Instead, I heard another voice: “Don’t fight, kill. Don’t wait, kill. Strike first, or you will die, Calliope.”
CALLIOPE—AGE 14
“Wake up!” she hollered at me as she lifted my head up by my hair.
I could barely see her through my swollen eyelids. Gasping for air that barely made it through my lips and into my lungs, I made to say, “I’m up.”
“No, you are not. You are still lying there like a pitiful sack of shit.” She tossed my head to the side, allowing it to drop back onto the ground.
I wanted to stay here.
On the ground.
It felt safe here.
“Kick her!”
And he did!
They kicked so hard that my body slid on the ground, and I felt something crack. I bit my lips from crying out in pain. I bit so hard that I could taste the blood.
“How many times do I have to tell you, Calliope? The only time you are safe is when you are attacking! Lying there won’t end it! So fight!”
“You told me not to!” I cried out.
She told me to take the hits! I was fucking taking them. I was doing what she fucking asked! I was doing it! I was—”
“Kick her again!” she screamed.
I heard the heavy footsteps as they came to me. I felt fear crawling up my body, wrapping around my throat, like a snake…squeezing…squeezing.
No! My mind screamed, and I sat up, grabbing his foot before it collided with my body, tossing him onto the ground, to jump on him, and I punched his throat over and over again before jamming my thumbs into his eyes with all my might. I couldn’t hear his screams. I couldn’t hear anything.
But I could feel.
And I felt the blood as it covered my thumbs.
Again, I felt that snake around my throat and got off him. I could barely see. But I noticed the knife in his hands as he screamed and shook, trying to get up. Rising off the ground, I kicked his wrist, crouching to pluck the knife out of his hands. He pulled out his gun, but it was too late. He fired, but he couldn’t see what was right below him, and when I came back up again, I drove the blade into his throat. Yanking it out, I stabbed it into his neck again, stabbing until he fell to the ground.
“Ma’am…” It was the last thing he gasped out.
It was only then that I stumbled back, lying back on the ground, trying to breathe. When I heard footsteps again, I held the knife.
“How messy, Calliope. I told you to fight. I never said you could kill him,” she said from above me. “Look at yourself. Covered in blood, on the ground, weak and pathetic.”
“But…alive,” I hissed.
“You won’t stay that way if you keep allowing your enemies to get this close to you. Don’t fight, kill. Don’t wait, kill. Strike first, or you will die, Calliope. To strike first, you have to be smart. You have to see the opening and take it. That’s how you stay alive…and not look so fucking pathetic. Now get up and dispose of this trash.”
“I can’t move.”
“Are you expecting help? You will get none. Because you have no one else but me. And that is not my job. So, you will get up because you have to. As I will send someone else, and either they will bury you both or you will have twice as much work. You have three minutes,” she said as her footsteps started to fade.
Slowly rolling over, coughing blood out before getting on my knees, I stayed there for a few seconds before rising to my feet. The whole world felt as if it were spinning, but when I looked to the door, there was no one else.
There was never anyone else.
I was alone.