by Jamie Davis
“I think Charlie went to the bathroom or something. He wasn’t there when I came downstairs just now.”
“Hey, Charlie,” the guard called past Cass for his partner. “Are you out there?”
His eyes narrowed when he got no answer. Cass wasn’t nearly close enough to make this work, but she had to try. He was already getting suspicious. Cass charged at the guard, running around the side of the island countertop, bringing her arm up in a wild, roundhouse swing at his head the way she had against the first guard.
Unfortunately, this guy was prepared for her attack. His suspicious nature paid off for him and he quickly reached out with one arm to block the incoming blow. He used some sort of fancy maneuver with his free hand and before Cass knew what happened, he’d disarmed her. He threw the trophy to the floor behind him while holding her wrist in an iron grip with one hand. His fingers squeezed hard, grinding the bones in her wrist together.
“Ouch, you’re hurting me.”
“What do I care. You’re not even human anymore so how do I even know you feel pain? You’re just a damned sub. What did you do to Charlie?”
“Charlie’s taking a little nap, that’s all. Maybe he’ll wake up and then again maybe he won’t.”
Her snarky answer earned her another painful squeeze on her wrist. The strength in his grip felt like he could snap the bones in Cass’s arm just by twisting his hand.
“Stop it, that’s enough. I won’t try to get away, I promise.” Cass hissed her words through gritted teeth as she tried not to cry out. There was still a chance she could get away, but only if she kept from waking up the rest of the family. Somehow, Cass had to break away from this guy and make a run for it.
“I see you eyeballing the door girlie-girl. You can’t get away because we have all the doors locked and monitored. Right now, you’re going to come over here and sit down while I handcuff you to this chair.”
He hauled Cass over to one of the kitchen barstools. The guard sat her down on one of them and brought her hands down to her side. A few seconds later, he clapped something cold and metal around her wrist and she felt it click shut and ratchet closed till it was tight against her skin. He slipped the other end of the handcuff through the rungs in the back of the chair, then attached it to her other wrist so that she was bound not just with her arms behind her back, but also secured to the chair itself.
“Ouch, you’re hurting me again.”
“Shut up. I have to go check on Charlie. You stay here.”
Cass didn’t have a choice. The bar stools were made of cast-iron and were very heavy. Even if she could manage to pick up the stool she was cuffed to, she wouldn’t get very far out of the house with it before she was caught. Cass tugged and pulled at the painful tightness of the handcuffs, but it was no use. Her plan had failed. It was over.
Chapter 25
A small noise behind Cass drew her attention. Her mother came into the room from the doorway leading to the driveway.
“Cassie, what are you doing up?”
Cass’s anger made her lose all pretense of being up for innocent reasons. “What do you think I’m doing, Mother. I’m trying to get away before you all kill me tomorrow.”
Her mom came over to Cass and bent down on the other side of the island, picking up the trophy.
Cass’s mom shook her head. She glanced up as the guard reentered the kitchen.
“Oh, hello ma’am. I’m glad you’re up. Your daughter here injured my partner and I have to call in to have back up come and replace him. We have orders to maintain two people here at all times.”
“Not a problem at all. I’m sorry she did that. Apparently, she used this.” Cass’s mom held up the trophy as the other guard nodded.
“Yes, she tried to hit me with it, too. If you hold onto it for a little bit, I probably should get it as evidence. Mr. Cantwell will want to know what she did.”
Her mom smiled and nodded. “No problem at all. Go ahead and make your call. I’ll go and put it in the other room by the door. That way, you won’t forget it.”
The guard nodded thanks and started tapping something on his phone before holding it up to his ear to make the call.
What happened next caught Cass completely by surprise. As soon as the guard turned away from her mother, she raised the trophy overhead and brought it crashing down on the back of the man’s neck. He fell to his knees, knocked down but definitely not knocked out. The guard twisted around to try and grab the weapon from her.
Her mom dodged his initial attempts to grab the trophy and swung two more times, hitting him in the back of the head and on the shoulder. She kept swinging repeatedly as the man crumpled on the far side of the island from where Cass sat. After the guy disappeared, the only thing Cass could see was her mother swinging the trophy again and again and again.
Her mother finally stopped and set the trophy down on the countertop, now covered in splatters of blood. Some of the splatters covered her face, too.
Her mother’s satisfied smile beaming amidst the blood dripping down her cheeks was an image Cass wouldn’t soon forget. “I don’t think he’ll be bothering us anymore. I’d slipped sleeping pills into their midnight snacks, but this’ll work, too.”
Cass’s mom gave her daughter another half-smile and bent down again, disappearing behind the counter. She puttered around out of sight for a few seconds, then stood up, holding the guard’s keys in her hand.
Moving behind Cass, it took her mom a few tries, but she eventually found the one that opened the handcuffs. Cass pulled her arms back in front of her and massaged her sore wrists.
“Come on, Cass. We have to hurry. There’s a narrow window of time before the next set of guards gets here to take over and by then, I need to be back in the house in bed.”
Cass stared at her mother, trying to understand what was happening.
“Cass, get up and follow me. Don’t freeze up now. We can’t stay here, sweetie. We have to get you out.”
“Out?”
“Yes, out. Now, come on. We don’t have much time.”
Her mom reached out and grabbed at Cass’s hand, dragging her towards the kitchen door. Cass shuffled along behind her mother, still unsure of what was going on. Her mother hadn’t said more than five words to her at a time since discovering the truth about her implants. Now, her mom led Cass outside as if she was trying to help her escape. It didn’t make any sense.
Her mom pushed Cass into the front passenger seat of the car before moving around to the driver’s side. “We have to hurry before anyone finds out you’re gone.”
As her mother climbed in behind the wheel and started the car, Cass asked, “Mom, what are you doing?”
“I’m getting you away from here. I can’t let them hurt you anymore. I hate that you have that thing in your head, but I’m not going to let them kill you, or worse, leave you only half alive. At least this way, I know you’ll have a fighting chance and maybe even manage to get away.”
Cass sat in the front seat staring straight ahead, her mind swimming through a sea of emotions as her mother backed the car out of the driveway. Until this moment, she was sure her mother had disowned her and stopped caring about her at all.
They drove through the darkened streets of the enclave, until they reached an area of the walled enclosure on the opposite side of the compound from their home. It was near the doctor’s office and the enclave market. It was nowhere near the entrance to the community.
“Mom, what’s over here? Shouldn’t we go out the main gate?”
“No, too many cameras there. I also wouldn’t put it past Simon Cantwell to have someone watching the front gate at night for an escape. Plus, his guards moved from the motel in town to stay on cots in the Rec Center. They’re too close to the entrance for comfort if we get stopped for any reason.”
Her mom pulled the car up behind some buildings near the tall, concrete enclosure wall. It was topped with coils of barbed wire.
Her mom got out and motioned for
Cass to follow her. “There’s a hole in the camera system over here that hasn’t been repaired for some time. The enclave doesn’t have the funds it used to have and a lot of the security cameras, while due for replacement, haven’t been upgraded.”
“How do you know all this?”
“Cadence’s mom, Maisy. She knows everything her husband does with security around here. She happened to let it slip a while ago that the cameras at this end of the enclave weren’t working. She joked about how easy it would be for someone to sneak in and rob the stores and offices here.”
Her mom pointed up to the wall above them. “Anyone going over the wall here won’t be seen at all, especially if they cover their tracks.”
“What about my implant and the firewall?”
“It’s all supported by the camera system. The cameras are down, so the wireless signal repeaters for the firewall are down as well.” Her mom smiled in the darkness. “Maisy really talks too much.”
Cass looked up. The wall around the enclave was at least eight feet tall here and that didn’t count the barbed wire. Cass wasn’t sure how she was going to get over it.
“Mom, do you have a ladder or something?”
“No, but the others do.”
Her mom pulled her phone from her pocket and tapped a message onto it then stood waiting for an answer. A few seconds later, there was the ping of an incoming message on her mom’s phone accompanied by a noise from the far side of the wall. Something scraped along the opposite side of the concrete from where they stood.
The scraping continued until a minute later, a figure wearing all black appeared in the darkness atop the wall climbing up from the outside. The newcomer reached out to the sharpened wire coils and tugged at them. They had a tool of some sort in their hand. Cass was so stunned at the speed with which all of this was happening, she didn’t even think to dial in her ocular implant to see better in the darkness.
The person on the other side of the wall worked for several more seconds until they managed to cut an opening in the wire. They slid the coils back in both directions far enough to leave a gap big enough for a person to climb through.
Her mom moved forward towards the base of the wall. “Come on, Cassie. We have to hurry before we’re spotted. I’ll help you climb up.”
Her mother bent down to form a stirrup with her interlaced fingers. Cass placed her foot in it and put her hands flat against the wall to steady herself as she prepared to step up and reach for the top.
The shadowy figure above her had their sweatshirt hood pulled up. It obscured their face at first. It wasn’t until the familiar metal hand extended down from the top of the wall to help pull her up that Cass realized who it was.
“Shelby? Is it really you?”
“In the flesh, roomy. Come on. Grab my wrist. Your mom’s right. We don’t have much time.”
Cass turned to her mother. “You called her? But how?”
“I have my ways. I used to be pretty good at cybersecurity myself before I met your father. Once we got together and you girls were born, I stopped working. I’ve tried to keep my skills up over the years, even though I don’t work anymore. It was hard to track her down, but I managed it.”
Shelby had pushed her hood back and Cass could see her face now. She smiled down at her girlfriend. “Smart women think alike, Cass. Your mom helped us avoid the Sapiens First hit squad that was sent after us and brought us here to get you.”
Her mom smiled and gestured at Shelby on the wall above them. “I never thought I would use my old skills for something like this, but I’m glad I stayed current on things.”
Cass reached out and pulled her mother close in a tight embrace. Her mother returned the hug, stroking her hand down the back of Cass’s head like she used to when Cass was little.
After a few seconds, she released her daughter. “Come on, I’ll give you a boost and Shelby can pull you up the rest of the way. I have to get the car back to the house before they know you’re gone. The longer we can keep them guessing, the better.”
She bent over, cupping her hands together again so that Cass could get a boost up to the top of the wall.
Cass stepped into her mother’s hands and pushed up with her leg while her mom lifted. Cass reached out for Shelby’s extended hand coming down from the top. She grasped the familiar warm metal appendage and held on.
Her mother lifted higher from below while Shelby pulled from the top. Soon Cass scrambled through the narrow gap in the wire until she’d straddled the top of the wall. A stepladder sat propped against the outside of the wall next to a small, white minivan.
Shelby leaned forward from where she sat atop the wall and hugged Cass.
“I can’t believe it’s really you, Shel. It’s like a dream.” Cass paused and squeezed Shelby tight. “I’m sorry about your parents.”
Shelby released the embrace and nodded to Cass as she leaned back. “We can talk later. Right now, swing your leg over and climb down the ladder. Someone might come along the roads on either side at any time even though it’s late.”
A voice from inside the van called up to them. “Hurry up ladies, we don’t have all day.” Cass saw a woman get out of the driver’s side. She stood even taller than Shelby, with short spiky red hair jutting up from the top of her head. The newcomer pointed to the bottom of the ladder. “Come on.”
Cass spared one glance back at her mother looking up at her from the other side, waved once, then she slid down until her feet reached the top of the ladder. It was just a few feet below the wall. She turned to face the stepladder and climbed down the rest of the way.
By the time she reached the bottom, Shelby had rearranged the coils of barbed wire above them to hide their escape route and climbed down the ladder to join her at the bottom. Together, she and Cass collapsed the ladder and shoved it into van’s open rear doors.
As soon as they shut the two doors, Cass pulled Shelby into another embrace, holding her close.
“I was so afraid they’d found you, Shel. I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to tell them where you were.”
“That’s all right, Cass. My cousin, Ramona, was one step ahead of them the whole time. Once we got the warning from your mother, we knew they were coming. We’d already moved on to a safe location by the time they arrived at her old place. Then your mother told me how she planned on getting you out. I rushed down here to help her so you could get away.”
Cass glanced back at the wall as she climbed in the back seat of the van. She wanted to ask her mother so many questions. She knew she’d probably never get that chance now. Shelby got in the back next to her and shut the sliding van door.
Ramona tapped a command on the dashboard’s control screen and the van pulled away from the grassy shoulder onto the road. She looked back over her shoulder at the two women in the seat behind her.
“It’s time to make you disappear, Cass. Are you ready to go on the run?”
Cass shrugged. She didn’t know what she wanted, other than to be sitting here next to Shelby.
Ramona laughed and turned around, lifting her foot up to rest on the dash as the automated van drove away.
Ten minutes later, they pulled onto a highway, headed west, putting miles and miles between them and the enclave.
Cass rested her head on Shelby’s shoulder. All she’d wanted for so long had been to hold on to her girlfriend’s hand again. Now, the two of them were on the run together, searching for the cyber underground.
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Cass Armstrong’s story continues with
Cyber’s Underground - Book 3
coming soon.
Afterword
A Note From The Author
It’s always interesting how things happening in the world around me seem to reflect what I’m writing at any given time. I think this happens because as I ponder the challenges and conflicts faced by my books’ characters, I become more aware of people facing those same challenges in the world outside my home.
As I wrote Cyber’s Escape and dealt with Cass’s parents, the Sapiens Movement, and their attempt to exert control over Cass’s person and beliefs, I was struck by several news stories about daughters fleeing repression from their families and countries. There were also countries in the news proposing new laws making being a homosexual a death penalty offense. The cliche that life is stranger than fiction may better be written as fiction reflects life in all its cruel strangeness and rich diversity.
In much of the world, women and girls are in positions where control over their bodies and individuality are in the hands of repressive, patriarchal families and governments. Stories persist about young women fleeing these repressive situations where they’re stopped as they try to complete their refugee journeys just short of their final destinations. Their families and home governments exert diplomatic control to interrupt travel and cancel visas while they’re en route to a final destination in a country ready to receive them with open arms.
In light of this, Cass’s struggle to escape the plans her father and the Sapiens Movement leadership have for her isn’t so far-fetched. While this story takes place years in the future, in a dystopian America we may not recognize, the possibilities represented in Cass’s plight could happen here. Indeed, it is legal today in much of the United States to reject applicants for employment or housing for something as simple as their choice of a partner in life. People I love and care about have faced such discrimination.
The story gets pretty dark in places as I explore these themes, especially when Simon tortures Cass to get Shelby’s location. It was important to show how dehumanizing a person, for whatever reason, makes it easier to do unspeakable things to them and pass it off as reasonable in our minds.