The New Generation

Chapter Four - Shreds of Humanity

A/N: Hey folks! It's Crazy Em. Sorry for the long wait for this chapter, but I assure you it was definitely worth it. Marc and I like to make the chapters longer to give all our characters equal treatment. This one was pretty difficult to master, because it's a totally new character and a new setting. We get to see how the children arrive at the facility, and what the outside world looks like after war, poverty, global warming, and natural disasters devastated it (not to mention cannibals heheh) Look on the bright side, at least America doesn't have the childhood obesity problem anymore, right? Anyway, thanks for sticking with us, I hope you enjoy it, and don't be afraid to tell us what you think. We don't bite, because that's too cliche, but we might, I dunno, lick you? 

Sand, sand, and more sand. Sand and heaps of trash were the only things left outside the major cities. The neighbourhoods and farmlands were long covered over with dust and wreckage due to prolonged droughts, dust storms, and other disasters both manmade and natural. No matter how many inventions the city people created, they couldn’t control the weather. Maggie sat next to a tiny window on the high-speed bullet train that those men in suits forced her into. The train was jet black and so fast that the landscape was a blur of singed brown and scorched orange. Occasionally she saw something green, but it passed so quickly that she wasn’t even sure she saw it.

Despite how nice the outside of the train appeared, the train car was packed tightly. It was approximately fifty by twenty feet, and there were at least fifty children inside with only enough space for half of them. Many of them were squished into the corner or sitting in the aisle.

All Maggie had to do was glance at the kids surrounding her and somehow they knew not to go near her. She was dangerous. Perhaps it was the set of her jaw, taut and unmoving as if she was ready to scream at them or strike them down with venomous words. Or maybe it was her impressively muscled arms and legs; anyone who could survive the slums and keep meat on their bones was not someone who you messed with. Or it might have been the hollowed look in her eyes. Most of the children had an echo of that expression as if their world had caved in around them, but Maggie’s eyes were dark, and deeply sunk in her grimy eye sockets. It was as if she was retreating somewhere far away. There might have been a spark of vitality in her eyes once, but it was quenched and hidden now. Whatever it was that kept the children away from Maggie, she was grateful for it. She had enough human contact for a life time. Not that those men with the shaved heads and black suits were, strictly speaking, human.

Maggie didn’t go with the men without a fight. After escaping the first time, she planned to escape again but, as if on cue, all of the men took out their semiautomatic handguns and strange, glowing chrome guns with wide barrels that Maggie had no name for. If she were to run away now, she’d be blown to pieces. They wouldn’t bother chasing one girl again when they had a train full of children to worry about. At least that’s what she told herself. Maybe that would be the better fate compared to what we’re in store for, Maggie thought.

Out of the fifty children in the train car less than a quarter were older than twelve. Maggie was fifteen, so she was one of the oldest. The younger children were whimpering, and after a few hours the whole cart smelled like urine and shit. One little girl tried to sit on her lap, but she pushed her away roughly. Maggie couldn’t afford to make any friends. Friends don’t live long. I have to survive. That’s it.

“Shut your trap. Stop crying,” she growled to a little boy sitting in front of her. He randomly burst out wailing for ten minutes straight, but when she yelled at him he stopped for a second and looked at her with his reddish brown eyes and then started crying again. Those eyes reminded her of someone. She sighed, leaned forward in her seat, and pressed her palms into her eye sockets as if she was trying to hold in her tears.