She punches my arm. “Thanks, Ky. Back at you.”
Drenched with sweat, we enter the private’s mess hall, shouting, “Aye! Hey! We need everyone’s attention.”
I stand on the table. “I need Jesail, Amber, Danny, Sally, Fire, and Marlin.”
Fein stands next to me, adding, “And Rick and Amy. Let’s go, you all are with us today.”
We jump down from the table as they come without question.
“What are we doing?” Fire asks.
“We are going to use you all as target practice so we can let our anger off from the heat,” Fein mutters seriously, wiping her face.
I laugh but don’t correct her. The terror on Fire’s face is priceless.
Chapter Eight
Everyone’s crowded around the film selection table, scrolling through the movie list. Collins stands next to Marc as they decide what movie to watch. She grins, grabbing his arm as they all joke about title fonts and cover images. She lightly slaps his arm as she chuckles and annoys the hell out of me. He’s flirting back, not pushing her away as she is entirely too close to him.
Though their actions make the nerves squirm in my stomach, I ignore it and find Danny.
“Thanks for letting me join you, Ky,” Danny says when he spots me approaching. “I never see Luke anymore. He had other things to attend to today?” he asks.
I sit beside him in the auditorium seats. “Yeah, his new title keeps him pretty busy.”
Danny gestures around the room, asking, “What’s this?”
“It’s an off day and too hot to do anything outside. Sitting around the house alone is boring, so we invited a selected few to hang out with us for the day.”
Air blasts from the vent feet above our heads. I sigh and lean my head back, cooling off quickly. The auditorium is wide and open because the simulator is in here. The chairs fold into the floor by the switch of a button and the simulator gives us more direct, in-person training, bringing to life the war or whatever scenario is input into its database.
It can place us in any environment, may it be water, desert, city, fields. It looks very real, especially when we are in a forest or the woods. We can almost touch the leaves and feel them brush against us as we run. A headband is required, which pricks into our temples and causes the real-life effect for its direct connection to the brain. A slim, compressing pair of gloves allows us access to weapons or we can use the laser weapons, which are equally efficient. The vest that straps around our upper bodies zaps us whenever we’re hit. The experience is immersing for the Normals and is the preferred training option because we can’t actually shoot them.
“They act like it matters which drive they put in.” Sean takes the seat beside me. “Just pick a damn movie and press play,” he yells at them.
Floyd is with them, shifting through the drives.
“Sean, you remember Danny, right?”
Sean looks over at Danny on my other side. “Yeah, from the diner.”
“Wassup?” Danny greets.
“Trying to figure out…” he raises his voice, “…why the hell we aren’t watching the movie yet?”
“You are impatient,” I say with a laugh.
“Ky,” Cory calls from a few rows back. He waves his hand for me to come to him.
I stand from my seat, shuffle past Sean, and climb the few stairs to the row of seats Cory’s sitting in. “What’s up?” I ask, taking the seat to his left. “Just get straight to the point, Cory. What’s really going on?”
“I didn’t do anything Luke may have told you I did. Luke and I don’t like each other.”
“That goes without saying, Cory.” I roll my eyes. “Do you have anything useful you’d like to share?”
Cory frowns. “Sheesh, Ky. Can you cut me some slack? My sister even looks at me sideways, and she knows me better than anyone.”
I half shrug. “Maybe she knows you’re a traitor too.”
He stares me down as if he’s seeing through my brain. “I work as a Creation, not for anyone else. I’ve never been a traitor. I serve my country and the Guidance, and I was placed in Separation to do a job. All of my intentions here are pure.” He whispers in my ear, “I told you, I only got the names to weed out the implants, not to become a traitor.”
“Was your name on that list?” There is definitely something up with Cory. Him stating ‘destroy and reconstruct’ proves that. He draws back slowly, locking eyes with me. “Well,” I push, “was it?”
He moves closer so we are face-to-face. “I’ll tell if you close this distance.”
I press my palm to his face and shove him away. “I’m not doing that.” He pushes my hand away. “I’m only asking a question, not forcing you to answer.”
He smirks and drags his gaze away from me. “It might be, but then again, it might not be.”
I look away from him when the lights shut off, and the projector turns on, creating a screen on the stage as the movie plays.
The chairs of this auditorium are circled around the large centered stage. No matter which side you sit on, you can see what’s playing. The screen the projector creates is large, going up more than thirty feet and spreading out more than seventy-five. It is enormous and feels like I’m in the middle of the movie with how real and close everything appears.
I slouch, getting comfortable in the chair.
Cory is mixed, I know it. And he’s going to tell me, just not here. Cory tells me everything. I just need to find the right time to ask.
“What are you doing?”
I look up at Marc. Dark, wavy hair hangs loose around his head and the scruff of his beard emphasizes the twitching muscle in his jaw. His broad frame towers over me. I sit up to lessen the effect and look away from him to the previews. “Today is tomorrow,” I say, shrugging.
“You don’t say.” He taps my shoulder, drawing my attention back to him. “Come here.”
I say to Cory, “I’ll talk to you later.” I see what Marc means about not being able to avoid me when I approach him. I feel the same way. I was fine, but I can’t not go with him. He has some type of pull on me.
As I stand Cory grumbles, “Your nothing is really something, Ky.”
“Like the answer you gave to that question I asked. You left me just as high and dry, Cory.”
He smacks his lips at my back, and I ignore his derogatory huff. Marc and I walk to the far end of a row, away from the others.
“Why are you making this difficult?” Marc asks.
“I’m doing what I am supposed to be doing, Marc. And I was doing a great job before you bothered me.”
“Bothered you, huh?” he objects calmly.
“Yes. Why don’t you go sit with Collins and do that thing you were just doing with her?” He jolts up and all but charges past me. Before he gets too far, I grab his arm. “Okay, wait.” His nostrils flare as he sighs and sits back down. “I didn’t mean that. It’s just that…It’s really hard to know what we know. A part of me wants so badly for us to leave here and have each other because…I…I…Because I just do. And that same part of me wants you to be okay with running away. But the more reasonable part of me knows that will never happen. I’d never leave my brother. You’d never leave yours.” I pause, but not long enough to give him time to respond. “But this is us. This is what we get, as unconventional and annoying as it is for the both of us. And I’m working on leaving you alone like you want me to and like I need to, for us.”
“There isn’t an us, Ky. There can’t be an us.”
Argh! “Your stubbornness is annoying, Marc.”
He slouches on his chair and stares at the movie that’s gone quiet as a title card graces the screen. I tap his hand for an answer, and he nods. “It’s complicated,” he utters.
That is a good title for what we have. Complicated. “Good to know you are as confused about this as I am.”
“I am not confused. I know what this is, I know what I want, I know what I am, and I know how I feel. But I know I can’t have wh
at I want. So I push you off and try to force you to leave me alone to make it easier to leave you alone. But I’m terribly jealous, and I don’t want anyone else to have you either. I’m not confused at all,” he says with a shrug.
I turn in my seat to face him. “What do you want to do?”
He flicks another glance at the movie. I wait for his answer and tap him again when he doesn’t speak. “You can go sit with Cory, and I’ll go sit with Sean.”
I sit back in the chair, angered by his suggestion and his contradiction. “No, Marc. I’m not doing that. But seeing you would push me off on Cory, like I were an unwanted pet animal, I get it. You make sure you hold up your side too because you most definitely are confused.” I stand and shove his legs out of my way as I pass.
“Wait.” He grabs my waist.
I shove him off me. “No way.”
I look for Fire and Fein in the auditorium and make my way to them and sit down.
Fire gets up and goes to sit next to Marc, and at this point, I really don’t care. At least, this is what I tell myself.
I turn my attention back to the movie. It’s one I’ve not seen yet where an alien species battles the human race, and I’m able to call the ending before it’s over. The humans win, they always win. Maybe, one day, there will be a place for something a little more than human to take down the aliens and stand up for something like this country.
The movie goes off, and we prepare for our fake war. We put on our headbands, gloves, and vests. The needle from the headband sticks into my temple, and I’m immediately transported to the forest, hidden behind a tree.
Gunshots are blazing, birds sing, and rough waves crash against a nearby beach.
I lean against a tree, staring at my gun. I could be more into this simulated war, but I’m just not. My leg jolts in pain, and I realize I’ve been shot.
I’m not up for playing with them. Not with Collins all over Marc’s back and trying to jump on him. Her laugh echoes through the air, attracting my attention to them near a bush about twelve feet from me. I hate her, and if he smiles at her, Collins will be eliminated from Separation. She jumps on his back again after he’s shaken her off twice.
Blaming my actions on jealousy, I aim my gun at her and pull the trigger, sending a bullet into the middle of her forehead. Her head whips back, and she loses her balance, falling backward off Marc.
I remove my headband, and I’m snapped back in the hall. I replace the gear on the charging shelf and leave, stepping out into the scorching heat. The desert is vacant, everyone afraid of getting sucked dry by the blazing sun. Heat waves dance across the ground on my walk back to our house. I hope Luke isn’t out in this weather.
I could really go for a nap, but I have a dilemma. By now, I should definitely be able to sleep on my own. I should be able to lie on my own bed and accept a nightmare like anyone else and not jump up from it trying to murder whatever brought me discomfort.
I had my first nightmare experience years before my parents died. It was something silly that would bother a child, and I can’t remember it today, but my mother came in my room at the time, calmly. I must have been crying loudly, or I might have screamed. She said to me, “Peace, Kylie. It wasn’t real, and you have to learn to separate the real from the unreal. Think of when you have a good dream. You don’t wake up thinking that was real. Relay those thoughts and feelings to the bad ones.”
I understood that, and I didn’t have a nightmare after that until the day they died, and then after the incident with my uncle. My mother probably didn’t consider I’d dream about things that were real, as if I were reliving them. If she did, she may have taught me a better way to abolish this fear.
Our home is silent when I enter. Though I know no one is here, I still say, “Kylie,” and it echoes through the house. We established a rule that each of us who live here will say something, may it be our name, hello, or something that tells each other we are entering and are not a Zombie. Everyone’s pretty good at following it, except my rebellious brother.
I run upstairs to grab a change of clothes from my room and go to the stalls for a shower. It helps cool me off, and the change of clothes helps me to get comfortable.
It’s not often I get the entire house to myself, and I take the opportunity to dance through the house as I drop my clothes off in my room and boogie into the den to find some music to listen to. It’s the best cure for my drowsiness that’ll soon loom over me if I don’t keep moving.
I press “shuffle Pop” on the screen, and through the speaker blasts an upbeat rhythm. I jump over the coffee table and onto the couch, bouncing on the cushions and pumping my fists in the air.
The front door opens.
I leap from the couch and rush to the music, trading it for a movie. Whoever enters doesn’t announce themselves, but it’s not Luke. Their footsteps thunder as they plod across the floor, this person’s heels drag.
Cory pokes his head around the corner. In a sing-song voice he asks, “Were you dancing?”
I walk around the table to sit in the corner of the sofa. “No.”
He gives me a wry smile, teasing, “I bet you were,” as he takes off his vest and tosses it on the table. “Do you remember that time we snuck off in the middle of the night to the gymnasium at the education center back home?”
“No,” I say, carrying it out. “I remember you trying to sneak out and falling off your roof. We never made it because you broke your ankle and Hanley had a cow.”
Cory throws his head back, bellowing a hearty laugh. “Ah-ha. That is what happened. I guess I just dreamed it went differently.”
I stifle my laugh and look away from him. “Always dreaming, Cory. It’s time you lived in the real life with the rest of us.”
“You mind if I sit with you?”
“You’re already sitting.” I shrug. “But you can stay if you answer my question from earlier.” He is going to tell me. If I have to beat it out of him, he’s going to admit to his name being on that list. That’s the only reason a Creation would double-team with the Trade. And if he reveals this, he may slip up and tell me he left that note on my bed, and then I’ll know the Trade is up to something mischievous. I could be wrong about all of this. But there are things that aren’t adding up.
“How long has this movie been on?”
“Just now.”
He grabs my hand. “I trust you, Ky.”
“Good,” I say, staring at the screen.
“You trust me?”
“No.”
“Why not?”
“Because you are hiding something.”
Letting go of my hand, he pushes behind me, grabs my waist, and pulls me to his side. “I’m not the only one hiding something,” he whispers.
I scoff. “What do you mean?”
“What do you think?” His gaze drops from my eyes downward.
I turn away from him, sensing him trying to kiss me. “You can either tell me or scoot over.”
His index finger pushes my jawline, turning my head to face him. “It’s the reason I wanted to be the one to get that list, and one of those reasons may have been to remove my name from it before giving it to the Trade.”
Yes! I knew it!
I try to turn my head, but he doesn’t let me. “Okay,” I say and try to turn again. He doesn’t allow me to, but he stares me down. “What?”
Distress clouds his features, making his green eyes soften. “I told you, and you had no reaction.”
I drop my gaze, looking away from his boyish face that reminds me of our years of laughter and time spent just talking for hours. “I already had my assumptions. Can I move my head now?”
He cracks a smile, flashing two rows of perfect white teeth. “No. I haven’t been this close to you in a long time.” The breath of his words wafts against my chin and neck. He’s too close.
“There is a reason for that.”
“C’mon, Ky,” he whispers before his lips touch mine.
I can’t say
why I have not moved away yet. Stupidly, maybe I want the snake to kiss me. Maybe to take my mind off everything. But it makes me think about it all even more. I break away from him and tug his hand from my chin.
Cory exhales. “With Marc out of the way, maybe we can regrow.”
“Marc is not the reason I stopped talking to you. You were. You were pushy and overbearing.”
Grumbling, he drags his hand over his buzz cut. “What if I told you I wasn’t the only alleged renegade? That I am not the only one hiding my identity in our division. The things I know can change your mind about a lot of people here.”
I raise my brows. “Are you going to tell me?”
“I could. But we could talk about something else.” He grabs my hand now resting in my lap.
“Like what?”
“I would tell you if you shut up.” And he kisses me without me moving back as I return his kiss. He leans back, pulling me over him.
Cory’s kiss is different; a mixture of pecks and a couple that linger. They aren’t warm and affectionate like Marc’s, and no feelings of my own lie behind the action. It’s a pointless notion, and it feels wrong to even grant him the pleasure.
His hand creeps over my hip and grabs my butt. I shove him away from me, moving back, instantly drawn uncomfortable. “Don’t touch me like that,” I blurt out. An icky feeling creeps over my flesh, making me want to vomit.
Cory throws his hands up. “I’m sorry.”
The front door whips open, and I quickly sit back on the other side of the sofa, covering my mouth. My breaths are a little rapid as I try to make my disgust pass.
Cory sits up, leaning against the back of the sofa. He throws a foot up on the table.
Luke walks in with Marc, Sean, and Fein. They stare at us for a second, and I feel even more uneasy.
Cory looks in my direction, and I pull my eyes from the screen to see he’s looking at me. “Maybe you should go,” I mumble in my hand.
Salient Invaders: A Young Adult Post-Apocalyptic Dystopian Series (The Separation Trilogy Book 2) Page 7
