Life Is Never Fair
LIFE IS NEVER FAIR
THADDEUS
“Next!”
I step up to the open spot in front of Guard Wicker, noting his frown when he realizes Syd won’t be in his line. The dude is a fucking sleaze and I’d like to punch him right in the mouth, but I don’t want to end up in the ‘Self-Awareness’ room. Misbehaving students from elementary to college level get thrown in these isolation cells and basically renditioned until their spirit breaks. Usually, people last about a week before they at least pretend to be reprogrammed. If you end up there often enough, they pull you from F.E.A.R. to be fitted for the lockdown version of a Marker.
Who knows what that is because those people never speak of it, nor do they mix with the general populace afterward.
“Hold your arms out, Calvin,” Wicker grunts in irritation. “I don’t have all day.”
He actually does, but I’m not going to let him rush me through in an attempt to get to Sydney. I put my bag down, lifting my arms slowly as I give him a fake apologetic look. “Sorry, boss. Spaced out for a second there.”
“Don’t let it happen again.”
Biting the inside of my cheek, I harness the anger of my grizzly at being treated like I’m lesser by a guy who couldn’t punch his way out of a paper bag. The damn Markers are the only thing keeping these fuckers alive, especially with the way they treat beings who could tear them apart bare-handed. Our world is topsy-turvy at the moment and nothing is fair—I don’t know if it ever will be again.
Wicker is human, so he doesn’t sense my fury, but I know the chained magic user scanning my bag does. The small witch raises dead eyes to me, and we share a long look as she casts. Her voice is low, almost too low to hear, but I think she’s ignoring the plastic blade I have zipped into the lining of the satchel. My lips quirk for a brief moment, then I go back to frowning at the moron who points me to the body scanner.
It’s dangerous to smuggle weapons into the academy, but I have someone besides myself to keep safe.
“Move it, Calvin.” The guard rolls his eyes as I lumber forward and he groans. “Fucking Monroe. Of course I’d get you.”
I can almost hear Huck’s shit-eating grin behind me. He shuffles up as I enter the body scanner, whistling under his breath. I know he’s in place when he coos, “Oh, Wicker, I didn’t know you cared. Are you offering to be my hombre?”
“Shut it, demon. No one wants anything from a crazy ass fear fucker who thinks he’s Doc Holliday.”
Huck is very aware that our nemesis is a total homophobe, so he’s happily pushing his buttons. It distracts the entire contingent from Sydney’s scans, and that’s his plan. She always sneaks things in—more than me—and neither of us want her to get sent to the Bad Place for a week. Females come back a lot more haunted than most males. It’s fucking disgusting, and I refuse to allow her to be subjected to it.
“You wound me, Wicker. I thought we were becoming friends.”
I swear to Odin, that demon is absolutely insane. Since he feeds on fear, he doesn’t feel it himself, and that leads to interesting behavior. Most people would call it unhinged and maybe it is. But he’s loyal as fuck, even if Syd pretends to hate him.
She definitely doesn’t; my shifter senses can tell.
“Huck, for fuck’s sake,” Syd growls as she crosses to the entrance. Her scans are done and we can stop screwing around. “Stop being an idiot and get inside.”
Pausing to pick up my bag, I give a very subtle chin jerk to the poor witch locked up by Wicker’s line and join my friends to head inside for another day of being told we’re the cause of the entire world’s ills.
None of us use the old rusty lockers that line the wall. Some kids do, but it’s foolish. The guards can search us at any time, but the admin can rifle your locker without you even knowing. It’s the perfect way to frame someone you don’t like. Syd, Huck, and I simply carry our shit everywhere, then head home. We’re more suspicious than the younger supes or the ones who weren’t caught in the earliest sweeps.
Watching people die in the early court system had a chilling effect on our ability to trust anything we can’t see with our own eyes.
“I will never understand why they make us attend a college level program. None of us will ever be allowed out of the sectors, so a higher education is a waste of time,” Sydney says as we walk down the hall.
“Maybe it’s for appearances?” I offer. Truthfully, I don’t know why, either, except it means they have all the younger supes under their thumbs for four more years. Rebellion is the watchword of the young, and perhaps they believe they’ll keep future generations under control by continued indoctrination.
Huck snorts. “Nada, little buddy. Since the blockades went up, the rest of the world could give a fuck less about the supes on this land mass. Taterman doesn’t need to pander to their wishes.”
Sydney whirls around giving us both a dirty look. “Did you fucking check for a Confession Enforcement indicator before you said his name ?”
The demon has the grace to look chagrined as he shakes his head. “Sorry, filly. It’s hard to remember, though I know it shouldn’t be. We’re four years out and this shit still gets me.”
“We didn’t grow up in a world like this one,” I murmur softly. “By the time this came along, we’d formed normal habits. It’s not weird that you’re still adjusting, Huck. Hell, we all are. Look how hard the lockdown supes fight against their situation.”
Syd frowns as she shrugs. “I don’t know why they do it. No one is coming to save us; that much is clear. And we’re unable to save ourselves now, so the Unveiling sentenced us to this life until we die. There’s no point in getting murdered.”
Her father’s death still haunts her and I wish I could help… but no one can.
Death gives no quarter, even to those who deserve it.
Our first class was History of Supernatural Interference 100 and how the asshole giving the lecture kept a straight face, I don’t know. Most supe groups—be it packs or covens or clashes or whatever—still used oral history to keep our existence secret while preserving our history before the Unveiling. Humans rely on governments and the internet and schools to teach doctored versions of theirs. The disconnect is why they’re failing to convince the young supes in sectors of the evils that supernaturals have done over the centuries.
Leaders in the supe sectors make sure we are not vilified before everyone who knows how it was before dies.
“How in the fuck can they stand up there and straight-up lie to people old enough to remember shit?” Sydney grumbles. “I know for a goddamn fact that supernaturals didn’t cause the fucking Gulf War fighting with djinn.”
“Djinn are a funny lot. They’ll go to war, but not unless they have to.” Huck chomps on the toothpick he’s been chewing since the beginning of class. “If it were true, that shitgibbon would never have been able to win. They’d owe all the American supes wishes. Dangerous game, but amazing spoils.”
“You’ve never met a djinn,” I scoff as we walk up the stairs to our Human Literary Masterpieces class. “Demons lie like they breathe.”
Huck rolls his eyes as we get to the door, holding it open for us. “I sure as hell have. She was as beautiful as can be, like a fever dream of spices and dark nights in the desert. But she had her Marker and wishes were not an option.”
Ah, he met her in the holding area before he was shipped here.
“I’ve never met a supe that exotic,” Syd says wistfully. “My dad kept us pretty under the radar so we wouldn’t get found out. We lived in a small town and there weren’t many supes at all, aside from witches and a few common shifters.”
“You’re not missing anything.” Shrugging, I follow her into the lecture hall and plop down in the seat on her left side. “We lived in Kansas, so lots of open space and that means bigger shifters and mythicals sometimes made their homes nearby. Most of them were dicks because they were powerful and rich—especially the vampires.”
“Fanged fuckers aren’t big,” Huck says with a sneer. “And they’re not uncommon. They’re just traitors to us all.”
Here we go…
“Huck, they were smarter than the rest of us,” Sydney mutters. “If I had a Wayback Machine and could tell the other species to mimic the fangers, I would.”
“Good afternoon, students!”
The loud bellow from Professor Ashley makes me wince. He doesn’t have magic or supe powers, so the dumbass uses this outdated bullhorn to teach the huge section of people. The squeal always hurts my sensitive bear ears, and I can’t do a damn thing to protect myself from it.
“Today, we will continue discussing Frankenstein . Shelley captured the need for eliminating the monsters within her world perfectly, I must say. We would all do well to respect the lesson this book teaches about what happens to those who rampage against their betters.”
Sydney tenses next to me and her hand is gripping her pen like she’s going to crack it. Obviously, she doesn’t agree with the interpretation being presented. I’ve never been much of a reader, but what I read doesn’t jive with the text, so she’s probably right. But then, the professors here don’t want us to learn; they want to control us. Of course they’d twist a narrative to suit their agendas.
Leaning down, I whisper in her ear. “You gotta calm down, Syd.”
“That’s not the lesson of this book, Thad .”
Huck shakes his head, slouching in his chair so no one notices him leaning into her other side. “Doesn’t matter, sweet pea. It’s what we’re forced to vomit up for their tests, so you need to have a come to Jesus moment and get good with it.”
Her eyes narrow as she looks at the demon. “You know that’s a fairy tale, Huckleberry Monroe.”
Ouch, the full name; she’s pissed.
“I do indeed, but I’m not fixin’ to get sent to the hole today. And I’d appreciate it if you could avoid it as well so I don’t have to lose my temper.”
We have to distract her and I hate to do it this way but… “Didn’t you just say it’s useless to fight? What good did fighting and trusting them do for your dad, Syd?”
It’s like a wave of ice hits our section of the room and I wince as she goes silent, staring ahead silently. She won’t make trouble while that dill hole up there continues, but our friend is also going to be a zombie for the rest of the day. I hate having to do that to her, but since Sydney is a mixed breed with a question mark where her mom should be…
I have to help her until she figures out what she has beyond magic.
“You’re a dick, Thad.”
“I’ll take that over silence any day,” I whisper as she scribbles notes in her notebook.
She’s very good at functioning in the low tech world sectors brought us back to, while I miss the hell out of phones and computers. We have an agreement that she’ll take the notes and we all study together so Huck and I can help her memorize. Since they put in her Marker, Sydney has trouble with memory gaps, blackouts, and sometimes, gaps in time. It’s like they short-circuited something important in her and it caused a magical dementia.
“I’m only talking to you because I need you. Otherwise, I’d freeze you for the day,” she says, her voice full of irritation. “Unfortunately, the damage done by my Marker will put me in the shit. Even Huck knows that by now.”
Our demon friend pushes his knee against hers, surreptitiously trying to siphon the fear off of her. It’s a win-win for him because he feeds, but it also helps our friend stay on an even keel. “Sweet pea, I don’t know why you act as though I’m a gnat buzzing around your pretty head. You know I’m your second favorite person in the entire world.”
“I only associate with two people, Huck. That’s not as special as you make it sound.”
No, we’re the lucky ones and she doesn’t have a clue.