Distorted

Chapter one, Army of dolls

//Prologue//.

The air was chill although it was still August. My heart was beating like an erratic drum, making the situation more stressful than it was.

In this old hospital room we sat down starring at each other, I could tell she didn't want any human presence around her, but her wishes are none of my concern, its a job, one that must be done quickly.

"Have you decided to talk yet?" I asked as calm as I can be, doing my best to grab her attention as her eyes strayed away.

Silent, as if I was addressing a corpse. The disconnection between us was unbearable, the room was plagued by the smell of alcohol she believed she hid well, and her eyes were a great source of discomfort to anyone that dared to approach her. I held my recorder close to her as a way into pressuring her to speak, and as she blinked and finally looked at me, those old cracked lips spoke.

"What do you want to hear?" She asked me with her toneless voice, that voice ripped my heart apart striking me with excitement and joy, but also worry and distress. I reached my hands out for her holding my recorder, "Tell me about it, everything " I trembled as my sweaty hands almost dropped the recorder, she kept the same expression.

"It was truly a strange world, unbelievably peculiar and interesting yet morbidly terrifying." She said, and I listened as carefully as I could.

"I saw the dream we have had for ages. The world everyone longed to touch, I've been into the place where the craft of Iron dictated the lives of millions. A prototype of the hell the likes of you wished to build. It was an atrocious sight of an unwanted evolution, don't you think?"

Seven years ago, City of Ilusia.

It was a busy day for the suit rats. Flooding across their tunnels oblivious to each other. Under thick clouds of steam, in the heart of the industrial city, there was nothing but endless work hours and dull faces, ticking clocks and a black sky. It was a life of repetitive work and routine. For some, it was the utopia, one where all you need to do is climb the stairs to glory till your last breath. But, the reality was that it was nothing but a prison they were cornered in. After all, these people never owned their lives, always masters and slaves but with a fashion sense.

The streets smelled of dirt, smoke and classy perfumes jumbled up into one. all of them belonged to the different classes that walked this amusing city. The sky was no eye pleasure, towers were so huge your eyes can never catch their top. As for technology, the higher class was accompanied by their own prototype robots that fulfilled their pleasure and desires, whatever you could imagine. A thick wallet can do wonders.

Two legs wandered across the workers' early morning race in great energy, busting the worker bees and going among them unnoticed. Her mind strayed far away, far over the grayish smoke veiling the blue sky. It was when she accidentally hit someone's shoulder her mind at last awakened, "Watch your steps, idiot." Muttered a man. she sighed and finally broke free of her daydreaming. "you're the idiot." She cursed under her breath, scared to be heard. During the black and white show of the early morning rush, she was rushing to empty the pockets of those hasty penny-grabbers.

//The Race.

She portrayed them in her own mind as rats rushing through tunnels in the sewers, so down below they could hardly realize where they are. She looked at that woman shouting at her son for dropping his candy, or the man hitting his phone in anger while cursing, "Damn machine!", all these people fueled her quick legs to push through the crowds as she holds her bag tightly.

That worn out and old bag was her treasure. That child was a scavenger, living off her quick wit. On her shoulder, on board her short daily adventure, she had stolen a necklace from a passed-out woman's neck, and a camera from a lost photographer's bag. There was no money, no food and no hardly any spare clothes. Only a piece of cloth she had to cover up herself when the coldness kicks in at night, a Grey jacket with a hood she could hide in and a black one for the coldest nights in Ilusia.