Locked Up

Locked Up (A short story for a competition)

1-1-3020- She didn’t trust him. He had betrayed her when her family disappeared. Her brothers, gone. Her father, gone. Her mother, gone. The same thing happened to the boy. The war ended when she was young, and everything was normal. Until almost whole families disappeared. The only people left was the youngest child of every family. Thirty families have already disappeared, and there are only ten families left. Over half of the adults who lived in town were gone. No one in town could figure out where the families went, as the fence was still as strong as ever. It was as if the whole town was locked up in a cage with little food. Nothing was normal, nothing.

1-4-3020- Elizabeth knocked on my door crying. Her family’s time must have come. That meant that thirty-one families were gone now. Everyone was starving. We were all alone in the world, or as I said before, maybe we were just locked in a cage. I don’t care anymore. I was the second person to lose their family to whatever this was. I was the second eldest in the town now without including everyone in the last nine families. Elizabeth turned six that day.

“Liz, I’m sorry to make this a short visit, but I need to go talk to someone,” I said. She nodded, and went over to Kelsey’s house. I quickly rushed down to Cale’s house. He was a year older, and was the oldest person here.

“Cale, we need to talk, now!” I yelled. He came out of his house, and saw that not only was I crying, but I was holding our journal.

“Who, and when?” he asked.

“Elizabeth’s family, about an hour ago,” I told him. He dug in the box of birth certificates.

“Elizabeth was born six years, and forty-five minutes ago, so, either its fifteen minutes before, or right when they turn six,” Cale said. We both lost our family years ago.

“I have to go check on them. I heard that Krista and Carlos are still fighting,” I told him. He hugged me, kissed my check, and let me go.

“Good luck,” he said.

1-7-3020- That’s all I needed when dealing with these two. Carlos tried to kill Krista a week after she turned six. It was a nightmare when you had to deal with them. Normally, Elizabeth’s parents would keep them from fighting. Now they were gone though, that job fell to me and Cale. I wish I wasn’t the youngest in my family. If I was older, I would still be with them. I missed them still, but I had Cale. I don’t like some of the kids, but they look up to me and Cale, so we have to be there to protect them. Neither of us liked it, but we lived with it, and were like… the first couple.

1-10-3020-I pried Krista and Carlos away from each other for the third time that day. Carlos quit clawing me, and Krista quit kicking me, about an hour after I pried them apart. I was used to this by now.

“Taylor, do you need help with them?” asked my friend Ryan. His family was still around, and that’s why he was still here.

“You get these two to stop trying to kill each other, and I’ll give you a prize… by the way, when does your brother turn six?” I asked.

“Chris turns six next week, why?” Ryan asked.

“Never mind, just get them off of me.” Ryan laughed and got Krista and Carlos to get off of me, and not fight. Ryan and I walked down to his house, so I could talk to his parents. They knew that their time was coming, but they weren’t completely ready. Everything in this place was messed up. Less than a week, and our population would decrease by another four people.

1-17-3020- Everything has been hectic recently. Ryan’s family disappeared on his brother’s sixth birthday at the exact moment that Chris turned six. I was there with Chris and Ryan, both were crying sad for what was about to happen. When Chris’s birth minute came, Ryan vanished. Ryan’s whole family vanished with him. Chris was crying even more. I picked him up and carried him over to Cale’s house. Cale was already expecting us.