Chapter One
I heard my feet slapping against the wet asphalt and felt the shock of the impact run up my legs. They were burning and I wanted to fall down and give up. I felt that if I did, something very terrible would happen. Everything was pitch black and I couldn't actually see anything but a feeling of dread was crushing my chest and I felt the urge to scream. I turned down an ally and barely missed a homeless person laying on the ground. I stopped to catch my breath when I thought I was safe but heard footsteps approaching quickly from behind me. I swung around and thrust my hand out towards the steps, following some kind of instinct, and a translucent blue light filled the darkness between the steps and I. I saw a tall man with broad shoulders and a leather jacket running towards me. The light collided with the man and he fell backwards and cracked his bald head open. Blood poured out like paint on a white wall.
I heard more footsteps approaching and sprinted down the alley into Main Street. The streetlights lit up several men that had the same appearance as the first man at the end of the street. By this time I was out of breath and my throat felt like knives were being slid up and down my throat. I saw Merle's Hardware and Tonya's Hair Salon and the street that led down to my house. These men were efficient so I had no doubt in my mind that my family was either dead or would be soon. I ducked into the grocery store and crept down the aisles looking for somewhere to hide. After they gave me cybernetic implants to augment my powers and stole my DNA from me, After they tried to turn me into a mindless slave for them to control, I knew they wouldn't let me rebel and live so I ran.
The smartest thing would be to turn around and kill the rest of the men but they were being controlled and I already knew that they would keep coming after me. With my gifts being amplified it consumes more of my energy to create and maintain force fields or turn completely invisible. I came to the door and realized it was locked so I gathered my energy and push the energy from my body to manifest a force field push that broke down the door. I heard one of the men talking over a radio to a british man, " Subject Zero is running, we are pursuing but have lost all visual." The british man sighed and said " I don't care, you've been briefed about his ability, so use that brain of yours and find him." The man looked right at me and then ducked into the broken down back door and brush past me. I held my breath and expected to be found but the man just kept walking until I heard the door slam shut and heard him yell, "STOP!" The man saw the decoy I made from My force field and tried to tackle it. By the time he had realized his mistakes I was invisible again and running towards my home.
The door was locked but my frame is small enough that I could slide through the basement window and drop down onto the cold cement. I laid there for a few moments to catch my breath and pull myself together. The house looked the same as when I lived here a few years ago. I'm only 22, a few years ago I was just a 15 year old Einstein and now I'm breaking down my own door and running from mad men. I graduated at 15 and defended my town against aliens with three other gifted kids and then met that terrible british man that ruined all our lives. Oh god, I don't even know if they're alive, I miss James. The house was silent as I crept up the creaking wooden stairs. Those ugly paintings of Jesus playing sports were still hanging in the hallway signifying that the family I came from were white trash. They only adopted me so they could get my survivor benefits from social security. I still remember it like it was yesterday.
"Get back here, you bitch!" My step father said as my Mother scrambled up the stairs, with blood running down her arms. The bastard had a knife in his hand and rage in his eyes. She threw her foot out and landed a kick on his chest which threw him down the stairs. The knife slid across the tile of the entry way and my mother lunged for it. She stood over him and said, "This is the last time you hurt me or my child!" The knife plunged into his chest and blood soaked through his shirt and stained my mothers hands. The police arrived after I called them and tried to get my catatonic mother to speak to them. They sat with her for 15 minutes but it seemed like an eternity for a 6 year old. The police officer wrapped a blanket around my shoulders, his name badge read "Willis", and asked me if I understood what happened. I didn't, of course, and blamed my Mother for everything I felt. I even blamed her for her own death. She went out one cold morning in August (The death was in June and she was currently in meetings with her lawyer for the trial) and loaded some stones into the pockets of her Sunday dress and waded into the creek a few streets from our house in Mississippi. The neighbors came to check on me after a whole week and found a starving child that didn't even look at me.
The police officer that came to pick me up was Officer Willis and he had his son with him. "Hi, I'm James, What's your name?" I didn't even answer, my teachers now had another thing to list on my long list of "problems". They were still trying tests to figure out if I was autistic or if I just hated people. Now they said, I was a zombie and a hopeless case. James was my only friend until he introduced me to Kane Montgomery when I was 12. I had been living with James and his father and mother since my Mother's death and hadn't left the house since then. Everyone in town talked about me and I saw their side long glances. I didn't care though, I had started to punish myself for the way I had driven my Mother to suicide. When I was 13, and in advanced placement classes in the local High School, I finally began to forgive myself and let people close to me. My teachers no longer worried about my socializing skills because I had made a few friends that I related to. There was James, Kane, Gigi, and Cylvia. James and Gigi were together, Gigi was the pretty one who always looked her best and sometimes came off as a little bit of a bitch. She had an overbearing mother who always put her in beauty pageants the G didn't want to do and eventually was the reason she had a short stint in rehab for Bullemia and Prescription drug addiction.
Kane was the only diversity in our small town, being the only black kid in our school, and he was also my first crush and my first boyfriend. Of course we had to sneak around because it was unnacceptable for two boys to love eachother in our town. He was the most beautiful person I had ever seen and his eyes were warm and hard to everyone else but gentle to me. He pretended to be tough but I saw his soft side and we had both cried to each other. He had broad shoulders and thick biceps. His hair was brown and curly and felt like silk. He was the quarter back of the football team and also ran everyday through the woods. Cylvia was quiet and her family owned the only Chinese food restaurant in town. She didn't understand Chinese but her parents always spoke about it when they didn't want her to hear.
The Willis' residence was still all put together, nice and neat, the way that Linda liked it. I climbed the stairs to my room and stopped at the top. I heard breathing and felt my skin tingle as my atoms made my skin become translucent. Linda and her husband were sleeping in their bed and James picture was still on the bedside table. He had gone missing the same time that I had. They were still looking for him and me and Kane and Gigi and Cylvia. The more I thought about it, the more I felt helpless, The more I felt like crying. The rain was pounding on my window and my bed still had the Paris bedspread on it, I'd always wanted to go there, and My drawers were open. The contents were strewn around on the floor and someone had taken my notebook that listed all the places I wanted to go if I ever got away. They didn't seriously think that I would remain naive and young, did they? Those were adolescent dreams.
The air stirred and I heard someone walking towards me from the corner of my room. I turned and almost screamed, I thought I was seeing a ghost.
"James?"