Danger Days

Look Alive, Sunshine

The pristine white walls were slowly suffocating her. She knew she had to get out of there. Out of that place of emotionless white and black. She wanted to feel something. Even pain was better than nothing. Maybe that was why she always hid the pills under her tongue until her father left the room, finally spitting the evil white tablet into the toilet or the garbage can.

The pills had become a standard, you took them once a week at age five, and daily once you turned ten. She had never liked them. As a child, she loved to laugh and play and sing. Once she took the pills, however, her mind told her she was content to sit around and listen to brainwashing transmissions and Mousekat cartoons. The rest of her rebelled. That wasn't what she wanted, it was what the drugs said she wanted.

She never had a name, the name her mother had given her at birth died with her seven years ago, in the fires of 2012. Her father and she had barely escaped with their lives, fleeing to the last safe place left: LA. Or, as it would come to be called, Battery City. Sure, a good half of the city was still nothing more than charred rubble, but the other half was supposedly lush and thriving. And it was.

She hated it. From the moment they arrived she hated that city. But it was for the best. They were safe now.

Her radio was her best friend. It was really her only friend. At first she could never get a signal. She would try and try for hours on end. There wasn't much else to do.

That's when she found it. Dr. Death's radio station, channel 109. She always listened to it, dreaming of a day when she herself could become a Fabulous Killjoy

That was a year ago. She was young. It's 2019 now, and she's grown up quite a bit even though she's only 19. She's had to, to keep her sanity.