I look back on the past, to those purposefully forgotten years of my life, when things were dark.
When things weren’t as they seemed.
I remember the town. That beautiful town, the land was full of lush, green forests, soft, rolling hills, snow white mountains, glittering blue rivers and medieval-like houses, everyone was at peace. Or so they thought.
Have you ever looked up at the faded mountains in the distance and wondered ‘What could be past those?’ I did, every day of my life.
I lived in a small town, and it happened to be in the valley of the hills. I was surrounded by tall mountains and the same 200 people every day of my life. Every day was the same; I would go to school, do chores, homework, dinner and bed. I secretly had a dream, I could never tell anyone, but I wanted to see the outside.
Only one person had ever seen the outside, he was two years older than me and in a neighbouring home. Everyone called him the ‘village idiot’ or the ‘town fool’ he wasn’t like me, he wasn’t shy, he was opinionated, he couldn’t keep anything to himself. That’s where he went wrong.
He left three years ago, when he was 15 and I was 13. He was the first person who ever opened me up to the possibility of leaving home, this hell-hole that I have forever been dreaming of escaping, but no one could suspect, if they did, the way that I would escape, would be death.
Because of his escape, they increased the patrolling guards around all of the villages; no one was allowed to leave. No one knew why, it was the way things went and had to go.
It was the eve of my 16th birthday when I saw him again, actually, I didn’t see him, he saw me, I was going home from school and was crossing the rickety, old, wooden bridge when I heard a rustling noise, coming from a bush, “Gabrielle! ”For a moment, I was startled, and nearly fell off of the bridge iinto the river below. The river looked beautiful, clear water, a glimmering shade of blue, but don’t be deceived. The river was actually fast flowing, and could carry you to your death. It was not to be taken lightly; many a child had fallen in and drowned.
“Gabrielle!” I had almost forgotten about the voice. This time the voice was more persistent, I decided to investigate it sounded like, no, it couldn’t be, “Kyle?” I asked, Kyle was the boy who had run away “is it you?”
My heart pounded as I re-crossed the bridge, it may have been Kyle, but there was also a chance that it was the school bully, or just a neighbouring adult.
I crept up slowly, willing myself nearer to the lusciously green bush; I steadied myself, and looked behind.
There was no one there!
“Expecting someone?”
“Kyle!” I rushed forward and hugged him so hard, I felt the wind knocked out of me, one thing I had forgotten to mention, Kyle and I were friends as kids, best friends. I couldn’t understand why he had left me here.
When he left, I had no friends, I was the school outcast and I was too shy to do anything about it.
“Miss me?” he asked.
I playfully slapped him on the shoulder, “how could you leave me here Kyle?”
“I’m sorry Gabby, you were too young, I really wanted to take you with me, so I waited until you turned 16 and now I can take you with me!”
“When do we leave?” I had been waiting for this moment my whole life, either I live my life as it was, or I could spice things up and leave with Kyle, finding the future I was destined to have. You can’t fight destiny.
It was a quarter to midnight, I was about to turn 16 and when I did, I would be free. Free to run wild in the grass lands, free to climb the trees in the rainforests, free to hike up mountains in the sun.
Free.
Did I know what I was getting myself into?
Absolutely not.
But to be free, everything was worth it.
I had three older brothers and 2 younger sisters, I wasn’t needed by my family, to them, I was just an extra mouth to feed. I preferred to stay invisible, that way, nobody would notice if I was gone.
I was an average student at school, I wasn’t dumb, but I wasn’t smart either, I wasn’t needed for my brains. The only person who had ever needed me was Kyle, and I would always be there for him.
10 to midnight, I needed to go.
Silently, I climbed through the window of my room, careful not to wake my 3 year old sister Molly; I would miss her the most.
I threw down a rope I had stolen from the market place down, and swiftly climbed down. I was leaving my whole life for some spur of a moment trip, this was the house where I had first learned to walk, where I said my first word, where I grew up, and it was time to go, forever.
I met Kyle at the fence that bordered our village, “Look, Over there, there’s a whole under the fence about 20 metres to our left, that’s how I escaped the first time.”
I was silent, I didn’t know how to respond, I was finally leaving, but was it what I wanted? What I’d been waiting my whole life for? Or was it just a huge mistake.
“Come on!” Kyle said impatiently, “We need to hurry or they’ll be onto us and catch us!”
I followed him through the small opening under the fence, obediently, like a duckling following its mother, not knowing if it was being led to the lake, or to the mouth of the devil’s lair.
I stood up on the other side of the life I’d now left behind.
“Goodbye forever” I whispered.
After walking aimlessly for an hour, we decided to go to sleep, and keep going the next day.
I was woken by harsh sunlight, I stood up, and was taken aback, instead of the beautiful forests that I had grown up in, this place was a wasteland. There were no trees in sight; the ground was brown, dusty and bare. I couldn’t see anything for miles. And what was that god-awful noise?
“There is a war going on,” Kyle said, answering my thoughts, “This land had a battle through it, just last week.”
I knew that there was a war going on, but I didn’t realise that it caused such destruction in its path, or that it was so close to home. “Will it come to our village?” I asked, “our old village…” I mumbled.
“No, it’ll never go there.” Kyle said.
“Why not?” I asked.
“It just won’t!” Kyle was snapping at me now, so I shut up. We kept walking in silence, not even looking at each other. “I’m sorry,” Kyle said, “I can’t tell you now, but I promise, I’ll explain later.”
“Ok,” I said, “I’m sorry too, I shouldn’t have pried.”
There was another 5 minutes of silence as we kept walking, further and further away from all I’ve ever known, “What have you been doing for the last 3 years?” I asked. “Missing you,” he replied.
“Now come on!” he said, “Someone will have reported your disappearance and the soldiers will be patrolling the land. They don’t want anyone to see the outside.”
I had about a gazillion questions, but now was not the time. We walked for hours on end, making idle conversation, we had stocked up on food and water before we left so we needn’t worry about that, until the sun began to fall and the sky became the beautiful warm colours of a sunset. Unfortunately, it was not so warm for us and Kyle instructed me to gather kindling.
We sat around the warm fire, eating beef jerky and nuts when I finally got the nerve to ask about the war, our village and the outside.
“I know you told me that you couldn’t tell me about the war, but is there time now?”
“I suppose we’re not going anywhere, alright. I’ll tell you.” He said, “You’ll have noticed how the land inside the village is peaceful, and the land outside, is a warzone. Well, I’m going to put this bluntly. Our town is an experiment. The government are ejecting a peace fog into the air at around 3am every morning, the fog will have cleared by 6am, everyone will be happy, no one will want to fight.We are merely pawns in their repressive game, when we are happy and content, they control us, when we aren’t, they kill us, or brainwash us!” I could see the fire dancing in his eyes as the conversation grew more heated, he was very passionate about the wrongdoings of the government, and I wondered why, why was it so personal to him. So I asked, “Kyle, how did you find out?”
“Do you remember Mr Jonki?” he asked, Mr Jonki had been our history teacher, he was an incredibly passionate speaker and had only recently come to live in our village, “yeah…” I said hesitantly, “Well, I was in detention with him and I asked about his life before he moved here. He told me everything. He told me about his 8 brothers and sisters, how they lived in a world of poverty when they were growing up, no food, no water. Nothing would ever grow, there was a city-wide curfew and there were public whippings. Everyone and everything was under lock down. Mr Jonki was the oldest, his father was beaten to death in the town square, he was accused of being dis-loyal to the government, spreading rumours, trying to organise a rebel group to unravel their power. On a cold winters day, they were freezing and starving, they had no money and their landlord was threatening to evict them from the premises, turning them out onto the street and Mr Jonki who was a carpenter’s apprentice couldn’t let that happen so he stole money from his employer and was beaten. He refused to conform, to obey the government and was brought here where he was supposed to have been brainwashed, but he wasn’t, the man who was supposed to undertake the task was a friend of the Jonki’s and only pretended. He is trapped inside the peace fog, he won’t do anything to the government, he has been subjected to the fog’s power. The fog has one problem, it doesn’t work on children. With adults, it never fails. ” Kyle stopped, and turned to look at me, “that’s how we are able to know the truth and question authority, why teenagers are known as the ‘troublemakers’ because we are able to know the truth, and we are able to administer it to others, we are able to spread the word. Mr Jonki could only tell me because he was drunk at the time, his memories were still embedded deep inside his brain. That’s why we have to tell everyone, band together against the evil forces of what we call our government! Will you join me?”
Wow.
He was so passionate about this, but my head was still buzzing with thousands of questions. Hewanted me to do this with him, he needed me to, he was waiting for me all this time.
He held out his hand, waiting for me to grasp it, to signify that I was going to join him, support him, be there with him, and I slowly moved my shaking hand over to his, stepped forward, embracing my new way of life and held his hand firmly, I had made my choice.
“We must hurry,” he said, staring into my eyes, “The have been experimenting with the fog, creating new versions that will also work on children and when they succeed, it will be the end of our humanity, our freedom, they will subdue our human-like qualities and create shells, empty, and they will be able to persuade us of anything. They will infect the whole country with the fog and everyone will be affected. I listened to government officials in a meeting, discussing their plans. They want to take over the world, using our bodies as their army.”
“But what can we do about it?” I asked, trying to keep my voice calm and steady, overshadowing the panic within .
“We can create a child army and destroy the serum, the fog will never be released again. I, I umm…… ‘overheard’ guards discussing a movement of the serum, they received an anonymous tip off from me, that someone was trying to steal the fog and pass it off as their own, and they are moving everything across to a new location that I also ‘overheard’. They are moving in three days.
We have until then. We have a long day tomorrow, get some sleep.”
And with that, he rolled over with his back facing me, the fire burned out and I found myself drifting off.
I woke up to hear the sound of a rooster crowing, it was early morning, the sky was still quite dark. Somehow, there was a tree next to us, next to where Kyle was sleeping, but I couldn’t find Kyle. I looked up at the trees thick branches, searching for a sign, something, and I saw it. A tiny flash of light.
I started to climb the tree, swinging effortlessly among the branches.
Until I reached a branch larger than the others, sticking off the side of the tree, and sitting on that branch, was Kyle. He was holding a small chunk of wood, and was carving into it with a knife.
He has a troubled expression on his face, he was frowning and his forehead was creased, he was thinking deeply, something was bothering him.
I was about to leave him alone with his thoughts and was about to climb down when the branch I was holding snapped. Luckily, my other hand and feet remained stable.
Kyle abruptly turned to face me, and sighed. “What’s wrong?” I asked, I had a feeling that he wasn’t telling me something, something to do with what happened while he was gone. “What happened while you were gone?” I asked slowly, trying to understand his change of mood.
And he told me.
“It was a few months after I escaped, I was living on scraps that I found in dumpsters, I was starving, not having nearly enough to eat. That’s when they found me. They brought me to a scientific building and they, they tested on me.” His voice was starting to break as he told me his horror story, but he kept going. “Everyday they would come and inject me with the latest serum and at night they would test out the fog. It never worked. At first I resisted, but that only landed me with these.” He lifted his shirt, on his back there were lines and lines of scars, some deeper, some thicker. It showed torture given over a multitude of time. “How did you escape?” I asked, “Another subject went wild, knocked out a guard, stole his gun and when he got his hands on that gun, he went crazy, shooting his way out, I merely followed him, there was… so much blood, so much death. It was everywhere.” He turned away, afraid to show any signs of weakness, of vulnerability.
I moved forward to comfort him, I was hugging him, my head resting on his shoulder as he was recounting his previous few years.
When he finished, he turned to face me, he looked me in the eyes, “thankyou” he said, “for what?” I asked.
“For being you,” he replied, “For being here with me. Thank you.”
He was so emotionally unstable, so vulnerable at that point, I felt myself welling up, remembering all of those dreadful things he told me.
He brushed a tear off of my cheek and started to lean in towards me…….
There was light, so much light. I slowly opened my eyes, and blinked a few times, letting my eyes adjust to the brightness.
I looked over at Kyle, he was still sleeping, with his back towards me. My face heated up and I flushed at the memory of my dream.
Slowly, he rolled over and looked at me.
It was then that I realised it. I will follow him wherever he goes, I will always be there beside him, I will go to the ends of the earth if I have to, I will follow him forever, and I will always love him. As long as I live.