Requiem

Chapter Eighteen: FINAL

Air floods through my lungs, inflating them like balloons. My eyes snap open, wide with shock, and I let out a sputtered cough. Bright light shines in my eyes, blinding me, darting back and forth across my face. Faces appear briefly between the bright flashes of light and voices sound from millions of miles away. 

“She’s stable,” A feminine voice drones. 

"Scar," A familiar voice soothes, "Hey, can you hear me?" 

My eyebrows furrow. The haze slowly starts to lift as several hands help pull me up into a sitting position. My fingers curl around the edge of the capsule I seem to be sitting in, one hand clenched tightly around someone's thumb. I blink several times, trying to make sense of everything that's going on around me. 

And it isn't until I hear, "Owe, owe, owe! Scar, you're killing my thumb!", that everything shifts into place.

"Jasper!" I gasp, fingers spreading wide, back hitting the opposite side of the capsule. I try to scramble back further, images of his animated corpse flashing through my mind's eye. 

He frowns, holding both palms up. "Scar, it's okay!" 

"You're dead!" I shout at him, pointing accusingly.

"Not really," He shouts, pointing back, smiling slightly, "They lied to you."

I stare at him for a few moments, "Who?"

Jasper gestures to the room around us. For the first time since my eyes opened, I look around, taking in the strange sights around us. Silver colored tubes and hoses cover the ceilings, the walls, rushing through a thick plate of glass into the next room -where huge computers and machines are set up. Several people sit behind the desks, typing away or fiddling with buttons -completely ignoring us. 

I sit in the capsule, the Activity Pod I'd climbed into for my annual check. The nylon lid is lifted, high into the air, and Jasper sits beside it, Mo and Sebastian standing behind him. Sebastian smiles at me warmly, something akin to relief swimming inside his dark eyes. Monique stands beside him with her arms folded across her chest. 

She smiles at me, "Well hello there, Sleeping Beauty."

"You're alive." I let out a hysteric laugh. My shoulders sag and I slump down against the side of the pod, staring at the trio, overcome with relief. 

"Indeed," An unfamiliar voice echoes through the room, "You're all alive; perfectly safe and healthy," A man slows to a stop at the foot of the Activity Pod, a clipboard in his hands. He adjusts his glasses, pushing the circular frames further up his nose, and smiles gently my way, "Welcome back, Scar. Do you know where you are?"

"Am I being pranked?"

"No," He lets out a laugh, shaking his head, "You were a part of an experiment." 

I stare at him, like he's just grown a third eye. Then my father steps out from behind him, smiling weakly, and says, “Allow me to explain..."