Subject One

XI. Gone

"No..." Eon runs toward his son. Mafiona turns to me with a bright fury in her eyes just as the security guards surround me. I let them put their binders on me, pinning my hands behind my back. I can't tear my gaze away from Luca, slump and limp against the wall with blood trickling from his skull.

"What the fuck have you done?" Mafiona seethes.

Eon kneels down next to his son and checks Luca's pulse.

"He's alive. He's just unconscious." Even though these words are complete relief to my ears, Eon breaks down. I would expect the professional side of him to take over and start caring for Luca's wounds, but he doesn't. Tears glaze his eyes as he points an authoritative finger in my direction. "Get that thing out of here!"

The security takes advantage of my shock and injects me with some sort of substance. I instantly become limp and they start to drag me away, but I resist long enough to try and get a glimpse of the scene unfolding before me. I strain my ears and can hear the whispers.

"Mafiona, he's dead." Eon speaks as soft as the grave. Mafiona gasps in response and then she checks Luca's pulse herself. Her hands fling to her mouth as she stifles a sob, her eyes worriedly looking back toward the security guards to make sure they didn't overhear.

Luca is dead... I killed him. My mind is racing and the redness comes back to my eyes again, but it's quietly overwhelmed by a crushing, gray guilt.

"What do we do?" She asks.

"We have to act fast." Eon says.

The door slams shut, and I'm sealed away from the scene as the security guards drag me away like the monster I am. They take me to what must be Archangel's version of a holding cell. It's in a small wing that I have not yet come across, tucked away from everything. I am unable to resist and I'm locked up without incident. I feel like I just got out of a stasis tank. Are they going to kill me? I'm injected with more of the security substance, and the gray guilt is settled in my eyes as I fall asleep.

.-.-.-.

I'm with my educational superior in a small room with only a small amount of light coming from the center. There is a long metal table situated in the middle of the room with a figure lying down on it. I push a mess of brown tendrils out of my eyes. I need to get my hair cut. I just had my seventeenth birthday.

My superior stands in front of the metal table with a digital notepad in his hand. "Luca Arthyr. Level 14. Proceed."

I walk toward my superior with a syringe in my hand. I begin to chant in the way that I have been taught since I was three years old. "The Supresin is Life."

The superior steps aside, revealing the full, naked body of the figure lying on the table. It's small, male, and probably no more than one-hundred and twenty pounds, with bright blonde hair. It looks just like one of us. But it's not, it's a thing.

A subject.

"The Purpose is Adapt."

I stick the syringe into a bottle of simulated Supresin. My hands are shaking slightly and I hope that my superior doesn't notice. I can't fuck this up.

"The Lab is the Way."

I run my spare hand through my hair nervously. The subject is right in front of me with its eyes glazed over. It's breathing becomes heightened as I hover over it, contemplating. I had to get this perfectly right. There were only a select few subjects brought out from their stasis tanks for this exact purpose. I am lucky enough to be able to have this experience.