Marked
Chapter 22

It was a blaring alarm that rudely woke Rachel.

Removing her slobbered cheek from her pillow, she scanned the room to make sure that no one had been around to see her, swung her legs over the bed and stretched.

After having slept like a baby all night, she emerged from her cocoon of blankets feeling content and energized for a change until a shrill buzzing from her watch told her in an automated voice that she had to be in the training rooms by 0600 to report to Officer Rodriguez.

Having dressed in a haste, she stepped out onto the landing in front of her room where a crowd of girls were all emerging from their doors and walking towards the showers like sheep in a herd.

Rachel followed after them, searching the crowd for a familiar face.

Finally she spotted the short crop of black hair that was Pippa as she squeezed through other bodies to get to her.

“Pippa, hey.”

“Oh, hi, Rachel! We’re going to the showers now before starting the day. I can show you the way.”

“Thanks,” Rachel replied. “Have you seen Simone by any chance?”

Pippa threw her head back and laughed. “Simone always waits until the last minute to get up and run to the showers. She’s still asleep, that lazy girl.”

Rachel smiled.

That did sound like Simone, always the procrastinator.

“How long does drill last for, do you know?”

“Tom says it’s from six until lunch time. What officer are you assigned to?”

“Uh-Rodriguez, I think.”

“Oh, you got a good one! A total badass. She’s been going and coming from the capital for months now. She’s kind of a legend around here. She’s the only one that’s ever been able to get a job inside CN’s headquarters.”

“What is she doing there?”

“Gathering information for when we’re ready to attack. Impressive stuff.”

After a quick shower and a no fuss breakfast consisting of a bran muffin and orange juice, Rachel rushed down to the room she was supposed to report to at 0600.

She arrived with two other girls and sighed in relief that she hadn’t been the last to get there.

She’d never been good at standing in front of a crowd and so she slipped into the back of the room quietly, hoping to go undetected.

The room was littered with blue mats and the wall closest to the entrance was divided in half with a mirror. She couldn’t see anything except her reflection though she knew anyone passing on the other side could see her.

The people around her were all chattering in excited tones and she had to admit not knowing anyone sucked. She reminded herself that she wasn’t there to make friends. She was there to train.

“Come on you pathetic lot, gather around.” A female voice announced as a slender but curvy woman stepped through the door.

Her long, brown hair was pulled back into a ponytail that stretched out her eyes. She wore black cargo pants that looked like they would explode around her thighs with a gun was holstered at her hip.

Everyone stood at once and Rachel followed suit.

The woman walked down the rows of people, grabbing a bruised face between her slim hands every once in a while as if inspecting livestock she planned to purchase.

As Officer Rodriguez made her rounds, Rachel noticed the girl in front of her had a nasty bruise on her arm, the person beside her a red, healing gash on the back of his calf. Abandoning her ogling of training battle scars, Rachel’s eyes snapped straight ahead as Office Rodriguez neared her.

“Perhaps we can enlighten our newbie,” Her eyes narrowed as she studied Rachel. “On the laws of the land. First law?”

In unison, the crowd barked out, “If discovered, you are on your own!”

“That’s right. We work as a team but we are individual pieces in a dangerous puzzle. If a teammate is discovered then you leave them behind. We have too much at stake here to be play the hero.”

Officer Rodriguez clasped her arms behind her back, her gaze burning Rachel with its intensity.

“The second law?”

“Be prepared to lay down your life!” The trainee’s voices were in sync, all perfect notes in a crude chant.

“And do you know the most important rule of all, newbie?”

“D-don’t jeopardize the mission,” Rachel mumbled.

“What? I couldn’t hear you.”

“Don’t jeopardize the mission!”

"Ma’am.” Rodriguez sneered.

“I’m sorry?” Rachel asked, uncertainty in her voice.

“You will address me as ma’am. Is that clear?”

Rachel swallowed, her face growing hot with something close to embarrassment as several pairs of eyes darted to look at her.

“Yes. Ma’am.”

“Good.” Rodriguez clapped her hands together and spun on her heel. “Let’s start with a few combat exercises. I want four even rows, right now.”

After scuttling a few moments, the group of twenty arranged themselves into four rows of five while Rachel let out a long sigh.

“Now I want the first and third row to turn around.” They all did and Rachel found herself looking at a girl with pale blonde hair and piercing blue eyes rimmed in black eyeliner that made her look a little like a raccoon.

“Begin your sparing exercises. The loser of each group has to do a hundred laps around the gym. Winner gets to call it a day.”

"Again?” Groaned a lanky guy near the end of her line.

Rodriguez shot him a withering look.

In a few short steps, she’d reached him, and though he was taller than her, Rachel thought she same him quiver.

“What is your name?”

“J-Johnny.”

“Well, J-Johnny,” She said in a smooth, velvety voice that hardly masked her disdain.

Before Rachel could blink, Rodriguez twisted Johnny’s arm and sent him sailing through the air, tumbling back down so that his face landed on the mat with her knee spearing his lower back.

Johnny’s face became squished against one of the blue mats and Rachel could see him cringing in pain.

“Any other complaints I should be aware of, J-Johnny? Speak now or forever hold your peace.”

“N-no,” He replied through gritted teeth.

Officer Rodriguez dug her knee further between his shoulder blades.

“Ma’am!” He shouted. “No, ma’am!”

Rodriguez stood and dusted off her pants. “Anyone else have any questions?”

Silence greeted her.

“Then get to it!”

Breathing hard, Rachel eyed her partner.

She didn’t look all that strong or dangerous but she’d learned long ago never to underestimate an opponent.

“I don’t really want to hurt you...” Rachel trailed.

The girl’s arm snaked out and struck her across the jaw, causing Rachel to stumble back a few steps in surprise.

“Don’t talk.” The girl said.

Okay, so that’s how it’s going to be.

Rachel shook off the pain and held her arms up in defense.

The girl stepped forward and when she lifted her foot to kick, Rachel quickly kicked her other leg out from under her causing her to land on the mat with a hollow thud.

The girl growled and stood, tackling Rachel to the floor. Her bony fists connected with Rachel’s face before she had the good sense to cover it up and pain sprung behind her eyes and on the bridge of her nose, a ringing in her ear.

Bucking her hips proved to be useless.

Rachel abandoned the defensive cradle around her head and though it earned her a punch to the eye that she would later regret, she did manage to jam her fingers into the girls eye sockets.

Rachel squeezed, and with a scream, raccoon eyes jumped off of her.

Recovering quickly, Rachel scurried across the blue mat, rolled on top of raccoon eyes and pinned her down.

Casting a brief glance around the room, she saw a depiction of chaos, of fists flying, legs kicking, of blood being spat onto shiny blue mats.

Returning her attention back to her partner, who writhed beneath her, Rachel realized the only way to prevent either of them from getting more hurt was to end this now.

In a split second she’d pulled her arm back and then forward to deliver a blow across raccoon eye’s face that knocked her out cold.

Finally able to catch her breath, Rachel dismounted raccoon eyes, running her sleeve across the back of her mouth.

Guilt raced through her body when she looked at raccoon eyes but it was short-lived as Rodriguez came up beside her.

“Good, newbie” Rodriguez said, coming up behind her. “You’re stronger than I anticipated. Maybe you will get somewhere.”

Sore didn’t begin to describe how Rachel felt after her first few days of training. Each muscle ached and after a hot shower it wasn’t any better.

Officer Rodriguez was harsh and pushed them too hard but Rachel understood, that in a fight against the capital, harshness was needed.

That night, as she nursed her sore body, she found herself with an inexplicable urge to draw.

Back in the compound, it was the one thing that had brought her peace but she hadn’t done much of it since Jed’s departure because somehow, and for whatever reason, she always ended up with a portrait of him with a mark over his forehead.

She lounged in the domed simulation room, pencil and sketchpad in hand. Though she didn’t conjure up images of home, she could clearly picture each detail of the forest and it was as if she were truly there.

The door swished open in the middle of her drawing and because the lights were dim, at first, she couldn’t see the two men who walked in.

“St. Rachel,” Juan said, striding up and standing over her shoulder. He ruffled her hair and she was struck by how young it made her feel even though she was older than him.

“Hey, that’s really good. Didn’t know you could draw like that.”

“I try,” she said, pushing the sketchpad close to her chest. “You need the room?”

“We can wait,” Hector said from the entryway.

“No, please. I wasn’t using it. I just wanted somewhere quiet to draw.”

“It’s our mom’s birthday today,” Juan explained as Rachel rose slowly to her feet.

“We wanted to see her one last time, even if it’s through a fake screen and shit. Messed up, ain’t it?”

“No,” She said, gently. “Not at all. The room is all yours.”

As she strode past Hector and his features became clear, her heart ached for both him and Juan. There was sadness in their eyes. It was normal for children to outlive their parents but not in the way that they had, not lost to so much violence.

Rachel touched Hector’s shoulder and gave it a small squeeze before leaving the room.

As she set up camp in the rec room, she wondered if she could ever do that. Go into a simulation room and conjure up the best, nicest memory she had of Jed just to be able to see him one more time.

She didn’t even have a picture of him.

Even if, like the other compound women, Ruth had saved the priceless family albums when they’d fled their home, she realized now those memories would be lost to the mountain forever.

Mrs. Hernandez’s pictures would succumb to the passage of time and so would the memory of her in her children’s minds.

Without realizing it, her pencil stroked madly over the smooth canvas of her sheet, slowly taking the form of Mrs. Hernandez.

She studied the image of Hector’s mother, at least the way she remembered her from the compound.

She’d been a beautiful woman with long, black hair, gray in some places. There had been fine lines around her skin and a weariness, or maybe a sadness in here eyes.

But Rachel didn’t draw that.

Instead, she drew Juan and Hector’s mother with a sparkle in her eyes, the way she imagined she'd look when she smiled at her children.

She couldn’t give them much else, but at least she could give them that.

When she heard the rec room door open some time later, a part of her subconsciously had hoped he’d make his way here, to her.

Her knees were pulled up to her chest, her sketchpad sandwiched between her side and the sofa pillow.

Hector strode into the room and sat quietly beside her legs.

“You mind if I sit here with you for a while, Rachel?” Hector asked, voice throaty, as if he’d been crying.

Rachel nodded and his shoulders visibly relaxed as he leaned forward to rest his elbows against his knees.

“Juan really wanted to see her,” he said. “I don’t think he understood how hard that would be.”

Recognizing this for what it was, a son grieving his dead mother, she reached out and stroked his back with her fingertips. Hector closed his eyes and sighed as she rubbed gentle circles between his shoulder blades.

“You’re such a good brother,” she said. She’d never been all that great with words, but in this moment, for him, she was willing to try her best. “I can imagine what that must have cost you, but you did it anyway. For him.”

“It was too soon. Pops always said we had to be each other’s strength but...I wasn’t prepared for that.”

“Your parents raised an amazing son. But strong...that doesn’t always mean unbreakable, Hector.”

“You want to hear something silly?” His brown eyes, when they met hers, were soft. “When I left that simulation room, the only thing I could think to make me feel better was to sit next to you. Even if we didn’t speak, the thought of sitting next to you brought me peace.”

Rachel’s heart fluttered at those words.

“That’s not silly. Want to hear what is?”

“Tell me.”

“When I’m around you, I feel...safe. I never felt that around mom or Jed, or anyone but I feel it around you. I’m glad you’re here.” Heat spread across her cheeks, admitting that out loud.

But it felt right.

“I’ve...never even asked about your family,” Hector said, frowning. “You’ve lost just as much as we have and I’ve never even asked. God, I’m such a jerk.”

Rachel laughed a little. “You’re not a jerk but you are too hard on yourself.”

Her fingertips smoothed out the crinkle in his forehead. He didn’t object to her touch, in fact, he seemed quite pleased by it.

As if this intimate touch were a normal occurrence, he pulled her hand from his forehead and held her wrist between his fingers, his thumb stroking the inner crease of her wrist.

Rachel tried not to be distracted by the point of contact but it was difficult.

“Do you want to talk about them?”

“No,” Rachel said, gently. “I don’t. Because talking about them as if they’re gone, it makes it real and I’m not ready to face that yet.”

“Then tell me about this.” He gestured to her sketchpad. “You like to draw.”

It wasn’t a question but she answered anyway. “Yes,” She pulled the sketchpad out with her free hand and looked up at him with her lip caught between her teeth. “I hope I’m not overstepping but I made something for you. I figured you didn’t have any pictures, so...”

She tilted the sketchpad down, allowing him to get a better view.

Hector sucked in a breath and shifted in his seat, bringing him closer to the image.

Slowly, he ran a hand across the canvas, his lip pulling into a small, wistful smile.

Those piercing brown eyes looked up at her then and her breath did a funny thing, almost stopping altogether.

“Rachel...” He whispered.

“I figured you could easily fold it up and carry it in your pocket if you wanted to. When you miss her, you can look at this instead of a simulation...”

Carefully, she ripped the sheet from the pad and handed it to him.

“I never knew your pops but if you describe him to me, maybe I can draw him next—”

His lips crashed against hers with a gentle force that pushed her head into the sofa pillows and stole the breath from her lungs.

For a moment, she was shocked.

He kneeled on the ground; his hands wrapped around either side of her face. Electricity coursed through her body and she found herself leaning into his kiss, arms going for his shoulders, to pull him closer, when abruptly, he disappeared.

Rachel’s eyes drew open. Confused and dazed, she looked up at him, now standing a few feet away from her.

“I shouldn’t have done that,” He said, unable to meet her eyes.

Rachel frowned. “W-why not?”

“I could die tomorrow. Or you. That’s the reality of our world, Rachel, and I refuse to give you someone else to mourn.”

“Hector--”

“Thank you, for this, it means a lot.” He held up his mother’s picture. “But I have to go.”