Author Games: Contest Entries

First Task: ADA MORSS

Dear Diary,

They come for the dead again today. Every week they come, and every week the halls grow emptier and emptier. I've gotten used to their visits. I help out when I can. The nurses say that if the world ever returns, they would train me. They want to keep me. I'm useful, they say. But I know that today will be the day they come for me.

The soldiers never take the bodies. I realized that on their last visit. The dead pile up in the hallways and in empty rooms. Their bodies turn strange colors in the heat and the density of the air. Flies gather around them, and all around I can hear their buzzing. Like it's become a part of me. I don't think the flies help contain the disease, but at this point we only try to make everyone comfortable on their last days.

But there are those who make it, diary. Those who emerge from those piles like newborn butterflies. And although they didn't want me to find out, I know why those are the ones the soldiers take. It's because of that broadcast. They're looking for people like me. The ones that the sickness changed. At the beginning of the week, they look for more of us. And each time, the nurses keep me tucked away. They say that they want us to fight. To train us like their soldiers and use us against the enemy. I don't know who the enemy is. But I know that I will find out soon.

I broke into the nurse's station this morning and got out my things. My real ones, not the ones the hospital gave me. I changed out of their plain white nurse's uniform an hour ago. When they come for me, I want to look nice, diary. Mother always said to make a good first impression. So I'm dressed the way I was when they brought me here. My dress is the color of the sky. That color is gone now, and soon it will fade from the memories of humanity. The soft material is soothing to run my fingers over, and they've even sewn up the gashes from where Mother cut me. If I touch my stomach and trace the cloth, I can hardly feel the stitches. I can hardly feel the memories that go with them. All I really feel, diary, is the sunlight streaming in from my window. It warms my room, casts shadows across the threadbare blanket and cool metal table. I can feel the air of the hospital too—the sweet, sticky feeling of death that never seems to go away.

I talked to the soldiers before they left the last time, diary.

They need me and I know they do.

So I will go with them.

Any moment now, the clock will strike its hands against the numbers of mid-morning. I will be able to hear their trucks and vans pull into the paved entry to the hospital. Oh, diary, I'm shaking as I write this. I'm terrified that maybe it's too soon. Maybe it's too late. There's fire in my veins now, diary. Fire and water, instead of blood and flesh. I feel like a creature of the earth and I know they will see it. They will see what I have become—and perhaps they will mock me. Or perhaps they will treat me with extra caution. The soldiers know the fire almost as well as I. They've felt its deceitful touch, they know its dangers. All men have felt the kiss of fire.

My fingers cannot stop rubbing the ribbon in my palm. It's a nervous habit, diary. One I must shake, if I am to impress them. I know I can be impressive. I can be anything they can require of me. I know what they will ask of me. They will train me; turn me into something I'm not. I might hurt people someday. But I'm prepared for the consequences of my actions. I've seen things here at the hospital. Things no one should ever have to face alone. I know the casualties of war. Grown men, tears streaming down their faces, crying out to mother's long dead as we do our best to remove their shattered legs from their bodies. Sickness that sweeps through the children's ward, leaving nothing but rooms full of young bodies that will never wake again. I've seen the fire, diary. I know its strengths and its weaknesses. I will fight for my people, even if that means becoming the monster they fear most. The unknown is a powerful thing.

I hear them now! Diary, I'm not sure whether to be frightened or excited. But I will find out soon.

**

There are twenty-seven of us. Twenty seven, out of the whole world. They fit us all into their trucks, and drove us away for what seemed like miles. The head nurse cried when I stepped forward. She begged them not to take me, but my mind was made up. I could feel the flames burning bright in my chest as I hugged her goodbye. She had always been so kind to me. Maybe, if I live, I will return to that place. It was a good home. But for now, Ada the Nurse must say goodbye. I am Deranko now, they call me. The soldiers hiss our names under their breath. They avoid me, diary. I tried to speak to one, but she called me dense and refused to speak further. The rest isolated themselves, watching the others with shifted eyes and narrow glances. We are alike, them and I, yet we have never been so different. I look for their markings and see dots and lines that glow, but none like me. None that can see the fire.

There are gates that lead to my "new home". Towering, massive steel doors that lock us inside like rats in a maze. When we arrived inside, the soldiers herded us into a circle. That's how I knew there were twenty-seven. They divided us up into male and female sections, took us to separate rooms and took all that we brought. My sky blue dress is gone now, along with you, diary. I bet you did not know that you are now only sheets of paper now, hm? They stripped us of all the dirt and filth of the world with water so cold I almost thought to use the flames. But I didn't. I was good. When they dressed us again, we all looked alike. We are little toy soldiers in a toy store, diary.

A woman was there as well. Raveen, they called her, and oh, diary—she is wicked. I can see it in her eyes and in the way she smiles. She enjoys the ruin. She enjoys watching the cities fall and stacking up her soldiers like dominoes only so that she may knock them down again. "Everything and everyone you ever knew is dead," she said to us. "We are your home now. We are your family. You will respect your family. You will die for your family, if that's what we tell you to do."

There was more that she said, diary. But those are the words I remember most. They remind me of Mother, and that idea makes my heart swell. I can play Mother's Game, even if Mother isn't here. I will make this my home. I will make these people my family. Raveen and her comrades, they will be my elders. I will respect them. I will learn, and when the time comes, I will give into the flames. I will let them wash over me. I will let them burn my flesh and char my bones.

And I will be reborn.