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Chapter 1
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When I open my eyes, pain torments my form. Sickly tenderness surrounds every curved bone in my ribs and when I roll, the skeletal structures seem to snap themselves under the pressure. I imagine a mighty cracking boom and tiny fragments of bone floating in the space between organs. In light of that awful possibility, I force myself to think of something good. That's the only way to get through things nowadays. Think good thoughts.
Relief floods. If I feel pain I'm still alive. That's the light in the dark. The relief quickly fades as the tender area tightens. I can only groan and take short pants to reduce the torture. It barely lessens the fear that with one wrong, ill-timed breath, I could snap a vital bodily structure, but I'll take what I can get.
Still panting, I carefully reach out into the darkness, expecting to feel the rubble, maybe even the bodies of Jewel and Adonis. I refuse to think Adonis may be sprawled in front of me, immobile as stone, the iron bars having taken his last breaths. To think when Jewel let go of my hand and smacked somewhere in sharp, glass-ridden rubble, that that was our last moment together. That would mean I lost everything I loved and lived for, in one night. I can't even come to terms with that. It's a nightmare too awful to dream.
Instead of either visions becoming reality, my fingers glide across a soft, flannel blanket. I jolt.
The bones at my side grate together, pinching a nerve, and I holler, immediately dropping back down. The sensation continues in rolling aftershocks. All I can do is scream until my voice cracks, frantically gripping fistfuls of my sheets.
Feet pound in my direction. Cold hands flip me onto my hollow belly. I scream as rib bones grind together and grab the hand that pokes my side. My angry, fearful fingers crush the foreigner's hand into a tight ball.
"Who are you? Where is my family?"
"Nurse, sedate her!"
"Someone help me! Where are they?!"
The nurse lifts the tip of my gown, exposing my back to the cool air. I think of home and the lake breeze in the summer. Of Kerry's smile. Of good things.
The nasty sting of a long needle brings lost heat back and my screams fade to pitiful whimpers. I'm subdued, trapped in a wounded body with no way to fight.
A kaleidoscope of color dances as I descend into drugged oblivion. I grip the hospital bed, knowing that oblivion might take me to the place where I'm a helpless, lost girl. The place where he would skulk. But I go anyway, just as weak and as defenseless as I was when it happened.
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The drugs dissipate enough that the low hum of a generator reaches my ears. This time when I open my eyes, salty sweat steams off my skin and I shake softly, like a lone, worried pup. But unlike last time, pain has lost its potency. I wriggle cautiously, finding that the violent ache disappeared. I brush my side, feeling smooth, warm skin, even going so far as to gently press it. My breathing steadies and I move with ease.
How long have I been unconscious?
My eyes drink in white walls, the few figures moving from patient to patient, and neatly made beds lined on either side of the room. I shudder, thankful that my sight wasn't permanently ruined. The last thing I would have seen was the horror on Jewel's face and that awful light. What a way to go blind, beholding my hometown's first and last moment of horror.
I'll never take my sight for granted again.
On the bed to my right lies a slender boy who appears to be about my age, nineteen. An odd white cocoon surrounds his leg and a steely contraption lifts it to a forty-five degree angle. I stare unabashed at his carved profile. His chest rises and falls softly. A hot lump works it's way into my cracked throat. Seeing the boy causes Adonis's face to flash before me.
Where is my little brother?
The boy's eyes unexpectedly open and I gasp, partly in surprise and partly because of the strange color of his eyes. There's a remarkable resemblance to the color of brandy and it's startling.
"You're staring at me."
I duck my head.
"I wasn't."
He snorts, rolling his eyes and propping a few pillows behind him. I clear my throat and hope that my dark skin hides the blush blooming in my cheeks. Who would've thought he'd wake up so suddenly?
"Your blush says otherwise."
My face burns. I'm sure in a few seconds it'll be in flames.
"I'm sorry. I lost my sight and you're the first person I've seen."
"You looked up at the light, didn't you?" His tone almost sounds accusatory.
"It was an accident."
"I wasn't judging," he smiles. "Just thinking out loud."
I frown. Nice excuse.
"What happened to your leg?"
"The earthquake threw me out a window. This leg took the fall."
I wince, recalling the jerky snap in my chest when my body slammed into iron bars. His fall had to be considerably worse.
"I'm sorry," is all I can think of to say.
Laughter spills from his chapped lips, the sound reverberating through the nearly silent room.
"Why are you apologizing? Did you break my leg?"
I shake my head and bite back a smile.
"Well then. Don't apologize."
I chuckle and turn away, staring out the window behind me. I don't know what to say anymore, so I pretend to be distracted. All we have in common is our pain and confusion.
Beyond the glass panes lies the rubble of Helion. Only a few strong towers stand amidst the chaos of toppled skyscrapers and powdery debris. I suck in a breath and lean closer to the glass, my heart thumping faster and erratic. I never knew it was this bad. It seemed as if all this only happened to my family. Images of Jewel and Adonis lying dead out there dig into my thoughts and it's not long before wetness rolls down my cheeks.
"We were attacked," the boy says, watching me. "By Grecous."
"Grecous? Who are they?"
"I have no clue. I just overheard one of the Protectorates whispering it." At the mention of the Protectorates my panic lessens. Surely they know what to do, they can fix this.
The Protectorates sworn duty is to protect each and every Helionite from harm. They are also our surrogate parents, seeing as that ancient concept doesn't exist anymore. Advances in science have made it possible to create ourselves from simple petri dishes and synthetic wombs.
All they do nowadays is combine saved sperm with a frozen egg and drop the produced embryo into one of the synthetic wombs in a lab carrying hundreds of them. Nine months later the bun in the oven pops out, nice and toasty. Forget the labor pains, the risks to female health. It's all gone, they say, thanks to all mighty science. Naturally, the role that is no longer needed to create life is only needed in nurturing our growth till we're twenty.
And even then, if you request it, you can dismiss your surrogate parents even earlier. No parent drama or abuse. No angsty teens hating domineering parental figures. We're free, you see?
"Then I suppose the Protectorates will handle it." I may disagree with a few of the Protectorates rules but when it comes to a disaster like this, I'm beginning to see why they are necessary.
"Like they have so far?" The boy smirks. "Have you been asleep this whole time?"
"Actually, I have. What are you talking about?"
"Just look out the window," he says.
"I already have."
"Well do it again."
Pursing my lips, I consent. "I'm looking."
"Where are the Protectorates?" he says, seriousness edging into his tone. I pause, suddenly realizing their absence. Children clutching teddy bears with blown off heads and the stuffing spilling out cry helplessly. Teens holding dead phones in dirty, quivering fingers aimlessly wander the ruins of Helion, our home. Their Graduate Day robes and prissy, pricey ball gowns torn. Their faces covered in soot. No Protectorates labor among the bunch. They don't run over to the crying boy with chapped cheeks and tell him everything's going to be okay. They don't tell the adolescent dragging red bricks off a young girl's crushed body that she's still alive, that nothing ever disturbed our fragile truths.
"Perhaps they're working somewhere else," I whisper.
"Perhaps," the auburn-haired boy replies. Then he scoffs.
Though a few after shocks do rumble underground, the rest of the day goes by relatively event-less. I spend it replaying the slam of my body onto iron bars, trying to decipher if Jewel or Adonis injured themselves with me. It's a terrible way to spend the rest of the day, but I have to know. The worry makes my hands fidgety. It's no use asking the people in white if they have seen a boy identical to me, just eleven years younger. If they've seen a petite, extremely kind, blue-eyed girl. I'm ignored and stabbed with needles as thick as bobby pins, the contents inside making my skin glow and heal rapidly.
They give the boy something that knocks him out flat all the time. He's relatively motionless, only falling into erratic, jerky conniptions once or twice. Each time I fear for his life. That's how bad he jumps and jitters, as if moving to an insidious electric rhythm. The Protectorates and the white coated doctors pass by nonchalantly during the episodes, smirking at one another.
He wakes up when the last of the light vanishes. I offer him a smile of camaraderie and he's about to speak, but a white coat quickly interrupts.
In her arms lies a tray bearing two cups of water, gel with a pig's hair brush, and two thin, electronic headsets. She starts on the boy first, dipping the brush into the gel, making a glush sound in the goop. She swipes it on his forehead. Then she carefully presses the long headset on the full length of his forehead and, remarkably, it stays in place.
"Drink this." She hands him the cup of water. He quickly downs the contents, smacking his lips obnoxiously and sticking his pink tongue out. I stifle an erupting laugh.
She does the same to me. The gel feels like sticky, leftover jam summer gnats would kill for. The metal is so cold it sends shivers down my throat.
After I finish the lukewarm water she takes both our cups and leaves. I watch her retreat disinterestedly until I hear a faint countdown somewhere in the room.
Twenty...
Nineteen...
Eighteen...
Sitting up, I peer around for the sound. I notice that the boy is doing the same thing.
"You hear it too?"
He nods and says, "It's probably this."
He reaches for the headset. His fingers barely brush it before it shocks him, sending him into animal-like convulsions. I yell for the woman but the wild tremors quickly end, leaving the boy motionless on the bed. Drool from his full lipped mouth spills onto the sheets and soaks in.
My mouth hangs open and I reach for him, hoping he's still alive.
Three...
Two...
One...
A curtain of blackness quickly stops me. Then the faint, husky voice of a man says, "Xaro."
Thanks for reading! :P