Page 19 of Of Sinners & Salvation
It’s what brought me to the Slaughterpen, and probably what brought a few of them here. For a moment, I consider starting a real fight, showing them how good I am, that I’m worthy of respect. But I’m not strong enough yet, and keeping my secret a little longer might benefit me later. So I don’t move from the table, even though everyone in the room is on their feet, hurling food from the table and floor. I sit quietly in the chaos, eating quickly but neatly, ignoring the food that splatters onto me when someone misses their target. Everything is soft, so I’m not worried about getting hit.
A scream rings out, and after a second of searching for the source, I see that the boy who hurled his tray has bitten another one’s arm, latched on like he’s trying to tear a piece of flesh away. The blond boy who threw the chicken is cackling maniacally and swinging a chair.
Suddenly a deafening alarm blares through the place. The instigator falls to the floor, covering his ears, his face twisted into a terrible grimace of agony, blood streaking his clenched teeth. The others are covering their heads and ears, most of them having abandoned the food fight in favor of saving their eardrums.
A dozen people in scrubs rush into the room along with an equal number in what must be guard uniforms. They’re all wearing ear protection, and they gesture and yell over the noise. They descend on different groups to get them under control, and I flinch when a few of the guards use batons to club the kids who have started fighting with fists instead of food. Some of the ones in scrubs are injecting others with syringes, which might be worse.
The guy who was bitten has blood running down his arm and is wailing almost as loud as the alarm. The blond is getting clubbed over the head by two guards at once. I force myself to keep eating despite it. I need strength, and food is the only way to get it. Ignoring the melee, I polish off my chicken and start on the pile of green beans left.
After a few minutes, everyone is huddled in groups—the boys our age, the girls, several groups of older people, a group of crying little kids, and a small group that looks just a bit younger than us. My stomach turns when I see them, remembering Dr. Augustine’s fingers probing my insides. Eternity would have been in that group when she arrived. I search the fifteen-to-twenty-five group, but I can’t find her. Where is she?
When everyone is assembled and the alarm has ceased blaring, Miss Sarah, who returned to help keep order, turns to me. “Are you planning on joining us?” she asks, her tone snide.
I tuck the last bite into my mouth, push back from the table, step over a pile of slippery green beans, and join the group. A few give me curious or wary glances, but I recognize respect in the eyes of a couple girls. Apparently pissing off Miss Sarah is all it takes.
We leave the room in a straight line, stepping over puddles and chunks of food. Half the staff remains in the dining room, tending to the people they knocked out. The scary boy who threw his tray is being restrained by three orderlies while another one fits what can only be described as a muzzle over the bottom half of his face. The injured come with us, cradling their limbs, poking at bruises, licking split lips.
The boys’ line moves past us in the hall, walking against the far wall at a faster pace than Patricia is leading our line.
The blond boy who started the food fight tips his chin at me in a nod and makes a kissy-face with his lips. His face is sickeningly swollen, bruises forming already.
“Don’t mess with him,” says the girl with the scar. “He treats this place like a vacation, in and out whenever he pleases.”
“Don’t mess with any of the boys,” says the plain girl, Emily. “It’s not worth it.”
“If you get pregnant while you’re here, I bet they take your baby to do experiments on,” whispers Chelsea behind me. “You’d never see it again. Dr. Augustine would never send in a birth certificate, so no one would know it exists.”
“Quiet,” snaps Miss Sarah, stalking past us.
“What did I do?” Chelsea protests.
“You were talking,” Miss Sarah calls over her shoulder.
“Nuh-uh,” Chelsea says. “Why are you always singling me out? It wasn’t even me. You’re so racist.”
Miss Sarah turns around, frowning. “Then who was it?” she demands.
No one says anything.
“Who was it?” Miss Sarah asks again.
“It was those two,” Emily says, gesturing from me to Chelsea.
“Narc,” Chelsea hisses at her.
“I’ll put that in your charts,” Miss Sarah says to us. “You’ll be seeing Dr. Augustine, Chelsea. Mercy, you have four more marks in your chart before you’ll have a visit.”
“That’s not fair,” Chelsea cries, and I can see real fear written on her face. “I didn’t do anything!”
Grayson, the boy who yelled out in the cafeteria, passes us, muttering under his breath now. “Eyedrops are an invisible killer. No one would ever suspect it.”
Chelsea’s eyes follow him, and she swallows hard, then continues in our line, head down, subdued. I can’t help but wonder if she heard him, and if he was suggesting a method for her to kill the doctor or a method the doctor might kill her.
Suddenly his earlier ranting seems a lot more meaningful.
Frankenstein is the doctor and the monster.
Was he trying to tip me off, warning me without saying what he really meant: Augustine is the doctor and the monster?
