I mentioned somewhere on the Megamind LJ Comm a while back that I was working on a Minion-centric one shot. Well, here it is! I decided to post it here as well. It's possible that I'll continue writing more for this, but I'm still thinking about it. I'll wait to see how people react to it and see what they think :P
This was rather difficult to write, so critique would be positively wonderful ^_^

Purpose Driven Minion

I can still remember what it was like before I was given this antenna in the back of my head. The transition from simple minded too having a higher intelligence was quick, and my memories from before it happened are fuzzy, but they're still there, in the back of my mind.

Everything was cloudy and bright. It felt cramped and I wanted to move. I became restless and started to twist and turn inside the small bubble that was my world. Suddenly something gave way, and my world became much bigger, out of one void and into the next.

This world was equally as bright as the last but it seemed endless. Surrounding me were many other creatures popping out of their own personal bubbles. We were all very still, floating in the empty white space.

One of us moved, and then we were all moving – twitching and darting, driven by a basic instinct to get somewhere, where ever that was. I had no concept of time and no thinking was involved. We were all one mind, mimicking the group. That was, for the most part, anyway.

I don't know which one of us came up with the idea to start swimming around, but I'm pretty sure I was the first to think of going in one direction. While the others went in circles, I went straight. Eventually I came to the end of our swarm. I swam and swam and swam – and then I hit something.

I swam again and then hit it again. I didn't know what it was; it didn't look like anything was in front of me. Clearly I had found the end of the world. Looking passed it I saw other larger creatures staring back at me. I couldn't comprehend how they were on the other side of the end of the world, and why I couldn't join them. Watching, I saw them bare their teeth. I experienced the sense of hearing for the first time as they created noises with their mouths.

"This curious fellow is already exploring his tank! He's perfect,"

The shape of my world changed once again as I was taken away from the swarm; I would later realize they were my brothers and sisters. The world hugged me and dragged me upward, out of my floating home, and I was then pinned down by an invisible force. I blinked my eyes shut and gasped, thrashing in the empty space while my insides burned.

Splish! I breathed in and felt relief, the burning sensation ended. I could float again. I was alone, and soon I found the end of the world once more.

Directly outside of my world was a flat, upright rectangle with shapes and colors on it. I couldn't interpret it, but I stared anyway.

I don't know how long it had been since, but the next time I was removed from my world, I was bigger than before. I was taken and placed on a flat surface, and the invisible force held me down the same as before. There was a sharp pain in my side, but afterwards my body became a ghost to its surroundings – I felt nothing at all.

I could still hear. There was a soft, slicing sound, followed by a sawing sound that traveled through my body to my teeth. I tried to peer upwards at the creatures that were hovering about me. This time their eyes and mouths were shielded, and they held thin, shining objects covered in a dark liquid. Slowly, one of the objects was lowered towards my back and out of my vision. Poke.

My fins jerked outwards on their own, one after the other. Then my eyes began blinking independently, and my jaws snapped open and shut without my will. I had lost all control of my body. A simple thought drifting behind the eyes of a meat puppet. The pitter pattering in my chest accelerated and the dark liquid I saw on the shining objects dripped into my eyes.

Everything was cold and warm, dark and light all at once. The liquid was swabbed away and then everything started to fade in and out until my eyes shut and it all went into nothingness.

When I woke up I was back in my new world. I felt odd, something was different about me. It felt as though I had a new extension of my body. I felt heavy and sank downwards until the world stopped me.

It was then the world started to change. I blinked, confused. What was going on? In front of me was the upright rectangle. I sat there and stared at it in a daze, then closed my eyes tightly for a long moment while the world around me seemed to sway. When I opened my eyes again, something amazing happened. I understood.

I understood that up was that way, and down was this way, and that this was left and right. I understood I wasn't floating in space, I was floating in water. I understood that my world didn't end here; it was just part of a much larger world. Before me was something solid but see through, and beyond that was…I jolted when my vision suddenly made sense of the shapes and colors on the upright rectangle. I knew that each color was different, and I noticed the shades and values. There were blacks and whites, blues and greens; and was that yellow? The shapes flowed and curved. The flat surface was no longer a flat surface; it was popping out at me. It was…it was - it was a face!

It was a picture of the young face of one of those creatures, those creatures that hovered around me sometimes. It had blue skin, and green eyes. It was an infant. I wondered how old it was. I wondered how old I was! What did I look like? Was I blue?

My vision shifted and I saw something else. It was between me and the face. It was a different face, the face of a new creature. I stared at it and processed. No…no, it wasn't a new creature. It was me. It was my reflection, and I wasn't blue, I realized with some disappointment. I was brown with light brown and some dark brown tossed in. I liked blue better. Oh, but was that some green on my…my, my belly? Was that my belly? And then those were my fins, and my eyes and…what was that? It didn't look like it belonged. It was stiff and pointy and grey, on my back right between my – well, I didn't know what those things were. Oh wait! Those were blue! I guessed I wasn't so bad looking after all.

Looking around I noticed more shapes on the top of my tank. B/MINION #214 - P11 DAY: 13, what did that mean? I couldn't understand the meaning behind the symbols.

For the longest time it was just me, my reflection, and the face. With little else to do, I studied the face intensely, imprinting it into my mind.

Every now and then the larger blue creatures would take me and place me in a tank away from the face, where I would perform tasks and solve puzzles, even swim through mazes. It seemed to please them; they would always bare their teeth in a smile and reward me with food. After doing whatever thing that was need of me I was returned to my original tank with the baby face, which was good, because I never liked to stay away from it for too long. I had grown fond of it after all.

Days passed, and I noticed a change in the blue adults. They seemed anxious about something, and started fretting over me more and more. One night while I lay at the bottom of my tank, resting against the glass as close to the face as possible, they came and hovered over me very much like the first day I encountered them. Language was not something I had mastered yet, but I was able to understand a little of what they said.

"I'm not sure if he's ready yet or not. He's still so young and uneducated. Sure, he's excelled as no other minion has before, but –"

"It's now or never."

"He needs to be the best for what he's destined for."

"He is - he will be. I can tell."

"…"

"I know he'll do his duty well, my sweet, trust me. See how he sleeps close to the photo?"

"Yes, your right. Let's get this over with then, time is running out."

That was when I noticed the surface of my water was rippling on its own. I wasn't sure how long it had been doing that, but it was steadily becoming more energetic, to the point the ripples were waves and I started to be sloshed around. The smooth faced adult went off on its own while the scruffy faced one stood and stared at me for a few moments. It then reached in a picked me up with its bare hands, something that had never happened to me before. I was lifted until I was at its level and our brown eyes met.

"I truly hope I was right to have chosen you out of all the others. Don't let us down."

It seemed troubled about something, and while I didn't know what that something was, I felt the need to comfort it. I pressed my side into one of its palms while rubbing my fin against the other, offering a smile. This seemed to put it at ease, and it smiled back.

I was placed into a spherical tank that fit me perfectly and then I was set aside on a round platform. A light went off somewhere and I was sucked upward through a tube. As suddenly as I was suctioned up, I came to a slow stop on a different platform in a place I'd never seen before. It was a large room with a domed ceiling, and huge round screens of blinking blue and red. I didn't like red, it was scary. A loud blaring noise was sounding from somewhere and the entire place was shaking, falling apart even. There were more blue creatures, too, more that I had ever seen before, all dashing around in a panic. I looked for the ones I had come to think of as my own. Where were they?

The platform I was on levitated and moved forward, I looked around for them through the chaos. Rubble came close to hitting me, but the platform smoothly dodged all obstacles. My body relaxed with relief when I saw my blue adults racing toward me holding something protectively. Oh good, they were all right. I then became distracted when I saw the strange thing before me. It was round with spiny antenna sticking out of the back of it, and it was stood upon a small stand of some sort.

Things got darker when large blue hands wrapped around my sphere and picked me up. I could hear the destruction of our surroundings growing, and for the first time I feared what the creatures were doing with me. I felt myself frown and look around worriedly though fingers.

"Here is your Minion. He will take care of you."

That was when I saw the face in front of me. My mouth formed a genuine smile on its own accord. Everything made sense now. I knew what I was supposed to do.

It was the infant from the picture, only it was real this time, and it was soon wrapping its little fingers around me. I continued to smile. This was my purpose in life, and I couldn't have felt more at home than in this baby's lap. Somehow, someway, I was to watch over this life and protect it from harm.

The baby seemed confused, so I tried to smile at it. So far in my experience smiling made everything better. It wasn't looking at me though. My smile slipped and I wondered what was in store for us.

Together we were launched through the domed roof and into the sky. Well, whatever was going to happen, I was ready. So long as we were together, we would survive.