The Great Four

Chapter 1

As I wake up all I can see is chaos. People on the streets are going crazy. They are throwing things at the government buildings. Destroying the colony flag. They are even trying to get into the laboratories. I understand why they're doing it of course. I wish that I could join them. You see today is the third Monday of the third month. The day the government gets together to decide who is the next person who will be a subject for The Laboratory. The announcement will be tonight. One person's life will change forever, and nor for the good.

The government chooses a new person every three months. We are never told what they do to them in The Laboratory. All we know is that when someone goes in, they never come back. People say that they were experimenting with The Plague, or that they are going to one of the other colonies. The only thing that Anyone knows for sure about the place is that they talk to the other colonies. As in actual contact, not the random radio waves the rest of the colony hears.

I should probably tell you about the colonies. There are 4 colonies, and I live in Colony 2. As a civilian I can't contact any of the other colonies. No one is supposed to be able to ever. The Government only started letting The Laboratory communicate with the other colonies about ten years ago. That was when they started taking subjects. It's also when the theories started about what they really do there.

When they first started taking subjects no one really understood what it ment. I was just six years old at the time. My mom was one of the first taken. She was the forth one to be exact. She acted like she expected it. As if she knew it had been coming. My father told me not to worry about it. That she would be back soon. That she wouldn't want me to worry for her. That she had prepped for it somehow. She never came back. Then my father was selected.

When he was taken from me five years ago I was only 11. He was the last one that year. After they took him I no longer cared about what I was supposed to say, manly because I had no one to talk to. I had no friends and no family. The only thing I had was my job. I was working at the only gas station in the colony. I still work there now because nowhere else will hire me. No matter what I say, my family history made sure of that. No one wants a kid that is higher up on the selection list, and both of my parents being chosen made me look like I'm next to be chosen.

I try to go about my day as usual, which is even more difficult than I thought it would be. I'm used to the chaos that comes with today. Most people are scared that they might be chosen, but I'm not. I have no reason to be afraid. The government promised my father when he was taken that I would never be chosen to be a subject. No one was supposed to know about it, not even me. The only reason I know is because they gave my father time to say goodbye.

They gave him a day to say goodbye and collect his things. He told me what they promised. I can remember his words even now. He told me to throw away anything he doesn't take before they come to remove all traces of him. My father told me I would never be chosen because he made a deal with them. His life for mine. They could never touch me, no matter what.

I never understood why he would do that for me. Why he would sacrifice himself for me. I guess he thought that I still had my life to live. I mean he's not wrong, but how am I supposed to live my life if no one will ever talk to me once they know who I am. They always say that I'm cursed. And, who knows? Maybe I am. Maybe it is my fault that my parents were chosen. Maybe I caused it all. Maybe I'm the reason that people are made into subjects. Maybe it's all my fault.

All I can think about throughout the day is, what if it is actually me? I know that it won't be. In the past two years it hasn't been me. The government people that come into the gas station have never given me a second glance, even though they know who I am. Everyone does. I'm the girl that has no one, I'm the girl who lost both of her parents to the Selections.

I have learned how to live like this. How to live when everyone hates me. How to live like I can't hear what people say about me. How to live like I'm not terrified that I will be next, that I will be chosen to go to the Laboratories as a subject. How to live as if no one thinks I will be the next Subject. It's how I live and how I will probably always live. I live in hidden, constant fear.