A Girl of Smoke and Shadow

Project Hebe ~ Chapter 6

Spiderman and the metal armed man walked me up a few flights of stairs, in a hovercraft ride for an half hour and then out onto a landing space above the avengers facility. At least I guess it was, the big white and glass walls, smack in the middle of nowhere with some semi-famous enhanced's running about in a basketball court away from the main building.

We made our way off the roof, through the building which was surprisingly spacious and comfy looking for a cult. 

Hey, I mean, I wasn't wrong. The Avengers was either a weird blood cult for the enhanced or a fancy rich mans club for people with enough money or brains to catch up on the power scale to an enhanced. At least that's how it felt to outsiders.

Spiderman split off from our little trio, making it an even sadder duo and jogged down a hall as grumpy stumpy -a nickname I was particularly proud of after seeing the man with the metal arm detach and reattach it on the flight despite being introduced as Bucky- and called after another Avenger or one of their seemingly infinite lackeys.

Grumpy shoved me to keep moving, as I had stopped to watch, and I hissed at him.

"Watch it a$$hole, or I'll have you done for assaulting a minor."

His eyes, a blue which carried a darkness in their depths, rolled. He acted like he hadn't even heard me.

I walked on anyway, shaken slightly from the look. My moms eyes had been flat, like an expanse of ice. His, more like a cave.

We kept moving through the institute, our face eventually stalling when the large lettering- 'Project Hebe' which painted on a wall next to a door came into view. Through the glass of the door, it seemed to lead on to a circular spacing of other doors facing around a small lounge room, which had a few armchairs.

As we walked in, my eyes flicked instantly to the last door, a stark white only adorned with a purple number seven and my name in small letters, Elodie Raleigh.

Suddenly I didn't feel so much of an outsider as an intruder.

I was a criminal. At least the other freaks who I guess inhabited the other rooms might at least had the sh!tty excuse they were 'born' to cause havoc. I was trained.

"I'm sure you don't need me to tell you which ones yours. Get changed, and do whatever the hell you want until thirteen hundred when the others come back the get changed for lunch."

With that, grumpy stumpy turned and walked through the door. I turned on instinct, waiting a few seconds before trying the door.

Locked.

"Goddamn it."

I sighed at kicked the door half-hardheartedly, then turned to survey the room.

It was open, three large glass windows facing straight across from the entrance door, and out onto a courtyard, no doubt bullet proof or stronger. Mounted on them was a large TV with three armchairs and two small sofas making a semi-circle around them. They were in boring shades of red, white and black- looking a bit too new to feel homely.

On the left of the windows was three rooms- the third of which has a much larger door, a fraction taller and about three quarters wider, the space surrounding the door taking a much larger fraction of the wall too. No doubt the room inside would be larger.

"Please don't let it be someone made out of rocks or like 9ft tall."

The words spilled from me, and I ran my hands through my knotted hair, tossing it behind me to deal with later. Not to be rude, but I didn't want to share a space with someone who might lay geodes or complained about ceiling fans.