The Generators

Prologue

Hey guys! It's been such a great three months, and I would like to thank all of you for your help so far making this book even better than I'd imagined. As of June 15, I will be making some big changes and updates in the days to come! Enjoy this new prologue!

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Sometime in the near future

The air was thick with the smell of blood, sweat, and death. The night was young, but the battle was not. The cries of angry men rung out through the valley, as loud as their gunshots and the screams from the fallen. Taya was blinded by a sudden burst of light and raised her blistered hand to cover her face. When the stars had faded from her eyes she looked up to see all of the government's men laying on the ground. Their eyes were sunken into their skulls, their skin ashen and pale, and their bodies stiff with rigor mortis. 

Down in the heart of the valley sat Campion clutching the now limp body of Magdalenea. Her fingers were curled violently around her bleeding palms, each breath barely managed to escape from her marred lips. Her chopped red hair looked like flames atop her head and her freckles like ashes upon her skin.

And then, the haunting scene was pierced by Campion's cries for help as he buried his head in the crook of the girl's neck.

As Taya's team rushed down to help, Taya was paralyzed with fear and guilt. It was because of her they were here. It was because of her, Magdalena would see the face of death tonight. It was because of her, this was only the beginning. 

The present

The first thing that Taya heard was the siren, a noise she knew all too well. Loud, aggressive, abrasive: there was no way she would be getting any more sleep tonight. As she rose from the bed, careful not to wake Theo who was sleeping soundly next to her, she was overcome by a deep sense of dread. Her fear increased as she walked over to the window and looked down over the streets of the Civil Institute. It was raining, and from some far off place a lightning bolt struck and thunder rolled.

There he was, well, that's where she assumed that he was because they'd done this to her too.  Amidst a crowd of armed guards, wearing their protective vests that shone out like stars against the darkness. And more and more of them seemed to appear out of nowhere, piling onto each other, holding the poor boy down.

Taya knew what would happen next, and after that, and after that. Because she was once brought here too, in the dead of night bound in chains. The whole thing was like a nightmare, one she wasn't sure she'd woken up from even now.

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Campion couldn't remember anything, not how he'd gotten here, inside a cell that emitted a sickening hum from the walls around him, not how he'd gotten that cut on his arm, it was big and angry and red. Someone had tried to take care of it, hastily. It was wrapped in a layer of gauze that was already soaked with blood. His head pounded like he'd been shot out of a canon and into a brick wall. He couldn't remember where he'd come from either, or if perhaps this was all that there had ever been, or if hopefully once there was a time he had been free. 

He curled himself into a ball and rested his head against the cool concrete wall, taking slow even breaths of the thick humid air that felt like syrup as it poured slowly into his lungs.

And as the darkness engulfed him, he remembered one thing and began to sob silently although there was no one to hear him, nor anyone to care. He remembered the stars in all of their majesty sparkling their hellos against the timelessness of the midnight sky. He remembered, and he wept.

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Magdalenea sat, her freckled face pushed up against the cool glass of her bay window, looking out over the city. It was many hours before dawn, and yet the city was as alive as ever. The lights from the buildings illuminating the night, making it almost as bright as day. She looked down and wished that she could one day leave this place and walk freely among the people who had things to do and places to go, neither of which she ever had.

But she knew that she would never be able to and each soft puff from her oxygen machine was just another reminder of what a kept little bird she was. There were tubes in her arms and under her nose, and she knew that if it wasn't for them she would be dead within minutes. She would never know the freedom of being able to move about freely and live however she pleased.

Magdalenea's only solace was her dream, completely illogical and fantastical, she dreamed of far off places and beautiful people. But more than that, she dreamed of having a life so ordinary that nobody would even care to mind her as they passed her on the street. She wanted so desperately to be just another face in the crowd, like one of the billions of stars in the sky.