Us Against The World

Chapter 6

My heart is pounding against my chest so hard that I am convinced it will burst at any given second. I'm almost too fearful to turn around; but when I do, slight relief washes over me. A boy who looks about my age stares back at me with dark brown eyes, daring me to speak. 

"H-hi." I stutter and the boy continues to stare. Fear shadows my body and I move to scoot away from him, but he grabs a tight hold of my wrist. I gasp and we stare into each others eyes for what seems like minutes but it is only seconds before he releases me and begins to laugh.

My heavy breathing threatens to suffocate me as I watch this stranger cachinnate before me. His head is thrown back and his eyes are tightly shut. I attempt a smile, but since I have no idea as to why he is laughing, I decide against it. 

When the boy is finally finished with his moment of humor, he looks at me with a remaining smile. "You should have seen yourself." he says a little too loudly and it takes everything for me to not press my hand against his already covered mouth.

"I'm Jexton, what's your name?" the boy holds out his hand and I hesitantly take it in mine. My subconcious pesters me to use a fake name to protect myself, but I shut it out. "Farrah." Jexton nods and smiles. "Nice to meet you." his slightly muffled voice greets. I imitate his actions, then we sit in silence for the next few moments looking about our surroundings.

By his appearance, I assume he is new to the outside world just as I am. I begin to wonder if he's on the same mission as I am. I vacillate whether to ask him what he's doing in the middle of nowhere. Then again, he's probably wondering the same about me.

"Why are you sitting in a ditch by a creek?" I ask with a small voice. "Why are you?" Jexton fires back with a teasing tone. I shrug and give him a shy smile. "I ran away from home because my dad was trying to force me to kill his imates." he explains and I feel my eyes dialate. "I-inmates?" I stutter and he nods. "He's one of the leaders of the Consilium." 

My heart drops into my stomach as I try to hide my nervousness but it doesn't work. "Don't worry, I'm completely against what they're up to." he adds and points to his mask. "Usually I wouldn't have to wear this, but the disease exists outside of our community and that's where I escaped from." I continue to stay silent in hopes that he speaks more.

As he explains his reasoning for running away from his father, I'm desperately hoping he doesn't ask me about mine.

"That disease you mentioned..." I begin and look away from him and up to the sky. "Do you know anything about it?" I shift uncomfortably and hear Jexton sigh. "Not really. I used to ask my dad about it all the time, but he would never tell me anything. My mom died from it." confusion washes over me and I turn to him quickly. "Were they married?" I ask and he nods. I cross my legs on the ground and lean over them.

 "The Consilium was the one who created the disease, right?" Jexton tilts his head back and forth a couple times before answering. "Well, the idea of it." he looks down at the ground, then back up at me. "So," I begin without taking my eyes off of him. "if your mom died from it, why would your dad continue to allow its existance?" confusion ties in with anger as I remember that my father had died the same way Jexton's mother did. "Because the Consilium can't destroy the disease," he explains and looks down as he rips grass from the ground before looking up at me again. "only the CDC can, and they refuse to."

I lower my eyebrows and continue to stare at Jexton. "Why?" I ask in a monotone voice and he shrugs. "That's one of the only facilities that the Consilium is still trying to overthrow; but they've been having issues with it for years." I shake my head and run my hands up my cheeks and over my forehead. 

"That makes no sense," I begin and Jexton opens his mouth to speak but I beat him to it. "if the Consilium created the... idea of the disease, wouldn't the CDC be apart of them then?" Jexton shook his head and turned around. I grew nervous when he didn't turn around right away. When he finally did, though, he answered my question.

 "Since the people at the CDC found out about the Consilium's plan to overthrow the Government, they tried to overthrow them. The Consilium hasn't succeeded in overthrowing everything yet; and the CDC is one of the most powerful facilities in the state. That's why they've been having so much trouble with it." I nod, understandingly. "So they're basically in competition with each other?" I ask and Jexton nods.

After I have taken a few moments to process all of this new information, I decide I can trust Jexton enough to speak of my father and my mission.

"My dad died of the disease, too," I begin, staring at the ground. Jexton eases in a soft "I'm sorry." before I continue. "His grandfather worked for the CDC... you know, before the Consilium overthrew the Government." I bring my knees up to my chest and rest my elbow on my thigh as I fiddle with the pendant of my necklace. My other arm rests on my opposite knee.

"He died a few months after I was born," I turn my head to Jexton briefly. "my dad; so I never got to meet him. I've been wearing this necklace my entire life and one day when I was 11, my mom took it away from me."

"Why?" Jexton asks and I notice that he sounds futher away than he actually is. "I don't know, really. But a couple days ago I was snooping around in my dad's old office and found the necklace and a letter in one of the locked drawers." he tries to hide his chuckling and I can't fight the smile on my face. "What did the letter say?" Jexton asks and I remove my bag from my shoulders. I pry it open and pull the neatly folded paper from the inside pocket and hand it to him. He carefully unfolds it and reads the words. He smiles before standing. 

"Let's go for a walk." he says as he hands the paper back to me.