Testing Zero: a dystopian post-apocalyptic young adult novella series (Remnants of Zone Four Chronicles Book 1)

by Simsion, N. G.

  “You see? Nothing to it.” Lefty panted and stood proudly, facing Zero and holding the crocodile up to eye level—his hands still securing the jaws shut. “Pick up my shirt, would you? Just stick it in my back pocket.”

  As Zero bent down to pick up the shirt, the croc’s tail swung violently, smacking Zero across the side of his head, knocking him backward. He shook it off, got back to his feet, and then stuffed the t-shirt into Lefty’s back pocket.

  “Their jaws are super strong when they want to bite down on something,” Lefty said, “but they’re not nearly as strong when they’re trying to open. That’s why I can hold his jaws shut.”

  “Well, aren’t you just a fountain of knowledge?”

  Lefty smiled as he admired his catch. He lowered it until the tail touched the ground, which made the crocodile jerk back and forth again. “Come on, Zero. The hard part’s done. All we need to do now is get this guy into Flea’s desk.”

  Zero rolled his eyes. “Aren’t you at least going to close that hole you made in the fence?”

  “What for? The hole is two feet off the ground. Crocs can’t jump through it.” He grinned. “I’m sure Professor Bird will know we were the ones to do this as soon as he sees, and he’ll make us clean up the mess. We’ll close it when we bring the croc back.”

  “But aren’t you scared one of the infected people will climb through the hole?”

  Lefty raised an eyebrow and dropped his shoulders. “The Remnants? Are you serious?”

  “Of course I’m serious. Professors talk about the infected Remnants of the old world all the time. They’re all over the place beyond the outer city wall. I don’t want one of them making it onto the school grounds.”

  “The professors talk about them all the time, yeah. But have you ever seen a Remnant?”

  “No.”

  “Me neither.” Lefty looked through the chain link fence at the immense wall standing a few hundred feet away. Made of all sizes of rock and mortar, it was about 100 feet tall, towering above even the tallest of the trees. “If they actually do exist, and if by some miracle one made it past the outer wall, what do you think would happen to them once they reached the river? The crocs would eat them alive before they came anywhere near the inner fence here. I’ve never even heard of one even making it into the swamp, let alone swimming across the river to the school grounds.”

  “I’m just saying. Maybe we should close the hole. It’s better to be safe than—”

  “Fine. You can close the hole if you want to. My hands are a little tied right now.” Lefty lifted the crocodile again to show him to Zero, which he regretted when its tail whacked him across the knee. “I need to hurry and get this thing into Flea’s desk before lunch hour is over.”

  Zero watched Lefty drag the young crocodile as he sprinted a short distance toward a clump of bushes, holding his hands low enough that nobody could see the animal.

  With so many people buzzing around in such a small space, it was difficult for the boys to sneak the crocodile from one set of bushes to the next. Zero and Lefty had less than ten minutes to make it to Flea’s desk before lunch break would be over.

  They felt the bushes claw at their skin as they snuck along the fence, eventually coming up behind Building 18 where their homeroom was located. They froze when the sound of voices came from around the corner.

  “Go see who it is,” Lefty said.

  “Why do I have to go? This is your hair-brained idea.”

  “Because I’m holding this.” Lefty lifted the croc, his hands still clamping down on its jaws. “I’d be happy to let you hold him while I go look.”

  “Fine.” Zero grunted and peeked around the corner. “It’s just three kids. They’re about six or seven years old.”

  “Are they hanging out by the back door?”

  “Yeah.”

  “Oh well. They’ll be no trouble.” Lefty walked around the corner into plain sight of the younger kids. They stared at him, mouths open. He held up the crocodile for them to see. “You’re probably thinking about running to tell on me right now, aren’t you? Do you think it’s smart to tell on a guy who’s holding a crocodile?”

  The three kids shook their heads in unison.

  Lefty brushed past them. “Good choice.”

  He crouched down in the last set of bushes next to the back entrance and nudged Zero with his elbow, encouraging him to enter the building to ensure that the coast was clear. It wasn’t. Caiman, one of the enormous boys Zero knew to be part of Flea’s gang, was spending his lunch hour pushing a mop around on the hall floors, which Zero presumed was punishment for some sort of misdeed.

  Zero looked at the clock mounted on the wall. Eight minutes remained before lunch break would be over. For a brief moment, he hoped Caiman would remain in the hall for the rest of lunch break to make it impossible for Lefty to go anywhere near Flea’s desk, but that hope dissipated when Caiman splashed the mop into the bucket and began walking in the opposite direction. He wheeled the mop bucket around the corner and out of sight.

  Zero exhaled, shook his head, and walked outside to tell Lefty the coast was now clear.

  Lefty stole a peek through the glass panes of the double doors before Zero opened it for him. The sound of the crocodile’s tail slapping the linoleum as they walked caused his heart to race. He was sure some professor would hear it and come bursting into the hall to see what was going on. He now believed Lefty was correct when he said people would be talking about this for years to come, but for all the wrong reasons. Countless things could go wrong with this plan. He shuddered, not being able to keep himself from envisioning what some of those things might be.

  They tiptoed through the empty hallway, which smelled strongly of Caiman’s lemon-scented mopping suds. Each step, no matter how quiet they tried to be, echoed off the walls.

  Zero stopped just outside the classroom door. “Seriously, Lefty, this is stupid!”

  Lefty took two steps into the room and spun around. “Come on. This is going to be great.”

  “How do you expect this to work? No crocodile is ever going to lie still inside of a desk. He’ll pop right out.”

  “Not if I’m sitting on it.” With a menacing grin on his face, Lefty turned into the classroom, lugging the croc, which, apart from flopping its tail now and again, had apparently abandoned the urge to fight back.

  Zero backed into the corner of the hall. His assigned desk wasn’t far from Flea’s, and he wasn’t about to take his seat yet. He didn’t want to be anywhere near the action when everything went down. He was convinced he’d somehow be the first one bit and be left with fewer fingers than Lefty had.

  The bell sounded, and Zero jumped. Flea soon walked through the doors with six of his cronies close behind. In less than a minute, the hall was buzzing with hundreds of students, which meant Zero could more easily proceed without drawing attention to himself.

  This was how Zero lived his life. For him, hiding from others was an art form. Like a chameleon, even though he was one of the largest people in school, he had the ability to blend into his surroundings simply by walking in others’ shadows, retreating to corners whenever possible, and avoiding the discomfort of conversation with everyone except Lefty—his only friend.

  It was this type of behavior that inspired his nickname. He had been standing motionless against a wall for nearly half an hour when a Professor directed a comment his way, calling him R-11, the name that had been assigned to him at birth. When those in the classroom spun around, surprised to see him standing there, one of them commented on Zero’s invisibility. “R-11? More like R-0,” the boy had joked. “Sometimes it’s like you don’t even exist.” It didn’t take long for R-0 to be shortened to just Zero, a name that might have felt offensive to someone else, but he liked it. He knew it fit.

  Zero used those chameleonic skills to blend into the crowd of students while st
ill keeping a close eye on Flea as he entered the classroom. As much as he wanted to avoid being part of the inevitable conflict that would soon erupt, he wasn’t about to miss watching it.

  “Are you lost?” Flea yelled at Lefty as he entered the room.

  Zero stopped in the doorway to watch.

  Lefty was now wearing his shirt again, but it had come out of his back pocket with a lot more wrinkles than it had before. “Who, me?” Lefty put on an innocent face.

  “Yeah, you. You’re the only one in my space. Now get off my desk.”

  “Oh, is this your desk? How was I supposed to know it was your desk? I thought you sat over there.” Lefty jerked a thumb over his shoulder.

  “This is your last warning, and you’re lucky to get that.”

  “Oh. I appreciate you giving me more chances than usual. I wouldn’t want to get on your bad side. If that ever happened, I just don’t know what I’d do.” Lefty was mocking now, filled with confidence. Zero cringed, knowing this would end badly. Why was Lefty so confrontational?

  Flea was obviously perturbed by Lefty’s refusal to move, but he didn’t say anything more. He didn’t have to. Caiman now stood behind him, towering over both Flea and Lefty. He began to move in.

  Lefty hopped down from the desk, keeping one hand still resting on it to keep it closed, and coming face-to-face with Flea’s enforcer. “Relax, Caiman,” Lefty said, patting him on the chest, which was just above Lefty’s eye level. “No need for this to get out of hand. I just got disoriented, that’s all. It happens sometimes when I’m in a classroom. You know how it is—something about a classroom scrambles my brain. I’ll just get out of your way and let Flea have his desk back.”

  Zero felt a tap on his right shoulder and turned to see Professor Bird. He could feel the color draining from his face.

  “Why are you standing in the hall, Zero? You’d better be in your desk by the time the bell rings.”

  Rather than step into the classroom, Zero stepped back into the hallway to let Professor Bird through.

  “Everybody, in your seats. Don’t make me say it twice,” Professor Bird yelled. He turned back toward the doorway. “That means you too, Zero. You have five seconds to be in your seat or you’ll spend the rest of the day scrubbing toilets.”

  But Zero remained in the hall, frozen in place.

  Then it happened. A quizzical look flashed across Flea’s face when he heard a rustling sound coming from inside his desk. The smart thing to do would have been to crack the desk open to peek at what was inside, but Flea was never known for his genius. He threw open his desk, and the crocodile sprang out, snapping.

  Chapter 3

  Zero pulled back another step. In less than two seconds every student in the class was either cowering in the corner or pushing past him to get out the door—all except for Lefty and Flea. Flea was unable to run away because the crocodile had latched onto his foot. Lefty was standing next to him, one hand on his stomach, doubled over with laughter.

  Flea squealed, flailing his arms and legs, knocking over his desk and kicking his chair down the aisle. He kicked at the crocodile, but that only seemed to make it bite down harder, causing him to cry even louder in pain. “Get it off me! Get it off me!”

  “Lefty,” Professor Bird yelled, “if you don’t have that crocodile off Flea’s foot and back in the river within two minutes, I’ll see that you’re kicked out. And I don’t mean just kicked out of the school. I mean you’ll be sent to Exile City!”

  It took a second for Lefty to regain his composure. “All right, Professor. All right. I’ll get rid of it. Besides, it’s just a little baby croc—nothing to be scared of.”

  In one smooth motion, Lefty pulled off his shirt again. He twisted it into a tight roll, and walked over to where Flea lay whimpering on the floor.

  “Don’t move.” Lefty slid the shirt sideways through the crocodile’s mouth in the open space between Flea’s foot and the back of the crocodile’s jaws. “Okay, now you’re going to have to stand up and put your weight on that foot so I can pry its jaw open.”

  Flea held out a hand for Lefty to help him to his feet, but Lefty did nothing more than grin at him as he struggled to stand up. Lefty put his right knee on the back of the crocodile’s neck and pulled up on the shirt. Flea shifted his weight to his bleeding foot, and as soon as he got the nod from Lefty, he jerked his shoe out of the crocodile’s mouth. Without skipping a beat, Flea cocked back his fist and swung at Lefty. Lefty dodged to the side and the blow glanced off the side of his head. Flea cocked his other fist back, ready to throw again.

  “You sure you want to do that?” Lefty asked. “If you swing at me, I might let go of this thing. Or, better yet, I might have to defend myself. Only a fool would mess with a guy who has a crocodile for a weapon.”

  “Flea, Lefty, this is done. Go put that thing back in the river. And everyone, get back in your seats!” Professor Bird yelled. “When you get back, don’t bother coming to class. Meet me in Director Keys’ office.”

  “Yes, sir,” Lefty said, holding the jaw shut and lifting it like he had done before.

  “And you, Flea, report to the nurse’s station to get that foot checked.” Professor Bird looked around the classroom. “Where’s Zero?” He spotted him standing one step in the hallway. “Zero, you’ll be joining us in the office.”

  Zero sighed. Even though Lefty had promised to take the blame, Zero learned a long time ago that the professors always assumed he was part of the planning. “Me, Professor?”

  “Yes, you. Don’t pretend you had nothing to do with this. I saw you cowering in the hallway before the bell rang.”

  “Yes, sir.”

  The fun part was over. Now it was time to find out what the consequences were for a stunt like this. Zero assumed this was probably the first time anyone had tried this before, so the punishment could very well be just as inventive as the crime itself. He took a deep breath, worried about what exactly that might mean.

  Zero followed behind Lefty as he dragged the crocodile back to the hole in the fence. He didn’t share in Lefty’s love for animals, but he found himself feeling sorry for this little crocodile now that it had spent the last forty-five minutes with its tail dragged through the bushes, wrestled on the ground, and shoved into a desk into which it didn’t fit very well.

  After the crocodile was back through the opening and had slipped back into the swamp, the two boys walked again toward their dorm building. They knew Professor Bird was waiting for them in the front office building, but Lefty insisted on grabbing a new shirt—one that wasn’t torn or smelled like the inside of a crocodile’s mouth—first.

  On the bottom floor of their dorm building, they walked into the shower room and over to the stacks of shirts. The shirts were neatly folded and stacked according to size. He grabbed one from the top of the pile marked by a sign that read “size E” and he slipped it on. He threw the tattered, smelly shirt into a large bin of soiled clothes. They turned and were about to leave the shower room when Lefty changed direction and walked toward a stack of blue jeans that was taller than he was.

  “I should probably change my pants, too. The less I smell like the swamp, the less likely I am to get sent to Exile City.”

  “You could smell like pumpkin pie and it wouldn’t save you.” Zero paused for a moment. “Or me either.”

  Lefty shook his head as he slipped his right leg, then his left, into the fresh pair of pants. “You worry too much.” He threw his old swampy pants into the laundry bin, stopped for a few seconds in front of the mirror to check his hair, and then walked out.

  ***

  Zero took a seat between Lefty and Professor Bird as they waited quietly for Director Keys to enter the office. Once he came in they stood in unison until he reached his seat, then took their seats in turn.

  This wasn’t their first time in the director’s office
, but it was the first time they’d had to wait for so long. Zero forgot for a moment about the trouble he was in, absorbing the comforts arrayed around him. This was the only air-conditioned room he had ever been in. It always smelled of a fragrance he never smelled anywhere else. Director Keys was a round man, both in face and build. He had the same thick walrus mustache he’d had since the day Zero and Lefty arrived at school fifteen years earlier, but it had gradually shifted from brown to gray over those years. It wasn’t until Director Keys opened a drawer, pulled out a small brown bottle labeled Stetson Cologne, and splashed his neck with its contents that he finally knew the source of that smell. The pleasant odor immediately took over the room.

  “Now. What’s this all about?” Director Keys asked.

  Professor Bird opened his mouth to explain, but he was interrupted by someone knocking loudly on the door behind him, who then entered without waiting for permission. It was a tall man in a long purple robe—the kind only the Elite of society wore. He had a long, thin face and a pointy nose. His hair, which was long enough to touch his shoulders, was shiny and slicked back. He said nothing as he crossed the room and stood in the corner behind Director Keys. He folded his arms, tilted his head back and looked down his nose at everyone.

  Director Keys didn’t turn to look at him. “Boys, this is Cumulus,” he said. “He is the man in charge of overseeing your placement tests tomorrow.” Judging by the look on his face, he clearly wasn’t thrilled to have Cumulus standing near him, or even in the room.

  Professor Bird opened his mouth again to speak but then paused, apparently waiting to make sure it was okay to talk, and then spent the next few minutes explaining. The two boys sat quietly—their eyes down and their hands folded in their laps.

  Director Keys looked at Lefty, then at Zero, and then back at Lefty again. He opened his mouth to speak, but didn’t say anything. He stood up and made his way to the door, which he opened. “Professor Bird, you can go now.”