The Operatives

PROLOGUE

THE BEGINNING

It started with the jump.

It was a sunny day with clear skies.

A strange little girl stood in front of the rails that attempted to shield people like her from falling hundreds of feet to the sandy shore below. 'The End' is what the people of Beta City called the daunting cliff she stood on.

Warm thoughts buzzed inside her head as she gripped the rusted guard. So many feelings and emotions beat inside her heart, ran rampant inside her brain and pulsed vigorously through her veins. Yet as she stood at the edge of her impending doom she showed no fear.

Bags lined her sullen, cobalt-colored eyes. A sickening grimace was plastered on her face. She wanted to go further and test her limits.

She wanted to go further and test everyone's limits.

She clambered slowly onto the barrier and counted each passing second in her head. The disturbed young lady admired the azure skies and the teal waves that crashed against the shore and retreated back into the safety of the ocean time and time again. Her eyes swept across the horizon that reached out and seemed to stretch on for an eternity.

This cliff was her favorite place in the entire world.

This was going to be the end.

Her end.

It was going to be majestic and beautiful and free.

She slowly tipped herself forward, feeling her feet roughly slide and skid against rusted metal and then... nothing.

Her short, raven hair whipped at her face and stung her freckled skin as gravity pulled her to the rocky ground that came closer as every second passed.

The jumper squeezed her eyes shut, her grimace turned into a twisted grin that spread across her face as the earth sped towards her.

This was her ecstasy. To feel death's embrace becoming tighter and tighter, wrapping its cold, rough fingers around her throat was an immeasurable sensation. Her breath shortened as blackness enveloped her and white lights unfolded and danced beneath her eyelids.

The fall seemed to last forever for her, but she was in no rush. She enjoyed the feeling of flying. She swiveled around in the air and opened her eyes to view the beautiful blue skies once more, spreading her arms like dysfunctional wings and letting gravity bring her down, down, down.

It was everything she imagined. The weightless feeling. The cold, sharp breeze that stung her teeth as she smiled.

The feeling of freedom.

On the shore, onlookers gasped. Some closed their eyes and others couldn't take their eyes off the falling figure. Children screamed. A teenager whipped out his cell-phone and hurriedly recorded the girl's fall while his mother screamed at him to call for help.

But she was beyond help. And she was beyond healing.

Her body hit the floor and eyes more blue than the deepest oceans fluttered shut.

Her name was Eva.