Emmy Laybourne - Savage Drift

And then I smell it.

The compounds hit my nose and it is like coming home.

Black grit in my eyes and mouth.

A key in a lock.

One second, everything is dull and gray and then the world is on fire—everything I look at is brilliant and beautiful.

The grit is the compounds and it washes away my weakness.

The drifts go through the people in the camp like a ripple.

Voices rise in an instant chorus of rage and terror.

The desire to kill is a lightning bolt and I am full of its charge.

Venger.

Face pale with terror, he fumbles for his gun.

His hand is shaking.

He will be the first one I’ll kill.

Only Carlo and the other two Union Men had set on him already and are dragging him to the ground.

“JOSIE!” comes a muffled voice, over the joyous background noises of glass breaking and doors pulled off their hinges and bones snapping.

From a million miles away I see Niko in his suit.

No, no. I need to kill and Venger deserves it.

Venger has dropped his gun and is scrambling for it in the dirt.

Carlo and the short man are on him but I dive into the fight. A few blows to the head. Fighting. Freedom. Heaven. I grab Venger’s head and he begs for mercy but my blood demands he die and I say, “Shhhhhh,” and I brace my feet on his shoulders to pull his head off but I see the light is gone, his eyes are dead, and I see Carlo has punched his hand into Venger’s chest and is pulling out organs by the fistful.

The people who’d spilled out of the dining hall are now attacking one another. Bodies twisting and fighting and bleeding everywhere and the screaming.

I breathe in.

The colors are so beautiful.

Sky blue and grit gray and blood and brain.

I am finally living again.

Carlo, Carlo.

Carlo next then.

He still has his hands in Venger’s abdomen so I pick up Venger’s gun and hit him on the head with it.

I fell him and pound one-two-three-four-five. Carlo’s skull, caving in under my gun hammer. Joy in my heart.

I turn to take the other Union Men down. They are fighting each other.

Then my brain says: WAIT.

And I see a guard at the gate, fumbling with his keys.

He gets it open and goes running for the second gate.

And Niko is there.

My brain wants me to pay attention to that.

My hands want a throat to squeeze.

The short man is biting some other man on the leg. I grab him up by the neck and snap , I twist his head to the side.

THINK.

My brain talking to me again and I bring my bloody hands up to my head and squeeze it.

The thoughts are painful to me.

I want to rage with the others. What a party it is.

SEE THEM—my brain makes me look.

A woman grabs me by the waist and I push her down.

My brain is winning.

LOOK and I see it: my kids.

My kids are fighting.

Lori is on Freddy, and Aidan is attacking a man alongside Heather. The man swipes at Heather and she falls to the ground. Hits her head and isn’t moving and then Aidan, mouth bloody, like a newborn vampire, turns on Heather, on his own almost-sister, and starts to attack her.

NO. This is wrong.

I look back at the fence.

Niko is at the second gate. Has his hands stuck through and is trying to help the guard to unlock it.

One step. Two steps. To the kids.

My brain can make my body OBEY.

I grab Aidan by the shoulder and wrench him off Heather. He sinks his teeth into my hand.

Can’t feel it.

I drag them toward the other two.

“LORI!” I shout.

She is sitting on Freddy, clawing at him.

“STOP! STOP!” I shout.

She looks up at me for a second.

Then a woman, an older woman, attacks Lori.

Freddy lays gasping and I haul Heather up, onto my shoulder.

“FREDDY, COME!” I shout.

He lays there, panting, looking at me like I am speaking Russian.

Heather on my shoulder, I haul Aidan toward the gate.

I will get them out.

Yes.

Then I will go back and get Lori and Freddy and we’ll be free.

Now I am fully in control, riding the rage like a surfer, using its power to fuel my escape.

I can hear Niko’s heart praying for me to hurry.

“I’m coming,” I whisper to him in my own heart. “I’m coming.”

I step over the bodies of the dead and dying and brawling. I slip a little, in their blood and spilt organs.

I see Dr. Quarropas and Dr. Neman and some guards coming from the direction of Rollins. They burst into the courtyard, spewing darts from machine guns.

The doctors are headed for the gate, shooting down anyone in their way.

But at the gate, Os are there. Two teenagers attacking the guard. Others attacking the teenagers.

Niko is trying to get the keys, which lie just out of his reach through the fence.

“Almost there,” I tell Niko inside my heart and then I see Dr. Quarropas notice me.

I have Heather on my shoulder and I am dragging Aidan. I am going to make it to the gate.

And then Dr. Quarropas catches my eye. I don’t know what he is trying to tell me before he raises up his gun and mows me down.

“Oh my God! No! No!!!” Astrid’s voice came screaming into my dream and I shot out of the glider.

My heart was thudding like it would burst my chest. I took the stairs two at a time and found her in the living room, clutching a note.

“What is it? What is it?” I asked.

“It’s Jake!” she cried. “He’s gone.”

“What?”

“He’s gone! He left!” She pushed the note into my hand and bent into a crouch, grabbing her belly.

“Is that all?!” I shouted. I shouldn’t have shouted at her, but my heart was hammering so hard.

“I’m sorry. I’m sorry,” she said. “I didn’t mean to scare you but maybe… maybe we can get him back. If we hurry, Dean!” There was panic in her voice. She opened the door.

“Okay, okay!” I said. “Just calm down. This is not an emergency.”

“We have to get him back!” she cried.

“Are you okay?” I asked.

“Still cramps, but I’m okay,” she said.

Rinée started crying upstairs.

“I’ll get her,” Astrid said. “Can you go outside? See if you see him?”

“I will. But please, calm down, can you do that?” I said.

She rolled her eyes. “I’ll try. But I don’t want to lose him!”