by Andi Feron
“That’s what I can’t figure out, sir. I’ve run the program five times with the same results, and she’s off the charts. It looks like someone changed her assignment, but this shows the system is working. These final checks are to catch any errors.”
The man covered his mouth, making it hard to tell if he said anything further.
The woman continued, “If we put her in the cap…she will show at a record level. At…in theory.”
I missed a couple of words, but they were easy enough to guess. I grew even more cautious as I worried about whatever they were about to put me into. If Talon was the one who put me in a different group, then wherever I should be was probably somewhere I should avoid.
“Holding cell,” the man said.
Both disappeared from the room, and two soldiers entered my side of the glass. One grabbed me by the arm and yanked me down another long hallway through a couple of rooms until we reached what looked like a cell block. About fifteen cells lined both sides of the hall, with glass holding the enclosures rather than bars.
The guard put in a series of numbers on the panel, the glass lifted, and he pushed me in. A steel bench leaned against the wall with an inch thick orange cushion across it, and a pillow and blanket were placed at the end. A small toilet and sink were to the left. I started to demand my lawyer, but the guards laughed and closed the glass.
I tried to remove the toilet so I could slam it into the glass. I tried the sink and even the bed, but they were all welded tightly. I turned my attention to the sink handles, then I beat on the glass even with the realization that it was thick enough to be bulletproof.
I gave up and sat on the bed as the lights went dark. A loud voice through a ceiling intercom instructed me to sleep. I pulled the scratchy blanket over my face and laid facing the wall. Lumps comprised the pillow, and the cushion on the bed had been placed merely for show rather than comfort. Exhaustion consumed me, but sleep didn’t come, only tears.
Chapter Five
John-October 24, 2012
The last point I saw Allie was right before I was placed under ultraviolet lights. I was scanned in a lab, and now I was waiting in a holding cell. An intercom told me to get some sleep, but the firmness of steel is rough on the back. I needed to see Allie, even if we couldn’t touch or speak. I had to find a way to get out of here, but I needed to play it smart. I would learn the routine and formulate a plan.
I began to calculate the trajectories of pool balls in my mind. I discovered this to be a task that brought stress relief. I must have drifted off at some point. The sound of a small slot in the glass opening jarred me awake. Soggy scrambled eggs, some kind of slimy kale compilation, water, and a half piece of mushy bread made up the tray pushed into my cell. They couldn’t even splurge for an entire piece.
How appetizing? I thought with a roll of my eyes. I wasn’t hungry enough yet, and I didn’t trust the water. I was skeptical of the food as well, but tap water from an undisclosed location screamed Hepatitis A. Eventually, I would have to drink something, but for now, I would wait it out.
I yelled into the air, “I want answers, and I demand to see Althea Cooper or I starve!”
Guards arrived and removed my tray. As they were leaving, I ran to the glass, hitting it firmly with my fist. I yelled into the glass barrier, demanding that I be allowed to speak to the warden, supervisor, or title of whoever was in charge. The soldiers didn’t so much as flinch as they marched out of the room.
I started keeping track of time by the trays brought in and the days passing by how many times the lights went out. The intercom informed me on day three that if I didn’t drink, I would be hooked to an IV and eventually a feeding tube against my will. I replied to this with a greeting of my middle finger toward the intercom. Making them remove me seemed appealing and strengthened the will behind my hunger strike. On the fourth day, true to their word, I was dragged out by two guards.
“Take him to sickbay, and when Dr. Monroe clears him, take him to the camp,” a guard said.
“Yes, sir!” the soldiers responded in unison.
I was taken to what looked like an ER. Medical equipment sat around twenty beds with curtains that could be pulled around each space for privacy. Three people, wearing scrubs, sat behind a station in the middle of the room. They were typing into computers and watching several monitors.
Machines beeped loudly, and I failed to comprehend how half the patients were sleeping with all the noise. The smell of alcohol and bleach mixed in the air, bringing back memories of getting my appendix out when I was twelve. A guard strapped me to the bed.
A deep voice questioned the guards. “Is that necessary? I doubt that four days without food or water makes him much of a flight risk. Why you guys waited so long I don’t know. You’re lucky it’s not the morgue he had to be taken to.” He ordered the nurses to start an IV.
The IV was most likely sterile and Hepatitis free. I felt even better when I saw the nurse pull the needle out of a new package. I needed to regain my strength if I was going to find Allie and get out of here. The food strike, or at least refusal of water, probably hadn’t been the wisest idea, but my track record for good judgment was lacking as of late.
A tall black man approached and looked to be in his mid-forties. His white lab coat and stethoscope gave him away as the doctor. His graying hair was cut short to his head, and his beard was neatly trimmed.
He carried a clipboard and looked it over. “Hello, John, I’m Dr. Monroe. We’re going to take good care of you here, get you hydrated. I need you to do me a favor. I need you to drink on your own so we can get you out of here as soon as possible.”
“I need to get back to college, and I need Althea Cooper to go with me.”
“Right now, you need to focus on your health.”
“Why am I here?”
“Because you are refusing to eat and drink.” He continued scanning my chart and wrote something down.
“No, why have you brought us to this place? We were brought here against our will, have been separated and locked in solitary confinement. Requests for lawyers have gone ignored. I know my Miranda rights. I know what false imprisonment is. My uncle is a lawyer.”
Dr. Monroe looked up at me and turned his head slightly. “You weren’t recruited for the program?”
“What program? We were in Lucius’ dorm room then, bam, we were here and have been locked up ever since.”
“I’ll be right back.” Dr. Monroe left the room. At his return, he said, “I’m going to give you a sedative so you can sleep and give the fluids time to work. If you start eating and drinking for me, I’ll see what I can do about having some of those answers for you. We’ll talk in the morning.”
The nurse injected a pink fluid into my IV, and it wasn’t working. I was still wide awake. The next thing I knew, I opened my eyes, and the clock on the wall showed that hours had passed. Dr. Monroe brought me a protein shake. He unstrapped my arms and ignored the protests from the guards that were still posted in my room. I drank the shake since this doctor was the first kind person I’d met since we arrived. He also promised me answers, which is something everyone else ignored.
Later that day, I was taken to a bunk room with beds stacked two high with olive green blankets over the tops of them. The walls were bear with a beige color spread across them. I was pretty sure that our detainment violated human rights laws, but there was nothing that I could do about it at this point.
By the looks of it, I had been forcibly recruited into the military, as I was told to put on a uniform. The uniform, a mix of blue and gray and did not belong to any military branch that I recognized. By the time I showered and dressed, I found the bunkhouse full of about twenty other guys in the same type of uniform. I was assigned a bunk and told to wait for orders.
That first night in the mess hall, it became apparent that everyone else had signed up for this. I decided to use this to my advantage and pretended that I had chosen this as well. I figured that this was th
e best way to find out the details of what everyone was calling “the program”. I hoped that someone would know where Allie was.
Training began in the morning. There seemed to be no access to the outside. All of our running took place on an indoor track. We climbed ropes to build strength, pushed tires, and worked until I felt confident I would collapse. All of this seemed effortless to the others.
Our drill instructor, was named Baylor. We were only to address him as “Baylor, Sir.” He had to be pushing six foot seven. His muscles pushed tightly against his shirt, and I was sure that at the slightest movement his shirt would be shredded.
The days blended together. No one had heard of Allie or seen anyone with her description—the purple eyes would have most likely been remembered. The total training time was supposed to last twelve weeks, then everyone was talking about the big event at the end.
Capsulization was a big word for something that everyone was working for, some type of reward for completing this round of training. There was no shore leave, and no one seemed to want there to be. I was already seen as the weakest link among the guys. During the day, my lack of speed would earn us laps, my inability to swiftly climb and toss myself over a twenty-foot wall would leave us with pushups. I was mocked at night and even kicked and shoved, but I kept going. Finding Allie and getting us home safe drove me to push myself beyond when my sore muscles told me to quit.
Six weeks in they began weapons training. I had played paintball during the summer and even made it to state with my team one year. I applied the concept to this portion of training. It came as a complete shock to me that I excelled at weapons training. I hit nearly every target.
All the times my dad had complained about shelling out money to help me develop the useless skill of paintball mastery had been stomped on. I was also defeating the sims in record time. The shock seemed to be felt by the others too, and they began to lighten up on sending punishments my way. Baylor also seemed shocked by my talent increase.
“I had been convinced you were a sack of shit the minute I laid eyes on you, Trammel, but it seems your worthless worm of a self is redeemable when it comes to hand-eye coordination. I’ve unexpectedly decided you will lead an ops team in the final mission before capsulization. It’s a good old game of capture the flag. With one mistake, you can get your men killed.”
Capture the flag was always the final game for the paintball championships I participated in. This would be the final test to see if we were worthy enough for the gloriously sought after capsulization. We were divided into four teams with around twenty members each. The teams were divided by colors: red, yellow, blue, and green. Baylor assigned me the red team.
The rifles they gave us were the sweetest guns I’d ever seen. They looked like a futuristic sniper rifle with rounded edges and painted two shades of blue swirling in and out of each other. There was a scope on top with an artificial brain that would make my aim more accurate. These guns were different from the ones that we had been using as target practice; obviously, this was because those were real guns.
My fingers ran across the cool metal, and I guessed that there must be some type of system to show who was hit and where. We were assigned our base and were taken to a massive indoor course with real trees and foliage. Each team had its own small two-story fort with a colored flag on top.
I began assigning posts, “Jameson and Skip, you’re on defense. You guard the flag with your life.”
“Sir! Yes, sir,” they said in unison.
I broke the rest into recon teams. One man was in charge of each of the three groups that would get the flags.
I gave a glory speech, “We have poured ourselves into these twelve weeks of training and are now nearing the end. We will take down the enemy, capture their flags and declare ourselves the victors! In our victory we shall reap the reward of capsulization!!” Cheers erupted across the room. I was clueless as to what they were carrying on about, but it poured motivation into their hearts.
I took Tucker, Jake, Levi, Simp, and Gonzales with me. For the last few weeks, they were closest to me in the bunk room, so I knew them well. The other team would most likely be expecting us from the front or sides. The back of the blue team’s base ran against a narrow fence, and our backpacks wouldn’t fit on our backs with enough room to maneuver past it. We ran the perimeter until we could see the blue base to the right. We started toward the bottom using the brush for cover.
We made it ten feet farther, and I motioned everyone to their feet. My men followed me. Gonzales’ eerie scream broke the silence, and we watched him dropping on the floor in one swift movement. His eyes bulged, and a large pool of blood formed around his head. His forehead caved inward, and the edges of the wound were charred. Terrified, I glanced down at the weapons they had given us.
Survival mode kicked in, and I ushered the men I had left under the stairs. Rasp, the killer of Gonzales, cornered us. Tucker fired, striking him in the chest. Rasp collapsed on the ground, and Tucker blasted him in the head, killing him instantly. Nothing made any sense. Rasp was our friend, and we killed him over a game.
Tucker glared at me as if to say that he knew the screw up couldn’t handle leadership. I regained my composure. The stakes were raised, and I became more focused on getting my men out alive. I recalled a move that my paintball team had done the year we won state. I directed the men to put their backpacks down so we could squeeze along the fence line.
I grabbed my rope and anchored it to the roof. We began climbing up the side, careful to avoid the windows and keep our boots as quiet as possible. We would carry our assault from above. We scaled down and climbed into the open windows. We were behind the flag, and both guards were facing away. I blunted the guard on the right with my rifle and Levi did the same to the other. The first guard started to stir.
Tucker pointed his gun at the guard’s head. “Remain still, or your brain matter will make the wallpaper for your fort!”
I grabbed the flag and directed my men out the door.
“What about them?” Tucker pointed to our blue opponents on the ground.
“Grab their guns and let’s go,” I said.
“You kidding me, man?! Let’s end them.”
“You have your orders.”
“I should shoot you, and no one will know the better of it.” Tucker blunted the stirring opponent with his rifle then pointed his gun at me.
“What’s going on, Tuck?” Jake looked confused at Tucker’s betrayal.
“I think we’re starting a mutiny,” Tucker said.
I heard a click from Tucker’s rifle and knew all that was left was for him to fire. I wouldn’t be making it to the end to save Allie. Simp snuck up from behind and blunted Tucker onto the ground. Tucker’s rifle fired, but his sudden drop changed the trajectory, missing my head by at least a foot. A large hole burned into the wood wall of the fort.
Getting back to base proved easier. Much of the carnage was complete, and I tried to avoid glancing at the bodies strewn about. Anytime I accidentally spotted one I had to fight the urge to vomit. Violence always seemed senseless to me, except if I needed to protect Allie. I would fight with everything I had to keep her safe.
But this violence had no purpose. Training us to kill by forcing us to murder our comrades was abhorrent. We arrived back to find Skip dead and Jameson still guarding our flag. Our squad against the yellow team stumbled in with three members left and the yellow flag in hand. That left our green recon.
I was starting to assemble a search team when the alarm sounded. We were all lined up. The scores—as if this had been a high school football match—displayed across the board and revealed twenty casualties. Each of the teams’ stats flashed, and my team was declared the winner since we had captured the most flags and kept our own.
Baylor called the four leaders into his office. He had something to yell at each one of us for. He got to me last. “You a pansy ass or what, Trammel?!”
“Sir, no, sir!” I answered.
This entire thing was a joke. All the others knew the stakes, but they had thrown me in unprepared. I found sleep nearly immediately but hardly got to enjoy it as Baylor demanded us on our feet. I jumped up, no longer hesitant. They had made an unexpected soldier out of me.
Baylor began a speech. “Tomorrow you will undergo the capsulization process. Your minds will never be the same. You will be moved to the category of whatever new skill you possess. Once grouped, you will be placed in smaller categories based on the strength of those new skills. You will rank zero to seven. If you gain a zero, you will most likely be put in group purple and sent home or given a desk job.
“You will then be assigned your stations. No station is too low in this war. We need you all to rid the universe of the vile Khalbytians. They are bringing an end to the Loctorians, and they will bring an end to humanity if allowed to fester in this galaxy.”
Baylor’s words were that of a ranting nutjob. I had to find Allie before these psychos did more damage. Fear ripped through me. What if Allie had been sent into a war game? What if she was already gone? She never really enjoyed paintball, and I couldn’t see her squashing an ant, let alone another human. Sleep no longer came easily. Whatever was going on tomorrow was not something I wanted to participate in. The others were feeling the opposite, and I could tell that excitement was spilling over; excitement after we killed our field mates.
Time slugged by on the large clock on the wall in front of my bunk. I finally dozed. Five a.m., we were awoken and directed to the mess hall. I couldn’t complain about the breakfast; it was the best since I arrived. Bacon, scrambled eggs, breakfast potatoes, orange juice, and milk were all set out in buffet fashion. A woman in a red skirt and navy blue shirt stood on the balcony above the mess hall.