Don't Be Yourself | #ShawRocketFundContest

~two~

Liam 65,8 holds a glinting pistol in front of him. The barrel is pointed straight at the government man's forehead. My boyfriend's breathing is ragged, his hair mussed up, and his eyes watering. His forehead gleams with a coat of sweat. His eyes briefly flicker towards me. "Are you okay?" he asks.

Incapable of speaking, I nod my head.

Liam swings his glare back to the Distsiplina officials. Both of them are matching his gaze, without so much as a blink. The man crosses his arms over his chest. "You wouldn't dare shoot," he says with callosity.

"Oh, but I would. I will if you do anything to harm my Sophie," Liam growls. "I love her and I will protect her."

The man scoffs. "There is no such thing as love," he spits. "We're all exact copies of each other; loving someone would be like loving everyone."

I turn to my mom, whose face is as blank as a whitewashed wall. Her gaze is fixated on Liam. She shows no fear. She can't show fear.

"That's not true," Liam croaks. I can see the bravado and courage that shoved him into my house with a weapon in hand is running out. "That's not true," he repeats, clearing his throat. "I love Sophie. It's indisputable." The corner of his mouth turns up in a grin, and he glances at me out of the corner of his eye.

I smile despite the solemnity of this situation.

"You mere little boy," the government man says through gritted teeth. "I am giving you one last chance to make the right decision. On the count of three, I, for a change, will shoot if you do not drop your weapon." He reaches into the gun holster on his waist. "One..."

"Well, you're not giving me much of a choice here," Liam 65,8 says, disengaging the safety with a click and pulling the trigger in the blink of an eye.

The Distsiplina man collapses to the floor in a heap. As soon as he does so, the government lady's posture returns to normal and the hypnotized glint in her eyes fades, like she was released from some evil power's hold. My mom screams, huddling against the wall. "You monster!" she shrieks at Liam. "You should be the one dying for him! He is part of the government that structures our lives so that we don't become barbarians! You should be grateful! Instead you end his life!" Tears are streaming down her face and she runs over to the government man's side and sobs wretchedly.

The government woman pulls a pair of handcuffs out of her pocket and swings it on her pointer finger. "Run!" I yell at Liam, sprinting towards him and gripping his arm. "She's going to arrest you!"

But instead of heading towards my boyfriend, she grabs my mother's hands and brings them behind her back, securing the metal loops around her wrists. "What?" my mom screams. "What are you doing? You should be doing this to the murderer present in this room, not me! What did I do?"

The government lady straightens her back again. "You, ma'am, are being removed from the room for loud and disruptive behaviour. Remember the seventy-eighth rule for a Better Society; 'No emotions or feelings are to be displayed to the public.'"

"But this isn't the public!" my mom cries. "This is my own home! Please, let me go!"

The government lady shakes her head, helping my mother to her feet. "I'm gravely sorry, Sophie. Now, please come with me. I need to escort you to the Distsiplina van for processing."

"She's going to kill me," my mom says, trembling. "She's going to kill me, and all because of you!" She points at me with a shaking finger. "If you weren't so-"

The government lady placed a cloth gag over my mother's mouth, muffling her desperate screams. I burry myself in Liam's chest, my body shaking with sobs. My mother is going to die, all because of me. All because of my inadequacies, of my imperfections. Her life was put in danger the second I was born, yet she still gave everything she had to protect me from the Distsiplina.