Famished

by Lauren Hammond

  Mr. Baker pried himself away from my father’s grasp. “You’re going to regret this! All of you! I can promise you that!”

  It wasn’t until that moment that I stepped forward and tapped Mr. Baker lightly on the shoulder. He faced me, his breathing heavy, teeth grinding and his fists balled up. Reaching into my back pocket, I pulled out the piece of paper with my name, grabbed his palm, pried open his fingers and slapped the piece of paper down.

  Mr. Baker, knowing what the piece of paper was, closed his fist around it, crumbled it up and dropped it on the ground. And then, I leaned in, my lips right next to his ear and whispered, “That was for the Vickers girl.”

  Chapter 19: A Kept Promise Isn’t Always Best

  Until the daybreak, and the shadows flee away, I will get thee to the mountain of myrrh and to the hill of frankincense.~ Song of Solomon 4 1:6

  Owen told me to meet him in the middle of the mess hall at 11:00 pm. I was there five minutes early, pacing back and forth across the floor, in the darkness. I had faith in Owen. He made me a promise and according to him, he wasn’t the type to break a promise that he’d made.

  There were so many questions I had that I felt needed answered. Owen, was my only hope if I ever wanted to hear those answers. He knew things—secretive things—about the cannibals, the colonists, and Monica Vickers’s death. He’d told me that he wasn’t responsible for killing her. I didn’t think Owen was lying, because if he were, then I would have wound up dead too. In the end, I didn’t think anything would go back to normal until Owen filled me in on some of the things I needed to know.

  One thing I knew for certain, was the we, the colonists and myself, were like lab rats in a cage, always being monitored, every one of our movements carefully documented. And the worst part of all of it, none of us knew that the monitoring was going on. We walked around blindly, assuming that we were lucky to be alive, while the rest of the human population rotted and withered away.

  At least if I was starving to death, I’d still have my freedom. I’d probably die a horrible and no doubt painful death, but no one would be peeping in on me, tracking my every movement, and at the end, I’d finally be at peace.

  I’d seen helpless starving people before, in the streets of the city, during the beginning stages of The Great Famine. Most of the inhabitants had only gone weeks without eating, yet they knew what the future held for them. They hit their knees, begging and pleading with hopelessness in their eyes for someone to come along and put them out of their misery. They’d rather have someone blow their brains out than live through the devastation of pestilence and famine.Sometimes, I thought that way too, but not now, not anymore.

  Giving up was way too easy. I’d fought out the last two years, starving, overcoming obstacles, and watching people die. And even though it hurt to see the human population, especially the children, fade away, it made me stronger as a person and it made me want to keep fighting.

  The minutes began to dwindle down. First, there were five, then four, now only three minutes remained until it was eleven o’clock. Mid-pace, I stopped and squinted up at the ceiling as my eyes adjusted to the blackness. I was anticipating the lift coming down through the center of the mess hall, even fabricating the illusion of the sound it made in my mind.

  An eerie silence crept up on me like a venomous cobra with its back arched, preparing to strike it’s victim. I couldn’t even hear the sound of my own breathing because I was pretty sure that I hadn’t breathed for an entire minute. That led me to believe that even though I still had time left until eleven o’clock, that maybe Owen was going back on his word.

  Now it was one minute to eleven o’clock and I was really beginning to worry. The last time I saw Mr. Baker, the rage inside of him was clawing at his insides, eating him alive. What if he showed up and did something terrible to Owen? The sound of his earlier slap echoed in my head. “Oh, no,” I gasped. What if he killed him?

  After what Mr. Baker did to Monica, and what he tried to do to me, I wouldn’t have put it past him. I imagined that he was in an extremely bad mood after everything that went down at the council meeting. I, in particular, enjoyed the last few words I’d shared with him and the look on his face that accompanied those words.

  I had no regrets in exposing myself to him in those final seconds. Even though he assumed I was the one that switched the ballots, he would have never known for sure until I mentioned it to him. I might have set myself up for some kind of act of revenge, but I doubted that. And even if I did, I felt like somebody owed it to Monica Vickers to bring her murderer to justice. Thankfully, justice was served out properly at my hand.

  Wherever Monica was, I hoped that she was somewhere smiling and happy. I hoped that she could move on knowing that her death had been avenged.

  It was officially eleven o’clock. Still no Owen. I resorted to sitting down, on the floor, Indian style. Silently, I told myself that I would wait until 11:05 and not a minute later. If Owen didn’t show up, I could kiss any answers to any questions that I may have had goodbye. “Please come, Owen. Please.”

  To pass the time, I swirled my finger around on the concrete floor, thought about tomorrow, and thought about Owen and his stunning, violet eyes. In the two years that our colony had been established, we’d never cast anyone out before, The Baker family would be the first.And even though I despised Mr. Baker, it was still going to be difficult for me to watch him and his family being escorted from the colony.

  Also, the fact that I would probably never see Owen again haunted me. He did trick me, let me believe he was a flesh-eating monster ready to devour me at a moment’s notice, but in my short time knowing him, I’d grown fond of the guy who I could now call my savior. If it wasn’t for him, I’d be walking around with a censor inside of my brain, my every movement being tracked.

  And….

  If it wasn’t for Owen, I’d most likely be dead.

  Whenever I thought about death, I always wound up frightened. Death was final. There was no coming back from it. Even living in the kind of world where people dying every day was the norm, death was still a tough subject to think about.

  At four minutes to eleven, I’d given up on Owen. The dutiful part of me wanted to wait another five minutes, but the logical part of me consumed the dutiful part and swallowed it whole. As much as I hated to admit it, Owen was a no-show. He wasn’t coming.

  Getting to my feet, even though I knew what was best, walking out of the mess hall was difficult for me. I struggled taking those first few steps to the open doorway. I had no closure, and without closure I’d never be able to move I’d with my life. I’d constantly be asking myself ‘what if?’

  I dragged my feet against the cement, shuffling and scuffing them, trying to detain myself a little bit longer. At the open doorway, I glanced over my shoulder into a pit full of darkness as the depressed feeling that began in my heart swept over my entire body. Then, I began walking back to my room.

  It wasn’t until I was half-way down the hall that I heard a noise. A soft, vibrating noise that hummed, like a motor in a brand new car. I pivoted around. I didn’t see anyone following me. There were no footsteps, no shadows against the walls. The humming sound intensified. “Where is that coming from?” Perhaps it was a stupid idea for me to investigate, but with Mr. Baker and his family departing tomorrow, I felt like I had nothing to fear.

  The humming sound started to putter as I moved toward the mess hall. I took small, slow steps easing myself forward. Then, when I reached the open doorway and peeked around the wall, Owen shined a flashlight in my eyes, a radiant smile on his face, violet eyes gleaming in the afterglow of the dim lighting.

  I rushed toward him, beaming and elated. Relief washed over me when I got closer and was able to gaze into his eyes. “You’re here!” I half-shouted, half-whispered. “I thought something happened to you.”

  Letting out a controlled, hushed laugh, he extended his arms to me and pulled me up on to the lift. He wrapped his right arm arou
nd my waist and held it tightly to his body. Then, he hit a button on the lift and we started going up, up into the ceiling.

  Hugging him tightly, I never wanted to let go. An overwhelming sense of warmth and safety flourished throughout me and I knew I could trust him. He hit another button on the lift and spun me around to face him. He brushed my hair off of my shoulders, leaned down into my ear, and whispered, “See, like I said before, I never break my promises.”

  Chapter 20: Something Wicked This Way Comes

  For now we see through a glass, darkly; but then face to face: now I know in part;but then shall I know even as also I am known ~Corinthians 1:13

  The lift jolted to a stop in between floors. I stumbled forward and Owen caught me, steadying my stance. “Easy there,” he said, softly.

  Once I got a firm hold on my balance, I looked at him puzzled. “Why did you stop the lift? Aren’t we going up to the control room?”

  He shook his head. “I don’t have much time and we can’t go up there. Mark is there. He’stearing all of the stuff down because he’s leaving tomorrow.”

  I frowned. “What do you mean, you don’t have much time?”

  “I’m leaving in thirty minutes.”

  “What?” I screeched. The sound of my voice filled the narrow, confined space.

  Owen lifted his finger to his lips. “SHHH! Do you want Mark to hear you?”

  At that moment, Mr. Baker was the least of my concerns. My first and major concern was the fact that I might never see Owen again. “Do you know where you’re going?” Perhaps it wouldn’t be too far. If it wasn’t that far, then that would make us being able to see each other doable.

  His violet eyes pierced my chocolate ones, full of uncertainty. “I don’t know. I just know that Mark made it clear to me that wherever he goes I have to follow.”

  The last sentence he spoke made me furious. Where was his free will? Did he always intend on being Mr. Baker’s little puppet? And did he honestly think that he wouldn’t be doing the same kind of things somewhere else as he did here? “Do you always do what he tells you?” I asked, crossing my arms and tapping my foot.

  He smiled, seductively. “Not always. I kept you alive didn’t I?”

  I blushed. “Yes.” The sight of his smile always made my heart flutter—like the exciting feeling a kid would get when they got a present they had been longing for. “But, he treats you so badly. And on top of that, he’s an evil, evil man.”

  Owen looked down and took both of my hands in his. He gently brushed his thumb against my skin and spoke sweetly, “I’m not going to disagree with you on that.” He lifted his head and looked into my eyes. “But, I’ve known Mark Baker for years and

  he does have some redeeming qualities.”

  “Ha!” I spat out. “Like what?”

  He smirked. “Do you know that I’m a child prodigy? I graduated high school when I was twelve years old. College at seventeen with my Masters in technology and PhD at eighteen in Nuclear medicine.”

  He traced my jaw line with the tip of his finger. “I’m sure you’d believe it if I told you Mark Baker didn’t raise chickens for a living.” Oh, I definitely believed that. There was no way Mr. Baker’s obsession with control and tyrannical ways came from raising chickens. “He and I worked together for the government on a string of top secret projects. And everyone in our division had an alias lifestyle. Me, I was a pizza boy.”

  I laughed. “You can’t be serious.”

  He nodded. “Would you expect your neighborhood pizza boy as a secret government official?”

  “No. Not at all.” I tried to picture my neighborhood pizza boy. His name was Barry, he always smelled like stale cigarettes, and he always had this dumfounded look on his face.

  Owen went on. “After the asteroid hit, and the earth and human population slowly began to die, I was left without a home, without food, and without hope—just like a lot of others who, unfortunately, are now bones lining the sides of the road.

  “Then, one day Mark Baker found me, sick and dying of starvation, lying on the side of the road. And he took me in. He promised to keep me fed and alive, as long as I helped him with some of the things he wanted me to do.”

  In that moment, I felt for him, I did, but there are some things a person shouldn’t agree to, whether they are rotting from starvation or not. “Owen, do you know what you’re doing? If you’re as smart as you say you are, you’d see that whether he saved you or not, what you’re doing for him is wrong. It’s criminal!” Placing both of my hands on his shoulder blades, I looked him dead in the eye. “How many more people have to die for loyalty?”

  He rolled his shoulders, pulling away from me. “I don’t expect you to understand.”

  I furrowed my brow. “What’s that supposed to mean?”

  “It means that you’re one of the lucky ones. You live trapped in this little bubble of a society, eating every day, two or three times a day. I’ve seen people bite off their own fingers to feed themselves. I’ve felt my organs shriveling up inside of me because of my lack of nourishment. I’ve felt my bones through my skin while my exterior wasted away.”

  I glared at him incredulously. “Do you mean to tell me, that you think I haven’t witnessed or felt the devastation of The Great Famine?”

  “You haven’t.”

  “You don’t know anything,” I growled. My mind instantly reverted back to those two little boys, the ones who cried day and night for their mother. I gulped hard, trying to erase the thought. “I’ve seen a lot more than you think I have Owen Sanders, and I can tell you this, I’d rather starve to death with my dignity than live with a belly full of food doing someone else’s dirty work.”

  Owen narrowed his eyes. “You say that now, but have you ever starved?”

  “I’ve gone days without eating,” I shot back.

  “That’s not what I’m talking about.”

  “Well, then,” I said sarcastically. “Enlighten me, genius.”He bit his upper lip and shook his head. “Starving to death is a slow, torturous, and agonizing process. First, every ounce of fat and muscle on your body melts away. You become someone different, someone you didn’t think you could be, snapping at people, resorting to violence, and losing your sanity. Then, your skin cracks from dehydration and you develop multiple diseases because your body is so weak that your immune system fails to fight them off.

  “Finally, your organs begin to shut down. One. By. One. If you’re lucky you’ll die after the first one goes. If not, you’ll be forced to endure weeks of pain—like the intestines being ripped from your body whole.” My mouth dropped open and I gawked at him. Nobody had ever fully explained it to me that way. “I’ve been there,” he went on. “I’ve been on death’s doorstep. And I can name at least a hundred other people who have done exactly what I did. Hell, they would have done exactly what I did to lick the crumbs off someone’s plate. So forgive me for choosing life instead of an agonizing death.”

  I shook my head. Even though I thought that maybe, he made the right decision time. There was no excuse for him still doing everything Mr. Baker commanded him to. “How long do you think Mr. Baker is going to keep you around, knowing that you’re letting the people he wants killed, go? Owen, that is something you really have to think about. Are you willing to murder another human being—an innocent human so that you can eat? And if you say yes that would be the most sad, pitiful, and selfish thing that I’ve ever heard.”

  He looked down at his hands. “Well, technically, I’m not the one who’ll be doing the killing.”

  “Owen,” I snapped.

  He shrugged. “I wouldn’t. Mark controls all of the cannibals in this area.”

  I couldn’t believe that he was still trying to….

  Wait…. “What?”

  “Mark controls all of the cannibals in this area,” he repeated.

  “What do you mean ‘controls’ them?”

  “He operates them. He put computer chips in their brains that allows him to c
ontrol them.”

  This was startling news. And I couldn’t stomach it. I was starting to feel queasy. I didn’t want him to tell me anymore. Every time he revealed something new felt like a bomb going off inside of me. “Are you trying to say that the cannibals aren’t real?”

  “Oh, no, don’t get me wrong, they are definitely real. I’ve seen the real ones up close. But the ones around here, yeah, they are like cyborgs. Mark used to operate them from the control panel upstairs.”

  “He controls who they eat?”

  “Well, most of the time. The chip in their brain can be turned on and off from the control panel, but Mark is the only one who knows the code. He would never tell me what it was.”

  “The ones you were with?”

  “Yes.”

  The next question was stuck in my throat. I almost didn’t want to ask it at all, then, suddenly, I blurted out, “Did they kill Monica? Did Mr. Baker make them kill Monica?” I flinched, expecting him to say yes quickly.

  “No. They didn’t.”

  “But she is dead, right? And she was killed.”

  Owen nodded. “Yes to both. She is dead and she was killed, but not by the cannibals.”

  “Then by who?”

  “One of the decayed ones.”

  “No…..” I cupped my hands over my mouth when I thought of Monica enduring hours of torture, her limbs being hacked away, before she was finally eaten alive. “That can’t be.” I almost wanted him to say that a cannibal consumed her. At least then I knew she would have been given a merciful death. “Are you sure?”

  “Positive.”

  “How can you be sure?”

  Owen looked away from me and didn’t meet my gaze. “You don’t want to know.”

  “I do, though.”

  “No you don’t.”

  Part of me wanted to know and part of me didn’t. What if it was too gruesome for me to handle? What would I say to her family? I already had to tell them that their daughter didn’t just disappear, I had to tell them that she had been murdered. “Just tell me, Owen.” Better that I found out sooner rather than later.