Are You Going To Push Me

Chapter 1

Big big thank you to Scotty94/Hiccuped Studios for the amazing cover art! You are an amazing artist!

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It was difficult running from the government, but I managed to stay hidden. There were so many of us, but at the same time so few. We were a dying breed, being hunted by the people that were supposed to protect us.

I had only met a handful of people like me, but only five of them were still alive. Well, I hoped that five of them were still alive, but didn't know for sure. It had been two years since I had seen one of them. One I missed so much that it made me nauseous to think about him.

He was supposed to meet me, but he never showed. Then my world went to hell.

I wiped down everything I touched with the bleached rag, paying attention to the taps and railings, even more to the doorframes and windowsills. I was careful to put everything I used for hygiene into a Ziplock bag, ready to dispose of it in a public trash a few blocks from here.

The US government had a secret department that only a few knew about called Division. That section of government was employed solely by psychics who were powerful, cunning, smart, but ultimately murderous. In a twisted way, they were designed to exterminate us, while keeping the ones they wanted the most for themselves, forcing them to work for them, or killing them.

I'd been hiding from them since they took my mom from me. I was fifteen. My dad went into hiding shortly after that after leaving me with a friend he knew he could trust. That was until they died and I fled with their daughter Lissa.

I got onto the first subway that came into the station and got off randomly, not thinking about where I was going. It was safer not to think about where I was going.

Eventually, during my wandering, I started to recognize where I was and blindly veered off to the left. I came to a building that I knew. I knocked on the door and waited, looking around me with weary eyes. It didn't take long for the door to open, and one of the few people I could call 'friend' stood behind it.

"Hi," I said softly.

"What are you doing? You know it's not safe to come here often," she said with a quick dart of her eyes. "Were you followed?"

"No. I've been careful. Sniffers have been crawling all over the city," I answered, holding up my leather gloved hand up for her to see. Lissa looked at it wearily for a minute before nodding and stepped away from the door, allowing me to come in. I thanked her and slipped past her, careful not to rub up against anything.

Lissa Dragomir was the same age as me and was luckier than most. She was off the government's radar because she had something valuable. She was a sniff too, but on occasion would be neutral ground, even helping rouge government agents go into hiding. Sometimes the government would reach out to her if there was someone that they really wanted, but couldn't find with their own sniffs. She didn't do it often because she felt like she was betraying us, but it kept them off her back.

Sniffers or 'sniffs' were people who could touch an object and see where you've been and could follow a trail to find you. Which was why I was religious with bleaching everything down and wearing gloves. The less I leave behind, the harder it was for a sniff to smell me.

They liked to use toothbrushes the most. Maybe hairbrushes, lipstick if we were stupid enough to use them. Anything that we touched frequently. You wouldn't think about being careful as to where you threw out your toothbrush.

"Not that I'm not happy to see you, but what are you doing here?" Lissa said as she led me into her seating room, adjusting he own gloves over her hands. She gestured for me to sit down and I sank into the couch.