Inhuman (OLD VERSION; UNFINISHED - SEE NEW BOOK)

Chapter 1 - Jay

The chill of late night air in the city creeps through my body. A shudder courses through me and I lift my gloved hands to my mouth, blowing hot air into them and creating swirls of vapour around me. I pull my jacket tighter around me, the hood covering the cap which conceals most of my face. The darkness of the alley clings to me and I cling to it, hiding in its shadows.

She stands in the bus shelter across the street, clinging to a paper with one hand and her jacket with the other. She shifts her feet, left to right, forcing her body to produce heat. Clouds of vapour leave her mouth and she lifts her jacket higher, blowing warm air in to try and alleviate the cold. She always works until late, is almost always the last to leave.

She doesn't see me. She never sees me, and that's the point. She pokes her head out of the doorway, newspaper above her head, weary of the ongoing rain over the past week.

The sound of heavy wheels rolling through water grows from the end of the street. Lights shine off the roads surface as a bus emerges from around the corner and slows to a stop at the shelter. She runs to it as rain begins to fall, the newspaper poised protectively above her head. Only once she is safely on does the bus pull away, and only then do I leave the shadow of the alley.

For five days and five nights I have watched her, assessed her, unwittingly tested her. She could be the key to our problems, the answer to our prayers, the one to rescue humanity from a plague most don't know exists.

Ahead a car approaches, its lights flashing over me as it passes. I pull the cap down further as though protecting myself from the rain and quicken my pace. I recognise it as the same one that has been making laps of the facility since she started her shift. I've seen them here before, at her school, even outside of her home.

They're watching her, monitoring her even closer now, which means it won't be long before they make their move. If I can get to her first, I can tell her the truth, the truth about our world and the reason for it being this way, how the people she thinks are good are the ones working against her, against us all. 

I quicken my pace and wrap my jacket tighter around me. My orders were to monitor and report back in two days, but I don't think she has that long. The last time they showed interest in someone, that someone ended up dead. If I can get to her first, if I can keep her out of their hands, maybe I can save her. If I can save her, maybe she can save us all.