The Survivors

Chapter 3

Six years. I spent six years in that hell.

We were all divided by colors and gender. There were different times to eat and work for us because they didn't want the colors to mix. 

The routine was always the same. The PSF came in at 6 in the morning to wake us up and expected us to make our beds. The first night I spent here, most of the girls cried themselves to sleep, mainly because they missed home. But I didn't have time for tears and I don't have a home anymore, if I ever had one. 

Afterwards we went immediately to work in the garden or the factory. There was no breakfast. The rules were also clear. We weren't allowed to talk to each other, nor were we allowed to leave our barracks, unless we were being fetched and above all we weren't allowed to pull a 'freak act'. Whether by accident or on purpose. That was the first time I ever heard our symptoms called a freak act.

Every day we had an hour in the barracks to rest. While the other girls were telling each other stories about a Prince Charming who will save them one day, I stayed out of the whole thing. I talked to no one and I wasn't a dreamer. I was realistic. No one is coming to save us.

After about two years, the camp administration had taken the dangerous ones somewhere else because they could not get them under control. But that was not the end of the so-called 'improvements' In the garden we grew our own vegetables, most of which the soliders ate. In the factory we had to wash all our clothes and sew our own uniforms and those of the PSF. We were not only prisoners, but also workers. 

I was just standing in the factory again, threading shoelaces into the black boots, when suddenly a solider went through the rows to check our work. I must admit that the whole work was child's play compared to what the PSF did to us. Because if we touched them, we were immediately punished, but that did not stop them from touching us. 

He stopped with the girl next to me and started to count the boots that were on her table. In his hands he held a black gun. The girl was about half a head shorter than me, had red hair tied in a braid and many little freckles decorated her nose. Only the expression of fear was visible in her face. 

"Eight, nine, ten..." How could he make every single number in his mouth sound so sharp. The girl must have thought the same thing, because she flinched at every number. Then the guy took two steps towards her and put his hand on her ass. When she didn't react, he stretched out an arm and pretented to correct her work, but he pressed her against her chest. What a perverted asshole!

But she didn't move a bit, didn't make a sound, because how did she know what was coming when she did. But it made me angry and I already felt the fire blazing inside me. 

"You're doing it all wrong." He said, close to her face. "Look at me" She did not respond. "Come on look at me!" He was screaming so loudly now that some were gasping for breath in horror. 

"We were forbidden to look at you." She gave it away very quietly and stared further ahead. The man started to grin dirty. "The laces are threaded from above and not from below." He took all the shoes and threw them of her table with a a jerk. A tear fell from the corner of her eye.

And that was the moment when I realized that I could no longer watch. "You thread it from below." I gathered all my courage and looked him in the eye. 

"What did you say?" The solider asked with a piercing look, while the girl simply opened her eyes in shock. 

I took a deep breath. It was strange to hear my own voice again after so many years. It sounded deeper than I remembered it and my throat scratched a little. "The lacing is tighter  if you thread it from above and not from below." And then I said something that I knew would make the PSF very angry. But I just wanted him to leave that girl alone. "Breathing in all the steam from the shoe polish probably killed your last brain cells." 

Not even a second later he had grabbed me by the hair and kicked me against my hip. It hurt, but I didn't make a sound. He wanted me to suffer and see me on the ground, but I would not allow him this triumph. 

He pulled me up by my arm again and came very close to me with his face. "What did you say, you little bitch?"

I knew every pair of eyes in the room were on me. Since they would punish me anyway, I immediately refused to beg for forgiveness, as anyone else would have done. "Get you filthy sausage fingers off my arm right now, you ugly, fat pig, because otherwise they're off."

He snorted angrily. "You really like to spend a day in the cold, don't you?" I glanced at him. I had heard about this punishment and how bad it was to sit outside in the cold without blanket and food. But this guy had no idea that cold didn't bother me.

He must have seen the provocation in my eyes, because he grabbed me by the neck. "All right. A day in the garden for disobedient and disrespectful behaviour." With these words I was dragged out of the factory.

Because they always bathe us at the entrance gate we had to walk about half a kilometre through the camp. As we were working in the factory today, the greens were busy in the garden. We walked past them and when some saw me, I saw the shock and pity in their eyes. I hated pity. I've always hated that. It just shows that people see you as weak and that's the last thing I needed right now.

Every single second that passed the air was felt thinner and thinner. Arriving at the gate, there were already some children sitting there, who probably had done someting wrong. One girl was by now so full of snowflakes that you couldn't tell her blonde hair from all that white. The clattering of the teeth could still be heard through the whole wind. 

Before the solider left me on the cold floor, he took my face in his hands. "You'd be so much prettier if you'd just keep your big mouth shut." Pretty? I'd like to throw up right here and now. To guys like him, girls were just pretty things. Disgusting! 

In the middle of the night someone came and took me back to my barracks. As I was about to get into bed, someone tapped me from behind. With a jerk I turned around and saw the girl I had defended yesterday. I had no idea she was in my barracks. 

She came two steps towards me and wrapped her thin arms around me. After a few seconds I returned the hug. "Thank you." She mumbled softly. "For what?" I asked although I could already guess the answer. We sat down on my bed. Since the beds were arranged alphabetically, mine was pretty much in the middle.

"For standing up for me. I'm Annie, by the way" "Lilli" I answered. "And no problem."

She put on a little smile, which also made me laugh. She started to talk a little bit about her former life and I just listened to her. It was good to hear a voice that was not full of anger, fear or false hope. 

"And what about your parents? Don't they miss you?" She suddenly asked out of nowhere. I didn't know why I was lying. "My parents are dead" Actually, it wasn't a lie, because my mom was already dead and my dad was dead to me.

She smiled at me and a tear flowed from the corner of her eye. "I'm sorry about that." I said nothing to it and when a rustling sounded, we both lay down in our beds very quickly. My mom always said that I have the ability to recognize when a person is good. And this girl has a heart made of gold. Maybe talking to these girl isn't so bad after all.