Two children trudged through the woods of the French countryside. It was the middle of winter and so the winds felt like it, icy fingers tickling their cold skin. The girl, no more than twelve years old, shivered beneath her thin jacket.
"Hans, it's so cold. Where are we going?" she whimpered, letting out a white breath into the frigid evening air.
Hans took his sister's small blue hand in his and gave it what he thought was a reassuring big-brotherly sort of squeeze. "Don't worry, Greta, I'll keep you safe."
"I think my head gears are starting to freeze in place," the girl exclaimed. "I can't move my head!" True to her word, she put her hands up on either side of her head to try and turn it, but it wouldn't budge.
Hans pried her fingers from her scalp. "Just hang on. We'll get out of here soon."
But if truth be told, Hans was just as scared as his little sister. After their stepmother had banished them from her home by threatening to kill Greta, Hans figured they had no choice but to run. And it was for the worst reason too, their stepmother hating little Greta. Greta was a cyborg. Almost sixty percent of her head was wires and gears and other technical stuff Hans didn't know about. After all, he was only thirteen himself, still practically a child. Although he would never admit that thought out loud.
At the same time the trees started to clear, a snow began falling. Light at first, then coming down in huge flakes. It was too cold out there for them. Hans didn't know why but he suddenly felt they were in danger, like eyes were watching him, following their every move. He felt like prey.
He grabbed Greta's hand still tighter and told her to run. The ground was not smooth, but uneven and littered with sticks and fallen tree branches. But nevertheless, huffing and puffing though they were, they made to the edge of the wood. They stood there, hands, clasped together, breathing heavily which was sending large amounts of frosty breath around them.
Greta looked around them, her cyborg eyes taking it all in, Hans knew. "We made it to a road."
A long, dirt country road that twisted up and through the French countryside hills. It ran in just one lane, a reflecting yellow line down the center as reference for the ships around her ; they could choose to go right towards what was possibly the city, and that was what they were trying to get away from. No, the city would not do, even if Hans was only vaguely guessing going right meant ending in the city. He looked left. The road just seemed to go on and on, like their stepmother's yarn that they'd sometimes give to the cat to play with. Stepmother always grew very angry and sometimes even hit Greta, even if it was Hans who'd started it and protested so.
The snow was falling thickly now, obscuring the road in front of them. Hans tugged at his cotton fleece, thinking he'd been stupid not to bring provisions. Think next time, dummy! Anyone escapade always thinks of that first! At least in all the shows he'd watched with Papa.
"We've got to run, I have to keep my gears moving!" Greta whispered and she took off at a dead sprint, Hans right on her heels.
It was the second time they'd run that night with despair blooming in their chests and ice in their veins. They ran for a long time. Probably three hours, Hans thought. But when they saw the lights of a desolate farm, Greta told him it hadn't been nearly that long.
"I guess we were only ten minutes away from this farm."
They stood at a top of a hill, looking down on the farm. Warm yellow light poured out of a large building's windows; it didn't look like the farmhouse as there was another building a little ways away that was three stores with lots of windows and a front porch. There was light on in there too. People were there. They could take them in. They could let them stay the night maybe, and they could live out here in the safe isolation. Yes, they'd miss their Papa, but if it meant Stepmother stayed away from Greta, it was better than longing for their father. At least that's what Hans was trying to convince himself of.
"Let's go down to that building over there." He pointed a shaking, cold finger over to the one that reminded him of a hanger Papa worked at.
Again, they ran instead of walked, down the bumpy hill. Greta almost slipped and fell because the snow was sticking like frost to the wet grass. When they reached the farm they headed straight over to the hangar. The door was wide open but there was no sign of anyone inside. The place had to be someone's workshop, a messy one at that, what with the place littered with greasy black tools and rags as it was.
Greta sniffed the air. "It smells weird in here."
"I guess like what a shop should smell like," Hans tried to feebly attempt at joking. Even though it was his specialty, he was so tired right now he couldn't make a knock-knock joke if his life depended on it. Well that wasn't completely true but it's a good way of saying I'm tired, Hans thought to himself.
"What's this?" Greta had wandered over to a hole in the floor.
Frowning, Hans walked over to join her and looked down. There was a ladder with rusty old rungs leading into what looked like some sort of secret room. "Cool." Hans could just imagine what sort of awesome thing was down there. Maybe a machine gun which he could use if they ran into any Lunars any time soon.
He placed his heel on the first rung and down he went, hearing Greta call after him, "I really don't think that's a great idea, Hans. Hans?!" And then she went down after him.
There was fluorescent lighting, white and pale, the kind that hurt your eyes. There was a tank. And a long table with operating lights and veins of cords and - it was an operating table! Just like ones out of a movie. He started to step toward it when he heard a screech. Then the lights shut down and they were plunged into darkness. Hans heard Greta scream and he found her in his blindness, just as her eyes lit up in all their cyborg glory like flashlights.
"Who's there?" It was a deep, scratchy voice, but a woman's all the same. She sounded panicked.
"I'm so sorry," Greta whimpered. "Me and my brother were just curious what was down here. We're really sorry."
A pause. "Are you the police? Lunars?"
Where was her voice coming from? Hans craned his head, trying to see beyond the small patch of floor Greta's cyborg eyes lit up.
"No! We aren't anybody important! Please just let us leave." Greta would've been crying if she wasn't cyborg; Hans knew the thick, choked tone in her voice.
Then, the lights flickered on. A woman stood on the ladder, hanging onto a rung behind her. Her hair was white and she wore a coat with a seal on it. Hans couldn't see what it was, but it seemed very military-like. She didn't look like most old ladies that he'd seen; in fact, if she didn't have all the rivers of wrinkles creasing her face she could've been thirty, Hans thought.
The woman seemed to be sizing them up, then, Hans guessed deeming them not to be a threat, she heaved a sigh. "You need to get back up here. I'll take you to the house."
Three minutes later they were entering the farmhouse, the woman prodding them from behind with a wrench of some sort. Hans could feel the petrified Greta's fear coming off her in ways. An old lady with a wrench? Why, the thing from nightmares! Hans wasn't all that scared. Although he was getting a little annoyed with the poking. But he decided to forgive the lady for the wrench because of how warm the house was. He sighed with pleasure.
The woman ushered the children into a small kitchen, where a girl with flaming red hair met them. "Who's this?" She asked the woman, looking from Hans to Greta, then back to the woman.
"I don't know, these two kids were poking around in the hangar. Just found 'em out there while I was feeding the chickens." The woman said, then she steered Hans and Greta over to a dinner table and sat them down. "I think you owe us an explanation. You tell us what you're here for and we won't turn you in as missing persons, just deposit you back to your family."
"No!" Hans blurted out before he could stop himself. The girl with the red hair raised an eyebrow. "Our stepmother's real bad! She'll hit Greta because she's cyborg!"
Interested, the woman looked over at Greta, who shrank back in her chair. Then she turned back to Hans. "Don't worry, we'll make sure your stepmother is taken care of. Right, Scarlet?"
The red-head shook her head, grinning. "If you say so, Grand-mere."