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CHAPTER SIX

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Caliko was roughly shaken awake the next morning. A guard thrust a bowl of stew in her hands. "Eat." He said, moving on to the other girls. "Wake up! Time to eat! We've got to get moving again soon!"

Caliko hastily devoured her food. It may have only been left-overs from the guards supper last night, but it was far better than the bread and other scraps she had lived on for the last few months. The pain had dulled a little in her back from not sleeping on the floor, but the pain in her hips were still there, and worsening by the moment. She hated the thought of the sitting another day day bouncy around in the truck.

After eating and being allowed to share a bottle of water, the girls found themselves once again ushered outside and onto the truck, but this time they were joined by two new girls. Caliko sat herself down further away from the others and tried to ignore their conversations. The truck's movements soon took its toll on Caliko's back and hips. She ached and wished she could have been pregnant in the time before the virus. She remembered when her aunt had been pregnant and how the two of them had sat on the couch watching television, her aunt's feet propped up on a cushy foot stool. She remembered how they had shared a bowl of ice cream on her aunt's swollen belly. How happy her uncle had been about the baby coming. How happy they all had been back then...

Caliko's thoughts were interupted by the truck's sudden stop. They hadn't been driving long, surely they hadn't come to their destination already? No, she could hear something going on outside. People yelling and running.

Suddenly the tarp was pulled away and Caliko sat blinking in the bright sunlight. She looked around her, there didn't seem to be any Chosen around, just ten or so kids staring at them as if in shock. She didn't know who these kids were, if they were Chosen or not, or just what they had planned for the girls.

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Who, they were, Caliko soon found out, were a restistance group calling themselves "The Rebels". They consisted of what remained of the tribe called the Mallrats and another tribe called the "Gaians". They had stopped the truck in hopes that it contained leaders of other tribes and were quite shocked to find it instead packed full of pregnant girls.

The Rebels took Caliko and the other girls back to village they had been to earlier that morning. When they arrvived, the girls were told they were free to go. Caliko had finally found her freedom, but what would she do with herself? The blonde and red headed girls, left immediately, they had homes and boyfriends to get back too. But where did Caliko have to go? She had only herself and this infant she carried. She sat down beside a tree at the edge of the village to think on where she should go. She wondered if she should stay here, or return to the city. The city, though, didn't seem safe anymore. But had it ever been safe after the virus?

"Hey!" Caliko stood up and walked over to a group of Rebels. Gathering courage, she walked up to the friendliest looking one. "I can't stay here, I need to get back to the city. Take me with you." The other Rebels, dispersed, leaving only Caliko and a tall, skinny guy with shoulder-length dread-locks.

"Take you back to the city? Why?"

"I can't stay here. I am better off in the city."

"Lady, no one is better off in the city. Haven't you heard? That place is a war-zone. No place to have a baby." He looked at her, leaning on his staff. "Where's the father?"

"Gone, and for good I hope."

"So you have no one?" He handed her a canteen, which Caliko happily accepted.

"Just myself," she replied, opening the canteen and taking a drink. "and that's all I need. Look, I am just asking you to take me to the city. Close to the city even, if that's what you want. Just, don't leave me here. I don't even know where I am." She handed the canteen back.

"Look --" He set the canteen down and studied her face. "What's your name?"

"Trin-- Caliko."

"Okay, Caliko, I'm Lynx. I'll --" He sighed. "I'll talk to Bray and the others and I'll see what I can do. But I am telling you, that city is the last place anyone should go. Let alone a pregnant mother."