Without the proper equipment, no one could tell that all her symptoms were fake. She wouldn’t let anyone touch her, hoarsely whispering that she didn’t want to get them sick. The council had sent an officer to her room, telling her that she had to stay quarantined until she was no longer sick. When she was in good health again her room would be disinfected so she could live in it without the worry of picking up the virus again.
Faking the sickness had been a spur of the moment deal. She wanted out of work for just a week, one little week. Her hands were blistered and her muscles were sore. She needed a break. On the fifth day she heard a knock on her door. The fancy white powder she kept from her mother’s makeup box was her savior as she slapped it on her face then put on the medical mask they had given her, and answered the door. It was Jaime. She had always liked her for some odd reason. In her hands was a glass Pyrex dish that had some sort of brown food substance in it.
“Hey sweetheart,” She said through her own medical mask, the guard outside her door had a big stack of them just in case people wanted to visit. Not many did. “I can’t come in, but I made you some apple crumble, I know it’s your favorite.” She took the Pyrex and set it down on her front table, thanking the woman with a nod and quiet ‘thanks’. Jaime fiddled in her spot, moving to leave, but stopping herself and leaning in to the door. “Jaye...we’re all worried about you, just know that. You’re an important citizen here.”
“I know.” Jaye says, not willing to break the facade of the town Jaime had built. There were no citizens, just tyrants and peasants. The woman left with a wave and Jaye shut her door, locking it back up.
She couldn’t be the only one who saw it, who noticed the corruption in their dear ‘council’. It was that damn leader’s fault. She had never bothered to learn his name, wasn’t important, but she had bothered to learn his face. To learn his routine. Everything about him. Maybe one day she could be the one to slip into his room or follow him down a dark alley and slit his throat. The apocalypse had made her dark.
Twelve hours into the fifth day she leaves her room. The window in her room on the side of the building faces another apartment complex with a few windows, but otherwise the tree next to the building blocks all views of the window. Lifting the frame she steps out, her bare toes gripping onto the thin siding for dear life as she scales across the wall and uses the windows below her to help her to the ground. Once there she slips on the pair of boots she keeps hidden under some debris no one ever bothered to move, and headed for the south side of the wall.
It was the one side that never really got any action, so there was always only one guard. She threw a rock over the wall when he wasn’t looking, glad to hear it hit a tree and ruffle the leaves. No matter how many times she used the gag it always seemed to work. People were so paranoid.
Jaye hoisted herself up and over the wall, sprinting for the growing forest that had originally just been a park, but exploded once people stopped caring for it. The trees were her cover for a while before she was spout out onto an abandoned street. Her knife is drawn as she walks down the street for the small little bookstore that had been left to the elements all those years ago. The second time she had broken out of that prison that dared called itself a town, she had removed the two-by-fours covering the front entrance and replaced them with a chain and padlock only she had the key to.
Unlocking the chain, Jaye entered, doing a quick sweep, just in case. Once clear, she began to browse. The shop was small, but it held thousands of books. Book shelves covered pretty much every inch of the store, besides the small walkways and the counter area that had once had a cash register on top of it. She always had wondered why someone had felt the need to steal something as trivial as money.
She heads to the bookshelf she had yet to scour through, and lifted a good ten books off the shelf, setting them down on the floor. Jaye takes a seat next to the stack and begins to read through the synopses on the back. They were mostly cheesy romances that had the type of plots she could come up with, but one stuck out in particular. She tucked it under her arm and tossed the other books onto the pile of rejects she had been accumulating. At one point she’d have to clean that up.
The padlock is securely in its place when she leaves, the key in her back pocket and her hands occupied by the book and her weapon. She only encounters one of the slower ones on her way back. It hobbles for her, reaching for her, scratching at the air. Jaye lets it get real close before kicking it in the knee and skewering it with her knife once it’s down.
She uses the same rock she did on her way out to distract the guard again, but this time she throws it near the tallest part of the wall so she can run for the shortest. Jumping just before she reaches the wall she’s able to grip onto the edge and pull herself up. Before he can look over in her direction she’s already on the ground and running for her apartment again.
Ditching the shoes under the debris she climbs back up the wall and into her window, remembering the one time she had tried to do it with shoes on and had fallen, thus breaking her arm. It hadn’t been fun at all.
The seventh day rolls around and Jaye contemplates telling someone that she no longer feels sick. She had finished her book rather quickly and was beginning to get bored. Really bored. But she doesn’t even have to open her mouth. Greg visits her, wearing a mask, but she could still see his shit eating grin through it.
“How’ve you been feeling?” She shrugs, not willing to humor the man. “Well, you see, as much as I’d love to just let you go back to work, to make up the days you missed, I seemed to have installed a rather recent policy.” Jaye bites the inside of her cheek to keep from laughing at his obvious lie. He was going to punish her just because he could find a reason too. “Skipping a week of work, not matter how sick you are, just won’t do. There are things that need to get done and sitting in your room is doing nothing to finish them. So I’m signing you up for something you’ve never done before. It should be fun, a new experience.”
And he leaves without another word. Jaime visits her that night. Jaye tells her the abridged version of what Greg had said to her, and the woman gasps, her eyes turning red near the edges like she’s about to cry. Jaye repressed the urge to roll her eyes. People could be so overdramatic and weak, especially after being sheltered behind walls for five years. “Oh no, sweetie, I hope to the lord he doesn’t put you on…” She leans in, whispering her next words harshly. “Bait duty.”
“What’s that?”
“It’s when you have to run the perimeter of the gate, drawing those things near you so the soldiers can pick them off easier. It helps spread out the herds so they can’t take down the wall with their sheer force. It helps...but it’s dangerous. Many people die doing it.”
She only asks another question because the idea has started to intrigue her. “Have you ever done it?”
“No.” The woman says. “But not long before you got here my husband...he signed up. He was tackled by a runner and, uh, never got back up.” She wipes the sides of her eyes. Jaye drops the subject and lets Jaime tall her all about her week until the sun starts to set and she runs back to her home.
Jaye watches the sunset. Running with the biters. That’s nuts. Exhilarating, but nuts.
It’s not Greg who fetches her in the morning, but rather one of his goons. One she’d had multiple run-ins with before. He always yelled at her because she was ‘too quiet’ and apparently ‘fuckin’ rude’. He relishes in the chance to drag her out of her room and down to the mess hall where she’s given a light breakfast, then dragged around again to the front gate.
Some lady who looked like she had either been a tattoo artist or was in some hardcore punk band and a kid were already standing there. A Chinese man was leaning on the gate, his gaze stuck on her as she arrived. He handed her four bracelets she put on her ankles and wrists. They were covered in little bells.
She thinks the woman tries to speak to her, but she ignores her and just stares forward, only looking to her side once an older looking fellow showed up, and the Chinese guy went through this speech that sounded like complete and under bull honkey. They were each given a hammer ‘just in case’ and told to be careful, even if the man’s main concern seemed to be the older man. She looked down the line of people, soaking in all of their appearances for the first time.
The old man was going to die. She could feel. No way he’d last out there running for who knew how long. The young boy looked like he was going to puke, which would slow him down and draw the monsters to him, so he was probably right there with the old guy. The woman was a toss-up. She looked more like she was going to kill her fellow runners rather than the skin-eaters outside.
Jaye made a mental note to stay out of her way at all costs.
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