1212, May 15th 2532 [MILITARY CALENDAR]/Inner colony Orogontor, Augumonto Elementary school
Perish can't say that what he left behind was ever truly great. A widowed father who worked all of the time with no mother. Perish's lask of trust for any other person left him with no friends and no one to talk to. Even the teachers in his school avoided him. But Perish did not mind this kind of life. He enjoyed the isolation he was gifted from being left alone. He would sit at the top of the big green hill during recess and watch the other children play and have fun. To Perish, this was just as fun as running around in the grass and on the jungle gyms.
The kids in his class told him that he was too mean. But the teachers told him that he was too smart. Perish would frequently correct or add facts during their lessons and either confuse or infuriate the adults. Even though he would get yelled at, Perish enjoyed outsmarting the adults. It made him feel powerful.
This sense of empowerment is exactly what brought Christian C. Waylen to Augumonto Elementary school on a cool midsummer day. She entered the playground on the lie that she was a family member come to speak with Perish Topplar.
When Perish saw her, he was sitting at the top of the hill with his back to the cement wall that served as their fence. The wind blew gently across the well trimmed emerald grass. The sun was high in the rusty brown sky and the children down below were squealing happily with laughter. Perish could hear the distant rumblings of the mining quarry and his mind started wandering to the pit that he had once seen from a far distance away. He wanted to explore that pit and find out what was at the bottom. But his father said it was too dangerous for someone as young as him, and that all that was down there was just more rock. But this didn't sway the young child's curiosity and he found himself daydreaming about unexplored tunnels gleaming with bright rocks and glowing crystals.
When the gate opened loudly, it startled the boy. His gaze fell on the two adults entering the playground. Peering through the glare of the sun, he saw that it was a lady dressed in a strange white coat that reminded him of the dentists his father would occasionally take him to see. Perish wondered what a dentist would be doing at his school. Behind the woman followed a tall and muscular man with short hair and narrow eyes. The little boy had seen soldiers before in posters and on TV, and this man almost reminded him of the brave men who fought on his TV. But he looked different, less...friendly.
The little boy watched the two scan the playground before beginning to walk casually through it. He watched them as they slowly climbed the hill and came to a stop by his side. Perish slowly stood up and looked up at them. "Who are you?" he asked defensively, taking a step back to look at them better. This close up, the man looked even more intimidating. Perish could see old scars riddling his face and callouses marking his hands. He could swear he saw a bulge of something on the man's hip underneath his jacket.
The lady smiled and knelt down to his level which didn't make her seem any less intimidating. "You are Perish Topplar, correct?" She asked with a small smile that lit up her entire face. Perish felt a twinge of sadness upon seeing her smile. It reminded him of his mother who he had lost almost two years ago. But he buried that feeling and stared her straight in the eyes. The cold steel look in his eyes startled Waylen so much that she had to blink.
"Yes. I'm Perish. Did my dad send you?" the boy asked. Waylen smiled again and produced a small pendant from her pocket. She held it out for him to see and the small trinket intrigued the boy.
It was a transparent crystal with glistening edges. Tiny words were inscribed into one side and Perish had to squint to see them. Waylen gave it to him and he held it up to the sun. The light shone brightly through the crystal and hurt his eyes. He moved away from the sun and peered close at the tiny words in the rock. "You're your own weapon..." Perish read slowly. "Correct," Waylen said, smiling warmly. "Everyone has a weapon. Do you know what yours is?"
Perish thought hard about that for a moment before finally shaking his head. He had expected the lady to say something about it, but she only got up and left, the man with the narrow eyes following her.
It was only a week later that Perish's life would be forever altered. If he knew what was going to happen, the child would have ran away. But not even his father had expected the kidnapping.
Perish was walking home through one of their nature parks and enjoying the quiet. The birds were loud that day and were flying high over the child's head. Perish reached into his pocket and picked up the crystal pendant that he had been given by Waylen and studied it. He had gone over time and again what the words could have meant. "You're your own weapon." But he couldn't figure it out no matter how hard he tried.
Perish had heard something moving behind him and suddenly stopped and looked over his shoulder. He finally dismissed it and looked back around, but didn't expect to see someone standing there. The man was dressed in a black suit, very unusual for the hot weather they had been having. Perish was about to say something but a hand suddenly clamped over his mouth from behind. He didn't even have time to scream before the needle injected into his bloodstream. He tried to fight whatever was pulling him under but he only managed to fall to his hands and knees. "Subject is detained. Bring the car around," one of the men had said, speaking into an earpiece. Perish fell on his back and stared up at the fading sky. His mind was swimming in a dense fog and he couldn't think at all. He only held on to conciousness for another minute before the drug pulled him under and forcing him to sleep for a long time.