I twist and yank, desperate to get out of their grasp. There are a lot of them, but they’re weak, barely standing on their feet as I pull away.
White Streak makes a series of screechy noises that sound suspiciously like a laugh. It thinks this is funny.
It grabs me and drags me toward the stream of people coming from the ferry.
It never intended to dump me into the torture bin. It just wanted to tease the prisoners and, I guess, me.
I’ve never looked forward to killing anything before. But I’m certainly looking forward to killing this one.
WE WALK UP the paved path toward the main building, which sits at the top of the island. Above us, swarms of scorpions fly in what looks like massive chaos. There are so many of them, they actually create wind that blows in unnaturally changing directions. I know from what I saw earlier that there’s a practice pattern to their flight, but from here, it looks and feels as if we’re in the middle of a giant insect’s nest.
There’s not a regular angel in sight. This can’t be their new aerie. From what I’ve seen, angels prefer the finer things in life, and Alcatraz isn’t exactly a high-class resort. This must be some kind of human processing center.
I look around to see how Clara and Mom are doing. Clara is easy to spot with her jerky skin and shriveled body but my mother is nowhere to be found. When Clara sees me searching, she looks around too, seemingly surprised to find that my mom is not beside her.
No one seems to be looking for a missing prisoner. I’m not sure if this is good or bad.
I can’t hear a thing beyond the insect buzzing of the scorpion wings, but our guards make it clear where they want us to go. We climb toward the stone building on the giant rock that is Alcatraz, following the path walked by so many prisoners of the past.
The weird wind whipsaws my hair all around my head, reflecting what I feel inside.
Chpater 36
ONCE WE enter the building, the noise and wind quiet down. Instead, there’s a low moan that echoes off the walls. Not just the moan of one person but the collective moans of a building full of people.
I am in hell.
I’ve heard about the horrid conditions of some foreign prisons, places where human rights are a distant dream seen only on television or read about by university students. What I didn’t realize is that the guards, the awful conditions, and being trapped are only part of the hell.
The rest of it is in your head. The stuff you imagine about the screams you hear from parts unknown. The image you make up of the face of the woman who cries non-stop a few cells from you. The story you piece together incorporating the gurgling, clanging, and the high-pitched sound of what can only be some kind of electric sawing.
We’re crammed into old prison cells decorated with rust and streaky paint. Only, they don’t hold one or two of us per cell the way they were designed to. It’s standing room only.
Good thing the cot takes up space, otherwise, the scorpions probably would have crushed more of us in here. As it is, a few of us can sit on the cot at a time, which lets the injured take a break and will come in handy when we’re calm enough to rotate for sleep.
As if this p
lace isn’t hellish enough, an alarm goes off at random intervals, echoing through the building and putting us all on edge. Also, every few hours, a group of us gets marched down the hallway, which is even more nerve-wracking.
No one seems to know what happens to those who are taken away, but none of them come back. The guards who escort these groups are a couple of humans with a couple of scorpions as backup. The human guards are stoic and talk as little as possible, which makes them even scarier.
Over these fear cycles, I lose track of time as I doze in and out. I don’t know if we’ve been here for hours or days.
When a door clanks, we know another group is leaving.
As they march past us, I recognize a few of the faces. One is the father who was separated from his son. His eyes search frantically for his boy among those of us left behind bars. When he finds him, tears stream down his face.
The boy is in the cell across from mine. The other prisoners gather around him as he shakes with tears, watching his father march away from him.
One of the men starts to sing “Amazing Grace” in a beautiful, deep baritone. It’s a song whose words many of us don’t know, including me, but we all recognize it in our hearts. I hum along with everyone else as the doomed group walks past us.
CIGARETTES. Who knew they’d be such a problem at the end of the world?
There are a few smokers in our cell, and one of them passed them around. We’re jammed together so no matter how hard the smokers try, they can’t help but blow into someone’s face. In California, you might as well spit on someone as blow smoke on them.
“Seriously, can you please put that out?” a guy asks. “Don’t you think it’s bad enough in here without you polluting the air?”
“Sorry. If there was ever a time when I needed a cigarette, this is it. ” The woman squashes out her cigarette against the wall. “A double latte sounds great too. ”
Two other prisoners continue smoking. One of them has tattoos on his shoulders and along his arms. The designs are intricate and colorful and were clearly done in the World Before.
There were gangs here in the Bay Area before the angels came. Not many and they stayed in their small territories, but they were here. They’re probably the reason the street gangs grew so fast. They were already organized and established. They were the first to take over the stores and then they started recruiting.
My bet is that this guy was one of the original gang members. He gives off an air of the ‘hood that Silicon Valley engineers just can’t copy, regardless of what they’ve done on the streets in the past couple of months.
“What you worried about, vegan boy?” asks Mr. Tattoo. “Lung cancer?” He leans over to the other guy and fake-coughs in his face, exploding smoke all over him.
Everybody tenses up. People shift out of his way, but they can’t get far. We’re trapped so closely that if there’s a fight, we’re all going down. It’d be like being caught in a blender. No matter what you do, you can’t help but get sucked in.