Nyehhhh, unfortunately I’m not a huge fan of this chapter. I feel like it just goes on and on without getting anywhere, which also feels like the point? Like, I kept feeling while writing that this is supposed to be long and not get anywhere too fast. Also, I’m starting to super like this new unnamed second soldier. She’s so far ahead of Chaos I think it’s funny.
Any editing pointers would be welcomed!
TRIGGER WARNING: mention of sexual assault and potentially rape.
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I came to with a light beaming in my face. Go into the white light, I heard my father whispering.
Hot damn, was I dying?
“Wake up!” barked a soldier, startling me out of my groggy state.
I was in a bare room with a large window leading to nowhere- Ohhhh, an interrogation room. I’d seen these so often in the movies. Now I was actually in one. Well, maybe one day I’ll be in my own movie-
“Look here,” barked the soldier. He had a deep voice, the obligatory crew cut, and a chiseled jaw. Other than that, he was wearing a black uniform. What was that, the anti-vampire division?
“You’re not hot,” I informed him with a slur.
He glared at me. With a slap, he pushed my fake ID across the table between us. “Your ID is fake. Explain that.”
“Nun ov it?” I sniggered, playing on the over-tired pun of Nunavut’s pronounciation. “You sure?”
He gave me a death-ray glare. I sniggered on, and on, and on. Oh look! I could move my arms! I reached up to comb my hair back from my face, only to see they were cuffed together. At least I still had my bracelets on. And yes – I still had my necklaces. Good.
“You’re rather young to be used as a mule, aren’t you?” he asked.
I sniggered. “You don’t know what else I’m too young for-” and then I paused. Didn’t mules carry drugs up their butts or something? I gawked out loud, wondering whether I’d been probed. Then, realizing my mouth was open, I slowly closed it.
“Look here, kid,” the soldier said, leaning across the table. “You tell us who you are, where you’re from, and what species you are. Now.”
I whined, kicking my feet lightly against the floor. Dramatically, I threw my head back and groaned. “No-o-o-o,” I whined, intoning every sound with gusto. I hated being told what to do! I hated it, I hated it, I hated hated hated-
My eyes snapped open as I caught sight of the jacket that was strewn over the side of my chair. Mark’s jacket. “Hey,” I said, picking up th e fuzzy jacket and half-tossing it across the table. It landed with a flump in the middle, over my ID papers. “That’s not mine. It’s the trucker’s. Give it back to him.”
The soldier didn’t move.
“It’s not mine!” I slurred loudly, flopping back in my chair. “Think I’d wear something like that?” Oops, technically I had been wearing it. But it had been cold, okay? Cold weather ruins fashion.
The soldier just gave me a look. A long moment dragged on. I groaned, dropping my head down to my chest. I felt so groggy. Itchy all over. So weird. Is this why dad never let me try drugs? The world was woozy-
“Let’s start simple,” the soldier said, pushing the jacket back towards me. “Who is the trucker? The one you were riding with?”
“Mark?” I groaned, not bothering to lift my head. I let my eyes slide closed.
“And who is he?”
I lifted my head. “The fuck would I know? He just gave me a lift.”
The soldier gave me a deadpan expression. This guy had so many shades of neutral, it was unbelievable. “Why did he give you a lift?”
“’Cuz it’s cold and,” I dropped my voice as far as it’d go “Hey kid, it’s cold out here. Come ride,” I returned to my normal voice “You know. It was snowing!” And fuck this world is cold!
The soldier didn’t seem to ‘know’, ‘dig it’ or ‘vibe’ with what I was saying. “So what are you saying?” he asked.
I propped my elbows on the table and leaned forward. “Are you really that stupid?” I whispered loudly. “Do I have to spell everything out for you?”
“Yes,” he said coldly.
“He gave me a ride because it was fucking cold!” I yelled in the soldier’s face. It had absolutely zero effect. Like, none. Well that was demotivating. I slumped back into my chair, frowning. Usually when I yelled, you know. Shit happened.
Well, the soldier tilted his head to the side. Did that count? “So how do you know Mark?”
I gobbled air like a fish. “I just told you!” I croaked, voice sore from the yell. I sounded hoarse now. “We met on the side of the road.”
The soldier blinked. Was my brain less fuzzy now? Was it? How about now?
“Why did he take you into his truck?”
“Huh?” I squinted. What was – in the movies this was faster. More interesting.
“Why, did he, take you, into, his truck?” The soldier repeated with infuriating enunciation. I wanted to throw myself at him and gouge his eyes out. Could I? I reached for my dice – and found my pocket empty.
Oh shit.
I blanched, suddenly feeling cold. Don’t be, I told myself, it’s just a dice.
But it was my dice!
I looked sourly at the benum sitting across from me. “Okay, what do you want?” I was getting really sick of this.
He didn’t seem bored one bit. In fact, he was still in neutral gear, and truth be told it was getting on my nerves. “Start by telling me what you were doing in that truck.”
“Hitching a ride?” I asked with a half-laugh. “Dude, we’ve gone over this already!”
He just sat there. I fidgeted. Patience was not of my many virtues.
And he just sat there. I cocked my head to the side and gawked at him. “Seriously?” I asked. “If you’re wasting time-” I shoved the jacket at him. “Bring this back to Mark! Get out of my face!”
The jacket didn’t go far. His expression didn’t budge. “How much would you say Mark knows about your mission?”
Uh- “I’m not on a mission,” I lied feebly. “And Mark, is just some guy who gave me a ride.”
He blinked, kind of like a lizard, really. “How lucky of you to get a ride.”
I fidgeted. “Well, I’ll put ‘lucky’ on my CV the next time. Crap, man, what the hell-”
He took the jacket and placed it beside him on the desk between us. “Is it important for Mark to get this jacket back?”
“It’s his jacket!” I burst. “What- what kind of a question is that?”
He just kept staring me, like an alien on crack or something. I huffed and threw myself back in my chair. It didn’t budge. I glared at him. He didn’t budge.
I heaved a sigh. “Mark is some sweet, derpy, family-loving guy who gave the ‘poor lost kid’ a ride. Happy? Come on, that’s it.”
After a moment I added “I swear, he has nothing to do with this. Okay? Leave him out of this.”
The unblinking lizard across from me licked its eyeballs. I wish. No, he really just blinked again.
In a flash of temper my psychiatrist would call a ‘mood swing’, I snapped my arm out to grab the jacket.
“Fine, I’m keeping the-” but my arms didn’t reach. I jarred to a stop at the end of a chain that was connected to the floor. Waggling my fingers, I still tried to reach. I didn’t even brush the fabric.
McSnakeNoExpression just looked from the jacket to me. “Is the jacket important?” he asked.
I dropped my arms into my lap and hung my head back, groaning loudly. “You’re dumb!” I declared.
Just then the door open. A woman, slim and fairy-like in her features and fox-like short hair, stepped in. She was wearing the same black uniform, but with different grade patches and stuff. “I’ll take it from here,” she said in a surprisingly deep voice. Trans? Maybe?
“Hey gurl,” I said, hoping to win brownie points. No points were to be had. She marched over and took the other soldier’s seat. He left the room, leaving the jacket at her side.
“My jacket,” I said, “Can I-”
“I’m so sorry to be late,” she said, talking over me. “But you must understand that the average soldier does not know how to deal with someone of your stature.”
Someone of my stature? Oh yeah, I felt right at home now. I grinned, unable to stop myself. Finally, some respect around here.
She smiled, and it was sweet. “Tell me your name?”
“Chaos,” I said gruffly.
“Hmm,” her eyes narrowed. “Now tell me, Chaos, how well do you know Mark?”
I dropped my hands in my lap and groaned. “Tell me – look, I don’t know the guy!”
“Oh,” she seemed distracted by that. “That’s awfully sad.”
I frowned. “Why?”
“Well,” she touched the jacket lightly.”We’ve found, questionable, things in his cargo. Care to explain that?”
I blinked. “What?”
She smiled so slightly, and I felt like she was light-years ahead of me in this game. “Do you know who you were riding with?”
I blinked and blinked. Then I shook my head. “Mark is just some guy.”
“Some guy smuggling vampire pods into town? Granted, if you hadn’t been there we wouldn’t have caught them. Now that you were though, we’ve run his ID and,” she shook her head, tapping a finger in the jacket. “It doesn’t look very good.”
I was baffled. “Mark’s a vampire?”
“No,” she said sweetly. “But he’s part of a gang that works with them.” She leaned across the desk, wafting sweet perfume across the table. “The price of which is execution. Now, if you don’t want to go down that road with him,” she eyed the jacket. “You might want to explain what you were doing in that truck with him.”
My heart began racing. Think fast, think fast. But fuck, I was never good at creative writing, or making up stories. “I, uh,” I ducked my head. “Was really just getting a ride.” Gulp. I fumbled along, staring at the table and trying to make sense of things. “I was on the side of the road and he – he was just – come on kid. He seemed nice.” And I shrugged.
“What were you doing on the side of the road? In the middle of the night?” She asked softly. “You don’t even have your own jacket.”
I gulped. “I don’t know,” I croaked. “It’s, uh, hazy.”
“Try to remember,” she said so softly, so venemously.
I pressed my lips together. Hung my head lower. “’was in a car,” I mumbled, partly ashamed to be making stuff up and partly trying to convince her I was telling the truth. “And there was people? I guess-” and I let it trail away. Then, hesitantly, I added hoarsely “They were touching me.” That, that, was not really a lie. I fidgeted, digging back upon painful memories. “I just – they were there and,” but how do you describe something like that? “I bit,” I lied. I wished I had. You wouldn’t think I’d never even bite back, would you? What a failure. “So they threw me out of the car.”
I hung my head.
“Were they your relatives?” she asked.
I shifted, wondering where to take my lie. “I don’t, remember,” I mumbled. “They were wearing black.” Yeah, that’s useful, right? “I didn’t recognize them,” I mumbled.
She nodded, but didn’t say anything. I pressed my lips together, determined not to say anymore. But now that I was talking, I had to get it out. “They were supposed to be my friends,” I said, choking on tears. “But they left me there! And,” I gulped, realizing that if I spoke too much I’d make a mess of my statement. “People suck!” I snapped, emotions boiling up.
She nodded again, but it didn’t seem to mean anything.
“Whatever,” I grumbled, crossing my arms over my chest and glaring at her. I shouldn’t have spoken so much. I felt raw now, completely unnerved.
“So how do you know Mark?” she asked again. And just as she said it, an idea came to me. A way to pass myself off as human.
“He’s my older brother,” I fibbed. “I guess he heard I’d been thrown out of the car and came looking for me.”
She nodded, so slowly. I fibbed on. “I, I think that, because of what’s happened to me – it could make my blood seem off.”
Another nod.
“But I’m human. Like Mark. Please, can’t I – be let go? I’m, I’m human.” I tried to play the victim as well as I could. Play the sad, hurt, teen. “I promise I have nothing to do with any of this. I just want to go home.”
Fuckin’ mistake.
“So where is home?” she asked softly.
Oh crap. Crap, crap, fuck. “Uh,” I bumbled around in my mind like a blind person flailing around. How the hell would I know where Mark’s family lived? “Uh.”
She smiled. I gulped.
Fuck.
Unhinged and unenlightened 