Facility HyB

Prologue: Accident

"Reyna! Jasmine!" I call out loudly to be heard over the rambunctious commotion in the halls. My two best friends turn to face me, waving happily from beside my dulling red locker. Years of aggressive use and unkind owners making the scuffed and scraped locker all the more dear to me; even if calling a locker 'dear to me' might be slightly on the crazy side.

My cobalt blue eyes scanning the students and teachers alike moving through the hall. I speed up my walk towards them, my wavy coconut brown hair flowing out behind me over the emerald-green tee-shirt with big bubble letters in black saying Go Green on it that Reyna had gotten me for my sixteenth birthday, as well as my favorite pair of slightly ripped blue jeans that were tight against my extremely pale and skinny legs. No amount of sunlight has given me even the slightest tan anywhere on my body, even though I spend almost every day of every summer basking in the sun at the public pool.

Even from where I was, I could see that Reyna was dressed in her usual red checkered skirt and light grey simple V-neck, with her black jacket tied loosely around her waist. She's pretty reserved and a huge bookworm, with her rich black hair tied in a long french braid over her shoulder and big old round glasses perched on the end of her nose. She wore no makeup and her dark brown skin was splashed with even darker freckles, her hazel colored eyes usually buried behind a thick hardcover fantasy novel.

Jasmine was the exact opposite. With nicely tanned skin—courtesy of the summers spent with me at the pool, powdered with faint golden blush, dark black eyeliner outlining her deep blue eyes, and her dark brown hair streaked with faint blond. She was wearing a bright pastel pink thigh length dress with frill along the elbow length sleeves. Just one look at her and you could tell she's the hyperactive cheerleader type. Head cheerleader to be exact; and an obvious choice with her can-do attitude, always smiling and filled to the brim with gossip.

"Carmen! Ohh," Jasmine squealed, skipping up to me and shaking my shoulders with vigor. Behind her, Reyna sighed deeply—most likely already having heard what Jasmine was about to say. "Did you hear that Brock and Cindy got back together? It's the biggest thing in school since they broke up four days ago!!" I couldn't help rolling my eyes at her enthusiasm. 

"Yes Jasmine, I heard about it. Everyone knows they're just going to break up again in less than a week anyway." Reyna quietly hummed in agreement from behind her hardcover Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince book, not looking up from the well-used pages but still somehow keeping up with the conversation. I was still trying to figure out how she did that...

"So are you two still able to come over for a sleepover today?" I ask, giving them my best puppy dog eyes even though I knew Reyna couldn't see them. But even though she didn't see them she still saw them, and she nods her head yes anyway, not once looking up from well into the center of her book while Jasmine nods vigorously, her wavy hair bouncing over her shoulders and back before ultimately bringing me into a bone crushing hug that spilled my history and algebra book right onto the checker-tiled floor. 

"Oh, I'm sooo sorry Carmen!" She quickly goes down and scoops them up before I could even begin to bend down, handing them back to me with great flourish and many more high-pitched apologies that left my ears ringing. 

"I'm sure she's fine, Jasmine. This happens all the time so could you please stop apologizing so loudly? I can barely concentrate on my story." Reyna asks, slowly putting her book in her backpack with a deep frown after Jasmine continued to apologize if not even louder than before. 

After about five minutes of navigating through the crowd of teenagers we all head out of school, the crowd already flocking to their cars. My trio starts walking down the length of Mongrey High School and in the direction of my house, which is thankfully only a few blocks from the school.