She rested her elbows on her knees, her chin in her hands, trying to ignore the dull pain of her wrists being chafed raw on her handcuffs. As the girl looked around at the darkness shrouding the interior of the van, she counted.
Left twice.
Once right.
Then left again.
The van then slowly decelerated, turned left once more and came to a shuddering stop. Soldiers clad in protective vests hauled open the solid alloy door of the van, and blinding light flooded the interior of the van. The girl, and her fifteen comrades, looked up beyond the door, and were met with the sight of a single long corridor curving away. A single word was printed into the perfectly finished smooth walls, one every 5 meters or so. Garde.
"Genies. Out now. Two lines, follow me." Genie; a condescending insult the soldiers called the genetically modified soldiers, and relished doing so.
The government facility two streets behind GeneHQ, next to the sprawling mess that used to be one of the main business districts, now all abandoned because of the War. That's where they had brought them; she'd tracked the turns and the time between each. No doubt the teenagers to her left and right had figured it out as well, holding on to that scrap of information like a lifejacket.
"Anyone try anything funny, I'm gonna set my lamp loose on you." He gestured to a weapon, and the girl recoiled slightly, looking away. Too many painful memories lay within that thin cylinder of metal. She sensed her comrades doing the same, lips pursed just imperceptibly harder.
This wasn't a normal mission. The abnormally hostile tone of the guard, the blackened windows of the van, the completely unnecessary handcuffs, even the almost-unnoticeable tremble in the guard's voice. Everything felt wrong.
Bent metal and shattered glass was all that was left of the door to the guard's lounge. That, and blood, blood a bright, bright crimson dripping down the walls like pieces of ripped tapestry. The girl had been the first to walk through the ruin, the first to see Charles sitting cross-legged in the middle of the room, hands covered in blood, tears carving paths through the red on his face. The first to see him cradle the weapon in his huge hands, a weapon that had hurt her so many times in hands that had helped her up so many times. The only one who saw him raise the weapon to his chin, the only one who saw the life drain out of his face like it had deserted those who lay dead beside him. She'd been dragged out of the room hours later, hardly conscious and delirious, not knowing who she could trust, who was the predator and who the prey. She trusted Charles with her life, and had done so before, yet she'd been told since young that everything the soldiers were doing was for their survival. So what had driven him to do this? She wondered now, one day later, if her answer was at hand.
Silently, the genetically advanced soldiers emerged from the back of the van, following the soldier into the corridor. And for the first time since they were put into active duty, they didn't expect a proverbial light at the end of the tunnel.