Mutations

November 25, 2014

November 25, 2014
I toss and turn all night, I can't sleep. Jackson won't get out of my head, I know that's a bad thing to think since he is my baby, but I need to sleep. I look at the clock on the dresser, it's 3:42. God it's early. I'm tired of just laying there, so I get up as quietly as possible.
"Can't sleep?" Ryan asks, I jump and crash into the wall.
"Dammit, I think I just put a hole in the wall," I say rubbing my head where I hit it.
"Yeah, okay. I can't sleep either," he says and lays back down on his bed. "Where are you going?"
"For a walk," I say getting up. The hallways are empty, I jump when I see someone walking around the corner. I don't care that I'm only wearing boxers and a t-shirt, the people who work here have probably seen me naked anyway. They changed me after they knocked me out in the car, I wasn't even wearing the same underwear. I follow the person down the hallway. They go down the hallway to the gym but they pass the gym and go into a room labeled "Locker Rooms." I press my ear to the door, I don't hear anything. I slowly push the door open and walk in, there are blue lockers lined up across the walls. There is almost like a sobbing noise. There are several rows of lockers, I look down each one and don't see anyone. In the last row there is a girl sitting at the every end of the row of lockers.
"I'm sorry if I woke you up," she says without looking up at me.
"You didn't, I just saw you walking down the hallway," I say trying to put my arm in a position where the tape won't pull the hair on it. The cuts are smaller, they're starting to heal, the cut on my hand is still there but it doesn't hurt as much.
"I want to go home," she says, I walk up and sit down next to her. She doesn't move away from me. She has dark brown, wavy hair, and light skin.
"I want to go home too. What's your name?" I try to make her feel better. It's the least I could do it's three in the morning.
"Mia," she says. "The only reasoning I want to go home is it's my grandpa's funeral tomorrow, and now I can't go because of these bitches."
"I'm sorry," I say.
"Why do you want to leave?" she asks.
"I want to go see my son. My ex-girlfriend told me she had a miscarriage, then broke up with me to have the baby, so I wouldn't know about him," I explain to her, if she's going to be open to me about her problems I guess I can be open to her. She leans closer to me. She is cute but I don't know if I want to start anything while I'm here.
"I heard if you get into the top sixteen they'll give you one thing from outside the campus," she says. Now I have to get in the top sixteen, I want Jackson. That's the only way I can get him from her without getting kicked out of here.
"Are you serious?" I ask. She nods. She's now leaning her head on my chest, drawing small circles with the top of her fingers on it.
"I heard they are having eight boys and eight girls getting in. They're testing us together but scoring us separately," she says. I nod, then yawn. I'm so tired but I don't want to leave her alone.
"Who's your roommate?" I ask her. I know if I don't keep the conversation going I won't be able to stay awake.
"Her name is Brandi, she's in first for the girls," she says.
"I'm with the first place guy, Ryan," I say, she doesn't respond, "What did you do to get here?"
"I saved someone from drowning in a pool. I don't know why that was so great, it's my job. I'm a life guard," I yawn again, she notices this time, "You can go back to your room it you want."
"No, I would rather stay here."
"We can at least lay down," I nod. We lay down on the floor, I lay on my back and she puts her head on my chest. She's asleep a couple minutes after we lay down, I am too. Maybe I should start something, even though we just met, she makes me feel like I'm at home.
It only feels like five minutes later when I'm being shaken awake. It's Mason. I'm still really tired. "Leave me alone," I say rolling over on my side, the concrete is warm from where I've been laying all night.
"Come on James you have to get up for testing you missed breakfast. Mia already left, and if you miss this you will be sent home," he says, I start getting up to that, I can't get kicked out of here, I need to see Jackson. "Here are your clothes for testing," he stands up and turns around. Sit ups are today, I did these at school too, but the maximum amount you could do was seventy-five. Here there is no max, so I have no idea how many I can do. I sit up on the floor, my legs ache from yesterday. The clothes he gives me are a black pair of shorts, a white t-shirt, a pair of white socks and a pair of black compression shorts. I put then on and he turns back around.
"No shoes?" I ask, Mia must have woke up earlier and went to breakfast. I wish I woke up earlier for breakfast that would have been really good right now.
"You're in a room connected to the gym and you really don't need them for sit-ups anyway," he say, he walks over to me and stands next to me. He puts his hand on my lower back and pushes me forwards. He leads me towards a door then pushes it open. Everyone is already in the gym, there is another doctor standing at the desk.
"Who's she?" I ask.
"That is Dr. Quinn Williams, she's in charge of this part of testing, good luck," he say then he walks back through the door. I walk to the rest of the group and Dr. Williams starts. She has long black hair, she's shorter than me, she has an olive color skin. She's wearing black pants and a black shirt covered by a white lab coat.
"Today you will be testing your abdominals with sit ups," she says, "like yesterday a man's voice will be counting the number of sit ups you have completed, and a woman's voice will be counting the number of you remaining. The shirts and socks you are wear are made with iron particles so when you fail to complete a sit up the magnets you will be laying on will turn on preventing you from doing anymore. The magnets in your socks prevent your feet from sliding. If you want to continue you have to do at least two-hundred-ninety sit ups. Go to your mats."
I didn't really look around before but nothing else is in the gym besides a row of mats with numbers on them. I walk over to the thirty-six, Chris is next to me again, I'm surprised that Tyson isn't right next to her. He's at number thirty-three, I see Mia all the way down at number two. I lay down on the mat, I bend my knees and put my feet down on the mat. I hear a click and my feet are stuck to the mat.
"Get ready, up," the man's voice says, everyone lists their shoulders off their mat into a sitting position, "down, one." Everyone lays back down on their mat. This goes on for on for about ten minutes and we're at number one-hundred-fifty-six, then the woman speaks.
"Thirty-two people left," then again at one-hundred-eighty-eight, again at two-hundred-twenty-four and two-hundred-eighty-six. "Twenty-eight people left," that person must be pissed they were four sit ups away from getting in. After today we'll half way through training, thank god. By three-hundred-twenty, we're down to sixteen. My shoulders start to feel like weights, as I keep going they get heavier and heavier.
"Three-hundred-sixty," the man says.
"Nine people left," the woman says. Oh my god I'm dying right now. Chris was stopped at three-hundred-fifty-seven. Three-hundred-sixty-six, Tyson is stopped. Three-hundred-sixty-seven. My stomach feels like it got punched two-hundred times. Three-hundred-sixty-eight, I hear a click from the floor and I can't move. It isn't until four-hundred-twelve until someone else is stopped and I don't feel like I'm going to throw up. By four-hundred-eighty there are three people left. One is a boy I don't know, Mia is still going, and Ryan. Mia and the other boy stop pretty quickly after that, but Ryan is still going. A couple minutes later he is stopped at five-hundred-thirty-six. I hear a click and I can move my feet and back again.
"Are you okay?" Chris asks me. She's standing in front of me with her hand out to help me up.
"Yeah, why?" I ask her and take her hand. She pulls me up, I stand up but stubble a few steps forward. She catches me. Her hands are on my chest.
"You looked a bit dizzy," she says, her face is inches away from mine. This is a bit close and Mia is standing right behind me.
"I'll be fine," I say stepping away from her. I walk over to the score board and my name moved all the way down to eighth. I don't look for anyone else, but I notice that Ryan is still in first and Mia is in second.
"There are only twenty-eight of you left, six more of you will be gone by the end of the day and six more will be gone by Friday. Combat training will be after lunch again. You have an hour-and-a-half until lunch. You may go," Dr. Williams says. What does she mean six of us will be gone by the end of the day? I need answers, I have to find Mason.
I get back to the room before Ryan and take a quick shower. I don't need to put gauze and tape on my arm anymore, it's all scabs. Ryan is in the room when I get out of the shower. He doesn't say anything he just walks into the bathroom after I step out. They gave us the same type of clothes yesterday. I put them on and leave the room. There is only a few people in the hallway, but I don't know any of them. I walk past them and one of them slaps my ass. They all burst out laughing, I blush a little then turn back around. The girl who slapped my ass, has long blonde hairs me dark brown eyes. Her face is covered in make-up. I don't know where she got it from living in this place for the last couple day. She's skinny and has nice curves. She would probably look hotter if she didn't have to wear The Stations clothes.
I walk back to where she's standing push her against the wall and kiss her hard. My hands are at her hips. I move my hands to her ass and hers move between my legs. She rubs her hand across my dick. I start to kiss her neck and then someone yells, "Hey! No fucking in the hallways!" All the girls burst out laughing hysterically. The girl I kissed was blushing, I step back and walk down the hallway. I can't help grinning, I have a feeling I'll see her again later. The boy who yelled at me ran after me down the hallway. "Dude that was fucking great! How did you get a girl like her?"
"Okay first of all I didn't 'get a girl like her,' I mess with chicks who flirt all the time. Second of all, I don't know who she is," I say. I turn and walk down the hallway to go to the gym. This guy has hair about the same length as me, but his is blonde. He's taller then me, his skin is light and his eyes are green. He reminds me of my brother. My brother Matthew is almost eight years older then me. He went to a college in souther California, he majored in life science and had a minor in chemistry. The guy I'm talking to now only looks like my brother it doesn't look like they really have anything else in common.
"It was still great, like she's the hottest girl here," he says. "I'm Albert."
"Uh, James," I reply.
"Where are you going?" He asks. I push the door to the gym open but only Dr. Williams is in there. So I walk back out
"I'm looking for Mason," I say he looks like he has no idea who I'm talking about, "Dr. Rose. The guy who told us what we were doing yesterday."
"Oh. Why are you looking for him?" I walk down to the locker room and he follows.
"I wanted to ask him something," I say and push the door to the locker room open.
"Oh, we'll I need to find my trainer, Matthew, he said he would work with me before lunch."
"Matthew? What's his last name?"
"I don't know."
"Ask him," if my brother is here I'm going to kill him. He would have known that I have been here. We used to not get along but now we do, even though I haven't seen him in over a year since he went to his new job in Arizona. Albert nods and then turns around and walks back down the hallway. I walk into the locker room, no one is in there, I look down all the rows and no one is there either. I walk into the gym Dr. Williams is still sitting at the desk. I stand in front of her desk and clear my throat. The gym is back to the way it was after lunch yesterday.
"What may I help you with?" She asks looking up, she has a pair of reading glasses on the end of her nose.
"Do you know where Dr. Rose is?" I ask her.
"He is in his office. If you go out the main doors of the gym and take a right his office is the third door on the left," she says.
"Thank you," I say she doesn't say anything back she just looks back down at the screen on the desk. I follow her directions and go to the third door on the left. I hear him talking to someone inside.
"It is essential that you don't let James know," I hear Mason say. That's enough for me, I burst into his office. Mason stops talking and looks at me. His office is about the size of my room, there is a desk toward the back wall, which he is sitting at. There are two chairs in front of his desk. The walls are bare the floor is tile and there is a small trash can next to his desk.
"James," he say, there is a tone of stress in his voice. There is a man sitting in one of the chairs in front of his desk. He turns around, it's Matthew.
"What the fuck. Why didn't you tell me you were going to be here?" I yell at Matthew, ignoring the real reason I came here.
"He wasn't aloud," Mason says. "It might have given you an edge against the rest of the other subjects. So you can't let any of the competitors left know that you two are related. You can know each other, but make it seem like you just met." Matthew just nods. We both leave the office, I never asked my questions.
"I can't believe you. You know I'm here and you don't-" he cuts me off and hugs me. I hug him back slowly. He has tears in his eyes.
"They said you could have died when they brought you here," he says stepping away from me.
"What?"
"There was a piece of glass about the size of a quarter stuck in your upper arm that they missed when you were at the crash. They did a full body scan on you and the glass was stuck in your brachial artery. They had to remove the glass, if they burst the artery they said you would have died in a little more than a minute. And if they pulled the glass out and didn't stop the bleeding fast enough you would have died," I can't believe all of this is happening and no one is telling me.
"Why does nobody tell me these things?" I ask.
"I don't know, I'm just glad you're okay," he says.
"Albert said he was looking for you," I tell him. He wipes his eyes, I wonder what dad thinks his job is, or if he ever talks to him. Matthew and me have different moms, that's whys there is such and age difference. He was six when him mom and dad divorced. A year later he met my mom and the year after that they had me. They called me a "wedding knight baby." Matthew had dirty blonde hair, blue eyes, light skin. Just like Albert, but his hair is longer and I could smell after shave on him when he hugged me.
"I don't think we'll have time now," he says pulling him self back together. We walk down the hallway toward the gym.
"Do you know what this half way elimination thing is about?" I ask him because I didn't ask Mason.
"Yeah," he says, "but I'm not supposed to tell you." What's new? I mean we never get to hear what is really going on from them.
Matthew goes and eats lunch with the trainers and I head to the cafeteria. I sit alone again, guilt washes over me when I see the girl I kissed and Stephanie pops into my head. Today for lunch we have ham sandwiches with fruit. I have a sandwich and two apples on my tray. The girl sits across from me and a friend of hers sits next to her.
"I'm Sierra, maybe we could go to my room and have a little fun," she says, I feel her foot touch my dick. I smile at her.
"Maybe," I say. I scoot to the edge of my seat and take a bite of my apple. We talk for a little longer, her friend's name is Britney. She keeps bringing her having sex with me back into the conversation. This girl is really hot and she says her roommate was kicked out during the pacer so it's just her. I told her I would think about it and then I got up and left.
I walk down to Mason's office because I didn't get my questions answered. The questions that I forgot to ask. I look in the gym real quick before I head down to his office, there was no one in there, not even Dr. Williams. I come out of the gym and there is a man standing behind me. He has greasy black hair, tan skin and brown eyes. He's wearing the same clothes I am.
"Hermano, do you want to have a spot in this experiment?" He asks me in a heavy Spanish accent
"Yes," I say slowly. There has to be something this guy wants.
"I know how to get you in," he's looking around a lot too. He has to want something bad.
"Why me? You don't even know me," I mean there is a chance he could have a way to get me into the experiment. Who knows.
"If you take a drop from dos to nueve in two days you must be worried," he says. I really want to be in this experiment, so does everyone else so I decide to go with him.
"Okay, what's the secret?" I ask. He looks down the hallway then back at me.
"Not here, hermano. Follow me," he turns and walks down the hallway that leads to Mason's office. I guess I'm not going to ask my questions after all. I hesitate first but then I follow him down the hall. We pass Mason's office and he pushes open a door that says "storage" on it. "Inside hermano."
I walk inside, it's really dark, there is only one lightbulb in the back of the room lit. The rest must be burnt out. There are cardboard boxes stacked almost to the ceiling. He closes the door behind him and before I can say anything I feel his fist hit my nose. I stumble backward and run into the stacked boxes. I feel a throbbing in my nose. I can't see him. I take another punch to the side of the head, I fall to the floor. I tried to get back up but he kicked me in the side, I roll on my side and groan. He kicks me in the stomach then the head. My vision is blurring and my body is starting to ache. He swing to kick my stomach again but I catch his foot and he slips and falls on his back. He wiggles his foot out of my grasp.
"You fucking son of a bitch," he says and kicks me again. It's really hard for me to see now. He kicks me in the head and I'm out cold. I wake up and the room is still dark, my body is aching. My eyes are swelling. I try to move to stand up but pain shoots up my leg. I can't move. I lay there for about twenty more minutes, I don't think I have ever been in this much pain since I broke my arm falling out of a tree.