Child of Light

One

We break out at midnight, just as we agreed. Like ghosts risen from our graves to reclaim the lives that were stolen from us, we flee.

We are quick and we are fast, one following the other, staying in order the way Tommy has taught us, pretending it's just a drill, knowing it isn't. No one speaks, no one whispers; no one makes any sound they can avoid. There are no mistakes because there can be no mistakes. Others who have tried to escape this facility before have all made at least one mistake. And all are dead.

Courage, I tell myself. I am desperate to get free. We all are. Don't think. Just go!

There are fifteen of us-too many for what we are attempting. But once someone is in, it is impossible to decide later that they are out-unless of course you are willing to kill them to keep them from talking. I couldn't do that. None of us could. We're just kids. Ordinary kids in other circumstances; something else now. But still, just kids, not killers. Not yet, anyway. None of us has killed anyone-except maybe JoJo. He says he has, but we can't be sure about what he has or hasn't done. He's big on talk, but you can usually tell when someone is padding the truth, making himself appear to be something he isn't. We all thought that was what he was doing.

But still we wonder.

We started out as a group of eight: Tommy, Malik, Barris and Breck, Wince, JoJo, Khoury, and me. That would have been enough if together we possessed the skills and knowledge that are needed. But we need more to make this escape happen, as we find out quickly enough once we begin to talk our way through the plan. So we are forced to bring in other kids. It is easy enough to choose the ones we are looking for. All we have to do is keep our eyes and ears open until we discover the handful we need. There are only about 330 of us in the camp. I don't know if other camps exist.

Still, I assume there must be more. Given this one's purpose, there pretty much have to be. It's simple mathematics. Our captors number in the hundreds. We call them Goblins-though in truth we have no idea who or what they really are, save not Human. Piggish faces, warped and twisted limbs, bodies much larger than those of Humans, skin hanging loose in gray mottled folds, voices that communicate as often with grunts and snorts as with words. They are despicable creatures that transcend our worst nightmares. The kids in the prison are here to serve them. We are brought here from all over and raised in captivity. Our lives are predetermined. Someone is needed to maintain and operate the hydroponic farms and weapons factories. But the Goblins require something else from us in payment for their services as our jailers. Goblins are carnivores and require fresh meat, so prisoners offer a ready source of both food and labor.

Our fates as prisoners are fixed. From the moment we arrive, all of us must work to maintain or repair the prison and grounds or be eaten. The disabled, weak, and injured kids are dispatched early. Those who remain healthy and able-bodied are allowed to grow until they are deemed adults and then sent to the reproductive pens, the work farms, and the factories. Unless, as sometimes happens, overpopulation of the prison requires a culling. Then the healthy are eaten, too. Our numbers are never allowed to fluctuate far. If too many die, new kids take their place. Where do the Goblins find them? Where did they find any of us? How are we chosen? No one knows. I don't know what I am doing here, and this seems to be true for the others as well.

The one common denominator we all share is that no one seems to miss us. Some of us are orphans. Others had families-gone now? I wonder if it is the same in the other camps, the ones we never see. Is it different for them? I don't know; I have no way of knowing. I just hope it isn't something worse.

All of us are between the ages of ten and twenty. Adults and little kids are kept elsewhere; we don't know where. Kids like us are designated as worker bees until we are determined to be old enough for transport to the reproductive pens. There we are paired off and forced to make babies. Once you spend enough time in the pens to renew the population, you are shipped out to work the farms and factories. If you are unable to reproduce or work, you are retired. That's what it is called-retired. A euphemism for executed. Put down because you no longer serve any useful purpose. Disposed of because, if you can't work and you can't reproduce, you are just taking up space. Sometimes they keep you for other reasons-but not often and not for long. And not for pets. Goblins don't have pets. Just those monstrous things they call Ronks, and those are used primarily for hunting. You c...