The Benders (12 page)

His grip on me loosens and I yank back, stumbling into the wall and nearly falling over. Mister shoots a glance my way, looking like he’ll come after me but a figure steps between us.

Doc stands in front of Mister, hands on hips, head up. Doc’s at least one hundred pounds lighter and a foot shorter, but it doesn’t seem to matter. “Leave this one alone. This bender’s mine.”

I’m his?

Mister scowls. “Says who?” His big hands form into fists.

Doc glances at them, but seems unfazed. “You may think you run this bunk house, but who do you think Merek would side with? A grunt who’s easily replaceable”—Doc gestures to Mister— “or a medical professional who knows things about the human body you’d never understand? Could you fix a vas deferens, Mister? Remove an appendix?” Doc smiles impishly, waggling his eyebrows.

Mister glares at Doc and then at me. With a push to Doc’s shoulder, he shoves past and stalks to the bunkhouse.

Doc turns to me, his impish smile faded. He leans in and whispers in my ear. “That was your favor,” he says, his breath tickling the skin on my neck. “You don’t need to say thank you. Just get inside.”

I take a step back and shake my head. Around us, benders stream into the bunkhouse. Some glance our way. “I didn’t ask for your help,” I whisper, “so that’s not my favor. I could’ve handled that.”

Doc raises an eyebrow. “You could’ve handled that. Mister? You could’ve handled Mister?”

I nod, clutching the wall. Nada walks past, staring. Doc waves her in.

“Yes, I could’ve handled Mister,” I whisper when the other benders are gone.

Doc’s eyes search my face. “You’re really something.” He blows out a breath. “Fine. One more favor. Knowing you is going to get me into a lot of trouble, I can tell.”

A corner of my mouth lifts in the hint of a smile. “A lot of people say that.”

We enter the bunkhouse to a wall of heat and a smell that reminds me of our cow barn. Human bodies can be just as disgusting as animals and benders are no different. And once we’re in, we’re in for the night. The guards chain the doors behind us with a clink of metal on metal. I wonder about having to use the bathroom, but notice pots in the corners and realize that’s the stink. Great.

The bunkhouse is bare—concrete floors and walls, rows and rows of metal bunks with thin, stained mattresses, no blankets (not that you’d want one in this heat) or pillows. Except Mister and Dareen and some of the other big benders have pillows and nicer mattresses with thin sheets covering them. Some of them have foot lockers, too, with padlocks. Probably got goodies inside. The rest of the benders got nothing but a ratty change of clothes piled under their beds.

I walk by rows and rows of exhausted benders, eyes red, fingers black, faces void of hope.

This isn’t right. These people should be free.

Doc touches my elbow to keep me moving. Mister glares at us from a bunk he seems to have all to himself. I walk where Doc leads, my eyes on the floor.

In a back corner, Nada waits on a top bunk, swinging her legs like a child. One hand runs nervously back and forth over her buzzed hair. When she sees us, she jumps down and springs toward us.

“Everything okay?” she asks, looking at Doc. “Mister looked pissed.”

“If Mister ever stopped looking pissed, I’d worry,” Doc says, waving a dismissive hand in that direction. “He knows not to mess with me.”

I raise an eyebrow. “I’ve known people like Mister before. They’re the ‘punch first, think later’ type. I wouldn’t be so cocky if I were you.”

Doc turns on me, his eyebrow raised again. “You sure do talk a lot.”

I shrug. “So do you. Which bunk’s mine?”

He points to the one next to his and Nada’s. “Last bender who bunked with us is gone. Either dead or wishing he was.” Doc slides his eyes over to me to make sure I’ve caught his drift, then continues. “I didn’t manage to get you sheets or a pillow,” he says. “Sorry.”

“It’s fine,” I say, sitting on the bottom bunk.

Nada sits beside me and Doc stands facing us, his eyes roving around the bunkhouse.

“Who do you think will enter?” Nada asks him, bouncing on my bed nervously.

Doc looks at her absentmindedly. “Hmm?”

“The contest,” she says. “Mister for sure and Dareen, but probably Angel and Frida, too. Maybe Joe?”

Doc sits on the bed beside ours with a squeaky protest of springs. “I don’t care who enters. It’ll be a lot of stitches and tourniquets for me.” He sighs. “That man’s a menace.”

Nada’s eyes widen. “Don’t let them hear you say that,” she whispers.

Doc shakes his head. “The guards are gone and don’t think I haven’t heard every single one of these benders say the exact same thing behind closed doors.”

Still, Nada gnaws her lower lip. “Do you think Charlie will enter?”

“Why do you care so much?” he asks, getting up and fiddling with his own padlocked footlocker. He brings out a comb and runs it through his hair.

Nada gnaws her lower lip and jiggles the bed again with a
squeak, squeak, squeak
. I put my hand on her knee to stop her.

“I’m entering the contest and you can’t stop me,” she says in a burst of words.

Doc stops combing and stares at her. “You can’t be serious.”

“I am,” she says, jutting out her chin.

“I’m entering, too, not that you’d care,” I say.

Doc glances at me, but turns his full attention to Nada. “Don’t be ridiculous.”

She pulls her knees up onto the mattress and folds her arms around them. “I’m not being ridiculous. You know as well as me that one of these days I’m going to end up blown sky high like Larry or Benson. Working in the powder might as well be a death sentence.”

My ears prick up at that. I work in the powder.

“I’m getting you out of there,” he hisses. “I told you that.”

Nada shakes her head, her body trembling now. “Can you get me free, too? Can you do that?”

Doc looks hurt. “Nada.”

“That’s what I thought.”

He stands, his face flushing, and leans into the bunk, towering over Nada. “If Dad knew what you were thinking—”

“Dad’s dead,” she says, her eyes filling with tears. “He died so that we could be
free
.”

Doc flinches at this and his eyes find me. “You’re encouraging this,” he says, sitting down on the mattress beside ours with a huff.

I shake my head. “I don’t think Nada should do it.”

She shoots me a hurt look.

“But I see where she’s coming from,” I add. “No one should be forced to live as a slave. Even if it means fighting against crazy odds. It’s just like taking on the Breeders; that seemed insane, too.” I go quiet, thinking of Clay and Ethan. But we didn’t win, did we? All we did was delay our capture.

“You were taken by the Breeders?” Nada whispers, eyes wide.

I glance around, making sure the other benders aren’t listening. “They wanted to put a baby in me, but we got away.” Images flash through my head—Clay killing his father, Betsy being dragged away by Breeder’s guards, Rayburn (poor, sweet Rayburn) driving the van.

Nada watches me carefully. “Maybe you can win the tournament,” she says with wonder. “If you do, take me with you.”

“She can’t win the tournament,” Doc says, flopping back on his mattress. “And she can’t take you with her.” He pulls out an old hardback book from his locker and buries his nose in it.

Nada makes a face at him and turns back to me. “If you win, will you take me?”

“There’s someone else here I’ve promised to save.” I smile sadly, thinking of Auntie. Where is she right now?

Her frown deepens. “I have to enter.” She gets up.

I put a hand on her arm to stop her. “I still think it’s a bad idea for you to enter.”

She looks at me for a beat and climbs the ladder. Her weight settles into a depression on the mattress above. I stare at the interlocking metal springs for a while, thinking all this over. I’d hate to face Nada in battle. If it came down to it, could I beat her up for a chance at freedom? Could I kill her—kill anyone for that matter? It won’t come to that. I can’t kill just for a shot at freedom. I doubt Merek wants to kill off half his labor force for sport anyway. Plus, Nada’ll be knocked out in the first round and I won’t have to face her.

The bunkhouse’s lights go dark. Thin slivers of moonlight peek through barred windows, making the room a landscape of shadows. Around me, sleeping noises pick up, the wheezing breath of the bender two rows down. The quiet murmur of voices across the room. The squeak of springs. Do benders have sex with each other? I guess they must, based on the noises coming from somewhere to my left. My brain runs with this thought for a while, but my body is tired and my eyelids droop.

Sleep comes hard and fast.

Waking up comes even faster. There’s a hand on my mouth and another on my arm, yanking me out of bed. Panic blasts the fatigue away. My eyes snap open.

Mister hovers over me with a pocket knife aimed at my eye socket.

“Make a sound and you’ll need an eye patch,” he whispers in my ear.

I stare up at the blade inches from my cornea. I nod dumbly.

He drags me off the mattress and into a standing position, his dirty hand still clamped over my mouth and the knife never wavering from my eye. I flick a glance at Doc, willing him to wake, but he’s turned toward the wall and isn’t stirring. Neither is Nada. A few benders look up from their bunks as we pass, but their eyes snap down again when they see Mister. I shoot them pleading looks. They ignore me.

Mister’s hand clamps tight on my arm and he leads me to a side door that’s been cracked open. He shoves me out into the moonlight.

A guard with a gun strapped to his back regards us with interest. Mister hands him a small package and the guard nods. “Five minutes.”

Mister chuckles low under his breath. “It won’t take me five minutes to teach this fresh meat a lesson.”

Cole.

The word hits me like a hammer to my brain. I clutch the banister and stare up at Ethan and my mother.

“What did you say?” I whisper.

“He said his name is Cole.” Nessa narrows her eyes at me. “Your brother, Cole.”

“No.” I stumble back. My head blares with a dull pain. My mouth’s dry. “No.”

Nessa leads Ethan down the steps, her red nails still clamped on his shoulder. “I told you I wanted to make it up to you,” she says, smilin’ again. “This is how I do it. I bring your life back.”

“I don’t want this life,” I say, glancing ‘round the room. “Ain’t none of this real.” I stride over to Ethan and place my hands on his shoulders. “You don’t hafta lie. You can tell the truth. You’re Ethan.”

He stares up at me with big, brown eyes. His hair’s been cut, no shaggy locks to toss away. He looks between me and Nessa.

“I’m Cole.” He pauses. “Your brother.”

I drop my hold on his shoulders and take a step back. “What did she do to you?”

He says nothing, but his face pinches. Anger boils in my brain at the sight of his confusion. My eyes snap up to Nessa.

She frowns, one hand on her hip. “You aren’t very grateful, young man.”

“Grateful for this…lie?” I ask, narrowin’ my eyes. “Grateful for this manipulation?”

Anger burns like flash powder in my brain. I lunge for her, one hand wrappin’ around her throat. Her eyes widen, but then narrow to snake-like slits. Her hand moves fast, jutting forward into my ribcage. An object, slender and cool, presses against my chest. At first I think
gun
, but the shape is too rectangular.

She smiles.

The current hits me like a punch. Raw and snappin’, it electrifies my body, like eels wrigglin’ through my blood, lightin’ me up. I fall and convulse. My muscles aren’t my own. My brain—my brain burns.

Oh God, Riley. I’ll die before I see her again.

Then it’s over. I sizzle like overdone bacon on the floor. Muscles twitch. My breathing stutters. The warm puddle under me has to be my own piss, but I’m too broken to be ashamed. My hospital gown flaps open, showin’ my bare ass to all. Somewhere behind me, Betsy sobs.

“Take him back to his room,” my mother says, like I been a naughty boy.

You’re the naughty one
, I think.
And I’m gonna kill ya.

Michael hauls my useless body up and smirks in my face. “Nice work, mama’s boy,” he whispers in my ear as he pulls me backward. “Now I gotta strip you down and wipe your ass like a baby.” He chuckles as he clunks me down the steps, my heels bangin’ into the wood with a
thud, thud, thud
. He throws me into a Jeep and drives me back to my room.

How have I been reduced to this snivelin’, useless sonovabitch? If my pa were here, he’d laugh and probably beat me for good measure.

Slowly, my muscles begin to awaken, but they’re twitchy and mostly useless. I think about throwin’ myself from the Jeep, but a fall right now would leave me crippled on the concrete and more broken than before. I can’t believe she tased me. I can’t believe she’s makin’ Ethan say he’s Cole.

Just thinkin’ about Cole opens a raw wound deep in my heart. The images flash before me, an awful slideshow of nightmares—the flashy sports car on the side of the road, me getting out to see it, the marauders’ faces as they sprung out, Cole bleedin’. It was my fault I couldn’t protect him and now Ethan, who I love like a brother, is in danger and I still did nothing. The helplessness eats at me like a festerin’ sore. I need to bust out of here or die tryin’. There’s no way I’ll live with myself if I can’t.

Michael cuffs my wrists, drags me back to my room, throws me on the bed, and stares down at me in disgust.

“You can sleep in your own piss, mama’s boy,” he says, one lip curled up. “It’ll teach you to use the potty like the big boys.”

“You won’t feel so big when I put a bullet in your guts,” I say, my voice flat.

“Keep on threatening me.” He gives my bed a kick. “Your mama won’t always be around to protect you.”

I roll over and face the wall. When he gets no response from me, he kicks the bed again, and slams the door. Moments later, the lights snap off and I’m left in darkness.

Curling up on the bed, my wet hospital gown stickin’ to my thighs, all I can think is,
Least Riley ain’t here to see this
. Then I spend the moments before sleep comes tryin’ to remember the exact color of her eyes.