48-Hour War

Rose woke up on a normal morning, in a normal week. Except for one thing. War had finally started.

Marissa shakes me vigorously until I wake up, weary from the night before. Alex, one of the battle tutors, had been forcing me to disassemble and reassemble a hand gun over and over again. He wouldn't let me sleep until I got it down to thirty seconds, which didn't happen. Alex is a little...out of it, but no one hates him or decides he's a freak. Not in front of him, that is.

"What," I moan, rolling in the bed. I fall off the side of it, landing on my face and screech a small, "Ow!" Marissa grabs me and pulls me up. I almost trip over the blanket just before hearing what's going on outside our door. Gunshots, bombs and screams of terror.

"Rose, it's started," she tells me softly as I try to wake up and reach for my handgun, still partially disassembled. Giving a small shout of frustration as I try to force the parts together, Marissa hands me the key piece.

"Right," I say, thanking her as gently as possible before thrashing on my black jacket over my pink pajamas. I have no time to change my pants as we grab our paintball guns from the closet. They aren't that lethal, but they'll have to do. I notice the other two beds where Cally and Angela would have slept are empty. They must have woken before me.

Standing at the door, breathing heavily, we listen to the sounds of what we had known would happen outside. War. I can tell Marissa is just as nervous as I am, and we look at eachother.

She huffs her emotions out. "Open it," she says, ready. I turn the knob and thrust it open, and gasp at what I see. EOWs (Enemy Of War) are everywhere, grabbing children and shooting them on the spot in the torn apart dorm building. It’s practically the outdoors we stand in. Teenagers and adults run around with real guns on their shoulders, shooting the first EOWs that stumble into their sight. The intruders wear black armor with a yellow symbol on their chest. Everything seems so unreal to me. I didn't realize the war would come so soon.

I see a gun pointed at us as we stand in the doorway of our dorm room, and push us out of the way. Marissa comes to her senses and whips her goldish sand colored hair around, pulling me through a door into the gray, blood splattered halls. We almost trip over the lifeless body of Angela, and I gasp, trying to stop for just one moment. Marissa doesn't let us.

Just as we turn around the corner, I bump into tall Sawyer, with brownish hair and a hooked nose. We fall to the ground, and glare at each other. He's practically the one enemy I have, besides the EOW. Marissa points to the weapon he dropped during collision. "Where did you get that gun?"

He grunts, as if deciding whether or not to tell us. We get up before I shout at him. "Sawyer, you tell us now or people will die!"

He thinks for only a moment, then mutters, "There's some in my dorm, 512." He runs off with his gun, shooting anyone he can. There's a wild, fearful look in his eyes.

"C'mon," Marissa urges, and pulls us to the direction Sawyer came from, another line of dorm rooms. We run along the giant hallway, glancing at the numbers. 499, 501...

I hear Marissa bump into something, and turn around to see her lying on the ground below an EOW. She is dead. I shoot with my paintball gun blindly, running back. I scream as a bullet whizzes past my mouse brown hair. I turn the corner and see terror outside again, spotting Caiden in the crowd of gunfire. I begin to run, my feet and legs blasting with agony and shock. He sees me as I'm halfway across the once peaceful park. "Rose," I hear him shout. "Behind you!" I turn and there is someone with black armor grasping me, with a gun at my forehead.

My ears are practically deaf and I can't hear Caiden's shouts amidst the fighting and screams. "You didn't get very far," says the EOW, and I notice a green paint splatter on his shoulder. There is a shot behind me and the EOW falls back. Caiden grabs my arm and we run back into the city building, taking the other hallway. It leads into a tall but narrow room, and I see scrambling inside. This is the bomb shelter room, I realize, and see silver doors on the floor along the sides of the long room. Caiden opens one and pushes me inside.

I try to refuse but he closes the door saying, "I'll be fine." Knowing he won't accept anything else, I turn and wish nothing had happened. I imagine that it is true, and believe I’m dreaming until I hear the faint sound of glass breaking outside as I open my eyes. I sit in the corner of a gray room, dimly lit. It's like a cube, and there's a small doorway for storage across from the silver doors that lead out. There are controls to my right, one of them for the lights. I turn them almost completely off, leaving a light no brighter than a tiny candle. My knees are pulled up to my chest, and I put my head down with my eyes closed. Sleep is the only thing I wish for, since this whole thing is a dream.

Seconds later I hear the doors open. I forgot to lock it! I scream in my head. Light pours into the room as I lift my head up to see who has intruded. My handgun is in my pocket, ready for me to grab. I see someone with a white t-shirt on and simple jeans. He wears a small shark tooth necklace, and his hair is a particular, curly brown. Sawyer.

As soon as he turns around after locking the doors with a pin, we stare at each other in disbelief for several minutes. My jaw drops from a late reaction.

Sawyer finally turns around and sits against the opposite wall, looking to his right. We don't want to look at eachother. Instead I listen to the commotion outside before realizing I want to block it out.

I need to know the lock, I remember, but still wait several minutes before speaking. "What number?"

Sawyer turns his head at me, an expression on his face that says he thinks I'm a lunatic. "What?"

"What's the pin number," I reword, annoyed for no real reason.

We stare for a long time. "4, 3, 7, 2," he says slowly, before turning away.

"Oh," I grunt, trying to fry the number into my head. We don't talk for a long time, listening to the sounds of war outside and just thinking of hateful things in general.

Sawyer begins to mutter things. "What?" I demand.

He glares at me from the corner of his eye, muttering louder, "I can't believe my luck."

Anger bounces around in side of me, duplicating by the second as I try to lock it up. I try to take a few deep breaths, but I can’t hold it in. “Your luck? How about mine? I’m stuck with someone who never understands what it means to actually hurt people! You practically kill people-”

“I’m sorry?” Sawyer interrupts me. “I don’t hurt people. Not physically, and not mentally. You-”

“What about Marissa?”

He stares at me as if I brought up something personal. “Do you even know the whole story?”

I gape at him. “Of course I do!”

“Sure you do,” he retorts, ending the conversation and turning away from me.

The lights begin to flicker in the small shelter built for one. Every now and then it gets pitch black and I try not to scream. “The power must be getting tampered with.” I don’t respond. Sawyer stands up the same time I do - we hear pleading outside the door. A few frantic knocks make me jolt and gasp as I lunge at the door to open it. Four is the only number I am able to type before Sawyer pushes me against the wall. “Don’t,” he shouts.

“Why...not?” I manage a small squeak before he releases me.

“Do you want to let an EOW in?”

I glare at him, thinking of an answer. “What?” is all I can come up with.

Sawyer slides back against the wall.  “The clink of the knocks. That’s the sound of an EOW's metal plated glove on steel.”

I stare at him for a while, trying to block out the fake pleads for help, but I can’t. Sinking to the cold cement floor instead, I hold my head in my hands. I can barely hold its immense weight.

Long after they stop I am still huddled in a ball, shaking. “Are you alright?” Sawyer manages to speak gently to me. I’m almost annoyed by his patience.

“I’m fine,” I mutter, grabbing a device from my pocket. It seems long and thin, but all I have to do is pull the two electric sticks away from each other and a glass tablet is seen before me. It locks in place. Pulling up the browser I try to search for a news site, but the signal is horrible in the small shelter. I groan a little before Sawyer pulls a wire from the wall and hands it to me. “What’s this for?”

“Internet,” he responds shortly, sitting back down. I try not to smile as I plug in the wire and pull up live news.  Sawyer slides over next to me as I turn up the volume, and for once I don’t mind.

“The entire city is being run down by EOWs from Dale, which  we all know as the last rivaling city!” The reporter is shouting things I can’t hear over the noise in the background. She appears to be in the midst of the fighting, on a dirt ground. Everything looks so torn apart from the shaky camera we watch from. The camera swerves away from the reporter to one of the towers housing our power. A few people are climbing up on its rungs. “It looks like they are trying to take out our pow-!” I receive a message on my screen that tells me my connection was disconnected just as the lights go out and my ears open up. Suddenly I realize it is more silent than usual, besides what is outside.

“There’s no more whirring sound,” says Sawyer.

“Oh,” is all I manage. It’s pitch black and as I try to stand, I fall over. Somehow Sawyer sees me and catches my back before it hits the cement. Before the cement cracks my head open. He stands me up. “How did you-”

“I heard you trip a little, it was instinct.” I almost make a sound, but figure silence is okay for now.

I start to worry. My limbs and brain don’t function very well in pitch black darkness, and don’t get me started on how well my eyes will work. My hands bring themselves to the floor, and so do my feet. I try not to look around me in fear and paranoia. “Hey, don’t worry,” Sawyer says in an exaggerated accent of some place I don’t know. I hear the click of my tablet on fingernails, and then the word “flashlight.” Instantly a beam of light strikes the ceiling. I’m starting to feel glad that I’m not here alone.

“Hm,” says Sawyer. I hear the clicks of my tablet again and the word “lamp.” Now the entire room is illuminated as if by a real camp fire. I wish I could imagine that’s all this was - a camping trip. But I can’t. I know that.

Sawyer walks over to the storage door and pulls on the handle. I walk up behind him as the silver door opens, revealing a sleeping bag, food, a plumbing system, and other necessities. He pulls out the sleeping bag and hands it to me. Behind it is an electric blanket. “So I’m taking the sleeping bag?” His head turns to face me at a crooked angle, trying not to glare.

“That’s why I gave it to you,” he retorts. Grunting, I set it down in the corner and curl up in it. My jacket is uncomfortable inside the bag but it would be strange to be only wearing a tank top in front of Sawyer. I deal with it.  

My eyes are opened abruptly when Sawyer shifts in his blanket full of wires. I hear a door and sit up, to see Sawyer rummaging inside the storage room. “No flashlights,” he mutters.

“What?” I get up and stuff myself into the closet uncomfortably. There’s a basket labeled FLASHLIGHTS, but it’s empty. “Oh,” I mutter, remembering that one time Marissa and I were playing around when all the lights went out; we were near the bomb shelter room and figured, “Well, when are we ever going to need these?” That was only a month ago. War stumbled upon us too quickly.

I sit back down on my ‘cot’ and stare at the floor, finally realizing what has hit us. I rub my arm guiltily. “What are you thinking about?” Sawyer stares at me suspiciously, closing the door.

I look up. “What?” I shift my face a little to make myself look annoyed, but my reaction is too late.

“Why are you acting so guilty?” He turns to face me.

“I’m not,” I respond, looking away. My eyes are tearing up, and the last thing I want is Sawyer to think I’m a cry baby.

There is a small moment of silence. “Hey,” he says as softly as possible. His words are still bitter, but he sits down near me.

I whip my hair around. “I’m fine!” Then I shove myself into the sleeping bag as I try to forget everything, especially the surprised look on Sawyer’s face after I lashed out.

But what I can’t block out are the sounds of war just outside the thick doors.

_____________________________________

I wake up with one arm out of my jacket, and a sleeping bag half off of me. I shrug my jacket back on and sit up. There is a sound in my ear and Sawyer is leaning against a gray wall with a bag of freeze dried food in his hand, as well as a spoon. The room I sit in is cube shaped and barely illuminated. I wonder where I am.

There is a muffled boom and I jump. Sawyer tries not to laugh, being more polite than usual, and I suddenly remember where I am. The tears nearly come flowing back, and I realize how tight my face is. I look at the shiny silver door and see red cheeks and puffy eyes. I must have cried myself to sleep. A bag of rehydrated spaghetti seems to be magically put in front of me. “Food?” I groggily nod at the offer and am handed a spoon. The noodles are short enough to fit on the collapsable spoons.

I take one bite eagerly yet slowly, and drop my spoon in as I reach in for more sauce. Groaning and placing the bag on the floor, Sawyer moves closer to me and I almost wonder why, but don’t bother. It feels too early in the morning to wonder about these things, despite the darkness surrounding us. It’s as if I woke up in the middle of the night from a nightmare. That’s all this should really be, to be honest.

Sawyer tries to open a conversation. “Did you sleep well?”

I sit for a while trying to comprehend the question, and grab my bag of food. “That’s one of the lame conversation starters that go no where.” I think for a moment. “Unless the person you’re talking to is awesome.” I put a groggy emphasis on awesome, still waking up. I move my neck around to stretch it. There is another series of booms that clench my teeth.

He laughs a little after the bangs stop. “So you’re telling me you aren’t awesome?”

I shake my head slightly. “No, see, this conversation is going somewhere.” I think about that. “Er...sorta.” He laughs again and I try to think why he’s being so...friendly. “Tell me,” I start, “why?”

His head swivels to look at me. “Why...?”

“Why are you being...not you?”

He stares at me for a few seconds, as if deciphering me. “We’re going to be here awhile. We may as well be tolerable.” I try not to glare at his common sense before looking away to cure my immense hunger. The spaghetti is almost completely hard, and is barely hot, but I’m hungry so I eat it anyways. “Sorry about the noodles,” Sawyer apologizes after seeing my reaction to the cold breakfast.

Before I can answer there is a loud boom soon followed by a harsh shaking, making me drop my  breakfast on the floor. Sawyer falls over backwards and hits his head while I crawl to the doors and hang on tight to the handles that hopefully won’t open the doors. It seems like forever that I stand my ground and squeeze my eyes closed. Tears stream slowly down my face in zigzags, affected by the rumbles.

It’s hard to think of anything good as I listen to the bombs erupting outside, the place I was sworn to protect not only on paper, but in my heart. Yet I had fled the dangers that are now destroying my city, and everyone in it.

Finally they come to an end, and I slowly open my eyes to darkness, first, before my eyes adjust again. A trickle of blood had erupted into tiny splatters all over the cube. Sawyer holds his head on the ground, seemingly lifeless. He screams and startles me, but he stops as quickly as he had started. “Sawyer?” The sweetness in my voice is as real as the blood in his hair. I reach my hand to his head slowly, then pull back a little.

“I’m alright,” he tells me, turning his head a little and hiding his heavy breathing. We hear the sound of loud gunfire beginning to erupt outside again, and I bring my tablet over.

I croak, “Flashlight,” and aim the beam at the curls in his hair. It’s not a big cut, but it’s obviously going to affect him. I drop the device from my shaking hands. “I...don’t know what to do.” There’s an awkward silence. Sawyer sighs a little every few seconds, as if he needs to get air out but doesn’t know what for.

My hand reaches to grab Sawyer a pillow, but my head aims to hit it, and I fail at my attempt to not break out in tears. Just in the past twenty four hours, everything has fallen apart.

_____________________________________

Sawyer had been laying on the sleeping bag with the electric blanket over him in the past hour. I had been using the hot water our storage room provided to rehydrate some casserole. I hand the bag of well cooked food to him and help him sit up. “Thanks,” he grunts, and leans against the silver wall. We eat in silence, besides the faint gunshots outside. “Tastes better than mine,” Sawyer tells me, breaking the silence. I try to laugh, but it comes out as a sob. He reaches a hand over, hovering it in the air. “Are you alright?” I open my mouth to tell him “Yes, of course I am,” but I end up with my head in my knees, with a hand on my back, shaking. I don’t even care what he thinks anymore.

Sawyer is asleep hours later. I dim the light on my tablet to help me sleep, but it only makes the sounds coming from outside seem more real. All I can think of is my betrayal to the only place I called home.

I pull the electric blanket over my shoulder as I turn away from the sound. Sawyer groans then shifts a little. I hope I didn’t wake him. There’s silence as I lay in my uncomfortable position, not wanting to wake him. “Marissa stole from Jenn,” he mutters, and I wait a second to let that sink into my head before turning myself around again to close my eyes and, hopefully, sleep.

_____________________________________

I wake up with something different buzzing in my ear. “Sawyer,” I croak, groggy. He doesn’t respond. I sit up and reach my hand over, brushing his arm. “Sawyer!”

“Wha-?” He pokes his head out of the sleeping bag. He cringes as his head brushes the fabric.

“There’s something buzzing in my ear,” I tell him, standing up to stretch after turning the light back on. He listens for a moment, then nods.

“Yeah, you’re right.” We get up and work around each other as we rehydrate some beef stroganoff.

I grab the small bag and flop carefully onto the blanket. Sawyer moves his sleeping bag next to me and plops onto it, careful not to hit his head. I get one spoonful into my mouth before I realize what is terribly wrong - or right, depending on how you look at it. “Sawyer.” I tap his arm. “Sawyer,” I say again, standing up.

“What?” He stands up. “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

I try not to break down at that comment. “It’s...completely...silent.” He stares at me for a few seconds with more than a few expressions, as if he’s trying them all on. Then he grabs the door handle and enters the pin before I have time to react. Light floods in, blinding us. It looks like he’s about to fall over, so I run over and hold him up and we look beyond our previous confinements.

Dirt is everywhere, as well as ashes. And the bodies. There must be thousands. I don’t want to look, but there is nothing more to look at other than the metal bomb shelter we were in. The building we would have been standing in is destroyed, torn to the ground from bombs. The shelter skidded several inches away from its original position. I don’t know where to start or what to do, or if we should think about surviving. Should we make sure no other EOWs are around? Where are they? What do we think about? What are we going to reach for?

I don’t know. It’s all gone. Everything is destroyed. Everything has truly fallen apart.

Author's Note

Please don't steal this idea, I am planning to possibly write a novel off of this. Thanks for reading! I would love it if people who read this reviewed it or rated it. Thank you!