My name is Alexis, but my friends call me Alex.
I am sixteen years old, and about a year ago, my life was relatively simple.
Well, as simple as living in a Camp Z, a Top Secret government facility. My parents dumped me at said facility ten years ago. Maybe they were scared of what I could do. Maybe they never wanted a child who blasted holes in walls when they had a temper tantrum. Either way, I have never heard from them since then.
The worst part about my life besides the beatings, the starvation, the killing, was that I had a job that was so Top Secret that half the time for all of the ten years that the Government wasted on me there came the absolute greatest shock; I did not actually know what my job actually was.
I do now. I do because they told me, after the "heroes" quietly rescued me from the depths of the facility. I am a weapon. I am the world's first superhuman. I could heal, I could output energy to my advantage, I could fight, and I had special mind powers that enabled me to tell my superiors what the foreign minister sitting across from the President was really thinking. The government trained me from the age of five not to have emotions. All they ever told me that was vaguely important were three words. Seek. Kill. Destroy. They taught me how to use all different types of weaponry, they taught me how to use my powers, and they taught me important things in lessons until I was able to do university level everything. I was a killing machine at age thirteen. That was when I went on my first overseas mission. Some people have heard about the Iraq war. I ended that. It was my duty - to end the suffering, the killing, the pain.
Now, the people who helped me out and who want me to be a normal teenager are trying to re-train me. They want to undo the ten years of damage. They acted as if it were easy. Like poof, and the pain, the anger, is gone.
They want to know all about me, and they seem terrified when I never cry. I never laugh. I never smile. I never lose my temper. They get scared when I put my mask on. I do not want to show them anything in case this is a test my superiors have created to see whether I am any good in our military. That is not right though. I saw them die. I saw the way Wolf looked at me as he pulled the knife from their chests, the way he carried me out of the base to the heroes… I cannot think about my team anymore. It is almost forbidden to speak of them.
There are no longer superiors ready to beat me if I show one spark of human feeling. There are no longer days where I would not get food because I could never land a punch on my trainers. People are more worried about the fact that I cannot eat much- due to the times they starved me for a punishment, or the fact that I do not talk, that I can keep myself entertained for several hours just by staring at a wall.
Sometimes I even wish I was back in the base.
When I was eleven, I got a book. It was when my teacher was giving me a year ten essay. The book was "To Kill a Mockingbird", and I memorised it within a month. The men I trained with found it in the changing rooms, and they began a heated discussion about it. I could speak about it with them. That was when my teacher raised me up to year twelve work within that year.
I found the book, along with several other classics, on the shelf above my bed. It was over this book that I shed my first tear. My psychologist practically threw a party. I mean, he actually did a dance around the room that barely passes as an office. He'd become a lot less scared around me as I gradually
However, my biggest challenge- and despite me telling myself otherwise, fear- was the thing every teen in my books dread: high school.
On my first day of school, my guardians gave me everything I needed. They gave it to me, and I never even had to ask. A bag, pencils and pens, books, a timetable, a map, money for my lunch, a phone with a fully charged battery and unlimited credit were the most important items they gave me. They were also keen to have me meet all the teachers at the school prior to me meeting them on the day. That way, I would have a 'friendly face', as Kian- who is my adopted brother- put it, before the new experience completely overwhelmed.
If anything, I ended up underwhelmed as I made my way into the red brick buildings. High school already had a lot to answer for, and I had only been there a minute. The bell went and I felt a surge of panic. I was never late to anything- something I owed to my military training.
With a jolt, I remembered that Mel, my guardian, had dropped me off slightly late because I had to meet the principal in his office before going to school. Mel had wanted to come with me, but I assured her that I was fine, and that I was mature enough to take care of myself. She looked taken aback, but reluctantly allowed me to go in by myself. My heart calmed itself a little.
Parents turned to face me as I entered the office, sympathy evident on their faces. I ignored them and walked up to the secretary- a cheerful looking woman- and in my most deadpan voice, I asked her to show me into Mr Phillips's office. She dutifully showed me in, handing me a courtesy map, the clucking and whispering of the parents still audible behind me.
'Good luck,' she said, smiling at me happily, as if she was pleased to have me there. I shuddered, People that nice were just was too unnatural.
Mr Phillips was a short, rotund man, with a balding head and coke-bottle glasses. He wore a tie and suit, the colours of his pasty white skin, but the tie was so tightly done up that he appeared to have more than his two chins and a purplish tinge to his face.
He greeted me with a smile and sat back down on his chair, which creaked and tilted precariously to one side.
'It's nice to finally meet you, after hearing so much about you. I'd like to say that I'm sorry about what happened to you.'
I just stared at him. I hated this apologising thing. It was too new. I mean, I never apologised to somebody for hitting him or her. He sighed and slid my locker combination across the desk to me.
'They warned me you'd be a difficult one to deal with. I'd better show you to your locker and to class.'
He stood up and waddled over to the door. 'Come on,' he said, motioning for me to follow him. 'You don't want to be late for your first class.'
I hesitantly followed him down multiple corridors, taking note of the hospital-like appearance, with the white walls and the gum smeared grey tiles. The only difference were the lockers lining the halls and the smutted-up "inspirational" posters that some hopeful teachers tacked up to the walls, in the off-chance that some of the students were not actually burnouts like the rest of the student population.
Mr Phillips spoke at me as we walked, showing me the cafeteria, the gym and the teachers staffroom until we reached room 12B. I smoothed down my camouflage pants, which were tight-fitted and popped out against my grey t-shirts. Mel had been trying to get me in the jeans she had bought for me, but I had no intention of ever wearing them. Wearing camouflage was comforting and it was the only thing that I could get my head around wearing. I had originally wanted to wear my Special Ops uniform, which consisted of the colour black, black, and even blacker. We had compromised on camouflage. Not that Mel would want to irritate me.
A dark haired librarian-type teacher with a salmon-pink cardigan and a long pink plaid skirt was marking off the roll on her laptop. She waved to Mr Phillips and opened the door.
I smiled at her, but it seemed to unnerve her, and she lost a bit of spark.
'Hello, you must be my new student.' She beamed at me, but the smile didn't quite reach her eyes.
'Yes.' I nodded tersely. She reminded me of my ex-supervisor. I called her Faux Finch- and the men liked the name. It pretty much stuck. Supervisor Finch had a mean trick she would use with me. She would act like a friend, make me trust her, and then she would go and complain about me slacking off in training sessions. Then came the punishment that she chose for me, that would scream that I could trust nobody. It put me off friends for life.
Mr Phillips gave me a brief smile. 'Alexis, this is Miss Hicks. She is your homeroom teacher.'
'Hello,' I ventured.
There were gasps inside the classroom.
Mr Phillips gave Miss Hicks a meaningful look before turning around and walking back the way we had just come.
'Come on, Alexis. I'll introduce you to your class.'
She walked back in and faced the students.
'Okay everybody. We have a new student joining us. Her name is Alexis.'
'Is she hot?' a male voice called from the back of the classroom.
'See for yourself, Mike.' Miss Hicks gestured for me to come into the room. I readjusted my bag on my shoulders, took a deep breath, and stepped in.
More gasps from the class echoed around the room, and hostile looks directed from the teenagers within my age-bracket burnt holes through me.
A girl in the middle row stood and glared at me. She wore a totally impractical dress with a slit along the side. It was obvious from the appreciative stares she received from the boys in the class that she was Queen Bee. I could have taken her down easily, which made me smile, but I restrained myself from doing so. My smile seemed unnerve her.
'Miss, there is no way I am in a class with a killing machine.' She directed her attention to the teacher briefly before she returned to glaring at me. The amount of venom in her words was positively lethal.
Did she have any idea what the base was like for me? Surely she would have heard the stories? This girl had it all. She didn't have to deal with starvation, torture and abuse on a daily basis. She probably had straight-A's, a teenage brother who she hated because she could, a pair of loving parents, perhaps a pet thrown into the mix. When had her life ever been hard?
And here she was, staring down her nose at me, like I was something the cat had dragged in. Like my entire life wasn't worth acknowledging. I could feel the anger rising, surging and bubbling, coursing through my veins as she continued shouting at my teacher about my "supposed" war crimes, about how I was a ruthless, merciless killer who would execute them whenever I wanted them to. Right then, I was considering the last bit as a possibility. The Queen Bee was on the top of the list, along with anybody else who tried to defend her… No. I couldn't kill anybody, even though my fingers itched to do it, to punch her at the base of her spine, paralyse her and then wrap my hands around her neck and… No. I was not a killer, not anymore. My hands gripped my grey shirt tightly, my knuckles turning white as I attempted to exercise some self-restraint. Anger was one of my first emotions, when I had tried to kill Kane. I needed to learn to control it.
'Andrea, SIT DOWN!' Miss Hicks roared. Nobody except my superiors had ever spoken like that, and my guardians tried so hard to keep calm and even voices around me. I flinched, listening to my breathing speed up until I knew I was hyperventilating. I tried to calm my heart, but to no avail. Everything began to change drastically fast.
The walls began transforming into grey stainless steel, the students into men holding scary looking weapons, and the desks into blasters. Miss Hicks turned into my worst nightmare. Supervisor Finch stood before me, her fake smile plastered across her face.
She spun to face me. 'Alex, Alex, Alex,' she said condescendingly. 'Did you think you could get away that easily?'
'You… are j-j-j-just a… p-p-p-projection of my f-f-f-ears,' I stuttered out, trying desperately to calm my heart rate. I stumbled backwards, knocking items off Mss Hick's desk. They crashed to the ground and made me jump further.
'Alex, what have I told you about speaking without superior permission? It would look as if we have a punishment on our hands.'
'No!' I shrieked, looking at her in angst. 'No more!'
I whirled around and powered out of the classroom, feeling the rush of air on my face as I began sprinting. I had no idea where I was going. All I knew was that I needed to get out of there. My sense of direction took me to a small grassy spot at the very edge of the school.
I made sure the coast was clear before I dropped to my knees and screamed.