Fadeout

Chapter 1: Silas

Five Years Later

The three new boys huddled together in front of the unopened yard door. Silas watched them out of the corner of his eye. He kept his face forward so he wouldn’t draw attention to himself and silently wished they would stop glancing about. It would only make things harder for them, and their first week in the Cartiam would be hard enough if it was anything like his.

The sharp whistle blew signaling the door’s opening. One of the boys jumped. Tymas, the Faan guard standing by the door, walked over to the boy and cuffed him so hard the side of the boy’s face smashed into the concrete floor. The boy began to cry, but he stood up and stayed in his spot as the door opened slowly.

“Now run,” Tymas said nudging the first new boy with his baton.

Along the wall. Silas closed his eyes as the boy ran straight out into the yard.

Two gun shots crackled reverberating again and again in echo. Feet shuffled and Silas peeked to see what had happened. The boy was still running, like a deer in a ripe corn field infested with rabid dogs. The next shot hit the dirt by the boy’s feet and he leaped to the side. Silas didn’t get to see anymore because the line was starting to move. The other new boys were more tentative in entering the yard, but the older, more experienced boys passed them, turned right and ran in the dirt groove near the side of the wall.

It was a fast pace. Fast enough to raise everyone’s heart rate above 130 when it was sustained for an hour. Silas remembered wondering how he would ever keep it up the first week he arrived, but it was almost too easy now. The first boy figured out where he was supposed to be running and rejoined the line by the wall.

Before they were halfway done with the first lap, the girls were let out of their ward and they quickly caught up with the boy’s line. No one was in a rush. Most of them had done this before, with the exception of the four new girls at the front of the line. Every chance Silas got he scanned the girls out of the corner of his eye for his older sister. Malina was normally easy to spot, with her bright taupe eyes and quick smile no matter what she was doing. But this day Silas couldn’t find her. His heart pounded faster and he feared that she had been taken. The Machine made the lights flicker all night long and all he had been able to do was hope it wasn’t her. He craned his neck to check the girls closer and almost tripped, but he saw her. Her hair tucked back into a braid, different from her usual ponytail, which was now starting to come loose. Her normal smile was gone and she plodded after everyone as if she were only going through the motions. But she was here and safe. For now.

Silas pushed his relief down. It wouldn’t do for them to see it. He refocused on the pounding of his feet and the feel of the air as it hit his sweaty matted hair. Any time he felt tired he thought of the picture on the calendar in his cell. It was a beautiful, calming scene. A forest of trees and a small waterfall that flowed cool and free between them. He wondered how it would feel to be that free. Something about the line of the trees and the stilled rush of the water that made him want to run faster and run far away. But he couldn’t. The chip implant at the base of his neck made sure of that. Still, Silas couldn’t get escape out of his mind.

The whistle blew again and everyone slowed to a walk. They did one more lap to cool off and then everyone lined up according to age, all 358 of them; the boys on one side and the girls on the other.