The Annihilation of Foreverland (5 page)

The island was even better.

No one assaulted him in his sleep. No one dumped him in a trash can or even so much as gave him a wedgie. It was ten days of non-stop fun.

It started in the game room which turned out to be a game
building
. Flat screen monitors were positioned around the perimeter showing on-going games or flashing team standings of various competitions. Most of them were small capsules
where
campers could experience three-dimensional action while some were simple screen games for one or two people.

On the first day, Sid led them through the crowd. There were about twenty-five people – all boys, no old men – watching or playing. They made their way to center stage: a twenty-foot wide circular platform enclosed by a clear dome. Inside was a small scale layout of a war-torn city with smoldered buildings and overturned cars. Digital troops strategically stalked the cityscape and miniature helicopters rained bullets and missiles into clouds of smoke and fire.

There was a group on each side that controlled the tiny figures and with each explosion and each death, numbers changed on the four-side scoreboard hanging from the ceiling. Names repositioned in the standings. An hour later, one team stood victorious.

Zin smacked Danny in the chest. “We’re up.”

The taunting started when they stepped onto the small stage vacated by the losers, a group of Middle Eastern boys in their early teens. Danny saw the other team on the opposite side of the dome – they were Russian, maybe – pulling on black gloves. Sid was trading insults with the crowd, pointing at the scoreboard and thumping his chest. Zin gave Danny a pair of gloves and knee pads.

“No time for instruction. You’ll figure it out.”

The gloves slid on like silk embedded with fine wire mesh. The knee pads strapped on without anything special. Sid passed out yellow-tinted goggles with embedded earbuds and miniature microphones. Danny was still playing with the goggles when he was assigned to a tower and told to keep his head down.

“Watch and learn.” That was the only time Sid addressed Danny. “And try not to get killed, poke.”

The game started.

Instead of watching the action like the spectators, Danny saw it inside the goggles. The view was first person, like he was inside the dome, shrunk down to size. The goggles absorbed his vision. When he turned his head, the view changed.

He was in a tower with a two-ton bell. For the first twenty minutes, he did what he was told, experimenting with the controls and not getting killed. He learned his movements were controlled by bending his knees. The gloves controlled his hands and weapons. After that, he watched half of his crew get slaughtered on one of Sid’s stupid ambushes.

When there was nothing to lose, he went to the ground.

He felt the rubble under his feet, the heat of burning automobiles. He ran from building to building and by the time he neared the action, Zin was the only one left. He was hiding inside a bunker that was about to be flamed.

When Danny was later asked how he slaughtered the opposing team, he didn’t have a good answer. He just said that it made sense, that he didn’t realize he was intuiting the enemy’s moves and shot them with effortless accuracy and moved with the grace of a veteran assassin. He just did it.

He sniped the last enemy from three hundreds. After that, everyone in the game room knew his name.

There were classes, too.

Although, like Mr. Jones said, it wasn’t really class. They talked about economics and geology and philosophy, but it was just talk. There was no homework, no tests. The instructors were the old men, of course, that insisted they exercise their whole brains when they thought about various topics, so they kept the discussion lively. The boys debated loudly, acted out their passion and shook hands when it was all over. It wasn’t bad, Danny had to admit. Without the busy-work of homework, he was interested in class.

Sort of. Kind of.

Strange thing, though. There was no Internet, no email, text messages or phones. There weren’t even computers. There was plenty of time for worldly things, the Investors said. Just not now.

Occasionally, Danny would hear a bell ring three times like a gong. Then he’d see boys heading for the Haystack and sometimes leaving it. Once, someone was carted away from it. An Investor was driving a utility vehicle and another old man was on the flatbed with the boy lying down. No one said much and the Investors stared straight ahead as they drove around the dormitory toward the Chimney.

In the first couple weeks, Danny saw the Chimney smoke three times.

Danny sat with his camp at lunch. He didn’t know anyone else.

He half-listened to Sid layout their next game strategy and watched people move through the line. Another group returned from the Haystack, this one Hispanic. They hardly spoke.

One of them was a new poke.
The band-aid.

Mr. Jones took Danny’s band-aid off within the first week. He was a little more chill after the hand on the cheek incident. Danny decided if it happened again, he was swimming for it, screw the sharks. But Mr. Jones was cool. He just wanted to make sure Danny was getting everything he needed and followed his schedule. He had a knack of always finding Danny, but then he remembered the tracker in his neck. Mr. Jones could probably count the number of turds Danny dropped in the morning.

Danny peeled the band-aid off. Beneath it was a neat little hole. It wasn’t red, wasn’t sore. Just a hole. Mr. Jones wiped it with some alcohol, said the stent was healing just fine. He sensed Danny had a question – as anyone who woke up with a hole in the head would have – and said the hole was for healing. And not to worry.

Don’t worry, my boy.
He said that a lot.

“You listening?” Sid snapped his fingers in Danny’s face. “Come on, man, you need to pay attention. This next battle is our last before we go to the Haystack. That’s when it gets real, son. You’re good with the gloves but things change when you get inside.”

“Danny Boy isn’t going to be any good the first round,” Zin said, swallowing the last of his milk. “He shouldn’t even be on the squad until he gets a few rounds inside the Haystack, you know that. You forget, he’s a new poke.”

“Yeah, just in case, Zinski.”

“That’s what we do in the Haystack?” Danny asked. “More games?”

Long silence.

Silence, every time the topic of the Haystack came up – and what the needle was. Danny knew what was likely to happen, it didn’t take a genius. There was a needle and there was a hole in his head. It didn’t take an engineer. Still, it was hard to imagine a needle going through his skull, so there had to be other explanations. He didn’t want think about that.

When everyone was on another topic, Zin leaned over. “We’re going inside the Haystack in two days. Everyone gets a little edgy, but don’t let them worry you. It’s all cool.”

“So what happens, exactly?”

“It’s a good time. You won’t remember much, though.”

“What are you going to be doing?”

“Uhhhh…” Zin looked around then smiled, mischievously. “Well, I don’t know about the rest of these war mongers, but I’ll be hooking up with my lady. If there’s time, I might join them for some shoot ‘em up, but that ain’t my priority. I promise you.”

“Girls?”

“Oh, yeah.” Zin looked around again but no one was paying attention. He mouthed the word with a smile.

GIRLS.

They were going to see girls? There had never been one on the island – coming or going from the Haystack – unless they were dropped off on the back side of the island and snuck into the back of the building. Danny thought of the possibilities. Boys were in the Haystack alone for half a day or longer. If there were girls in there, too, then all kinds of things could be happening. So far, the island was a summer camp, but the way Zin was smiling made him wonder if it had some real-life sex education.

Just keeps getting better.

The last people in line were grabbing their trays off the dessert table. The last one was all alone, something Danny rarely saw. Everyone travelled in packs. There were no loners on the island, except for the guy at the end of the line – the long-haired kid Danny
saw
his first day. He moved slowly, carefully. Occasionally, he turned his head listening to something, looking around the cafeteria. Then he slid his tray along the service line.

“We’re going to be down three men,” Sid was saying. “Parker’s going in with us but he ain’t going to last long. He’ll be smoked, after this. Am I right, Parker?”

Parker breathed through his mouth, holding an empty spoon over his tray. His food was untouched. He shrugged his shoulders when Sid snapped his fingers.

“Easy money,” Sid said. “Anyway, Zin’s right about Danny Boy clumping up like a vegetable, so we’ll be short-handed. We’ll have to play some defense.”

“Who’s the third person?” Zin asked.

“Oh.” Sid twitched his chin at the loner in line. “Forgot to tell you, we got the freak.”

There was a collective moan and some pissing to go along with it.

“Who is he?” Danny asked.

“That’s Reed,” Zin said. “Guy’s been through, like, 100 rounds or something like that without taking the needle.” Zin shook his head. “One tough dude, man. Someone said his head got all scrambled when he first got here. Ask me, I think he’s just some badass that wants to piss in the Director’s cereal.”

“Where’s he been?”

“He goes to the beach on the north end, stands there looking at the water all by himself. No one goes out to the beach, man. The bugs and the wind and no one’s going swimming. There are a thousand better things to do, trust me.”

“That makes him crazy?”

“You wait and see, no sane person would do what he’s done. He just doesn’t have any friends and no one wants to get near him, afraid his crazy will rub off. Can’t say I disagree.”

Reed stopped at the dessert table and held still like someone hit pause on him.

“See what I mean?” Zin said. “He’s an odd dude named Reed, the kid that bends but don’t break.”

“What’s that mean?”

“You’ll see.”

Reed nodded. He was either agreeing with himself or with the voices Zin said he was hearing. Reed left his tray on the dessert table and grabbed an apple. He left the cafeteria.

“I rest my case,” Zin said. “Whack-a-do.”

Reed didn’t walk like he was crazy. Danny didn’t exactly know what a crazy man would walk like, but it didn’t seem like it would be confident, slow and steady. Just because someone doesn’t fly with all the birds doesn’t mean he’s nuts.

The flock could be going in the wrong direction.

Danny woke up two hours before the sun rose. His eyes opened and refused to shut. He stared at the ceiling. The unknown was terrifying. Everyone else seemed excited. Danny rubbed his forehead, making a tiny circle around the hole.
No way they stick a needle in there.

There was a soft knock.

Danny pulled the sheet up to his chin. Mr. Jones opened the door. Danny realized he looked pathetic, but he couldn’t will himself to get up anymore than he could make himself sleep. Besides, he was in his underwear and even though Mr. Jones wasn’t so creepy, there was no need to roll the dice.

“Good morning,” Mr. Jones said.

Danny didn’t answer.

Mr. Jones, usually cheery that time of the day – usually throwing open the curtains and welcoming the morning and telling Danny it was a great day to be alive – this time he went directly to the chest of drawers and began to fold Danny’s clothes. When his shirts were organized, Mr. Jones put his hand on the desk. His cheeks moved like he was chewing on his tongue.

He sat on the bed, sinking into the mattress and rolling Danny closer. Thankfully, he placed his hands on his own lap.

“Danny Boy,” he started and let out a sigh. “Today is a big day. It’s a big day, my boy. You can’t imagine what it means to me. The journey you’re about to take will be revolutionary. You should know that, so that in your darkest hour you have something to hold onto. The Haystack is critical to what we do here on the island, you understand? We wouldn’t do anything to hurt you, but sometimes you have to go to the dentist to stay well, am I right?”

Danny pulled the sheet just under his eyes. He wanted to pull it over his head but that wouldn’t make the bogeyman go away.

“Here.” Mr. Jones held a pill between his finger and thumb. “Put this under your tongue, it’ll boost your immunity. I don’t want you catching cold while you’re in there, it just makes things harder.”

Danny didn’t move.

Mr. Jones had to pull the sheet down and put it on his lips. His fingers smelled like old leather. Danny let the pill fall into his mouth just so he’d get his hand away. It dissolved like candy.

Mr. Jones sighed again, looked at the ceiling. His eyes looked a little wet. It was times like this Danny thought he might be regretting something. He squeezed Danny’s knee. “You’re a hero, son. A real hero.”

And then he got up, after two attempts, and went to the door looking more hunched over than usual. He put his hand on the knob and, without turning, said, “You go on and get dressed now, you hear? I’ll be back up in an hour to escort you over to the building. No one goes into the Haystack alone, my boy.”