Renegade, page 12
“You,” I scream. “You are the reason that millions of children have died. You developed the virus that killed them!” I sob hard, my body trying to claw its way out of the leather restraints.
“I did it for us,” she screams back, almost unrecognizable now. “I did it so you would be alive. So Jack and Sarah would be alive! My only request was that you all be brought here, safe from the virus, safe from the explosions. And here you are, safe!”
My brain frantically runs through the last two weeks, putting pieces together, everything connected, everything making sense now. The explosions on our train and the posters all over the city with Jack and me plastered on them. They made it look like we were the ones responsible so they could bring us back here. The extra officers looking for us on every train, her call urging us all to come in tonight. She was going to talk us into staying. They had been searching for us this entire time, tracking us, trying to get us here.
“You were trying to keep us alive?” I ask, tears streaming down my face. “They almost killed me so many times. My train was bombed, I was chased, shot at, starved, and almost raped and murdered trying to get to you.” My body is tired of fighting. I let my head fall against the metal back of the chair, my tears flowing freely down my cheeks and neck.
“Anne, you have to understand,” she begs, “I didn’t want this. I didn’t have a choice. You aren’t dead, your siblings aren’t dead. That is all I could ask for. We just have to bring them here, and we can all finally be safe like they promised.” Her red face fills with false hope, breaking my heart.
“And what, Mom? Live here forever? Trapped in this prison?” I motion to my restrained wrists. “We aren’t free here. We never will be. They will just use us to blackmail you into killing billions of people for the rest of our lives.”
My mother starts to cry again. “What other option do I have, Anne? I can’t let them kill you. I can’t live in here worrying about whether or not you are dead. Yes, I wish they were different, but because of them, my children are alive! I just have to follow their rules, and they won’t hurt you!”
My heart aches, and I slam my head back against the metal hard, filled with frustration. “They won’t hurt us? Look at me, Mom! Look at Sarah! She’s already dead, Mom. Sarah is gone!”
My mother’s face grows stony, her body shaking. “No,” she insists. “No, Sarah is hiding with Jack. They promised. They promised she would be safe. They promised they wouldn’t bomb her town.”
I slam my head again and again into the back of my chair, my face hot from tears and anger. “Sarah killed herself!” I scream. “She killed her daughters—your granddaughters—and then killed herself because your virus infected her babies.” I am ravenous now, thrashing against the chair, my eyes wild. “I held her as she died. I watched my sister die because of you!”
My mother crumples to the floor, her body convulsing as she sobs. “No, no. My baby!” she screams to herself over and over as she lies there. This whole time, I thought all these attacks were from terrorists, people outside the country using our own weapons against us. No, the government forced my mother into creating the viruses that killed billions of people in the rest of the world. The viruses they used on their own people, the one that is killing off an entire generation of their citizens. The one that was released with every bomb that landed in their own towns and cities, the one that made me lose my sister and nieces.
“Anne, I tried to be done. I tried to stop after the first one, but I couldn’t. They were going to kill my son. I had to make a trade. Anne, there are more. Dozens more.” I can feel my eyes go wide, my heartrate picking up as everything sinks in. Jack. She traded herself for Jack to come home from his assignment alive. This isn’t the only virus, and they will continue to blackmail her into creating more as long as me and the rest of my family is still alive. The only way to stop it is for everyone I love to die—for me to die.
“Why?” I scream at her. “Why would they do this to their own people? To their own children?”
She slowly pulls herself onto all fours, barely able to lift her head to look at me, her face twisted and hard behind her tears. Her puffy, blood-shot eyes lock with mine. “What better way to break people, than to take their children from them? What better way to maintain control, to ensure obedience, than to tear everything they would fight for right out of their arms?”
My mind shuts off, letting the rage take control of my every thought, every move. I can feel myself falling deeper and deeper into insanity, no longer aware of my surroundings, and unable to think or to breathe. I feel like I am no longer a part of my body. I know my body is moving, but I can’t feel it anymore. I can’t feel anything but the rage flowing through my veins, circulating every inch of my body, and flowing back into my heart only to be pumped back through me again. My mind flashes with images, memories of the past engraved into the darkness when I close my eyes, forever a part of me.
I see the little boy, running to his dead mother’s body on the train. I see his face, twisted in an agony no child should know, tears streaming down his tiny cheeks and falling onto her dark hair as he buries his face in it, clinging to her still-warm body. I see the half-charred off faces staring up at me, screaming in pain, their bodies convulsing in their death thralls. I can feel their burned hands reach out to grab my legs as I crawl over what is left of their bodies, begging me to come back, to take them with me, to help them escape their last agonizing moments in that fiery hell. I see the face of the young mother, desperately trying not to let her dying son see her terror, begging me to help him, to give her some ounce of hope that she wouldn’t lose her only child.
I see the piles of tiny, blistered bodies, half-dead children stacked on top of each other, calling out for their parents to hold them close one last time, crying for their dead mothers, afraid to die there alone, in a sea of strangers. I see the terror in the little girl’s eyes as I held her, her face disfigured so badly from the blisters that she was unrecognizable to even her own parents, if they were even still alive. I see my nieces through the car window, lying dead, buckled into their seats, their skin already covered with pus-filled pockets, their lips swollen and blue. I see Sarah, lying in my arms, watch as she promises her children that she is coming for them, tears rolling down her cheeks. Watch her take her last breath, feel her body fall limp against me.
Suddenly I am snapped back into reality. I am being lifted, carried somewhere. The guards must have come back for me. My mother must have pushed the button again. I thrash against the strong arms holding me, kicking and screaming, tearing their flesh away with my nails, biting down on an arm, doing everything I can to escape.
“Anne, it’s okay. I’ve got you.” The voice brings me back down to my body with one thought. Ben.
When he sees me stop fighting, he lets go of me, and I turn and crash my body into his, his strong arms wrapping around me. I shake uncontrollably in his arms, sobbing into his chest. He slowly lifts my chin to look at him, brushing my hair, matted to my face with my tears, out of my eyes.
“Look at me—just breathe okay?” he says. I nod as he lets go of my chin, letting me look around.
“Where…where are we?” I ask, surrounded by darkness.
“We are getting you out of here,” he says as he turns toward wherever we are going. We must be somewhere in the building’s infrastructure.
“No,” I say, planting my feet and shaking my head. “Not without Ashlynn.”
He turns back to me patiently, speaking softly. “Anne, we don’t have any more time. We are being hunted as we speak. Maybe we can come back for her.”
No, I know he is lying. There is no way we will be able to get back into this building. Now that we know that the government was really behind all the “terrorist attacks,” that they created the virus and hold the antidote, we will be lucky to survive the night. “No, I can’t leave her. I’m not stupid, Ben. I know there is no going back. It has to be now.”
His eyes are filled with pain. He doesn’t want to have to make me leave her. He starts walking toward me fast. I also know that there is no way he is going to let me go get killed. “Ben, no! Please, Ben, don’t make me leave her!” I cry, stumbling back away from him.
He shakes his head, and I can see the conflict in his face as he bites down on his lip. “I’m sorry, Anne. I’m so sorry.”
I stumble backward, my body wild with the fear of what he is about to make me do. I’m too slow. His strong arms wrap around me, dragging me farther and farther from Ashlynn. I scream and try to push against him, thrashing desperately to free myself from his grip. “Ben, please! Please, Ben, I need her,” I scream through my sobs. “Please, don’t do this to me!”
He just stays silent as he pulls me away, pinning my arms down underneath his to keep me from hurting him. I scream and scream Ashlynn’s name, sobbing and thrashing. I can feel her slipping away. She is so close to me, she could be in the next room over and she will never know that I came for her, that I tried. She will never be safe, always a tool to blackmail my mother, her life always in the balance. I came so close, I can’t stop now. I got away from Ben once, and I can do it again. I have to get to her. I have to save her.
I quickly jerk my body to the side of Ben’s, giving my good fist room to pound down behind me on his groin. His grip on me loosens for a second as he yells out in pain. A second is all I need to slip out from between his arms. I feel the cool air against my free skin for only a moment before he comes crashing down on top of me again. I am pinned on the floor, his body on top of mine chest to chest. One of his hands pins my arms above my thrashing head. He uses the other to reach down into the pocket of his black uniform pants and pulls out a white cloth that reeks of chemicals.
My eyes go wide as a realize what he is about to do. “No, Ben, please. Please don’t do this!” I beg. “I can’t lose them both.” I sob, willing him to understand.
There’s a moment of hesitation in his face. Maybe he is going to let me go. Maybe he’ll help me get her. “I’m sorry, Anne,” he says, his expression hardening again. He presses the cloth against my face, covering my mouth and nose firmly. I whip my head around violently, trying to get away from him, but it is no use. He is too strong. I hold my breath for as long as I can before my lungs feel like they are about to burst from the pain, forcing me to breathe.
I scream against the white cloth for as long as I can before my vision starts to cloud, my body relax under his. My head finally holds still, and all I can focus on are Ben’s green eyes. It almost looks as if he is tearing up, or maybe it is just the blurry patches floating across my vision. I focus on them until my own eyes start to close, surrendering to the darkness. I’m so tired. I force my eyes half open again—I have to get to Ashlynn. She needs me. Ashlynn. Ashlynn needs me. I keep saying it over and over to myself, trying to convince my body to keep fighting, but it refuses to struggle against the drugs anymore. The darkness takes over, drowning my mind in a numbing depth of nothingness.
Chapter Seventeen
Jack’s hands fumble with his identification papers as we sit on the train. I can tell he’s nervous, but I don’t know what to say to help. I was never as good with words as Sarah. Instead, I just intertwine my hand with his to stop him from tearing up his documents. Even though we’re both all grown up, my hand still feels as small as ever in his.
“You’re going to be great,” I whisper, attempting to reassure him.
If anyone was meant for an assignment, it’s Jack. The train starts to slow down, and I know this is where we say goodbye. The next time I see my brother, he’ll know what he’s supposed to do with his life.
“Good luck,” I say as he stands. He gives my hand one last squeeze before he lets go and heads off to meet the people who hold the rest of his life in their hands. He takes a deep breath and steps past me, smiling and giving me a little wave before he steps off the train to leave me to get to the hospital for my career training.
I can barely focus on anything my whole shift. My brain churns, my hands dart restlessly over my work, and my charts get more and more sloppy as the hours drag on. When I finally get home later that day, I stand at the window for what feels like hours before I see him coming down the dirt road and run out to meet him. I run into him, his arms squeezing me tight. When he lets me go his eyes are bright, and he smiles wide, holding a letter out in front of himself.
He starts reading it aloud, taking my hand in his and spinning me around. “You have been assigned to serve your government overseas. You are assigned to service for the next ten years at a military base on the outside. You are lucky to have the opportunity to serve your government. You will do much good for people not only in your own country, but for the people outside our country. For the ignorant, the unruly, for those who suffer due to lack of rules, due to lack of understanding, for those who are not safe.” He dips me, giggling, and then spins me back away from him, waving his letter in front of me again. “I told you, Anne. I told you I’d do it one day.”
The next month flies by. It feels like all I did was blink and suddenly we are standing at the train platform again, but this time he wears his soldier’s uniform. I stand by and watch as my siblings embrace, Jack can barely get his arms around Sarah’s pregnant belly anymore, but that doesn’t stop either of them.
“You’re going to be an amazing mother,” he whispers as tears fall from Sarah’s eyes.
“I know that somehow there are people out there who need you more than I do right now,” she says, holding him tighter, “but I don’t know how I’m going to live without you.”
I wait for them to separate before I take my turn. I run into him, almost knocking him over. “I love you,” I whisper, never wanting to let go.
“Don’t cry, Anne,” he says, squeezing me. “I’ll be back before you know it.”
“Promise?” I ask, looking up into his face as I hold out a pinky.
“I promise.” He laughs, intertwining his own pinky with mine. He stands again, turning to face my mother. But she isn’t there. “If Mom comes back before I do, tell her I love her and that I’ll miss her. Tell her I’m sorry we didn’t get a real goodbye. Tell her thank you…for everything,” he says, fighting to keep his tears in as he takes us all in one last time.
✽✽✽
My eyes open slowly, adjusting to the light in the room. I try to sit up, but my arms are caught by metal handcuffs tying me to the bed railing. What is going on? Where am I? Suddenly it all comes rushing back—the phone call, solitary confinement with Ben, the man with the scar-covered face, my mother, Ben holding the cloth to my face.
Panic rushes through me. “Ashlynn!” I scream, pulling desperately against the metal restraints holding me to the bed. That’s when I see Ben on the bed across from me. His face is stony, resting in his hands as he watches me. His eyes look glassed over as if his mind is somewhere far away, his usual boyish grin wiped from his face.
“You’re up,” he says, refusing to look me in the eye.
I stop fighting against the handcuffs, distracted by his coldness. I notice his arms are covered in cuts and scratches. “Did I do that to you?” I ask, a pit forming in my stomach.
He nods in response. “And you did that to yourself too.” He motions to my wrists. They have been wrapped with bandages but I can see the blood starting to soak through. I must have really been going crazy in my mother’s lab. I didn’t even feel myself tearing the skin from my bones as I thrashed against the leather straps.
“I’m so sorry, Ben,” I say, starting to tear up. “For everything.”
He looks down at the ground between his feet and stands up, starting to pace back and forth across the room. “Sorry doesn’t fix everything, Anne,” he says, shaking his head. “You used me, you manipulated me, and then knocked me out when I was vulnerable. You fought me when I came to save you, you stabbed one of your own…”
I sit up as far as I can on the bed, cutting him off. “I didn’t stab anyone!” I protest, shocked that he would accuse me of such a thing.
“Oh yeah?” he asks, throwing his hands above his head. “Then how did Lee get a knife shoved through his arm? How did you think we found you, Anne? Jack heard him screaming and found him there. We already know that he tried to stop you, and you stabbed him to escape.”
It feels like my heart has collapsed into my lungs, forcing the oxygen from them. Lee—he must be the man with the scars from last night. “Ben,” I say, my face solemn, “you don’t understand, I—” My face falls, the more time I have to think about it, the scarier it feels. “He tried to kill me!”
Ben’s head whips around, and he starts to quickly walk toward me. “How am I supposed to believe you, Anne?” he demands. “Lee has stood by us for years. You are the one who is running around trying to get yourself and everyone else killed!”
“How could you think that I would just stab someone? I was trying to do the right thing!” I scream back at him.
“There is a difference between the right thing and the selfish thing. You disobeyed Jack, you used and attacked me, and you obviously attacked Lee. You are willing to do whatever it takes to get Ashlynn back, no matter who you have to go through. I could have died, Anne. Who knows what could have happened when you slammed my head into the wall. How did you know I would just go unconscious? Let alone what could have happened when I came after you last night.” He shakes his head, turning away from me. “I’ve asked to be relieved from babysitting you. Since Lee can’t do his usual job, he’ll be taking over from here.”
My eyes widen as I strain my neck to see the scar-covered man walk into the room, his repulsive mouth curled into a twisted smile. His arm is bandaged and held close to his body in a sling. No, this can’t be happening. He won’t really leave me here with him. Ben turns and starts to walk past my new guard.
“Ben!” I cry out. “Ben, please don’t leave me! Please, Ben, please come back!” He doesn’t even look back at me. He just keeps walking toward the door. I pull against the handcuffs, willing my aching body forward. “Ben!” Tears stream from my eyes, my body wild with adrenalin and fear. “Ben, I need you!” For a second his feet hesitate, shuffling back and forth. He remembers those words. His words. He won’t leave me.
