Legend Of Zuleika

Nightmares

I was now sixteen. Three years away from graduating, and leaving forever. I'd never come back to Ohio. Not if my life depended on it. I sat in front of a half broken body mirror I dragged out of an old alleyway. It was a long walk, but, it was worth it. I had already checked to make sure Dorothy wasn't here. I slowly took off my green cap and watched as my loose white waves washed from my head to the floor. It was getting longer. I stood up from the floor careful not to step on any of my hair. It touched the very bottom of my butt. I looked odd having my hair down. I took my old brush and slowly started to brush it out. After I was done, I sat back down and stared back at the girl on the other side of the mirror. How did this even happen? I used to be so normal with lots of friends, and now people didn't even want to sit next to me. My life was wasting away along with everything else in this old, dusty attic.

" What the hell do you think you are doing up here!" My foster mother came lavishly into my room. Startling me out of my daydreams, I scrambled to my hat and hurriedly put it on. " Aren't you supposed to be cleaning you ungrateful skank!" She hollered as she walked over and swung an open hand leaving a stinging burn on my left cheek.

A silent tear fell as she rushed out the door grabbing the gilded clutch she must have left behind. I pulled my cap on tight and went on to clean the beautiful house downstairs that I was never allowed to be in unless I was cleaning or cooking. Of course, that was the deal of living with her. She took me in, and I became her makeshift Cinderella. But, this is no fairytale. Just a nightmare.

BEEP, BEEP, BEEP!

I arose to the sound of my blaring alarm clock. Great, another day of hell. Another day closer to freedom. And by freedom I mean war, but, of course, the war is only for hues. We're calling it the second cold war. The people who are most important or rich are in the very center of this place we call home. The poor live on the outskirts of society. Little, dirty shacks lined wall to wall next to a dirt road full of glass and gravel. No one knows exactly what we're fighting, some say they're rouge humans. Others say they're our "ancestors", or, strange creatures who have come to take over the human race now that our population is so low.

I jumped out of bed, just to fall flat on my face. Another mirror. I guess you could say I collect them. I'm not allowed to look in any of the mirrors in the house. Dorothy says she's afraid my reflection would shatter her priceless, antique mirrors. Whatever.

I took off my cap and combed through my frosted, white hair. I looked at the tiny window above my head. The only source of night and day. Even as an almost adult, I could still climb through the tiny porthole. With me being malnurtured and all, I could pretty much fit anywhere. I'm only five-two and ninety-five pounds.

I stripped down out of my cotton blue nightgown, which was now a dusty white, and trudged over to my closet of used, old, and hand-me-down clothes. I slowly stopped in front of the mirror looking at the morosely frail thing I call a body. Is this really me?

I had gotten so skinny and I hadn't even noticed. I slowly raked my slightly calloused hands down my prominent ribs, eligible to count every single one. Sorry, did I forget to mention that Dory doesn't feed me? She says I look perfectly healthy and if I were hungry I could scavenge. And she's right, that's exactly what I do.

Last year another store was shut down for black marketing. After they closed down a huge riot of people were let loose and they took every perishable and nonperishable food item they could. That's all people ever took. I, on the other hand, took all the weapons or makeshift weapons I could find, along with: sleeping bags, medical supplies, a couple of handheld guns, bows and arrows, fishing line, knives, ropes, a tent, fishing poles, books, and a 'how to survive in the wilderness' hand guide.

My plan was simple. Leave right after graduation. This way I can't be drafted into the war. A girl like me, a half-ass hue as they call me, is only good for a few things. None of which have to do with fighting in the war. Washing clothes and dishes, maybe even serving food or scrubbing down bathrooms, but never fighting.

I'd be considered useless to the entire cause. So instead I'll just run, no matter how far I have to go, I will never give my life to the government. What have they ever done for me besides give me a bad foster parent and never tell me what happened to my real ones? Nothing.

I quickly snatched a blue rustic shirt and an old pair of black skinny jeans with holes in the thighs and knees. I slipped them on and snagged my navy green satchel off the floor along with my worn out red flannel. I slipped out the door and tiptoed down the creaky stairs hoping not to wake Dorothy. By the time I reached the bottom of the winding stairs I was out the door.

The morning fog was deep and dreary and rain was in the air. Fall was clearly here and winter was sneaking up behind the corner, ready to strike like a rattlesnake. As I continued to walk I noticed colorful heads popping up here and there. I saw the bus stop coming into view. I, as always, was the first on there and soon we were a dulled rainbow hiding in the thick fog. No one talked for we were all from different school statuses, but, it was a calming quietness. And that's when things took an eerie turn.

A wave of dark heads came around the corner. Mundanes... It's what we called them. Boring. Plain. Powerless, and because they are powerless, they gain their own power by force. Last week Alaya Johnson, a twelve-year-old little girl with creamy chocolate skin and dark auburn ringlets for hair, was found dead by the old sewer grate near my house. Simply because she was tepid. The ability to grow and reduce the calcium in her body. Most people wouldn't think that would be anything useful, but, from what I observed it was. She could make her hair, nails, and bones longer or shorter. She could shrink her hand to fit inside a keyhole.

Mundanes didn't like us. We had something that they could never possess, the ability to fight off what they couldn't see. The war made everyone crazy. Crazy to the point where mundanes were killing the hued. And the hued were killing themselves out of fear of the war or the mundanes. As the cloud of dark greys and deep blacks got closer we all grew eerier.

"Oh, look! If it ain't the hue crew", Theresa sneered at us. Looking at her now makes me sad. Her father killed by one of the Invisibles. The things they can't see.

We all stood still. No one dared to show an ounce of bravery, we were trying too hard not to show fear let alone worry about what might happen if we were to show bravery. They began closing on us like a pack of hungry animals closing in on their prey, ready to pounce at any given moment. Fear began pounding on my chest like a sledgehammer against a pile of stones. They closed in even further, blocking us from any view that was past them. My muscles squeezed. Hued were shorter than the average mundane. Once we get our powers our growth stumps. We grow less and less each year. I, myself, stopped growing by age fifteen. So I'm only five-two and probably the shortest hue to ever live. On this block there were more mundanes then there were hues. I'm sure the hues could overpower and even beat them if we really wanted to. But, that would get us into some deep shit. Theresa got closer and my nerves were on their last end.

I nearly gasped in relief when I saw the deathly bright, yellow bus pull around the corner. All the hues sighed as we hurriedly boarded the bisque integrate. And it was at that moment that I realized it. If we were to get into an actual fight with the normies... I had no power to protect myself.

The ride to school was like any other day. Boring. I sat in the back with the rest of the outlawed kids. But, of course, I was the only one who actually didn't have the monopolistic black hair like the rest of them. I had on my green cap and was on high alert as the bus stopped to pick up one of my worst enemies, Veronica Murphy. Her father, Jackson Murphy, was the president of the USP. The United surviving populations. All of those who survived the pollution reformed a new kind of government. One that will put them in full power.

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A/N:

Hey thanks for reading and let me know opinions on how I'm doing so far!!

,love Tina <3