I keep ruminating over it for a while. I get it why she’s desperate. But we all are. And yet you don’t see us coming up with plans that would get us all killed.
At this point, there’s no visible solution that we might all be keen on. We’re out of options. Everything we can come up with seems hopeless and tiresome. We’re tired of fighting for existence. Why do we have to inconvenience ourselves with this kind of intricacy when our peers are all underneath this satellite or whatever enjoying the normal life.
“I mean, this—“ she tries to come up with the right word, “—thing, has an orbit of its own and it’s rendering around it. We can’t just jump out and expect to fall to the Earth. We need the spaceships.” She tells me mildly this time.
“You think that I don’t know that?” I try to sound just as mild as Zoey this time but somehow fail. “If it were up to me I’d run to the tower right away hop in the nearest spaceship I could find and bring myself to earth. But it’s not that simple.”
“So what? We just wait here?”
“I mean, as for now, that’s not like we have a better plan.” I mumble. “And we need to watch out. They can use the pills to get at you whenever they want.”
There’s a moment of soundlessness on spot.
And then, after a while, a compulsion captivates me, giving me the impulse to do what I do next.
I grab Zoey’s hand.
She gets hold of it.
I can’t explain why this feeling seems so… familiar.
“We’ll find a way out of this.” I try to soothe her.
“I hope so.” She says not so… hopefully.
After that, mumbled shattering sounds could be heard from outside.
22
“What is going on?” Avery asks terrified.
We’re all too afraid to respond but I know we’re on the same page about this.
It’s the crew.
Finally, they’ve managed to find us!
“Just grab a gun, everybody.” I howl. “I don’t know if they’re paying an amicable visit to us.”
They all urge on and grab the nearest gun they can find. I’m shuffling through thoughts and concerns at the moment. Of all the things I thought might happen right now this was the least expected.
And yet there they are. Waiting for us.
I’m just drenching in frustration to know why we are so precious to them.
It’s like they don’t wanna hurt us. Now Andrew was just a way to get at us, but I keep wondering, if they wanted to destroy us, by now, they would’ve.
I mean, there must be something about us.
Something that they value.
We must be valuable to them.
Now I know how egotistic this might sound, but that’s the furthest reasonable explanation I can get at.
“What do we do now?” Colin asks after seems to have grabbed him own gun.
“We wait for a sign.” I say. “They will be the first ones to put highlight to their presence here. They will just wanna let us know.”
They wait quietly. Maybe some of them might contradict my resolution, it’s just that they’re too scared of what’s going to happen next to even say a single word.
Shooting mumbled the atmosphere.
Avery jumped up in expectancy. Zoey holds her.
They all seem scared. And really, how not to? We’re just a bunch of young adults about to fight with a professional posse. How wouldn’t be scared of that?
For the next two minutes, silence captivated all of us.
“Why aren’t they doing anything?” Avery asks scared.
“They’re probably gone.” Colin tries to soothe her.
“Or they’re just thinking of the next horrible attack they’ve got in their agenda.” Carter reasons.
Avery’s eyes sparkles in horror.
After a while we can hear footsteps approaching the interior.
It’s strange ‘cause only the steps of a single person can be heard. Wouldn’t they all barge in and attack by now?
We wait for whoever that person is to show up.
In terror… might I add.
“Just as I imagined it to be.” Says the man, as soon as he shows up in front of us with a huge conceited smile on his face.
Wait.
I know him.
His face sounds so familiar.
It’s Mr. Berkeley.
He must be the head of the crew.
“Now that’s quite a shelter to hide away.” He says.
I cannot bear with his smug smile on his complexion. I want to tear that off of his face.
“Why would you wanna inconvenience yourselves into the wilderness,” he proceeds, “when I offered you all the comfort one could ask for?”
“You call that comfort?” I say distastefully. “Why don’t you better tell us why you kept us all holed up there when earth is not really unlivable as you promised?”
“What makes you think that it isn’t?” he smiles.
Really!
Some nerve this man got.
“You’re here, in the open and still alive. What do you call that?” I ask him.
“Good resolution.” He congratulates me. Really, even being congratulated by this man just feels so disgusting and terrible. “But I figure you already know that this is not the earth we’re currently lodging in to. I gathered just as much.”
“What makes you say that?” I ask him. And soon enough realize what a silly question this was. He might have been knowing everything all along. Having managed to create this alternate world rendering on its own orbit, I wouldn’t put it past him if he’d tracked each move of us till now.
“The looks on your faces. It’s the same look of a person who fears reality.”
Bum.
I thought I was doing good concealing my fear.
For a moment, Mr. Berkeley pores over and takes a look at the terrible juxtaposition of Andrew on the ground.
“So, I see that even as you’re trying to survive in the open and acting all bravely, you still had not managed to not get yourselves hurt.” He talks over.
How dare he talk about Andrew?
He’s the one behind this and still has the never to gabble about it.
“Don’t talk like that about my friend.” I howl at him. His eyebrows raise as though in surprise, though the smirk on his face widens. “I know you did this.”
“Me? What makes you say that?”
What does this man think we are, fools he can poke fun at?
“I just entered the room and saw you after a couple of weeks now.” He proceeds.
“You know. You really have got to have some never showing up here all alone, on enforcements. I could put a bullet on your head right away and not give it a second thought.”
“Would you really?” he smiles and doubts my capability of doing it.
That’s just urging me to do it even more.
‘I wouldn’t be so self-conceited if I were in your position.” I tell him.
“You’d dare think that even when there are a ton of guards outdoors. I don’t think you are that stupid.” He’s just trying to get in my nerves.
I hold the gun with both arms and weight the thought of shooting him. I’m just so startled at myself and the way I’m beginning to think lately. But what can I do? I can’t help it. I know that he deserves it after everything he’s put us to.
“Greyson,” Zoey talks to me softly. “I don’t think that would change anything. Probably it’ll just make things worse.”
I’m trying to not let it get to my head.
Even though it’s hard not to.
She’s just so influenceable in regards to me.
I mean, I don’t want it to be like that. I just can’t help myself. It’s a compulsion.
Ughh.
What was I thinking anyway?
I just cannot believe myself. Even in the middle of these terrible circumstances, Zoey can turn everything to smash and have that effect upon me.
“
Greyson,” Zoey mumbles milder this time.
“You know this can do you no good.” Mr. Berkeley tells me.
“Just shut up.” I tell him, swiveling the gun that I’m holding with both hands. I feel sweat dripping on my forehead. I’m nervous. But then again, anyone in this circumstances would feel just like me.
“You know we can control your friends. This can end up very badly if you do anything stupid.” He keeps talking, making me ponder of these latent events that might take place if I ignore what he’s saying.
But I’m just so miffed, I want to ignore everything that comes out of that man’s mouth.
“Then what do you suggest?” I ask him, disgusted by his presence around.
“You give in to us.”
“Are you crazy? We surrender just like this? Why? So you could do to us whatever you did to Cody?”
“Nothing bad would happen to you.”
“Why should I believe that?”
“Because you don’t know what I’m up to.”
“I know everything you and the crew are after. We know your plans. We know everything you do is up to no good.”
“You seem so determined it makes me wonder, do you really believe what you’re saying? Why do you think we’d wanna do anything bad to any of you?”
Can you believe this man?
He’s telling me that they’re actually trying to save us. That he’s on our side.
Bullshit!
“Then tell me,” I howl. “What did you do to Cody?”
“Why do you thing we did anything to him.”
“Because I saw it. I was there. I witnessed everything. I saw the cruel way how you treated him. I heard him screaming for mercy and you did nothing to help him.”
“I don’t know what you’re talking about.”
The way he keeps treating us like we’re fools is getting me over the edge. I was there. I witnessed everything. I can’t allow to be treated like this.
My heart is beating crazily. My pals are sweating. Hands shaking uncontrollably.
I feel my fingers moving… though I didn’t intend for them to.
I hear a shattering sound that makes you wanna block up year ears with your hands.
I drop the gun and look at the conveyed outcome taking place.
23
“Greyson, what did you do?” Zoey shouts at me.
What did I do?
What did I do?
I look at Mr. Berkeley and see blood coming out of his stomach.
I’m serious I didn’t mean for it to and I know it’s going to be really difficult for us from now on.
Three guards come running and look at the body of Mr. Berkeley. One of them approaches his hand on his mouth and talks to some device. In no time, there are three other people dressed in white that gather around their leader and get his body out of the cave.
After that, the man who controlled the nutcracker thingy makes an appearance.
“I’d suggest you gave up willingly. There’s no way out of this.” He tells us.
What startles me the most throughout all this is how they don’t do anything to hurt us. That just emphasizes my previous thought. We might be really precious to them.
We might be worthy of something.
What I don’t know is if their idea of worthy is reciprocated. And chances are it is not.
While I’m ruminating over these facts I hear another shuttering sound same to the one that infused the room before.
It takes me a while to realize that the man in white is shot twice. I turn around and look at Colin who is holding the gun in his hands. He doesn’t seem to regret what he did.
For some reason, I don’t too.
“Colin.” Zoey shouts.
I just can’t understand her sense of protectiveness when it comes to the crew. All they wanna do is take us down one by one. That is, if we don’t fight them first.
So my question is. Why should we allow ourselves to be taken down like this?
We have to stand up for ourselves. We have to get out of this crazy mess.
The woman who accompanied the man in white who just got shot, grabs a tablet off of his hands and becomes involved to it for the next few seconds.
I’ve just got a bad feeling about this.
And it turns out, my feeling was justified.
I see my friends dropping their guns down and waddling towards the crew.
“Guys, what is going on?” I howl to them.
I know exactly what is going on. I just refuse to believe it.
“Zoey!” I shout. “Colin! Carter!”
It’s worthless.
None of them seems to care.
They’re all ditching me.
What am I supposed to do?
Very soon I remember that I’ve managed to deal with this kind of situations before. I’ve come to realize that they get off this hallucinatory condition, just by being encountered to a shaking impulse that could tremble their senses just as much as to get them back to normal.
I shoot the gun up in the air.
They come to their senses again and are probably asking themselves what they’re doing so close to the crew.
“Zoey,” I ask, worried.
“Greyson?” she turns around to face me. “It happened again?”
I just nod.
She runs at me, and holds my arm in a way that brines up and lot of memories I can’t comprehend precisely.
“What did I do?” I ask her, worried. “She can control you just with a click. I cannot bring you back like this repeatedly. I’ll run out of bullets.”
“Maybe we should just give in. I don’t see a way out of this.”
“Not if we get it over with her.” Colin says and the third shattering sounds fills the room for the day.
We’re kinda becoming immune of the sound now.
The nurse, or whatever, is lying in the ground in no time.
“Why did you do this Colin?” Zoey is so angry at him, somehow, I don’t understand.
“Colin was trying to protect us.” I say, startled by her anger. “He’s not the bad guy here. They are.” I point at the crew. And soon enough I feel stupid for having to show her whose side she should be on.
“You think I don’t know that?” she mumbles. Oh, boy! Now she’s angry at me. “The only thing we’re doing by shooting them down one after one is just making them more irritated. We don’t know what to expect like that.”
“It’s not like we’re to expect anything good, if this didn’t happen anyway.” I shrug.
We hear footsteps approaching from behind the cave.
Other possemen appear.
Boy, this will not end good.
There’s just too many of them.
We don’t have a chance against them even if we decide to fire bullets all along.
All I see for the next couple of minutes is all blurry.
Zoey is looking at me terrified.
Boy, is she beautiful!
One of the guards throws something at our direction.
Mist comes to accrue in the middle of the cave.
Ugh. It smells disgusting.
I want to block my nose with my hand though I’ll still need to breath anyway.
I hear coughing.
I am coughing.
Colin drops down in the ground.
Avery after him.
And Brianne.
I don’t know what happens next.
24
Two months ago
God! He’s so reckless.
I wish I was more like my brother.
He just doesn’t give a hoot about anything other than his own requisiteness. If all his desires and wishes are fulfilled, he wouldn’t just as much as take into consideration the needs of the peers. I look at him and try to snub the view in front of me.
He’s all nestled on the couch, playing some game on the wide screen, legs prompted on the coffee table. If my mother were here this moment, she wouldn’t have appreciated his current juxt
aposition. But to his luck, the house it’s all empty at the moment. It’s just Ethan and I, and let’s be honest, there’s nothing like a little fight with my little bro, but I’m not in the mood right now. My head is just muddled with some strange mail I’ve received an hour ago.
It was the strangest thing ever.
Firstly, I thought there was something wrong with it, or that the postman had misplaced it. But nope! The address and the name were all right. Except the fact that I hadn’t the slightest clue about the entity that had decided to address that to me.
“What is this game?” I ask Ethan, who is still ever so encumbered at the new game he’s currently playing.
“It came in the mail. I think it was addressed to you, or something. It’s just that I didn’t pay much attention to.”
“It’s not cool messing up with my mails.”
“Well, you think I don’t know that? I just saw a game and let’s be honest. You’re not the world’s biggest gamer… ever since a few years ago.”
Well, he’s got a point right there. These last two years I’ve had my head perplexed with all kinds of things. Like varsity, and finals, SATs… Zoey.
So, let’s just say, I’ve had plenty on my plate as it is.
“What’s it about?” I ask, since I’m bored and have got nothing better to do. He makes some space on the couch, as I try to take a seat, and places his feet on the floor right now.
“It’s so cool, man. It’s basically this whole new world, that is basically the Earth’s miniature imitation and it’s lying right above us on its own orbit around our planet.”
“Hmm.” I frown. Nothing until now gives me the heed about it.
“So, we’re fighting against humans and gathering as much high intelligence quotient people to light up this digital tree.” He focuses the game at some bizarre, enchanting nonetheless tree, and my mouth opens and closes like a goldfish.
“What’s the purpose of all this?” I ask.
“Well, I still haven’t figured this one out. I guess it’ll come up at the final levels.”
“What level are you on right now?”
“I just started it. But I’ve completed a couple of missions so far. I guess I’m getting the hang of it better and better.”
Faking Apocalypse (The Apocalyptic Games Book 1) Page 15