Glitches (Book 1)

Chapter 32: Vince

I just found out this book is ranked #37 IN SCIENCE FICTION!!! Thank you so much, guys!

..................

A dull ache pulsed through my body when I first opened my eyes. Blinking a couple of times to clear my blurry vision, I began to survey my surroundings.

I lay on a cot in a small room with metal walls. A coarse linen sheet covered my lower body and I was still in my bright blue Team Codie Glitchketball shorts, though they weren't in the best condition. My shirt was off, and my entire chest and stomach were wrapped in bandages.

I placed my arms by my sides and attempted to sit up, but a wave of intense pain shot through my upper body, causing me to drop back down with a yelp of pain.

"Vince?" A voice called out from behind the door across from me. "Are you awake?"

"Yeah," I managed to croak out. "Who are you? And where am I?"

The door squeaked open and a tall, fierce looking woman who looked to be in her early twenties entered.

"Boy, Vincey, you've grown!" The woman exclaimed. "And don't worry. You're in a safe place."

Vincey. There was only one person in this universe besides my mom who ever called me that.

"President Solace?" I asked, my jaw dropping past my knees. "There's absolutely no way. I must be dreaming."

"No, you're not dreaming," she said. "And it's just Ashley now. Welcome to People Amanda Thinks She Killed But Are Still Alive club.

Typical Ashley Solace humor. It had been five years since her supposed death, but no one in WGO could forget how she made you laugh. She and her successor Amanda were polar opposites.

"How did you survive?" I asked, my eyes sparking with curiosity. "And what about Vice President Murphy and the rest of our old Government? Are they still alive too?"

"No," Ashley said darkly. "That scheming witch Amanda and her little friend Jade ambushed us while we were watching a movie in my room the night after we tried to get her kicked out of WGO. And we did that for good reasons too! I watched her shoot my boyfriend, Vincey, and there was nothing I could do about it," tears welled up in her eyes as she told the story of the worst night of her life.

"He was lying on the floor bleeding to death and I was hiding in the closet, scared for my life. When the noise was gone I came out, and the whole place looked like a crime scene. It was a crime scene. My three friends lay dead in a pool of blood and an imprint of Amanda's knife was on the carpet. I immediately ran away as fast as I could, just took off with no specific destination in mind. I knew if I stayed there one more minute, she would come back for me. When I left WGO, I fell into this random underground bunker-thing. Good thing for me it was abandoned. Ever since then, I've been living off the canned food supply in here."

"An imprint of her knife..." I trailed off. "Wait, she had that knife back then? The long pocketknife with the smooth black hilt?"

"Yeah, she loves that thing for some reason. At least she did back when I was President. I still remember the day she first showed up to WGO, back when we were just a couple of scared kids with powers we didn't know how to use huddled in an apartment. She carried the knife clutched to her chest and was super attached to it for the first few days. Like, she wouldn't ever let it out of her sight, and she would slap anyone who tried to touch it. She relaxed a little more as time passed, but she always treated that thing like something special."