The Future Stands Still (Book One Of The Risen Angel Trilogy)

Prologue

     As a chemist, his duty was to create new addictions for La Laguna Orthros. Juarez began tampering with black tar heroin; trying to make it better and bring in profit. It ended up not only boosting his value in the cartel but changed everything worldwide. What he created altered the drug to create an all-time edge even Cocaine and Meth could not compete with. It would make you faster, stronger, smarter as if all your senses became heightened. It was a phenomenon, so Juarez told his boss who named the drug Onyx and decided to test it out in the states.

After having shipped off 900 of the small bags, and customers coming back for more, it was a hit. Super stars, models, and regular people all asked for another shipment. Some were high enough in the business asked the boss themselves. After hearing all the demands the boss demanded Juarez to make more. They both had taken it around five times and were enjoying the high when one turned on had turned on the news. There were more deaths all over the states than regular and the body count kept rising. Abnormalities began to grow, a pair of gills, broken arms with feathers in their skin and metal cat claws. It was later confirmed that they had died of Onyx, the new drug sweeping the streets all after their sixth dose. The boss called and asked the chemist to make it more potent with longer effects. I mean, who would not want to feel super powerful all the time and make a profit? So, he agreed and tested it on himself and gained a chilling ability. The boss took the dosage while sellers sold, and things began to change.

The next spawning's skills showed on their fifth year; unique to their genetic code. Schools adapted to the new generation, creating a system based on a child's prowess. Strange abilities ascertained across the world and used for both good and evil. The president at that time went and hid away, scared of what its people could do. How could a bodyguard protect you when fighting a woman made of iron? Or letting an assassin waltz by if they were invisible? After grasping the loss of control, the states went into hiding but left armies to control society. We created levels while military kept order, weaponizing the most powerful into soldiers.

I learned of this in Junior High year 2540, a week before everything snatched from my fingertips. Never understanding then why they treated me like a fragile creature, I understood by the end. The military found my differences a short while after a fight turned into a bloody graveyard. At lunch, big Shirley stated metal bending made her the best and demanded our respect. I ate in silence, listening but not caring up until she demanded my mothers' homemade cookies from me. I told her they were my damn cookies and that I would not share it with her. I stomped my foot in anger and yelled to try and take my cookies if she was as strong as she claimed. This caused a small crack to open up, in the playground gravel. Shirley rolled up her puffy pink sleeves and ran headfirst into my stomach, making me lose my breath. I kneeled on the floor gasping to breath with tears prickling my eyes, and anger starting to settle into my gut. She skipped to my lunch box on the bench and showed off her new cookies to her pose. Pulling myself off the ground, I stared with hate; mother rarely baked, and I sure was not going to let her have them. I stood seething in the back of the playground, wishing she would pay for taking what was mine. It was like the ground around me understood and began splitting from my feet and zig zagged to Shirley. The pose fell first and she vanished soon after along with the surrounding children. Dropping my mouth in shock, my spine and tailbone started searing in pain as if finally bursting open. Twisting around to stop the pain made it flare up more. Curling up and wailing for it stop while tears merged into the sky. My abilities snapped together like a rubber band released from tension. Snowflakes and ashes surrounded me while silver wings flared from my back. A slim pitch-black tail slithered out of my tail bone with a spike at the end with a light shine of honey.

My body ached from the intense magic flow but hummed in approval of it's liberation. I was a changed person not only in appearance and magic flow but in soul as well. Amidst the pain a quartz pendent materialized, the chain dangling to my ribcage. Although it was brand new, I had an inkling of what it was for. A teacher rushed out screaming and yelling, saying I was a murderer and needed locking up. She started walking towards me but by then I was so scared all I thought of was running. I ran in my tattered clothing, stained with blood and wings fidgeting. I got home and ran straight into my mothers' arms as the door opened for her to tend to our garden. Tears streamed down my face and tattered clothing swayed in the wind as I mumbled into her apron that I was sorry.