Lavish already has his tablet connected to the TV by the time I take my seat. It’s got a map loaded up on it of Artip, one of the ten regional district metropolises. Dad says that before it was renamed by the Ruthless, the city’s name used to be Chicago.

“Alright,” Lavish says. “We’ve got about four hours of travel to get to Artip. I suggest we hide the cruiser about two miles out of the city so that we can sneak in unnoticed.”

“Problem,” I raise my hand. “Where are we going to hide a cruiser?”

“Do you think I’d make such a small oversight? I’ve already taken the liberty of doing a terrain scan of the location. There’s a pretty big, abandoned farm nearby where we can hide our vehicle and camp out if need be.”

“Are you sure it’s abandoned?” I ask.

“Absolutely. I also checked for a thermal footprint—no sign of heat movement for over three months. It’s abandoned.”

I scoff. “And here I thought that the Ruthless were out to colonize every piece of land that wasn’t theirs.”

“It’s just a family farm in the middle of nowhere. It looks smaller than the Bunker. The R-Zombs probably figured it would be a waste of time to build over when Artip was right there,” Lavish points out.

“Okay, so we get to the farm. And then what?”

“And then we make our way to Artip on foot. Once we’re in, we begin to infiltrate. I suggest we start somewhere where we can get supplies. Our medicine stores are pretty expired. And then we should try and find a human-run establishment.”

I lean forward in my chair and furrow my brow. “Woah, woah, wait. Why are we doing all of that? Shouldn’t we just look for our parents and then get out?”

Lavish breaks eye contact, opting instead to stare at the TV.

“Lavish,” I press, “What are you not telling me?”

He chews on the inside of his cheek, and it suddenly strikes me how old he looks. He’s got a squared jaw and his eyes are sunken into his skull from a poisonous mixture of exhaustion and stress. I’ve never thought about it before but seeing him now—he looks more like his father than he looks like the kid that I grew up with.

“Rekill,” Lavish begins, his voice low. “The truth is, I don’t think our parents are in Artip.”

“You mean, you think they’re…”

“I don’t think they’re dead,” Lavish says quickly. “But… it’s been ten years. Do you really think they would’ve stayed within a one-hundred-mile radius from where they were stolen after all that time?”

I feel my teeth clench. “So, what the hell are we risking our lives for, then? A few bottles of Tylenol?” I don’t mean to raise my voice, but I can’t help myself. My hope sinks like a stone in the pit of my stomach.

“Rekill!” Lavish snaps. “Don’t you think I’m upset, too? I want to find our parents just as badly as you do.”

I try to hold back the anger that seeps into my vision like a thick red haze. “Then why are we wasting our time with this?”

Lavish sighs deeply, his entire body deflating. “While I was looking through this tablet, I found an encrypted folder titled with your Dad’s name. I was interested, so I had SUSAN code-break it for me. Inside, I found a document… it was the plan, Rekill. Our parents’ plan.”

“Their plan to what?”

The next words out of Lavish’s mouth feel incredibly loud and incredibly soft at the same time: “Their plan to overthrow the Ruthless. For good.”

“Why didn’t you tell me about this?” I ask. “Lavish, I should’ve known if it was something that Dad wrote.”

“I know,” Lavish says. “I’m sorry. But you were already losing sleep working every day and every night on your tech and I knew that if you found this, you’d pour over it for the next decade. Besides, haven’t I always been our ‘plan guy’? I need a job to feel important, too.”

The anger in me subsides as I take a moment to breathe and absorb Lavish’s words. Deep down, I know he’s right. We’ve both got our specialties in making different things work—for me, it’s machines. And for Lavish, it’s plans.

“Okay,” I say. “So, plan guy, what did Dad write about?”

Lavish turns back to the TV, where he pulls up a new file. To me, it looks like a mess of unintelligible garble.

“Your dad was a smart guy,” Lavish says. “He wrote everything in his own code. It took SUSAN nearly five days straight to figure it out.”

“Is that why the entire Bunker AI was acting funny two weeks ago?”

“Sorry.” Lavish shrugs. “In any case, the plan basically outlined a method of overthrowing the R-Zomb using their own tactics. Namely, the hoard. Your dad believed—believes—that there are still humans living underground, like us. And he believes that if we can somehow unionize everyone, we can defeat the R-Zomb by overpowering them in a numbers game.”

“That’s ambitious,” I say.

Lavish nods in agreement. “Extremely.”

To be continued…