The Death Trials

20

Upon us...Cranks, lots of them. Standing and starring like we're the next walking meat, cause I afraid we are! One of the Crank walk near the van, examining it. I give Brenda a short signal so that she move away from the door. She nod and slowly drag herself on the seat aside.

"Shut up and play along" I whisper to Lawrence before suddenly, a knock came from the door. I slowly slide down the window and there, stood a deadly face Crank. He craned his neck to see what's in the van.

"State your name and health condition."

"Minna.. and health condition, simple... a healthy Crank."

"I've never see you around"

"You expect to see me? We're in what- a pool of Crank and you expected to see me? Plus, I'm always stick with my sister there. She got beaten pretty bad from the Right Arm."

"Who's driving?"

"Why you ask so much? I would love a nice sit down and tea time, but I really need to go."

"Fine then, careful with The Right Arm, they're much the disturber. And one more thing- great van, good job."

"Well, look who's here, Minna!"

As that, the Crank yell to his friends t make way for us, Lawrence move the van away. After a few meters away, I finally slammed myself on the seat and let out a big sigh.

"That. Was. Creepy. Remind me not to disturb them. EVER!" Brenda wiped the sweat that come down through her forehead.

"Just glad we're here" Lawrence said as the van made a small turn into a garage that closed as soon as we entered.

When the van pulled to a stop and Lawrence shut off the engine, silence roar around me. The only thing I heard was the rush of pumping blood inside my head and also the beat of my heart, not more than that. Lawrence suddenly broke the silence.

"They're out there, surrounding us, waiting for us to get out."

"Who?" Brenda asked.

"The boss's guards. They know this is one of their vans, but they won't approach us until we get out and show ourselves. They need to confirm who we are—I'd guess we have about twenty weapons aimed at us right now."

"So what do we do? I don't want to rot in here" I asked.

"We get out, nice and slow. They'll recognize me soon enough." I crawled over the seats follow by Brenda close behind me.

"Do we get out at the same time, or should just one of us go first?"

"I'll get out first, tell them it's okay. Wait until I knock on the window to get out," Lawrence answered.

"Ready?"

Brenda eased her door open slowly and stepped out. I followed her, straining to see in the darkness, but the room was pitch-black.

We slowly step out and suddenly, a loud click sounded and the place was instantly flooded with bright white light. I shield my hands up and squeezed my eyes shut, squinted to see what was going on. A huge spotlight mounted on a tripod was pointed directly at them. I could just make out the silhouettes of two figures on either side of it. Scanning the rest of the room, he saw that there were at least a dozen other people, all holding various types of weapons, just as Lawrence had said there would be.

"Lawrence, is that you?" a man called out, his voice echoing against concrete walls. It was impossible to tell which person had spoken.

"Yeah, it's me." Lawrence answered it short and sound.

"What happened to our van, and who are these people? Tell me you didn't bring infected in here."

"We got jumped by a huge group of Cranks down the alley a ways. And these girls, they forced me to bring them to you. They want to see the boss."

"Why?" the man asked.

"They said—"

The man cut Lawrence off. "No, I want to hear it from them. State your names, why you forced our man to come here and destroy one of the few vehicles we have left. And it better be a good reason." Me and Brenda exchanged a look to see who should talk and Brenda nodded to me.

I returned my gaze to the spotlight, focusing on the person to the right of it. That was his best guess at who'd been doing the talking.

"My name is Minna. This is Brenda. We know Gally—we were with him once and he told us about the Right Arm and what you guys are doing a few days ago. We were on board to help, but not like this. We just want to know what you're planning, why you're kidnapping immune people and locking them up. I thought that was WICKED kind of stuff."

I didn't know what I'd expected, but the guy started to chuckle.

"I think I'll let you see the boss just so you get the damn idea out of your head that we'd ever do anything like WICKED. And as a matter of fact, it's a rare thing to have Girls do the asking part and not boys. You amaze me somehow."

"Fine. Let us see your boss then".

But it still didn't make sense why they'd taken all those inmunes, just...why? As we were brought into a room. Two people sat at the far side of the table, I noticed Gally first, on the right. He looked tired and disheveled, but he managed a slight nod and a small smile—nothing more than an unfortunate wrinkle in the mess that was his face. A huge man was next to him, more fat than muscle.

"This is the headquarters of the Right Arm?" Brenda asked.

"Consider me a little discouraged." Gally answered, his smile gone. "We've moved around more times than we can count. But thank you for the compliment."

"So which one of you is the boss?" I asked.

"Don't be a slinthead—Vince is in charge. And show some respect. He's risked his life just because he believes that things should be made right in the world." I held my hands up in a conciliatory gesture.

"I didn't mean anything, okay okay. Just wanna some explanation. Deep one."

"What do you people want?"

"Just one thing. We want to know why you captured us. Why you're kidnapping people for WICKED. Gally gave us a lot of hope—we thought we were on the same side. Imagine our surprise when we found out the Right Arm was just as bad as the people they're supposedly fighting against. How much money were you going to make selling humans?"

"Gally? You trust these girls"

"Well, I've met them before. They're close friend to mine, I say we can trust them."

"Then, I have to tell you from top. Look, WICKED had made this world like theirs. They've been doing many wrong tings lately,. Yes, their motion is pure, to find the cure. But the way it is done...I don't have to tell, you know it by yourselves. There is one day that is our big day, we managed to kill an Assistant Director of Wicked, we thought WICKED will slow down somehow, but the opposite happened. These humans act heartless, they even pick a new assistant. But still, that's our victory so far."

I rush to him, grab him by the collar and slammed him to his chair;

"That victory day of your is a bad day for me, do you have any idea who he is?"

"Wait..how do you know that it's a man?"

"Because...you know what? HE'S MY SHUCKING FATHER!"