The Sector

Chapter Twelve

Hours later when the door swung open to reveal Darbee's timid figure standing in the corridor, Seth still held the book in his hands. He glanced up almost distractedly at the dim light creeping in.

"Come on," Darbee whispered. "We need to do this quickly."

Closing the book, Seth rose and met him at the threshold.

"Where are we going?" he asked.

"Out," Darbee replied simply. His fingers twitched unconsciously—a nervous tick.

They hurried back down the passageway to the large room that Darbee's desk occupied, then continued further, back into the foyer and from there, out the doors.

Two guarding Officers stood watch just outside.

Seth did not anticipate them. Darbee did.

Without missing a beat, he whipped something out from beneath his jacket and pointed it at the nearest Officer. It went off, and the Officer convulsed with a violence that shook Seth to his core before slumping to the dirt.

Seth realized with a twitch in his gut that Darbee had used a Taser on the man. He wondered idly if that was what he had looked like when he'd been attacked.

He was ripped from his thoughts a moment later, however, when the second Officer grabbed him from behind, wrapped an arm around his throat, and cut off his air supply. The journal fell out of his grasp as he lifted his hands to claw desperately at the man's forearm, eyes watering and red-faced.

As black dots began to spot his vision, he did the only thing he could think to do and stopped fighting. He let his arms fall to his sides, let his head loll, let his legs give out from under him.

It worked.

The Officer released him and he collapsed, playing dead. He heard Darbee's gasp as he felt the Officer move towards him.

The man reached for Darbee, who was now pressed up against the cement outside wall of the Testing Centre and trembling, his Taser having fallen to the ground a few feet away—well out of his reach.

As the Officer drew back to strike him, Seth flung his arm out, caught him by the ankle, yanked, and sent him toppling to the ground beside him.

A fraction of a second later, Seth was straddling him, pinning him to the ground, and driving an elbow hard into his temple.

The Officer's body went limp beneath him, unconscious. Still catching his breath, Seth scrambled up, snatched his journal and Darbee's Taser from where they lay in the dirt, grabbed Darbee by the wrist, and ran.

"Which way?" he called back at Darbee, who didn't seem to hear him.

"Darbee!" He snapped his fingers in front of his face as they reached the vehicles, parked in a perfect line a few hundred metres from the colossal cement building. "Which way do we go?"

Darbee's stunned eyes settled on him, his face sickly pale. He looked as if he were about to throw up. Seth wouldn't have been surprised if he did.

"Come on, Darbee! We don't have much time!"

Slowly, as if realizing he was being spoken to, Darbee focused. "To the Sector," he said in a small voice, still not completely present.

"I didn't see the way we came in, I don't know which direction that is," Seth said in frustration. Then, when Darbee's mind seemed to drift back into a stupor again, "Darbee!"

He shook him by the shoulders. 

"Listen," he said. "Hey, I need you to listen to me for a minute. We had a close call back there but we got out, okay? Now we need to keep going or they'll catch us for sure, and we both know what they'll do if that happens. I don't want to die, Darbee—and I know you don't either—so you need to snap out of it right now or I'm going to have to leave you behind."

Seemingly focused enough to register what he was saying, Darbee's eyes flew wide at that. He shook his head—a tiny movement, but one that was not lost on Seth. "No. Please, no. I can't..." he whispered, trailing off.

"Then which way is it, Darbee?" Seth pressed.

"To the right," Darbee said. "But take one of the larger trucks. Once they realize we're gone, they'll bring guns instead of Tasers and we're going to need as much protection as possible." Darbee pulled a set of keys out of his pocket and tossed them to Seth. "They'll work for any of the vehicles. Each and every ignition is the same—it was more convenient that way."

Seth nodded and they hurried three vehicles down the line to a large armoured truck.

In the truck, once Darbee had calmed down considerably, Seth turned to him.

"Can I ask you something?"

"Sure," Darbee answered.

"The man whose office you got me to hide in," Seth began, "You said he left a few months ago... He was killed like Frasier and the others, wasn't he?"

Darbee was quiet for a moment, then, "Yes."

"Why?"

"Because he realised—the same way you and I did—that what they're doing in there... This program they're running..." he paused, gathering himself. "...He realised that it's wrong. That it's immoral and inhumane and barbaric, and he tried to put a stop to it."

"And Gianna wasn't going to let that happen," Seth finished.

"Yes. Why do you ask?"

Seth reached forward and retrieved the journal from where he'd thrown it in the truck's dashboard compartment.

He handed it to Darbee.

"I found that in his office," he said.

"What is it?"

"Open it," Seth told him.

Darbee did as he was told, his jaw falling slack when he saw the neat handwriting scrawled within.

"It's a journal," Seth said. "Everything he saw in this place, everything he did... Every thought he had... It's all in there."

"Oh my God," Darbee breathed, flipping through the pages.

"What war is going on outside this place, Darbee? What do they need the superhumans for? What's so important?"

"This program is just preparation for the war," Darbee said. "It hasn't actually begun. Not yet, anyway. When it does though, it will be big, and it will be brutal, and we'll need all the man-power we can get—which is where you all come in."

"Who are we fighting though?"

"The rest of the human race... They're calling it the War on Colour. You've lived a very sheltered life, Seth. Safe in the Sector with your friends, oblivious to the outside world... Tell me, could you imagine meeting someone whose skin was not white? Could you imagine a person whose skin was yellow or brown or black?"

Seth's brow furrowed. "Is that possible?" he asked.

"It is. And there are people outside the Sector—more people than you could possibly imagine—who are just like that."