I grew up being told that everything used to be different. Things were not always so difficult and chaotic. There was a time before where people tried, cared, and even worked together. There were rules and laws, and hell, there were even manners. But that was before The War to End All Wars, before the bombs, before the New Way.
For a 17 year old, I was fairly lucky. I had a roof over my head, fresh food, and endless ammunition. I was set. My uncle brought me to the farm when I was only 3. I don't remember much before that. I barely remember my mother's face. I only have one small memory of her, but its tarnished. I remember seeing her intense green eyes stuck in a dead glare staring at me from her bloodied face as we both lay in the grass facing each other. I don't know why she bled, but I remember being whisked away by my father. I knew it was him because I remembered his scent and I remember my tiny fingers getting tangled in his tight curls as he ran from my mother's body.
I didn't cry.
I haven't cried.
I don't think I can.
My father brought me to my uncle that day. I never saw him again. I found a picture of my him in a book under my uncle's table once. He was a chizzled man with tight black curls and deep, dark, chocolate eyes. His skin was a smooth shade of peanut butter and he had a dimple in his chin. I wish my uncle didn't burn that photo. It was all I had left. Memories fade. He told me we had to forget our past in order to move into the future. What we didn't know couldn't haunt us.
He was wrong. It the past always comes back.
They were here for blood; four males, one female. My uncle tried to stop them at the door. We had always planned ahead in case of an attack. Uncle said they would come, one day. That's what happens when you let your guard down. They come. They come and drag your uncle out the front door and shoot him in the back of the head before he has a chance to blink. No last words, no checking if you have the right guy, just pure execution. That's when they found me. I was walking back to the house, chopped wood in hand, when I heard the shot and saw Aabe fall face down, dead.
Instincts kicked in.
I ran. Not away from the assailants, but towards them. I had trained all my life for this moment. To put it simply, they were going to die.
That's when I, too, was shot and laid out to die. So there I laid thinking 'if I play dead, I'll have the upper hand'. Bad plan. These were scum hired to kill two randoms. They weren't here for revenge or blood. They were here for money, and apparently lust.
The male that shot me wasn't a great shot. His 35 caliber grazed my head just enough to make me bleed like it was a point blank shot. This sick bastard was already standing over my body grinning so hard drool was seeping out the right corner of his mouth. He fumbled with his belt buckle as if he couldn't get it off fast enough. Then he started muttering "yeah, mmmm, yeah yeah." As he got down on his knees and reached for my pants.
The second he grabbed my waist belt, I grabbed both his hands, pulled both my legs up, and shoved my heels so hard into his face, that I don't know if he died from me snapping his neck, or if he bled out from me ripping his arms off his body. If he had been alone, I would have beat his lifeless body with his own arms just to make a point. But I had four other psychos to deal with.
It was a beautiful sight, almost poeticn. I stood there with two limbs, one in each hand, while the other four stared back.I contemplated which one would die next. But before I was able to choose, they hopped into their military style Humvee and sped off leaving their friend behind in a pool of blood at my feet.
