As They Slip Away

1. Three Months Before I Die

I stare at the basket of hypodermic needles. So slender and pretty, each filled with a yellow liquid that reminds me of gold paint.

"Inoculations," I say. I consult the floppy that contains my instructions for today's labor. Across the top of the screen is a chart and the words GENETIC MODIFICATION.

That's . . . not right. These needles are filled with inoculations.

Eldest told me so. That's what he said this morning, when he brought me the basket himself.

"Selene," he had told me, his voice warm and kind, "these are inoculations for the rabbits. Inject one full dose per rabbit today."

My eyes burn with pain as I scan the text on the floppy. There's nothing about inoculations here.

Sharp pain shoots through my head.

Eldest told me these were inoculations.

"Inoculations," I say, a soft smile curving my lips. I pat the basket of needles as if comforting it in the knowledge of what it truly is.

It doesn't matter what the chart and words on the floppy say. It only matters what Eldest says.

Everything is only what Eldest says it is.

*** 

The rabbit field is quiet, but not silent. That is what I like about it.

I like sounds.

Soft thumps on the ground as the rabbits hop around. The little chirruping noises they make. The gentle clacky-chewy sounds as they nibble on grass.

I sit down in the grass field.

For a moment, I look up at the sky. Made of metal and painted with clouds that never move. My sky is a certainty. That's nice.

Sometimes, I think about how I'm living aboard a spaceship hurtling through the stars toward a new planet. But those thoughts are too big, and so I don't think them often.

I blink and see darkness.

I open my eyes and see blue.

Blink. Dark.

Light. Blue.

Blink. Dark. Dark. I don't open my eyes. Dark.

Bloodbruisespainbetrayalalonealonealonealonealone.

I open my eyes.

I do not like the dark.

I stand. There is work to do.

The rabbits are fat and lazy. But they do not like it when I try to grab them. Perhaps they know that sometimes when I snatch them up, I send them to the butcher and they are made into food. But if they do know this, they're not too concerned about it. They scamper away, but only a meter or so. Then I sneak. I sneak behind them, where they can't see, don't know I'm coming.

They think I am their friend.

And then I lunge.

I tackle the nearest rabbit, pinning it down by its shoulders. After scanning its identification chip-Number 424, the screen says-I plunge a hypodermic needle into its back leg.

"Number 424, inoculated," I say aloud.

I don't have to say it aloud.

But I like sound.

This is my day. Sneak up on rabbits. Lunge. Grab. Hold. Inoculate.

Sometimes I look at the sky. Sometimes I look around me, at the green hills. I see someone running through the fields, a swing of color, bright against the normal green.

I hum, and I work.

And then.

Then a girl shows up.

She is a freak. Eldest told me she is a freak, told all of us on the ship. A genetically modified experiment gone wrong. She looks like a freak. Pale skin, almost the color of the fluffy white tails of the rabbits. Bright, bright hair. Red hair. With orange and gold in it.

Like the koi in the pond by the Hospital.

Friendsgonegonegonealonealonealone.

"Hello," the girl says.

I look at the girl. I look at her koi-fish hair. "Hello," I say.

She is different. She reminds me of . . . something. A sharp pain shoots through my head again. I look down, away from her.

"You're the genetically modified experiment," I say. I wait for her to confirm this is true, even though I know it is because Eldest said she is. "Eldest has said we don't have to speak to you."

The girl is mad at me. I know because of her voice. I like sounds. I pay attention not just to which words are said, but how they are said, and this girl says them angrily.

But she doesn't go away. She keeps talking to me. She asks about the rabbits. She asks about the needles.

She talks a lot.

"I saw you running," I say suddenly, realizing that the person I saw before was this girl, the bright color in the green fields was her koi-fish hair.

A strange feeling washes over me. My heart is loud and slow, and my head hurts.

"What were you running from?" I ask. My voice cracks. I pay attention to sound. Even the sounds I make. And the sound I am making is fear.

Hewillgetmerunrunrunrunrunhide.

"Just running," the girl says, as if it isn't strange to run for no reason.

She talks more. Questions, questions. I have work to do.

But then I remember more about what Eldest told us about this girl. That she was to live in the Hospital.

I ask her, and she confirms it. She lives in the Hospital.

"My grandfather was taken to the Hospital," I say.

Gonegonegone.

"Is he better now?" the girl asks.

"He's gone."

Gonegonegone.

"I'm sorry," the girl says. Her voice surprises me. She means it. She means that she's sorry.

"Why?" I ask. "It was his time."

The girl stares at me for so long I think she's done speaking. But then she says, "You're crying."

I touch my face.

My fingers come away wet with salty tears.

"I have no reason to be sad," I say.

It's true.

I have no reason to be sad.

None at all.