Three

  You Say Suspicious? I Say … Please Help Me, I’m Scared

  I dared not move an inch.

  I was completely surrounded. Dozens of wingless men in black uniforms and helmets crowded in front of the tiny moving room, some crouching, the others standing behind. Their eyes and weapons were aimed solely at me. Unblinking. Unwavering. I could feel my heartbeats pounding thickly in my throat, so heavy I could choke on them. As it was, I hadn’t taken a breath in what seemed like hours. It felt like time was frozen in that moment for an eternity, but really the standoff only lasted less than a minute.

  *… bing! …*

  The sound of the bell might as well have been a bomb going off, it shattered the deafening silence so suddenly. All at once, I gasped, the wingless unleashed a volley of darts, and the metal doors began to close. Rolling against the wall, I dodged out of the way as the place I’d just been standing was peppered in orange-plumed needles. The small room sealed up again and began to descend.

  I slumped into a corner, pulling my knees up to my chest as the urge to cry became unbearable. My feathers rustled as my body shook, tears pouring freely down my face. Why was all this happening? Where were Dr. Agoka’ta and Ma’hy’nami? Who were all these wingless people and why didn’t this world feel like home?

  It wasn’t supposed to be like this. I stared down at my lap, watching tears drip onto my skin. I was supposed to have woken up back in the lab with my parents and the nice technicians there to greet me. They’d been going to teach me how to fly.

  Suddenly the moving room rumbled to a stop much sooner than I’d been expecting it to. Had I really gone back to the bottom already? No, it didn’t feel right. I was stopped at a different floor. The bell rang once again, and the doors started to open. I buried my head in my arms and braced to be shot at or attacked in some other way, but after a few seconds I realized nothing was happening. Sniffing and blinking the bleariness out of my eyes, I slowly peaked up.

  A younger looking wingless man and a woman stood in the doorway, staring at me. I stared back, eyes flicking over their fully maroon clothes and the faces of a few other people peeking out from behind them. The woman whispered something to the man who muttered back while shaking his head. Then she took a tentative step towards me. I shifted back out of instinct, feeling another round of tears welling up. Seeing this, she held up her empty hands and made soft shushing sounds, I felt in an effort to calm me down. Still apprehensive, I built up my telepathic field again and let a wave of it roll over her. With a little gasp, the wingless woman froze, her jaw dropping a bit. Our eyes met as I touched at her mind, sensing strong feelings of concern and a willingness to help. We came to a thread of understanding. She reached out and I took her hand, letting her pull me to my feet and walk me out of the moving room.

  These wingless people are different than the others. I noted. Maybe not all of them want to hurt me. Maybe it’s just those ones in the dark uniforms. But why?

  The woman motioned to another behind her, who reached behind a nearby counter and handed her a bundle of fabric. She unrolled it to reveal a simple white and blue gown with bits of string at the top, middle, and bottom. I gladly accepted the offered covering, slipping my arms through the almost elbow length sleeves. The young wingless man tied the strings behind my neck, back, and the backs of my knees.

  “Ahpta sai,” I dipped my head. (Thank you)

  They nodded, then the three of us flinched when the moving room’s bell dinged again. The doors started to close, but the young man lunged and stuck his hand between them. They stopped and opened all the way again. He held his hand against one side, motioning and seeming to tell his female companion to go. She took my hand and the other wingless moved out of the way as she started pulling me down another hallway. We turned right and came to a door on the left that the woman quietly pushed open. Beyond were staircases going up and down. I could hear voices and footsteps echoing somewhere above and clung tighter to my helper’s hand. She squeezed my fingers in return and we took the lower stairs.

  I don’t understand why any of this is happening, but I’m gonna trust it. Maybe there’s a reason. I thought.

  I followed my guide down four levels to a landing and a pair of big grey doors with a black and yellow striped boarder. We both peeked through the long, narrow windows near the center seam. Through them I saw a huge room where wingless people were controlling machines carrying stacks of boxes. They were taking them out or putting them into the backs of even bigger machines. The woman crouched down close to me, pointing to the large vehicles then to the left. I followed her finger and saw that the space gradually sloped upwards. At the end, I could see a gleaming point of light.

  Oh … Oh! If I get into one of those big things, they’ll take me out of here! I realized.

  My eyes lit up and I nodded vigorously. Smiling at me for a moment, my rescuer tapped a finger to her lips and slowly pushed open the door. She stuck her head out, making sure the coast was clear before inching out, and I crept along in her footsteps. We ran low and ducked behind a palate of boxes, waiting for a machine operator to drive past, then scooting over to the next bit of cover. We repeated the process until we were right beside one of the big mechanical beasts.

  The woman turned to me and gently held my face in her hands. She looked me in the eyes and spoke, but still the words just wouldn’t click. I could tell by her tone that she was really trying to tell me something. I desperately wanted to understand what it was. As my telepathic field focused on her again, I saw one of her eyes twitch a little, but she didn’t feel afraid at all. Instead, she seemed to push her words at me from her mind too. I didn’t even know if these wingless had any mental powers of their own, but this woman, for whatever reason, could get through to me just a little bit. Though our languages were worlds apart, I understood what she meant to say.

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  … I don’t know who you are, where you came from, or where you’re going, but just know that you’re going to be alright …

  Her emotions felt so convinced and sure.

  I believed her.

  Something made a banging sound in the back of the room and we jumped as barking voices grew louder. The woman poked her head up and looked around rapidly, motioning me to move. It was time to go. I scurried around her and she helped me climb the bars on the back of the big machine into the almost fully loaded container. Holding onto her hand a second longer, I pushed my own words into her mind.

  “Ahpta sai. Sa ohte kahtah dehapte sair sadite,” I whispered. (Thank you. I will never forget your kindness.)

  She smiled with a nod and I let go of her fingers, slipping back into the safety of the box machine’s interior. Peeking through a gap between the stacks of cargo, I watched her sneak back the way we’d come. My hearts thudded as on the opposite side of the cavernous room I saw a bunch of the black armored wingless being bossed around by others in dark suits. I didn’t get to see if my friend made it to safety or not. A man appeared and I ducked as he hoisted himself up onto the back of the machine. He reached up and grabbed a rope dangling from the top of the container, pulling down a flexible metal sheet. The inside of the container was plunged into darkness as the rolling door clanged into place, and I heard it be locked from the outside.

  I guess there’s no turning back now. I blinked as my eyes adjusted.

  Suddenly there was a roar that faded into a rumble and the machine began to vibrate. I faceplanted into the boxes in front of me as the container lurched before starting to move steadily forwards. I tucked myself into a relatively stable spot, wishing I could see where I was now headed. I’d never used my telepathic field while in motion before. With everything moving, I doubted I’d be able to get a clear mental picture before the scenery shifted again.

  I was overcome with the urge to yawn and nestled further into the secure niche. The motion of the machine and its constant rumble was oddly soothing, the dim, contained atmosphere something I hadn’t experienced before. Tucking my legs up and pulling my new dress over my knees, I decided to close my eyes for a bit.

  …

  Everything was loud.

  The blood pumping through my ears, my heartbeats, the blaring sirens.

  I sprinted down the black hallway doused in red light, sweat pouring down my face. My lungs felt like they were on fire with every heaving breath. The soles of my feet stung from the force of contact with the ground. How long had I been running? I couldn’t remember how any of this had started.

  Glancing over my shoulder, a wave of terror gripped me.

  Hordes of shadows filled the corridor, shaped like people with glowing white eyes. They were haggard and hideous. Nothing but spindly limbs and spidery hands clawing at the air where I’d just been. Sometimes they had gaping greyish maws, then the next second were featureless. Either way, they kept screaming, filling the already deafening air with a grating static sound.

  I had no thoughts other than to run. Keep running. If I stopped … I didn’t know what would happen if I stopped. What would these things do to me? Would they kill me? Rip me apart? Or just overwhelm me, dragging me and everything into their amalgamous black void? I didn’t want to find out.

  My legs began to turn heavy. Soon it felt like I was trying to run through viscous mud. The shadows were still behind me, but not getting any closer. At the same time, I wasn’t moving any further ahead, the whole world moving but simultaneously stuck in place. A repeating frame of fear and uncertainty. I tried to jump and get my legs moving again. As I fell back down, there was a slight gust of air under my wings. Gasping, I had a sudden glimpse of hope.

  I could fly! I could just spread my wings and get away! I thought.

  Now with a smile I flung my arms open and expected my wings to do the same. But an ache ran down my back. My wings were now as heavy as my legs, drooping towards the floor, dragging and slowing me down. I reached forwards, straining, and slowly they lifted, making my shoulders burn. I tried to extend them more and flap, but my avian limbs seemed locked in place. I could barely even feel them, like they weren’t really attached to me. Not mine. Just an illusion.

  Fly! Come on! Fly! FLY! I screamed at myself.

  I grabbed the edges of my wings and held them up, arms trembling under the weight. It was as if they’d been turned to solid metal. Finally, I felt the wind begin to catch under my unfurled feathers, my body lifting ever so slightly. With desperate determination, I flapped my arms and wings with them, and rose a little higher.

  The world around me distorted. Rough ground battered my feet, damp grass tangling around my toes, threatening to trip me. Burning hot sunlight beat down on my head. Squinting against the light, I thought I could see a pair of winged forms hovering in front of the sun. My hearts leapt to my throat. I couldn’t see their faces, but the blurred colors of their beating wings looked so familiar. Had Agoka’ta’jai and Ma’hy’nami finally come to rescue me? I flapped harder, fighting against my burning tired body and the apparent weight of gravity itself. I glided … glided … glided … then dropped. Ran and jumped and glided some more. Bit by bit I climbed higher and higher, though it all felt wrong and disjointed, like I wasn’t really flying and everything around me was moving instead. Looking up, I saw the hovering silhouettes reaching for me, smiling, their soft laughter an enticing promise of safety.

  I reached for them in return, letting go of my wings …

  … and fell.

  I plummeted away from the freedom of the big, blue sky, the sun, my parents. Flailing, my wings were limp, paralyzed, and useless. I screamed as I careened downwards faster and faster. The wind whistling in my ears quickly phased into the shrieking of the shadows. They reached for me, clawing, grabbing, sucking the breath from my lungs as I plunged into their darkness. I hit the ground with a jarring shock to my shoulder …

  …

  I gasped at my eyes shot open, heaving for breath, sweat pouring down my face.

  A wingless man was bent over me, his hand gripping my shoulder. He yelped and staggered back as I screamed, shooting to my feet and bolting in the opposite direction. I punched through the side of the container, not even stopping for a millisecond to ponder the fact that I’d torn through solid metal. Tripping and rolling, I tumbled down a slope into prickly brush, ripping myself out of it and continuing to run.

  Eyes stinging with sweat and tears, I could hardly see where I was going, but I didn’t care which direction I was heading anymore.

  There had to be some way to escape this nightmare.