Ben rolled his eyes and shook his head. “He
thought it was possible, but I knew it was bullshit. He wanted to
catch you and test you to see if you were the real Ben. But if
there was a real Ben, he probably died years ago. Think about it.
Think about all the shit we survived. That trip all the way out
here from Georgia, avoiding the nuclear zones.” That reminded him
of something and he laughed with disdain before saying, “Want to
hear something crazy? Those stories about the nuclear plants
failing were bullshit. They lit up a few of them, but nothing like
what people thought. If they had, we’d all be living through a
fallout. They just cooked up those stories to force people to move
where they wanted them. Man, you should hear some of the stuff they
did. It was sick.”
“Then why are you working with them?” I
asked.
“I’m not,” he said, as if I’d offended him.
“I’m fighting them. That’s the reason I joined Jerald. Look, I know
you’ve been spending time with the Sons of Reagan…”
“You mean the High Rollers?”
“Whatever they call themselves. You let them
fuck with your head. They’re out here pulling their shit, running
around causing trouble, but the only person actually fighting back
is Jerald and the Wolf Pack. They’re the ones you should work with,
not these fucking terrorists.”
I saw the flash of eyes in the woods behind
him. Predators on the move.
It only happened for a moment, and then they
were gone, lost again in the forest. The grey sky had started to
darken as night approached, but we were still illuminated by the
light coming from the camp behind us. That light had momentarily
flashed in the eyes of a dog that was moving through the dark,
attracted by our gunshots. My brother was oblivious to their
advance.
“How would Jerald have tested me?” I asked,
eager to get an answer before we were attacked. If I lived through
this, I wanted to know if I was a clone or not.
“It had something to do with a memory that
the real Ben would have, but that they didn’t put into the clones
because it would’ve been too dangerous for them to know.”
“What was it?” I asked as I watched the
shapes of wolves begin to appear in the distance. “What was the
memory?”
“Something about a red-haired girl…” He never
finished his sentence.
The pack of wolves attacked, and my brother
heard them as they leapt at his back. I was also a target, but at
least I was prepared for them. The wolves were massive, but
scrawny, victims of a long winter, and they wobbled as they walked,
as if addled by some unknown ailment. I thought there were four of
them, but more materialized from the woods around us, emerging from
the inky darkness, and my brother was brought down quickly.
A beast lunged at me, but I caught it by the
neck and threw it down at my feet. The wound on my arm ripped open,
and I felt fresh blood trickle down my sleeve as I put my entire
weight against the undead monster. My brother was screaming in pain
as the wolves shredded him. They ignored me, more interested in the
easy kill, and I saw my pistol laying in the snow a few feet
away.
The wolf under me was kicking and biting, but
he was trapped as I pushed down hard on his ribs. The creature
looked more decayed than the coyotes I’d encountered earlier. His
lips had rotted away, leaving him with a permanent snarl. His gums
were blackened, and wet with his own blood. The animal’s tongue had
been bitten off, and I wondered if it was by its own teeth as it
continued to snap at me.
I pressed harder and felt the animal’s ribs
snapping beneath me. A gush of fetid liquid spewed out of the
animal’s mouth, and formed a pool beneath us. It was still alive,
and tried to kick free, but I began to punch at its head until its
skull cracked. When it was finally dead, I looked up to see if it
was safe to go for the gun.
Most of the wolves were focused on their
kill, but one had moved back to gnaw on a piece of meat that he’d
torn away from the others. His maw was wet with my brother’s blood
as he chewed at the meat, staring at me as he did. He was wavering
in his stance, just slightly side to side, like a drunkard trying
to feign sobriety.
I went for the gun, and the wolf growled at
me. It was unlike any other animal noise I’d ever heard, deep and
wet, as if the creature was ill instead of vicious. I picked up the
gun and took careful aim before firing. The wolf’s body rolled
backwards, its head split from the bullet, and its legs twitched as
it died.
The rest of the pack looked up at me, strings
of flesh hanging from their teeth, and I started firing into them,
carefully picking them off one by one. The pack didn’t relent their
assault on my brother in favor of survival. They had no fear of me
or my gun, and no concern for the death of their brethren. When I
got to the last of them, the animal barely paid me any mind as it
gnawed at my brother’s exposed intestines. Its eyes just looked up
at me as its maw stayed buried in its meal. I killed it and then
looked at my pale doppelganger, his skin nearly as white as the
snow, with flecks of red blood adding the only color to his
cheeks.
He gasped, and his torso jerked, but that was
all he could manage as he stared up at the snow falling down on us
both. I knelt beside him and asked, “Was it Annie? Was the
red-haired girl that Jerald talked about Annie?”
My brother choked, and blood leaked out from
the corner of his mouth. His eyes never looked at me, but stayed
focused on the sky above as the snow came to bury him.
Celeste
I knew that I couldn’t take out all of the
guards that were in the great room with the rest of the Dawns, but
I had to do something. This could be my only chance to escape, and
I had to take it.
I pulled the helmet off of the dead guard in
my room, and looked at his lifeless expression. His mouth was open,
and there was blood all over his chin from my attack. His blue eyes
stared straight at me, almost as if he were alive, but they never
moved as I took his helmet into the bathroom to wipe off the blood.
I could only hope this would work.
The helmet was set in the sink, the bottom
facing up, as I pressed the button on the side that would allow me
to speak with the other guards.
“This is the Administrator. We have Undying
in the…” I stumbled on my words, uncertain what to say. “We have
Undying above the Dawn’s great room. You need to get the girls back
to their rooms and ask them to stay there. Then get up here to
help.”
It seemed reasonable, considering I knew that
the creatures had gotten into that area at least once before. All I
could do was wait to see if it worked, and hope no one came looking
for the missing guard. I waited in my ready room with the rifle I’d
stolen pointed at the door, prepared if this didn’t work.
I could hear the girls being ushered through
the hall, all of them silently obeying, just as terrified as I had
been before my first escape. This was a good sign, but I knew it
wouldn’t last long. The guards would realize they’d been duped, and
would come looking for their friend.
I listened until I thought it was safe, and
then creaked the door open. The hallway was empty, and I hurried to
close the door that led to the great room. I started opening the
doors to the other Dawns rooms and yelling in at them to come out
into the hall. I didn’t wait for anyone to obey me, and continued
down the hall, opening doors as I went, and crying out, “Hurry!
Come out into the hall.”
Elise was the first to do as I asked.
“Cobra?”
“No,” I said as I smiled in greeting. “Call
me Celeste.”
“What? What’s going on?”
“Help me get the others out.”
“Why? What’s happening?” she asked as she ran
alongside me.
“This is it. We’re getting out.”
She nodded, and I could see a glimmer of
excitement in her eyes.
We gathered the Dawns, although several of
the girls were too scared to come out of their rooms. The ones that
dared to disobey the orders of the guards were gathered around me
as I stepped up onto the stoop of one of the rooms, raising me
slightly higher.
“Dawns, listen to me. You’ve probably heard
from Elise that Hailey and I were quarantined because we got sick.
That’s not the truth.”
They murmured, uncertain what to think.
“The day that man fell from the ceiling we
discovered the truth about this place. We’re not here because we’re
being trained to live on the surface, or to get any sort of surface
status. We’re prisoners here.”
Other girls had begun to peer out from their
rooms, cautiously listening to me as I went on.
“The surface they told you about is a lie. I
know, because I’ve been there.”
This earned disbelief from many of them that
they expressed with dismissive groans.
“It’s true. Hailey and I made it to the
surface, but they captured me and brought me back. And they killed
Hailey.”
The girls didn’t believe me.
“And they’ll kill all of you too. I don’t
know what they have planned for us, but I can promise you that
you’re not going to end up in a paradise on the surface.”
“How do we know you’re telling the truth?”
asked Emery Dawn, one of the red-haired girls.
“I can prove it.”
“How?” asked Elise, eager to hear.
“Hailey and I escaped through hallways that
we found behind the walls.” Again, the Dawns murmured in disbelief.
“We got through the mirror in my ready room, and if you’re willing
to go with me, I can take you to the surface. If we all fight back,
they can’t stop us. Right now I’m giving you the choice, either
come with me or stay a prisoner locked down in this dungeon. The
choice is yours, but I promise you this is the only chance you’ll
have to escape.”
“You still have to prove it,” said Emery, and
the rest of the Dawns agreed with her.
“Okay, I will. Come with me.” I opened the
door to the room beside me. I wasn’t sure which Dawn’s room this
was as I climbed up onto the counter of the ready room. I slung the
rifle over my shoulder and said, “Elise, come help me.” She climbed
up, and I showed them all how the top of the mirror wasn’t attached
to the wall. We pried it off, just as Hailey and I had done months
earlier.
The Dawns gasped at the revelation that there
was a hallway behind it.
“They’ve been watching us?” asked one of the
girls as she noticed that the mirror was one-sided.
“Yes,” I said loudly. “We’re nothing more
than experiments to them. They study us like some sort of animal.
But not me. Not anymore.” I climbed through the hole and then
yelled back at them, “Come with me, and I’ll take you to the
surface.”
I don’t know if all of the Dawns followed me,
but most of them did. We flooded those thin, grey halls, and I told
them about the day Hailey and I escaped. Elise stayed close behind
me, listening intently as I led on.
A pang of heartache stung me as I thought of
Hailey and me sneaking through this same passage. I stole a moment
to close my eyes and cherish a memory, and it strengthened my
resolve. This was what I had to do. I was leading the Dawns to
freedom, and if it hadn’t been for my lost love, this day would’ve
never happened. It had been Hailey that inspired me to escape, and
it was her courage, not mine, that prompted us to tear down that
false mirror and enter these grey halls hidden behind the
walls.
I led them to the door that opened into the
room filled with computers. I knew there were stairs just past here
that would lead up, but what lay between was uncertain. It could be
that I was leading us all to our deaths.
Just one way to find out.
I spun the handle that opened the door, and
walked out to discover the body of an Administrator laying on the
floor in a pool of blood. Elise gasped as she came from behind, and
the other girls struggled to see, each of them gasping in turn upon
the revelation.
We filed into the room avoiding the blood,
and I heard one of the girls say, “I recognize her. Don’t you? I
know her,” as they studied the dead girl. I recalled how it had
been a revelation to Hailey and me when we saw our first real
Administrator instead of just seeing them on our screens.
“We need to go up these stairs over here…” I
started to head to the door that led to the stairs when I heard
something thud against it. I paused, and aimed at the door, ready
to obliterate any guard that dared stand in my way.
The door didn’t open, but the thudding
continued.
“Open it,” said Elise, prompting me eagerly,
her ignorance of the real world showing through.
I took the handle, and pulled the door
open.
A grey man fell through, pushing the door
wide and issuing forth a chorus of hungry moans. The staircase was
filled with the dead, and they were falling over themselves in a
rush to get to fresh meat. Our room was invaded in moments, even as
I blasted the creatures that stormed through. The Dawns were crying
out in horror and fear as the faces of the dead exploded into bits
of bone and blood, their rotted brains and milky eyes splattering
against the walls as I demolished them.
“Go back to the rooms,” said one of the
girls.
“No,” I yelled, certain they would be caught.
I knew my ruse wasn’t going to last long, and that we only had a
limited time to get out of this place. We had to take our
opportunity now. “Find another way. Don’t go back in the
cells.”
“Where are we supposed to go?” asked one of
the girls in a panic. I pointed in a direction that wasn’t
backward, and told them to go that way. I had no idea where I was
leading them, but I knew we couldn’t go back.
The surge of dead never stopped, and I was
forced to retreat. Even as the bodies piled up, they continued to
come, climbing over one another and reaching out at us in
desperation.