Run (3 page)

Camp Zero, they had explained, was located at Changi. The leaders of the country had planned to brave the looming disaster by building hundreds of emergency shelters at Camp Zero.

Tons of supplies were trucked into the area – bedding, medicine, medical equipment, food, water, diesel-powered electric generators, solar-powered generators. The idea was to move everyone into that area when things got really bad.

The police and military were the first to be moved into Camp Zero, because things were expected to be chaotic and someone needed to maintain order. But as the speed of the disaster took the whole world by surprise, it became clear that they simply didn't have time to build enough shelters.

Food was also a major worry. Even though the government had stockpiled huge amounts of rice and other basic food supplies, they estimated that they had only enough to feed two million people for six months. Or one million people for a year. Or half a million people for two years… You get the idea.

For a while, people assumed that the government would simply build shelters faster and buy more food. What they didn't realise was that worldwide, there wasn't any more food to be bought – at any price. When selected families started getting letters to move into Camp Zero, people started getting suspicious. Rumours started going around that only a few “chosen” families and individuals would be invited to live at Camp Zero, while the rest would be left to fend for themselves on the outside.

Fear set in. People started looting supermarkets and malls, grabbing everything and anything they could find – water, clothes, food. It was a real mess that ended in riots. Thousands of people were killed. But they were the lucky ones, because they didn't live to suffer the hunger and desperation that was to follow. Hordes of people started showing up at the doors of Camp Zero, demanding to be let in, only to be turned away by armed soldiers.

Within the first month, those on the outside slowly died off. Some of the stronger ones formed fierce roving gangs, gangs that would kill other gangs for food. Some were killed simply for the clothes or shoes they were wearing. The world was no longer a civilised place. It was a matter of survival.

Military trucks still patrolled the roads every day, but if they came across any skirmishes, they didn't intervene. The only thing the soldiers did was to pick up the bodies. This was still Singapore, after all, Jae had said with a cynical laugh. The leaders couldn't bear to leave the bodies to rot where they were.

I felt sad thinking about it. And weary. I started to drift back to sleep when something jarred me awake.

From outside, I heard voices. They sounded angry. Curious, I crept out silently. The voices were coming from downstairs. I heard three separate voices. I slid myself into a crouch and looked down into the living room from the top of the stairs, careful not to be seen.

It was Kyl, Jae and Brion. They were sitting on the floor facing each other. Kyl was shouting.

“I hate you so much I hope you fall onto a fork.”

“Well, I hate you so much I hope you fall into a fan and I get to turn it on!” Jae shouted back.

“I hope a fridge falls on your head while you sleep,” Brion yelled.

What? I shook my head, just in case I was dreaming. I was not.

“I hope you choke on a candy cane and it gets stuck in your throat,” Kyl retorted. “Horizontally.”

“I hope someone drops a pot of boiling hot pee on your head!” Jae said.

“I hope that when the both of you parachute out of a plane, you land in a bowl of needles,” Brion snapped back.

They glared at each other, fuming. Their faces were tight with anger.

Brion broke the silence. “Why would anyone boil a pot of pee?”

“So that it can be poured over you, lamebrain,” Jae said. “What about a bowl of needles? That makes even less sense. Where would you find a bowl that big?”

“I hope your ass gets bitten off by a wolf,” Brion said, apparently moving the bizarre argument along.

“Your ass is so gross, no wolf would want to bite it,” was Jae's reply.

“You two are so ugly, when you walk down the street, babies faint,” Kyl interjected.

“You are so ugly, when your mother gave birth to you, the doctor vomited,” Brion said.

“You're so ugly, when you go to watch a comedy, people cry,” Jae shouted.

Kyl's mouth twitched. His shoulders shook. He burst out laughing. What on earth?

I felt a tug at my elbow. I jumped in fright, then relaxed when I saw that it was only Eryn.

“Who's winning?” she asked.

“Winning?”

“Yup. The game. Face-Off. They made it up. They do this all the time. They sit and hurl insults at each other to relieve stress,” Eryn explained.

“How does insulting each other relieve stress?” I asked.

“They are the oldest here, and they feel responsible for all of us. It's a big burden and they used to get into fights with each other over what to do. That's how Jae got that big wound on his arm. It was Kyl. It was then that they decided that fighting was not very useful. We don't have medicine, so we can't afford to hurt each other. So they started Face-Off,” she said.

It made sense, sort of. I asked Eryn, “So how does a person win this game?”

“The one who laughs first loses. The one who can keep a straight face the longest, wins.”

I peered through the railing. Kyl was totally losing it. He was laughing quite hysterically. Brion and Jae sat stone-faced, staring at each other.

“You are so stupid, the dust ball on the floor is smarter than you,” Brion said.

“You are so stupid, your brain grew an arm so it could slap itself,” Jae replied.

Eryn giggled softly. “Another thing,” she said, “no cussing allowed. That's a rule. Because of the little kids.”

“Okaaay,” I said.

“They are getting better at this. I've caught almost all their shows,” she said, as if she was watching television. I guess there wasn't much to do in terms of entertainment, so this would have to do.

“I hope your brain shrivels up like a raisin and gets eaten by a donkey,” Brion said.

“I hope your wee-wee shrivels up and falls off,” Jae said.

“Wee-wee?” Eryn repeated. She clamped her hand over her mouth to stop herself from laughing out loud.

“Shh!” I warned, but I too was stifling my laughter.

By now, Kyl was rolling on the floor clutching his stomach. He laughed so hard he snorted.

“I bet you don't even have one,” Brion continued.

“I bet you don't have an asshole. Because you're so full of shit,” Jae shot back.

“Hey! No cussing!” Brion said.

“Asshole is not cussing. It is a noun. So is shit,” Jae said, crossing his arms.

Eryn and I clutched each other, laughing silently.

Brion made a weird snort. He started to smile, but stopped himself. Jae's lips twitched. He was trying hard not to smile too. Kyl's laughter was too contagious. They both looked at him, then at each other. Soon, they exploded into laughter.

“C'mon. Let's get some rest,” Kyl said after they managed to calm down. They stood up and made their way towards the stairs.

“Eee!” Eryn squeaked. She grabbed my hand and dragged me away before we got spotted. We stumbled into our room and shut the door, collapsing on the floor and giggling quietly.

“Shut up!” It was Dyanne. “Or I will come over and smash your heads!”

Yikes! We scrambled to our mattresses and lay down. I smiled to myself. I couldn't be sure, but I had the feeling that I hadn't laughed like that for a long time.

I clutched at my side painfully as I ran next to Jae.

“I knew you shouldn't have come,” he said, glancing at me.

We were on a “hunting” expedition for more food. Breakfast had been really horrible, just half a can of baked beans each.

And lunch had been worse – more sardines and jars of pickled vegetables that were salty and disgusting. I ate everything, nonetheless. It was then that I realised that the “feast” the night before had been a special one, just for me.

They normally ate as little as possible to preserve whatever food they had left. The stash in the house was dwindling, so when the kids started talking about venturing out to search for more food – something they took turns to do regularly – I volunteered to go. It was my way of thanking them. Plus, I didn't want them to start thinking of me as a burden, an extra mouth to feed. Dyanne had already voiced her objections to keeping me in their group.

“Why is she here, anyway? We can hardly feed ourselves! We're running out of food. We don't know who she is, so why must we help her?”

She had glanced around smugly to see if anyone else agreed with her. I looked around and saw a few kids nodding silently.

“You see? You all agree with…”

Kyl cut her off with a glare. “How could you? So now you think survival is more important than helping someone? More important than living an honourable life? Who knows what would've happened if we had left her there. Since when did the lives of other people not matter?”

Dyanne backed down, but looked defiant.

Another kid spoke up, “If we don't have enough to eat, we will all die. I don't want to die.”

“But if we leave her to die, won't we be like the ones in Camp Zero? Saving themselves and leaving others to die?” Jae said. “We all have a choice, you know. And our choices define who we are. I don't want to be one of them.”

“Why are you defending her, anyway?” Dyanne said. “Just because she's pretty? You talk about honour, but it is so clear that you stupid boys are all suckers for a pretty face!”

“That's not true,” Eryn said quietly. “I want her to stay too. It wouldn't be right to let another kid die. Haven't we seen enough kids die? What if it were Shulin? What if we lost her one day, and another group found her and left her to die instead of helping her? How would you feel then?”

That seemed to have an effect on Dyanne. Her face took on a stubborn look, but I saw a deep sadness in her eyes.

“We have to give her a chance at least,” Kyl said. “She could be useful. Another set of hands also means more work can be done.”

So Jae and I had just stolen some food – although in my mind, it wasn't really stealing if people had abandoned their stuff. We had rummaged through the homes in an HDB block and were about to run away with our loot when three adults ambushed us and tried to take our food.

They jumped us when we rounded a corner at the void deck and tried to grab at our bags of food. We should have known better, and we should have been more alert, but we were tired from searching house to house, climbing all those stairs.

We ran from them as fast as we could, turning a corner where Jae pulled me into a small enclosed space, where we stayed hidden. There we sat, gasping for air until the sound of angry footsteps faded.

I turned and glared at Jae, trying to ignore the fact that we were standing so close. “That wouldn't have happened if you had listened to what I said, but no, you had to do it your way and now look what happened.”

Jae had insisted on being super thorough. He had made us start from the very top floor – the 25th floor, in this case – and we had to go through every single flat. Being the impatient one, I had wanted to leave after finding a nice stash of canned food and instant noodles on the 20th floor. But no, Jae said, we had to look in every flat.

Jae shot me a sheepish half-grin. “Look, tulip, I'm sorry, okay? But it's not my fault, you agreed to do it too.”

Tulip? I scowled at him. “Jerk.”

“We should go back now, since we have everything we need. Also, they might have friends, so we'd better go before they bring back-up.”

“Why don't they just look for their own food anyway, instead of stealing from us?” I asked.

“Firstly, they are too lazy and too weak to search the way we do. Secondly,” he said, pausing to give me a smug look, “they can't pick locks like I can.”

“Yeah, yeah, big applause for the master criminal,” I said sarcastically. I refused to let him see how impressed I was with his lock-picking skills, which were really quite good. He had managed to open all kinds of locked doors and metal gates.

He looked faintly disappointed. “Enough chatting. We'd better go now.”

“Fine, but give me something to fight with first, just in case. I bet you fight like a girl,” I taunted needlessly. Why was I being so mean to Jae? Was I a mean person?

Jae peered around the space we were in. It was a small storage area filled with cleaning equipment – brooms and pails and stuff like that. He took hold of a mop and pulled off the head.

“Here, will this do?” he said, handing me the mop stick.

I sighed, taking the stick. “Do I have a choice? Let's go!”

Jae opened the door to the storage room slowly and looked out. He shut it really quickly and blew out a big breath.

“Not good,” he said. “They brought back-up. There are 10 of them now.”

“So what do we do? Maybe we should just stay in here,” I whispered.

“Chicken,” he said, smirking at me. “Who's being the girl now?”

“I
am
a girl,” I said, shooting daggers at him.

Before he could think of a comeback, the door to the storage room flew open and we found ourselves staring at a big man. He had a shaved head and tattoos running up his bulging arm muscles. He would have looked a lot scarier had he not been wearing a pink T-shirt.

As I stood and gawked, Jae grabbed a broom and shoved the dusty end into his face. As the man spluttered, Jae pushed him aside and ran out, grabbing me along.

We tried to run away but they had us surrounded. I gaped in horror at the men.

Jae and I stood back to back, each with a huge rucksack filled with food.

“Don't let them take the food,” he said. “They are weak. We can take them down.”

Two of the men lunged at me. Embarrassingly, I screeched.

I was terrified. I shouldn't be here, I thought. I should be at home, painting my nails and texting friends on my phone – or whatever it was I usually did. Not fighting a bunch of guys! I panicked and swung my stick at them. The stick hit one of the guys on the side of his head and he simply crumpled to the ground.

My mind registered what happened with some surprise – I did that?

Then my hands started moving on their own. I twirled the stick smoothly and shot off a stunningly fast blow to the other guy. I hit him right in the middle of his chest with the end of the stick and he dropped on the floor, gasping for breath. I stared at the poor guy in shock.

What did I just do? How did I do that?

I looked over at Jae. He was surrounded by five of them while three others – including Tattoo Guy – simply stood by, watching. When they realised that I had taken down two of their guys, the three of them surged towards me.

I screamed again and panicked. This time, my wits seemed to have left me and I found myself swinging my stick wildly. Tattoo Guy easily smacked my stick away and caught my arm. In his other hand, he had a knife.

I shrieked. “Jae! Help me!”