After the Fear (Young Adult Dystopian) (18 page)

While the woman regains her balance, I catch a glimpse of myself on the screen. My school uniform is slick with sweat and sand. Where my face should be, there’s a mass of reddish- purple swelling. Seeing it makes it hurt even more, and I look away just as the woman rushes at me, seemingly eager to take me down while I have no weapon.

I guess it’s time to see whether my signature move works.

I wait two beats. Then throw both arms up and leap forwards into a cartwheel. I close my right hand over the hilt of the dagger lying on the sand. My legs fly over my head, star-fish style, before landing perfectly on the ground. As my feet hit the sand, I twist. My arm follows the arc-like motion, reminding me of a discus thrower.

The dagger I was holding slices into the woman’s neck.

Just as I had planned. Just as I—oh—planned.

A broken cry alerts me to where the man stands, his shield held up defiantly despite his other wrist limp at his side. He looks hopelessly from where the woman now lies back to me. It occurs way too late that they might have been a family.

Or maybe it’s too early.

He strides towards me, shield raised. He wants it over. If only I was Alixis. I could give him some kind of prayer or nice thing to say before he dies. But I have nothing. So I dodge the sharp rim of his shield and pivot on one foot so that I’m round the back of him.

In quick succession, so that he would barely have time to register I’m no longer opposite him, I stand on the small of his back and grab his shoulders, using them to launch myself upwards. The moment that I’m at his height, I place my hands on either side of his head.

As I break his neck, I’ve never hated myself more.

‘SOLA! MY DEAREST, you did so well!’ Shepherd Fines greets me with open arms, a bunch of exotic flowers sticking out of his fist.

‘No thanks,’ I say, pushing the bouquet away and clambering into the spinner. I don’t deserve flowers, or praise. One of the two Herd officers who escorted me to the Stadium asked for my autograph on the way back, and I nearly threw up all of his digipad.

Shepherd Fines gives Ebiere the flowers instead, which she accepts graciously, of course. He climbs in next to me, shuffling up to the middle seat.

I want that horrible thing inside of me to wake up again. At least when it’s there it relieves me of my guilt. I don’t see the people who I’ve killed every time I blink. My body’s numb, but I want it worse because I can still
feel
. When I’m filled with fear, everything I do makes sense. When that’s gone, what do I have left?

I stare out of the side of the machine which takes us upwards, but the scenery has lost its magic. Everything is dull. I think that’s why I let Shepherd Fines keep his hand on my knee. After a while, it slowly creeps up to my thigh. I want to tell him to take it away, but I can’t let him see my face. It’s covered in tears and blood.

***

I SPEND THE REST OF THE NIGHT in the Wetpod. Scrubbing and scrubbing every inch of my skin until I have taken off the old, filthy layer, and it is too painful to scour anymore. The shower in the little cubicle is steaming hot, and I gulp in air through the sharp lines of running water. I don’t look down to see the water running red down the drain.

The cuts on my stomach and thigh are superficial, but they bleed more than their depth should allow. And despite already having two royal-purple arcs staining both eyes, I don’t think my nose is broken, just very, very bruised.

I relish in the pain. It distracts me from the other hurt: the worse, deeper misery.

Shepherd Fines tried to force me over to the Medic’s Cabin as soon as we touched down, but I only wanted one thing from him.

‘Sir, when is William coming back?’ I asked.

‘My darling, who?’ He spoke in a similar way to how you would address a favourite pet.

‘William. He was hurt during my tryout and went to hospital.’

‘Oh, of course. Yes, I was told about him before. There were some unfortunate complications with his healing. Don’t you worry yourself, Sola. He will be here, but the way you’re carrying on, it will likely be after you’ve gone!’

Now, as I shampoo my hair for the third time to get rid of every grain of sand, I wonder what he meant by
gone
. Back to my father? Or to my—how would Alixis put it?—
eternal resting place
.

Strangely enough, when I get to my locker and find a new uniform waiting for me, crisp white, ironed and still warm, some of my self-loathing lifts away. I’m not proud of what I did today, but this uniform reminds me that I’m here for a reason. That I’m part of a collective who all do the same.

I’m acting like I’m disgusted by it all, and I am, but come my next Demonstration, I will do it all again. Because the alternative is
my
life.

Selfish, selfish, selfish. Those are all the words I have for myself as I sprint across the empty field and head towards my pod shaft. I scan in to find Alixis sitting in the dark on her bed, her hands clasped together in front of her face and her head bowed. She looks up, startled.

‘Sola!’ Her arms are like welcome wings as she embraces me. I don’t move or hug her back, but not because I don’t love her. Because I can’t seem to do
anything
.

‘Let me guess, praying for me?’ I ask.

She pulls away, still holding my shoulders, and examines my face.

‘Actually, I was praying for
me
.’ She smiles. Using the tip of her finger, she eases my face one way, then another. I giggle, which hurts my nose. I guess everyone is a tiny bit selfish in this place.

‘Hmm, you got a pretty bad head-butt, but I don’t think it’s broken. You’ll have those bruises for a while though. Huh, it looks like you’re wearing a head band and it’s fallen down over your nose.’

‘Or like I’m wearing war paint.’

‘Or like you fell asleep in your breakfast.’

‘Oh yeah, that purple breakfast we’re always having?’ I ask sarcastically but can’t help laughing. I sit on the edge of her bed and fling myself back so that I’m staring up at the metal bottom of my own bunk. Soon, there’s a dip in the bed. Alixis lies next to me.

‘So, are you well and everything?’ she asks. I can tell she’s trying to make it sound casual.

Still staring upwards, I shake my head.

‘Actually, Alixis, there’s something I need to tell you.’

‘Ooh. Sounds serious,’ she whispers dramatically, turning her head to me. ‘Go on then.’

I’m about to talk when I look to the trigger camera. The red dot tells me I probably activated it when I said the word ‘prayer’.

‘One second,’ I say, before getting up and climbing onto the top bunk. I pull the sheet from my bed, lean over to the camera and wrap the sheet as thickly as I can around the small screen at the end and the microphone panel. What I’m about to tell Alixis isn’t for anyone else’s ears.

Alixis gasps. ‘We’ll be found out. Shepherd Fines is probably being alerted right now.’ She’s not berating me; in fact, she looks quite impressed. I climb down from my bunk and sit next to her.

‘Shepherd Fines had his hand on my leg for an hour today. Right now, I don’t care if I annoy him. Anyway—’ I take a deep breath. ‘—I realised today what’s important. I want to be a nice person, but I always put what
I
want in front of everyone else. That’s what got me here in the first place. I really like Dylan. I mean, I’m totally infatuated with him. We even kissed at Coral’s party even though she liked him first. But what I’m saying is. I
love
you, in a different way. And if there is anything going on between you and Dylan, even the tiniest spark of attraction on your part, then I promise I’ll never pursue anything more than friendship with him ever again.’

I wait. There’s a second of stillness.

‘Pahaha!’Alixis claps a hand over her mouth, but it does nothing to stifle her fit of giggles. She shakes her head, rolls over to turn away and through the gasps of air and laughter, I think she’s apologising to me.

‘Sorry, Sola. That was rude. It’s just—’

She laughs again, then makes a straight face so that it looks ridiculous and over the top.

‘Right, sorry. You’re just so funny when you’re serious.’ She brings up her hand as if to bob me on the nose, but obviously thinks better of it.

‘There’s nothing going on between Dylan and me,’ she says, her expression finally earnest.

‘What about all those times when you were whispering together, making plans, laughing?’

‘I don’t know when we were laughing.’ A sigh, laced with something I can’t place, comes from my best friend. I watch her sit with effort, staring at the side of the pod which looks down upon the playground.

‘I’m sorry, Sola. I wanted to tell you before but I had to keep it secret, not for me but—’ She looks over her shoulder at me, then to the smothered trigger camera.

My stomach lurches. I sit up and allow her to take my hand. The way people do right before they look into your eyes and give you bad news. . . .

She places my hand on her belly. It’s hard, but still round as if she’s eaten way too much.

‘Meet my baby.’ She breathes out slowly, her mouth a hopeful smile.

A second of nothingness. I don’t think I heard her right. . . . Her
baby
?

‘You’re pregnant?’

She nods, casting her eyes once more to the camera.

‘But who—how . . . how long have you—?’ Apparently the power of speech has deserted me. Alixis looks down, smiling now.

‘Three months. My fiancé is the father.’ She laughs, almost anticipating my open-mouthed response. I know from Debtbook that she’s twenty-two years old, but she still seems too young, too near my own age to be having a baby. Not to mention the fiancé.

‘Does he know?’ I ask.

‘Of course, he was there when it happened, you know.’ She raises her eyebrows at me.

I roll my eyes. ‘Thanks for the sex-ed lesson. Seriously though, what’s going to happen?’ I don’t need to add
with your tour
or
with your growing stomach
.

Her smile lessens.

‘I need to fight,’ she whispers. I can tell she’s said the words to herself a thousand times before. ‘Fight and finish my tour before I really show. Training is keeping my belly small for now. I probably have another month, maybe two until I can’t make excuses about being bloated any more. But, Sola, in the past people have finished their tour in two weeks! I’ve done research.’

She looks at me with hopeful eyes; soft around the edges and pleading with me to agree with her. I’ve known her long enough to gather that even if I do point out that those people were probably in much better physical shape, not carrying a baby, and were about one out of two hundred others, she won’t give up.

‘You’ll need to train harder, but you could do it,’ I say with a deep breath. ‘Find a way to make the crowd love you in your first game, get lots of followers. Maybe I could ask Shepherd Fines to go easy on you?’ I’m basically thinking out-loud, remembering what Alixis once said about Shepherd Fines doing anything for me.

‘No! You can’t get him involved.’

‘I wasn’t going to tell—’

‘Please, not even a clue. He’s the one I’m hiding from. No hints, no nothing, even if it will help me. He’ll take her away,’ Alixis says.

‘I’m sure he wouldn’t—’

‘He will! I looked it up in the Book of Red Ink, and Dylan re-checked. It’s in there.’ She casts a worried look at the bedside cabinet as if the book itself will tell on us. ‘Act 66: All children borne by persons chosen to pay the Debt at a time when their Debt remains outstanding shall unconditionally and irrevocably become the property of the Shepherds.’ The words are learnt by heart.

I wrap my arm around her shoulders, drawing her into me.

‘We won’t let that happen, okay? We’ll get Dylan to recommend you to begin your tour and we’ll train you harder and you’ll survive and go home and raise your baby.’ The words rush out of me. I try my hardest to believe them for Alixis’ sake.

‘Dylan won’t do it though. He thinks it’s a suicide mission. Oh, maybe you could ask him?’

‘I’ll do it tomorrow, I promise.’

As I rub my hand up and down the top of her arm, a misplaced memory triggers. I think back to our first day here, when I thought Alixis swapped her blood test.

‘Alixis, what did you do with your blood vial?’

She knows straight away what I’m talking about. I see it in the way her shoulders sag.

‘I didn’t mean to get the brothers into trouble. I knew they wouldn’t test them for pregnancy,’ she whispers. ‘Now they’re gone and I can’t help but wonder . . .’ Her eyes fill with water and she looks away. Regret pierces my middle.

‘You only swapped it with one brother, not both. And we have no idea what happened to them, it might not be anything to do with you. Now why don’t we get some sleep, we both need it,’ I say, trying to salvage the situation.

‘Oh, my Lord, Sola, I’m sorry. I was supposed to be comforting you after today not the other way around.’ She sniffs, pulling away so she can look at me. ‘Your fight was brilliant. Debtbook is going crazy over your no-gun thing. You should have seen Dylan when you fainted. He nearly burst a vein!’