Rough Passages: The Collected Stories by K. M. Herkes

Author:K. M. Herkes [Herkes, K. M.]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: super, hero, psychic, powers, feminine, heroine, strong female, military, action, paranormal, short story
Publisher: Dawnrigger Publishing
Published: 2017-11-07T00:00:00+00:00

Roundup

The proud ones died first. They died in the exam rooms, they died on the train platform behind the intake offices, and they died standing in the hot sun as they waited for a ride to oblivion. They refused to disrobe, defied the orders of their uniformed kidnappers, and demanded water and shade. Pride was a sin, and they paid for their transgressions with their lives.

Ruth remembered her Scripture in time to save her life. Patience is better than pride, the Bible taught. When the government thugs came for her with their legal papers, their uniforms, and their red, sweaty faces, she bowed her head and opened the door. While the thugs drank sweet iced tea and mocked her daughter’s crooked shelves and small treasures, Ruth packed the one bag the law allowed her to bring, and then she hugged her grandchildren and kissed her daughter’s salt-wet cheek.

She would not be provoked in spirit even when the thugs grew bored with the farewells. They pulled her from her family and called her old nigger bitch in front of her grandchildren, but she lowered her eyes and swallowed pride. Humility was a frail shield, but it was all she had. She consoled herself with the hidden truth. She might be an old bitch, but that made her a cunning old dog who could learn new tricks. Her time would come. There was a time for everything, under the sun.

The thugs brought her to the government building, where she was inspected by men who looked at computer screens more than her naked form. She was humble, they were indifferent, and they passed her back to the thugs with stamps and papers that were promptly taken away, as her bag had been.

The rules of this new existence seemed simple enough, and not much different than the ones that had governed her old life. Never expect help, never challenge authority, never show weakness, never rebel. Disrespect was death. Weakness was death. The silent and the strong survived.

She wanted to survive. She had been patient all her life, and her time would come soon. The official diagnosis only gave numbers and labels to what anyone with eyes could see; even as Ruth’s womb had shriveled and her hair turned gray, God had touched her body with strange new blessings.

Old nigger bitch, the thugs called her, but her skin was whiter than theirs now. She was changing, and that was what they feared most. Weeks past, her wrinkled skin had begun to peel like the bark of a sycamore tree, leaving pale tender flesh exposed. Silence would be easy now. The shifts within her body had stolen the voice she once raised in joy with the church choir every Sunday.

She would have other powers to replace the lost skill, if she completed this metamorphosis that came to the old and killed the proud. Rollover, the thugs and bureaucrats called it, like a command to a pet, or a sleepy stretch in bed, but it fell where it pleased, and it was not restful.

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.