Savage Run (4 page)

Walking through the narrow mud-packed
streets to our trailer, I passed a woman I had never seen. She
smiled at me with an encouraging and warm expression before
vanishing into a trailer close to ours. Approaching home, I saw my
father waiting at the front door, beating the Palka in his hand. He
thanked the Unifer and apologized profusely on my behalf for being
such a defiant, ignorant child. I still remember watching as the
Unifer walked away, and I even found myself wishing that I could go
with him. Instead, I forced myself to walk inside, the feeling of
utter terror coursing through my veins. Had I just had some
strength left in my legs, I would have run away, but my legs didn’t
have an ounce of strength left in them.

The physical punishment wasn’t as bad as I
imagined, an angry fist in my face and a few dozen Palka lashes in
my palms. But there are some punishments that last so much longer
than physical pain. With each whip, my father repeated over and
over, how all these years, he wanted a boy, but he only had me. A
girl who had murdered the love between him, and the woman he loved.
Murderer! Murderer! He would say again and again as the lashes
slowly drew out the blood from my palms.

At age ten, I wasn’t mature enough to
realize that I didn’t murder my mother. That the circumstances that
led up to her being dragged away from the Unifers weren’t my fault.
Nothing was. All I knew was that he believed it was true, so I did
too. I didn’t have the wisdom to see the lie he was telling me. And
himself. See how much he was hurting and finding only relief
through putting the blame on others. After that night, my father
threw the Palka away and never touched me again—I think he felt bad
about what he did.

After lying in my bed awake for hours,
pressing my cheek against the expanding wet spot on my pillow, I
decided to run away. I climbed out of my window, found a secluded
spot in the woods, and was just trying to figure out a plan. When
Gemma walked by, it was well past midnight. My fingers and toes had
frozen stiff, and I had grown weary of watching the white vapors of
breath rising from my mouth. The first thing she said was that she
liked to walk outside at night to watch the stars—it made her feel
connected, as if everything had purpose. Her comment took me off
guard. Purpose? There is no purpose to this. She asked me if it was
all right if she could sit down next to me, and I nodded. Sitting
so close she studied my face for a moment. I know she saw the
bruise on my cheek, and I even think she had her suspicions about
what had transpired between my father and me, especially by the way
her face warmed with compassion, but she didn’t prod—just stated
that she was so glad she’d found someone to talk to.

She explained that she and her mother had
just moved to our street that day from another Laborer sector right
off the east coast. Several had been relocated because there simply
was no more room. The Unifiers had gone through the city and
handpicked the women and children to be sent to Culmination. The
oilrigs don’t need pretty faces, they had told them, but the
cultural hub of Newland does. When they arrived, the Unifers
crammed her and her mother in with the Porter family. They’re nice
enough—a little too involved in the neighborhood gossip, but decent
folks.

After telling her story, Gemma invited me
over to her home, and her mother offered me a cup of peppermint tea
and a bowl of rice and lentils. Ruth was the same woman I had
earlier passed on the streets, and I wondered if it was her who had
sent Gemma out to me, witnessing how my father had waited for me
with his Palka. This made me feel embarrassed, but they didn’t
bring it up at all. Not once. Sitting up until three a.m., we
exchanged stories about our lives and laughed until my cheeks
cramped. At the end of the night, Ruth said she would be my
substitute mother since I didn’t have one, and ever since that
night, she would ask how my day was and how things were at home. It
was that night of kindness that made me think that maybe, just
maybe, there’s some purpose to this crazy life after all. That it
might be worth living for a few rare moments of bliss. Although my
father never found out about that first night, he did catch me
sneaking out a few months later. That’s when he barb-wired my
window. But even though he had taken so many things from me and
continued to do so over the years, he could never touch the part of
me that holds my most cherished memories.

But I am not Gemma and I don’t have a velvet
touch when it comes to difficult conversations. I’ll just lay it
all out in one clear, unapologetic statement.

Just as I’m about to say it, she points at
my bike. “You have a flat tire.”

My heart misses a beat. In all my planning,
I hadn’t planned for this. I look her straight in the eyes. “I
don’t have time to fix it. We’re going to register for the Savage
Run.” My lungs constrict as I wait for her reply.

Gemma’s eyes widen. “This isn’t the time to
joke around.”

“
Sergio can get us fake
IDs.”

“
Who?”

“
Never mind, it’s a long
story. Will you do it?” I ask.

“
Wait—you’re
serious?”

I pause a moment before I answer.
“Completely.”

“
But they’re not going to
let us register!”

“
If we get new IDs from
Sergio, they will,” I say impatiently.

She shakes her head and her hand hits her
temple. “This is so bad. Totally illegal. If they discover us,
we’ll be outlaws. Or they’ll take us to Skull Hill!”

“
Well, we kind of already
are,” I remind her.

She gives me an annoyed
look. “And—what—we’re supposed to
pretend
to be guys?”

“
Yes.”

“
But…we’ll just…die in the
Savage Run. Haven’t you heard that the obstacles are
deadly?”

“
Well, they estimate that
around seventy-five to eighty percent of the participants will make
it.”

She pauses as if to think. “I can’t do
it.”

“
We’ll die if we stay
here.” My pulse quickens. Surely, she must see that?

“
Was this your plan all
along?” Her tone is accusatory.

“
Yes.”

“
But it’s crazy!” She
breathes erratically and paces back and forth. “I should just go
back to Master Douglas and beg for his forgiveness before he kills
me.”

“
This plan is way better
than returning to Master Douglas. This way we have a chance to be
free.”

Her body goes rigid and she glares at me.
“Don’t you remember the time you convinced me to climb a tree and I
fell and broke my arm?”

I do and I felt really guilty for pressuring
her into doing it. But she’s older now and must have become at
least a little stronger. “You were twelve.”

“
All those dangerous
obstacle courses—I don’t have a chance.”

“
You do have a chance, and
besides, wouldn’t you rather die trying than…just die?”

“
I don’t know, Heidi. I
remember we joked about something like this before, but I didn’t
think we’d actually be considering it!”

I groan and let my head fall back. “Well, do
you have a better plan? If we go back to your mother or my father,
Master Douglas will find us.”

“
What about living in the
mountains? I could fish and pick berries.”

“
Where would we live? In
the trees?”

“
I don’t know. But we could
work it out.”

“
Gemma…”

“
We could just move to
another country where everyone is free.”

I had thought about it, but in all reality,
where would we get the money to travel? Or eat? We would still need
fake IDs to get out of the country, and what would we do once we
arrived somewhere else, unfamiliar with the language? I figured the
chances of making it were much greater if we sign up for Savage
Run.

“
I don’t want to die!” Her
hands flail for a moment before she buries her face in her palms,
sinking to the ground, her back against the dumpster.

The ground is covered in trash and is damp
from the rain, but still, I sit down next to her.

Her hands drop into her lap and she exhales
at length. “Isn’t there any other way? There has to be.”

“
Listen, I don’t want to
rush your decision, but we have to get going if we’re going to make
it. The registration ends at noon.”

She takes a deep breath and remains still
for a long time, chewing on her bottom lip.

“
We’ll do it together. I’ll
help you. You’ll help me.”

She pauses for so long that I think I might
rip my hair out. Sitting up a little straighter, she says, “Fine.
I’ll agree to do it if you promise you’ll stay by my side the
entire time.”

“
Promise.” Pressing my lips
together, I notice that my shoulders relax a little. “Let’s go to
Sergio’s.” I grab the bag of clothes from the back rack of my bike,
and we’re off.

Chapter 3

Sergio’s place presses up against the
backside of a massive abandoned factory and is situated across from
a transporter scrap yard. The wooden shack has tinted windows and a
slanted aluminum roof—a perfect place for unlawful dealings.

I hand the bag of clothes to Gemma and knock
with a leaden hand. Closing my eyes, I touch my locket, asking for
some help for just this one thing. I listen for movement inside,
but all I hear is the sound of metal clanking from the scrapyard.
Pressing my hands against the filthy, water-stained window, I
glimpse inside, but other than the shadows, it’s completely
dark.

It was an accident how I found out about
Sergio. A few months ago, I had been ordered to deliver
prescription medication to him, but when I arrived, no matter how
many times I knocked no one answered. Knowing I couldn’t return to
the hospital without a signature confirming the delivery, I stepped
inside. To my surprise, I found an open trap door in the floor.
Stressing about how I needed to get to my other deliveries before
time ran out, I decided to descend the stairs and noticed that the
light bulbs along the stairwell were lit—even though it was well
past seven o’clock in the morning. We Laborers have electricity
rationed to us from five to seven a.m. daily, and the government is
infallible at keeping the electricity shut off the rest of the day.
When I reached the bottom of the staircase, I overheard someone
talking about counterfeit IDs.

And that’s when it all came together and the
idea of registering for the Savage Run came to me.

I stopped breathing at this point and
quickly decided to make the other deliveries first. When I came
back to Sergio’s place, I found him eating lunch. I’ve made two
deliveries to him since then, and each time brought a bottle of my
father’s beer and smiled as I listened to him complaining about his
ex-wife. I never brought the whole fake ID thing up to him, but
he’s definitely some type of underground rebel, which is just the
type of man I need.

I knock again—harder and longer this
time.

Be home, please be home, I plead quietly to
myself.

Suddenly the door flings open. Sergio’s dark
blond, curly hair is messy and he has bags under his green
puppy-dog eyes. “I did not order medication,” he says in a thick
Eastern accent, a frown on his lips. He’s holding a beer bottle and
smells like he hasn’t showered or changed in weeks.

Although I had this entire refined speech
memorized, I can’t remember a single word of it. Instead, I just
blurt out, “I’m not here for that. We’re here for fake IDs.” I
inhale and hold it.

His right eyebrow twitches once. He grabs my
elbow, pulls us inside, and slams the door shut. The room is a
dark, stuffy, beer-smelling cave.

Pointing his index finger right in my face,
he says, “I don’t know what you talking about, but talking like
that is trouble for you and me both. Now get out of here!”

“
No! I rescued my friend
Gemma from a cruel Master and he said he was going to kill her, and
he’ll kill me, too, so the only way to get out of this mess is if
we join the Savage Run. And for that I need my ID card to say that
I’m a guy.”

He runs his hands through
his hair before studying me for a moment. “I don’t know what you
even talking about. I don’t have such
fake
IDs.” His tone is more
nonchalant than before, flippant even.

I take a step toward him, my heart like a
drum. “I know what you do. You have a trap door below that rug
there.” I point and continue to say, “And if you don’t help us,
I’ll notify the authorities.”

He frowns. “You do not have any proofs,
little pteetsa.”

Pteetsa
? “Then I’m sure you wouldn’t mind when the Unifers search
your house.” I grab the rusty doorknob, silently praying he’ll buy
my bluff.

“
Wait!” he says, hitting my
hand away from the doorknob. “Ah! Stupid girl! How you pay
me?”

I repress a smile. “Your payment is that I
won’t give you away.” I expect him to go ballistic on me, knock me
unconscious or pull out a gun to get me to leave. He seems like the
type of guy who doesn’t take any crap from anyone, especially a
young Laborer girl without money or influence. “And if I survive,
I’ll…remember you and send you money. And more beer.”

He starts to laugh, softly
at first, increasingly louder until his round shoulders roll.
“
You
survive
Savage Run? You never will survive and I never will get
pay.”