I've always wondered where picture frame stock photos came from, because they're tasteful but also completely boring. Was there a picture frame stock photo photographer? Or did people submit their family portraits to fill empty frames in stores (can you get paid doing that?)? I also wondered about the people in the photos. Did they know each other before the shoot? Did they answer a casting call that their agent booked them or something?

"Come on LuLu, get your sister." I jumped, nearly dropping the black desk frame I had been holding as my mother called me from the front of the store.

"Yeah," I replied, setting the frame back down nicely on the shelf before I turned to scan the store for my little sister. I finally spotter her in the toy aisle, her little Teen Titans backpack discarded beside her.

"C'mon Ana, time to go." I said walking over to her. She was busy playing with a Beast Boy and a Starfire doll.

"Cab I det is beeees!" She asked, holding up the Starfire doll in her little chubby hand.

"Ana you have, like, three Starfires at home, come on, Mama's waiting." I sighed, picking up her backpack and slinging it over my shoulder.

"Bud all de oder ones are bo-ken!"

"Lo siento, pero este es tu maletín, Ana. You shouldn't have chewed on their arms."

"Beeeees LuLu!" She wailed, catching the attention of some other nearby shoppers. I huffed as they stared, whispering behind their hands.

"Alright," I said, caving in. "Hand it over." Ana cheered and placed the toy in my hand. "Ay dios mio! Twenty dollars for this stupid piece of plastic? What, does it shit gold?" I scoffed, tossing the Starfire toy back into the toy bin. "Sorry Ana, not happening." Ana began to wail, her round face scrunching up as she screamed and stomped her feet.

"Bu bees! Bu bees! Bu bees bees bees bees beeeeeeees!"

"Luisa!" Came my mother's voice and I turned around to see her making her way towards us. "What did you do? All I did was ask you to get your sister!"

"Ugh! Nothing!" I cried, throwing up my hands. "She just wants this dumb expensive toy and she won't take no for an answer!" I watched as my mother picked up the discarded Starfire doll and check the price.

"I don't see why she can't get it. Most of her dolls back home are either yours or Miguel's hand-me-downs. It can be her early birthday present," she shot me a smug smile and handed the toy to me, "besides you should be able to get a discount, right?" She asked, wiggling her eyebrows suggestively at me.

I frowned, "I feel like you shouldn't be encouraging that." My mother reached up and patted my cheek.

"Has it ever failed?"

"Not yet." She snorted and pushed me off towards the counter with one hand while the other shoved a five dollar bill into my other free hand.

"Don't talk like that, now go get us a bargain! Ana, Miguel, Papa and I will be outside waiting by the car." I grumbled out my discontent but I was the only one around to hear it, Mama and Ana had already left the store.

Readjusting the Teen Titans backpack, I made my way up to the one and only check counter. Behind the counter a tall teenage boy no older than maybe nineteen, with a pock-marked face and stringy red hair.

"Hi," I smiled, immediately locking eyes with the boy; his nametag read: "Quinn."

That did the trick. I leaned forward as Quinn's eyes became glassy. He stared back at me with a star-struck expression.

"Just this for me today," I said, making sure that my fingers brushed over his as I handed him the Starfire doll. As I did so, a dopy lop-sided grin appeared on his face.

"Of course. That'll be $21.19." I winced at the price.

"Ohh, that's awfully expensive," I simpered, "isn't there like some discount I could get, Quinn?"

"Oh-uh, uh yeah!" Quinn jumped, punching a few buttons on the cash register. "Would 85% off be good for you?" He asked, looking at me eagerly to see if he had managed to please me.

"Quinn, really?" I giggled, "At 85% off you might as well just give it to me for free!" I joked.

"Okay." Quinn smiled, nodding along with my words as he punched more things into the register. "Consider it on the house!"

"Really? Quinn, oh my God, you're the best! My little sister is going to love this doll!" I praised him, making his face go red as I clutched the Starfire doll to my chest. "Thank you!" I called, heading towards the door.

"Uh- c-come back soon!" He called, leaning far over the counter to watch me go. I cast him one last look over my shoulder and smiled.

"Goodbye, Quinn."

"Goodbye." As soon as I turned back around I shot my mother a smug grin from across the parking lot, waving the toy and five dollar bill up in the air for them to see.

"Good work, Lu! What a steal!" My mother cheered and I chuckled, handing the Starfire doll to Ana.

"Stop!" Shouted a voice. I felt my heart race as I whirled around to see two cops marching their way over. "That young man says you stole that doll." One of the cops said, jerking a thumb over his shoulder to the store with Quinn standing in the doorway, his arms crossed.

"What? No I-I didn't he said—" I began, panicked.

"Are you calling him a liar?" The other cop interjected.

"Yes!" I said frantically, from behind me Ana began to cry, my mother comforting her.

"Tell them you got it at a bargain! That store clerk is lying!" My mother said, and I chanced a look back at them. Ana in my mother's lap as my mother looked on.

"You're in America, taco! Speak English, comprende?" One of the cops said snidely. My father tried to step in, holding his hands up in a non-threatening manner.

"Listen, friends, I'm sure this is all just a—"

"Quiet!" Shouted the other cop, as he yanked on my arm.

"Ow! Hey, let go of me!" I cried out as I felt cold metal close around my wrist.

"Don't! You're hurting her!" I watched as my father took another step forward, trying to come to my aid only for the other cop to slug him across the face. My mother screamed.

Now fully panicked, I began to struggle, wriggling myself free of the cop's grasp with only one handcuff on, the other dangling from the chain.

"Now, wait! I—" But they weren't listening to me.

"Yeah we got a 10-100 down in front of the Quick-E store, we're gonna need backup." The cop said into his radio, both of them pulling out their batons.

"Wait—no—" Tears sprung to my eyes as the two cops advanced toward me.

"Run, Luisa!" My mother cried, my father still out cold on the cement. I didn't have time to act though, as the nearest one tackled me. I screamed, kicking and scratching at his brute weight.

Above me was a clear blue sky. The other cop stood at me head, readying his baton. Tears streamed down the sides of my face and into my hair.

"Please!" I begged, not daring to take my eyes off him. In the struggle the Teen Titans backpack had been thrown from my shoulder and now lay beside me. I tried to feel for it, something I could use for protection.

The baton swung at my face.

Ow.

My head was throbbing, no, pulsating in time with my heart beat. It felt as is an invisible hammer was continuously pounding on the inside of my skull.

I was on a hard surface—the ground. Yes, that's right! I'm lying on the ground outside the Quick-E Store. The pain is from the baton. Oh crap. The Cops.

With great effort I forced my eyes open to see bright fluorescent lights shining above me. It was then that I noticed the steady beeping of a heart monitor. Jerking up into a sitting position I looked around to find myself in some kind of… laboratory? And what I was on was not the ground but actually a work slab. All in all making this way more unsettling than the police brutality I thought I'd be waking up to.

'What if they sold me to some testing facility?' Am I about to be a human lab rat for the rest of my existence? I would really rather not…

Just then the door on the other side of the lab opened. In walked a short woman with her hair tied back in a ponytail. Our eyes met and she gasped, dropping the clipboard she was carrying. She looked like she was about to turn tail and run but I shot out a hand.

"Wait!" She froze. "Please, stay—" I squinted to read the ID card that hung on a lanyard around her neck "—Barbara. I just woke up, where am I? How did I get here?" She stared at me for a moment and something seemed to come over her as she took a step closer.

"You're in the NEXUS laboratory. We found you unconscious in the city streets." Barbara said, keeping her eyes locked with mine as she moved another step closer.

This doesn't make sense. Where's my family? Was I right, was I sold by the cops to some underground illegal human experiment lab? But then why was I found on the ground?

"What's NEXUS? Why am I here?"

"NEXUS is an illegal corporation whose goal is to mass produce superpower genetics to sell to the highest bidder on the black market. We find people who carry the gene, enhance it, and then farm it. You're here because our scanners picked up your genetic code."

I'm sorry, what?

My head is killing me.

Maybe this is all some vivid dream.

Hopefully this is all some vivid dream…

"I…" I didn't know what to say—or really, I didn't know what I wanted to say first. "But superpowers… that's comic book stuff. Marvel, DC stuff. Why are you so freely telling me all of this?-… What's my power?" Barbara took another step closer and I could see the glassy look in her eye as she stared at me with awe.

"Superpowers are real, and I don't—I don't know why I'm…. I shouldn't be" I saw something flicker in her eyes and I knew I was losing her.

"Barbara," I said her name again, trying to sound enticing and calm when on the inside I was hardcore panicking. I smiled at her and the glassy look in her eyes returned.

"We don't know what your power is yet, not until we run you through our course which will exhaust every possible option." I grimaced.

"Sounds unpleasant, Barbara, do I have to? Can't you just… let me go?" It was a long shot, but also maybe not… maybe I'd be able to-

"Oh—no, I'm sorry Gen-E 742, I can't. We need your DNA." She looked truly sorry too. My face crumpled as I buried my face into my hands. This was bad, so so so so so so SO bad. I was doomed to live a life of human trafficking to some crazy white scientists that think they're Batman or something. Or I'd be sold to the highest bidder for their personal militia where I'd have to fight in their dumb guerilla warfare because they decided to pump me full with their Chemical X and mass produce Power Puff Girls—

There was a gasp.

My head shot up to see Barbara running back toward the door to grab her clipboard while speaking into a walkie-talkie.

"Gen-E 742 is awake, it shows powers of mental manipulation and persuasion. I'd get team down here now to start prepping her." There came a reply over the radio but it was too muffled for me to understand. "I know! Imagine the waves this'll make among the business entrepreneurs…" That doesn't sound good for me. I looked around the lab frantically. It sounded like if I was going to escape, now would be the time to do it. I moved to get off the slab only to realize my arms and legs were shackled down.

Of course they were…

I yanked on them experimentally. They seemed pretty sturdy, but there were a few links in the chain, giving me some leeway in movement.

Wait- I'm in a lab! There's gotta be something corrosive that could do some damage to these cuffs! I looked around for beakers or maybe something with a skull and cross-bone symbol, or that odd circle thing that means it's radioactive but there was nothing. I pursed my lips, blinking back tears. There was no way out. My time was up.

At that moment, a fleet of scientists came in through the door, flanked by three large, burly men in scrubs.

"Get her," the lead scientist said, looking at me over his horned rimmed glasses. I gasped as the larger men lunged at me, a syringe in the left one's hand. I could only imagine what it contained. I tried to pull away but my chains held me in place.

"Wait!" I pleaded and he froze, his eyes glassy. Unfortunately, another one snatched the syringe from his hands while the other held me down. I cried out as the needle was plunged into the side of my neck.

I have no idea how long I've been down here. Easily days, weeks—a month? Who knows? Not me, that's for sure. I haven't seen daylight since I arrived at this god forsaken facility, always kept underground.

Or maybe there were windows. I wouldn't know. My eyes were considered my power source so if I wasn't being tested or conditioned on one of Nexus' courses, I had a permanent blindfold covering my eyes, and handcuffs that bound my arms together from wrist to elbow. When they weren't using me, they kept me in a cell. From what I can tell it's a pretty nice cell, seeing as I've never seen the inside (blindfold). I don't have any roommates, in fact, I've never seen or heard anyone else here; I'm sure there are others, they're probably all just as isolated as me. I've got a bed, and a sink, and a toilet in my cell. The beds in the left corner farthest from the door and the sink and toilet are parallel. The walls are smooth and free of blemishes (in my head they're white because I think that fits with the whole sterile vibe of this place, but for all I know they could be Chartreuse). I have no idea how high the ceiling goes.

The tests they run are torturous but also the only source of entertainment, exercise, and time I get with my blindfold off so I couldn't really say I don't look forward to the testing. For the most part they're pretty standard evil corporation tests, according to my knowledge based on films and comics and the like. They'll hook me up to a lot of monitors and make me run as hard and as fast as I can until end up vomiting from overexertion. Always fun.

Then they'll record the information and then pump me with another dose of what I call Chemical X (I don't actually know what's in the syringe, but I'm pretty sure it makes my powers stronger and it burns like Hell too). Then I'll be made to hypnotize some mice and pigs and make them do menial little tasks. Finally, they'll make me control multiple mice and pigs to see just how many I can hypnotize to do my bidding at once.

One time they had me read the memories of a mouse. And as cool as it was to see life through the eyes of a mouse, mice have shit memories and it was a memory of the animal eating a hunk of cheese from about an hour ago.

I think I'm getting used to being here. They don't torture me, they're not Nazis. I'm just saying, this could all definitely be worse. This is certainly no concentration camp, they could be pulling some V for Vendetta shit and keep me locked up in a dirty dungeon where I have to drink toilet water to survive. I mean, seeing as someday they're going to harvest my DNA to make copies and then sell me to the highest bidder at some black market auction someday, I'm not saying I'm chummy with them… just…

Compliant.

Or really, I've just given up on trying to escape. The blindfold really is a huge inhibitor.

I miss my family. I wonder how they're holding up since I've gone missing. Did the police force their silence when they kidnapped me? Are they okay? I could only imagine what happened to them… maybe they were paid for their silence. Or maybe they were offered a deal and sold me—

I shook my head. No, no, they'd never sell me, we're not from some small village out in the Himalayan Mountains where families sell their children and girls are married off to old men as their child brides, we live in Miami.

So really… could be a possibility.

CLANK.

My head shot up, looking in the direction of my cell door. What was that?

CLINK. CLANK. BOOM. CRASH. BAM. THUNK.

Ummm.

All that noise… sounds like a fight. I chewed on my lip and got out of my bed, moving in the direction of the doors. I reached out my hands, feeling for the edge of the door when-

Whoosh.

"You Gen-E 742?" Asked a voice. It wasn't one of the scientists, it was too young. Maybe one of the other prisoners like me?

"Yes," I said hesitantly.

"How would you like to get out of here?"