Immortals

Interlude // Shane

I had just fallen asleep when the guards came in and dragged me away.

For a fleeting moment, I had hope. Hope that I was on my way to freedom, by some otherworldly miracle. However impossible escape was, I let myself believe for a split second that I was free from the fate that awaited me.

It was foolish of me to hope. I knew deep down that I was heading towards the end. My time with my mind and my free will was over. The time between me and the fate of all of the captured Unfavorables before me was narrowing.

And as I was chained to a table in a blindingly white operating room, the last glimmer of hope I had immediately flickered out and died. This was it. My final moments.

I was not going to let myself cry. I couldn't cry, not here, not in front of the people who would steal my life from me. I would stay strong, despite the tears prickling in my eyes. I would not let them see me break, no matter how close to my breaking point I was.

"Wait here," one of the guards said in a deep, burly voice, as if my chained up body could leave like they were.

"I thought you were going to brainwash me. Isn't that part of your protocol?"

I had no clue what inspired the first scratchy words I spoke in over twenty-four hours to be a sarcastic jab at a government guard, but the wave of regret I felt after those words was strong. I braced myself for abuse, the ordeal I had been through the previous night strong in my mind. A knife against my skin, blood, scars, demands for me to betray my friends that I refused to meet.

The scars had not healed in the slightest and the blood still stained me, almost like I was meant to be reminded of my continued defiance. As if I would only be clean when I submitted to their control

"Letting the boss deal with you. Her orders."

And with that, the room was empty of everyone except for me. I, Shane Golden, was alone and soon to lose myself all because I didn't feel romance like "normal" people did and didn't fully feel like a boy.

It was sick, how the world could create so much hate. A hate that was so strong that they believed eradication to be the answer. Eradicate the ones that they hated, regardless of the reason that they were hated for, and only keep the ones they viewed as up to their seemingly impossible standards.

Now, because I was not a miracle that could do the impossible, I was going to essentially die. This was the end of my life, alone and injured. There was no escape. My grave had been dug, and I hadn't even gotten the chance to say goodbye to my friends.

I didn't get to say goodbye.

It was with that realization, that dose of grief, that I finally let myself cry for everything I had been through.