Chapter 10: Mark of the Beast by Stephen Simpson
Giovanni jimmied the lock of the orange back door of the
cabin, and as Lydia stood there watching him, she considered that they did not know
him at all. He seemed likable but who was he really? The way he opened the door
so easily gave her an uneasy feeling. Could he be trusted?
Liam and Giovanni stepped aside so Lydia could walk in first. She took a hesitant step over the threshold and was pleasantly surprised. Right at the door to her left there was a double bed, and to her right there was a bunk bed. In the middle of the long, open plan cottage there was a cupboard with another double bed. The cupboard opened on both sides with wide double doors. She rushed over to the bed-in-the-cupboard and sat down on the light blue and white striped throw blanket draped over the bed. “This is mine,” she said, claiming the bed for herself. “If I close these doors, it will be like night in here, I’m sure.”
Liam dove for the double bed to his side. “Mine, all mine,”
he said, spreading his body across the blue and white comforter.
“That’s fine,” Giovanni said as he walked further into the
cabin. Across the bed-in-a-cupboard, there was a little kitchen. He started
opening drawers and cupboards. He announced, “There’s pots, pans, crockery and
cutlery but no food.”
“No electric either,” Lydia said. “I guess if we had food
and we wanted to cook, we’d have to do it on a fire.”
“Making a fire will attract unnecessary attention,” Liam
called from the double bed where he had moved his body so that his head was on the
pillows.
Giovanni looked out of the double glass doors at the
opposite end of the cabin from where they had entered. “Where is everybody?
It’s not like people disappeared or anything. Life is still going on.”
Liam yawned. “This place is only booked out on weekends.”
“I hope you’re right.”
Liam sounded sleepy. “I am one hundred percent sure.”
Giovanni laughed a soft sound and turned to face Lydia. He
motioned for her to come closer.
She stepped closer to him and looked in the direction where
his finger was pointing.
There was a large rooster walking around in the dust outside
the cabin. It was ignorant of them, and its sole focus was on pecking the
ground, looking for food. Every time its head went down, the red comb on its
head flopped from one side to the other.
He said softly, “Dinner.”
Lydia’s stomach growled. “Are you sure?”
He nodded. “Definitely.”
“Did you know chickens can remember more than one hundred faces
of people.”
He pulled his face at her. “Did you know pigs are smarter
than dogs. We still eat them, though. Don’t tell me you don’t eat meat.”
She looked sad. “I wish I could tell you that, and even if I
didn’t, I am just too hungry. Right now, in this moment, it’s all about
self-preservation.”
“So? Are you going to help me catch it?”
She gave him a side-eye. “Like run after it?”
“Yeah. How else?”
“I saw a fishing net at the second cabin when we walked past
it. Maybe that’ll be easier.” Lydia shrugged.
Giovanni raised his eyebrows. “Clever.” He moved to open the
glass sliding door.
“No. Not out there. I think it’s best if we only go in and
out of the back door.”
“The rooster is out front.”
“Even more reason not to spook it.” She turned around to
walk back through the cottage. When she reached the double bed, on her way to
the door, she started to ask Liam if he wanted to come with them, but she heard
his soft snoring and decided not to wake him. She was tired too. Her brain felt
foggy from lack of sleep, but she was hungrier than she was tired. A girl
cannot live off snack bars alone.
They stepped onto the covered porch, and Lydia said, “Once
my belly is full, I am taking a shower, and I am sleeping for days.”
“Liam will want to leave tonight.”
“I don’t think so. We need to recharge our batteries.”
“You saw a phone charger?”
She laughed. “No. My batteries. I’m running on empty
right now.
The spaces between the cabins were not very wide and when
they reached the cabin they stepped onto the covered porch.
She peered through the large window on the side and was just
about to ask Giovanni how he knew how to pick locks when two brown eyes in a
brown face looked right back at her. If it was not for the glass her nose would
be touching the nose of the other girl on the other side of the window. Lydia yelped
and took a step backwards, knocking into Giovanni who stepped back at the same
time and they both fell over backwards onto the hard ground behind them.
Giovanni grunted as he pushed Lydia off him.
Lydia groaned as she stood up. “There’s a girl in there.”
He turned quickly to look at the cabin.
The girl had disappeared.
He asked, “Did she have a barcode?”
Lydia shook her head.
“Then it’s okay. We’ll just knock.”
“What if she’s not alone?” Lydia sounded scared.
“If she didn’t have a barcode, we can assume we’re on the
same side.”
He stepped back up onto the porch and knocked.
Nobody answered the door.
He knocked again, and said, “It’s okay. We’re not coded.”
The door opened slowly and a girl of about fifteen years old
poked her head around the door. “I’m not looking for trouble,” she said in a
heavy Outpost Colstand accent.
“Neither are we,” Giovanni said. “We were just hoping to
borrow your fishing net.”
“Why?” The girl gave him a suspicious look.
“We’re staying in the last cabin and there’s a rooster we
want to catch.”
Her eyes lit up. “To eat?”
Giovanni nodded. “If you let us use your net, we’ll share.”
The girl stepped backwards, and the door swung open wider.
Giovanni stepped over the threshold. “I’m Giovanni, in case you were
wondering.”
Lydia followed Giovanni but stopped next to the girl who still
had her hand on the door. “I’m Lydia. Are you here all by yourself?”
The girl hesitated. “No.”
“Good,” Lydia said. “You shouldn’t be alone. Where are you
from?” Lydia laughed softly. “Maybe, I should first ask your name.”
The girl said, “Mandy. I’m from Brigdehun, north of Outpost
Colstand.”
“Wow.” Lydia let the word rush over her lips. “That’s quite
a walk from there to here.”
“Cities aren’t as quiet and peaceful as out here in the
countryside,” Giovanni chipped in.
Lydia nodded as if she understood but she did not really.
She could only imagine how it was in the cities. There were so many more
people, so many more who could be dissident. So many who could oppose what the
government told them to do, especially now that the whole of Danglen had turned
into an authoritarian state. Which meant there were so many more people who
were hungry, probably starving, and hiding in unsavoury hovels and abandoned
places.
Mandy explained, “My parents went to go get the barcode and when
they got back, two days later, they were different. They definitely were not my
parents anymore. My mum and dad left one day as if they were going to the
shops, and then these two robot-zombie things came back who pretended to be my
parents. Everything they did was as if they were automated to do it.”
Lydia asked, “What do you mean?”
“Usually there was always chaos in the house first thing in
the morning cause one of them always overslept but suddenly everything worked
like clockwork. No chaos, and a perfect routine. It creeped me out to watch them
and I was hoping every second of the day that they would just snap out of it
and go back to the way they were, but as the days went by, they didn’t. I kept
thinking that it was just an after effect of the chemicals in the ink, or
whatever they use, of the barcode. They were coaxing me every day to also get
coded. It was subtle at first, then about a week ago my dad grabbed me by the
arm and was dragging me out the house to take me to the coding centre. Luckily
for me, he tripped, and I managed to pull my arm from his grip, and I ran and
ran as fast as I could until I could not hear him coming after me anymore.
Lydia felt sorry for her.
Giovanni came back from the other end of the cabin with the long-poled
fishing net in his hands.
“Where did you get that rifle?” Mandy asked, keeping her
eyes on it.
Giovanni pushed the strap tighter over his shoulder and the
gun shifted to his back. “I found it,” was all he said. He walked past them and
out the door. “Let’s go catch that chicken.”
Mandy and Lydia followed him.
Lydia asked Giovanni, “Do you even know how to kill a
chicken and how to get all those feathers off?”
He said, over his shoulder, “I’ll look it up. I’ve still got
about fifteen percent battery on my phone.”
Lydia said, “I have about the same. I was saving it.”
“What for?” Mandy asked. “Didn’t you hear, it’s the end of
the world.”
“So, where’s the other people you’re with?” Giovanni asked
when they reached the cabin at the farthest end.
“Just one person,” she replied. “Shaun. There’s a big house
on the other side of those trees over there.” She pointed in the direction.
“He’s gone to look for food.”
“Well, let’s get this chicken and hopefully he finds
something, and we can have a feast. I am not even hungry anymore, that’s how
hungry I am.”
They were surprised at how easy it was to catch the chicken.
Lydia said, “It’s probably because there’s always people
here on the weekend.”
Mandy agreed, “Yeah. It must be used to people. That’s sad.”
Giovanni asked, “Who’s going to help me prepare it?”
“I will,” a voice said from behind them.
They quickly turned but the figure was hidden within the
shadows of the trees. When he stepped out and stepped closer to them, Lydia
took a deep breath. From a distance he looked a lot like Jodie but as he came
closer, she noticed, obviously, that he was a lot different too. She wondered
where Jodie was. Was he like one of these robot-zombie-people, who did as he
was told? Who was well behaved, and never questioned the government? Was he now
the perfect pawn? Would he still have that same cheeky smile, would he still
make jokes at her expense but look at her in that odd, butterflies in the pit
of her stomach inducing way?
Mandy ran forward. “Shaun.” She grabbed his hand and pulled
him closer to them. “This is Giovanni and Lydia. I just met them, and we’re
going to have barbequed chicken.”
Shaun looked at them. “Is it wise to start a fire?”
Giovanni rolled his eyes. “Not another one,” he mumbled. He
said, a little louder, “We’ll keep it small. Are you going to help me, or what?”
Shaun pulled a long-bladed knife from a sheath hanging from
his hip. “I’ll chop off its neck.”
Lydia cringed but looked away when Shaun took the chicken
from Giovanni, holding it by its long neck. She heard the chicken make a few
desperate clucks before she heard a chopping noise and then the chicken was
quiet.
Shaun held the chicken upside down until most of the blood
had drained from the body and then sat down on the ground with his legs crossed
in front of him. The chicken was placed in the space his knees made and he
started plucking feathers from the dead chicken.
They all sat down in a circle, watching Shaun.
Lydia took off her shoes so that her socks could dry out.
Giovanni asked, “Seeing it’s just us against everyone else right
now, let’s get to know each other a little more. Like age, where you’re from,
and how you got here to this moment.”
Mandy immediately said, “Sixteen.”
“You look more like fifteen,” Liam said as he walked up to
join them.
Lydia looked up and gave him a wide smile. “Hey, sleepy head.
You were out for the count.” She looked at the others in the circle.
“Everybody, this is Liam. We started this journey together.” Pointing at each
one, she introduced Liam to them. “Shaun and Mandy.”
“Hey,” Liam said and sat down on the ground beside Lydia. “I
don’t know what happened. The one moment I was awake, and then the next
everyone was gone.”
Mandy complained, “I don’t look like I’m fifteen, do I?” She
looked at Shaun and Giovanni.
Giovanni nodded. “Actually, you do.”
She huffed. “I am sixteen, almost seventeen.”
Liam grinned. “More like fifteen, almost sixteen.”
She folded her arms across her chest. “I don’t have to
convince you. I don’t care if you don’t believe me.”
Giovanni turned to Shaun. “And you?”
Shaun shrugged but kept his eyes focussed on the chicken
between his legs. “What do you want to know?”
“Your story.”
Shaun glanced up briefly to look at Giovanni. “Seventeen,
from Scoraig.”
“Where’s that?” Lydia asked. “I don’t think I’ve ever heard
of it.”
“It’s on a remote peninsula in the north-west of Outpost
Colstand. You can only get there by either walking for five miles or by boat.
There’s no access by road. We live, or should I say, lived in relative
isolation.”
Mandy exclaimed, “Why would anyone do that?”
He gave her a sideways glance, and a small smile. “We lived
off-grid, using wind power, and there is a small school too. We thought it
wasn’t easily accessible, which was appealing. Also, obviously, being in touch
with nature and the elements and life is what made my parents move there long before
I was even born. They used to tell me they moved there to be self-sustainable,
to keep chickens, to grow their own veg and to make their own power rather than
to be part of a big machine. The biggest downside is that the high school is in
Ullapool, so all the older kids go and stay away all week.”
Liam asked, “Is that when the army came for you? When you
were at school?”
“Yeah. We were in the dorm, and there was this big commotion
downstairs. My roommate and I had already decided that we weren’t getting the
barcode, so we ran down the back stairs and out the back. Just then a soldier
came around the corner of the building, and I swear, he looked like some
otherworldly creature.”
Mandy asked, “Like what kind of otherworldly creature?”
Shaun thought for a bit. “Just off the top of my head, maybe
like the Terminator, from the movie.”
Lydia asked, “So big and full of muscles?”
“Not really the way he looked, more like the way he moved.”
Mandy chipped in, “See. I told you they’re like robot-zombies
or something now. Not all together there anymore.”
Giovanni prompted, “And then? What happened after that?”
“I ran like a bat outa hell. You know that saying that if a
lion chases you and a friend, all you have to do is run faster than your
friend, well that’s exactly what I did.” He stopped plucking for a second.
“Well, that’s how they got him.”
Lydia asked, “Did you go back home?”
He nodded. “But they were all gone.”
Giovanni wanted to know, “Why are you going south, and not
further north?”
He looked up at Giovanni. There was a determined, angry look
on his face. “Scoraig is about as north as you can get, and nobody there was
safe. I am going south to where they store the data, and I am going to blow it
all up.”
Mandy added, lifting her hand in the air, “Me too.”
Liam said, “That’s ridiculous. What’s that going to help?
It’s better to find somewhere to hide.”
Shaun stopped plucking the chicken and looked straight at
Liam. “How long do you want to hide for? Forever? It’s not like you can get on
a boat and flee to another country. It’s like this all over Rheta.”
Lydia looked at Liam. She had known him for as long as she
could remember, and she knew he was scared. Not afraid to stand up against
evil, but afraid of confrontation. She was suddenly grateful for Liam. Liam saved
her when she did not know what to do when the two people who were her safe
places were snatched away from her. She would be forever grateful that he came
to her rescue, but she knew that Shaun was right. They could not run away and
hide from this, they had to stand up and fight back. She said, “They’re right,
Liam. We have to go with them.”
He gave her a sad look before he looked at Giovanni. “And
you? What’s your story?”
Giovanni shrugged. “Not much to tell.”
“Well, we know you walked all the way here from Colony Dinta
but tell us more. Like where are you from?”
He said, “From Colony Dinta.”
“But you sound foreign.”
He sighed. “Originally from Italy. The name Giovanni should
have clued you in on that one.”
Mandy added, “And the dark features.”
He wiggled his bushy eyebrows at her. “Colony Dinta was
already a place of have-nots and haves, but it’s worse now. Much worse. I am
eighteen and if you want complete honesty, I did sign up to join the army.”
They looked at him in shock.
He pushed his palm against his forehead and pushed up his
fringe. “No barcode, though. I chickened out when I was standing in the queue.
One of the soldiers came after me, but I managed to grab his rifle and I shot
him.”
The others gasped.
He said, “Not dead. Just wounded.”
Mandy asked, “With that gun?”
Giovanni patted the gun. “Yes. This gun.” He lifted himself
up off the ground. “We should start making a fire before it gets dark and so
that we can start eating. I am literally starving right now.”
Continue reading Chapter 11/17
All work created and posted on this blog is the intellectual property of Stephen Simpson.
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