Bite me

Chapter 4

My mom had always told me to sleep off a bad day. Because no matter how bad things get, you can always dream of something good. Unless, of course, the nightmares got hold of you. But even then, when you woke up and saw that your life wasn't half as bad as it could be, everything would feel just that little bit better.

But at that moment, my nightmares were scarily alike my reality. Like a broken tape, I would see Miranda taken from her cell, her small feet dragging behind her, her arms linked with the guards. But before the door could shut, I'd see my sister in her wheelchair, my mother behind her, and my father. They shook their beads, looked away, and the door slammed shut. I'd feel myself convulse, drop to the floor, cry. But everytime I tried to scream to her, my voice was lost. It was like the air had been sucked from the room everytime I tried to talk. An open vaccum sucking it away.

And then I'd wake. In a layer of my own sweat and vomit, I'd wake next to an empty cell- eyes on me as my screams startled them. They watched me with their robot eyes, completely glazed, but with an awful sense of curiosity, like I was something they'd never seen.

Maybe if I wasn't fixated on finding Miranda, I could have called them up on it.

But It's all I could think about. Miranda Miranda Miranda. I didn't care what it took, I would find her. I'd already lost my family because I was too stupid to fight, I wasn't going to give up on this one.

~~

For the second time in what felt like countless hours, I was awoken by the sound of feet scraping, only this time, it wasn't just 2 or 3, and they were accompanied by voices and cries. And they weren't mine.

I opened my eyes, feeling the heaviness of them. Sitting up on the concrete floor, I waited to adjust to the dim lighting.

I felt an emptiness from the second I woke. Knowing that, when I opened my eyes, I wouldn't have the friendly honey eyes of Miranda staring back at me, hurt like hell.

"Move it along." I heard someone call, bringing me back to the present.

My breathing hitched. As I watched, what seemed like hundreds of humans walked past my cell in a thin line, guards by their sides, leading them out to the corridor beyond the metal doors.

My eyes widened in shock, and I wondered for a moment if maybe I hadn't in fact woken up.

Swallowing hard, I stood from the ground and made my way over to the front bars. For a few minutes I was struck into silence; the humans just kept coming. How many were down there? Hundreds, thousands, maybe.

I realised then how long it had been since I felt so... Safe. Surrounded fully by my own kind, being set... Free, prehaps? Hope was a thrilling feeling. But it also hurt, with the possibilities lining up, the one person I wanted to rejoice with was the one person I could not in fact be there for.

But as I looked closer, my hope fizzled away into underlining fear and repulsion. Bloodied clothes, bruises, and scars that covered most of their bodies. For each human that passed, the damage seemed to worsen. Like the further back, the worse they were treated.

What the hell had happened to them? And what the hell was going on?

I reached to grab onto the first arm my hand made contact with. A middle aged man with greying hair, stress dripping from his stiff profile, and his eyes sunken so far back into his head you'd swear they were hollow of all life.

As our skin made contact, he hissed a sharp spit between his teeth. He wrenched his arm back, tucking it under his shirt as his face contorted in pain. I wondered for a minute what I had done, until, of course, I saw the marks on his arm.