Free Recoil by Joanne Macgregor

cyber-tutorials. To her, I was still a little kid who liked
Captain Crunch and watching old reruns of The Simpsons . And yet,
apparently, I could shoot, and I was leaving home to learn how to shoot real
live plague rats.
    “To think my daughter is going to have such an important role in
the war against the plague. I’m so proud of you!”
    The words, “Your father would be so proud of you,” hovered
between us, but they remained unspoken. My mother never spoke about Dad, and if
Robin or I mentioned him, her eyes would cloud over and fill with tears. When
the two of us wanted to talk about Dad and the days before the plague, we did
so in private.
    “Don’t be too soft on Robin, Mom. If you let him, he’ll dream all
day and read all night. Make sure he does his schoolwork and finishes the
semester, and encourage him to do more programming units on The Game — he’s
really good and could turn it into a career, unlike poetry. And he needs hugs
every day, even when he pretends he’s too old for them.”
    “I know what I’m doing! I’ve been a mother for sixteen years,
Jinx, I’m hardly likely to stop now.”
    You did before.
    “Of course,” I reassured her. “And don’t worry about me. I’ll be
perfectly safe.”
    “I’ll always worry. It’s part of my job description as a mother.
I suppose you’d better go now, they’re waiting for you.”
    “Love you,” I called to them.
    “More!” they shouted back.
    As soon as I was in the decon unit with
my back turned to Mom and Robin, I swapped my half-face respirator for the
lighter, form-fitted mask. When the decon unit door
clicked open, I hurried off to the transport, not turning to wave. I didn’t
want my mother to see that I was hardly out the door and already I was breaking
her rules.
    It looked like the same twelve-seater Hummer, though its sides
were a plain, glossy black with no PlayState logo. I
was surprised to see that the official standing beside the open door, holding a
clipboard and pen, was Fiona, one of the instructors from the simulation.
    “Hi! How come you’re here? Do you also work at the Academy?” I
asked, confused.
    “Stow your bag,” she said, pointing to the trailer behind the
vehicle.
    As I hoisted my luggage into the trailer, I noticed that many of
the other bags bore airline tags. This transport must already have collected
new recruits from the airport. The recruits starting their training with me today
probably came from all over the Southern Sector.
    Fiona closed and locked the lid, then held out the clipboard and
pen to me.
    “As you were informed in the documentation sent to you, you need
to sign a non-disclosure confidentiality agreement about today’s proceedings.
Also, before you get inside, please note that there’s to be no talking on the
transport to the Academy.”
    It struck me as a little extreme, but there must be a good reason
for it, so I made no objection as I signed the form and then climbed inside.
    Bruce had seated himself up front. I noticed that he had shaved
some sort of geometric pattern into the strip of buzz-cut hair above his ears.
He gestured to the seats opposite him, which were impossible to avoid since all
the rest, except for the spot right next to him, were taken. It was awkward,
being in one of the two seats that faced everyone else, including Bruce. Why
did I keep finding myself in this hot spot?
    Ten sets of eyes stared back at me — from faces that were black,
white and brown, male and female, with a variety of different styles and colors
of hair. One boy near the back had hair cut into a triangular scarlet afro. It
was hard to tell because of the masks, but I guessed they were all a couple of
years older than me. I’d made a good call on the face-mask because only one
person, a slim Asian boy with a ponytail, was wearing a half-face respirator.
    “Do you know if Leya is also coming?” I
asked Bruce. I was keen to make a friend of her.
    Fiona spun around from her seat up front and