by Garr, Amber
I tried to push those thoughts away as Trevor and I argued about why he would be one of the prisoners and not a mercenary.
FOURTEEN
Vivienne
The process was simple - dump, rinse, wash, dry, store. One and two liter glass bottles followed by the occasional gallon jug kept us working nonstop. We weren’t allowed to speak to each other and I found it a miserable way to pass the time. Perhaps if we had music I could bear it, but the rhythmic snap, swish, roar, puff of the sterilizing dryer became my own personal torture of repetitive noises. My dreams now consisted of a never ending assembly line, bottles falling to the ground because I couldn’t keep up.
Our shifts lasted five hours in the morning and five hours in the afternoon. We only had a break for lunch which also happened to be the only time I got to see Hunter during the day. I was thankful he didn’t have to serve time, and I suspected he was enjoying school. By the second day after class he wouldn’t stop gushing about a girl named Iris. Apparently Iris was the smartest twelve year old in the world with eyes like the moon and freckles that made her cute and impish. His words not mine.
I smiled at how quickly Iris had made an impression, reminding me of when I’d met Zach in middle school. Although very different, from the first time he spoke to me, I knew I wanted to capture his attention every day. Impish indeed.
Three days had passed since I first began working off my sentence. The deserters standing next to me changed every day and we were told to expect that. Some had been assigned elsewhere and some were now working other shifts. It didn’t matter though, because I didn’t speak to anyone. Didn’t even try. I did, however, look for Max, disappointed each day when he wouldn’t show.
Riley hadn’t checked in with me as promised and I’d all but given up. I don’t know why that bothered me. It’s not like I was attracted to him, but something about the way he spoke to me, made me feel like I had someone on my side. Although as I scrubbed another bottle covered with lipstick smudge and tried to ignore the fact the skin on my fingers was peeling off, I only felt alone. Alone and depressed and worried I wouldn’t be able to tolerate two years in this place.
I slammed the lid closed on the dryer, being sure to squeeze in a few extra bottles. It gave me a five minute break. Another deserter quickly rolled a three layer cart full of dirty containers to my station immediately crushing my spirits. It was never-ending.
Sighing, I turned back to my sink and began the process all over again. I pushed away tears as the sheer devastation of these menial tasks began to suck the life out of me. I tried to occupy my mind with thoughts of Zach and fighting by his side. We were a good match. And I had to thank Jackson for reminding me of that a few days ago. I would give anything to have a sword in my hand standing next to Zach and feeling his warmth right now.
My bottle crashed to the bottom of the sink when my vision blurred. Quickly looking around, I checked to see if my mistake had been noticed. I had yet to see anyone abused for making a mistake, but the atmosphere of expected perfection certainly rang throughout the dungeon environment.
Breathing a sigh of relief when no one yelled at me, I wiped my eyes and picked up the bottle. Drowning in my sorrows and ignoring the song my dryer sang, I didn’t hear anyone walk up behind me.
“Hanging in there?” Riley asked.
Startled, I dropped the bottle again, soap suds flying through the air when I clutched at my heart. “Jesus,” I shouted, knowing this time someone would notice.
The guard, or soldier as Riley had called them, stood straight and pushed away from the counter he’d been leaning against. Swinging his gun around to the front, he looked curiously at me and then frowned when he saw Riley.
“Sir?” he questioned.
“I need to borrow her for a little while,” Riley answered while I tried to wipe the suds off my chest.
“Sir, I don’t have any orders-”
“You don’t need any. Patrick asked to see her.”
A knowing look passed over the guards face and he gave a curt nod. “Okay, sir.”
“Who’s Patrick?” I asked, tempted to squash the tiny bubble of soap that had landed on Riley’s bicep. Wringing my hands in a towel, I kept them busy while he contemplated answering my question.
“My superior,” he finally said and I balked.
“Why…why does he want to see me?” This couldn’t be good.
Riley smiled and even in the limited light that smile could charm the best of them. “Just come with me. And hurry before your guard checks my story.”
I looked up at him in confusion, realizing he must be several inches taller than Zach since I had to crane my neck. His dimples were back and a mischievous look glistened in his eyes. Assuming he didn’t plan on killing me, I shrugged and tossed the towel into the sink. He didn’t need to ask me twice to take a break from the snap, swish, roar, puff of my machine.
“Where are we going?” I whispered.
“Shh,” he said, escorting me around him and gently guiding me out the far side of the room with his hand on my lower back.
I felt the eyes on me as we left, and wondered if I was making a huge mistake. Although if I listened to my gut, which almost never led me astray, then I could trust him. I laughed at how I’d changed my tune so sharply in the last seventy-two hours and Riley made some kind of noise. Shaking my head, he never asked what I found so amusing.
We pushed through the door and walked down the hall toward the elevator. The lights flickered from bad bulbs and the high-pitched buzzing was another one of those noises that would put me in an early grave. Not really funny, but true.
“Where are we going?” I asked again as Riley swiped his card over a keypad and entered a quick code. His shoulders looked relaxed and the hint of a grin wavered at the edge of his mouth. If I didn’t know better, I’d guess he was gloating.
He never answered as the metal doors slid open and the smell of stale bodies and cleaning supplies flooded my nose. The sides of the elevator reflected back distorted mimics of us like a carnival fun house on steroids. I hoped my hair didn’t look that out of control.
Smoothing the strands and shoving them back into my too-long ponytail, I watched in silence as the elevator passed by the normal floor where the cafeteria and my living quarters resided. I glanced sideways at my companion, surprised to see him looking at me.
“Riley?” I asked.
He smiled, full of teeth like a kid that just got away with stealing the candy. “How about some fresh air?”
Excitement flitted through me. I’d missed the sun. “That would be wonderful,” I whispered.
He nodded and looked back at the crack in the doors like it held all of the answers. I didn’t know what he had planned, or why it involved me, but something in me came back to life. Maybe I’d found a friend in here after all.
Maybe he could help me escape.
I immediately squashed that notion the second the elevator pinged and daylight rushed inside like a tidal wave. Throwing my hands up to shield my eyes, I took a deep breath but was disappointed when all I could smell was another sterilized hallway. Albeit, one made out of windows, but it was still inside.
“This way,” Riley said, sensing my disappointment.
I followed him through the tunnel of glass, still adjusting to the brightness of the sun. And the heat. Real warmth from the sun that soaked all the way to my bones. After another key card swipe and code entry, we walked outside and onto the roof of the factory. Wind whipped through my hair bringing back a familiar sense of comfort. Too many years in the forest had spoiled me with nature’s peace and I hadn’t realized just how badly I missed it.
“Well?” he asked with a huge smile, waiting for me to say something.
“Thank you.” Turning my head back up to bask in the sunlight I asked, “Why me?”
“Why you what?”
“Why did you bring me here? Why are you being so nice to me?”
His face dropped slightly before looking a
way from me and out into the distance. “I wanted to show you what you can have. Once you’re finished with your sentence, I mean.” He shuffled his feet back and forth clearly deciding something. Suddenly, he grabbed my hand and pulled me away from the glass hallway. “Come this way. I want to show you something.”
I found his excitement contagious and wanted to see more. The mercenary who’d threatened Hunter’s life over my own just a few days earlier now held my hand and bounced around like he just discovered gold. I had a feeling there were more layers to Riley than I cared to know.
We jogged for five minutes around the perimeter of the roof until we reached the far side. This factory was way bigger than I thought and I wondered what else was going on below us. The small pieces of gravel underneath my feet crunched with each step. My slipper-like shoes had very little support and I felt every tiny pebble gnaw at my arches.
Riley kept glancing back at me with a smile, oblivious of the pain in my feet and simply excited to share this with me. Throughout the roof were stacks of columns used for venting air and steam. Each one protected by a chain-linked fence eight feet high. Riley pulled me over to one of them and I yanked my hand out of his grasp. The pipe columns looked like they rose up out of the ground and hugged the side of the building. There wasn’t any roof on the other side where he wanted to go.
“What is this?” I asked.
“Relax.” He beckoned me forward. “Come on, we’re almost there.” He disappeared around the side of the fence into nothingness.
“Riley!” I shouted, afraid he went over the edge.
A moment later, he peeked around the column at me, somehow inside of the fence. “Come on!”
Cautiously, I tiptoed closer realizing how high up we were. When I reached the fence, Riley looked through the holes and smiled at me.
“Climb over. I’ll catch you.”
“What?”
“Climb over so you can get inside.” I gave him a look and he sighed. “It’s either that or you have to come in the way I did.”
“Which is?”
“Climb the fence hanging five hundred feet above the ground and wiggle through a tiny hole.”
I looked at him again, brow pinched and head shaking. “Well, why didn’t you just climb over like me?”
“Because I had to turn off the alarm,” he said as though obvious. “Now come on! I’m sure you can scale this fence.”
His tone had a ring of admiration mixed in, and it made me uncomfortable. Riley didn’t know me. But, oddly enough, I kind of wanted to trust him. Sticking my toe through one of the links, I found myself now thankful for the thin and flexible shoes. In just a few moments, I was swinging my leg over the top and taking a quick breather.
“Jump and I’ll catch you.”
“No!” I said, then added quietly, “You’re crazy.”
Riley chuckled. “I heard that. Now jump.”
Nope. Not going to happen. I started to make my way down the fence, but slipped when my left big toe fell from its hole. Surprised, I lost my hand hold and fell backward straight into Riley. He wrapped his arms around my waist and turned me around until I faced the opposite direction. Setting me down lightly, he laughed again and looked at me with a little too much intensity.
“See, I told you I’d catch you.”
“So now what?” I asked, wanting to distract him from whatever was running through his mind.
“This way.” He looked like he was about to reach for my hand, then thought better of it. I sighed in relief.
We were on a little balcony of concrete specifically designed to provide access to the columns. Riley hugged the edge as he guided me around the narrow walkway. Acutely aware at how high up we were, I closed my eyes to suppress a wave of vertigo.
“You okay?” he asked. I nodded my head, eyes still closed and trying to center myself. He chuckled again. “Almost there.”
When we finally reached the far side of the balcony, I found a blanket and a pair of binoculars lying on the ground. “We’re here?”
“We’re here,” he said as he beamed at me and spread his arms.
I followed his gaze out past the factory where we now had a clear view of the massive city hidden from most of the world. “Wow,” I breathed.
As far as I could see, skyscrapers and dome-like peaks of cathedrals or museums or something pierced through the hazy sky and reminded me of a world I thought died a long time ago. Large green oaks, pines, and other trees dotted the landscape making it an eclectic mix of nature and manmade beauty. Everything smelled so fresh and clean, far from what I’ve experienced the past five years.
“Here,” Riley said, pushing the binoculars into my hand.
Suddenly the crazy height didn’t bother me anymore and I began to appreciate my birds-eye view of Oasis One. With his military grade binoculars, I could zoom in to amazing precision. Although the streets were covered in a light fog, the sunlight glistened off the high peaks of the buildings. Large balconies encompassed each floor and outdoor furniture decorated the space. Potted plants added a touch of green and my chest clenched as I thought about my mom’s garden.
“How is this possible?” I lowered my arms and felt tears building in my eyes again. Turning to face Riley I asked, “They told us all of the cities were destroyed along with most of the humans in them. I’ve been hunted for five years by the government, yet everything I’ve seen so far has been nothing like the stories we were led to believe.”
He smiled down at me before locking both hands in the fence and leaning his head against it to get as close to the edge as possible. “This is exactly why I wanted to bring you here. I wasn’t lying when I told you all I’d been captured.”
“You were a deserter?”
He flinched but didn’t look at me. “Kind of. I ran away once and got caught.” A noise caught in his throat and he shook his head. “They made me serve two years as punishment.”
“Ran away?” I took a step closer to the edge until my legs went numb and I almost collapsed.
“Whoa!” Riley said, reaching an arm out to catch me before I could stop myself. “Here, sit down.” He guided my quivering body to the blanket and I slumped to the ground. Leaning back against the column I felt much safer when I couldn’t see the ground.
“Thanks,” I said, surprised when Riley folded his long legs and gracefully sat down beside me. “So tell me what happened.”
He shifted uncomfortably again. I continued to stare, waiting for an answer. “It’s complicated.”
“Oh come on,” I groaned. But when he didn’t budge I changed tactics. “Okay, fine. Is Riley your last name?”
Chuckling he picked up the binoculars and pretended to find something very interesting in the distance. “Yes.”
“What’s your first name?”
He tilted his head and flashed a glance in my direction. “Only my mother knows that.” His smile grew wider at my eye roll.
“You’re the one that brought me up here,” I grumbled. And although the conversation was stifling, I did appreciate the chance to be here and see what the government had been hiding from us. We sat in silence for a while, me contemplating what this all meant, and Riley preoccupied with the scenery.
“How old are you?” he suddenly asked.
“How old are you?” He gave me look that showed how childish my comment was. “I’m twenty,” I answered.
He bobbed his head. “That’s good. You’ll be fine.”
Kind of getting tired of the cryptic conversation, I rolled my head back against the column and closed my eyes. The sun beat down on my face and the metal tube behind me hummed. It quickly put my mind at ease and for a few priceless minutes, I forgot where I was.
“Once you’re done with your sentence, you’ll be able to live in the apartments like me. They’ll probably make you a soldier, and I think that’s perfect,” Riley continued out of the blue. “I can train you.”
Ignoring all of the other weirdness hidden in that comment, I focused
on the facts. “No one leaves the factory alive.”
Riley’s head twisted quickly to the side so he could look at me straight on. “That’s not true at all. You see this place,” he gestured to the city. “Once people get here they don’t want to leave.”
“You did,” I said, sure I’d guessed right when he paled.
“I…I didn’t say that.”
“You said you ran away. Where else would you have run away from?”
He held my eyes another moment before letting a smirk appear. “Very perceptive.” Smacking his lips together his head moved up and down. “I knew you’d be perfect.”
“Perfect for what?”
“This life. Most of these soldiers are just here because they’re forced to serve one year of their precious, spoiled existence.” The sudden change in tone didn’t go unnoticed. “But people like you and me…we’re different. We’re real.”
I felt like I’d stepped into another dimension. “Riley, I have no idea what you’re talking about.”
He shifted his entire body so that he could face me. His knee brushed up against mine, but he didn’t move. “Don’t you think if the deserters knew what kind of life they could have, they’d come here?”
I shrugged. “These are not the kind of stories that we hear. This type of place, with buildings and beds, and food, and water…this doesn’t exist. But what we do know is that once you’re collected, you never come back.” My voice choked on those words.
“But now you know different,” he said softly.
“I have friends still out there.”
Riley sighed and looked back out over the city. “Maybe you’ll see them again someday.”
I couldn’t respond because the lump in my throat prevented me from saying a word. It might be nice to live in a society again, but not if Zach wasn’t here with me.
Quickly, and without warning, Riley jumped to his feet. “We should go. I don’t want to risk getting you in trouble.”