Free We Live Inside You by Jeremy Robert Johnson Page A

to earn fancy SUV’s, desperate to protect their soft, weak bodies with a steel shell, so afraid of the world around them. They tell themselves that they are enlightened, that they’ve escaped their animal roots and have taken humanity on a higher course. These are easy to believe when your food arrives shrink-wrapped and drinking water comes with the twist of a faucet. But take those things away and see what happens. See how fast the laws of survival take hold.
    “Each of you has a mission tonight. Some of you already know what that is, and you will succeed! The rest of you will follow me as we begin our path to glory.
    “Tonight you will show the world what the human race was meant to be.
    “Tonight the fire that I see in your eyes will sweep through this city and bring it back to life!”
    Jackson watched Frank watching them, staring down each of them and none of them, playing up his messiah moment for all it was worth.
    “This is your time to define who you are and what you are! This is your time to take your rightful place in the world! So I ask you…”
    Frank put his fists up in the air.
    “ARE YOU WITH ME?”
    The roar that filled the air left no doubt about the response.
    With that the tribe of born-again savages began their march into the night.

    Jackson knew he was bleeding from a deep gash over his right eyebrow, but the wound seemed to be gumming shut, and he’d washed the blood out of his eye at a public water fountain.
    I think I shattered that guy’s jaw.
    The man was about two blocks east of Jackson now, likely still lying in the pool of blood that had been spreading wide under his splayed face.
    He had it coming. Try to cut me with a fucking broken bottle…he’s lucky I didn’t kill him.
    “You should have killed that guy, Jackson.”
    Kane had found him.
    “I think he’ll die, but you could have made sure.”
    Kane had dived all the way into the big night. His wife-beater was Pollacked with blood spatter in varying degrees of dryness. Jackson thought he could see a glint of white bone where Kane’s knuckles had split open, but it may have just been the weird arc-sodium light from above. The black S (for Strength, he’d said) on Kane’s forehead was now smeared with sweat from exertion.
    “You take care of that gash, Jackson?”
    Jackson nodded in the affirmative.
    “Good. We have to keep moving. Frank said that if we stick to our small groups and stay in motion it’ll take them way longer to pin down what’s going on.”
    “I know what he fucking said, Kane.”
    “I know. Just making sure that bummy bar fucker didn’t cut loose your brain with that busted bottle. Being all stoked on steroids doesn’t make you Superman.”
    Shit, he knows.
    How does he know? Does he really know? Don’t let this escalate.
    “Yeah, right, man. I’m all juiced up. Whatever.”
    “Jackson, I’ve sparred with you. I’ve been in the group shower with you at the gym. And I’m not as fucking stupid as you think. Your arms are big like mine, but they feel puffy. You’ve got a nasty patch of back zits going. You put on 20 pounds in two months.”
    “Hey, I’ve been working my ass off, just like…”
    “Shut the fuck up. You’re going to lie to me? To me ?”
    Kane had him pegged. This was a no-graceful-way-out scenario. Best he could do was damage control and be ready if Kane charged.
    I’m big now. Maybe I can take him.
    “Okay. Yeah, I’ve been cycling. I wanted to be ready. I was so stressed out about tonight and I needed to be sure I could hold my own. I know it’s not pure like Frank wants it to be, but…”
    “Excuses. You know who you sound like right now? Kill it, man.”
    “Does Frank know?”
    “No, but he will if you don’t end it right now. Things are only going to get rougher after tonight, and you need to be stronger than that. Not in your body, in your mind.”
    Jackson guessed he might have felt relief at hearing this, were his system not so awash in the chemical