by Caroline Wei
3
ALLE
Everyone was running towards the lone river—the only source of water we had, and, at the moment, the only place of shelter we had. The idea was that if you dove underneath the surface, whatever was coming couldn’t get you. The water would provide a type of shield.
Unless, of course, whatever Trial Two was involved electricity.
Somehow I doubted that would be it. The makers of the Cube, as some people were calling our prison, would be more creative than attacking us with lightning every time.
I followed the crowd of panicking people to the river. Malchin was trying to calm everyone down and have us move in an organized fashion, but even his strong, solid voice was being drowned out by people yelling.
I threw a glance over my shoulders, at the red digital clock that was counting down like a bomb. The sight of it pierced my blood with ice cold daggers.
“Shhhh,” someone was saying to my right. I turned to see a pregnant woman with sun-tanned skin, trying to calm a crying girl. The girl wouldn’t be calmed, though—she squirmed and shrieked, trying to escape from the lady’s grasp. As I watched, she broke free and started running in the opposite direction. The pregnant woman couldn’t keep up with her.
Without even realizing what I was doing, I found myself sprinting after the fugitive child and scooping her up in my arms. She hollered at me, her face contorted in pain. I must have been putting too much pressure on her still-healing burn marks, but I didn’t care. If she didn’t get to safety, she would probably die.
The pregnant woman’s eyes were filled with tears when I returned. Her name was Sabaa, according to her armlet.
“Thank you,” she whispered to me.
“Is she your daughter?” I asked, before the stupidity of the question got to me. The lady looked at me sadly. There was no way any of us remembered if we had family.
“I’m just trying to take care of her,” she told me, then looked at the ticking clock displayed on the glass wall. There were only fifteen seconds left.
“Go on, quickly,” Sabaa said, and with surprising force, pushed me towards the river, which was filled with bobbing people. I ran, making sure she was behind me. The little girl in my arms had given up the fight, instead choosing to bury her head in my arms.
We were both knee-high in the crowded river when the time ran out.
All around me, people held on to each other, not knowing what to expect. There was a brief moment of quiet—the calm before the storm.
And then, with a loud clanking noise, invisible squares in the ceiling started flapping open. From within the glass came a horrible buzzing noise.
I held the girl closer to my chest, Sabaa breathing heavily beside me.
From the ceiling above us, little metal objects came soaring out. They looked kind of like drones, each one the size of my palm, traveling in swarms at first, and then splitting off.
Some people in the river ducked down beneath the surface of the water, but others, the more curious ones, reached out their arms to try to touch the strange metal bees.
A teenage boy, no more than sixteen, cradled one in his hands. “Hey, these are okay,” he said excitedly, his voice pitched a little too high. Before he’d even finished his sentence, the bee grew legs. There were eight in total—sharp, spindly, wicked-looking contraptions, the tips of the legs glowing an evil-looking red. Faster than a person could blink, the bee-turned-spider sank all eight of its razors deep into the boy’s hands.
He screamed and fell over, the water sloshing against everyone around him, who were now in a panic.
“Get down!” I yelled, pressing Sabaa down next to me. I crouched on my knees, making sure the little girl could still breathe, keeping an eye on the silver devils in the air. All around, people were crying out. There simply wasn’t enough water for everyone to stay submerged, and even then, we couldn’t stay underwater for long.
That was when somebody grabbed onto my hair and yanked me back up. I turned to see a wild-eyed Clarice, her straw-colored hair matted with moisture, before she started clawing at my face.
“Clarice, what—” I put up one hand to fend her off, but I couldn’t use my other because of the little girl, who was whimpering. Clarice’s fingers were digging into my scalp, creating sharp pinpoints of pain all over my skull. “What are you doing?” I spluttered.
Clarice didn’t answer. It was almost like she wasn’t herself.
On her arm, standing out starkly against her pale skin, were eight deep gouges, black as the pits of hell. They were oozing some sort of black pus, and it did not look good.
I glanced back up at Clarice, who was growling and trying to rip out my hair. I pushed her roughly away, trying to connect the dots.
If you were stabbed by one of the spiders, you started to turn on your own.
Nearby, someone howled like a wolf and threw herself at a nearby child. They went down into the water, sending rippling waves splashing onto the riverbank. I kicked Clarice hard in the stomach, and she flew away from me, colliding into a man. I didn’t turn to see what happened next. There were no houses, no solid form of structure. All we had was the river.
“Please, no, no,” the tiny child in my arms cried against me. Her little nose was running, and her face was warm against my chest, making my shirt wet with tears. “Not again.”
The spiders were attacking full force. Once they hit the ground or made contact with skin, their legs shot out of their bodies, transforming them into deadly monsters. One of them started scuttling towards me, but I backhanded it away, my mind racing for a solution.
I couldn’t think of anything.
A silver drone landed on Sabaa’s head, and before I could warn her, it had its eight legs buried deep into her scalp. The words died in my mouth, the air ripped out of my throat.
Sabaa convulsed, clawing at her head, but the spider had escaped to find its next victim.
I could only watch in shock as Sabaa turned to face me, her eyes whorls of furor. Then she reached for a rock by the riverbed and slammed it against her own head.
I found my breath again. “Sabaa!”
She fell into the water, her head a bleeding mess—her, as well as the child inside her, dead before they hit the surface.
I let out an outraged cry. “Fight!” I screamed. “Fight the things!” I crawled out of the river, making sure the little girl was cradled tight, and grabbed a long stick. Everywhere I could see one of the silver bees, I started thwacking them out of the air with as much force as I could muster with one arm. They fell lazily to the ground, like drunk insects. They were getting to be less and less in the air, though. The problem was on the ground.
As if they sensed a challenger, the spiders came crawling out from among the grass and from people they’d infected, their legs piercing the ground. They had eight beady little eyes in their heads, I realized, and the back of my neck prickled with the uncomfortable feeling of being watched.
I bashed them all into the dirt, grinding my heel into a few of the cameras for extra measure. It was somewhat satisfying to see cobweb-like cracks form across the mechanic eyes.
Out of nowhere, someone barreled into me. I grunted as I twisted to land with my back first so the terrified girl in my arms wouldn’t be hurt, but I realized too late, as a grizzled man with manic eyes smiled down at me, that it only put her in harm’s way.
The man reached out with dirty hands and tried to pry the girl from my grasp. Throwing my legs into the air, I tried to kick him away like I did to Clarice, but he was stronger than her.
My entire system flooded with icy horror as he gripped the little girl’s head, even as she protested, her tiny hands reaching weakly. If I didn’t release my hold on her, one hard snap of the man’s arms, and her neck would be broken. I bit my tongue hard and released the girl.
“Run!” I screamed, scrambling to my feet. “Run!”
The man didn’t spare one glance at me, but instead took off after the girl like a predator after i
ts prey. The girl was weaker, smaller, slower. He would catch her.
I sprinted after the man, hurling rocks at him, but he only went faster. I saw now the deep holes in the back of his neck that told of pain and the insane frenzy that came afterwards.
It was now or never. I had to somehow outrun him if I wanted to save the innocent child’s life—she was depending on me.
I got in front of the man, blocking his way, my head slightly turned so I could still see the girl. “Get away from her,” I snarled and aimed my fist straight at his nose. With a sharp crack, red began leaking from his face. He growled at me, teeth showing.
Then the growl turned into a smile, then a laugh.
The prickling sense that something was wrong made me turn to check on the little girl—my responsibility, the child I was supposed to protect. She had tripped, and a metallic monster with eight vicious blades for legs was on her chest.
I launched myself at her, but there was no way I could get to her in time. Everything seemed to slow down except for the tiny child on the ground and the horrific insect standing triumphantly on top of her.
Then it speared one sharp leg directly into her heart.
She didn’t even have time to turn crazy and start attacking everyone. The spider leapt off her and tried to scuttle away, but not before I brought my shoe down on top of it. Red-hot rage was all that I could feel. I had managed to get the killer only after it had killed.
The little girl was so small, her eyelashes fluttering like newborn butterflies, one chubby hand clutched to her crimson-stained shirt. I knelt next to her and wondered why her face was suddenly so blurry.
“My mumma—” she choked, her eyes fractured. “Where is…?”
“Shhh, sweetheart. You’re going to be okay.” I stroked her face, so warm and full. “You don’t have to worry about anything.” Her armlet glinted with blood, outlining the word Carmen. I cradled her in my arms, rocking back and forth, trying to convince myself that she was only going to sleep. It was nighttime, the stars were out, and we were dozing off to the galaxy’s melody.
Carmen’s tears were silent ones. She looked up at me with those wide eyes, her hand reaching up towards my face. After hovering near my cheek for a while, it fell back to her chest, almost slowly, like a feather falling.
I held Carmen and cried, not caring what else was going on around me. I didn’t hear the screams or the running or the pleas for help.
Her eyes were blue.
~.~.~.~.~
Somebody was pulling me away from Carmen, but I fought them. I kicked and clawed and bit. I wouldn’t leave Carmen’s body to be run over by clacking spiders and stampeding feet.
“Alle! You need to get out of here!” The voice was vaguely familiar, but I didn’t want to figure out who it was.
I twisted out of reach and stood up, readying my fist at whoever dared intrude.
Malchin stood there, shoulders heaving, face streaked with dirt. “Alle, please.”
I swayed, glaring at him, before collapsing to my knees. Malchin scooped me up and started running, but my body stayed limp. My mind stayed limp.
Dirt began to pass overhead, and I saw the roots of plants dangling from the ceiling. A musty, earthy smell overwhelmed my senses to the point where I buried my face into Malchin’s shirt to escape it. There, I could feel his warmth and hear his heartbeat, and I clung to that constant, steady rhythm. It was reliable. It was safe.
Malchin lowered me gently onto a bed of soil, but my head was still bursting with pain. I was supposed to defend Carmen. She was too young and small to fight for herself, so I was supposed to.
And I had failed.
“Where are you going?” I asked, pushing myself up.
Malchin’s hand pressed gently on my shoulder, easing me back down. “Outside.”
“It’s way too dangerous.” My voice was a cracked mess. “Don’t go out there, Malchin. You’ll get killed.” The dirt walls surrounding me turned into Carmen’s honey angel hair, her small body, her chest spouting blood. My fingers laced around Malchin’s wrist, so tight it must have hurt.
“Don’t leave.”
“I have to, Alle. There are others who need help.” He pried my fingers from his wrist and sprinted off through a tunnel that probably led outside.
“Malchin!” My yell was hardly a yell. More like a wail. I thumped the ground hard with my hand, burning with fury. How could he just run off like that when I told him not to?
“Do you need any water?”
I snapped my head towards the speaker, my muscles already tensing to fight, but it was only Clarice’s friend, the lady with hair so pale it was white. Her eyes were still like ice cubes, betraying no expression, but they weren’t cold. Instead, she merely offered me a leaf filled with water.
It must have been plucked from the trees we had outside before everything went to chaos. I accepted the leaf cup and drank, letting the water nourish and energize me.
“Alle, is that right?” the woman asked, sitting back on her heels. I gave her back the empty leaf.
“Yes.” I rubbed my hands against each other, then sighed. “You never told me your name.”
“I am Victoria.” She began smoothing out the slightly damp leaf and then wrapped it around a cut on my leg. I winced as she tightened the bandage and tied it off. Without saying another word, she got up and started giving out more water to the injured and thirsty.
I stared after her for a moment and then scrambled towards the tunnel that Malchin had disappeared into. My anger was fading to be replaced with wrenching grief, but I urged myself forward. I was beginning to understand what Malchin was doing. Somehow, we now had an underground refuge from the silver spiders—whether it had been dug out of desperation or before the attack—and there had to be more survivors. They needed to be brought down here, to safety, away from those infected. Then we could deal with the others, though I didn’t know how we would somehow bring them back from their state of mindlessness.
I sprinted through the tunnel, running one hand against the wall until it was black with dirt. The tunnel came to a slope upwards, which I climbed, and then twisted right. Eventually a hole opened up above my head, letting in fading sunlight.
I could hear screaming and the sounds of the dying and the dead. The blood in my veins was replaced by bile, and I tasted steel in my mouth. There was no way I would allow any more people to die the way Carmen did or the way Sabaa did.
Pulling myself out of the hole, I immediately happened upon a pair of clicking spiders. I stamped the spark out of them and saw a groaning woman crawling on her stomach. She had no wounds from the mind-controlling drones, but if she stayed out here much longer she definitely would.
I ran over to her. “Let’s get you somewhere safe.” My voice was surprisingly steady, not how I expected it would be at all, and the woman followed me to the opening in the ground, where I directed her downwards.
Time was cruel. I helped get a few people to the underground shelter, but more than once, when I started off towards one of the injured, a spider would get there before me and bite into them. More than once, I was too late.
It made me want to scream or throw something, so I took out my anger on as many of the bee-spiders as I could. There were less of them after a while, but before long, the infected outnumbered the injured. Malchin was carrying a child in his arms when he bolted towards me.
“What are you doing out here?” he asked, pulling my wrist. “Get back down there!”
“I’m not going to do that while you’re out doing what matters! I’m helping you!”
Malchin set the child down next to the hole and whispered instructions to him. The boy nodded and took off into the darkness.
I shook off a spider trying to crawl up my shoe and ground my toe into its body. “Are there any more left?”
“Yes. But there are also too many bitten people, and you could get hurt.” He reached out towards me again, but I took a step back.
“I told you,
I’m going to help. Just lead the way.”
There was a moment of hesitation, when Malchin considered me. Then he nodded briskly, and we ran together through the glade, the dusk sky looming overhead.
There was a group of people huddled together in one corner of the Cube. By some miracle, they had been unnoticed for the most part by the spiders and the infected. Malchin got all of them standing up, and I offered a piggy back ride to a toddler whose leg was broken.
“We’re going to have to stay together and stay close,” he said. “Don’t look back. Don’t delay. One moment of time could cost all of us.” He nodded at me. “Let’s go.”
We took off, running as fast as we could. There were no more drones in the sky, but there were still enough of them with legs on the ground. I wasn’t as worried, since we had the advantage of stomping on them, but the bitten people were a whole other problem altogether.
They had noticed us running and were now in a big pack, blocking the way to the hole that led to safety. Adrenaline rushed through my system, speeding up my heart.
Some cracked their knuckles, and some smiled lecherously. Others were making animal noises, and yet others were attacking themselves.
“When I say go,” Malchin said so quietly I had to strain to hear, “start running. The people with us will follow you. I’ll distract these guys.”
Before I had time to react, one of the biggest of the infected, a man with bulging muscles, charged at us. He bellowed hyena sounds, and the rest of his crew dispersed. There seemed to be no order to how they operated—they simply sought to cause damage.
They were lumbering closer and closer, some of them taking strange detours. I was itching to bolt, and it was obvious everyone else wanted to as well. I watched Malchin, but he hadn’t given the word yet.
They were coming closer, so close I could see the whites of their eyes. If Malchin didn’t tell me to escape in exactly four seconds, I was going to run anyways.
A teenage girl with short dark hair was coming at me with her head hanging sideways. She was smiling, but it was a strange smile, and it made me swallow hard.