Chapter FIVE
1936
I wake up coughing black, my eyes are itchy and watery, making my vision blurry. My throat hurts. My eyes hurt. Everything hurts. Something warm is dripping down the side of my face and there's red on my hands.
I stare at them, hypnotized, until someone presses a white bandage into my palm and I look up, disoriented. It's military truck full of other young children, all covered in ash and soot and nursing various injuries. One girl is crying hysterically, snot covering her pale face. Two other small children are silent, clutching at each other and I see more red spattering their clothes. The girl next to me is still, looking straight ahead.
Dazed, I press the cotton pad to the side of my head as the truck starts moving.
Then I remember Jon. He was right next to me. Where is he? I can't see him on the truck. I try to stand on shaky legs, when a man comes and grabs my arm, forcing me back down. His hair is dark, and his face is meticulously shaved, a sign he had money.
"Sit," he barks and the other children flinch.
"Where's my brother? His name is Jon, " I cry. "He needs help too."
The man frowns at that. He's standing in front of me, bracing himself on the bars that stretch over the back of the vehicle, his dark eyes souring the war torn streets.
Where's Jon?
"Sir, the hospital isn't this way-," the older girl next to me says as we turn a sharp corner.
"Stop the truck!" The man shouts suddenly, banging the back of the transport to signal the drivers. He's pointing down a narrow alley, and I make out the figure of another child through the smoke. The young boy is struggling to support the weight of an older man,
who looks to have been injured in the bombing.
As the truck rolls to a stop, effectively blocking the entrance of the alleyway, two more black clad men get out from the cab and make their way to the pair.
"Thank you, he got hit in the head with a-" the boy starts to say, before they grab him, leaving the elderly man alone to fall heavily to the ground. The boy immediately starts shouting for help as he is dragged to the truck. The man who made me sit down says a bad word.
One on the men hits the boy on the head, hard. It's quiet again.
The boy is thrown up into the back of the truck with the rest of us and we start moving again, faster this time. He doesn't move.
"Where are we going?" I just want to go back, find Jon and Mother. Away from these evil
people.
"Hydra." He replies, emotionless
"And sweetheart, what's your name?" A lady with red lips asked me. She already bandaged my head and the scratches on my legs.
"Is this so Jon can find me?" The man was wrong, earlier. This is exactly like a hospital. I don't know what Hydra is. There are two long rows of beds. At each bed, soldiers like the ones from the truck stand, watching us. I don't like them.
I think we were on the truck for a long time. It had gotten really dark so I fell asleep, and woke up in this white room with blinding lights from the ceiling.
The older girl from the truck is sitting on the bed next to me, glaring at everyone who passed. The boy who was helping the old man is on the bed across from me. He still hasn't woken up. Another boy is on the left, crying.
"Hum?" She leans closer to my face, like she didn't hear me quite right.
"Jon? He's my brother."
"Oh, yes. Of course." She laughs a little as she says this, under her breath. She doing weird stuff now, tapping my knees, putting a squeezy thing on my arm, looking in my eyes and ears.
"Name?"
"Lillian Weber." She scribbles something on a clipboard.
She smiles at me like a wolf that had just caught sight of it's prey. Her teeth look too big in her mouth. I don't tell her this though. The orphanage people told me it was rude to say stuff like that out loud. "How old are you?"
"Five," I say, holding up a hand, fingers outstretched.
"And where are your parents?"
"My dad is a soldier. My mom is sleeping and she's not coming back. Is my brother okay? Will you find him?"
She is silent before turning to a tall soldier dressed in black behind her. He gives her a blue bag with a long tube hanging from it. She stands up and hooks it to a metal pole attached to the top of my bed.
"What's that?" I ask, pointing to the bright, almost glowing bag.
"It's medicine, it'll make you feel better." She then takes a long thin stick of metal out of her bag. She attaches it to the tube and the blue stuff flows to the end.
"Oh, okay." That makes sense, this is a hospital. "Wait, what are you doing now?" I say it loudly, and the soldier stiffens, taking a step toward me. Doctor Lane tries to grab my arm, the long metal piece in her other hand.
"No!" I'm screaming now. "No, no, no."
"Lillian, you need to relax. It's just a needle. I need you to be still for me." I don't listen, and Doctor Lane looks up and nods. Suddenly, another person grabs my other arm. The soldier. He moves it to the other side of the bed and untucks a metal handcuff, cinching it around my wrist. I try to kick at him, but he does the same to my ankles, and Doctor Lane finally grabs my left arm.
"Be still," she says stern, yet coldly calm. "The more you struggle, the longer this will take."
I scream again as she slides the needle into the crook of my elbow.
It burns.
I scream louder. I feel it, flowing everywhere. I try to scratch the needle out, but I can't reach.
She sighs again, and reaches into her bag once more. Doctor Lane pulls out a white rag and, holding my nose until I open my mouth, and stuffs it inside, muffling my cries.
It burns so much. I look at my arm, and I swear I can see it in my veins. Everything's so blurry now.
I want to sleep.
But there was something… I can't remember now. It's fuzzy, loud and quiet at the same time
Thx so much for reading.