Short Story

One Out of Many

I never knew how uncomfortable handcuffs were until I was cuffed to the seat of a bus, the anxious sweat from these tense few hours pooling around the cool steel of the cuffs making a less than pleasurable feeling. All around me is black. Black seats, black frame, black “windows,” even me and the rest of my less than fortunate peers are dressed in simple black cotton clothing.

I close my heavy eyes and look at the ground and feel the tears well up again. I can’t believe I’m still crying. I think I’ve been on this bus for a few hours now and I’m still crying. Maybe I’m not the only one. I look over to the teenager closest to me, a thin and lanky girl with long and slick brown hair. She looks dead behind the eyes, staring straight ahead of her, a slight frown on her long and monotonous face. I just wish there was something to look at. But nope, I’m stuck here between a world of black and my troubling thoughts.

I long to know where we were going. I imagined a stricter settlement, as they’d done with me before. But this time my family was not picked up, not even contacted to my knowledge. The others teens that were taken with me from the Meeting didn’t have their parents contacted either. We were ambushed, drugged, and we woke up in a white room filled with with dozens of cots. The Protectors told us to line up and said that if we spoke one word they would kill us “in the most painful possible way you could ever imagine.” As you might’ve guessed, we all shut up real quick. We were blindfolded, walked outside the room of beds, and led onto the bus. We were cuffed and our silk blindfolds were taken off our eyes.

That was hours ago, I think. I still feel the effects of the “steam” they used to drug us. I’ve felt it before but I always forget just how maddening it is. My mind feels foggy and unfocused and all my emotions feel numbed down to level zero. Yet still, I cry.

The bus turns and I feel it begin to slow down. We’re getting close to our destination. We hit a few bumps and the bus comes to a stop. Finally. The head-protector walks down the aisle militarily, his back straight, his gun held firmly in his hands. When he reaches the front of the bus he turns around and stands in front of us. He is in a basic protector's suit, a black one piece uniform with thin built-in body armor, but you can tell that he is very built. His intimidation does not stop at his burliness. He is smirking at us with a half-smile, making him look suspicious and eerie. His deep set eyes stare straight down at us and he raises one eyebrow. He looks like a wolf drooling at his prey.

“ It’s simple from here on out. Follow me in a line to where the commander will speak with you. If you speak or step out of line, you and your family will receive immediate extermination,” he says, keeping that seemingly inhuman grin on his face.

What he says doesn’t surprise me. The protectors often use threats of harming family members as a way to deter youth rebellion and uprising. I had been threatened with it many times before. All of us had. The kids on this bus aren’t criminals. We’re not violent, we aren’t unruly. Still, where we’re from we are disturbers of the “peace”. We practice civil disobedience and everyone wants us dead for it. We’re Meeters. We gather in secret weekly to plan how we are going to change our settlements for the better. But this time we’re done for. We’re all too high profile. They must stop us before an uprising.

The protector presses a button up front and the cuffs are unlocked. I rub my sore and stiff wrists and stand up, as does everyone around me. As the doors creak open and glaring light pours over and saturates the black air, I finally feel afraid for what lies ahead. Protectors aren’t ones for killing. They are ones for torturing and brainwashing, which with what I’ve experienced of the two, is much worse than death. I try to block out these new thoughts in my mind and focus on trying to get my drugged and beaten body out the door.

As I step outside the bright light is blinding and it takes me some time to adjust. When I do, I see that we’re in a stone yard with simple grey buildings bordering the courtyard. The walls are so high that I feel dizzy. But sightseeing is over. We trudge behind the protector until we reach the other side of the courtyard, where an old man in a motorized wheelchair is sitting next to two young protectors. Once we have all filed in, the man, who I presume to be commander begins to speak in a deep, raspy voice.

“Welcome to the compound children. We are sorry for the harsh treatment this morning. But you must understand the circumstances. You all have been attending illegal meetings. This compound was built to steer you away from this destructive path and, with your cooperation, make you functioning members of society again. Now for room assignments…,’ the commander said as he flipped through papers on his lap, ‘Room one, Winston and Jebidiah.”

As soon as our names were called protectors grabbed us by the arm and walked us to our room. I look over at my new roommate Winston and see a teen around 17 or 18 and thinly built. He wears glasses and his hair is long, past his shoulders. He is glaring at the protector escorting him and is writhing a bit in his firm grasp. When we reach our room in one of the little grey houses, the protectors throw us in and slam the door closed without a word.

“God, I could just…’ mutters Winston as he paces around the room angrily, ‘Don’t you just want to punch them the second you see them?”

“Not particularly,” I say sheepishly.

“Why not?” asks Winston.

“Well I think of it this way. They were raised in families where being a protector was good and just but we were raised in families knowing that they are cruel and unjust. They think they’re in the right. I know they’re definitely not, but I try not to have too much antipathy towards them,” I say as Winston stops pacing to look at me.

“You’re a weird kid,” he says, looking at me strangely. “I’m Winston.”

He holds out his hand and I shake it.

“Jeb, nice to meet you,” I say with a smile.

The first night is rough. I spend the time mostly by myself, sometimes talking to Winston. Winston sings all the time, but I don’t find it annoying. It’s quite endearing and I appreciate him attempting to keep spirits light. But that brief distraction doesn’t keep me from my thoughts. I can’t stop thinking about my family, my mom and my two little sisters. I hope my mom is getting