Fragments by Caroline Green Page A

at the curved, needle teeth that had been buried into my flesh. Dropping the filthy thing I looked up, eyes blurry with tears. A glass panel had silently divided the room. Horrified faces gazed at me from the other side. Skye had her hands pressed against the glass, her mouth hanging open in horror. I looked to my right and saw another panel separating me from Christian.
    He was looking at the ground, shaking as hard as me. A snake lay at his feet, its head caved in. My stomach heaved and I covered my mouth, willing myself not to be sick.
    The panels slid up, disappearing soundlessly into the ceiling and walls. Lewis walked over, still with that pleasant smile, like nothing out of the ordinary had just happened.
    ‘The bite is harmless, if a little painful,’ he said in a matter-of-fact tone. ‘We’ll get your wounds tended in a minute but first I want to ask a question of all of you.’ He paused. ‘What was the point of that exercise?’
    No one spoke. Then Skye tentatively raised a hand. Lewis nodded.
    ‘Yes, Skye?’
    ‘Is it, um, that you can’t predict where threats are going to come from?’

    ‘Go on,’ said Lewis.
    ‘Well, um, because of the exercise that we did just before this, Kyla and Christian were expecting the same sort of thing to happen. I mean, for the threat to be the same.’
    Lewis gently clapped. ‘Well done,’ he said with a smile. ‘Top of the class.’
    Stomach still churning, I beamed hatred at Lewis with my eyes. It’s true that I was expecting someone to creep up on me again, but wasn’t there a better way of getting the message across than using a bloody snake ? I realised now that this was what was in Lewis’s mystery box.
    I glanced at Christian, who had a trickle of blood running down the side of his hand. It didn’t look as bad as my wound, though, which was raining crimson drops onto the floor. It hurt so much, I had to keep checking the snake wasn’t still attached to me. I started to shake and had to hug myself to control it.
    I run my fingers over the bumpy skin on my hand that still hasn’t completely healed, remembering how it felt. I guess the experience was a good reminder that I shouldn’t get too relaxed here. I don’t think any of us have families out there, judging by stuff I’ve overheard. No one will miss us if they decide we don’t fit in. A mouthy girl called Renna disappeared in the first few weeks. No one wanted to know where she went. Maybe she went to the Facility. I heard some whispers that she ended up in the loch I can see from the top of the hill.
    I shiver now as I imagine plunging into that inky blankness, fighting for breath as water floods my mouth, murky and bitter. I can’t swim and the thought of drowning has always terrified me. I think I’d take any number of snakes over that.
    All the hairs on the back of my neck seem to ripple then as thunder rumbles in the distance. I’ve turned to look down at the camp, spread out below. There’s not much to see there. The main building looks like something made by a kid with no imagination from grey Lego. There are small windows all across the front in darkened glass. The roof is a mess of satellite-receiver antennae and coiled barbed wire, plus some big square boxes that might be lights. It looks about as welcoming as a smack in the mouth, which is probably the idea. It seems out of place among the swollen purple hills and stormy skies.
    A strange creaking sound makes me turn the other way, away from the camp. I gasp. Right there, near the bottom of the hill, is a huge, majestic stag.
    It has a tangle of rough brown hair down its front like a shaggy bib. Its antlers are white-tipped spikes, like they’ve been dipped in paint, and they curl out so high and wide it seems impossible the animal can support its head. We eyeball each other and I feel a weird happiness that fills my eyes with tears. Then it makes a sort of loud huff before dipping down to munch on some grass. I laugh, suddenly filled