The dark alleyway smells of old garbage and stale urine. Barely any light manages to infiltrate its depths, which is probably a good thing. It's not likely I'll be found here, but there is always a chance. They normally find me after a day or two, even after disabling the location services on my old iPhone XV. It sounds modern, but the thing is about twenty years old and barely works anymore; I can't even remember why I hung onto it, but it's the safest phone there is.
About thirty years ago, everything began to change. My parents were born into Generation Z, back when the technological development of the world was just beginning to really kick off. What little I can remember of them involves stories of their childhood, and how excited they were when the latest Samsung computer or iPhone was released and there was a mad rush to get one before they ran out. And then, everyone would do it again the next year. But as the technology developed, so did the government's ability to track the movements of everyone under their control, and I don't use that term loosely. When the government wants to control a population, they will do everything in their power to do it.
With the technological advancement of the age, tracking people became a normality. It wasn't unusual for family members to know exactly how far away from home you'd gone, what you'd done, how you'd done it, and what time you did it. And the government, seeking alternative ways to increase their power, began to use that, employing computer technicians to hack into people's phones and home security systems, until they too, knew everything about everyone.
But the biggest change they made was that around the importance of money. How much money you had to your name began to dictate how long you lived for, your usefulness to the government. As the amount of money you had to your name declined, the government began to take less and less notice of you, until, at long last, you ran out. Once that happened, you had to say your goodbyes to your loved ones within a few minutes, because as soon as you hit rock-bottom, you could guarantee the authorities would dispatch someone to get rid of you.
I've seen it happen, more times than I can count. It's why I stopped hiding out with other people, for fear of it happening to me. Well, again anyway.
The first time I'd seen the government's abuse of power in action was when I was three. My parents were out of a job and once that happened it was damn near impossible to get another one; with so much value on money, people didn't want other people working for them because it meant that they were losing precious hours or days of their lives to others, although there were a few benefits to having a big business; more people meant more spread of influences, and that, by extension, meant more money. My family, meanwhile, were behind on the bills and by the time we paid them, we literally had nothing left.
My father grabbed me and a few sets of clothes and raced me out into the cubby house. I was half asleep but the second the cold night air hit my face I jolted up.
"What's going on, daddy?" I asked, barely able to form the words in my terrified state.
"I don't know, sweetheart," he told me, but I knew he was lying. Yet I couldn't speak, as he carried me up the stairs of the cubby house and laid me down on the floor. "Stay here, I'll be back with Mummy." He kissed my head and held me for a few seconds. Then he was gone.
I chanced a glance out the window. There was no glass there, but there was a large amount of cobwebs in them; I didn't like to break them because then the spiders wouldn't have a home, so I had to make do with what I could see through them.
I heard the shattering sound of glass and splintering wood and my mothers terrified screams broke the silence. Lights flickered on across the road, doors flew open, but no one helped them. Then my parents were being dragged out of the front door, forced to their knees and, without much more warning than that, two gunshots louder than anything I had ever heard in my life slit the air, and my fathers sobs stopped, my mother's screams were silenced, and I became an orphan.
Somehow I knew what I had to do; I dressed in the warmest clothes I could find in the bundle my father had left me with, along with a pair of hiking boots, and stuffed the rest in the bag I always left in the cubby house. Then, after checking to make sure the authorities had left, I climbed down and, sticking to the shadows along the street, I ran. I didn't stop for a few hours, and by then I had no idea where I was or which way home was. I was hopelessly lost, but I must have known that it would only make it harder for them to find me.
With a shudder, I bring myself back to the present. Remembering that night, over and over again, still hurts me. I almost always find myself wishing that I had moved their bodies, which would surely be nothing but bones now, or even dust at this point. The fact that my father was crying, something he never did, haunts me in both my dreams and waking hours. I take a deep breath; tears are useless to me - crying won't bring them back.
Sighing, I pull my phone from my pocket and, angling it away from my face, open it enough that I can check the time. Midnight. I glance up at the sky, and only a single star penetrates the clouds above my head. I breathe in deeply again, the stench of the alley somehow soothing me in its familiarity. I've never been here before, but dark, abandoned alleys are usually where I hide.
Using my bag as a pillow and an extra jacket stolen from a charity store's bin as a blanket, I close my eyes, my ears straining for any sounds out of the ordinary, knowing that, as soon as something sounds strange or feels off, I will wake, and be ready to fight for my life.
All over again.
---
The night proves to be extremely uneventful, and I wake feeling somewhat refreshed, which is a rarity. Stuffing my extra jacket, which had fallen off me during the course of the dark hours, into my bag, I get to my feet and creep out of the alleyway into the crowded street outside, pulling my hood over my head as I do.
No one pays any attention to me, aside from sparing a half-second glance in my direction. More often than not, eyes slide over my slight frame, long but ratty dark-blonde hair that hasn't been washed in a few days, my pale face with its hazel eyes with blue flecks. My eyes are an unusual combination of colours, and are the one part of me that I actually like. The problem; if someone looks at me long enough, my eyes are what they will remember, and my eyes are also what gives me away.
Taking advantage of the lack of attention thrown my way, I begin to slip through the flow of people steadily moving in one direction, with only one person here and there walking the opposite way, looking as though they've been working all night and haven't had any sleep, or with the same ragged appearance as me, suggesting that they don't have anywhere to call home. As I walk faster than those around me, I manage to slip my fingers into bags and purses, stealing rings and wallets and watches without a second thought; something I picked up from both trial and error and observation of others like me. Well, everyone, really. For a society that relies so heavily on monetary value and balance, no one pays close enough attention to possessions that could be stolen and sold for a small fortune, buying a few extra days of life.
Well, that's what it is for me. As long as I have a few small dollars to my name, as well as a few spare to buy food and water, I'll be okay.
Everything goes smoothly. As I weave and duck through the crowd, taking small, priceless trinkets as I go, I slip them into my pockets to sell for a small fortune later at the local pawn shop. Everything is going smoothly, just another day, until...
"Hey! That's my wallet, missy!"
My heart stops. I've been caught. But I need the money more than this man does - he has a job and can easily earn more, and maybe it will teach him not to leave his wallet where a passer by can so easily take it.
So I take it and run. Once again, ducking under arms and weaving through the crowd, but this time for a different purpose. "Come back here!" I hear the man screeching after me, but I don't stop. I don't turn. I begin to sprint, desperately flailing to avoid outstretched arms and hands. I almost make it to the end of the block, but then I see the bright blue uniform that can only mean one thing.
Now everyone turns to face me. I begin to sprint,
I'm doomed.
I can either turn and go the other way, return the wallet to the man, and be on my way. Or I can run, and end up caught, and at that point I will be as good as dead.
I almost laugh out loud. It isn't even a choice.
I stop running before I realise what's happening, turning on my heel and walking back through the crowd towards him. I meet him halfway down the block and hand him his wallet. He snatches it from my hand and, with the other, grips the front of my shirt to force me to look at him.
"What gives, kid? You almost got me killed!" He snarls. His breath smells, and I see broken and missing teeth, the ones that remain turning brown. I flinch from him on instinct, but he snarls at me again, tightening his fist. My start to hyperventilate. He will turn me in, I should have kept running. I shouldn't have given it back to him, I should have-
"Hey! Are you listening, you little brat?" He yells at me. When I don't respond, he roars with rage, causing the flow of people to form an empty space around us. He takes advantage of this, throwing me roughly to the ground. I try and land on my feet but stumble, falling to the concrete hard. My arm scrapes against it, and I can feel blood beginning to drip onto the ground beneath me. But when I turn back to face him, my blood turns to ice, as he smirks down menacingly at me. Crouching down in front of me, his hand grips my chin, once again forcing me to look into him, his foul-smelling breath washing over me.
"You know what? I've got an idea. I'm going to take you in. Yes, that will work. The fewer selfish brats like you there are on the streets, the better off the rest of us will be. I'll hand you over, be rewarded with a few extra hours of life, and you'll be put into the cells like the criminal you are!"
I suck in a sharp breath. The cells are dreaded, feared beyond anything in our society, especially for people like me. The cells are like old-fashioned jail cells, but with a twist. You're put in one alone, with nothing but a bed and a camera for company. The cells are tiny, and in rooms with walls all around them so that you don't know what the time is, where you are, or who is being taken into the cell in the room next to you. The only sound that you can hear except for your own breathing is the screams of the other people in cells as they're taken to be killed, or sometimes beaten or even killed in their rooms. The terror I feel when the man says he is going to turn me in threatens to choke me, and I want to run, run far away and not stop, run until I just can't anymore and I collapse and fall asleep and don't wake up.
But, before I can react, the man grasps my upper arm in a grip that I can't break, no matter how hard I fight, and practically drags me to the station a few blocks away. When we arrive, most of the fight has left me. I don't protest as I am scanned with a camera that emits a bright light, with another blinding line that scans me, telling them who I am, where I lived before I ran, how old I am. I know they will put a file saying, 'Layla Jackson, 17 years, Wheaton, Chicago' into a cabinet before taking me somewhere that offers no escape.
Two officers in bright blue uniforms take me take me from the man and carry me between them to the barred, padded rooms that are bare of anything except a bed, with crisp, white sheets folded on the end beside a pillow. Another camera that looks very similar to the one that the officer scanned me on the street hangs in the corner, positioned to be able to see everything in the room at once, curved outwards so that you can't even hide beneath it.
Instead of sitting on the bed, I move to the corner opposite the camera and curl up on the ground, wanting the familiarity of cold stone beneath me. I have half a mind to grab the pillow from the bed, but decide against it. My back feels strange, and I realise absently that they must have taken my bag from me when they brought me down here. I close my eyes, permitting myself to drift off to sleep, waiting for them to collect me for my execution.
I'm almost asleep when an explosion rocks the underground cells.