Transcendente

ONE - KATE

     Have you ever asked yourself "what in the actual fuck is happening!?" 

        Well, I am sure you have, and so does Katherin everyday in her life. The girl had a small job at a cafeteria next to her home, it did not pay much but just enough to feed her little sister Chloe. In Great Hong Kong, life does not wait on two minors who also happen to be American immigrants from WWIII. The city expands kilometers in the air and to the sides, filth smell travels the streets in every corner of that place.  

        China raised to power a long time ago, uniting the world into one nation and creating opportunities to everyone on earth - or so they said would happen. Kate was born in the States, she has been with her sister in Hong Kong for a few years now and was somehow adapting. Her work at the cafeteria brought her enough happiness to keep going on day after day and the love for her sister is what kept her alive and with purpose.

        Katherine never really studied, as a kid, she easily learned from others and from any source of information she could find. She remembers her parents trying to enroll her in schools and she would always get either spelled or transferred because she had hurt some bully or because she was way ahead of her class. When Kate was about 12 years old, she was in a car accident with both her parents dying and only her and her sister surviving without a scratch. Shortly after that, after a couple years living from hole to hole, they finally found themselves in China with the chance to start again.  

       Everyday after her expedient, Kate would pass by a Italian restaurant to get a free portion of whatever they had left. The owner liked the girl and would hit on her sometimes but never crossed too much of a line so she appreciated the gesture and it became a habit.

        Katherin left the cafeteria at her usual time, turning the lights off on her way out and locking the doors. She lives a couple blocks away from the shop and usually just heads to the Italian restaurant and then straight home. Violence in this part of Hong Kong was undoubtedly it's worse problem. Cheap burglars  and random psychopaths would come out of the fucking shadows to steal from people who had less than themselves.

And this was Kate's turn.

A young boy dropped her purse while running, spilling all the pasta stored in a plastic box.  

 "Watch it, asshole!" said Kate while trying to pick up her things from the ground and realizing that all her month payment was falling out of it's envelope and exposed to everyone to see.. 

        She looked at the boy, his hands had already reached her purse and the money inside with it. 

 "Son of a bitch!"  the girl sprinted as fast as she could in hopes to reach the burglar. She blamed herself for not listening to the Italian restaurant's owner and getting a credit account so she wouldn't ever go through this - truly she just didn't really felt like her money was safe anyway. The boy turned into a corner that led into a small alley in between the massive buildings. Kate followed the boy, running on the tip of her toes and screaming for someone to stop him, obviously, not even a soul showed up. 

After following the asshole for what seemed like hours and turning up in a place she'd never even had the notion of it's existence, she cornered him in a endless alley.

"This is fucking enough!"  screamed Kate. "That's all I have, give me back now or I'll..."'

"Or what?" said the boy as other men showed up from the emergency exits of the buildings around her and from behind trash cans and cars "WHAT THE FUCK ARE YOU GONNA DO, BITCH?" 

Everybody started to surround Kate, who was suddenly taken by despair. How could I be so fucking dumb?  She tried to run but one of the bigger men threw her on the floor, ripping the skin of her hands and elbows. Another man kicked her ribs. She felt the air escape her lungs and let out a gasp of pain.

 "Look, you just stay still now and we promise we'll be kind"  the men around her already touching her, ripping off her black top and choking out any attempts of resistance. 

Despair transformed into horror, she was about to die. Katherin closed her eyes and screamed as hard and loud as she could, she kept screaming, hoping everything would be a dream when she opened her eyes.

    It wasn't.

Nobody had their hands on her anymore, in fact, she was the only person on a dozen that actually had both hands. The boy who stole her purse and shouldn't be any older than fifteen was laying body down inside a full trash can, except for his head that stared at the skies in a fixed look of terror. Another man was hanging  by the flesh of his right leg from a fire escape stair, his left leg was nowhere to be seen among all the blood and body parts. Complete chaos and horror around her as she looked around and saw all the death, her entire skin covered in blood and almost none of it hers. A gasp. One man was alive, or barely.. A truck wheel pinned him against a wall and both of his legs where completely  smashed.

"Holy.. FUCK! PLEASE HELP ME CALL SOMEONE!" 

Katherin tried to hold back her tears with her hands just to feel more blood, without looking at the man, she grabbed her ruined purse and started running again, running from the scene and heading home as fast as she could. No looking back, no hesitation. 

    Fuck. Fuck. Fuck. FUCK. What in the actual fuck just happened!?