Subject 01 remembered little of life before and he supposed it was better that way. He saw what it did to 03. Made her soft. Made her a target. Made her cry at night for a father that was never coming to get her – a father who probably wasn't even still alive.
For his part, 01 could only remember one little piece of his past, and it didn't even come from his own mind. It was on his door, a typed out card slipped into a small metal plaque. He'd stared at it for hours on end before, trying to make the words mean something to him. Anything. But all they brought was the distant thought that they belonged to him.
Subject 01
Dirk Strider
His name though it might be – and on his door, nonetheless – he and the other children, teenagers now, were banned from using it, or any of the other ones. They were told that names brought nothing but attachment, and attachment was a weakness. You couldn't kill what you were attached to.
Even still, he still liked seeing his name on the door. That subtle reminder that no matter what, he was still human. And as he walked down the hallway and passed the other doors, he habitually whispered the other names to himself.
03, Jane Crocker. 04, Jake English. 05, Meenah Peixes. All the way down to 16, Damara Megido.
He saved the door across from his own for last. As a show of rebelliousness, 02 had painted her door pink. It didn't matter how many times it was changed back to white, how many times she was punished, how many times her painting privileges were suspended… The door always ended up pink again. It made him smile, a little bit. She had a way of doing that.
02, Roxy Lalonde, was the only person who had been here quite as long as he had. He could vaguely remember running through the halls at the age of four, laughing and giggling at the game the two of them were playing… This was back when he actually laughed and giggled. He couldn't remember meeting her, or really anything before there had been a white building with no windows except to show the training amphitheater. As far as he could tell, he hadn't been anything before he'd been handed a gun and told that someday all of them would save the world and it would be worth it. There was nothing to go back to before he and 02 – he and Roxy – had been shooting at a target, boasting that each could do better than the other, only to stop and watch as a terrified 03 and 04 were brought in.
There was nothing before that except the painful realization that he had a name. That he wasn't just 01. That there had to be more to him than the human machine that knew its purpose and knew better than to deal with human attachment because human attachment was weakness… But that couldn't possibly apply to the girl with the pink door who leaned in close to his ear during training and whispered, "race you to the moon tonight, Dirk."
And it was on those rare, rebellious nights that he got those instructions that it really mattered to him. Sneaking out of his room and running into the amphitheater – already turned on by that rebellious girl – onto a path he knew well, winding through the illusionary scene that ended in a white sphere that he and 02 had always called the moon. For what were two kids who couldn't even remember what the moon looked like supposed to call it? He'd crawl underneath and wiggle his way inside, navigate the vertical obstacle course and make it to the top where she was always waiting, grinning like a fool, her pleased, "I beat you" sing-songing. But of course she beat him. He always let her go first.
They'd lay up there and look at the ceiling. "I wonder what the stars really look like," she would say, and he'd shrug. "I wonder what the world is like," she'd say. "Shitty." And like that they'd go, back and forth until she fell asleep, snuggled into him. It was then that he'd allow it all to break down and he'd stroke her hair and sigh because whenever her questions did get answered, who was to say that they'd live long enough to remember it. That was the danger. Shitty or not, the four walls of the compound and the amphitheater were safe.
But curiosity is not something easy satisfied by safety. These rebellious nights made him yearn for the world outside. A world where 03 wouldn't cry because she'd be safe with a father who called her Janey. Where 04 didn't get fewer meals every time he slipped up into a verbal pattern clearly picked up from the grandmother he talked about – the grandmother he had watched die in a bombing. "It's all I have left of her," he'd once said, quietly. "But they say it makes me stick out. Golly, I don't want to stick out…" One less meal.
His biggest desire, however, wasn't quite so drastic. He just wanted to be out in a world where 02 could be Roxy and he could be Dirk. Human teenagers with human teenager names. Nothing too drastic. Nothing that should be too difficult.
Sliding off the moon and carrying 02 back to bed, he would shake these thoughts away. They were ridiculous, after all. He had nothing to show him that the outside world would be kind. Why would they train kids in this way if it was? Whatever was going on, they were better inside… For once they were let out, he knew it was for one purpose only. To fix what was too broken to be fixed.
Thus, most of the time, he pushed thoughts of Dirk Strider out of his head. What was important was to train well, to be a good leader for his little team, to make sure that the experimental unit trained well… Something a little difficult when the experiments of the trainers had left 12 deaf, 14 mentally destroyed beyond repair, 07 refusing to talk because of whatever had been done to him and whatever he had seen happen to the others. Everything happened for a reason and he had no cause to believe that the trainers were trying to be cruel. It was easy to ignore any and all of the bad when everything stayed the same.
And then it didn't. A chronic insomniac, he patrolled the halls after midnight to ensure that everyone was alright. That's when he saw the door open. The door to hall C, normally closed and locked, completely empty when it wasn't. To see it open at night was unheard of. So he went in.
The first thing he noticed were the plaques on the doors. Curiously similar to those of his team and the experimental unit, he went over to one. Sure enough, it had the familiar typing.
Subject 18
Rose Lalonde
He could almost feel his heart stop at the last word. His mouth formed it, slowly, and he pushed open the door – movements forcefully controlled. There, on the bed, in a sleep too deep to be anything other than tranquilizer induced, was a girl – around the age of fifteen, he thought – who looked far too much like 02. He backed out of the room and closed the door, shaking his head. An anomaly. Couldn't possibly mean anything.
Slowly, he forced himself to turn and face the door across from 18's. He could see the plaque on it, but his eyes refused to focus. Refuse to let him believe – maybe it was hope, maybe it was horror – just what he might find.
Stepping closer, an inspection made his stomach drop out from underneath him.
Subject 17
Dave Strider
His opening of the door was much less controlled this time. His movements felt almost manic. And the boy on the bed could be a carbon copy of himself – just younger. Different hair. But sleeping in that same sprawled way that he did. He could hear the trainers in his mind. "Soldiers sleep straight. Keep yourself rigid. Always be ready for an attack." He remembered his younger self getting frustrated and saying that sleep should be the time he got to relax. He'd been punished for that. He hadn't slept a full night since.
As he watched, the boy started to shift and wake. He straightened as he watched, falling into a soldier's ready position. This could be a trap. The similarities were too strong for the possibility to be ignored. 17 sat up and rubbed at his eyes. The yawn he produced was wincingly loud – it would be something that had to be trained out of him.
He stopped breathing when their eyes met, but was surprised by an easy grin spreading across 17's face. And then the words came.
"Damn, bro, it's about time."