by J B Cantwell
“You know they’ll come after you,” I whispered. “Get it together.”
He sniffed as loudly as he dared and wiped the tear from his cheek.
“Thanks,” he said, voice cracking.
“We need to be like her.” I gestured to the seat in front of us. “Like Hannah. Pretend like this is all good and fine.”
Like there was no risk at all. Like we would all survive the next three years.
The way out of the city was treacherous. A series of elevated roads had been built over the past fifty years, but they were slim and difficult to traverse. Elevated trains ran beneath the bridges, speeding off to their destinations. But on top, each vehicle that headed in our direction forced us to pull over to the side to let pass. This made our progress slow as we rode over the places where the sea had taken the land.
The bus ride was long. They hadn’t told us where we were going, but the flooded parts of the land we traveled by were consistently on our left, so I guessed south. Here, unlike underwater Manhattan, the houses were simply stripped away from the land where the ocean had encroached. The only structures left standing out in the water were tall signs advertising hamburgers and gasoline. At the shoreline where the water met the freeway, a layer of debris floated at the edge. It was this that the burning plants collected, year after year, to convert into methane. The original purpose of the trawlers was to simply clean the ocean. That was back when the desire was to save the sea from destruction. But once they had gotten started they pulled in so much debris that those in charge realized we had nowhere to put it all. Gasoline was disappearing, and a thick film of waste blanketed the sky above, making solar energy difficult to collect. It didn’t take long for them to put their heads together and start burning the stuff. It had been originally touted as a solution to the pollution in the sea. The material would burn cleanly, they said. We would save the sea animals, they said. We would live in a cleaner world, they said. They would make sure that any pollution from the plants was handled with the utmost of care.
They said.
Soon enough, the skies were even darker than before. The pools of runoff waste from the plants were not well maintained and frequently burst their boundaries, seeping down into the aquifers and the drinking water. The oceans, cleaner now of debris, didn’t flourish, but died instead from the rising temperatures of the water. Now, eating a creature from the ocean was a rare thing for one to experience, and only the richest in the world could afford a plate of that delicate, flaking meat.
I was surprised, though, as we rumbled along the rough highway. The sea was still somehow beautiful, even though it had been all but destroyed by our ignorance. I had always lived in Brooklyn, never having money to travel anywhere. And where would I have gone with everything in the country so upside down? So I had never seen the ocean any closer than the view of the Hudson allowed, only heard about it from the stories that the old folks who played chess down on the green would tell. They reminisced about the smell of the air, the light stickiness that the humidity would leave on your skin. The way the sand would find its way into every crevice of your body after a long day at the beach.
I gazed out my window, watching the waves roll in again and again, and I couldn’t help but wish that we could stop here for a little while. Just long enough to take a few breaths of sea air. Just to see what it was like. Even the destruction we had created couldn’t be enough to take that pleasure away, could it?
On the other side of the freeway, farms stretched out as far as the eye could see. It was only here, along these stretches of coastal land, that the torrential rains would come, watering the crops and poisoning them at the same time as the clouds forced the acid down from the skies. There was little other choice. Most of the growing lands of the country had been ravaged by drought and were slowly turning into desert wastelands. Good soil was hard to find. Transport, expensive. Water for irrigation, astronomical. It was these things that resulted in so little to eat but for the government sanctioned nutrition squares. We were guaranteed to survive on them, even if every meal had the same gritty texture as the last.
Somewhere past Washington D.C. the bus turned away from the shoreline, and we found ourselves heading inland. There was little to look at here except for barren, open fields bordered by dead trees. Gradually, over the past eighty years, the coastal cities had been hit by immense hurricanes several times a year. The weather was too violent to sustain all but a few lucky farms, though out here there was far less shelter for those who might tend them.
We drove and drove. Occasionally, I slept. But the bus was not comfortable, and it frequently hit potholes left in the ill-repaired highway.
My military-issued watch had helped me keep track of the long hours on the bus, and finally, after nearly eleven hours, we arrived. When we each unloaded, our feet hitting the compacted dirt, nearly all of us stretched out as if we had just woken from a long, satisfying nap. Of course it was not satisfying in the least, but the relief I felt from being outside our moving prison was palpable. I was careful not to drop my pack as I lined up. I looked around at the tired, scared faces.
Maybe Alex is on some other bus. Maybe he’s headed here right now.
But no other buses came.
We would be entering the facility alone.
Chapter Three
It looked like a giant prison. High, red walls bordered the entire base, and only a row of small windows punctured the sides. As we stared at the building, entranced and exhausted, Holt came around to inspect us. I immediately stood at attention, or at least the my version of “attention.” A few others followed suit, but several simply stood, dazed by their trip here and the expectations now put upon them. Somewhere over the acid haze the sun was setting.
“Welcome to Fort Jamison,” he bellowed. “Drop your gear where you stand and line up!”
The twenty of us moved to stand in two lines before the sergeant.
“Two mile run!” he shouted. “The track around the building. Go!”
There was confusion among the recruits as we awkwardly began to jog away from the sergeant in the direction he pointed. Soon, several in the pack began passing the others, clearly trying to prove themselves as the fastest among the group. I felt pressure to follow, but I knew my leg couldn’t handle the sprint. The jog, though. I could do the jog all day, even in my heavy, military-issued boots.
After the first lap around, some of the show-offs began to slip back, wheezing to catch their breath, holding their stomachs where running cramps had taken hold.
“GO, GO, GO!” bellowed Holt.
I picked up my pace, blood pumping and heart racing from the sergeant’s command.
Faster. Don’t fall back.
But halfway around the second lap, I did fall back. The pain in my leg was starting to throb, and though I tried to keep myself in the middle of the pack, one by one they pulled away from me. I pushed as hard as I dared without showing the injury. What was better? Coming in last or showing my weakness? I couldn’t decide, and my mind fought to find middle ground.
The world began to blur, and the only sounds that made it into my ears were those of Holt yelling at us to get moving. Up ahead, the recruits that had finished their sprints were bent over, faces red, sweat pouring. I wanted to look behind me. Should I do it? What if I found nobody there?
Finally I crossed the finish line, and Holt clicked his watch. Only two came in after I did. One, a scrawny looking boy with white skin and dark eyebrows. The second, that same beefed up boy I had seen during recruitment. “Blondie” I had called him. I guessed he had spent all his workout time on his muscles instead of his staying power.
I stood, hands on my hips, breathing heavily. But there was no break.
“Everybody down!” yelled Holt. “Push-ups. Two minutes!”
We fell to the ground with varying amounts of gumption. This, I could do. Or at least I had done enough push-ups in the past several months that I felt at least slightly prepared for the task.
“Sit ups!”
I sat back, and the blood rushing to my arms made me lightheaded. My legs were jelly. My arms exhausted. I laid back onto the pavement and could barely move at all. I put my hands behind my head and did my first sit-up.
One. Two. Three.
I moved up from the ground again and again, trying with all my might to keep my feet still and planted on the pavement.
Holt walked among us, at once staring at the stopwatch in his hand and inspecting every recruit under his charge.
“That’s it!” he cried.
I slumped back to the ground, my entire body spent. As I looked around, several of the recruits had already gotten up to retrieve their packs. Something had been nagging me all day. I didn’t want to be the last in the pack. I knew what happened when you were the last one chosen for the team. If I wanted these people to watch my back, to give me respect, I had better earn it now before it was too late.
I climbed quickly to my feet, grabbed my pack and stood in the line that was now forming. Us not-yet-soldiers were beginning to understand. Backs straight. Muscles tensed. Ears open. Eyes ahead.
“1800 chow!” Holt called once we were back inside.
The building smelled musty and old.
“You’ll have ten minutes to drop your things and get in line.”
We were led down a narrow corridor and deposited into a room with thirty beds. The sound of the heavy metal door closing and locking sent chills down my spine. There were no windows in this place. No way out.
We scrambled.
I noticed that Lydia was already making her bed with the stiff, scratchy sheets we had been given. Of course she’d been through all of this before when she had been a Red. She knew what to expect. She had the upper hand.
I chose a cot off to one side of the room and was relieved when Hannah took the bed right next to mine. She shimmied across her mattress like a snake in a tree.
“What’d ya think, Pink?” she asked. Hannah had been toward the beginning of the pack during the run. I didn’t know how well she had done at the push ups or sit ups.
I shrugged. “I’m not sure.”
I looked back at the door and shuddered. My left hand rubbed my thigh absently. The sharper pains had stopped, but the dull throbbing remained. I hoped we wouldn’t be running any footraces tomorrow. If we just stayed at a jog, I’d be alright.
“What about you?” I asked. I had unearthed my sheets and started on the bed.
“It sucked. But I guess it’s not supposed to be fun, is it?”
We both made our beds as neatly as we could and then, when the clock read 1800, the door to the room clicked open automatically. We followed Sergeant Holt down the hallway toward dinner.
But when we entered the room, it wasn’t dinner that caught our attention. A huge viewscreen was mounted on the far wall. Upon it was a list of names. Twenty of them, to be exact. But just our names appearing on the screen wasn’t the problem. To the left of each name was a number, and to the right of each name was a new designation. I read through the list.
Recruit Andrew Anderson
Designation: Infantry
35
Recruit Lydia Davis
Designation: Infantry
59
Recruit Hannah Murphy
Designation: Specialty Infantry
78
Recruit Marie Harris
Designation: Burn
15
My stomach rolled over as I realized what “Burn” meant. The Service could send us anywhere, ask anything of us, demand that we do any job they say.
Even work at the burning plants.
Horrified, I looked for my own name, finding it just five up from the bottom, one above the word “Burn.”
Recruit Riley Taylor
Designation: Infantry
45
My stomach clenched as I realized what this board meant. It would calculate up our totals as each day’s tests were completed. In the end, whoever was left at the bottom would serve out their term at the burning plants. And whoever was at the top … well, they might have it a little easier compared to the rest.
Right now, I was just barely hanging onto the bottom rung of “Infantry.” It was a designation I might have expected, but it suddenly felt as if I were being dangled over a pit full of crocodiles.
I couldn’t go to the Burn.
I won’t.
I took my food from the line and walked in a daze to the table where Hannah sat with Joshua. I finally noticed that a change had occurred in my lens as well. It now read the designations that were dictated by that viewscreen.
Recruit Joshua Dane
Designation: Burn
19
I sat down beside him, suddenly feeling a lot less scared for myself and a lot more scared for him. Hannah seemed oblivious.
“It’s just how it goes,” she said, ladling the same mushy entree from the night before onto one of her nutritional squares.
“It was the first day,” I said, staring blankly down at my own food. “We have weeks to prove ourselves.” I was talking as much to myself as I was to Joshua.
“Don’t worry about it, kid,” Hannah said, mouth full to bursting. She shoved his tray at him until the edge of it rested against his shirt. “Eat,” she said. “You did the run just like the rest of us. If you’re not fueled up for tomorrow, you’ll regret it.”
I heeded Hannah’s advice and took a spoonful of the mash.
“It’s a lot better with some salt on it,” she said, passing over a small container.
“Thanks.” I tipped the shaker over and applied a healthy serving of salt to the mash.
I took the first tentative bite and was surprised that it wasn’t nearly as disgusting as I had feared. The mash at the recruitment center had been gloppy with a slimy sort of texture, but this was more like sticky rice. It was flavorless, but at least it wasn’t revolting.
Now that we were done with the day, the long ride on the bus, the unexpected workout out front, I found that I was starving. Soon I was shoving in mouthful after mouthful of mash, washing it down with water that tasted slightly of chlorine. I sat back, feeling quite full, and took one of the nutrition squares that sat at the top of my tray.
“Joshua, eat,” I instructed. “It’s not so bad.”
He took a square and nibbled a corner of it. I did the same with mine. Just like the mash, it wasn’t gross. It had almost a sweet flavor, and I recognized it from our grocer at home as the cheapest type of square you could buy. As I ate it, it filled in the rest of the empty spaces in my stomach until I was so full I had to stop.
Joshua hadn’t touched his mash, but by the end of the meal he had eaten both of his squares.
A harsh bell sounded, signaling that the meal was over. Holt stood at the exit, watching us all as we filed through the line, clearing off our plates and putting them on the conveyor belt that led to the kitchen.
In a single line, he led us back to our sleeping quarters. Now that the day was through, we would be allowed personal time for the next two hours before lights out.
As we walked, I noticed another group of recruits up ahead of us, the young men much larger in stature compared to those in my unit. My heart leapt in my chest as I searched the sea of bald heads for Alex. Their leader had taken a left down a different hallway, and as we caught up with the group, I finally found him.
“Alex!” I cried, not daring to speak over more than a whisper.
I forgot everything for a moment. The food. The run. The destruction we had seen on our way to this strange base.
I ran for him and grabbed him around the middle, only looking at his face long enough to make sure I was huggi
ng the right person.
“Riley?” he asked.
He put his hands on my shoulders and pushed me away so he could stare into my face.
“Is that really you?”
“Yes,” I croaked, trying not to cry.
He glanced around the hallway. The lines were disappearing fast, each sergeant now inside the bunk rooms.
“Oh, my God,” he said, hugging me again. “When I got through and didn’t see you I thought maybe you’d gone home.” I pulled back, and his face held both disappointment and relief. “Are you okay?”
“Yeah, I’m fine,” I lied.
“Your face looks …”
“Yeah, I know,” I said, well aware of the huge green bruise that covered my whole left cheek. “I’m so glad you’re here.”
He looked over his shoulder. The last of the recruits in his group was entering their bunk room. “We have to go.”
The line of recruits on my side was already gone.
“Tomorrow,” he said.
“Where?”
“I’ll figure something out. Now go.”
He pushed me away from him, toward my bunk room door as he turned and sprinted for his own.
I wanted desperately to follow him. Seeing him had made me realize how terrifying the past two days had been. I had been holding my own up until that moment. But seeing the face of my best friend, more like family than anyone I had ever known, tore me apart.
I raced for the bunk room, grateful that the sergeant had led us from the front of the line instead of following behind. I slinked through the door, trying to dry my eyes, to make it look as if nothing unusual had happened since we’d left chow.
As I made my way to my cot, my mind raced. Why hadn’t we been mixed in with the other group? Surely there were enough beds in here, or at least space to fit several more.
Alex. Seeing Alex was like salve on my wounds. The beating. The rejection. The snide remarks from that idiot Lydia.