The future is near

I open my eyes, then immediately wish I hadn't. The world around was completely different from the past. All the old building were on the floor, like mice in a mouse trap. New ones which were gleaming with white lights had been built. Everything was perfect, history was on the ground, everyone had a home. The only thing that is breaking that streak is me. I live in the old apartment building with the door on it's side. There's barely any electricity but Max and I handle it. Max is my dog, he's supposed to be a golden retriever but with the dirt and the rubble, he's more black than gold. I had a family once, but they were left with a choice, to get rid of Max and 1 person in the family, I still don't understand why, or get...executed. They picked me to go with Max since I was the problem child. I don't think they realised what "get rid of" meant.

The problem child who made money and saved it, got food, did the chores and, almost forgot, raised the family. My brothers and sisters were keen to get rid of me so that they could take all the money I saved up for incase of an economic crisis to buy toys for themselves. Sometimes I wonder if I was adopted.

Up till today, I've lived a pretty normal life, well, normal for me. The food has been pretty scarce but we manage, we had a few earthquakes, only one time the ceiling above the bathroom fell down, I had to move to a different building which was quite challenging but the most major problem and still going on is the searches. They know I'm still alive and that doesn't stop them from coming for me and Max. They think I went close and the center from the main state but actually I'm hidden where the mine hit.

They thought I must have been there and so when they found no bodies, they knew I wasn't here. The trick is to be always one step ahead of them. It came as a total shock one day when there was a bullet that whizzed right above my head, I thought it was a normal false alarm but when it said deploy camera, I grabbed Max and everything else I could because they would see me. It looked left to right and I thought, maybe it's just a harmless little monitor so I threw a rock to the side when it wasn't looking. That may have been the most idiotic thing I've ever done in my life. I triggered their thermal senses on the camera and apparently, technology was so super advanced that it flew right over me. I didn't know what to do, either hide and stay really still or run or destroy it, that way no one had evidence that it was me. I went with option 3, the only flaw in my plan was that it was a time bomb. I still remember, as soon as I lunged out from the washing machine, it just started firing little metal spikes at me, luckily I was smart enough to roll from the spot where it spotted me. It didn't follow me, I wasn't so lucky when it realised that it wasn't hitting me anymore and "self destructed".I wish I could have been in a hospital but I wasn't, bugs were swarming around me, and I was laying down on the dirty floor.

I woke up finally because of Max licking all the bugs, dirt and blood of my face. I really hope he wasn't licking anything else. I try to stand up but my legs weren't responding. Only now I realised I couldn't see anything. "Please don't be blind, please." I thought I said that but my mouth was covered with dried blood so it sounded disoriented. I stuck my finger down into the earth to get a bit of water to clear my eyes. When I had enough water, I cleared my eyes and used my weak arms to prop me up, the photographs of my mum, dad, sisters and brother saying, "You will always be our favourite Mike." They gave a photocopy to everyone in the family but of course they had to mess up on my name and typexed the name out and rewrote it as Mike instead of Sarah.My family might have been a little ignorant and annoying at some times but I prefered to be with them instead of alone, well, alone as it can be with a dog. Families aren't usually allowed to be friends and well, mix but when I was still with my family I had two best friends. Theodore and Maxine. A couple other kids were nice to me and I was nice to them but there was one kid who was really mean to everyone, everyone feared him and he made sure of that. His name was Greg. He was always talking about how he wanted to leave the buildings and go camping or be on the run but on the other hand he liked to brag about things that other kids didn't have. That was exactly an example of why they didn't let kids mingle, though I think the presidents did enjoy watching him taunt other kids. They always watch us, I mean them, in public areas like the swimming pool, recreational area, meeting areas and most of the time the exercise park. The exercise park is where we got to exercise and have 10 minutes of luxury outdoor time. They didn't watch us a lot there because they were too busy scaring us with the timer that went off after ten minutes. So I met Maxine there and Theodore at the Library and technology room. That was the only time where families could mingle but only by chatting, video conferences or holographic conferences. When we did bump into each other it wasn't for long. The technology room had no limit time, the library was 1 hour only but you could reactivate your 1 hour by simply walking out and walking back in. The park, like I said, was only 10 minutes and the rules were that you only had 10 minutes in the morning and 10 again in the afternoon. Sometimes Maxine comes and visits me but she rarely finds me and when she does, I have to move, but her visits are worth it. She keeps me updated with all of the new things and how everything is working and going.

One of the things she keeps me updated with is how often the searches take place, apparently I'm the one endangering the whole community and I'm famous in a bad way. To be honest I'm kind of glad that I'm famous because I get to rub it in my family's faces that they got rid of me and sooner or later will realise what a stupid mistake it was. If only they cared. It came to me as a total shock when I heard rummaging like someone was trying to be unheard. I crept out of the door and Max followed closely at my heels when suddenly he burst off towards the intruder and went to him wagging his tail like he knew the person. We were dead for sure.

It came as a total shock to me when I saw Maxine standing outside my hiding place, it rebel clothes. She ran to me and burst into tears as she explained her story of why she came here. At first I felt sad for her but then, when I thought about it, I started smiling. I asked her again for only the details of why she came here and she said she didn't know. There was a public announcement that someone had been leaving the compounds several times and whoever it was, they would be handled with a minor punishment. No one really knew what it meant because no one really saw the person who got the punishment and straight after those, the citizens memory got erased the next time they went to the doctor of that moment.Max was licking Maxine's face when I called him of her and said "Do you want to live with me?" Maxine just stood there and gaped at me. In our old city, we never asked each other over for a night over or a day over, we definitely never lived together even if it was just for a little while it was against the rules. So Maxine and I trundled over bricks and bits of my things while I was explaining to her all the things that the city had sent after me as she gaped. I gave her a tour of the main things that I thought she might think would be interesting for her but she really wanted to head back home. She started giggling at something but I wasn't sure what it was till she cried out in delight, "Can I use the bathroom first?" I thought the joke was kind of sick but then I realised she was mimicking the city language guide.

I tried to conjure up something appetising on the small fire I built but for us, food is usually nothing, sometimes a small lone chicken or some chives and soup, if I can find water but soup mainly consists of leaves and rotten tomatoes. If you overcook rotten tomatoes the taste not to bad in a way. I give her a sweet smile and tell her to chew on a mint leaf so it'll buy me some time to cook something. I manage to hunt down a waterfowl and cook it up in some normal enough tomatoes for dinner. We lived like this for a couple days till the waterfowl became near to extinction and so did Maxine's stomach after growling for something else than bird. Then I realised, a nice camping trip in the fields would be nice. So I tell Maxine that we're leaving for a trip. After I pack up and she does, we both head toward the field when a huge explosion explodes right inside my house. I'm happy I took nearly everything but while I try to figure out how they found me without us knowing, Maxine's sobbing and running so I try to catch up to her and comfort her but as she mumbles something I see she's been cutting her arm with a sharp stone and it's bleeding a lot. Suddenly, I weak and understand what she was trying to do. They implanted a tracker in her and I faint.

I don't know how but I wake up inside the city being carried on a makeshift waggon. Everywhere is stiff so I stifle a moan as I sit up. I gasp. I'm in dragged by Maxine and she's been crying and begging for help and doctors. I sigh and touch her shoulder. She screams and cries more, while trying to catch her breath. I say comforting words to her as she calms down and tell her I just fainted in shock. Everything seemed this way till I realised that the fields are near my house which is much further away but she managed to drag me here in an hour? She soon answers my question when she explains that I was "unconscious" for a couple days.

It takes a while before doctors come and treat me. They say it won't hurt because I'm weak but while I try to put two and two together because there's no anthesis, they begin and almost immediately I faint.

I wake up in a clean white room smelling of nothing. I sit up with no difficulty and find my family standing over me, and giving me smiles and opening arms saying, welcome back, we missed you.