Downsiders

In the dark, Railborn finds Gutta, who’s wet with blood. After a savage cry, Railborn emerges from the rubble, throwing stones and bricks at the terrified Topside workers, who flee. Railborn retrieves Gutta and, since her injury is beyond the healers (a stone has pierced her stomach), he takes her to a Topside hospital. As he watches her lying in the hospital bed, he thinks of a fairytale: She needs a kiss from a Most-Beloved to wake up. Yet Railborn doesn’t kiss her. Though she’s unconscious, she still might slap him.

A social worker says Gutta is stable, and Railborn visits her. Gutta tells Railborn to take off his bloody clothes. Naked, he recites a pledge, vowing never to visit the Downside again.

After Talon reads the documents Lindsay gave him, he feels his soul drop. He persuades the guard to let him out, then asks the guards in charge of the Place of First Runes to let him inside. They tell him that only a Most-Beloved can pass, which means that if Talon enters he will become Most-Beloved. He realizes this is his destiny and enters. Unlike Railborn, he never wanted “greatness,” and that’s why the position suits him better.

The Place of First Runes is lower than the homes of the Advisors, and it’s lower than the Bot. The walls are plastered with graffiti, carved words, and Topside years. There are also 39 graves, and the grave of Alfred Ely Beach stands out to him. Talon screams about the pride and nobility of Downsiders. He also hears a voice calling Downsiders “nothing.” Talon has an epiphany: If the Downside must be destroyed, Downsiders will destroy it themselves.

The narrator observes that most societies and individuals possess “nasty skeletons.” The Aztecs practiced “human sacrifice,” and Elvis Presley wore gaudy clothes during the 1970s, but societies and people have “the right” to move beyond their blunders.

The Downsiders don’t want to blunder, but they’re “desperate.” Talon’s plan is “trial by fire” (214). Tappers fill the High-Perimeter tunnel with natural gas and oxygen as Pidge’s battery-operated puppy—its feet covered in matchbook friction strips—saunters into a labyrinth of matches. Downsiders amass in the Floodgate Concourse, and the tappers shut hatches and doors to the High Perimeter, but the fire might blow them open.

Lying in bed, Lindsay debates her actions. Maybe, she thinks, telling Talon the truth was harmful. There were other truths: Downsiders had passion and purity. She goes downstairs, where Todd is snoring, and Mark is eating chocolate bars. The city needs someone to blame, and Mark is responsible for the project, so they want him to resign.

Lindsay wants to share something with her dad, so she shows him the box her mom put together for him. The box contains champagne glass from their wedding day, a pink baby bootie, and old housekeys. She picks up the bootie and gives it to her dad. After he stares at it, he smiles and signs the resignation letter.

As Topside city workers destroy the Downside barricades, they smell gas and notice rats running away from the foul air. The workers run when they hear a set of explosions. Lindsay’s walls shake, and her drains gurgle. On the way to her violin lesson, Becky feels the ground shudder and spots trucks and heavy objects soaring through the air as if they were toys.

Becky is standing on a sewer hole cover when they start to blow. Certain that the “Powers-That-Be” are punishing her for incessantly talking, Becky assumes a sewer hole cover will hit her head (222). None do, but old subway tokens fall out of the sky and hit her.

After the Aqueduct Shaft explodes, the utilities come back, and Topsiders, “bloated” on water, electricity, gas, and the sound of their voices, halt the war. A rumor claims Mark discovered vulnerabilities in New York’s utility structure. If the city didn’t give him money, he’d exploit the city’s fragilities. A dump truck full of ransom money fell into the hole—the bags of cash were full of subway tokens. A secret military mission destroyed the Shaft and Mark’s blackmail. The underground society was another one of Mark’s tricks. The false stories amuse Mark but frighten Todd’s mom, who, much to Lindsay’s delight, sends him to a military academy.

Lindsay tries to reenter the Downside through the library, but security prevents her. However, books keep disappearing from the library’s main branch. A unique sock replaces them.

Half of the Downside is gone, but half remains. Talon is the Most-Beloved, so he doesn’t have to do much. A thicker curtain divides his space from his parents’ area, and his mom admits she wanted to read the papers he keeps in his pillow, but she didn’t. She says he is becoming a “stranger,” but Talon asks her to “know” him for a little longer.

Talon visits the Place of First Runes and talks to Beach’s grave. He says Downsiders had to conceal Beach and concoct a history to thrive. Someday, Downsiders will know the truth. For now, Talon will keep the real history a secret. Leaving the Place of First Runes, Talon orders the guards to turn the fire on and not let anyone enter it again for a long time.

Topside, Railborn and Gutta become Raymond and Greta, and they stay at the John Alden Dix Home for teens without parents. Railborn excels at gleaning information from the internet, and Gutta is a first-rate conflict mediator.

In the spring, the wind blows Lindsay’s hair, and Becky thinks she looks like Albert Einstein. Crossing Third Avenue, Lindsay hears someone say her name, so she stops in the middle of the street and inspects a sewer hole cover. Becky warns her about the changing traffic light, and a cab swerves around them. Lindsay bids Becky farewell and climbs into the sewer hole.

Waiting for Lindsay is Talon. She tells Talon she and her dad had to move to a smaller space, but he just got a job to design a waterpark. Todd’s mother sent him to military school to get him away from his supposedly devious stepdad. As for Champ, neither Talon nor Lindsay can locate him.

Talon leads Lindsay up several ladders and flights of stairs till they’re on top of an old skyscraper. He explains that many Downsiders have been displaced by the fire, so they will now live above Topsiders in abandoned skyscrapers, as well as below, in the Downside. They won’t hide from Topsiders forever, but before they show themselves, they must learn everything the Topsiders know. Lindsay realizes Talon needs to be “left alone,” but Talon, quoting his grandma, says twisty paths cross again. He admires the sky, and Lindsay wonders if the Downsiders will change their name. Lindsay suggests Highsiders, and Talon wonders if there are Skysiders.