Experiment X

Prologue| 13 MISSING    

     So little time has passed, and yet so much has changed. And for the worse.   It took us all by neck-wrenching surprise.   We should have seen something like this coming though. It was inevitable. Unstoppable. Destined to happen sometime. An empire can only last so long. Or so says history. Our past.   And finally it did, happen. But we had become blind. Complacent. Drowning in our self-poured gasoline.  

     All that was needed was a single flicker of a spark. That was all it took. That’s all it ever takes. To consume us all in a skin-scalding, screaming, swallowing terror of flames. A fire that we made, all together dumbly hypnotized in our seeming, blissful ignorance of what was happening. What we all refused was happening. Something of this severity—this heart-breaking horror could never happen. Not to us. To someone else. To some other country. Not us. Never us.  

     It did.

     We were the first to go. And we went out not in ice, but in a blood-curdling inferno.   We didn’t have to look far to find the guilty. A mirror was all that was needed to show who did this. We all had, and still do have a part in the making of our undoing.   We had turned a blind eye. We had turned a deaf ear. We had chosen not to speak. And it let pass.  

     And just look where it has got us, now. Trapped in the smoke and ruins of the once Land of the Free and Home of the Brave, of dreams, beauty, life, and the pursuit of happiness for all. Now it is all shattered. We were a picturesque, silent halfway house of culture and democracy, freedom for all. Now the windows were blown out, blasted, and burnt by the uncontrollable fire. Abandoned with nothing but smoke. And you couldn’t even hold smoke in your hands without it whispering away. Insubstantial. An illusion of grasping. Holding. Clinging on to something.  

     That’s how it all began. It was a quiet, terrifyingly peaceful invasion. Then when we last expected. It happened.   First came the bombs, and in their deadly, devouring devastation, with their fiery masks twisted with sickening mockery: they took first our President, our Congress, our Supreme Court, our Democracy; then, they took our families, our husbands, our wives; our fathers, our mothers, our brothers, our sisters; our friends, our neighbors, our pets; our towns, our cities, our capitols—our lives.   Then out of the smoke, emerged first the Father. He promised change. He promised order. Peace. An end to the bombing. An end to the suffering. The death. All of the pain and sorrow. At the only cost of our unchallenged consent, and with that he took democracy away, everything the United States ever stood for, straight from us, without dissent from any of us. And like before, like super-sized combo meals we all ate it up without a second thought. We were desperate. For anything.

     We were all afraid. We became his Children. Always to be watched and taken care of, under the proclaimed crimson banner of our new emblem: the Phoenix. It was everywhere. The blood-colored flag invaded our homes, our windows, and even our clothes. Our minds. Our lives. We became them, stretching across this New America, threaded with the hopes of this disillusioned harmony, threaded with the blood of all we had lost, our loved ones.   Then came the Whitecoats with their silvery, scientific instruments of torture, of transformation, and of terror. The Fear. The Unknown. The Unseen. No one ever sees them. Only rumors. Horrible, nightmare-giving rumors. But where there are rumors, there are truths. A truth. A terrifying, inevitable truth. Breathless whispers from the dark. From the Black Hole. Escaped only to provide us with these truths. This one truth.  

     Then the Shadows. In their all black. Their patrolling, perpetually prowling Black Holes. That’s what we call them. Their Blacks Vans. Once you’re bagged and thrown into them, you’re never heard from again. You are lost in the Black Hole, forever. It’s like you’ve never even existed. No one speaks about it. Because if you do, even the slightest mentioning of it or inquiry, you’re next. No questions asked.   No one knows what happens to you then. 

They can get you even if you look at the Enforcers wrong, in their padded, bullet-proof armor, constantly holding their guns; always watching with their machine guns high above the sharp, gnarled barbed-wired walls, safely in their Towers. Always. Nowhere is safe now. Nowhere. You can trust no one, not even your own mother, father, brother, or sister, or whoever you have left. You must do as all of us can only do, be silent, and attempt to survive. And if you’re lucky enough, escape. But there is no escape.

     It’s only an illusion.   I’ve seen what they do to those who try to escape. Our Mothers. Our Fathers. Our Brothers. Our Sisters. Our Friends. Strangers. Everyone. Publically. I don’t want to talk about it. But you must watch. Or the Shadows will come for you, and you’ll be next.   God I hate this. All of this. Dammit.   The first to go were expected. We’ve heard about it, and read about it all before.   I don’t even have to say who they are. You know. You know everything.   If you weren’t what you’re supposed to be, you were taken. Even the sick. The disabled. The Old. One of every Twins, as the New America must be perfect, and everyone individual. God, even who they considered Ugly. They called them the Unrights. No one is safe. Not anymore. What fools we all were. What fucking fools. It makes me sick to my stomach. I don’t want to think about this anymore.  

But what I can’t even bring myself to even imagine is now that they are targeting teenagers. Why? Who the hell knows. So many have gone missing. So many. A knock on your door is the same as a bullet through the heart now. It could be you. You never know. It could be you. You.   Listen to me. Do not believe them. Do not believe a word they say. Tell you. Do not follow their orders. You still must be strong. You still must hope. You must believe in life, still. While you’re alive, still. Believe in what once was, will be again. If you don’t, you have nothing. You have no will to survive. And this New America you must survive, or there’s death, becoming another lost in the Black Hole we have created.                  

     This time it is Thirteen. Six girls. Seven boys. Or. Seven girls, and six boys. It is always Thirteen. Chosen out of fear. Our fear. Thirteen teenagers. Randomly chosen, but chosen for the same reason, from all across New America. For a special purpose, the Father will try to convince you. To honor your new country brought from the fire and ashes, reborn again as the Phoenix. But what they will not say is that you are being pawned, as nothing but a piece in their sadistic games, with their Experiments. And these Thirteen will be no exception. But this time, it will be different. Much more deadlier. Much more unbelievable. They will all be part of what the Whitecoats will call: Experiment X.   This has been done nine times. Now it is the tenth. So. That’s 117 kids. 117 kids so far over nine years.  

     But this year’s 13.   Each has been carefully observed, and analyzed.   Each has a story.   And each has an unconditional will of surviving, no matter the costs.   They each have names.   Emberly. Kel. Willow. Quint. Alaura. Bryon. Lelani. Zaden. Tallie. Seke. Anya. Vane. X.  

     But Names now are easily forgotten. Only one will be remembered. Because only one will be able to survive the Experiment X with their life. The One.   The Victor. The X.   It won’t be long now. Until they come for me. You shouldn’t know this. Any of this. But you have a right to know more than anyone. So it doesn’t happen. Time is running out. And there’s still so much you don’t know. So much I wish could tell. But I can’t tell you how I know this, or how I got the information.        

     You must just believe me. That’s all I can ask of you. Please. I love you more than anything.  

     You are the change. You are the difference. You are the small blank space between the horizontal lines. And that space, no matter how miniscule, changes everything. You are hope. You are the reason for hope. For our dreams.   Oh god, I can hear the monstrous sounds of their black van approaching. I knew it would come to this. But I have done my part. I knew the price, and it is worth it. There is one last piece of vital information you must know and it concerns—