Alive
A fan fiction in progress
by Bryan Harrison
Pt. 13
1
The gang set out through the forest, on a different path than the one on which they had arrived. They made their way down the long brushy slope, pass the numerous booby traps, and into the woods that led to civilization… or what was left of it. Sy cut back and forth a few times so it would be difficult, if not impossible, for anyone who didn't know the route by heart, to retrace their steps. There was a time when David would have been able to memorize every change of direction. But his human brain had too many other things to be concerned with for that kind of precise recollection.
After 30 minutes or so, the group came to a tunnel shrouded in thick undergrowth. They passed into the gloomy place and, after a short time, came out near a roadway. There were no cars about, but Sy made them all wait in the shadows that covered the mouth of the tunnel as he walked out onto the clearing beside the road. Two vans quickly rolled into view, as if they had been waiting for his arrival. They parked off the road and Sy leaned into the one of the windows to speak with a large man in dark glasses.
Some of the boys moaned at the sight. "Rollers?" Darek said. "Are you kidding me? Where'd he find those oldies? The 21 Century?"
David twisted his face up in puzzlement.
Wizzy gave him a perplexed look. "They still ride on wheels. Rollers. Get it?" she explained.
"Oh," David said. 'Well, uh, yeah. I… I just never heard that term before."
"I'm sure," Wizzy said sarcastically. Then she turned to Darek. "Why don't you complain about it to Sy," she suggested with a dark smile. "I'm sure he'd love to hear your opinion." Darek decided not to comment any further on the issue.
Sy scanned the roadway once more, and then waved them all over. In moments they had packed into the vans and were on the road, headed southward.
The sun was mid sky by the time Allentown came into view: a crop of shining new structures set high on the hills, older buildings in various states of disrepair lay in the trees beneath. This had once been a place sustained by farms and livestock. Now it provided office space, computer hardware and cruiser parts, as well as young naive soldiers for ambitious foreign campaigns.
Sy had the drivers pull over in the old downtown area, and ushered the gang into one of the Fun Zones. The place was filled with shouting local kids, who paid no attention to the anonymous looking strangers that sauntered in.
"No hustling," Sy ordered. "Just have a little fun until sunset. Then we go to work. And stick by your partners!"
Wizzy and David caroused the place, not speaking to one another, watching other boys play the Holographic Single Shooters and Racers. "Not my thing," Wizzy said. David didn't have any opinion on the matter. A few service Mecha caught his attention and it occurred to him just where they were headed that night. A shiver ran up his spine. Why, after all this time, was he bothered by the idea? He wasn't one of them anymore. Why should he care?
He had a sudden urge to tell Wuzzy about his past; a strange notion that she might somehow understand. But he pushed the thought away. The two managed some strained small talk as the afternoon wore on. Then Sy poked his head in the door.
"We're on," Wizzy whispered.
The locals didn't really pay attention to the large group of strange kids that left all at once and climbed into two large vans.
2
The Flesh Fair was laid out in the pit of a wide basin that spanned the distance between a large body of water and an old unused freeway. It had once been extensive orchards, until Mills Pond had swollen to lake sized proportions. Now the area was serving as parking for the traveling circus of destruction.
Sy dropped the gang off in pairs at strategic locations, far enough apart that they wouldn't run into each other. The vans were going to be parked near the main exits. Everyone noted their pick up points, just in case something went wrong.
When he had placed Animal and Tank, Sy ordered the driver to stop at the northeastern coroner of the lot. He turned to Wizzy and David. He passed a hand full of small, dull grey pellets to Wizzy and then placed his hands on both their shoulders. "Taking no risks tonight. We're only here for an hour. Then we're out. So don't dally. Set your timer. Listen for a foghorn. That's the clear-out call. Now move it!"
"What's a foghorn?" David asked as they jumped out of the van.
Wizzy looked as if she was about to scream at his stupidity. "Just watch for my cue," she said.
The sun had already set, but the horizon was still burning a violent gold. The pair waited quietly for a few minutes, watching families and large groups of young people moving through the lot towards the Fair. Then Wizzy spotted a man parking an old roller nearby. "Perfect" she said. She extracted one of the tiny snoopers from her pocket and turned to David.
"Give me your best pissed off face." She ordered. David got into the mood, gritted his teeth and narrowed his eyes on her. Wizzy sighed and kicked him hard on the shin.
"OW!" David screamed.
"That's more like it!" she laughed. Then she tore off, running towards where the old guy was ambling away from his car. David let out after her, recalling the practice runs they had tried in the courtyard. But this was real. He could get caught! The thought brought a flood of excitement though into veins and he suddenly became his character.
"Get back here you little brat!" David yelled.
The old man noticed them approaching. Almost on queue he stopped to intervene. "Ok now, you two What's going on here?"
Wizzy ran by the old timer, panting and terrified. "He's hurtin me!" she screamed. David chased her around the Mark once and then slowed to let her grab the man by the arm.
"You kids need to stop that," The man said. "Where's your parents?"
"I'll gonna stomp her… uh, his little butt!" David yelled. He lunged at Wizzy. The old man blocked his path.
"Stop that now! There ain't no reason for you youngsters to be fighting. Go on inside before you miss the show!"
Wizzy winked at David. She was finished.
"That's my cousin, mister, and he's in some serious trouble. So get out of my way!" David screamed.
The old man stepped back. "Ok, boy, Ok. But you need to settle down before someone gets hurt!"
Wizzy was already off. David let out after her, screaming and hollering about a pending 'ass whuppin,' and the two disappeared behind banks of parked cruisers. They found a place beside an old van and immediately fell into laughter.
"That's wasn't too bad at all, Pork Chop," Wizzy said, a look of approval in her eyes.
David's breath was racing. This was exhilarating. He had never experienced this type of excitement before. What they were doing was wrong, it was illegal, and he knew exactly what that meant. But somehow, that made it all the more thrilling.
"Let's do another one!" he said.
3
Forty minutes later, the parking lot crowd was thinning. David and Wizzy had worked their way close to the gates, pulling The Little Cuz at every opportunity. They'd had to reset their location once when they saw some of the gang playing the game close by. And they'd had a quick scare when one of their earlier Marks had come back to his car for something, and recognized them. "You two still at that?" the man said. He had pulled the two aside and innocently scolded them before heading back to his car. David had felt guilty. Wizzy thought it was hilarious. She grabbed David by the hand and led him to a dark area near the fence.
"I'm almost out of snoopers," she said. She checked her timer. "We still have about fifteen minutes. Let get rid of these and head to-"
A large explosion suddenly filled the air and the crowd inside began to roar. David flinched at the sound. It awoke something unexpected inside his mind.
"What's wrong with you?" Wizzy laughed. "Oh, let me guess, you never heard an bomb go off."
"No," David said, somberly. "I mean… yes. I've been to a Flesh Fair. It's just that…" He didn't know how to finish.
Wizzy gazed on him curiously for a moment. "What happened to you? Why were you in that hospital?" David could tell she wasn't mocking him now. He opened his mouth to reply, but knew that she would never believe. No one would.
An amplified voice rang out from inside the fair and echoed through the night.
"Welcome my fellow Humans! Welcome to the Celebration of Life. The tribute to Orga kind and to every breathing thing that walks or flys or crawls or swims upon God's Earth!"
The crowd roared. The stands began to shake with stomping feet.
"Are you ready?" the announcer yelled. "Are you ready to witness the purification of the world?" Another explosion went off and David mind's was flooded with images he never wanted to see again. Shattered bodies and melting faces. He moaned and tried to force the memories away.
Wizzy looked concerned now. "What's your problem?"
The chanting had started inside. "10… 9… 8…" It was the countdown to the first death of the night.
An unexpected emotion began building inside David's heart. "Can we go now?" he asked. He knew there was a whine in his voice, but he couldn't help it.
"No way! We have work to do," Wizzy said. She was no longer sympathetic.
"Please," David pleaded "I can't … I can't stand loud sounds," he lied.
"Can you stand Sy beating your butt tonight?"
"5… 4…3…"
David cupped his ears. But he could not hide from the force of the cannon. He felt the pressure of it on his flesh and saw the comedian's shattered face burning in his mind's eye. Someone grabbed his wrists and pryed them from his ears. David opened his eyes to see Wizzy's enraged eyes on him.
"Are you crying?" she screamed. "You'd better not be crying!"
David felt his face. There was wetness on his cheeks. "I'm sorry, Wizzy" he said. He felt pitiful and weak. But there was no way to explain his reaction.
"Shape up, Pork Chop!" she yelled over the din of the crowd. "We only have a ten minutes left. Now get moving!"
But another sound rose in the night. It was a low croaking moan that came from somewhere in the parking lot. Wizzy was instantly up and running. David started after her. "What?" he yelled.
"It's the foghorn!" she called over her shoulder. "Something went wrong. Keep up!"
4
They raced through the lot, passing a few stragglers that were still making their way to the gates. The people stopped and stared as the young pair ran by, knowing that something was going on, but not wanting to get involved. Behind them the crowds screamed and explosions shook the night as the slaughter began.
In minutes they were at their drop point. David fell to his knees, panting and wheezing. Wizzy paced nervously. "You need some exercise," she said as she looked around for the van. She climbed atop a car and scanned the area. "I can't see crap!"
A minute passed. Then five. Ten. Still no one came.
Wizzy grabbed David and pulled him to his feet. "We gotta go!" she said.
"Where?" David asked.
"The van should have been here by now! We can't wait. We'll have to make our way back alone."
"But… but that'll take days!" David exclaimed.
"Rules of the game! Let's move!" David started to object. "You'd rather go to jail?" she said.
He shook his head. "Ok. Which way?"
Wizzy started towards the thick woods that lined the parking area. David fell in behind her, feeling naked and vulnerable without Teddy and his fake ID. They had just made their way past the last bank of cars when headlights suddenly flared to life ahead of them.
"Freeze!" a loud voice said.
David felt his heart sink. If he was caught they'd take him back to the hospital… and then the man named Jeff would come and pick him up … and then…
David turned and ran back towards the lines of parked cars, seeking someplace out of the glare of the headlights; someplace to hide and plan his escape. He had reached some shadows when he heard voices raised behind him. They were yelling and telling him to stop running. "Get back here" someone yelled. Then they were … laughing.
Laughing?
"Hey, Pork Chop!" came a gruff voice. It was Sy's voice. David stopped and turned to see the man's shape silhouetted in the headlights, beckoning him back. "Where you going," the man asked. He was surrounded by the other boys, all bent over in laughter.
Wizzy stood in the middle of the group. Her arms crossed over her chest, foot tapping an impatient rhythm against the pavement. "Ain't a damned thing funny about this" she said.
David groaned and went to join his new friends. "Ha-ha-ha," he said sarcastically as they slapped him on the back and shuffled him into the van.
It had been a long eventful day. He was glad it was over.
5
Sy and the others laughed all the way back to the hideout. "Man, oh man," they said. "You should have seen yourselves!"
Wizzy was burning with humiliation. She didn't speak until they'd worked their way through the dark woods and back to the hideout, a trip that would have been impossible without Sy or Wizzy along.
They had decided to wrap up early, Sy explained after they were safely inside. The pay off had been better than he expected and he thought they'd just quit while they were ahead, before a real emergency sprang up. So he'd rolled through the parking lot, picking up the other teams. But when he picked up Animal and Tank, he'd decided to have a little fun, and had them sound the alarm.
"C'mon, Wizzy!" Sy pleaded, trying not to laugh. "It was a joke." Nance dutifully took the girl's side. "Well, I agree with The Wiz Kid," she said "What if they didn't see the pick up and ran into the trees. They'd be on the road for days. Not funny."
Sy waved them off and went to the computer to see how many accounts they'd managed to break into. "Women!" he complained. The boys all nodded agreement, whether they understood what he meant or not.
"How'd Pork Chop do?" Darek asked, trying to change the subject.
Everyone's eyes were suddenly on Wizzy. She set a cold look on David for a minute. He looked back, fully aware that he was at her mercy. She'd seen him panic at the sound of cannons and the mayhem of the fair. She'd seen him crying.
But she only shrugged and said, "Pretty damned good actually," Then she left to lie down.
Sy gave him a satisfied look. Darek patted him on the back. "Nice job, Pork Chop. We knew you had it in you."
David accepted the salutations, feeling kind of like a fraud and realizing that he was now in Wizzy's debt. Where would this all lead?
6
David couldn't get to sleep. He lay, tossing and turning in his cot, trying to digest the events of the day. So many emotions! News ones. Old ones. It was almost too much to experience. At what point did the Orga mind get overloaded with such feelings?
He wondered how he would he ever settle back into the calm life he had lived with Mommy, even if he did find his way home. And if he managed to get away, how would he find her? It was too much to think about. He closed his eyes and forced away his troubling thoughts.
He was starting to drift into a welcomed slumber when he noticed a light at the end of the room. He propped up on his elbow.
Voices. He heard voices. A strong feeling of déjà vu fell on him.
He rose from his cot and tip toed across the room, careful not to wake any of the gang. There was some sort of meeting going on. But, what could they be discussing so late in the night?
"Should we show him everything?" someone said.
This was all so… familiar. Was he dreaming?
"Nah! He's not ready. I don't care how well he did tonight," said another.
"No one is ever really ready," said someone else. It was Nance voice.
"But he's different," said a deep voice. Sy's voice. "I say we take him along."
"To Rouge?"
"Yeah," Sy said. "I got a feeling about this kid. He's different somehow. I say we teach him the ropes. Rouge City will be perfect for that."
"Well, let him practice with a few more Fairs first," Nance suggested.
"Fair enough," said Sy. The others laughed dutifully.
David pressed against the wall, his young Orga heart suddenly racing. The foundations of an escape plan were already forming somewhere in the unknown recesses of his brain. He wasn't sure exactly what the plan was yet, but it had something to do with Rouge City and escaping… and getting an address with the help of a brainy little hologram whose assistance he had one sought out.
"Ask Dr. Know," David whispered, as he tiptoed back to his cot. "There's nothing he doesn't."
(cont...)