Ethereal

The Camp

A coughing fit woke me up.

I groaned, gently rubbing my temples. My fingers hovered over two fresh bumps caked in blood and I hissed as the raw flesh ached whenever I tried to touch it. I pushed myself up onto my elbows, noticing that my hands were now free from their bonds. I rubbed the red sores that had blossomed across my skin. My impromptu escape earlier must have done some damage.

Another coughing fit broke out, and for a moment I thought it was me that was making all the noise. That was until I looked up to see several people huddled into small groups around me. It was an older woman in the corner who was hacking up a lung, and by the state of her labored breathing I knew she needed to see a doctor – sooner rather than later.

I sat up fully and looked around, trying to figure out where I was. The only source of light was coming through the cracks of the door at the other end of the room. A low hum of an engine and the vibrations of wheels rolling over gravel told me I was moving, and fast. The officials hadn’t killed me, but stuffed me into another shipping container like the one I was just in earlier today – or was it yesterday? How long had I been out?

“We’ve been driving for three hours now. Should be getting there soon.” Said a woman sitting down a couple feet away from me. I looked first at her bloody and blistered feet, then to her hands that didn’t look much better off on her lap. My eyes met hers, and the dark, empty look inside of them told me exactly where we were going.

The Camp.

Those two words floated around my head, my mind refusing to process them. I closed my eyes and sighed, letting myself fall back onto the metal floor of the truck bed. My fate was sealed, at least for the time being. I was too tired to feel overly upset about my destination, and I had a suspicion that the place I was going wasn’t going to be as quiet or warm as where I was now, and even with the old woman in the corner having coughing fits I could still fall asleep. Just for a little bit longer. My eyes drifted shut and I almost melted into the floor, my muscles turning to mush.

A moment later I felt myself airborne, the air flying around me until I hit the ground hard. I could feel the jagged ends of rocks digging into my side and the bits exposed skin on my arms and legs. I didn’t have to open my eyes to know the fall had drawn blood – the warm liquid was dripping down my neck and arm.

“Wakey, wakey, maggot.” said the stranger.

“Good morning to you too,” I said. I could hear the footfalls of the other train car members hopping out onto the ground. I knew I needed to stand up and move or risk another gently laid surprise, but my legs refused to cooperate, and a deep ache was radiating up from my right side.

“I said,” said the same voice, “time to get up, maggot.” A hand grabbed the back of my head and swung me upright, the sheer force of the action threatened to rip out a large chunk of hair.

I finally opened my eyes to see a bright sun shining down on the face of an official whose face was covered in the usual black gas mask. For some reason I wanted to tear away the mask and look into his eyes. To study the face of a man so determined to be cruel.

“Before this goes any further, I’d like to let you know that I prefer the name ‘weasel’ as it is more suited to my personality and appearance.” I said. Fatigue be damned – I could take this fool with my lips stitched shut.

The official paused for a moment, my response catching him off guard. He must only deal with subdued victims.

I felt the grip on my hair loosen and release me, a bark of laughter making me jerk in surprise. The same hand that grabbed my head grabbed ahold of my arm instead, lifting me onto my feet.

“We got a fighter!” the official said, a deep rumble of laughter still evident in his voice. Without another glance in my direction he pushed me forward along with the moving crowd. They were all being shepherded towards a far-off gate – the sole entrance into the Camp.

My eyes traveled away from the gate’s entrance to the ascending walls that towered above it, stretching out for hundreds of feet before making a slight turn inwards, where the wall probably continued for much further before forming a complete circle.

The sun was already high up in the sky, and from the deep rumble in my belly I knew I had missed several meals already. It was then that I realized that my shoulders felt oddly light, as though I something was missing. My gut twisted as I looked back at the train cart, knowing I had left my bag behind. If the officials hadn’t confiscated my bag when I was arrested, it was surely stolen at some point during the train ride. The hunger in my stomach was replaced with a somber ache. The orphanage was never my favorite place in the world, but for the several years that I had spent there it had become something of a home to me. That bag, as silly as it seemed, was the only thing I had left of that life.

My picture!

Suddenly remembering that I had packed my only family picture in my bag, I swirled around to run back to the train cart. I hadn’t moved two feet before a firm hand weaved itself into the back of my shirt and yanked me back.

“Keep moving forward,” the official said. I glanced from the black face mask to the gun holstered by his side. I wanted to push forward anyway, jump back onto the train and search for my bag. What was inside was irreplaceable, and I’d gladly take a beating if that meant I could get my picture back.

The guard must have read my face and known what I was thinking, because as soon as I took another step towards the train car the end of his gun dug itself into the side of my head. My legs froze beneath me, feeling the tug of war between logic and rage roared inside of me. There was the sound of a bullet loading into a chamber.

Biting my lip, I turned away from the train car, facing the walls of the Camp as I moved along with the others packed shoulder to shoulder next to me.

I felt as though something had been ripped out of my chest. I’d been hollowed out, my skin turned inside out, and there was nothing I could do. Holding back a sob in the back of my throat, I wiped a stray tear that escaped the corner of my eye and looked ahead.

As the walls of the Camp slowly increased in size as I shuffled closer to them, I looked around me to see the despair and sorrow etched into the faces of the soon-to-be Campers. Most were covered in dirt, their clothes soiled and torn to the point that they hung off their frames like tattered drapes on a window.

To them, Camp was a death sentence, and only fools would think otherwise. Though as I approached the Camp walls, I didn’t feel any kind of dread or hopelessness at my situation. Maybe I was meant to always end up here – where my family was. The only difference that separated me from everyone else was mindset. Where they saw only death, I saw an opportunity. A way into the Camp that would eventually lead to my way out. Hopefully, by that point, I would have found my family.

The crowd of people around me began to thin, and I realized that we were all now forming one long line before we passed through the gate. Just beyond that I could see a crowd of people forming as they peered forward, trying to see the new arrivals. Towards the entrance of the gate I could see an official standing next to a smoking fire pit. Whatever its purpose, it couldn’t be good.

Though I was several hundred feet away from the entrance the line moved quickly, and before I knew it, I was only a few feet between the outside world and the Camp. I watched as the person in front of me was instructed to hold out their forearm, and the attending official roughly grasped it as they leaned behind and grabbed a stick out of the fire pit.

I felt my chest tighten as the guard held a white-hot metal branding iron with a ‘C’ over the woman’s forearm and pushed it into their skin. They were branding us like cattle, marking us to identify the Camp’s ownership over us.

The official held the iron for a second too long, but the woman did not yelp or cry out. She remained stoic, refusing to give into her pain. I admired that. From the woman’s bloodied hands I recognized her from the train car – it was the woman who told me we were headed for the Camp.

The branding iron was peeled off her arm, taking with it a slice of skin. The woman merely continued forward, ignoring the stares of surrounding officials and the wondering eyes of Campers lingering just within the Camp’s entrance. I knew then that this was a defining moment – it was a ceremony of sorts, one that was obviously important enough for Campers and officials alike to attend. New Campers were judged for their response to the branding, and this judgement could mean either life or death inside of the Camp. What would my judgement be?

In a flurry of motion, I saw an arm swing out towards me, snatching me out of my daydream. It was my turn now, and I knew I couldn’t let myself scream. I tried to think of other things as a fresh branding iron was retrieved from a bed of coals next to the official, the red ‘C’ of the Camp sigil glowing menacingly. Dully I wondered if they took suggestions on the placement of the branding. I’ve always wanted some sort of body art on my ankle –

The iron pressed into my skin, the steam of my flesh curling around the iron as it melted away bits and pieces of me. The pain rooted itself deep into my bones, making my toes curl up in agony. Every hair on the back of my neck stood on end, a hot sweat coming over me as waves of nausea threatened to spill any remaining contents of my stomach all over the official.

“Son of a bitch!” I said, unable to hold my tongue. I ripped my arm away from the official, the pain ebbing away as a new, raw feeling of anger quickly bubbled to the surface. I could hear laughter from beyond the gate. The other Campers were laughing at me. My forearm aching, nails itching to claw off an official’s face, I turned and marched into the gate’s entrance.

How will I be judged? Not lightly.

I could see the officials lining the field of my vision and an army of Campers waiting for me beyond the gates. I could see that a few still had an amused grin on their faces, but I chose to ignore them and focus instead on my breathing. The sooner I could find my family the faster we could all get out of this place.

Without hesitation I stepped through the entrance of the Camp, looking up momentarily to observe the sharp metal stakes that poked out of the top of the gate I passed under. This was probably the gate that only opened for new Campers.

Another wave of pain washed over my body making me grind my teeth. Through the crowd of people, I could see a water well with lines of clothes hanging above it. I ignored the jeers of the crowd as I pushed them aside and threw myself over the edge of the well and dunked both of my arms into the murky water. It probably wasn’t a good idea to wash the burn in this kind of water, but the water was freezing cold and helped to sooth the pain. I let my head fall onto the stone lip of the well and sat like that until my back ached and the burning pain in my arm subsided into a dull throbbing.

I pulled myself out of the water and sat on the edge of the well, carefully drying my arms off with the bottom of my shirt. I looked around at my new surroundings, my eyes first catching the large scorch marks that were painted against the towering wall in front of me.

My eyebrows scrunched down as I sat there in confusion. There had been a fire here, one big enough to color the one hundred foot walls nearly black. Had there been an accident? A riot? The flames had scored thirty feet up onto the wall, dismal compared to the overall height of the structure, but nevertheless an impressive accomplishment if destruction was the intended goal of the fire.

I looked away from the wall and at the people rustling past me. Whatever the thought the interior of Camp would look like, I hadn’t expected to see it so lively. The Campers had proven themselves to be resourceful with the lack of materials provided them. Stalls made of dried mud and sticks, which housed vendors selling anything from spoiled fruit to watches with broken faces and piles of shoes and worn articles of clothing – presumably stolen from the dead.

Beyond the vendors were cloth tents and mud huts that people occupied as their homes, using thin blankets and sheets to separate them from the mud on the ground. The Camp had been turned into more than a slave camp – these people had turned it into a bustling city.

Every person within the Camp seemed to have a job, whether it was the officials patrolling the grounds, men selling and trading their stolen goods, and women and children walking through the streets carrying clothes and food to be mended and prepared back at their homes.

What surprised me the most was the sheer number of children I saw running around, their feet colored black from dirt and soot and the skin of their arms and legs hugging the outline of their bones.

I looked down at my own body, noticing the difference between myself and these starving children. Though the Matrons never fed us full meals, they at least fed us enough to keep starvation at bay. Working in the fields, hiking up and down the mountainsides, and climbing trees to collect sap and fruit built a strength in the muscles of my arms and legs. I might have lost some weight over the past few days, but I looked much healthier than most of the Campers here.

A flash of color caught my eye just then, pulling me away from my thoughts as the green stood out from the crowd of people wearing varying shades of browns and grays. The figure darted through the thick clots of people with an expert precision, their movements shift and agile. I blinked, mesmerized by the brilliant shade of color. I mindlessly stood and began to follow after them without a second thought.

I tried as best as I could to follow the green cloak through the horde of people, but they proved to be too quick even for me. Soon I was out of breath and panting in the middle of the street, vendors arguing with their customers and children running through small gaps between the bodies that crowded around me.

Just as I was about to turn around and head back towards the gates, I saw the same green figure standing beneath a vendor’s shaded booth staring out across the small market center. Not wanting them to see me, I turned and moved to stand behind a mud hut, peering around the corner of it to watch.

I wasn’t sure what I was waiting for, or why I was chasing someone I didn’t even know. I blinked hard, remembering the situation I was in. I was supposed to be looking for my family. Not running after some stranger. I couldn’t afford to waste any more time.

Wanting to smack myself for being so easily distracted, I stepped out from behind the corner of the hut and moved towards the center of the market. I turned away from where I had last seen the person wearing the green cloak, now determined to keep myself focused. I’d have to start asking these people questions and see if anybody had seen or even known my parents and brother. Without my picture that had been left behind on the train, I would have to describe them by memory, something I wasn’t too sure would work.

I looked from face to face of each person that passed by, a bundle of nerves worming their way across my stomach as I hesitated to approach anyone. I finally settled on an elderly woman sitting underneath the shade of a dead tree. She watched the bustling of the market center with calm yet observant eyes – she might prove to be a good start as any. Not knowing what I was going to say, I moved to walk towards her, only to skid to a stop as the figure dressed in green suddenly appeared in front of me.

He slid down his hood, revealing a mop of blonde hair that was hastily combed back out of his eyes. His back was facing towards me as he walked with an air of confidence – straight towards an unsuspecting official with his attention focused on a bald-headed Camper trying to sell him a bag of colorful rocks. I looked from the boy to the official, who carried a long black gun held firmly in his hands. Surely, he wasn’t about to do what I think he’s about to do?

I watched, entranced, as the boy slipped through a group of people and dipped his hand into the pocket of the official, drawing out a small handful of golden coins. The action had been so swift and quick that I barely had any time to process what had happened, but the action did not go unnoticed by the official, who whipped around as soon as the boy stepped out of sight.

The official patted his pockets, his hands reaching down and pulling out the empty fabric of his uniform. Realizing that he had been pickpocketed, he whirled around, searching for the perpetrator. Unfortunately for him, the boy in green was already gone, but the official didn’t know this.

The official’s gaze centered on a young boy that was walking past him at that exact moment, and who just so happened to be holding a handful of something shiny in his hands.

“You!” the guard bellowed, snatching the child clean off the ground and into the air. He shook and threw him every which way, making the boy’s limbs flail about wildly as he cried out.

The entire market center froze, everyone turning to watch the scene play out. They all knew how this was going to end – death.

“Give me back my money you little maggot!” the guard said, his voice rolling like thunder across the booths. I immediately recognized the official as the same one that had thrown me out of the train cart earlier. He must really get around. But the child held on to the object in his hand tightly, unwilling to let it go. Frustrated, the guard chucked the boy to the ground, his hand moving to pull out his gun.

I felt my heart pound once, one loud beat that rang in my ears that sent waves of adrenaline down my spine, and by the second beat I was standing in between the guard and the child, the palm of my hand swatting the gun out of the official’s grip. The gun landed with a dull thud into the mud between us.

All the surrounding Campers took a deep intake of air all at once, my actions surprising even the guard himself. He paused for a moment, his body still, before a loud rumble of laughter sounded out from underneath his helmet. Within a second the guards’ hands were wrapped around my throat as I was pinned against a wall.

“Ah, my fighting maggot! I was hoping I would see you again!” the guard said. It was nice to know that he remembered me.

The grip on his neck tightened, barely giving me enough leeway to breathe. I looked from the official’s blank black mask to the spot where the child had been thrown on the floor and saw that the boy had disappeared. At least he was still able to get up and run, or maybe someone was brave enough to pull him away.

I knew that kindness wouldn’t be extended towards me now. No Camper in their right mind would interfere with the punishment between an official and a Camper – unless you were an idiot – like me.

I clawed at his hands, my nails barely making a mark on his brown leather gloves. My dangling feet swung out below me trying to touch the bottom of the ground and my lungs burned with a fire that burned my throat, a deep crushing pain blooming across my chest. The edges of my vision were beginning to darken, and I knew that I didn’t have much time before I blacked out.

“That’s enough, Edwin.”

At once I was released, my body flopping to the floor like a puppet with their strings cut off. I gasped for air, taking long deep breaths until the pain in my chest began to subside. I didn’t realize my hands and legs were shaking until I tried to prop myself up and found that I couldn’t. Taking a slow, steady breath, I forced my arms to hold my weight and sat against the wall, looking for my savior.

Instead, I found an old man with a salt and pepper beard and a bald head dressed in nothing but a pair of blue overalls standing in front of the official – Edwin, what an unfortunate name – who just a moment ago was choking the literal life out of me. My eyes focused on the frail elder who was barely half of Edwin’s height stare him down defiantly.

“Shipping Master Eli,” said Edwin, “I’m sorry if I disturbed you, but the maggot –“

“Girl,” said Eli, “that is a person you are talking about is a girl, not a pest.”

“Erm, uh, girl – interfered with an official’s business. That’s punishable by death.” Said Edwin.

I sat against the wall with my mouth hanging down towards the ground. Was Edwin – towering, mountainous Edwin –afraid of this skinny old man? I watched as Edwin’s tree trunk of a back tensed up, his shoulders coiling up to his ears.

Old man Eli sighed, “You are right, Edwin. But death is such a commodity here in the Camp, surely you wouldn’t want to kill unless absolutely necessary?”

“I guesso,” said Edwin, but after a quirked eyebrow from Eli straightened his back and revised his answer to: “Yes sir, but the mag - girl – can’t go unpunished.”

“You are very right, Edwin.” Said Eli. I sat there with my heart pounding loudly in my chest. I wonder if anyone could hear it. Official punishments were known to be brutal and boarder-line torture. Death probably would have been a less painful option. “I was hoping then,” continued Eli, “that you would allow me to enlist this one under the care of one of my captains. The Shipping District is always looking for new recruits. Sea deaths are unfortunately as common as Camp deaths, perhaps more so during the wet season.”

All I could see was the back of Edwin’s head, but I swear I could feel the smile forming on his lips. He turned back to me, his fist curling into the top of my shirt as he yanked me up onto my feet.

“Have ya ever been on a boat before, girl?” he said.

I shook my head no. There aren’t very many oceans in the middle of the country.

“Do you know how to swim?” he said.

“If I never had a reason to get on a boat do you think I’d have a reason to learn how to swim?” I said, immediately regretting my decision to open my mouth. My throat nearly closed on itself, the abused muscles and tissue screaming out in agony the moment I forced them to move. I coughed hard enough to make the official flinch back and loosen his grip on my shirt.

“Fine,” the official said, tossing me at the feet of Eli. I looked from the curly white hair growing out of his boney toes and up to his curious gaze. His blue overalls matched the color of his eyes. Something within them brought me a slight sense of comfort. I expected him to offer me a hand to stand, but instead he gave a small tsk with his tongue and turned to leave the market center, his hand motioning me to follow him.

I spared a backwards glance at Edwin, feeling grateful and triumphant at having escaped my death sentence. I half expected Edwin to have walked on, shouting profanities at another innocent bystander, instead I found him waving me goodbye. An eerie feeling in my gut told me he was smiling beneath his mask, and not the friendly kind.