The Human Climax

She looked around, her eyes lighting up. "Not here. Let's go to my room. You'll be back before curfew."

"Uh, alright," I said stupidly, following her as she walked quickly in the direction of her room. Why was she rushing? Did she really think I cared about curfew anyway?

With every turn into another huge white hallway I grew more nervous. Don't even get me fucking started on these hallways. There were huge and wide, white on one side and black on the other. The ceilings are also super high here, something like 100 feet. We were in the dorm wing, and there were doors everywhere, leading in into everyone's rooms. Sometimes I forget how huge this place is. My eyes returned to Scarlet and I shook my head to clear it of negative thoughts.

We finally got to her room. Scarlet's roommate, Amira, was just leaving. I rolled my eyes as I stood through a few minutes of their girlish chatter.

When Amira finally left Scarlet sat me down on her bed and closed the door. The she sat across from me and stared at me.

"Well?" I said bluntly.

She ticked her glance at the wall, then back at me. She pursed her lips.

"Are you happy, Quinn?"

I looked at her before feeling the blood rush to my cheeks. I felt very uncomfortable with that question. I'm not a very emotional person, at all. This question was way too personal for me.

I don't think I even knew that answer. What kind of question was that? Was I happy? I didn't know. I haven't known a lot for a long time.

"I'm joyous." I said flatly.

"No, Quinn," she said, as if she knew how I would react. "I want you to answer me seriously."

My cheeks burned. I narrowed my eyes. "I can't give you a serious answer to a non-serious question."

She sighed, getting up and pacing the room. I pressed my tongue against the inside of my cheek.

She mumbled something quietly, and I didn't catch what she said.

"What?"

"I bet the steal aways are happy."

I furrowed my eyebrows in confusion, and my heart skipped when she said 'steal aways.'

She looked back at me. There was a glimmer of hope in her eyes that, frankly, was scaring me a bit.

"This place is not a home, Quinn," she said. "The steal aways know what they're doing. Just imagine it, there would be no one bossing us around or hurting us or threatening to kill us, no hearing about someone dying every other day, actual food, actual friends, an actual way of life!"

I stared at her. "What the hell are you trying to say?"

"We should escape, Quinn."

I could only stare.

She sat down and looked me straight in the eyes. "Escape with me," she whispered.

"Escape with you?"

She nodded, smiling.

"Are you insane, Scarlet? It isn't as easy as it sounds. We could...die."

"We can make it. And it would be worth it," she said. "I might've over exaggerated before, but I know it would definitely be better than this place. We could finally live again."

I put my head in my hands. "I don't know..."

"Please, Quinn," she said. "You can bring Christian and Dylan. I heard the steal aways know you anyway!"

She saw my face and quickly continued. "But even if they didn't. I've thought it all out. We could finally be beyond the fence!"

I said nothing.

"Will you, Quinn?" she pleaded.

"I...I don't know," I said, my head spinning.

She stood and put a hand on my shoulder, and I forced myself not to flinch away.

"We'll talk tomorrow. Sleep on it." She left.

Oh, God. Sleep on it, I would not.

But stay awake all night tortured by indecision...

Certainly.

That night I had barely a wink of sleep. I tossed and turned nonstop, and at one point I even got up and started pacing the room.

Stupid insomnia, stupid Scarlet.

It was a miracle when I fell asleep at 6:30 am. But it was not a miracle when I woke up again a half hour before I usually do, at 7:30.

I awoke to screaming. I fell out of bed and hit my head hard on the floor.

"Quinn?"

It was Stevie. I could tell the noise had woken her up, too.

I picked myself off the floor as the screaming continued. It was coming from the hallway outside our room. I ran out of the room, leaving the dark walls with no windows in a blur. I heard Stevie following close behind me.

Two aliens were wrestling with someone on the ground. The person was laying on the floor, and they were holding him down, yelling at him. I recognized the aliens as Thor and Ployd - hallway security. They were rough, always shoving and pushing everyone to where they needed to be.

Now normally I wouldn't have said anything and let whatever they were doing happen, because that was normal around here. But the fact that it was 7:30 in the morning, a whole half hour before everyone woke up, the fact that I was considering escaping, and the fact that the boy seemed to be about thirteen changed my actions.

"What is going on?" I shouted, running up to them. I heard Stevie following me.

Thor glared up at me. "Go back to bed, number..." He squinted at the number on my jacket. "708. And you too, number 22!"

Stevie glared at him.

"What the hell are you doing to this kid?!" I yelled, seeing for the first time blood on the boy. "And a half hour before waking time!"

Ployd stopped what he was doing, leaving the boy, who I could now see was number 488, breathing hard. Ployd, too, glared at me.

"Is that any of your business? If you don't go now Skinard will heard about this."

I raised my eyebrows. "I'm not afraid of Skinard."

Ployd looked angry, but Thor simply mocked me, also raising his eyebrows. "Aren't you?"

I crossed my arms over my chest. Seeing this action, Stevie also straightened behind me.

"Do you want to end up like 488 here?!" Ployd yelled, growing angrier by the second. "We're teaching him a lesson. He was talking in his sleep."

Thor grabbed 488 by the neck. "His roommate told us. We don't tolerate the strange things you humans do."

I was outraged. "Do you think he can control that?!"

"He was causing a disturbance."

"Get the fuck off him!" I shouted. "You are the ones causing the disturbance!"

I crouched down beside 488.

"Are you alright?" I asked. The amount of blood on his head scared me.

He widened his eyes at me. "I...I'm okay."

I nodded. "You should go back to sleep before they call breakfast."

I began to help him up, but Thor shoved me away.

I shoved him off me, and stood back and narrowed my eyes at him.

"You let him back to bed or I will personally tell Skinard myself that you were causing disturbance. He can check the cameras if he doesn't believe me."

Thor and Ployd looked at each other. I was surprised they hadn't beaten me back to my room yet. Everything had sounded much more confident in words then in my head.

Thor picked 488 up and glared at me. "Skinard can decide what to do with him." He said, and him and Ployd both grabbed one of 488's arms, and walked off towards Skinard's office.

Stevie started babbling behind me, but I didn't hear a word she said. I stared off.

Scarlet was right.