“Rules?” The word was barely audible through the chewed-up hamburger in my cheeks. “You guys have rules?”
“Mouth closed, please.” Craven’s eyes narrowed with hardly-disguised disgust. “It’s gross to talk with your mouth open. No one wants to see that.”
Warmth ran up my face as he pointed out my mistake. I quickly closed my lips, wiping a few of the meat crumbs from my chin. Dining manners were a new thing to me. I’d never eaten around anyone before since my infantile years, when I’d suckled on a bottle until I could stomach the headset goop. Was there something taboo about revealing your chewed-up food? You’d think that it would be a flex to show off how much you were eating to your fellow humans. An act of strength or something. Perhaps I was looking at humanity through too animalistic a lens.
“And yes, we do have rules,” He continued speaking. “They keep us safe in the unpredictable and perilous world your parents have subjected us to. They’re in place for a reason and are followed to a strict tee. I expect you to respect them if you wish to come along with us. If not, I’ll have you promptly removed.”
“Oh, don’t make it seem so cutthroat.” Link propped his feet up on the table, using his left pinky to pick at food in his molars. “I’ve broken my fair share of rules, and I’m still here.”
Craven’s lips twisted into a scowl. “The rules you’ve broken don’t put our lives in danger. You break the ones that threaten your dignity, not your survival. There’s a difference. He can learn the most commonly broken rules once he knows the ones of most importance.”
The orange-haired scoundrel grunted as his finger stabbed into his gum. “Mmpf.”
Craven scoffed, rolling his eyes. “Ginger fool.” Turning back to me, he pointed a finger accusatively at my chest. “Let it be known that our rules are especially important for you, considering your background. As the son of the 907 family, your presence increases the threat to our lives by nearly eighty percent. One slip-up from you, and our heads will certainly be pixelized and displayed for every person in this city to see.”
Alden shook his head. “Unlikely. They wouldn’t waste good bodies on something like that. They’d give us the same treatment they gave my mother. I’d almost argue that’s a fate worse than death.”
A tense silence hung between us, broken occasionally by a holler from another group or the rattling of a nearby table. The glorious taste of hamburger suddenly went dull. My cheeks felt as though they were full of cotton as images of her hazy, distressed eyes and her piercing, frightened wails reverberated through my head. Guilt, along with fear, twisted through my gut. It was my fault that had happened to his mother. Would I make it happen here, too? To end up like that, to have any of them end up like that…a shiver went down my spine.
Before the guilt could truly take hold, the last part of his sentence hit me. “A fate worse than death”. I couldn’t argue that ending up trapped in your own body was an awful destiny, but worse than death? I wasn’t sure if I could agree with that. Death was the end of everything. No more breathing, no more life, no more anything, just…well…I didn’t know. No one had ever told me what happened once you died. In fact, I’d never even given the subject much thought. Living in that virtual reality had made death seem like just another thing we’d been saved from. Yet, in the end, it was a visitor we’d never be able to avoid. A visitor who came bearing gifts of who-knows-what. I suppose that was what frightened me the most. Not knowing. Life before had guaranteed that everything was predictable. There was no part of your life you didn’t know every detail about. Now, sitting here at a metal lunch table with a real hamburger in my hand, it hit me that everything ahead, the path I’d chosen, was shrouded in uncertainty. Suddenly, I didn’t want to do it anymore.
“What’s with the wide eyes? You look like a deer in headlights.” Fickle waved her hand in front of my eyes, snapping me from my thoughts. “Earth to Rash! Earth to Rash!”
Scowling, I slapped her hand away, my hamburger slumping against my other palm. She only smiled mischievously, doing it again. Scowls must not phase her anymore; Craven did it so often that it no longer held any meaning.
“That’s not my name. Stop calling me that.”
“I haven’t seen your birth certificate, so I’m gonna keep calling you Rash until I do. I’m awfully certain you told me that was your name, anyway. Trying to gaslight me into believing I’m wrong, 907? You dirty little gaslighter! Bet that’s what you were born to b-”
“Fickle!”
