Marked

Chapter Three

It was a quiet ride back to the compound and the events of the day had certainly left their mark on all of them.

A gash ran the length of Ruth's left cheek, Bane's wound still wept blood and Rachel was black and blue with bruises.

She recalled how slow their trek back to the pick-up had been.

Once there, they'd found the emergency radio kept stashed under the driver's seat and while Bane had sat on a rock, crying himself into oblivion, Ruth had radioed the compound for help.

It had been Kenneth and Sung who'd arrived shortly after sundown.

Since the solar battery in the pick-up had been riddled through with bullet holes, rendering it useless, they'd had to wait for the guys to siphon what little gasoline could be found within the old cars lining the highway leading up to the compound.

They'd brought along a hunk of blue metal, a van with paint chipped off from years of sun exposure.

Robotically, they'd all filed into the back, the shock of the night's events still fresh in their minds.

Sitting in the van, getting a good whiff of the cursed liquid that burned through the engine, Rachel couldn't help but hate gasoline.

She'd heard all the stories-- about a dying planet, the exploitation of resources, the famines and droughts.

When the crops had become few and water scarce, entire nations had been thrust into a war for survival that had nearly destroyed humanity.

And Rachel hated gasoline, hated the Council of Nations, hated everything that had led to the CN rising into power.

Without the Council of Nations initiating the Mark, Rachel and her people would have never been hunted and someone somewhere wouldn't be planning a funeral for Elena and her baby.

If it wasn't for the CN...Jed would still be with her.

A sting at her arm shocked her out of her thoughts.

Sung, a tanned man with dark, pinched eyes sat across from Rachel in the back of the old van. His face was scrunched up in concentration as he placed stitches into a long gash on Rachel's forearm.

She knew they were lucky to have him.

He'd been a doctor before the transition--the period of time when the mark began to be implemented-- and he loved to tell fairy tales of a time before the Great War, a time where kindness had abounded, where the currency was paper money and where freedom was more than just a dream.

It was Sung taught who taught most of their history. 

When Mexico, Canada and the United States had joined forces, he'd been stationed on the front lines, proving aid to those suffering from E-91, the deadly virus unleashed on the world through biological warfare.

When the CN began to introduce the Mark as a foolproof way to ration the countries dwindling supplies and create an army, Sung had seen what it could do., how it could turn people into unfeeling war machines, and had refused it.

But refusing the mark was a crime punishable by death and so he'd headed for the mountains, far from the city where no one could take his freedom.

Now here he was- thin, aging and scared like the rest of them.

But he was alive, and he was free and that was what counted in Rachel's book.

***

Rachel must have fallen asleep because the sound of the doors being drawn open startled her awake.

"Bane! Are you okay? Is Elena okay? The baby?" A woman wearing a deep green shawl draped over her shoulders appeared at the foot of the van and Rachel quickly recognized her as Elena's mother.