Inherently Innocent

Following The Moon

“Where are we going?” Thyme asked.
“To the front garden,” The guard made a nodding movement for them to follow. The black mask over her face seemed to him thinner than others. He could make out the soft contour of her face.
They walked down the hallways, few small windows Thyme wouldn't give a second look made a pattern, letting few sunrays in. Several other locked doors clung to the walls in patterns intertwined with the windows. Thyme could only assume they were hiding other isolated nymphs behind. He didn’t want to know how many people, even children, could be there.
While his head looked left, staring at the iron doors, the guards turned right. Liliac, who had stayed behind to stare at the windows, approached him at that moment.
“There is no garden,” she whispered again.
Thyme felt time slow down.
“What?”
“There is no garden. Why would there be? This place is designed to keep nymphs weak. The few that do know how to use their powers aren't allowed to work the fields that often,” Lee looked to the side, back through the hallway, and then back to Thyme.
They were not going to be killed. They’d get out of there alive.
Fake guards had come to save them, but he could tell Liliac thought they were going to kill them. Or maybe for the guards to save them was worse than death for her. After all, even if they were there to save them, what was stopping actual guards from killing them afterwards?
“Why are we going to the garden, shouldn’t there be more,” Thyme spoke to the guard, but looked at Lee. The girl’s eyes were stuck on the floor. “Labour and experiments? That’s what goes on here, right? We can be useful.”
The guard didn’t stop talking, but she looked over her shoulder.
“Listen, just follow me, alright? You’ll have no trouble, trust me and you’ll be fine.”
The couple exchanged worried looks but reached a silent agreement.
Each step seemed eternal as Thyme analyzed every exit he could find. From running, to hiding, to attacking. The thought of taking the guard’s taser came to mind, and that’s when he realized she had none.
Had his dad sent them? Could he have? He had acquaintances with ishine and nymphs, Glenn probably managed to break him out. What if his mother had come back to save him? If she was waiting outside? Thyme couldn’t help but laugh. A single ha sound escaped him. He didn’t have to worry. He was safe.
They walked into a large room, the ceiling about four stories high, with white lamps replacing the lack of natural sunlight. It reminded Thyme of the school gym, but if the school gym had been thrown into jail.
Nymphs were scattered throughout performing various jobs. Some just simply carried stones from one place to another, some were powering the machines by guiding lightning from their skin into machine wires. Each nymph had their task, and each area had their respective armed guard. The lingering tension closer to the corners quietly whispered how the guns of guards closer to the nymphs in charge of electricity weren’t just tasers.
“Come on,” Liliac called for him without pulling his hand. The guards were waiting for them further on, a vast space between them, “I don’t know why the guard’s so patient.”
Thyme knew, but he feared telling Lee would be an issue. After all, would she agree to leave even if it was so easy?
They entered another hallway, one that went into the last door. It was the door he had been pushed through when he still had handcuffs around his hands. There was a door protected by an armed guard, with another door covered in wire and an electrified fence in front of it.
“Open up, I’m taking these two to governor Marull,” The guard stated with no fear.
“Not without explicit permission you aren’t,” One of the door guards walked forth, taking out his taser as he approached the nymphs. He seemed tired, he wasn’t even wearing his helmet and instead just eyed the four people with swollen eyes. His boring shift was not about to end, “Show me a document or something at least.”
“Sure, it’s right here,” The shorter fake guard offered a hand. The real guard, in his sleepy state, automatically took her hand. The fake guard grabbed the man’s hand tightly and pulled him in. In a swift movement, she took the taser gun from the man’s side and shot him.
The guard fell to the floor, maybe just too tired to even fight back. The second guard made no reaction, Thyme didn’t either. Only Lee spoke.
“Ok, what the hell?”
“Let’s get out of here,” The second guard unlocked the electrical fence, slamming the labeled switch that rose from the side.
“What about the others back there?”
“We have no time, we have to leave and plan a return later.”
“That wasn’t the plan!"
“You didn’t know the plan, let’s go.”
The fake guards argued with each other while Liliac and Thyme’s mind raced through every possible scenario of failure. Maybe get caught, maybe get killed, maybe escape and be shot in the back.
“We don’t have time for this, Aloe!”
The shorter guard opened the door, slamming the wire fence against the wall. She quickly moved to open the other one while the second masked guard walked closer to the nymphs.
“Listen Thyme, we’ll explain later. Right now, we need you to make some noise. Block the door as we leave, shake the ground, break a wall if you have to.”
“How do you know me?” He asked.
“They said we’ll explain later!” The shorter fake guard opened the second door before hurrying back to kick the real knocked down guard in the stomach. “Now, outside,” She pulled Liliac’s hand and started walking.
Thyme got to work. He ran outside and hurried to the side of the entrance pavement. The sun on the grass was bright, with no concrete walls to block the light. Thyme laid his hands on the dirt, falling to his knees in joy, feeling the blades of fertile grass tickle his fingers. He looked at Lee as the girl shook her head. But Thyme couldn't trust Lee's instincts. He buried his fingers on the wet dirt, feeling the earth dig under his claws. He begged the earth to answer. He prayed for it to help. Thinking of the ishine inside, asking for the dirt to be gentle with them. He amplified the earth's desire to move. And the ground agreed to move.
The two fake guards and Liliac were already outside when the dirt rose to cover the structure’s door. A wave of stone breaking against the building, but frozen in place like a picture.
Grass hung from the elevated stone, breen blades that would soon turn yellow and brown. The earth had sacrificed those plants for Thyme's wish of protection. Maybe that was what Liliac thought. Maybe that was what Liliac felt. She could be just as natural as the earth that had risen, even if she was siding with the humans.
Thyme remained kneeling with dirty fingers, staring at his piece of art until one of the fake guards lifted him from his shoulder.
“We’ll get them back. We have to go,” The shorter fake guard took off her helmet. She had long curly hair, tied in a ponytail away from her face. She also had an expression of alert on her black eyes. She looked human, with a familiar dark face. He remembered that look from the training groups, also felt like he’d seen it somewhere else. Whatever memory it unearthed, it was linked to his mother. Thyme couldn't tell if it was because the earth he guided had told him that story, or if the girl who helped them was related.
Thyme wanted to ask why she was helping if she was just a human, but he remembered he looked human too. The girl must have been a hiding nymph.
He looked over at Liliac.
“Let’s go, Lee,” He offered a hand.
The girl didn’t take it. Instead, she fixed her hair over her eye and started walking.
Then the guards started shooting.
Bullets sounded off in the distance until they started landing near the escapees.
The human looking girl put her helmet back on and started running. Behind followed the other fake guard. Thyme went third, going fast, but not as fast as he could. He stayed close to Liliac, scared she might run back, get shot, or trip and give up.
The sun, surrounded by clouds, was right up in the sky making it impossible to measure a direction with it. But the dirt in Thyme's fingers told him he was facing west. Towards the wild lands of the ishine.
Alarms started to sound from Program Imaginaria and deep shouts of the guards organizing echoed inside. More bullets rained, awfully close to the group. Liliac ran, stepping on her feathery dress until the purple stripes of the rainbow could no longer hold on. The feathers flew behind, leaving a purple trail for the wind to carry away. Thyme stopped to look back, seeing the feathers rise and leave, the earth he rose was still in the distance. The Program was in chaos shortly after his entry. He could change things.
Liliac ran past him, and he could see the chaos that followed her in her eyes.
All the other nymphs left behind would have to pay for their crime. Maybe that was part of Liliac's train of thought, the reason behind the guilt in her face. But there’d be a time later to save them. And for some reason, he fit into the plan.
Thyme ran.

The four reached a hill barely visible from the settlement, with a forest growing on the opposing side. Thick and straight trees with wild branches and no cuts enjoyed the quiet. A single tree with purple flowers adorned the centre of the forest, with its ornaments shaped like bells.
The fake guards fell on their knees to crawl under a lifted root, down into a large burrow. Thyme followed suit when the two vanished underground. He offered a hand to Liliac, but she still didn't take it.
The burrow resembled a large basement, with several rooms in idea, but a single shape and no doors in practice. It had the human difference that a small fire burnt to the side. Smoke didn't pile up. Some holes to the side of the dirt wall seemed to do the ventilation trick.
Nymphs closed in to take a look at the new ones, but they kept their distance as if they were igneous.
The human looking girl dropped her helmet by the entrance and untied her hair. The other fake guard did the same, surprising the new couple with the view that their head was adorned by long red flowers. Thyme recognized them thanks to his father. Aloe Vera flowers, they used to be called. An ishine, with their green skin and golden eyes. The ishine was wearing clothes, unusual for their kind that was often displayed in class as running around naked, or with plants and furs around their waist to teach the youngest of kids. Even weirder was the fact the shirt, even under the lying grey jacket, had the letters P and I embroidered in its back. They had gotten their hands on a guard uniform from Program Imaginaria, shirt and all.
"Leave your stuff by the door," The human turned to point at the spot for the two nymphs to leave their stuff before realizing they were carrying nothing. "Ok, you might want to sit down, I'll be with you in a moment."
The girl walked away to talk with the staring nymphs. They cheered quietly, having succeeded in their plan. A small girl of primary school age jumped around the older kids, clapping her hands. If they had been in the settlement, Thyme could see them cheer with some wine brought over by Cove Marull. At least that's how his father celebrated the ending of each school year. With a glass of wine and the talk of students. The nymphs, that day, cheered with their anxious eyes looking back and forth at the new nymphs.
Thyme looked back at Lee, and how her hand scratched the side of her arm until her pale skin was red. He hurried to pull her wrist away from herself.
"Don't do that, we're safe here."
"The Host will find us," She mumbled, "He'll find me and he'll kill us all. Or worse."
Thyme knew she wasn't lying. Ocarina had whispered about how Liliac often lied, about how she would do anything to keep nymphs in the Program. But she was free now. It would take longer to be free of almost a decade of a different life. And even still, Thyme himself had to be freed from the life he had lived in the settlement. What life was there left for the nymphs to live?
The human looking girl approached them again, with a smile on her face, "We have some talking to do."