Population: Katie

by Connor, Penelope

  “I’m warning you,” I tell Kyle, once Derek and Erin are well out of earshot.

  “I’m not stopping until you laugh,” Kyle insists.

  I let out a dreamy sigh. “Your brother’s a really good kisser.”

  “What?” Kyle says, clearly caught off guard.

  “Yeah,” I say, letting out another sigh and biting my lip. “He has amazing technique.”

  “I know what you’re trying to do,” Kyle says.

  I ignore him and continue, “He does this thing where he tilts your head to get just the right angle and -”

  “Okay, that’s about enough!” Kyle says, clapping his hand over my mouth. “I’ll stop, I swear.”

  I grin around his hand, which he promptly removes from my personal space. “You play dirty.”

  “So does your brother.”

  “Mercy!” Kyle says. “You win this one, just... stop it.”

  “Okay, I promise, that was the last one,” I say. After a minute of silence, I add, “Why does it bother you so much?”

  Kyle laughs and shrugs. “I don’t know. It always has. Derek practically raised me... you wouldn’t want to picture your dad making out with your best friend, now would you?”

  “I’m your best friend?” I ask, glazing over the primary point of Kyle’s statement, and latching onto the one that I like better.

  “I guess so,” Kyle admits, smiling at me.

  I grab his hand and swing it playfully back and forth as we walk. “I like that.”

  We arrive at the vehicle pileup, and quickly locate the station wagon. I swing open the passenger side door, pull off my backpack, and drop it onto the seat. While the guys spread out to pick over the remaining contents of the cars, I spend the time getting the car ready for travel. I start by grabbing the keys out of the glove compartment to open up the trunk. The fuel cans that I packed are all still upright and full, and surrounded by the few supplies that weren’t needed at the base. I fill the tank, then lock up the trunk and wait inside the station wagon. I stick the keys in the ignition, but don’t dare start it in case there are any Passives nearby that might hear and come to investigate. There’s no way I’ll be able to get the car free by myself if the others have to make a quick escape with the supplies.

  Alone for the moment, I open up my backpack and reach around inside, closing my hand around the lucky rabbit’s foot that Kenny gave me the previous night. I run my thumb along the still soft fur for a minute, and then tie the ornament to the rearview mirror of the car.

  Derek and the others return shortly, packs still looking relatively empty, and I wonder if they actually thought they might find anything here, or if Derek just figured it’d be easier to get me to agree to the help if it seemed like the trip was not just for my benefit.

  There was supposed to be training this morning, but with Derek and Erin here, Glory decided to give everyone a second day of rest.

  It takes no less than twenty minutes for the four of us to get the white car beside me to budge enough that the station wagon can be pushed backwards, and directed towards a clear path back out of the city.

  We can hear Passives groaning eerily in the distance, so the four of us exchange quick, but heartfelt goodbyes. I sit on the hood, watching them fade into the distance, in no particular hurry to be on my way. I’ve just hopped down when I hear my name. I look up to see Kyle jogging back towards me, the first aid kit that Derek had packed the night before in one hand.

  I jog out towards him so that he won’t have to run all of the way to the car, launching into a fierce hug when we meet in the middle.

  “Missing me already?” Kyle asks with a laugh, but I can hear the slightest of cracks in his voice.

  “Yeah,” I admit. “I guess I am.” I pull out of the hug and accept the first aid kit. “You take care of them, okay? No running off like a hero and getting yourself turned into a zombie or anything.”

  Kyle laughs and makes his best zombie impersonation, stalking towards me slowly. “I’d make a really good one.”

  I laugh and back away from him, my hands held up in protest. “Hey now! Don’t come drooling all over me.”

  He groans loudly, stepping closer to me with arms outstretched and an empty look on his face.

  I push him away and we both laugh, the infectious smile that first made me trust Kyle plastered across his face.

  The sound is loud and abrupt, piercing through our laughter. I register the look on Kyle’s face before my brain recognizes the startling sound as a gunshot. He has the oddest of expressions on his face, a mixture of that smile from a moment ago, almost frozen in place, and something else... something like... confusion.

  I follow his gaze down to his stomach, overwhelmed suddenly with the same confusion that I just read on Kyle’s face. “No. Not like this.”

  Kyle’s legs give out from under him and he tumbles forward.

  I try to catch him, but instead get caught up in his gravity, the pair of us ending up sprawled on the ground in an instant. I look up and in the distance I can see Derek charging toward us, but I can’t focus on him. The world around me seems noiseless and blurred, and altogether too bright as I focus on nothing but the boy in front of me.

  I push Kyle over onto his back, kneeling over him, my mind reeling to process what has happened. Kyle clutches at his middle with hands that are covered in blood. It’s dark. Much too dark. I notice that my own hands, holding tightly to his shirt, are now covered in the stuff as well. I don’t know what to say. I don’t know what to do.

  “Not so bad,” Kyle says in a voice that’s so soft that it’s almost not his own. He pats my hand, coating it even more thoroughly in the dark liquid. “I can barely feel a thing.” All traces of the smile are gone now, and the confusion is slowly melting into misplaced certainty.

  My breath catches in my throat, escaping in a strangled sob.

  Somewhere in the distance, I’m vaguely aware of a large, angular figure tackling Derek to the ground. Another figure rushes in to help the first, but Derek’s putting up a good fight.

  “Katie -”

  “I’m here,” I tell Kyle.

  “Katie,” he starts again, and somehow, the smile’s back again. “This goodbye is getting out of hand.”

  I am overwhelmed by the absurdity of the statement. Another limb joke... now? Before I can stop it, a coughing laugh escapes me.

  Kyle smiles. He doesn’t say anything, but I can tell that he considers this a victory.

  He coughs suddenly, tiny droplets of blood spattering onto his lips and chin. I wipe them away with the side of my arm.

  “Katie…” the smile’s fading again, “… I can’t... feel my toes.”

  I choke back a sob and grab hold of each of Kyle’s hands, holding them tightly in my own. “It’s okay,” I lie. “It’s gonna be okay.”

  Kyle squeezes my right hand with his left in a short, distinct pattern; the same one that Derek showed me the day he asked me to join his team. I return the pattern. Kyle smiles and closes his eyes as we go round and round like that, squeezing assurances and empty promises into each other’s hands. His responses slow until, finally, his hands relax and slip out of mine, landing lightly on his chest.

  It’s then that the soldiers reach us, shouting to each other, or maybe to me. I grab hold of Kyle, and cry for them to go, but they aren’t listening to me any more than I’m listening to them.

  One man grabs my shoulders to pull me back, so I try and elbow him in the side, but another grabs my arm before I make contact.

  “Get off!” I shout as the soldier pulls my arm back while the other grabs my waist, trying to pull me up to my feet. I wrestle free and grab hold of Kyle. “Don’t touch him! Get off me!”

  The soldiers have to pry my hands loose, my fingers clutching to Kyle’s arm and shirt as I fight against them, desperate to stay at his side. I thrash and kick as another soldier arrives, grabbing at my legs, while the other drags me towards the large armored truck that they appear to have a
rrived with.

  A fourth soldier walks past us, holding a sleek, black, army issue gun with a large clip stuck out in front of the trigger. He walks over to Kyle, and at once I know why they attacked us.

  “He’s not infected!” I shout at the soldier with the gun. “He’s not infected! Let me go!”

  But none of them respond. I struggle violently as the three soldiers lift me into the air, turning me away from Kyle and the soldier with the gun. I try to think back to my training classes, to anything that might help me break free of these men, but nothing comes to mind. Nothing I’m not already trying.

  “You can’t!” I cry out, hoping that the gun-toting man can hear me; that he’ll listen. “You can’t!”

  But he can, and he does.

  The shot goes off and I stop struggling. I stop thinking, and for an instant, I stop breathing.

  The only sound in the air is a terrible metal thudding that emanates from the inside of a nearby armored truck. They shove me forcibly in the back, and I collide with whoever’s making all the racket, both of us falling to the floor. The doors slam shut with the ear splitting clang of metal on metal, and I hear the lock slip shut on the outside.

  It’s pitch black in the truck, save for a narrow strip of light coming from the crack between the doors. Someone’s pulling me up into a seated position and asking me if I’m okay, but I shove away from them and back myself into the corner, holding my arms up over my face defensively.

  The truck starts up with a loud rumbling noise, and then we’re off to destinations unknown. I think of the green station wagon growing farther and farther away, and I wish that I’d just gotten in and driven away when I had the chance.

  Chapter 17 – Clean and Caged

  It doesn’t take long to realize that the other person in the back of the truck with me is Derek. While I sit curled up in the back corner with my hands squeezed over my ears, Derek shouts and pounds his fists against the solid door in a maniacal attempt to free us.

  In the near dark of the truck, he isn’t much more than a shadowy figure, periodically blocking out what little light we have as he moves back and forth, as though a fist to just the right part of the door might cause it to reopen. After a few minutes of this, he changes tactic. I hear the scuffle of his boots on the metal floor as he moves away from the door, then charges, slamming the side of his body against it.

  I try not to picture the door actually bursting open, knowing that if Derek were to get his way at this moment, and at this speed, he’d tumble out into the street and probably break something.

  “Stop,” I say, my voice shakier than I’d like it to be.

  The shadowy figure either ignores, or does not hear me, because he takes another run at the door, this time starting from the back of the truck.

  “Stop it!” I shout at Derek, fumbling to grab hold of his leg in the dark as he comes back within reach. I get a good grip on his jeans, wrapping one hand around his calf and pulling until he gives in and sits down next to me.

  “They’re going to kill us,” Derek says. His voice isn’t angry, as I expect it to be, or even scared, but certain, as though this is an obvious and inescapable fact of life. Fish live in water, gravity keeps us Earthbound, and the Gov is going to kill us.

  I fail to respond and so we fall into silence. I wrap my arms around my legs, and rest my chin on my knees, listening, for the first time, to the sounds around me. The truck creaks loudly, breaking and turning often, but it seems like we’re moving very slowly after all. If I concentrate, and block out the sounds of the truck, I can hear people talking in the cab of the vehicle. I can’t quite make out the words, but the tone is neutral. Not angry or excited, making me wonder if kidnapping citizens is an everyday sort of activity for these men, or if they’re just so utterly desensitized that it wouldn’t even occur to them that what’s happening here is wrong.

  They left Kyle’s body in the street; Erin’s missing... Erin. I saw the soldiers tackle Derek while I was tending to Kyle, but I’ve no idea where our other teammate went.

  “Did they... did they get Erin?” I ask tentatively.

  “Hmm?” Derek says, breaking from his own reverie. He seems to have caught the question after all, because he goes on to answer without further clarification from me. “I don’t know. We heard the shot and I just ran. I saw you and Kyle on the ground, but I couldn’t tell if you’d dropped when you heard the shot, or if it -”

  Before Derek can finish his sentence, we’re both thrown forward as the truck comes to a violent halt. Before we get the chance to recover, the doors swing open. And before we can take in the scene in front of us, the soldiers are pulling us out onto the street.

  A bag drops over my head, surrounding me not only in more darkness, but also in a strong musty smell that has me wondering what was in the bag before me. My hands are bound together, then secured to my belt by something vaguely scratchy. Thick twine comes to mind, but I assume that the Gov has something more sophisticated than twine to keep people from escaping.

  I stumble as they push us forward, the terrain probably even in reality, but perilously flawed in my mind’s eye. Right now, my biggest concern is tripping and hitting my face on the asphalt, since I can’t see and my hands are tied to my body, and can’t help to break my fall. This, of course, is a ridiculously mundane concern stacked next to the fact that I don’t know where we are, who we’re with, or why we were brought here, but at the moment, it’s about all the worry that I can process.

  I walk forward, bumping into people that I can’t see. If I knew which one of the surrounding forms was Derek, I would lean in his direction, but I have the feeling that if I said his name aloud, the soldiers would think we were planning something and react poorly.

  Panic doesn’t fully sink in until I hear Derek’s voice in the distance. It seems that we’re not being herded together after all, and I don’t want to even think about why we’ve been separated.

  “Derek!” I shout, receiving a sharp push forward for my effort. Suddenly, the ground has changed below my feet. It’s no longer gritty, but rather perfectly smooth.

  “Ka -” Derek’s response is cut off sharply by a door closing behind me. I jump, knocking into whoever pushed me forward, and receive another shove, which puts me off balance enough that I start to fall forward. Somehow, falling on my face seems the very least of my worries now, but regardless of its demotion on the list of scary things, I let out a squeak of terror even as someone catches me and sets me back onto my feet.

  “Cool it!” a stern voice commands. These are the first words that any soldier has spoken in front of me. The man’s voice is rough and annoyed, like he’s had a long day, and I assume that his comment relates more to his own state of being than mine.

  I peer down and see that the bag over my head has been jostled enough that I can see the ground around my feet. I’m surprised to find a white, tiled floor. Well, tiles that used to be white anyway. It’s not dirty per se, just worn from years and years of use. Nearer to me, and the only other thing I can really see, are my hands, which are covered in a lot more blood than I thought. Did it all come from Kyle, or am I hurt too, my brain too preoccupied to notice?

  Some of the soldiers lead me off in one direction, while others walk away in another. The boots of my new escorts are out of my limited line of sight, so I try to listen to the sounds they make to get a count on how many people I am with. It sounds like two, one right beside me, and the second on the other side and slightly ahead.

  I think back to Erin’s training classes, filtering through the various practical activities to see if there was anything about having both hands tied to my waist and a bag over my head. Unfortunately, this was not a scenario covered in class.

  We weave down several hallways, through a set of doors into a very noisy room, and then out into another quiet hallway. The farther we go, the less likely escape seems. Already, I can’t quite remember if we turned right, left, right, right, door, left... or right, left, left, r
ight, door, left.

  Finally, after another set of doors, we stop. The two soldiers seem to leave me in the care of someone new, exchanging very few words, and giving me absolutely no clues as to where I am. I turn my head and try to look at the feet of the person the soldiers have left me with. He has shiny black shoes, and seems to be wearing gray slacks with sharp creases down the front, as though they’ve been ironed recently. This man is obviously no soldier... maybe a doctor?

  The maybe doctor takes my arm, and leads me forward through a set of swing doors, where the floor turns from the dirty tile to a dull, gray cement. He passes me off to a person wearing what looks like some sort of biohazard suit. His feet and legs are covered in shiny plastic, and even his hand on my arm feels ballooned out as though covered in a thick glove.

  There seems to be an odd shift between the soldiers and the maybe doctor. I continue to look down at the ground as we walk, the cement floor growing increasingly concerning with each step. The light gray of the floor has turned very dark, like it’s wet, and there are streaks of red running towards a central drain.

  The hazard suit man stands me over the drain. This doesn’t seem good.

  The man pulls the bag off of my head, the overly bright lights above momentarily blinding me. I try to open my eyes to see where I am, but I can’t make out anything beyond the dark outline of the hazard suit man, backlit by the lights that all seem to be directed at me. It strikes me as an afterthought that lights surrounding me would require electricity to power them. In fact, the halls that we walked through were lit as well. Not the scattered and faded kind of light that filters in from windows, but the uniform kind that comes from proper ceiling lights.

  My eyes are beginning to focus just enough that I can see the man reach up and pull on something hanging from above. Any thoughts of escape, or even understanding, are washed from my mind as blindingly cold water crashes down from above, drawing a shocked cry from my already irritated throat. I instinctively try to pull my hands up to shield my face, but they’re still tied to my waist. I struggle and pull against them, spitting against the water and shouting at the hazard suit man, who, I can see now, is holding some sort of sponge. He grabs the back of my neck and begins scrubbing at my face and hair. I try to pull away from him, but his grip is unyielding, so the best I can do is scrunch up my shoulders and squeeze my eyes shut. This is the first shower that I’ve had in months, and it sucks.