In the After (27 page)

“Kay Oh punched me in the face,” I told her. It was more of a chop than a punch but,
either way, my face ached; the area around my eye had already begun to turn dark purple.

“What? Why did she do that?”

“It’s a long story. She was trying to help me, if you can believe it.”

“Remind me to never ask Kay Oh for help,” she said, studying my bruise. “But seriously,
why did Kay hit you?” she asked. Then understanding dawned on her face. “You’re training
to be a Guardian, aren’t you?” she whispered.

“No one can know,” I said, but I was relieved that she’d figured it out. I’d wanted
to tell her, if just to vent, but Kay was adamant that it had to be kept secret.

“I won’t tell anyone, I promise. Just be careful.” She reached for my hand, squeezed
it. I looked at her face—her scar—my eyes tracing the white line.

“Vivian, you never told me. What happened to you?” I asked.

She surveyed the class and then motioned to the door. “Let’s go for a walk.”

Outside in the fresh air, it was a while before Vivian began to speak. We watched
the Class Twos on the playground. I looked for Adam but didn’t spot him.

“We were trapped in our apartment building,” she finally said, sounding distant. “My
parents were out. They probably died right away. We were stuck. We couldn’t leave,
not with the Floraes on the loose. We barricaded the front doors and the stairs and
holed up in the top apartment. It was me, my brother, and a couple of people we knew
from our building. We weren’t thinking long term, we just wanted to survive each day.”
Her face was strangely calm though her voice was heavy with misery.

“We had electricity for a couple of days. But you know, the news was so grim, it was
almost a relief after the power went out and we couldn’t listen to the radio anymore.
We had no contact with the outside world. For all we knew, we were the only people
left on the planet.” Vivian tugged at her necklace.

“We ran out of food after a month. We were careful, basically starved ourselves to
conserve what we had. My brother and the old man from 7B went to search the other
apartments.” Her voice quavered at the mention of her brother. “They never came back.
A Florae must have gotten in somehow.

“We heard it eventually, clawing at the door. It wanted us. One woman wouldn’t stop
screaming. We . . . there was a man, one of our neighbors; he was going to kill her
to shut her up. I tried to stop him, but he was too strong. He knocked me out. When
I woke up, the woman was dead, lying in a pool of blood with a slit throat. My face
hurt when I touched my cheek.” She caressed her face. “It was wet. I thought it was
from my tears, but then I looked down and my hand was covered in blood.”

“What happened to the man, the one that killed the woman?”

She shook her head. “I don’t know. He was gone when I woke up. I thought maybe he
felt guilty and jumped off the roof. I couldn’t deal with being alone, so I went up
there to do the same. Going up those stairs in the dark, I was convinced a Florae
would attack at any second.” Wiping her eyes, she looked over at me.

“Oh, Amy, I just wanted to die. My parents were gone, my brother; the entire world
was dead—but I didn’t want a Florae to kill me. I’d rather have done it myself.”

I nodded knowingly.

“It’s a miracle,” she told me. “I was going to jump when I heard a thud behind me.
The Guardians saw me on the roof. They came to rescue me.”

She fingered the gold cross suspended above her breastbone. “This was my mother’s.
I always thought all that religious stuff she tried to get us to believe was crap,
but standing there on that rooftop, no hope in my heart, and being saved by the Guardians
. . . I thought they were angels. I know I was half starved and delusional with grief,
but at that moment I believed my mother had sent them to me. I still do. I light a
candle every Sunday and thank God I’m alive.”

I wrapped my arms around Vivian and gave her a gentle squeeze. I wasn’t able to take
away her horrible memories, but I could share her pain. Vivian hugged back and when
we pulled away she gave me a small smile.

“You’d be surprised how many of these people of science go to chapel every Sunday.
People who aren’t even religious, they just want a quiet place to pray.”

“I’m not surprised, it being the end of the world and all.”

“I don’t think it’s really the end, you know. Just something new,” Vivian said.

“I hope you’re right,” I told her.

• • •

“I feel very positive about this.” I hear Dr. Thorpe say, somewhere in the room. My
body and head are secured; I can only see the ceiling
.

“How many treatments before we can hope to see signs of recovery?” comes another,
older voice. Dr. Samuels
.

“It truly depends on the patient,” Dr. Reynolds says. My stomach drops at the sound
of his voice. “With some, there is noticeable progress after one session. Some take
more than twenty, and some never improve at all.”

“And the memory loss?” Dr. Thorpe asks. “What are the chances that Ms. Harris will
be affected? She was very concerned about that when I spoke with her.”

“Retrograde amnesia can be a side effect. So can cognitive impairment and death. No
treatment is without risk.”

I hear footsteps and the hum of a machine. I open my mouth to protest and something
is placed in it. It’s rubbery and smells like old leather. Dr. Reynolds’s head appears
above my face for a moment. He licks his lips, a look of pure joy in his eyes. “Let’s
begin,” he says loudly
.

The pain hits me like a lightning bolt and my entire body seizes. Every nerve, every
synapse is on fire. I am burning from the inside out. I bite down on the piece of
leather in my mouth, wishing that I were dead, that the excruciating agony would stop.
Anything to make it stop. When I lose consciousness, I welcome it. The darkness will
end the torture. The blackness is a relief
.

• • •

“Keep your focus,” Marcus yelled at me.

“Watch your back!” Gareth shouted.

“Where is your head today?” Kay spit.

They were watching me fight three of the Elite Eight, who had been instructed to behave
like Floraes. That meant they would run at me at top speed and try to slice me with
their knives. Not the rubber-tipped knives I trained with at first, but real ones
with sharp, shiny metal blades.

I felt someone stab at my back, and it could only be Jenny, because I had the two
boys in my sights.

I thought wearing the synth-suit’s hood would hurt my hearing and obstruct my vision.
The hood is attached to the back of the suit, but you can pull it down over your face
where it fastens seamlessly to the neck material with a strong, Velcro-like fastener.
It’s as strong as the rest of the suit, but so thin, it didn’t hinder my senses at
all. It amazed me that the concept for this started in our class. Vivian was a genius.

I heard Jenny approach again at a run from behind and I crouched down low at the last
second. Kay taught me that trick. Jenny tripped over me and fell on her side. I pushed
her on her back and traced my knife across her neck. According to the rules, she was
dead. We learned that if you were going to fight a Florae with a knife, your best
bet was to slit its throat, sever its spinal cord. Stabbing it anywhere else would
just piss it off.

I backed away from Jenny, who played dead on the ground. Nick and Rob didn’t waste
any time rushing me, taking me down. They stabbed at my face and torso. Now
I
was dead. They backed away and Jenny got to her feet. She pulled up her hood.

“Not bad.” She smiled.

I pulled up my hood, feeling a little disappointed in myself but also frustrated with
the setup. “You know, this is completely unrealistic,” I told them.

“Don’t be a sore loser,” Nick said. He hadn’t taken off his hood, so I couldn’t see
his expression.

“No. If you all were Floraes,” I explained, “I’d have been dead in five seconds. But
if I had managed to kill the Jenny Florae, you two would have been on her instantly,
and I could have made my escape . . . or killed you both while you were feeding. I
mean, you capture the Floraes, right? Don’t you study them? Learn how they behave?”

There was silence as Kay and Marcus exchanged an uncomfortable look.

“Amy, can I speak with you?” Kay said quietly.

I walked over to them with my head held high, though I really wanted to hunch over
and stare at the floor.

“How do you know that we capture the Floraes?” Marcus asked.

“I saw you, before I came here.” I lowered my voice. “One was about to kill me, actually,
before it was captured.” I didn’t tell them about being in a restricted area and seeing
the Floraes being tortured.

Both of them were quiet. Finally Marcus gave me an intense stare. “Listen, Amy, we
keep the Floraes in a secure facility on the base. Most citizens of New Hope would
not be comfortable to know they’re here.”

“But you do study them?” I asked, wondering how much they would tell me.

“Yes. We study them for a number of reasons. They’re crucial for perfecting our training
techniques. We watch the way they move, how they react to prey. . . .”

“You mean people.”

“I mean any mammal.” He glowered at me. “What, do you think we feed bad children to
the Floraes?”

“No, of course not. I just wonder why you don’t know how they act in groups. . . .”
I stopped, remembering that the Floraes I saw were kept alone, one to a room. “They’re
too dangerous in groups,” I whispered.

“We can only study one at a time,” Kay confirmed. “Otherwise we couldn’t contain them.”

“But you go out, into the . . .” I was about to say “the After,” but I realized they
wouldn’t know what I meant.

“We go and collect supplies and the odd survivor. We have our hover-copters, our guns.
We avoid places that are teeming with Floraes, unless our purpose is to capture one.
Then we’re in and out.”

“Then why all this training?” I asked.

“In the Marines,” Marcus told me, “they push you to your limits and expose you to
every imaginable horror. They gas you. They half drown you. You’re afraid, but it’s
only training. The next time you’re not so afraid. You know what to expect.”

“We can’t have Guardians freezing up the first time they encounter a Florae face-to-face,”
Kay clarified. “We depend on each other, so everyone has to function. There’s no alternative.”

“I get it,” I told them.

“Shall we continue practice?” Kay yelled, loud enough for the others to hear.

“Can I be a Florae this time?” I asked hopefully.

“Not until you’re a real Guardian, sunshine.” Kay smiled wickedly. I pulled my hood
back on and made a face she couldn’t see before walking back to the practice mat.
Then I took extra pleasure in pretend-killing Nick and for-real elbowing Rob in the
face. It didn’t even matter that in the end I was, once again, the loser. You just
couldn’t win against the Floraes.

After several hours, I stepped out of the Rumble Room, exhausted from my training
session. That’s why I didn’t see him until he called my name.

“Amy?”

I turned to find Dr. Reynolds watching me, a strange smile on his lips. “I wasn’t
aware you had clearance to be inside a restricted area.”

“I . . .” I froze, lost for words. Thankfully Gareth was next out the door. He took
in Dr. Reynolds and me with my mouth hanging open like an idiot.

“Thanks again, Amy,” he said quickly. He was wearing civilian clothes, jeans and a
T-shirt. He looked so different from when he was in his synth-suit—much less intimidating,
and even with his almost completely gray hair, much younger.

“Yeah . . . no problem,” I responded slowly, still frozen in place.

“Dr. Reynolds.” Gareth nodded at him pleasantly. “What brings you out our way?”

“I just wanted to observe the Guardians in training, but I suppose I’m too late,”
he said, the same eerie smile surfacing again. “Your psyche-evals are coming up soon.”

“Again? It’s been six months already?” Gareth asked. “Seems like my head was just
shrunk last week.”

Dr. Reynolds chuckled. “Well, let’s just hope you’ve solved some of your relationship
issues.”

Gareth grimaced. He’d mentioned to me he’d recently broken up with his boyfriend,
but didn’t go into details. It must have ended badly. I could tell Dr. Reynolds’s
comment cut him deeply.

Dr. Reynolds turned his gaze back to me. “Amy . . .”

“Amy was invited here by Kay,” Gareth said irritably, no longer pretending to be friendly.
“She was telling us more about her experiences with the Floraes in the field. She’s
an invaluable resource.”

“I’m sure she is.” He studied my face. “In fact, I hear you’ve been talking quite
a lot about the Floraes.” My blood turned to ice.

“Yes.” My voice cracked and I swallowed before trying to speak again. “I was trying
to prepare for my presentation to the Guardians,” I bluffed, trying to follow Gareth’s
lead. “I didn’t want to leave anything out.”