Jack was worried.

He paced back and forth while waiting with his stepmother and her two kids. Jamie and Sophie were on either side of their mother, engulfing her lower half in a one-armed hug. They half hide behind her as if she was some sort of shield even though she was sending them to the slaughter.

Beside them, there we're families just like them. Children hugged their parents and the parents held them in return. A lot of them were women, which sadden Jack even more as he paced.

Earth had made contact with other planets in the galaxies that surrounded the Milky Way. Trade had ensued. The other planets offered a cure for cancers and advanced technology while Earth offered exotic humans. Apparently, some aliens wanted humans.

Jack looked at his family. His siblings looked as scared as their mother felt. Her sorrow filled eyes locked with his in a silent understanding. He didn't want to do this. He really didn't want to.

The crowd of people were in the middle of a clearing. They were waiting on an aircraft. One in the same, they waited for their fate. Most needed the money. Some wanted the new start. Jack, he wanted to escape.

His mother had died during childbirth. He grew up without a mother and had a little sister in her place. He didn't blame his sister for his mother's death. He heard from his father, when he was older, that both his mother and his sister could have died. He understood that life was cruel like that.

When he was barely in his teens, Jack had taken his sister to stake on the frozen lake he usually stakes at in the winter. That year, the winter had been warmer than most. And it showed. The ice in one spot could not handle her. Jack thought quickly. He saw a long stick and he did the first thing that popped into his head. He pulled her out of danger and himself into it.

The ice had cracked under his weight. He was okay with that. He was prepared for death. Many children died young in his ho-bunk town. He thought it was his time. So, he welcomed it like an old friend.

However, fate had other plans for him.

He was rescued. He doesn't know how. And he doesn't know by whom, but he, somehow, survived. His sister, not so much. She got pneumonia. She died on the first day of spring that year.

By then, Jack felt like bad luck. His mother and his sister had died. Not by him, but he still blamed himself. He had asked his mother if he could have a little sibling. He had asked his little sister to stake with him at the lake. It was his fault they died.

His father remarried. She was a polite woman. She gave him two more children. Jamie and Sophie. Twins. His father was so pleased. However, Jack didn't want any more people in his life. They always got hurt because of them. They always did.

But, when he saw those two wrapped in their individual colored blankets, he want them. He wanted the twins. He wanted to protect them until they learned to protect themselves. He gently held each of them. In awe as he locked into their wonder-filled eyes. All babbly and smiley.

Years passed. Everything was good, but it didn't last long. One night, his father came home drunk. His father was, normally, a good man. However, when you gave him alcohol, he turned into this beast. And that's how he came home. A blazed beast.

He had thrown the front door open, the door knob stuck into the wall. Jack had been on the main floor when it had happened. His was cooking in the kitchen. The twins had been put into bed and their mother was working late. So, he was alone.

The noise itself scared him. He had jumped and burned his arm on the pot he was using. His father stumbled into the kitchen, drunkenly fumbling with his hands. He uttered hurtful slurs.

You are a murderer!

Jack stopped what he was doing on the stove. He turned to his father and took a shaky breath. He opened his mouth and was slapped down before the words even left his tongue. The force pushed Jack onto the floor and unbalanced the pot. All he could do was watch as the pot dropped its boiling contents onto his legs. Jack let out a silent scream.

His father was over him, the image blurry as tears stung his eyes. His father was enraged and deranged. He pulled Jack up by his hair and yelled into his face until he ears rang. Punches were thrown. Glass was broken. Voices rose. Pleads were made, but not heard.

Jack was done. He was down, bruised and broken. He was finally ready to die. He was ready to be with his sister and his mother. He closed his eyes and waited.

However, fate played with him, again.

Jamie had come into the kitchen, rubbing the sleep out of his eyes. He had called out for Jack, getting the attention of their deranged father in the process. His father turned his back on Jack and went at Jamie with the glass shard he had been cutting Jack's flesh with. Jack didn't think, he just acted. He managed to get in front of his father and took the wound from the glass as he protected his little brother.

Jamie has no idea what was going on. Jack pulled him so they would be face to face. He felt round in his pockets for his phone. Upon obtaining it, he offered it to Jamie. He told Jamie to go to the bathroom and call 911. Jamie hesitated. Jack pushed him out of the away as he fought off his father behind him. He slide the phone on the carpet to Jamie as he repeated his instructions.

Jamie disappeared into the bathroom. Jack turned back to his father. The glass shard had cut the sides of his face, shoulders, arms, legs and torso. His father came at him again.

Jack and his father danced around the kitchen. Jamie's voice drifted from the open door of the bathroom. He was on the phone with the authorities. That was good. Someone was coming to save them.

Jack was distracted. His father landed a blow with the shard. Jack screamed. Jamie screamed. His father screamed. Jack fell hard to the floor. His breathing was uneven. His blood pumped in his ears. His eyes blurred. His mind in a haze.

His father stepped over him. He went to find Jamie. Jack was not going to let that happen. Jack pushed himself up on shaky arms. His legs wobbled as he slowly stood. He rested against the wall as he slowly made it toward the bathroom. Once he entered, he found his father looming over Jamie. The poor kid was crying as he talked to the operator, calling into the phone for help, Jack's name, and for his father to stop.

Jack used the remainder of his strength to launch himself at his father. This unbalanced the stuck man and they fell into a rolling scuffle, the shard somewhere between them. Jamie called out his name as he wrestled his father. He was losing, badly.

Jack called out to Jamie to leave the bathroom and go to the living room. If he was going to die, he was not going to do it in front of his pure, little brother. He heard the sound of Jamie's bare feet flee the tiled bathroom and onto the hardwood of the hallway. The sound became distant, alerting Jack that Jamie was safe.

The next moment happen all too quickly. His father had had the shard and was trying to harm Jack with it. He thrusted at Jack's abdomen. Jack grabbed his wrist and pushed against his father's forearm until there was a sharp, wet sound.

They both looked down between them. The shard glistened ruby as the blood uniformly flowed out of the wound and onto the white tiles floor. They both gasped as both of their hands were covered in the iron-enriched liquid.

Jack could hear someone searching the house. He cried out, pleading for help. Officers in blue and white uniforms came into the bathroom. They peeled his father off of him. Jack was saved. He blacked out as they started patching him up.

Jack had woken up in the hospital. The white everything hurt his eyes. He squinted and blinked. When the white light left his vision, he looked around the room. It was a white room. A single room. He was by himself. The TV talked about politics. The machines he was hooked up to beeped in an off-beat order. He was still alive.

The door opened and a little man came in with a white lab coat. He came to the bedside to check on Jack. When he saw he was awake, he called over his shoulder, into the hall, for a nurse. Jack was breathing on his own, he didn't need the ventilator anymore. The nurse came in and helped the doctor remove the elongated tube from Jack's lung.

Jack gasped for breath. He swallowed and gagged. His throat was so dry. He felt like he was trying to swallow a beach ball. The doctor dispatched the nurse out of the room.

He checked Jack over. Shining a light into his eyes, asking him to look into different direction. Jack did as he was told. When the doctor was done with his closest eye, the man came around his bed to the other side and did the same thing to Jack's other eye.

The nurse came back in with a bucket lined with plastic and a plastic cup. She set the bucket in the meal table beside Jack's bed. She scooped the cup into the bucket and came out with a full cup of ice. She gently brought the cup to Jack's lips and asked him to take a few ice chips into his mouth to suck on. He obeyed. The ice was very cold inside of his warm mouth.

The nurse put the cup beside the bucket and left with the doctor out of the room. The doctor closed the door until there was just a crack before it would be fully closed. Jack shut his eyes, concentrating on the cool solid in his mouth. His mind was still fogged with sleep.

The door opened followed by heavy foot-falls. For a heartbreaking second, Jack thought is was his father. His eyes shot open as he was prepared to scream. The officer in front of him jumped. Good, it wasn't the monster. The officer introduced himself to Jack before he took the chair next to his bed. The officer moved something out of the way inside the chair as he sat. The object was put into Jack vision.

Jack's eyes widened. It was Sophie's bunny. She carried that thing everywhere ever since Jack had got it for her on this past Easter. Sophie had been here. Jamie had been here. Their mother had been here.

The officer placed the bunny beside Jack's bucket of ice. He withdrew a pad of paper and a pen from his breast pocket. He told Jack that he had been out for half a day and had died on the table twice. He looked Jack in the eyes. The officer asked him a simple question.

What do you remember about last night?

Jack opened his mouth to answer, but was unable to find the words. Instead, a sob slipped from his throat. His sore body rocked with the abundance of emotion that coursed through his veins. The officer waited for Jack, placing his pad and pen down on the meal tray table. He got up and found the Kleenexes. He pulled two, bunching them together. He offered them to Jack and blew his nose into them. The officer wadded them up and threw them into the trash bin that was beside Jack's bed.

The officer looked at Jack. The teen knew he looked worse for wear. He could see his distorted reflection in the chrome sunglasses the blue clad uniform deemed fit indoors. The officer took his place back in the chair. Jack's sobs turned into hiccups. He blabbered incoherent syllables.

The officer sighed. He removed his shades from his face, folding them correctly and placing them on his breast pocket with one earpiece held the eyewear to the shirt. He ran a hand through his hair. He did not get paid enough to pull secrets from abused children.

While the officer was in his own world, Jack wondered why he was being babied. He looked down and his breath caught in his throat. He was in one of those hospital gowns that tied in the back. The short sleeved material stopped about a third of the way down his humerus. From under the fabric, white cotton bandages wrapped around his arms, mummy style. The bandages disappeared below the off-white sheet and dull blue knitted hospital blanket.

Jack, for the first time since he woke up, tried to move his arms. They didn't listen to his directions. He could still feel them, of course. So, they had to be there, but he could move them. He found that the same was true for his legs. He could feel them, just not move them.

Jack sighed, frustrated. No wonder that nurse was waiting on him hand and foot. He couldn't use his arms nor his legs. Just remembering why caused him to hyperventilate. He need to calm down.

The loud, consecutive beeping on the monitor, which had been attached to Jack's heart, brought the officer out of his zoned-out state. He let out a few choice words under his breath. The officer hopped up from his seated position and bolted for the door. Pulling the wooden divider with a force that made the hinges communicate in protest, the officer yelled out in the hall for the doctor.

The sound of expensive leather shoes hitting linoleum reached Jack's ears, getting louder as the person or people went somewhere quickly. Everything in the hospital room faded. That sound was pushed to the forefront of his mind. That sound. It had haunted him for months, let alone years. All of the nightmares hit him all at once. Everything that he was holding in overflowed. He had finally reached his breaking point.

Jack's breathe quickened tenfold. He sweated bullets and his body rocked with the heaving of his chest. Hot tears obscured his vision, not that he could see anything at that point. He gulped down oxygen as if he was drowning all over again. His chest tightened and his limbs became numb. He wasn't even sure if he breathed at all.

When the doctor came in, Jack was in the middle of having his panic attack. The doctor passed by the stunned officer, entering the room quickly. He went to the bedside where he began trying to calm Jack down. The nurse followed suit, entering the room with a purpose. She held numerous amounts of small vials of clear liquid and just as many 10 ml needle syringes.

The nurse placed her handfuls onto the meal tray; the rabbit stuffed animal on the floor from where it landed when the officer knocked it off on his haste to the door. The doctor began dictating what liquids he needed and how much. The nurse followed the directions. She held up a needle and flicked the side of the syringe, getting rid of the access air bubbles from inside. Then, she repeated the procedure with the rest of the needles filled with copious amounts of liquid.

The doctor began to administer the liquids into the IV tube connected to Jack's forearm. He flushed the liquids, quickly. After about the third or fourth syringe, Jack showed signs of calming down. He breathing slowly deepened. His rigid body relaxed steadily. His eyes fluttered closed. Jack looked like he had just fallen asleep.

Looks like the sedatives worked.

The doctor exhaled. He had no idea that Jack was prone to having panic attacks. If he would have known, he would have had the officer ask different questions. He sighed. This was going to be a long day.

The doctor, nurse, and officer left the room, the officer closed the door behind them.

/line break\

Jack looked around the mass of bodies, once more. In the clearing that they were in, it was an abandoned field. Wild grass grew unmaintained and swayed in the gentle breeze. The little kids that did not know what was going on raced and chased each other while laughing the whole time.

Jack stilled by his family. Jamie and Sophie were still behind their mother's legs. Just looking at them now, you wouldn't believe that they were twins. Jamie had brown wispy curls and chocolate brown eyes. Sophie had blonde straight hair and bright green eyes. Both were pale and had the mother's last name of Bennett and Jack legally renamed himself with the last name of Frost to get rid of the only thing that was left of his father.

Jack looked over his shoulder one last time at his hometown, Burgess. The place that will hold good memories of the best of times. The place that will haunt him the rest of his life. He turned his head when he heard an aircraft on approach.

Circling above them, a giant carrier was trying to land. The children run back to their respective parent and cleared the field for the carrier to land. It eased its way down, the landing gear popped into view from its hidden compartment. The carrier centered itself in the middle of the crowd of people. It gently touched down, the landing gear absorbed the shock of free falling the last three meters with the emitting of steam from all of the joints.

The hanger door opened with a spurt of steam. A man donned in an all-black uniform stepped down the incline and onto the grassy field. He shielded his eyes with a pasty hand because the brim of his uniform cap wasn't long enough to do the job. He lowered his hand as he blinked and looked around. His coal black eyes searched for something specific and seemed to find it when he looked at Jack. He smirked.

As he zeroed in on Jack, a blond bob could be seen as they made their way to the officer and Jack. The officer stepped in front of Jack. He gaze was crude and his smirked showed off his gnarly teeth. Just as he was going to touch Jack with a black gloved hand, a tanned hand grabbed the officer's forearm, stopping him.

The officer looked at the offending hand with surprise. The tanned man put himself between Jack and the officer. The officer raised a thin brow that disappeared into his greasy black head of hair. He pulled his uniformed clad arm from the tanned hand. He made a move to get around the tanned giant but failed. The tanned man shock a mocking hand at the officer in the universal sign of, "Nu-uh".

The officer fumed. He gritted his teeth together. He pointed an accusing finger at the tanned man.

"You think this is funny, worm?"

The tanned man smirked and shrugged his shoulders, his hands in his pockets. This seemed to infuriate the officer even more. He reached up and grabbed the tanned man by his right ear, like a mother scolding her child and hauled ass to the ramp incline. He bickered under his breath as he yelled on board for someone to take the man to his office and to be held there.

When the officer was distracted by this, the tanned man turned and gave Jack two thumbs up. He smiled real big, showing off all of his pearly whites. A different officer came down the ramp to collect the tanned man for the other officer, black armor matched his weapon. An assault rifle. He pushed the gun into the center of the tanned giants back, marching him up the incline into the ship.

"Now, without any further interruptions, welcome to the Carrier Pidgin. I am the captain, General Pitch and I'll be fore-seeing this voyage to the Fraîche planet that you have decided to visit. When I call your name, please come in an ordered fashion to the table. We will band you with what you have indicated that you intend to do once we land. You have to keep your bands on at all times. So, the crew and I know how to handle you." His monotone voice ended with a sneer.

While he had been talking, two anonymous officers carried a table that held boxes down the incline. Heavy boats made loud thumping sounds against to the metal ramp as they descended. Once on the grass, they placed the table parallel to the end of the ramp and started to unpack the boxes, extracting bands of thousands of different colors. The general reached for the clipboard that also was on the table.

"Now! These names are in no particular order. So, listen up. If we say your name and you don't come when we call for you, well. Have fun trying to get on another ship. No answer, no ride."

As he talked, the general whacked the clipboard on a blank space on the table. He shrugged his shoulders with his hands up in a mocking surrender. Then, he held the clipboard with one hand, gesturing to the crowd with the short edge of the organizational tool. He flipped through the papers and called the names as he came to them. Slowly, a line started to form.

"OVERLAND!"

Jack's head shot up. Why would that name be mentioned? He had changed his name on his birth certificate. He blanched. The forms were filled out before he had changed it.

So much for a fresh start.

Jack looked back at his family. Both Jamie and Sophie didn't want to let go of their mother. They needed to go. Jack pride his little siblings off of their mother, screaming and thrashing. He dragged them away from their tearful mother.

"OVERLAND!"

Jack cringed. He pushed his way through the crowd that had yet to be called. They needed to get through before that man called that name once more or they wouldn't be able to leave. Jack managed to find a patch through the mass of bodies. He was holding two crying children. It kind of parted the people for him.

"OVER-"

"HERE!"

Jack finally made it to the ship. He panted has he had exerted himself too much while carrying his little siblings so, they wouldn't run back to their mother. He deposited the children in front of the banding station. He turned to the general and gave a mock salute.

"Overland here, sir."

The general looked Jack up and down, already judging him. His black pits that were his eyes rolled over Jack's body. He shivered, feeling violated. The general looked back at the list of names.

"Jackson-"

"Jack."

Jack interrupted the general. To get onto the ship, his stepmother had to give them the name that he were born with. Jack's full first name was Jackson, but he liked Jack better. The general raised a sculpted eyebrow at Jack. When Jack didn't say anything else, the general continued with the list in front of him.

"Overlan-"

"Frost."

The general looked up from the clipboard at Jack. He glared, his piercing black gaze caused jack to feel uneasy. The uniformed officer turned his head back to stare at the names on the paper in his position.

"The names you have provided are on this sheet of paper. If they are not right, how do I know that you are who you say you are. Hmm?"

The general lowered the list onto the table and crossed his arms. Jack sighed.

"The names are right, but-"

"Then, quit bitching."

The general picked up his clipboard and resumed calling of the names that were with Jack.

"James-"

"Jamie."

"and Sophia-"

"Sophie."

"Bennett."

When he wasn't met with argument, the general looked up from his list. Jack nodded his head. That had been the only information that could be used on the list. Since his stepmother had to use Jack's full name, she also had to use her children's as well. However, they don't answer to their proper names.

Jack moved to the banding station, sliding down the table to be in front of the cardboard boxes. The soldier looked at his own list that was in some type of grind system. He moved his finger down the column of names until he got to Jack's, albeit still the wrong name, but whatever. His finger scanned Jack's row, seeing which boxes were checked. He pulled out the corresponding colored band to the mark.

He handed Jack three contrasting colored bands. Each one of them meant something different. Jack accepted the bands from the soldier. He slipped them onto his wrist, the colors very bold against his pale skin tone.

He looked at Jamie and Sophie. They had two bands that matched each other and one that matched one of Jack's. That must be how he was going to stay with them. That's good. The twins were thirteen. They didn't need some strange person owning them. Jack went over to them and even though they were over the age to do so, he held their hands, anyway.

As they walked up the incline, Jack thought about what this meant. He was, now, not his own person. Neither were his little siblings, but they would be together. All of them together on a new planet that they would call home for the rest of their natural born lives.

So much for escape, Jack thought. I have just sent myself to a big, new cage.

Author's Note: Hey guys! I'm back and posting this on here without seeing if I need to fix anything else. But, hey. Nobody's perfect. *shrugs* Hope you enjoyed this as much as I had fun writing this! See you later! *waves*

P.S.: Brownie points to people who review!