“They say the rate is fifteen percent,” I said. “There are seven colors. That means an equal number for each so we don’t panic.”
Once everyone was tested, they divided us into our color groups. Then we were laser-tattooed on the back of our hands.
I got a small yellow circle. When I craned my neck to look at the group beside us—the reds—they were getting the same. So were the blacks to my left. I exhaled in relief and looked around for Katie.
A woman announced, “If you have a yellow circle, you are clear and you may?—”
That’s when the screaming started. From the green group. I caught sight of Katie, standing there, staring in horror at the black star on her wrist. I raced over. A soldier tried to stop me, but I pushed past him, saying, “I’m with her.”
A woman in uniform stepped into my path. “She’s?—”
“I know,” I said. “I’m staying with her.”
Itwasn’t a particularly noble sacrifice. That circle on my wrist meant I could leave at any time. Katie could not. I had nowhere to go anyway. My family…well, let’s just say that when I got accepted to college, I walked out and never looked back and don’t regret it. I won’t explain further. I don’t think I need to.
I would stay with Katie because she needed me and because I could and because—let me be frank—because it was the smart thing to do. I’d heard what the world was like beyond our campus. I was staying where there was food and shelter and safety and a friend.
Assemblies and a parade of officials and psychologists followed, all reassuring the others that their black star was not a death sentence. Not everyone who had the marker “turned.” Those who did were now being transported to a secure facility, where they’d continue to await a cure.
There were private sessions that day, too, with counselors. During those, I sat in one of the common rooms with the other yellow suns. Yes, I wasn’t the only one. We all had our reasons for staying, and most were like mine, part loyalty, part survival. We sat and we played cards, and we enjoyed the break from being hugged and told how wonderful and empathetic and strong we were, when we felt like none of those things.
Night came. Before today, the locks had been internal, meant to protect us while reassuring us that in the event of an emergency, wecouldleave. Now the doors had been fitted with an overriding electronic system. Perhaps it’s a testament to how far things had gone that not a single person complained. We were just happy for the locks, especially now, in a building filled with dormant monsters.
I woke to the first shot at midnight. I bolted up in bed, thinking I’d dreamed it. Then the second shot came. No screams. Just gunfire. I yanked on my jeans and ran to the door, in my confusion forgetting about the new locks. I twisted the knob and…
The door opened.
I yanked it shut fast and stood there, gripping the knob.
Was I really awake? Was I really me? How could I be sure?
People who “turned” were not usually killed on sight, not unless they were caught mid-rampage and had to be put down. Studies said that when vampires woke in the night, they later had no memory of it. People took comfort in that—at least if you turned, you’d be spared the horror of remembering you’d slaughtered your loved ones. I took no comfort because it also meant there was no way of knowing what it felt like to turn. Would you be conscious in that moment? Did it seem real at the time?
I looked at the unlocked door. My gaze swung down to the yellow sun on the back of my wrist.
Another shot, this one so close that I ducked, the echo ringing in my ears. The shot had come from the other side of the wall. Katie’s room.
I threw open my door and raced to hers, and finding it open, I ran through and…
Katie lay crumpled on the floor. In her outstretched hand was a gun.
I ran to her and then stopped short, staring. She lay on her stomach, and the side of her chest…there was a hole there. No, not a hole—that implies something neat and harmless. It was bloody and raw, a crater into her chest, just below her heart. I dropped to my knees, a sob catching in my throat.
She whimpered.
There was a moment when I didn’t move, when all I could think was that she’d come back to life, like a vampire from the old stories and Hollywood movies. Except that wasn’t how real vampires worked. They weren’t dead. They weren’t invulnerable. I grabbed her shoulders and turned her over.
Blood gushed from her mouth as I eased her onto her back. I tried not to think of that, tried not to let my brain assess that damage. It still did. I was pre-med. I’d spent enough hours volunteering in emergency wards to process the damagereflexively. She’d tried to shoot herself in the heart, not the head, because she didn’t know better, because she was the kind of person who couldn’t even watch action movies. So she’d aimed for her heart and missed, but not missed by enough. Not nearly enough.
I shouted for help. As I did, I heard other shouts. Other shots, too, and screams from deep in the dormitory and I tried to lay Katie down, to run out for help, but she gripped my hand and said, “No” and, “Stay” and I looked at her, and as much as I wanted to believe she’d survive, that she’d be fine, I knew better. So I shouted, as loud as I could, for help, but I stayed where I was, and I held her hand, and I told her everything would be fine, just fine.
“I couldn’t do it,” she whispered. “I couldn’t wait to turn. I couldn’t make you wait.”
“I would have,” I said, squeezing her hand as tears trickled down my face. “I’d have stayed for as long as you needed me.”
A faint smile. “Just a few more minutes. That’s all I’ll need. Then you can go.”
I told her I didn’t want to go, just hold on, stay strong and hold on and everything would be fine. Of course it wasn’t and we both knew that, but it gave us something to say in those final minutes, for me to tell her how brave and wonderful she was, and for her to tell me what a good friend I’d been.
