Severing Sanguine: A Companion Book to The Fallocaust Series Book 2 (9 page)

Then a bright light… a bright blinding light.

And gunshots.

I fell to the ground but my body was frozen stiff. Above me I saw lights and Cory’s body jerk and jolt as the thunderclaps of gunshots ripped through him. He stood standing for just a moment before he fell to the ground. I saw his hands twitch and frothy blood, bubbly with white foam start to pool around his body. His eyes were staring up and I saw his chest heave just once and his mouth heave too… then he shuddered and fell silent.

“Did you hit the kid?” a female voice sounded.

“No, of course I didn’t hit the fucking kid…” a man snapped.

I saw shadows above me but I could only let out a whimper. I wanted to jump up and fly away into the night sky. I didn’t want to get sold to a factory or given to slavers. All I wanted was friends to read to me and keep me company. If the Legion took me then Diaz and the others would be worried too.

I closed my eyes as I heard them approach me.

“He’s breathing… the dude is dead.” The lights were red under my closed eyelids but soon it was dark as the two people loomed over me. My ears were sore and throbbing from the gunshots but I could hear vehicles in the distance. These vehicles sounded big, I had only seen quads and dirt bikes before from the merchants visiting Sunshine House. Was the sound coming from cars?

“Hey, kid… we didn’t hit you did we?” the male one said. I felt him tap me with his foot. I kept my eyes closed but shook my head. I wasn’t for sure that I wasn’t hit but I didn’t feel anything on my body.

Arms grabbed me and helped me up. I kept my eyes closed though it was hard with all the activity around me, bright headlights and the low rumbling of vehicles. I could hear more people around too but I wasn’t sure how many.

“Open your eyes, we’re Skyfall’s Legion; we help little kids about to get strangled to death.” The man chuckled at his own joke and said to the female one, “He has his eyes shut tight. You know shutting your eyes won’t make us go away, right?”

I kept them shut tight. “Can I go?” I said quietly. “I want to go…”

“Was that your dad? Where are your parents?” the man asked, before saying to someone else, “He has to be at least eight or nine. We can get ten bucks if we recruit him. His parents would probably be willing to sell him after such a bad winter last year.”

“That’s a good idea… where did…”

“What the hell are you two doing?” another female voice boomed. This one made me jump and open my eyes but no one was looking at me they were looking at her.

“We found a kid, General Ellis, and we might’ve just killed his dad. Dad was trying to strangle the little fucker to death. What do we do with him?” the male voice asked.

I looked at my shoes and saw my hands were dripping blood. I could see the corner of Cory’s dead arm too; he had foamy blood all around him. He wasn’t my dad or ever had been – like everyone else he had lied.

I closed my eyes again.

“Drop him off in the nearest town, I suppose… why are his eyes closed?”

“Not sure either, maybe he’s retarded or something.”

“Really…” I felt hands on my chin; she grabbed onto it and gave it a shake. “Open your eyes.”

I shook my head and the other two laughed. The angry sounding lady shook my chin even harder. “Open your eyes, boy.”

I held my hand up over my mouth and spoke. “You’ll kill me if I do… just like everyone else tries to kill me if I do,” I said defiantly. I don’t know where I got my bravery from, maybe I just didn’t like my head being shaken like this.

“No excuses, I said open your damn eyes and put your hand down for fuck sakes,” the lady said in a sharp tone. She was getting mad at me – everyone hated me.

I sniffed and lowered my hand before opening my eyes. I looked up and saw the lady come into focus.

She had short black hair and purpely-blue eyes, her face was all serious and she was glaring at me like I was a parasite.

Though something weird happened, when she looked at me she didn’t scream or call me a demon – her eyes widened like she was surprised.

“Holy shit…” she whispered. I looked down at my shoes, feeling my body go hot under her intense stare. Though a moment later she took my chin, a bit more gentle this time and lifted it up. Then she pulled on my lower lip and I knew she was looking at my teeth.

“What’s your name?”

I swallowed and dug my fingers into my thighs again. “Sami.”

She was quiet for a moment, the sounds of the engines seemed lost in the silence.

“Did you call yourself that or did your mother name you Sami? What’s your other name, boy?”

I looked up at her, my brow creasing. I didn’t know what she meant by that or how she knew I called myself something else but I told her what she wanted to know either way.

“Sanguine.”

Her face paled; she looked around before her eyes went to one of the legionary who had gotten me. “Get Silas on a remote phone… now. I don’t care what he’s in the middle of, tell him it’s urgent.”

She took my hand which made my heart skip. I tried to pull away from her but she tightened her grip. “Come with me, Sanguine.”

“No!” I pulled back. “I’m not going with you; I didn’t do anything wrong!”

The lady named Ellis kept dragging me, I kept stumbling as I tried unsuccessfully to dig my boots in; she was literally dragging me towards one of the vehicles.

“What happened to your mother?” Ellis asked. She was opening the door of a big giant truck with one hand and pulling me towards it with the other. “Get in.”

“My mom’s dead, this is my home. Where are you taking me?” I yelled. Ellis grabbed me with both her hands and I started to kick and twist around to try and get free. I only had my emergency backpack on and everything else, all my food and ammo, were in the apartment.

“You’re not supposed to be out here alone, child…” Ellis swore and suddenly another pair of hands had me. A big burly man whose arms were huge. “Hold him, Nero. He’s a squirmer and he’ll run the moment you let him loose. And watch his–”

The man named Nero yelled as I sank my teeth into his hand. I clenched my jaw and kneading my fangs into his skin.

“ –watch his teeth.”

“You bitch, tell me now do ya? Get the little fucker off of me. Where the fuck is my Taser?” Nero smacked my head but I kept sinking my teeth further and further into his hands until I couldn’t bite down anymore. I sat there, his arms still holding me, and started to growl.

“Fuck, he’s growling? He’s seriously growling? Jack doesn’t growl… does he?” I saw a hand in front of my face and a moment later he pinched my nose. I didn’t realize what he was doing until I realized I couldn’t breathe. I unhinged my teeth with a gasp and started coughing.

Nero laughed and grabbed onto my chin. The door closed and a moment later Ellis got in beside Nero. I was horrified when the vehicle started moving.

“I want to go back to my home!” I yelled. “I have my guns there and my food. I spent all year making that place good, you fucks!”

Nero chuckled but Ellis was on her phone and wasn’t paying attention to me. I tried to pry myself out of Nero’s grasp but he was so strong it was like his arms were metal beams.

“Guns and ammo? He has been doing well for himself… do you have Kingy on the phone yet?” I tried to bite Nero again as he was talking but he was too fast for me; to show he was done with my biting he put his hand over my mouth.

“Father? We have…” Ellis looked at me and I scowled at her. Her eyes travelled to Nero and she said to him, “Cover his ears. I don’t think… you know.”

I growled and shook my head as Nero covered my ears with his hands. I took this chance to try and open the car door but Ellis grabbed my free hand and soon my other one was flailing around trying to grab anything I could shred. The angle they had me at was awkward though and there was nothing to grab. I ground my teeth in anger and decided to make as much noise as I could. I didn’t want to be taken anywhere, I wanted to go back to my town with my friends and my food and water. This wasn’t fair at all.

These people didn’t seem to want to hurt me just keep me quiet. Nan had said the Legion was nice most of the time and would give Nan free water filters and radiation juice for us; sometimes they even gave us pieces of candy. Though I had also heard from Cory and the other greywasters that the Legion was bad and would sell me for food or make me into a slave, so I didn’t know who to believe.

The Legion did help me because Cory was trying to strangle me to death and they seemed nice now.

I decided to stop squirming not long after. I stayed still and as a reward Nero loosened his grip on me, though his hands were still covering my ears as the mean lady was on the phone.

Then finally he took his hands away and I could hear.

“There he’s being good now,” Nero said. “See, I’m great with kids. Do you want some candy, Sanguine?”

I furrowed my brow and saw his eyes watching me in the rear view mirror of the truck. A legionary was driving it into the dark. My home was probably way behind now.

“Do you have cigarettes too?” I asked. Both Ellis and Nero laughed a lot at this for some reason.

“No, shithead, just some sweets. You want some or not?” Nero said through his laughs.

“Okay…” I said slowly, then I felt him rustling things in his jacket.

My mouth dropped open when he handed me an entire chocolate bar! This one was blue and white with a Dek’ko label. I ripped into it and started eating it; it was like nothing I’d ever tasted before!

“Take your backpack off and if you don’t feel like ripping my arm off again you can sit in the middle of us,” Nero said. I looked down and saw that he was wrapping his arm in a piece of rag. I decided to take off my backpack but I kept it on my lap, Barry was in there and the only leftover food and water I had.

Nero shifted me down into my own seat and I sat there savouring the sugary chocolate. I had never had chocolate before only chocolate flavoured hard candy. It coated my mouth in a blanket of creamy sweetness. I loved it.

I smiled as Nero brought out more chocolate bars from his shirt and started opening my bag. I watched him cautiously as he stuffed the chocolate into my bag before, with a laugh, he pulled out Barry.

Fear hit me, I didn’t want him to hurt my friend, he was my only friend now. I reached out to grab him and Nero let me take him without argument. He kept putting chocolate and other things in my pack.

“You have a stuffed bear, eh? Who gave that to you?” Nero asked.

“Nan,” I said, putting Barry on my lap.

“Nan? Where’s Nan?”

“They kicked me out for being bad.” Everyone had to ask me where Nan was and it hurt my heart every time I said to say it. I decided to save the follow up question and stated plainly, “I almost got axed to death by Gill because two boys hurt me so I lit them on fire.”

The car echoed with Nero’s laughter to the point where Ellis told him to shut up because she was on the phone. I smiled though because I had never had someone laugh when I told them I burned two boys alive. I liked Nero.

I looked at Ellis and chewed on my chocolate bar. “Where am I going? It took me forever to get food and water in my town. You can’t take me to a town they’ll kill me there. Why am I in the car? What did I do wrong? Am I going to be a legionary?”

Ellis at this point got off the phone. I saw she looked mad but I think she always looked mad.

“Silas says if he seems to be doing well for himself… he stays.”

Nero said
fuck
and passed me a bottle of brown stuff. I opened it and smelled it before something stung my nose. The surprise of the stinging bubbles made me growl. I think I was just on edge, everything was happening so fast.

“Seriously?” Nero’s tone dropped.

“King Silas?” I said in awe. Why did the king care what happened to me?

Ellis nodded and looked at me with a sigh. “We can help him though. Why don’t we take him to Little Spring and drop him off there? That has a well and it’s full of small game and it also is close to Melchai. Boy, you were saying you’ve had trouble because of how you look?”

I nodded and held up my palm. It now held a spiral scar that was bright pink. “No one wants to be my friend and if they do it’s to trick me. Am I a demon?”

“No, you’re not.” Ellis’s mouth pursed to the side and she looked at Nero. “I think it’s too late to find him a family. He seems fine on his own. Are you okay being by yourself?”

I didn’t know how to answer that. I liked having people to talk to but I was afraid that if I said no I would have to go to an orphanage or they would make me become a legionary. So I nodded. I wasn’t lying anyways I liked not having to listen to grown-ups and I could always find more greywasters to play with me.

“Why can’t I go back to my town?” I said. I started licking the melting chocolate off of my hands. “I was fine there until–”

“Until you decided to get almost strangled to death by that greywaster?” Ellis said, giving me a sharp look. She looked at me like Nan did. She must be a mom or at least a Nan. “We were going to that town for a reason. We’ve been hearing about people going missing around there… twenty of them. Was that all you?”