Jacked

by Kirk Dougal

  “She’s right.” Just then Jimmy ran up the steps of the stage and didn’t stop until he had grabbed One Shoe in a hug. His big brother punched him in the shoulder when he stepped back.

  “Hey! Not so rough,” said Jimmy in mock indignation.

  “That’s for making mom worry, Pup.”

  The boy rubbed his skinny arm as he turned toward Tar. “She’s right. He said you don’t need the Mind. He’s bringing you a present.”

  Tar frowned, looking back and forth between Jimmy and Nataly. “Who said? What do you mean?”

  Nataly’s eyes glistened with tears despite her smile, and she tilted her head toward the side of the stage. Dr. Pierinski shuffled toward them, using an improvised walking stick for support. Several gang members walked in an arc behind him. But it was the woman at the doctor’s side that drew Tar’s attention. Her gray-streaked, black hair was short, and wrinkles gathered at the corners of her eyes, but Tar recognized her instantly.

  It was his mother.

  He let go of Nataly’s fingers and staggered forward, nearly falling down as his feet tried to keep up with his body. He hopped down to the grass and walked to her.

  “Hisa,” Roger said. “It’s Taro. He’s here.”

  The woman stared through Tar, her eyes focused on nothing. Her face never changed expression, jaw slack and shoulders slumped.

  Realization hit Tar in the stomach. All these years he had heard stories about the zoms, heard about the hell The Crash had caused with their minds. But he had never seen one. Now he understood the real horror of what Father Eli had done, understood why Uncle Jahn had said the ones who died were the lucky ones.

  “Tar,” Roger said, “I don’t think Nataly protected me from the virus. I think I went zom the night of The Crash. Remember? I said I wobbled and woke up later.” He reached out and gently put his hand on his daughter’s back, looked in her teary eyes and smiled despite his cracked and swollen lips. “Nataly fixed me.”

  Tears ran from Tar’s eyes, too. He reached out and put his hands on his mother’s narrow shoulders. He hugged her and all his struggles, his life of hiding, the past weeks of running, all faded. He was just a boy holding his mom.

  “It’s okay,” he whispered. “It’s okay, Mom. I’m here.”

  Tar let go of Hisa and reached up, holding her head so he could look in her eyes. They were blank. Emotionless.

  He moved his hand. As soon as his palm touched behind her right ear, a tingle ran up his arm and the pathways in his mind lit up. It was a different feeling than he had ever experienced. much more alive than when he fixed an app, but not nearly as intense as when he and Nataly touched implants. It was somewhere in between and his thoughts raced down a muted landscape, along paths and alleys, while the light streamed all around him.

  But even the light was different. He flew down a shaft, the blockage there in front of him. This time he did not do what he had always done in the past, go back to find another way around, search for a new road to connect to the end. No, the light was already there. It was just trapped, held up against a blockage, as if it had been fastened there forever.

  Tar pushed, gently at first, and then harder. Though he was in his mind he felt his body sweating and his muscles quivering from the strain. Slowly, inch by inch, the light edged away from the dam until it abruptly broke free with a snap. It coursed down the path in the other direction and the blockage healed over, repairing itself like the scar of an old wound, finally smoothing until it looked like any other part of the walls.

  Tar blinked. Looking back at him were brown, almond-shaped eyes. But they were no longer dark without thought or understanding. They twinkled. They were alive. A smile of recognition spread over Hisa’s face and Taro Hutchins said the first thing that came to his mind, something he had wanted to say for as long as he could remember.

  “Hi, Mom.”

  About the Author

  Kirk Dougal has had fiction works appear in multiple anthologies and released his debut novel, Dreams of Ivory and Gold in May of 2014 through Angelic Knight Press, with a 2nd edition released in February 2015. His YA dystopian novel, Jacked, leads the launch of Ragnarok Publications' Per Aspera SF imprint in 2016.He is also waiting on the publication of his SF/LitRPG novel, Reset, while completing the sequel to Dreams, Valleys of the Earth.

  Kirk is currently working in a corporate position with a group of newspapers after serving as a group publisher and editor-in-chief. He lives in Ohio with his wife and four children. For more information on his writings or just to find out what he has been doing, you can find Kirk at his website, www.kirkdougal.com, or hanging out on Facebook and Twitter.