The Clean Ones

Chapter 24

I whipped the pistol out from my pocket and held it to the side of the Mayor's head. "You shoot him, I shoot you." I warned.

He dropped the gun, only to aim it in my direction. "So that's how you want to play this game." He chuckled. "Miss Bennett, did you not think that I would know you well enough by now to predict your actions?"

"Yeah, because you know me so well. Right."

"I know you a lot better than you think." He winked at me, with his hand still fiddling with the trigger of the gun. "Think about it. You're a smart girl; that's how I designed you to be. You think I don't know every single thought that runs through your mind- that has run through your mind for the past sixteen years of your life? Perri, Perri, Perri..." He shook his head. "Just what are we going to do with you?"

I didn't give him any time to think. I moved the gun down and shot at the floor, missing his foot by mere centimeters. He threw his body at the floor in attempt to doge the bullet. His body trembled and shook beneath his ill-fitted suit as it made impact against the tiled floor. I jumped out of the way as he reached for my ankle.

Cale didn't need any indication of what to do next. He sprang to his feet and advanced towards the Mayor.

"Cale!" I shouted as I grabbed the pistol off the Mayor's desk and chucked it at him; he caught it with ease.

His eyes did not meet mine, not even for a second. I could see- and nearly feel- the tension that radiated off of him from the firm set of his jaw to the stiffness of his shoulder blades. I wanted desperately to be able to ask him what was wrong, though I knew in my mind it wasn't an appropriate time to do such. For starters, we both were in possession of loaded weapons, which were pointed towards our target of the most powerful man in the country.

I took a step forward and then another. The pistol trembled in my single hand; beads of sweat trickled down my forehead. I couldn't let him see me shake. I grasped the gun as tightly as I could in both of my hands, and advanced forward.

"You think for even a second that you know what goes on inside my mind," I seethed. "You truly think you know me better than I know myself?"

The Mayor tried hopelessly to scramble to his feet. Thankfully, his larger frame didn't do much to help enable him. It gave me just enough time to shoot at his leg again- though I made an effort to not miss this time.
He yelped out in agonizing pain. The sound that emerged from him was so high pitched and strangled, I half expected it to have come from the Persian feline that lay napping in the corner of the room, rather than from a grown adult male.

"Oh, quit being a baby." I snarled. The venomous affliction in my tone made even the hair on my arms stand up. Hearing myself in such an enraged state was very unusual, and felt extremely foreign. Still, I couldn't resist feeding the fire that burned deep in the pit of my stomach. "This is for your own good."

My hands trembled hopelessly. I squinted and aimed my gun as best I could manage towards the Mayor's forehead.

"Perri, you don't have to do this." Cale warned.

I lowered my gun. "Are you serious right now?" I tightened my grip. My head shook back and forth; I was barely aware that I was doing so. A maniacal laugh escaped me. "No," I said in between laughs. "Not doing it? That's not an option, Cale." The last part came out of me as a high-pitched squeak. "Don't you see? This has to be done, Cale."

The Mayor ceased his screams. "You know, he's right. You don't have to do this, Miss Bennett."

"Did I say you could speak?!" I yelled. The Mayor's eyes bugged out wildly, as if he had just come in contact with a ghost. I could feel Cale take several steps backwards. Still, neither of them stopped me. "For so many years, you took away my voice. My entire life, I've never been able to say what I've been really thinking. It was implanted into my mind since the day I was created that doing so would destroy our Community. Do you even kind of understand what it's like to be a prisoner inside your own home, inside your own body? You created a breeding facility for robots. You told us that you were giving us this perfect life, but you and I both know that that is a bunch of garbage. You took away my voice. You took away my fundamental rights as a human being. And now, I'm going to take away yours."

I pressed my finger down over the trigger.

The bullet exploded from the chamber and ricocheted through the air, and landed straight on his chest.

He grunted, and then- silence.

Death is the fate of the ill and the unstable, not the Cleansed.

But he wasn't Cleansed.

Not. Even. Remotely.
I heard the door open, and shouts in the distance.

My head felt like it was underwater; sinking, drowning.

I crumpled to the ground.

What did I just do?