Thirteen

Being dead.

I'm tired. For the first time in a while i am tired. I feel exhausted. Exhausted of running, of overthinking, of hiding or lying about my true identity.I should stop. But how can I stop knowing that it's possible to lose myself? Simply. I don't. I keep fighting people who only want to exploit my brain. This is what people from Council do. It takes advantages from special teenagers. They call themselves our creators. We say nature transformed us in what we are today. For them we are a source of power. For nature we are just a number: THIRTEEN.

Hello. My name is Lore, I am 19 years old, almost 20 and I want to be alive again. I am into a tub full of ice and substances that I don't know. But I am not the only one stucked in here. There're other twelve teenagers too. We have been here for 15 years. We look exactly like 20 years old people because they administrate us some pills and a lot of strange liquids every month, but we haven't spent any minute alive since we were five. I don't know them, I have no idea how they ended up in this place. We can only hear voices and feeling how time is passing. The mind is the only thing we can use in our whole body. The rest is basically frozen and I still can not believe I lost 15 years of my life for nothing. 15 years that can't be reversed. 15 years that people from Council decided to take away from me, from us because they think humans being may have some special skills and those skills should show that a person is better than other ones.

But tomorrow is the day we come back to life. To real life. We will be able to breathe again, to walk, to feel somenthing else than ice and cold, to see, to talk, to do normal things that normal people do. Maybe we could fight back against to those who put us here. Three of the doctors who take care of us are coming and while they are giving us the daily pills they start talking.

January 'It's impressive! After such a long time, we are almost done.'

Kevin 'Almost done?! Not at all. The hard work is starting from now. We are far away to be done.'

January' I mean.. We won't be on charge to administrate their medicine, antidots every single day at every sharp hours..not even one second later.'

Liam (ironic smile) 'You will see.. That was the easiest thing you had to do. Like Kevin said: the hard part is coming. We should rest. Tomorrow is going to be a very busy and important day and we must be prepared.'

I can hear them leaving. Even if I am not able to feel any emotion, my brain is full of thoughts. Are they going to do this for us or for them? The experiment is over or it has just begun? Did they get what they wanted from us? We will go to our family or we'll still stay here?

Next day.

All the doctors are coming. I hear voices all around and some objects moving. Everything is prepared, everyone is ready to bring us back to live.

January 'I'm nervous. What if we do something wrong and they will never wake up?'

Kevin 'If they are the strongest, they will. If they not, it means they wouldn't have resisted afterwards anyway.'

What?! What does it suppose to mean? Isn't it 100% sure we will survive? I want to come back to life and I want to live. *15 seconds later, a noise bothered me and apparently the alarm too because it started ringing.

Liam 'What is happening? Why did the alarm start ringing?'

Maison(the oldest doctor) 'A tub is breaking!'

All that was heard was a loud "WHAT?!".

Maison 'Lore's. But..how can this be possible? This glass can't be broken.'

Liam 'We must pull her out and give her the antidot now!'

Kevin 'NO! We take them one at the time. She is number 13 so she is the last one!'

Liam 'Are you serious?! It is very possible not to even get the chance to save her if we do that.'

Maison 'Even if it's broken, the tub can maintain the pressure and the substances inside for ten more hours. We just need to hurry up and we will finish the process in eight hours. If we stick to the plan it will be faster and safer for everyone.'

I am in danger and they do nothing to save my life because they can't give up to their plan? And who broke the glass? Because I can't move and as far as I can see they didn't touch it either. I'm not feeling any different so far. I just want this to be over. Waiting is killing me. I've been waiting for 15 years and I want to make it count. I don't want to die, I need to fight.

After seven hours.

Kevin 'Alright. One more person and that's it.'

Maison 'Everybody, listen to me! I want full attention to Lore's tub. When we pull her out, Kevin, you will administrate her the antidot and take her to the private ward together with January and Primer. After that, all of us will meet in the main room to discuss.'

Everything is perfectly organised. For the first time in a long time I feel the touch of the hands on my body. They are injecting me something red like blood, but it's... the antidot. I think I finally can fall asleep and stop thinking. My mind needs a break and now it's the perfect time to make sure it receives this rest. Sleepy feeling is the best fee...( she fell asleep).

Liam 'Something is wrong. She is still cold.'

January 'It's OK. Maybe the antidot is going a little bit slower on her than it is going on the others. A few more minutes extra and the body temperature will be normal.'

Maison 'Good job, everyone! Congratulations! Kevin, please take Lore into her room. And now, let's meet in one hour to talk about the new big step for humanity. These kids, these teenagers will show us something different that we are used to seeing.'

-

A week is passing. Everyone woke up during this week except Lore. Maison comes to her to see how she is evolving. He pays attention to every single detail until Kevin arrives here and interrupts him.

Kevin 'What are you doing here?'

Maison 'I just want to make sure everything it's fine.'

Kevin 'Come on, Maison. Don't you trust me anymore? You know I would have told the crew if she had woken up.'

Maison 'I didn't say that. And you know if I had  had the chance to choose I wouldn't have chosen you to take care of Lore. You won't be able to handle her personality when she will be awake.'

Six days ago.

Each member of Council voted for each doctor to have two teenagers from those thirteen to watch on and make sure they survive. After long disscusions and short contradictions, the decision was made:

*Kevin - Lore. *Maison - Dylan&Lyvia. *January - Stephanie&Jo. *Primer - Eva&Nick.

*Monica - Melissa&Aiden. *Liam - David&Tess. *Andrew - Klaus&Andy.

Back to present.

Kevin 'And do you think you can? You don't know her. You know her when she was five years old. Let me tell you.. She's twenty now.'

Maison 'But she only knows those five years. She doesn't have any new memories.'

Kevin 'ShalI I remind you whose fault was that she is here now?'

They have been looking deep into each other's eyes for seconds, but suddenly a sound from Lore's oxygen breathing apparatus is heard. Kevin becomes nervous and starts getting closer to Lore's bed to see what's going on.

Maison 'What is that noise?'

A slow voice(it was something very familiar to a whisper) came from nowhere.

Lore 'It's me.'