Milk 3.0

This is the private journal of

Samuel Clemens

April 20/ 2032

It’s been three days since my last entry. I’ve been tied up for a couple of days. When I say “Tied up,” I mean it literally as that’s the way I woke up yesterday; Tied to a bed with an intravenous drip in my arm.

Panic set in, even before I opened my eyes, as I quickly realized I couldn’t move my arms or legs. My senses went to full-on mode as I opened my eyes and saw I was alone in a small room. No, not really a room, but a small area that was surrounded by plastic sheeting.

I tried to sit up, which was difficult because of the straps holding my wrists and ankles. After struggling for a little while, trying to break free, I gave up and tried calling for help. I could hear people talking, somewhere close, and tried to call out but couldn’t manage much more than a whisper.

Fully awake now, the memory of what happened was becoming much clearer and fear rose in my throat as I saw the words on that sign in my mind’s eye. “Keep door closed during Milking.”

My mind wouldn’t, or couldn’t, process those words as truth. I refused to believe that this place, the place that we all escaped to, was doing the same thing that Carla and her gang were doing. This place, Eden, was even worse as they were forcefully drawing sperm from not only men but also young boys. How could this be true?

Forcing myself to concentrate, I closed my eyes and tried to make out all the sounds and scents around me. I could hear people talking in whispers as they drew closer to my plastic cage. But the smell is what enveloped my thoughts. These smells were engrained in my soul. Growing up on a small farm a few hours north of Toronto, I knew the smell of a hay barn. I lived with the smell of hay and cow shit all through my youth, until I fled to the city to build my own future.

My mother was proud and happy that I stood up for what I wanted in life but my father, well, he was a different story. We didn’t speak for ten years after I left but I was the last person that spoke to him before the cancer caused by the Bump took his life.

The guilt of fracturing my family has lived in the corners of my mind for the last fourteen years. The phone systems collapsed shortly after my father died and the only contact I had with my mother for the following year was through a short wave radio owned by her neighbour. We would talk every Sunday at noon, for a few minutes, until that one Sunday they didn’t answer. For several months after, I tried every day to reach them but all I got back was static.

The turning point for me came on the day that my apartment was broken into by rampaging teens. I was beaten badly and left for dead, for what little supplies I had, and after several days of nursing my wounds, I started the five-day trek north to my childhood home.

After five days of walking, I arrived at what used to be our small farming village. There was nothing left standing as every house was burned to the ground. My childhood home looked like a war zone with burnt-out vehicles and small pieces of wood and brick that were once our house. I sifted through the rubble looking for anything that would give me some clue of my mother’s fate. To my great relief and the only thing that gave me any hope, I didn’t find any bodies. Either they’d escaped to someplace safe or they were taken prisoner. To this day I don’t know the answer to that question.

The only thing I found of any value that day was the heart-shaped locket my mother had always worn around her neck. It held a picture of our family, showing two proud parents holding a smiling baby boy.

For several years that locket was the only thing I possessed that held any true value to me. That is until the day that Jennifer broke my arm, for the first time, and confiscated it.

It was shortly after the milking began and Jennifer, Carla’s second in command, was collecting anything metal from the men. My anger rose as she removed the locket from around my neck and I screamed, “No!” as I pushed her to the ground. This resulted in one of her team smashing her rifle into my head and knocking me to my knees. That’s when Jennifer, who loved nothing more than inflicting pain, walked to me holding the steel bar she always carried. She smiled down at me, as her friend held a gun to my head, and swung that bar as hard as she could breaking my right arm at the elbow.

I never saw the locket again after that day.

The tears caused by these memories were flowing down my cheeks when the plastic door to my cage was pulled back, revealing a smiling Michael and his sister Lina.

Lina spoke first, “You’re awake. Thank God, it was touch and go for a while but late last night you started to improve and we knew you were coming back.”

Her obvious joy at seeing me awake startled me and left me speechless. I started pulling on my restraints, trying to free myself until Michael rushed to my side and said, “Whoa, hold on a second,” before removing the straps and helping me up.

They spent the next few minutes explaining what had happened and why I was restrained.

Lina said, “We found you outside the milking building. You had a large gash on the right side of your head and we couldn’t wake you. For the last couple of days, you’ve been thrashing around and screaming to the point that we had to use the restraints. You were hurting yourself.”

I stared at her dumbfounded before asking, “Why is there a milking building, Lina? What the hell is happening here? You said this was a place where we all would be free and work together.”

Michael, looking confused spoke next, “That’s exactly what Eden is, Samuel. I don’t understand what you’re talking about. Why would you think it’s something different?”

Getting angry, I replied, “I saw a young boy coming out of your milking building, holding his groin and crying in pain. What should I think? I’ve lived that pain for over three years.”

That’s when they both started laughing before Lina said, “That was, Tommy, Michael's son. He was crying because Stacy just kicked him in the balls. He’s fine and didn’t suffer any damage.”

I couldn’t believe that Michael was laughing about some woman kicking his son.

He continued laughing as he helped me to my feet and said, “I think we need to introduce you to Stacy.”

We walked together to the milking building with Lina telling me not to worry and that everything would make sense in a minute. I froze as we got to the door that said, “Keep door closed during milking,” and Lina said, “Don’t worry Samuel. Everything is ok. This is not what you think.”

We walked into what I thought would be my nightmare, to find that the sound I heard was from a generator that provided heat and light to the twenty or so milking cows that lived there. All of the cows were being hand- milked by teenage children, except one.

Lina and Michael walked me to the cow at the end that wasn’t being milked; just as it started kicking the stall.

Lina smiled as she rubbed my shoulder and said, “Samuel, I would like you to meet, Stacy.”

****

April 21/ 2032

As I write this everybody in Eden is working on fortifying the village and preparing for an attack. Michael and four of his team were doing their daily rounds of the area this morning when they were ambushed. About three miles from the village they came across a band of heavily armed women, camped on the river’s edge. The woman, maybe twenty in all, immediately opened fire on Michael and his team.

Michael and another member of his unit were wounded, before returning fire and escaping into the forest to find themselves trapped with their backs against a cliff wall. They took cover behind trees and started picking off the intruders as they advanced across the open grassland.

Michael said that they downed four or five of the band but were in real trouble as they were running out of ammunition. They had nowhere to go and felt doomed as the invaders got closer until fate stepped in. Just as the attackers got within a hundred feet of cover a group of rampaging moose charged into their midst, causing chaos and confusion as Michael’s unit escaped around the rock wall and into the dense forest.

They arrived at the village wounded and exhausted, ordering everybody not part of the defence team into the underground shelter.

The team worked like a well-oiled machine as they set up defensive positions around the perimeter of the village. I watched, in astonishment, as eight perfectly camouflaged snipers dropped into small holes in the ground before pulling false grass over their heads.

I was given a gun and took up position on top of the school with four other shooters. I hadn’t shot a gun in many years, but would defend this place with my life.

****

April 22/ 2032

Today we buried the bodies of our attackers; all but the two that survived and were being questioned by Michael’s team.

The village was dead silent when they appeared out of the eastern forest and walked towards the milking building. There were only twelve of them, so the moose must have eliminated several. It was over in seconds as the ground snipers popped out of their holes and mowed them down before they had advanced more than a few hundred feet.

Lina called me to the downed attackers and asked me did I recognize them. She knew what my answer would be as they were several of the most violent of Carla’s followers. I looked at the bodies of the women that had beaten and tortured several of my friends before going to the two survivors.

The one sitting against a tree with her hands tied behind her back I didn’t know so I walked to the one that was lying face down and moaning in pain. She was shot in both legs and Michael rolled her over as I approached.

A rage I never knew I had exploded out of me when I saw her face.

It was my torturer, Jennifer, and I lost all control as I jumped on her and wrapped my hands around her throat. Michael grabbed me from behind, pulling me away as he said, “No, Samuel. We need information.”

He was walking me away from her when I turned around begging him, “Wait please. Just one second. I need to check her for something.”

Michael agreed when I told him what I was looking for and walked me back to her. She had lost consciousness so I bent down and searched her pockets’ finding nothing. I was about to give up but Michael said, “Wait a second,” and ripped the front of Jennifer’s shirt open, revealing the locket around her neck.

He lifted her head as I gently removed the locket and hung it around my neck.

I could feel my mother’s heart beating next to mine as I walked away, with tears streaming down my face, to be alone with my family.