Free The One We Feed by Kristina Meister

where? With a glance at my bleeding friend, I planted my left
foot and kicked the two doors as hard as I could with the right. The metal dented
nicely, but not enough. Two more good, solid, preternatural kicks, and it
folding like a paper crane. The emergency light flashed, and an alarm sounded
in the metal cage trapped in the shaft just beyond. The doors tried to open but
ground in their tracks. Satisfied that our pursuers would not be leaving it
anytime soon, I turned my attention back to the boy.
    “Totally
against building codes anyway.”
    “Where’s a
clipboard jockey…when you need one, eh?” He sagged against the window,
breathing shallowly, his face waxen. When I again shouldered his weight, he
felt limp against me. “Sorry I...stabbed you, Lily,” he coughed. “I….”
    “Don’t worry
about it, Jinx.” I carried him around the tailgate of the truck, threw open his
door, and shoved him inside as hastily as I could. He sank into the seat with a
moan and gripped his stomach. Desperately I pressed my hands over his. My eyes
caught sight of the glove compartment.
    Did he?
    I popped it
open. Stuffed inside was a shiny metal bag. The label read “U.S. Army Issue
Celox Coagulant Pack.” The sense of things predetermined clotted in my chest.
    “Today officially sucks,” I whispered.

 
     
     
     
    Chapter
5
     
     
     
     
    The
Revolutionary
     
    We sat in silence while the
neon sign blinked obstinately, insisting that the best hamburgers in the north
could be found there. Based on the fact that ours was one of three cars in the
parking lot and that there were a waitress and presumably a cook inside, I felt
as if I knew why the sign was so large. Seagulls pecked at the ground near an
overflowing dumpster. Pothole puddles were being used as bathing tureens. The
moisture in the air stuck to everything, forming a thick cloud across the
windshield, made worse by his labored breathing.
    I looked at
him; the coagulant powder had turned his blood into a disgusting sanguine
jello, but his bleeding had stopped, and that was the important thing. I began
to reach for him several times but stopped myself. As Arthur had said, the boy
was not a boy. He was, in fact, my senior by many years. I was acutely aware of
these facts, but I couldn’t help it. Mortality was still a loud clanging in my
mind, tolling for someone, if not for me.
    “Are you okay?”
I whispered.
    He leaned
back, clutching the damp spot. “Fuck no!” he growled, his pain and anger
sounding slightly more Gallic than usual. “Why do people always ask that? I
just got shot, for Christ’s sake!”
    I swallowed,
my hands glued to the steering wheel. The last twenty-four hours had contained
so much, but none of it mattered just then. “What do you need?”
    He pointed at
the over-compensatory sign. “ Mon Dieu , I know it’s bullshit, but that
sounds delicious!”
    The laugh that
tumbled out surprised even me, but soon I was getting out of the car and
helping him to the door of the diner. Inside, the young waitress gave us a
wide-eyed grimace, her hoop earrings swinging.
    “Oh my god,”
she said, with absolutely no emotion in her voice.
    Jinx managed
to stand erect. “It ain’t mine.”
    “Oh,” she
said, and grabbed two menus. “Table by the window okay?”
    I snorted, but
in a moment we were sitting beside a bottle of ketchup that looked like it had
never been washed, two forks rolled up in thin napkins, and a sticky, laminated
fountain-drink menu. Glancing around, I realized why they weren’t worried about
the potential biohazard sitting across from me. I tried not to touch anything,
and, as she walked away, leaned forward.
    “You’re not
dying, are you?”
    “Screw you!” He
sent me a wry look. “It’s not the first time I’ve been shot in the gut.”
    I leaned back.
The more irascible he sounded, the better I felt. “Right...okay.”
    She came back
with two glasses of water. “What can I get you to drink?”
    “I’d like