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I can do this.
A CHILD OF THE LORD
‘RIVER’ – BISHOP BRIGGS
HATCHET
In all my time in this asylum, no one has tried to communicate with me using alternate methods. I’ve been shouted at, patronised, whipped, hit and punished for refusing to speak, but not once has someone tried to use anything other than speech. In the early days they were so preoccupied with getting me totalkthey never stopped to consider that getting me tocommunicatecould be something else entirely.
Eventually they gave up, leaving me alone for the most part, though occasionally trying to catch me by surprise with electro-shock and other hideous forms of ‘therapy’.
Facing my twenty-third year inside these walls, I’ve seen countless recruits come and go – and bygo,I mean be eliminated once they were no longer useful – and I’ve not spoken to any of them.
I’ve not uttered a word since I was nine years old and gifted to the Breckton parish priest at the time. It took me four years to snap. Kayla was right in saying the murders were planned, that I deliberately chose to strike at midnight mass when the community’s most depraved parishioners came out toworship.
If I’d been older, I would have taken the kids out with them. A fucking mercy killing. That village is rotten to the roots and the only way to save it is to nuke the fucking place and raze it to the ground.
Kayla saw that. She sawme. The child I was, and what I was forced to endure. And then she went out of her way to secure phones for each of us, with the sole purpose of communicating with me?
She’s floored me.
Until now I found her beguiling. I may not speak, but I watch and I see everything, and I could tell right from day one that she would change the very foundations of the asylum, but I didn’t expect it to happen so quickly.
They’re all ensnared by her. I wouldn’t go as far as to call it love. Not really. I barely think we’re capable of such an emotion. But it’s definitely something more than lust. Even Snow’s changed. He’s less selfish, less self-centred. I don’t know why he saved her and took those bullets, but I think the asylum may have finally found its dream team. With Kayla acting as the glue that keeps us together, we could be unstoppable for them.
But I don’t want to be.
Twenty-two years of following orders, growing up brainwashed and indoctrinated to the asylum and its missions, and this is the first time I’ve wanted to fight for something else. For someoneelse.
I’ve never had a problem with being in the asylum. Unlike the newer recruits they bring in. Maybe their reasons for killing were different to mine, but for me, being their pawn is a fucking holiday camp compared to being aChild of the Lordin Breckton.
Freedom.
The word tastes alien on my tongue as I roll it around my silent mouth and stare in wonder at the fiery redheaded girl who’s gone out of her way toknowme.
I never let myself dream of a future. I was the asylum’s soldier through and through. Work for them until you die. Either on a mission or once your time was up.
As she explains to the others what she was thinking in procuring the phones, I can’t help but wonder the price she paid. For me. For all of us. No one has ever done anything kind for me before.
She deserves so much more than my silent gratitude.
I pick up the device, surprised when it unlocks using my facial ID. Obviously, I’m out of touch with technology. Even at thirteen, most of the kids, hell most of the town, didn’t have mobile phones, so this is all new to me. Luckily for us, we have access to movies, so I’m not completely inept. I bring up the messaging app and find that all of the numbers have been pre-saved in the device. I click Kayla’s name and rattle off a quick message of thanks.
I smile when she blushes and holds the phone to her heart like a warm hug. Maybe I don’t fucking know what love looks like, but the way I felt when she handed me that phone, the way she holds hers to her chest like it’s precious when I thank her… Makes me think maybe.
I’m going to have to show her how much her sacrifice means to me.
LET ME SHOW YOU WHO’S REALLY IN CHARGE
‘DO I WANNA KNOW?’ – ARCTIC MONKEYS
GHOST
The phones are an interesting touch. I never have much to say, but I keep fingering it in my pocket, wondering if I should message her.
What would I say?
That I’m completely captivated by her? That I’ve not been able to stop thinking about her? That I’ve filled three sketchbooks full of drawings – all of her – since I painted her in art therapy?
