Sin Fronteras Spring 2017 Sin Fronteras Spring 2017 | Page 76

Tom started screaming too. He tried to get out, but he couldn’t. His
legs were shaking. Tears were streaming down his face, he wanted to find
his mom. He couldn’t see the man any longer. He decided to crawl, picking
his way over the bodies. Every time he moved, he could feel an extreme
pain from within him. He looked for any wounds, but none were visible.

The fire was still burning. As Tom moved further, he could feel the
heat increasing. He was too tired. A teardrop fell from his eyes, marking
a wet path over his blood covered face. When Tom looked up, he realized
that Ms. Ramirez was beside him. Ms. Ramirez was an old neighbor he had.
She lived in apartment A25, just beside theirs. She was a nice woman. Her
husband had died years ago at the Sown Battle.

Tom immediately went towards Ms. Ramirez; she turned towards
him. But half of her face was unrecognizable. Her burnt neck and face
made Tom vomit.

The rest of the survivors went toward the stairs. The man who had
taken Tom grabbed him once again.

“Come with me kid,” he spat at Tom. The man took Tom by his shoulders
and guided him towards the entrance. Tom remembered the sky was still
dark when they came out. The rain had stopped.

“My name is James by the way.”

“I… am Tom.”

James ran with the rest of the crowd. The streets were covered with
holes. Bum. The explosion sent Tom flying through the air. He fell on the
cold concrete. After that, Tom’s memory was kind of blurry. He remembered
that ten or maybe twenty armed men came down on ropes. They had
black masks with oxygen tubes sticking out of them. They were wearing a
gray suit that had a red and white cross at the upper right side. Tom’s eyes
filled with bewilderment, he recognized that cross as the Eastern Army’s
symbol. They all knew it. It was a requirement in school to learn everything
about the Eastern army, even their weapons.

The enemy militants took the remaining people. The soldiers started
yelling something, but Tom knew no other language that his.

“Ushta adkf!”

Tom looked down, he felt a sting spreading through his leg; it was
bleeding. He was one of the few survivors from that last blast. A soldier
grabbed Tom.
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“Huy tabti hubuta!”

He then inserted a syringe and injected a viscous dark liquid into his
blood. The rest of his memory faded at this point. He did remember seeing
the rest of the soldiers dragging the bodies from the Black Building to The
Outside.

After a while, they took him with the rest of the survivors, and put
them on a bus. He was thrown to the back, were the rest of the survivors
were. As soon as he sat down, his vision faded and before he knew it, he
had fallen asleep.

Tom hated that memory, it was the only one left from his mother. He
never knew what happened to her.

Lorenza’s voice echoed through his pained thoughts and brought
him back to reality. “Come forward A2467!” She shouted again. Tom had
no alternative, he stepped out of his cell for the first time in years. Lorenza
grabbed Tom by the forearms. She put a cold pair of handcuffs around his
wrists.

“Follow me,” she uttered in a cold, dismissive tone.

Another five boys walked beside him; Tom recognized their faces,
but he didn’t know their names or who they were. As they walked, they
passed a dozen soldiers standing between each section. He knew it was
forbidden to look up when walking through the cells. If one did so, it was
an order for a soldier to punish the cel lmate.

They crossed through section B. Tom had never seen this part of the
place. It was no longer cells, but just a bunch of rooms. Lorenza took them
to a gray walled room. There was a bench in the middle of it.

“All of you, sit there and don’t move!” she commanded.

She closed the door behind her. By focusing on the wall, Tom figured
out that it looked more like a window or something. He knew it was not
a wall; he was sure he could see his reflection in it. After a while, a dark
smoke emerged from beneath the bench and from the ceiling. Tom now
knew why his cellmate John never came back. After some breaths, he fell
into an infinite sleep.
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