Gods of Anthem Read Online Free

were trapped inside. He’d bitten me on the finger, just a small pinch, before they’d pushed him from the train and into the green ocean.
    Both bites were excruciating for twenty-four hours.
    One in five people will die; they’ll get bit and immediately flip. I’m one of the other four, and I won’t turn even after I’m dead. An entirely different probability, there. But they burn the bodies here so it’s not even a chance.
    The nurse bandaging my arm watches me warily.
    “Don’t worry”—I check her nametag—“May. I won’t become one. I’ve already been bitten, see?”
    She nods and dutifully glances down at the scars when I raise my pant leg. May peers with a grimace at the white skin pressed into an outline of tiny, perfect teeth.
    Later, she crosses herself when she thinks I’m not looking.
    After another round of spasms, I’m sweating buckets and shivering in a fever. The bite throbs, and the skin around it is itchy and hot.
    When I twist to see it, it looks infected.

Nine
    I am sick. Before, I was very sick, as well. But now, something new has come that doesn’t quite have a name yet, but might look a lot like giving up.
    Mimi shakes my shoulder, and when she pulls away, she wipes her hand on her smock.
    “What’s wrong?”
    I don’t answer. Instead, I roll over, trying to let the fire that’s burning deep in my shoulder catch the rest of me.
    It’ll kill me. That’s my hope.
    Mimi whispers to the others, asking if I’ll be a zombie. They tell her “no,” but she hides her head under the covers at night anyway. I’m the monster under her bed; the bloodshot eyes and moans giving her nightmares are mine this time.

    I really must look terrible.
    It’s apparent, because when they come to take me to the sick bay, they head toward the side where the dead people go.
    This will be my resting place, where I’ll find freedom.
    Finally.
    I’m there for what feels like years, while everyone waits for me to pass. They’re pleasant enough … for strangers.
    No one should have to feel lonely when they die, but we feel so much more than that. We feel left behind, too.
    There will be no funeral, but if the death is quick, then I’m settled.
    Doctors visit, but they don’t really check my chart. One glance at my face, and they move on to the next poor dying prisoner. We’re beyond help, as if we’ve already become ghosts.
    After three whole days of deep sleep, Nurse May tells me it’s a miracle that I’m still alive. I’m unable to croak out a reply.
    Refusing water does no good. She only returns and inserts an IV, guiltily avoiding my glare. It’s obvious May feels sorry for trying keep me alive, even if it is her job.
    My bones poke through my skin at all angles in a grotesque fashion. The sharp pieces of me, they tell a story of what’s left: Nothing.
    Mimi visits, but scurries back from my shooing and leaves me to rest.
    What is there left to do, but die?
    God, just let me die.

Ten
    They’ve placed me in a new part of the island. The birds are loud by my large, unbarred window, and dull sunrays shine through clean panes.
    The smell here is fresh, missing the stench of fear, death, and despair.
    New nurses I’ve never seen before, dressed in regular surgical smocks, look me over with vacant, professional eyes. They are quiet, unsmiling. Another doctor comes in, this one finely dressed, and though I’m certain that I’ve never seen him before, deja vu enters through the numbness.
    The nurse and doctor give me shots, both holding me down like I’d do anything but lie limp on the crisp white sheets.
    He watches me, and compassion fills his eyes, yet there’s something missing. Almost like a copy—a rendering from a very good artist.
    An urge to run from this man with missing puzzle pieces, a kind of Pretend Man, strikes me even in my feeble state. He turns away when that thought arises, as if he can sense the empty I’ve found in him and doesn’t want to frighten me.
    If I could,