Page 12 of Calico Descending

“And? What’d he do to you?”

“Nothing like that.”

“Nothing?” She shrugs and shakes her head. “Well, that’s intriguing, don’t you think?”

“There’s nothing intriguing about the Alphas. Mine almost killed me. Strangled me against the wall.”

“Shit, Cali. I’m sorry.” She’s the only one who calls me by my real name here, otherwise we refer to each other by the last three numbers tattooed on the back of our necks. “Let me see.”

Lifting my chin up high, I let her take a look at the bruised band around my throat that’s still tender to the touch.

“Jesus.” Her lips curl, as she drags the tip of her finger over what’s probably a black and purple mess now. Not that she hasn’t seen worse, even on me. Roz has sometimes been the one to wheel me back to my room after my weekly checkups. All I know is, when I’m taken to one of the experimental suites, there’s a few seconds of excruciating pain, and I wake up in recovery afterward. According to her, it’s never pretty when she first retrieves me. “He could’ve snapped your neck, by the looks of it.”

“Felt like he wanted to.” Rubbing my hand over the sensitive flesh, I lower my chin. “I have to make him … like me.” If Medusa, or Doctor Ericsson, heard me discussing the experiment, I’m certain I’d be looking at solitary or “treatment”, which is what they call thermo, or electro, therapy for bad behavior. “I don’t even know how they think I’m going to accomplish that.”

“Touch his cock.”

Frowning, I shake my head. “Can you not be obsessed with the male genitalia for once? This is serious.”

“So am I. You’d be surprised what one little stroke can do. Take Kenny. Guy wouldn’t even look at me for months. Then one day? I transported a No Pulse down to the incinerators.” No Pulse is how those in transport refer to the late stage infected after dissection. “He was standing behind me, and I accidentally brushed up against his dick. Next day? We were making out under the staircase.”

Eyes closing, I blow out an exasperated breath. “I’m not touching his cock. I doubt he’d let me near it, anyway.”

“What I’ve heard, you could probably stand a foot away and brush it.”

“Where the hell do you hear these things?”

Her cheeks cave with another drag of her cigarette. “Shit gets around.”

“Lights out!” Medusa’s voice thunders from the doorway, and eyes popping wide, Roz bends forward, stamping her cigarette out under the bed, before she scrambles up to her top bunk. I catch her licking the ash from her palm, as she climbs the ladder, and I shiver at what that must taste like, if the smell is anything to go by.

The stout guard makes her rounds to each bunk, inspecting every bed for any sign of foul play, which includes hiding food, and in some rare cases, boys from B wing. It’s only happened once where I was assigned, and as far as we know, that boy is dead.

When she finally reaches my and Roz’s bunk, her head raises, eyes scanning over Roz, and then me. Mine is nothing but a cursory glance, as I’ve not broken a rule in a couple years now.

None that she’s been privy to, anyway.

I work in the kitchen during times when I’m not laid out on a gurney, and I did, on occasion, smuggle food back for the others, which resulted in losing my rations for nearly a week, and some solitary. A week through which I still had to serve my fellow subjects, while starving. That day, I lost privileges to see Bryani, since she nearly died trying to defend me, and my hope is to earn those privileges back. I don’t remember much of it, since I blacked out during the interrogation, and I haven’t smuggled anything out of the kitchen since then.

The lights cut out.

There is no place in the desert as black as this room when the lights go out. I can’t even see past my own nose, so when Roz hits the top of my bunk and whispers a sound to get my attention, I don’t even know where to look. “Give me your fingers. Index and middle.”

“Why?”

“Just do it.”

Huffing, I hold up my fingers around the edge of the bed, as she requests, and wait until she taps hers along them in the dark. Her hand curls around my fingers, and she slides her palm up and down. “Feel that?”

“Yeah? So?”

“That’s how you stroke a dick.”

“What the hell are you two doing?” Seven-one-one whispers from the bunk beside us, Shoshanna’s her real name—she’s been here just over three years and works in the cleaning crew. Nice girl, but nosey as hell.

“Mind your own fucking business,” Roz snaps, and keeps on with her stroking.

I don’t know why I let her. Maybe this is how she feels useful to me for all the times I stuck up for her when she first arrived. That’s what friends do for each other in this place. I wouldn’t be here, if someone hadn’t stuck up for me. “Are you done now?” I ask, trying to sound bored, but my mind is brimming with intrigue. It’s not unusual to see a boy’s penis, especially on the experimental wards. Sometimes, they’ll flash us, if they’re brave enough not to get caught. Sometimes, we see the naked bodies of a No Pulse getting wheeled down to incinerators. In a few cases, the guards have propositioned the girls here, in exchange for favors, like cigarettes, or extra food rations. For whatever reason, though, they tend to stay away from the girls in Alpha Project, like me, which is just fine.

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