Glitch

by Brenda Pandos

“No,” she whispered, a hard edge to her voice. Once I got closer, I saw why. New concrete filled in the space, sealing up the small hole completely.

  I spun in a circle, studying the ground and the surroundings. They must have come today, but when? We should have seen them earlier. Now we were too late. I scanned further down the wall on both sides for new cameras, just in case.

  Elle knelt down, grasping at something on the ground.

  “There’s no use.” I tugged at her arm. “We can’t dig under it. We should go.”

  “I know. Hold on.” She stood up and messed with something in her pocket. Then she cocked back her arm.

  In a flash, she lobbed what looked like a stone over the wall. I watched in awe then cringed in terror, expecting gun fire. Nothing happened.

  “Why’d you do that?” I hit her in the arm. “Are you nuts?”

  “Okay, let’s go.”

  I didn’t like the new calm hinted in her voice. “What did you throw?”

  “Let’s just say that we accomplished our mission.”

  My mouth fell opened. “What?”

  I knew what she’d done even before she had a chance to explain. If I’d checked, I’d find the note was no longer in her pocket, but somewhere on the other side of the wall, wrapped around that blasted rock.

  “You. Didn’t.”

  “Hey,” someone yelled from the top of the ravine. “Who’s down there?”

  “Run,” Elle whispered, before she disappeared into the trees.

  Me, on the other hand, stood like a stupid deer caught in the beam of the stranger’s flashlight. Frozen.

  CHAPTER NINE

  No matter what my brain screamed at me to do, my feet wouldn’t move. Within moments, EA officials would surround the place and haul me off to the precinct. They’d wake up my parents to come pick me up. Then, I’d be fitted with a permanent DOD watch so I could never sneak out again. I hadn’t even been legal 24 hours and was already in trouble. Was this why my future self warned me not to ever leave the walls of Brighton?

  The blinding light grew brighter as the cop walked down the trail.

  “Abby?” The holder of the flashlight said. “What are you doing down here?”

  I blinked, surprised. “Landon?”

  “Where’s Elle?” Landon swept the trees with his beam.

  She peeked out from behind a stump, a sneer on her face. “Geez, Landon. What are you doing here?”

  “My job,” he said indignantly. He flipped off his flashlight and grabbed ahold of our shoulders. “We need to go, now.”

  “What’s the rush?” she asked casually.

  Landon chuckled, but gripped harder. “Lucky for you two, I didn’t call for backup. But someone else could still be watching. Understood?”

  “Ouch. Do you have to squeeze that hard?” Elle asked.

  “Yes.”

  He marched us both around the darkened edge of the field, across the street and up the steps to his condo. Once inside, he ripped off my black hat and frisked me. My cheeks heated as he ran his fingers thoroughly and slowly along my waistband and up my stomach. Little did he know about the paper gem hiding inside my bra.

  “Is this really necessary?” Elle watched with her hand perched on her hip.

  “Abby, sit.” He pointed to the couch, then patted down his sister with less detail. “What’s this?” He held the zombie gun he’d pulled from the back of her waistband between two fingers.

  Elle smirked. “Protection.”

  He pointed for her to sit next to me, then grabbed a chair from the kitchen and straddled it. He leaned forward against the chair back. He wasn’t wearing his DOD. “Now tell me what you two were doing by the wall tonight.”

  Elle sighed, folding her arms over her chest. “Exploring.”

  “Exploring?” He cocked his brow. “This makes two nights in a row that someone, without DOD watches on mind you, decided to visit that spot. So let’s try this again. What are you two up to?”

  “I promise. It was nothing,” Elle said.

  “And was it nothing when you sent Abby into my place today?”

  Dread zinged into me. From the corner of my eye, I watched Elle’s mouth drop, then her glare accosted the side of my face.

  “Because after last night, I was tasked to research video feeds to find out why someone would want to break the law to visit there,” he finished.

  I gulped down my nervousness. I was on those feeds and so was Blue Eyes. We were going to be caught.

  “What did you see?” Elle asked, her voice light. I couldn’t believe she continued on with her act of ignorance and innocence.

  Landon’s accusing eyes zeroed in on me, filled with knowledge. He knew. He knew it all. The confession bubbled to my lips. I just wanted my conscience clean, to get this out in the open and be over with it already. “I didn’t—”

  “Okay, you caught us,” Elle interrupted. “We saw the hole when Abby fell down the ravine during our game. There were bare footprints in the dirt, so… I just wanted to see a zombie first hand and they’re only out at night, so… Sorry.”

  My gaze swung to her in shock. Why was she continuing on with this bogus story? He’d know she was lying after watching the feeds.

  Landon’s posture relaxed. “Look. I get your obsession and need for danger, but you can’t be doing that, especially now that you’re legal. I don’t mind if you come over and check out the feeds here, but you can’t run around without your DOD on. If you get caught, there’s only so much I can do to protect you.”

  “Pschtt, right.” She lounged into the couch cushions and kicked up her feet on the coffee table. “Keeping your enemies closer much?”

  Landon leaned forward, eyes hard, and knocked her feet off the table. “I get your pain, Elle. It’s not like I wanted the option of kids taken from me either, but acquiring the antidote isn’t going to happen if I piss off the wrong people. Do you hear me?”

  My breath stole in my throat. Was he sterilized, too? The need to strangle someone in the EA overwhelmed me.

  Elle looked away and wiped her cheek with the back of her hand. “You could have told me.”

  “And chance you’d stand up your meeting? Hardly.” He worked his jaw. “I’m on your side, remember that. But for now, for your own good, I’m monitoring you both. If you so much as take off your DOD once to even pee, I’ll be all over you. Got it?”

  I swallowed and nodded. Visions of him being all over me—in a naughty way—spring-boarded into my brain, leaving a splash of goose bumps across my skin. He turned to me and smiled as if he knew the dirty thoughts I was thinking. My cheeks heated to a three-alarm fire.

  Elle stood and saluted. “Got it, big brother. So I guess we’ll be going now that the lecture is over.”

  Landon gave her a stern look before returning his chair to the kitchen table. Once he moved out of earshot, Elle leaned in and whispered, “Thank God you didn’t say anything. I deleted the feeds with you and zombie zone guy, and you’re welcome by the way. So we’re cool there, but a heads up that Landon actually saw you today would have been nice.”

  “I know… I’m sorry,” I said as she stood. “I… was going to tell you earlier.”

  “It’s fine. Let’s go.”

  But the words it’s fine didn’t sit right with me. I wanted to shake Elle and remind her we were far from good. Plastered on an illegal slip of paper was my name with a request to meet a criminal in two days. Though I didn’t know how that would happen, especially now with Landon monitoring us, we’d treaded into dangerous territory, especially if the EA found the note. Forget being fitted with a permanent DOD, I’d be as good as dead.

  CHAPTER TEN

  The next night I lay in bed wide-awake, the clock on my bedside table taunting a bold 3 AM. Guilt about everything swirled inside me: my Complement, my future, Zombie Zone Guy and most importantly the blasted rock. I could only wish for rain to wash away the incriminating charcoal words we’d written. The chances he’d actually find it we
re slim to none and we both knew it. Even still, Elle had spent the entire day at Landon’s watching the feeds to be sure and I wanted nothing to do with him or his place, especially after his insinuations I was good for him.

  The most astounding part though was that my DOD had increased in time—to seventy years. Before, I would have been elated. Now, after the delightful talk with my Complement, I was depressed. Had the secret all along been to remain apathetic? Should I have not worried about how my decisions affected things?

  The wind gently tugged the strings of my neighbor Mrs. Polnachek’s chimes hanging from her veranda and the soft sound fluttered through my opened window. I closed my eyes, feeling the lull of sleep finally take ahold when Roofus began to bark, then growl.

  “Dang dog,” I mumbled, pulling the pillow over my head.

  After he didn’t stop, I sat up in bed and peered out the window ready to yell at him. To my surprise, someone in a full length coat stood in the shadows of her yard. Roofus, now silent, lay at his feet, sprawled in an unnatural position. A gasp escaped my lips. The stranger’s head swung upward to my two story window. I bounced backward and leapt off my bed to alert my parents, smacking directly into something large and hairy.

  A shriek burst from my lips a moment too late. One hand wove over my mouth while the other secured my waist, lifting me off the ground. I thrashed and kicked, holding onto the wall like a cat refusing to be bathed. This thing, whatever it was, wouldn’t take me without a fight.

  Effortlessly, the creature strolled downstairs and out the opened front door. It placed me on my feet directly in front the stranger: Roofus’ murderer.

  My body trembled as I dared to look at him. His hood shrouded his eyes and left only his thinned lips showing. He clapped the creature on the arm, as if in thanks, and turned to leave. My feet lifted off the ground again, but this time courage sprang inside me. I reared my foot back and smashed the thing in the shins. It yelped in pain, but didn’t let go.

  With a growl, the stranger looped a rope around my ankles and tied them together. I took advantage while he was distracted and slid my wrists together. With a quick prayer, I pressed the emergency button on my DOD.

  “What’s your emergency?” the computer generated voice asked.

  Relief and terror flooded me. Landon promised to be watching. He’d see my elevated heart rate and come to my rescue, since yelling with the hairy beast’s hand over my mouth wasn’t happening.

  “What the—?” The stranger grabbed my arm. Red numerals counted down again—ten minutes left.

  Fear overtook me as my suspicions were confirmed. He was going to kill me like he killed the dog. I arched my back and screamed under the creature’s hand. The stranger slid my DOD off my wrist and threw it to the ground. In slow motion, I watched him grind the thing that had guided every decision I’d made (since the age of six) into splintery pieces with the heel of his boot. I wanted to cry.

  Then sirens erupted all around us.

  I bit the beast’s hand and screamed. “Landon!”

  The stranger whipped his head around. He pulled something from his backpack. “Hold her.”

  The beast secured my head while the stranger tied a gag around my mouth. My wrists were next, then I was plunged into darkness under a sack.

  I braced for the pain, for however he’d kill me. Instead, my body flew upward and came to rest on the creatures shoulder. Then the thing took off like a bucking bronco. Trapped in its hold, I screamed into my gag and clung onto its furry back. I quickly lost my breath and focused instead on tightening my stomach muscles with each jarring impact. The bag made breathing increasingly difficult.

  Why were they waiting to kill me? I braced for the worst when our trajectory changed and we ascended downward. Brush scratched against my arms and hands. I tried to kick, only to feel the creature’s hands tighten around my thighs harder. As the sirens lessened, the soft footfalls and labored breaths of the creature filled the night. Then things began to click. Elle and I had seen this walking bear on the cameras, though we didn’t want to admit what we suspected it was: Yeti, Sasquatch, Big Foot, you name it. Now I knew they were real. Legend had suggested they’d smelled horrible, but this one didn’t. Did they make a habit of kidnapping people? And since when were they civilized and friends of humans?

  Eventually we slowed, then climbed up what felt like a ladder. We had to be at the wall. I thrashed harder. No way were they going to take me into the zombie zone. Was that the stranger’s plan? His sick pleasure? To feed me to zombies?

  “Stop that or you’ll fall,” he said from below. A thread of worry tinged his voice. Why?

  “Then let me go,” I muffled into the gag.

  They ignored me and in an instant, we were on top of something very tall. The wind whipped against my body, the vulnerability was terrorizing. I was deathly afraid of heights—of falling, actually. Then I was tossed into the air and freefalling to my death like my DOD predicted.

  One moment of accuracy in the midst of chaos.

  There would be no lonely existence for me in the stark white halls of Brighton’s laboratories. No rescue at all. I’d die of a broken back on the floor of the forest, hopefully before the zombies came to dine on my brains.

  CHAPTER ELEVEN

  Death didn’t come. Instead, I landed softly, cradled in the arms of the thing carrying me. Oddly, the guns on the turret didn’t blast either. And all around the sirens faded to nothing. To my right, an “umph” of someone landing on the ground followed. Then the Sasquatch started to move again, slowing to a walk. Two sets of footfalls crushed the dry leaves of the forest floor.

  Lightheaded from breathing in my carbon dioxide mixed with the fading adrenaline rush, my limbs relaxed from the warmth of the Sasquatch’s fur. Lavender filled my nose from somewhere, and I turned to find it coming strongest from the creature. Tremendous exhaustion overcame me and the will to fight evaporated. There wasn’t anything I could do to free myself and Landon’s promise had merely been a threat. Maybe he wasn’t even awake, or monitoring me closely enough to care that I’d been abducted.

  Before I could stop myself, I drifted off to sleep. I awoke with a body-jolting snort, nestled in a pile of brush on the ground. The burlap sack and the gag were gone, and above me a canopy of redwoods hung against the daylight. Only my wrists were still tethered.

  I sat up and looked around. Before me, a small fire crackled and a rodent of sorts lay roasting on a spit over a fire. My tummy, unaware it should be revolted by such things, pinched in hunger.

  Barefoot, I gathered to my feet, my stomach muscles aching. The trail led off in two separate directions. Did I dare run? Which way was home?

  “Good, you’re finally awake.”

  I swiveled around to the stranger’s voice, terrified. With his hood off and blue eyes shining, Zombie Zone Guy scrutinized me.

  “You.” I blinked at him, disbelieving.

  His eyes caressed me for a minute and a brief smile tipped his lips. Clad in my pink pajamas, I wasn’t dressed for the occasion. I eyed his jeans and dark shirt. Did I imagine his furry coat?

  “You hungry?” He pulled a pan off the fire and spooned up what looked like beans onto an aluminum plate. He held the dish toward me.

  Disgusted by the sight of the rodent, I shook my head.

  “Suit yourself.” He pulled the leg off the charred animal and dissected it on his plate. The sight just about did me in.

  I turned away to focus on my surroundings. Escape. That should be my biggest priority. But which way and how far? The dread knotted my stomach and I kicked myself for not taking Survivalist Training in net school. Without supplies, food, water, let alone shoes, I was as good as dead. And then there were the zombies.

  My naked wrist reminded me again that he’d broken my watch, and I cursed inside. I couldn’t even half-decide and consult my DOD to see if it were a good decision or not. It lay crushed in front of my house next to… Roofus.

  Pinching my eyes shut, I willed
away the tears. My parents had to be frantic. What about Elle? Damn that Landon. I raised my chin and eyed the sky. Someone would find me. They had to.

  “What do you want with me?” I finally asked.

  He stirred the fire with a stick, eyes low. “Nothing, yet.” He chuckled as if he’d told a joke.

  I scowled. Why the secrecy? Was I being held for ransom? Or worse, as a slave? Maybe that was part of his game: watching me squirm. I’d heard about sociopaths before, ones who lived among the people before the invention of DOD watches. Whatever he had planned, his Sasquatch henchman wasn’t around.

  “Where are we?”

  “In the middle of Chesney Forest. Pretty, isn’t it?”

  Laughter involuntarily slipped out from my lips. Did he think I was dumb? Yes, this pretty spectacular dense little section of redwoods, ferns, and ivy was unheard of in Brighton, but calling it a forest was a stretch of the imagination. Humans before us had raped and rendered the land useless. This anomaly was only wrapping paper to cover what really hid here: criminals and diseases that made healthy people sick and dead people alive. He had to be insane to expect me to agree.

  “What’s so funny?” He continued to dissect his rodent.

  “Nothing.” I shook my head. “You live here? Alone?”

  “Yes and no.”

  Anger flared through me. He acted as if nothing had happened. “Just tell me what you want so we can go back to our lives. My dad works for the EA. He has access to money, or… whatever you want.”

  Zombie Zone Guy laughed and finally looked up, flashing his blue eyes. “What good would money do me? Or your stuff?”

  “You must want something.” I cringed at my words when he squinted, then his gaze fell to my chest, then to my bound wrists. I raised my bound hands to my boobs to hide the fact I wasn’t wearing a bra.

  He inhaled slowly, his eyes losing focus. “This will all make sense soon. I promise.”

  Deep desperation swelled over me like a drowning wave. I didn’t want things to make sense. I wanted to go home. “Just let me go.”