Resistance to Our New Lives



Resistance to Our New Lives

"Frank!" I exclaimed. His nose looked slightly broken, and his right eye was puffy. His lip was split and blood ran down his face from a cut on his forehead.

"Kelly," He said, reaching out for me. "I thought they got you too…" Frank hugged me, and then started to cry into my shoulder.

"What's wrong?" I asked. How badly was he hurt?

"The only way they would drop the charges was if I joined the military," Frank cried.

"Oh, no," I moaned. "No, Frank, no. You didn't!"

"I had to," He said. "I had to. I start training on Monday." I tried to blink back my tears, but sadness and anger took over. The stupid government, the stupid society...

"You did nothing wrong," I said, stroking his ears. "You did nothing wrong."

"I love you," Frank whispered.

"I love you too."

And we just stood there.


One week later, Frank came back for one last weekend before he was re-located to the base. Thankfully, the stuff they had done so far was "schematics", weighing, measuring, and basic orientation. It was the training at the base we were both worried about. In just a few days, Frank would be sucked into the war machine that was the military.

Two days later, Frank left. We told each other that we'd see them again, but at the back of our minds, we knew that the military would push Frank until he died.

The next day, I investigated to see if anyone had survived that night and escaped the party, like me. Several doors were slammed in my face, several more never opened. Only a few welcomed me in as a friend, and those were the ones I was looking for. The government had gone too far with this one, and now it was time to push back.

Then, Frank phoned me from the base. He told me that the military had created "welfare camps", (although they were more like concentration camps, he told me) that housed more species than the governments had reported.

"More than four?" I asked, running down the list in my mind. Human, dog, cat, rabbit.

"More than four," He had said. At the census taken, an estimated eighty five more species were listed to the list of possibilities the virus could turn a person into. I was appalled.

"Who sanctioned this?" I asked. "Who did this?"

"Everyone," Frank said, his voice weary. "Almost every First World country employed these strategies to suppress all but four species."

"Why?" I exclaimed.

"No one knows," Frank told me. "No one's telling." He told me that a few other soldiers were gathering evidence to try and stop it. He wasn't taking any part in it; he was risking too much just telling me.

Two nights later, it was on the news. There was a public outcry, people in the streets screaming tyranny, and the governments announced that the terrible events had been orchestrated by "terrorists with known associations to rouge military groups". This satisfied the public, and everyone called it a day, crying for the liberation of these camps. I knew the truth, though; I knew that the government had done this, set up the camps, and only choosing the "best" species. The survivors were released, speaking of horror stories and survivor's guilt. People compared these events to the Holocaust.

Three days later, the world leaders agreed to give rights to all the suppressed species that made them equal to the dog, cat, and rabbit people. They did not, however, have equal rights to humans.

Now, what was a possibility was a cold, hard fact; the animal-human hybrid population drastically outnumbered the pure human population. Yet for some reason, it was the humans who had all the power, all the wealth. Somehow, the whole world had entered a global apartheid.


Weeks went by, and slowly, we formed a rebellion. The word spread, and the group grew, becoming groups in other cities, then in other countries. I dropped out of school, and my new family backed me up, sending me to different regions to organize small revolutions; riots, invasions, lootings. But the groups were small, and all of us were unarmed.

Five weeks after this all started, Frank showed up at home, disoriented and delusional. He had a very bad cut on his arm, and he kept repeating "they're dead, they're all dead, they're all dead…" I later learned that Frank had been deployed to wipe out "dangerous terrorist cells" within the country. Those "terrorists" were groups like ours; small, unarmed, and mostly innocent. I never asked how he got cut so badly. I hope I never have to know.

A week later, Frank was well enough to tell me that he had deserted the military, and that he was now a fugitive from the government. The two of us escaped from our homes, keeping in discreet contact with our family. Over the next few days, several other people in our rebel group followed, and we started a small community outside the city. By this time, Frank was well enough to teach our "cell", as we referred to ourselves, how to use guns. That night, the news would report that vandals had broken into and looted several gunshops in the area.

Now, we were armed and dangerous.


After several more weeks of training, cells across the continent moved at exactly the same time, targeting military outposts and bases. In unison, fifty-three bases were attacked, and of those, forty-seven were taken successfully. We grew in power, and soon the government started to show its fear of us. Laws were made that forbade all animal-people (now labeled "animalias") to leave their homes without a human contact, and martial law was declared in several areas around the U.S. and Canada. Animalias had to have I.D. at all times, even in their homes.

Around this time, the military performed "raids" on "terrorist cells" (mostly just groups of civilian animalias), capturing them and forcing them to train in the military. Soon, 98% of the military were animalias, as humans began to get a conscience and stopped enrolling in the military. To prevent any rebellions in the army, they employed shock collars on all animalias. No one cared, not even the PETA

The society that was running so well before had collapsed due to an unprecedented event, and then rebuilt itself in the worst way possible. Now, it was crumbling once again, from the inside out. The news had kept all of this on the down-low, so civilians had no clue that there was a rebellion group, growing in numbers around the world every day. We were secret, we were infiltrating, we were everywhere and could be anyone. We could be the bunny stripper that you just gave a twenty to, the cat maid that cleaned our house, the dog butler that gives you the mail. In all levels of society, were watched, and we planned. Society had pushed us down, and now we were getting ready to push back.


That started four months ago.

Now, I was the leader of all rebellion groups in my city, even though I was living nearly ten miles away. My adopted family accepted this when Frank and I left, and proclaimed that I had "run away" when the cops showed up. They had told me that the cops stopped looking for me a few days after that.

Frank now worked in the field, part recruitment officer, part arms dealer, part weapons trainer. I smiled as I monitored the "secure access transmissions" from the capitol to the local military. A raid was going to take place tonight, to "recruit" more soldiers for the military. I glanced at the time, doing the mental math. Thirteen hours until the raid took place. Good, that meant there was plenty of time to plan.

"What happened?" I said to Frank, who stood behind me. I heard him come in.

"What, no, 'Hello, good to see you're still alive'?" He said sarcastically. I turned, flashing him a coy smile.

"Hello, good to see you're still alive," I said. "Really, though, what's happened?"

"A couple of people came in today," Frank said. "It was a close call. After I took them away safely, the government arrived and searched the place."

"Did anyone see you?" I asked.

"Nope. I was just another civilian animalia, obediently driving his contact to work." Frank smiled. "It's almost too easy." Walking to him, I put my arms around him.

"They think we're stupid," I said, hugging him. "They think we can't possibly plan to overthrow society. Not this violently, or by any means, actually. They live in fear of us, fear that we will rise, but they live in contempt of us, because we're different." I looked up at Frank, who was staring off in the distance.

"I know," Frank said. "And someday, this will all be over." Looking down at me, he smiled. "I promise." We kissed, and the moment seemed to last much longer than it actually did. Then, Frank's cell phone rang. He sighed and answered it.

"What?" He said. After a moment, his ears perked up, and his eyes widened. "Really?" Frank said excitedly. "Alright, we'll be there. Fill me in on any developments as they happen. And not a moment sooner!" Frank hung up and took me by the arm. "Come on!" He said urgently.

"What?" I asked. "What just happened?"

"They found it," Frank said, smiling. I stared at him.

"How?" I asked.

"Very easily," Frank said, still smiling. "We thought that it would take more time, given our resources and limited technology, but… we found a cure."

Then, Frank gave me a big, gleeful smile.

"It's finally the beginning of the end."