The Line

Toward the plugging

Flynn rubbed the back of his head with a dingy towel. His hair was mostly clean and a gleaming scarlet, like he'd just shampooed with blood.

He glued his normally shifty eyes to Juan's, making his normally booming voice soft.

"So? Anything? You coming?"

"Yes, of course," Juan said slowly. He gave their apartment one last look. It smelled of dust, mould, wetness, and age. The tarp he'd covered the windows with kept the light out, but it also made the stuffy room stuffier. If he closed his eyes and blocked his nose, if he pictured spotless white floors and elegant marble archways, if he saw recycled water flowing from a fountain and large, empty hallways, he saw his home, kind of.

Then an image of the people he'd left behind appeared. His brother's scornful sneers. His father's folded arms. His mother's hologram.

He could live with losing Flynn when he went back to the South Side. It might leave him smarting, but he'd live through it. On the other hand, if his family didn't want him...

He liked keeping the doubt alive. Because then--and only then--he could imagine a reality where they missed him terribly. If that reality turned out to be a fallacy, what would happen next?

He didn't know.

///

"You're so slow," Flynn complained. "Hurry up."

"I am."

The hallway was rotting; barely-muffled discord echoed from the other apartments. There was a man's deep baritone as he conversed with someone--maybe himself. A woman's high-pitched whines about the Weather Man's prediction once upon a time. Things crashing. Sounds of argument. There were sounds of love-making, too. Flynn chuckled at those, while Juan decided to focus on what sounded like a fistfight instead.

Love-making was common in the Line--as well as the North Side. "Not much else to do," had been Flynn's answer when Juan had asked him why he tolerated the banging against their walls.

Juan had been aghast. "So, this is normal? On the North Side, you-"

"Not much to do with the cold and all."

Flynn blamed the universal sterility in the Line on the forcefield.

///

"I won't miss this." Flynn's feet flew down the stairs; he brought his arms up and twirled through the cough-inducing atrium, giving Juan a disapproving look when he didn't join in. "So slow."

"This isn't a race, Flynn," Juan said.

"It should be. It should. I would win."

They exited the ramshackle building to a clear red sky--no rain in sight--and Flynn sighed, picking up even more speed. He was nearly jogging toward the dock now, bobbing his head as he thought of beaches, lemonade, and sun.

Unlike Juan, Flynn was certain, without an edge of doubt, that no one on the North Side had missed him. His life on the South Side would be a true fresh start--no dangling strings left behind.

It could be sad.

It might be terrible.

It should be terrifying.

It was freeing.

"Slow down!" Juan shouted.

Ignoring the cry, Flynn stuffed his hands in his pockets and felt the map--the map. Weiss was right: he deserved it. He'd done everything he'd been told to, as unpleasant as it had seemed, but he deserved this. This made it worth it.

Leaving the Line made it worth it.

I won't miss this, he thought. I won't miss this. I won't--

"Pluggers!" Juan shouted.

And Flynn froze.

///

Pluggers.

Flynn's heart throbbed, a dull boom-boom that made his ribcage feel too small.

Stay still, he told himself.

He didn't dare turn around to look at Juan.

Be calm.

Be calm!

The pluggers passed, a blur of shiny metal that sliced the air with a whoosh. There were three of them, arranged in V formation.

Stingers out.

"They're heading toward the dock," Juan said in a small voice. "I think--"

"Someone's going to get plugged," Flynn interrupted, and swallowed hard. It was easy to act like he didn't care about pluggers when he was in Weiss's presence. First off, they always met in the least plugger-dense areas. Second off, Flynn knew the pluggers would never go after Weiss--Weiss worked for the court, after all. Anyone in his immediate vicinity was safe, right?

But now, right now, one image consumed Flynn's mind.

He'd only seen a plugging once.

Once had been enough.

///

Juan was breathless. "Do you want to go see?" he suggested. "I know we shouldn't"--here he momentarily stiffened, before clearing his throat and speaking too slowly for confidence--"but, I mean, I've never..."

Today was a day of firsts. Juan had never questioned the plan before--and now he was asking to see pluggers.

A day of firsts.

Flynn smiled. He wouldn't show how scared he was. He'd tell his heart to shut up and his trembling hands to get their act together--and he would pretend. He was very good at pretending.

He didn't trust his voice yet, though.

So he nodded.

And started running toward the plugging.