Obey Defy: Novella by Craig Lea Gordon

Author:Craig Lea Gordon [Gordon, Craig Lea]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: dystopian
Publisher: SID Origin
Published: 2022-02-24T16:00:00+00:00

6: THE MAN INSIDE

She awoke with a shock, her head clanging against metal.

“Awake,” a male voice said, slapping her on the side of the head.

Her head slammed into metal again, sending a deep clang reverberating around her.

“I am awake,” she growled through gritted teeth. “If you do that again…”

“Ha, Harek said you trouble. Lucky me. You pretty one,” he said.

She snapped her head sideways and launched herself up and forward. She was millimetres away from his throat when her hands jerked against the length of chain. She strained, pushing hard until the metal cuffs bit into her skin.

“Sit,” he said, thrusting the butt of his plasma carbine into her chest.

Falling backwards, she slumped into the seat with a thud, head smacking off the back wall, sending another metal thunk reverberating around the confines of the space.

She looked down, and sure enough, her hands were cuffed to a chain that was bolted into place on the floor.

“Headache?” the guard snorted.

She ignored him and scanned her surroundings.

Imprisoned in the back of a mobile supply truck, the white metal sides pressed in all around her. There was space for three on the benches on either side. But there was only her and the guard. There was no movement, and checking through the darkened glass to the cab, the driver wasn’t at the wheel. The crick in her neck suggesting that she’d been slumped for a while. So, wherever they were, this was their destination.

“Where are we?”

He didn’t so much as twitch.

“You know what’s happening here, don’t you?”

Nothing.

“They’re going to kill them all. Don’t you care?”

She jumped to her feet, chain snagging once more against her wrists.

“Come on, don’t you even know why we’re here? The system is corrupt. It’s broken. Let me go and I can help fix it.”

His face as unreadable as their featureless city.

She started shaking her hands at him, making the chain jangle and snap against the bolt in the floor.

“Cut me free. Please. Please!”

He stood up, and for a second, she thought he was going to free her.

“Sit.”

He raised his weapon and slammed the butt of it into her even harder.

Thrust backward, she slammed into the side of the truck, a jolt of pain connecting her neck and back.

“Zero point eight. Me. Zero point eight. Shut up. Next time. Your teeth,” he said, brandishing the butt of the weapon at her.

Different avenues of thought sliced through her. Other things to say. To do. To try to sway him. But she knew she couldn’t. Nothing she could say would cause him to deviate. She couldn’t break his self-imposed conditioning.

All was not lost. She had to grab whatever opportunity arose. For now, though, let him think he’d won.

Her shoulders slumped. Let her head fall forward and her eyes fill with tears. She sniffed, and a tear fell from her nose to strike the corrugated metal floor of the truck.

“Pathetic,” he said.

Daylight slashed its way through the gloom as the back doors of the truck were jerked open.

This is it, she thought. I need to seize my chance.

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