smokeSCREEN : book6.0

"I wanted you to be awake for that," he tells me. "I really don't care if you pass out for the rest."

He spits in my face.

I'm still crying.

* * *

A few hours later I'm all cried out. I've thought long and hard about any possible means of escape. Much like things back at the hotel, all seems hopeless.

Two days I hang there.

Two days, pulled up and kept down.

Two days of never getting enough air – no sleep. Just constant, ragged breath.

No guard, it seems.

No food. Just empty, hot, ragged breath.

I think perhaps they'll just leave me here to die and rot.

But early on the third day, Mickey enters followed closely by Brie.

She's dressed strangely – in green robes – but I can tell it's her under the green cap and white mask. In front of her, she pushes a metal trolley. The collar holds me down so low I can't see what's on it.

As Mickey closes the door behind them, she pulls up a huge syringe and he says;

"No – you don't need that."

"She's in a great deal of pain, Mickey, I don't want to leave her completely useless."

"No – don't undo her restraints. Do it like this."

She doesn't heed him, and the metal collar falls from my bruised throat. Air rushes in like, for a time, I'd forgotten it could. I gasp, and find my muscles disobeying me. I spasm under the new lack of tension.

"Can you talk?" she asks me. "Do you know where you are?"

I don't know what she wants me to say.

"Grand Forks – captive," is all I can think of.

"It lives," Brie smiles, pulling down her mask. Strange – it's a real smile. Even a warm smile. "She's severely dehydrated – I'm not sure I even want to try this until she's more healthy. You should have had her fed at least."

"It doesn't have to be clean, it just has to be done," he says.

"Water?" I ask. My voice is tiny – a sqeak. It surprises me.

"Yes, of course," Brie says. "Mickey? Get her some water – not too cold."

For a moment, it looks as if he's going to challenge her, but he simply leaves. She leans down, stroking my hair. "I would have taken you with the first of them, if he hadn't singled you out, you know," she tells me. "You were so healthy."

"Thank you," I say. But she shakes her head;

"Not today, dear. You have to understand that some things are more important than a few lives."

"Kill me, then," I tell her. She shakes her head again, and pulls up the syringe.

"No – you're an excellent specimen, as a whole. Don't tell Mickey about this – it will make things much easier on everyone." She jabs me in the leg with the needle and shoves the plunger down.

I bite my lip – it's a big needle.

But soon it's back on the cart, and Mickey has returned with my water. It hurts to swallow, but the cool flood is like a reunited loved one rolling down my throat. Brie lets me take my time in swallowing it all, before she sets the glass on the cart.

I'm not entirely sure of everything now. It's fuzzy.

It's good.

"Now?" he says.

Brie leans down and lights a cigarette in front of me. She stares deep in my eyes as the match flares to life in the dark room, and lets me take a drag before grinding out the smoke under her heel. Her brow furrows – she's not sure. So she drags the tip of the cigarette across my shoulder lightly. It takes me a second to look over an cock an eyebrow, before slowly looking up to her.

What?

"Now," she says.

I am fucked up.

It's not like being stoned. It's different. Liquid. Fuzzy. Good.

Mickey's in my face now, grinning.

"What're you gon'do?" I manage.

Brie pulls him aside, and leans down with something silver in her hand. The silver thing is moving towards my face, but I can't focus on it.

"Take a deep breath," she says.

I try to, but I can't work like that right now.

Everything's real weird.

* * *

Someone's touching me. It's Cypress.

We're together.

He's stroking my stomach, and he kisses me.

Whoah.

I wake up.

Cool.

My head sorta' hurts. It's a weird feeling – and I can't really focus on anything.

No one's around. My arms aren't bound any more.

I've been sleeping for a long long time.

First time I've slept in days, and I notice I'm laying on one of those metal beds they have in hospitals. Wow.

I lean back and grin, feeling the soft blankets and pillow luxuriously. I look around – I'm still in the concrete room, but now only my right arm is chained to the bed. My left arm is free to grab the pack of cigarettes on the table beside the bed and munch on real fuit while I smoke.

My head hurts, and I scratch at my eyes. Then I notice the bandage.

Then I remember.

No – no way.

I tear at the bandages, ripping them out like hair.

She wouldn't.

Carefully, my index reaches towards my blind eye.

...fuckoff.

Nothing. Nothing is there, and it hurts. Like. Shit.

"Fuck!" I shriek, covering my face.

They wanted me to live, they just took my eye as punishment. Oh, God. First they shoot off a finger, now this.

Brie didn't seem to want to take my eye. She seemed concerned for me. She did give me the heroin.

Mickey told me he loved me on a daily basis. He told me he never expected me to say it back. I don't suppose he expected me to do what I did – but then I didn't expect him to react in such a way.

I suppose this is the state of life. Of becoming accustomed to one world – one way of existing – and being thrown, blind, into another.

I'd never been chained up before the past few days – aside from the trip south. They walked us on two long chains behind their cars.

That was a long walk.

But I'd never been really chained up until this. I've decided I loathe it. I've decided if I ever take a prisoner, they may be locked up or kept watch on, but I will never chain them.

Except perhaps Mickey.

Speaking of Mickey, he comes in now.

"Good evening, Sophie," he whispers.

"Good evening, Michael," I say. I know to say.

"You had me very fooled, didn't you? Here, I thought you had reserved yourself to feeling nothing at all, " he says, leaning down to me. "But there is a spark of passion somewhere in there, isn't there?"

"Yes, Michael."

"But not for me," he says.

"For freedom," I tell him, glancing up with my one good eye. This hits him like a load of bricks. This pushes him back, until he is pressed against the cold concrete wall, just staring at me.

"You understand nothing!" he shouts at me. "You – living your little lives. You – fearless in your preserved city, eating what those before you had left! Smoking drugs! Illiterate! All of you! You think you understand true values? True concern for an idea? A way of life?" He comes forward now, gripping my hair as he tears off the mask. He holds my good eye to his scarred face and says; "You will not die, Sophie. I won't allow it. You have suffered now, and perhaps it will give you some perspective. You'll return to work at the hotel, and you will never see me again. Do you understand?"

Frankly, I don't.

"Yes, Michael."

I re-enter the hotel that night, and no one says boo to me. Everyone goes about their work. We eat in silence. We clean the Eating Room in silence. We retire to our beds in silence, and Michael doesn't come for me.

I'm re-working events in my head, and I don't understand why he returned me to the general population. If Brie had wanted to 'take me', as she said, from the beginning, why wasn't I removed?

I am so lost in thought that it takes me a moment to realize Martha is whispering at me in the next bed;

"What happened?" she's saying. I look, and I see almost eveyone else is sitting up, waiting to know.

"I killed two of them," I say, "and took Mickey's eye."

"Is that why..."

"Yeah."

Eveyone's just grinning for a moment, before Amy says,

"How did you do it?"

"Every night in the eating room, I would pocket a knife on the chance I wouldn't get searched that day."

A small bark comes from the back of the room. It's followed by another. And another.

Soon we're all barking – something we used to do when a raiding party came back successful.

Two old ones burst through the door, but they just stare as we all bark, the volume rising.

"Stop it!" one of them shouts.

We bark louder.

"All of you! Stop it!"

I let my bark exend into a howl – and the others quiet down. In a moment, the room is silent.

I'm grinning under my blanket. They can't possibly punish all of us.

They lead us in our nightwear out of the hotel, through the broken streets in bare feet until we come to an old building. We're given huge hammers that we can barely move, and told to knock it down.

If we do it quick, perhaps we can be back in time for lunch.

But the day turns so hot. We're so tired and hungry. The hammers are too heavy to use as weapons, so we can only work under their gun barrels.

We don't make it home for lunch, but we do make dinner.

* * *

The event falls into memory. My experiences with Mickey become a memory. My routine is like the others – I get up, I work. I eat a little, then work 'till dinner. I work, then go to bed. Rinse and repeat. Every week Brie comes to take a look at how my eye is healing. She's replaced the bandage with a small black patch, like pirates wore. This makes me the village freak, which satisfies.

Days turn into weeks again, the repetition takes over, and even I stop thinking of escape. Constantly, of escape. Of rebellion.

I am convinced that nothing could stir any of us. Things are too hard as it is, to risk making them worse.

Five weeks after I lost my eye we're at work in the sewing room. Today's work consists of three quilts, with ten girls working on each. My fingers move deftly and quickly – the work will be done when it's done, and we work swiftly to help it end sooner rather than later. But today, the motony is broken again;

"Alright, look alive bitches!" a megaphone shouts from the indoor courtyard of the hotel. "Fresh meat!"

Martha looks at me from across the sewing table and cocks an eyebrow.

"'Fresh meat'?"

"I didn't hear a lot of cars moving," I whisper.

"You know how to sew?" I hear an old one say, distant behind me.

"Just wounds," she tells her. I stiffen like a board, and my heart begins to thrash. I know it before Martha says;

"Crow."

* * *

She sits across from me at dinner in the Eating Room.

"Jesus Christ," she whispers. "What's with the patch?"

"Remember the one with the mask?" I say. She nods. "I stabbed him in the eye with a butter knife."

"One of these?"

"Yeah," I nod. "What the fuck happened to you?"

"I found Cypress under the Forks – he got us out in time," she says.

"Where did you go?"

"Grand Beach. We stayed the winter at a cabin there."

"Wh... why'd you come back?" I whisper.

"It's a long story," she grins. I've missed her so much. I feel like crying.

"I thought you were dead," she tells me.

"I thought you were dead," she laughs, but wipes away a tear.

"HEY! No talking!" A huge old one stands beside our table, her rifle in our faces. Crow and I both go back to eating.

"I'll tell you everything tonight," I whisper.

* * *

one day i was walking by / with a walkman on when i caught a guy / givin' me the awkward eye / so i strangled him off in the parkin' lot / with his karl kinnard / i don't give a fuck if it's dark or not / i'm harder than me, tryin' to park a Dodge / when i'm drunk as fuck / right next to a humongous truck / in a two-car garage

so from here on out it's the chronic two / start a new day, tomorrow's anew / and yet i'm still loco enough t'choke ya to death with a charleston chew

* * *

"It was Brie who guessed Cypress had planted a bomb at the Forks – she ordered us all out, and for a while we were scattered across the city. They took the Tower and hunted us. If we ever tried to go home they were there, with tranquilizer darts. Phoebe officially surrendered when they got to the Tower, but a good half of us made it away.

They hunted us down. It took about a month for them to get all of us. A week before the first snow, they chained us all together and started to walk us South.

It was a long, long fuckin' walk. Eventually, we get here, to Grand Forks, and they set up shop. I'm almost positive they've got three different locations. One for us, one for them, one for the boys."

"They do," Crow whispers in the bed next to mine. For about ten minutes now, we've been able to maintain a level of volume that no one outside the room can hear.

"And now, that's it," I say. "We work all day, for them. Sleep for six hours. Rinse and repeat. What happened to you?"

I hear her shift in the bunk – she's looking at me.

"We left Grand Beach as soon as the snow started melting. Only stopped in Winnipeg for a day – Cypress was sure you guys were here."

"Where is he?"

"I dunno. He'd gone scouting when they nabbed me. Most likely he knows where I am, by now." Her eyes flash in the pale light. "He'll be here soon."

"But what could he do? There are so many of them," Lori says. Crow shakes her spiky head, just as the door bursts open.

"Evening," Cypress says. He's at the door.

Cypress it at the door. "Making quite a bit of noise in here," he grins.

I'm out of bed in a shot, squeezing him. For some reason I'm not even conscious of Crow there – it's good to see him again.

"Where are the guards?" Amy asks. .

"Passed out," he says.

"Gas?" I cock an eyebrow at him.

"Staff upside the head."

I turn and look at the room – someone hit the lights and they're all sitting up, staring at him. For a moment, I get a flash in my head of a catholic girl's school with all the tiny girls in their white nightgowns staring curiously down the hall, like uniformed angels.

"They're all out?" Crow says, hopping from her bed and shedding the nightgown – she's wearing her old field clothes underneath.

"Every one – there's a shift change in two hours, though," he tells her, lighting her a smoke before handing one to me.

"When should they wake up?"

"Four hours or so, give or take. Either way – two hour safety net."

"Sophie, go get the others," she says.

"They're up the hall," I nod, scampering out of the room in bare feet and hopping over an unconscious guard.

I don't walk – I run. The door is locked, but a sturdy kick opens it and five shapes sit up inside.

"All the guards are out," I say. "General meeting in my room. Set?"

They just stare at me.

"Fuck off, you guys – the guards are out, Cypress is here – meeting in my room. Set."

"Cypress is here?"

"I'm not fuckin' with you – are we set?"

"Set," Jennifer nods.

"Set."

* * *

Cypress has brought a map of the city, and is highlighting points.

"This is the factory where the boys are," he circles a block about a mile away. "This is us, and this is where the old ones are holed up. It's a mansion five miles north."

We all nod. Just like that.

Things change in a moment.

"Weapons?" I say.

"Here," he puts a red dot three blocks away.

"Ours?"

"No – I don't know what they did with them," he says. "For all I know, they're back in Winnipeg. But there's rifles, machine guns, everything here." He points at the red dot, before turning back to us.

"There's only twenty-six of you left?" he says.

"They took the others," Jennifer says. Jennifer has a voice that always sounds something like a moan. "They took the strong ones first."

I'm sitting, crosslegged in the middle of us – Crow is leaning against the far wall, and she's growing impatient;

"Who's ready to make a run for those weapons? It's dark, we could end this by morning."

Cypress goes to say something, but stops.

"Not yet," he says.

"Why not?" For a second, I was sure I had only said it in my head. But he's looking at me. "It's only three blocks." Something is different about Cypress. He seems to radiate good faith, while his speech is almost cold.

"Not tonight," he says. "Something's up."

"Where?" Crow says. He shakes his head, closes his eyes and turns East.

"I don't know."

"What do you mean, you don't know?" Crow snaps at him – I don't understand what they're talking about.

"I mean I don't know, alright? I'm stressed out, it's hard to get centered."

"Put it to a vote," Crow says, turning to the rest of us. "The weapons are three blocks away – this is our chance. Do we go?"

"Set," the small crowd barks at her. She nods, and turns triumphantly to Cypress. He only shakes his head.

"Something's not right," he tells her. "You don't feel it? They know."

"How could they-"

"They know."

"Cypress, we're making a run on those weapons with or without you. Are you in, or what?"

* * *

I can't get the Little Angel picture out of my head as I watch everyone pour down the stairwell – all in the long white nightshirts. We look like fluttering ivory bells with hair.

Cypress leads us down into the lobby, and pushes open the doors to the city with his staff. We step out into the night, and freeze.

"Thought you'd waltz on in, did you?" Brie says from behind her men. Thirty or so of them. Cypress just leans on his staff as some of us dash back into the hotel. Seven stay with him.

"I did waltz in. It'll just take fancier moves to get out."

"Take him," Brie says to no one in particular. And then suddenly, Cypress drops to his knees. Crow shrieks as his face smacks into the concrete, and two old ones rush forward to retrieve him. She moves to jump forward to intercept, but Cypress doesn't stay down. He yanks what looks like a pin from his neck, and slashes out in a big awkward arc as he stumbles to his feet and forward. It's not as elegant as usual, but the two old ones fall in four blood-splattering pieces onto the concrete – thuTHUD thudthud.

Cypress manages to regain his balance, wipes the sword and sheathes it with a regained ease. For a moment, everyone just stares at him. Remember when you were a kid, and your uncle pulled off his thumb? You stared, and just couldn't grasp how it was done. So, we stare at Cypress.

"Again!" Mickey roars.

"No!" Brie snaps. "Two will kill him."

"Well one didn't do much!" Brie seems to grow, bearing down on Mickey, her hand raised. He shies from her. He's terrified of her. And to me it's like the first time you beat your Alpha at something. You stare, 'cause it never occurred to you that you were equals. Just people. Not characters or creatures, but thoughts and wills and good intentions gone wrong. If she can scare him, so can I. Brie's saying something, and now twenty old ones pour forward and surround Cypress. And Cypress does something very very strange. He bows his head, and seems larger in the shoulders. Even the lights around us – the lights of the hotel, the lights of the cars dim around him. He reaches out his hand to an old one. Staring, almost blankly – but his eyes burn all the same. He's not reaching for the man's hand. He's reaching for his head.

"Oh God no," Crow whispers. I open my mouth to ask her, but a spray of bullets erupts from the circle – it's just one of them – he's slaughtering the others around the swordsman. And now Cypress spins and lashes out with the sword, and what was twenty is now eight. The old one who started firing – the others shoot him until he's dead on his feet, and he collapses, steaming on the bloody concrete.

"Why did-" But Crow claps her hand around my mouth and draws me back into the building. "Quiet," she whispers. "Everyone – retreat."

"What?"

"Back!" she hisses, spreading her arms like wings and fanning us backwards into the lobby. As the doors close, she nods to a few others; "Bar the door."