Grey

Crossing the streets in the busy concrete city, I had been happy. It was a grey day, overcast with solid-looking clouds, though not cold.

I was perusing amid the shops, browsing amongst this and that, forgetting for a moment the descent of the area around me; the crime sprees, the underground slave traders, and the frequent ASIO stings set up by the government to trap those involved in the gangland activity.

On the surface, everything appeared as normal, and, save for the occasional soldier posted at the intersections by Swanston St, and the khaki green jeeps and black vans that kept a vigil on the city's activity, one could imagine that the country had not fallen to the rebels, and that it was business as usual in Melbourne.

They said each night the rebels grew stronger and that slave trading was fast becoming a growth industry in the underground world. That the black market was expanding into bigger and better things, advancing with the times and accomodating each buyer's tastes with their produce from what was now most commonly called 'the flesh pits'.

However to the common eye, to the public and the consumer, the underground battle seemed a distant one. The only news of the war with the rebels was what filtered through the media. For the right price though, one could easily buy information from various sources, and word travelled quickly through the grapevine. It became hard to determine fact from fiction, as the rumors spread. The latest leak was sprawled on the headlines.

I passed a newspaper stand, glancing at the front cover of The Australian that told all about he latest discovery that the slave traders were directly linked with the streetwear coup in the centrals. The youth were being targeted and recruited, it said. Brainwashed.

A blind lady reached out and grabbed my arm. She asked me if I could help her cross the busy Brunswick St.

I obliged, and halfway across the road the old woman's knobbly bony fingers dug into my arm and she held me still. A van pulled up beside us and a man and a woman, both dressed head to toe in black, jumped out.

The man held me still and the woman ripped the back of my jumper from my neck. She looked at the tag and said to the man "that's it" and he wrenched the jumper down around my shoulders as if he could take it off me that way.

He twisted my arms behind my back and handcuffed me, jeering about how smart I must have thought I was to walk around in the streets wearing that and not think I would be caught. I knew now at once that he referred to the coded uniform of the rebels, and I began screaming at him, to the woman, to anybody, that there had been some mistake; that this was simply a common jumper bought from the department store, and a simple iron-on transfer bought in the same way, not even near the chain stores and streetwear stands rumored to be linked with the rebels.

But they ignored me, and hustled me along out of the street.

The next thing I knew, I was in their camp. I was chained, arm by arm, to the nearest line of of 'convicts' ready to be loaded into the next truck that was bound for somewhere only the Agents knew. The whisper of 'slave trader' was all around me now and I pleaded for someone to release me, I screamed that I was innocent. The other rebels chained to me ignored me, as though I were not there.

Agents and wardens passed me, one lashed out at me to keep quiet, and smacked my face harshly. I was crying hard, desperately pleading with them, anyone to please understand.

I fell to the ground, the shackles pulling at my wrists as the chain gang progressed forward, but I didnt care. I got to my feet and once again yelled at the top of my lungs. Desperation and fear were seizing me.

A passing woman, walking with the agents who caught me, stopped by me and looked me over. She was dressed in a semi-military fashion, with a small patch of badges on her left lapel. I had seen her before. I had seen her at one of the streetwear stands said to be linked with the underground rise. She had seen me there, she had seen me pass by, hands in my pockets, nose wrinkled as I had increased my pace to hurry past the stand. She had been undercover, she had seen me, surely she would order me to be loaded first into the truck.

As she gazed at me, I saw the memory register in her eyes. She remembered.

"She's not one," I heard her say to the man who had cuffed me. "Release her."

I crumpled at her feet and groped upward, clutching her hand and thanking her over and over and over. She removed her hand from mine, said "You're welcome" flatly, and, eager to continue work, briskly walked on down the line.

The man uncuffed me, and walked off in the same fashion. All of a sudden the trucks moved out, the lines were hustled away, and I was alone in the empty camp.

I collapsed to the ground and cried with deliverance.

I was saved.

Isn't that the weirdest fucking dream?

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