A/N: Thank you to everyone that reviewed, favorited, and followed. :) I never anticipated such a welcome and it made me so extraordinarily happy that you guys like the story so far. :)
More is coming soon!
I hope y'all enjoy. :)
Two
We were lost creatures, the lot of us. We had nowhere to call home but a lab that doubled as a training facility, no family but the other freaks around us, and no hope but the delusions we gave ourselves.
But he changed all that.
The first time I ever saw him was during my very first physical combat training session. We had two teachers who demonstrated a move and then walked amongst us to observe our progress as we broke off into pairs and tried to perfect the move while fighting. Unfortunately, I had never taken a fighting class of any kind – I hadn't even taken yoga – and so my first fight was completely based off of instincts and reflexes.
Somewhere in the middle of it, I saw him. He was beautiful in a savage kind of way, with his legs spread shoulder-width and his arms folded across his chest, with his imposing cheekbones and piercing eyes. He had a stare unlike any I'd ever seen before. He could simply look at you and make you feel as though he knew every single one of your secrets and thoughts.
But right then, that gaze wasn't leveled at me or even at any of my fellow miracle wonders. He was looking at the guards.
There were guards everywhere, of course. I had supposed that it was only really natural in a medical lab to have people that could sound an alarm if something went horribly wrong, but nothing had gone horribly wrong, so the guards were rather... unnecessary.
So why were they there?
I was distracted from my temporary reverie by a fist hitting my stomach and the wind knocking out of me. I didn't remember how I ended up bent over and gasping for air, but I remember looking up and realizing that his eyes were leveled on me and his head had cocked ever so slightly.
That was the first time his eyes ever analyzed me. And it wouldn't be the last.
My only thought right then was that I hadn't ever thought I would gain a boy's attention by getting beat up.
Life settled into a mundane, weary routine. We had our daily physicals, our slop of a breakfast in the mess hall, a few lectures to "maximize our intelligence," then lunch, then strategistics and all things battle, then combat training. Dinner, an hour of monitored "free time," and another check-up, then lights out. We learned to be pristine and unfaulty, to be perfect and disciplined. We were learning to be soldiers.
But there's one thing that the doctors and the lab rats and the people above them could never control: our minds.
And he made sure of that.
He was really very quiet, all things considered. He never said anything that didn't contribute to the conversation. I realize now that maybe this was his secret to being powerful: any thoughts that weren't brilliant were simply kept to himself. Of course, this theory requires him to actually have had thoughts that weren't absolutely extraordinary and, at that point, I don't think any of us even comprehended the possibility of that notion. To us, he was something like a god.
Either way, I don't think I even heard his voice until the day when he first spoke to me.
It was another combat training session. I had been getting better and better, but I had also been growing so restless than my skin physically itched sometimes. I was just so completely sick of it all – of the training, of the lectures that didn't challenge me at all, of the "free time" that was generally spent in the gym rather pointlessly, of the general feeling of being sheep led to some sort of slaughter, though we weren't entirely sure what kind of slaughter it was...
I was just so sick of it all.
And so, on that fateful day, I released my anger. However, rather unfortunately for my temporary sparring partner, it was on him. And the crack of my fist hitting his fist filled me with such satisfaction—
Because I could finally take my frustrations out on someone.
I am still somewhat ashamed that I let myself go so completely out of control, even though perhaps I might have needed it. Time blurred. There was nothing except me and the man I had conquered and my fists hitting him.
And then I came to myself abruptly, only to find myself atop a bloody man with my fist raised and guards advancing towards me with their weapons raised and my brothers and sisters looking at me with something akin to fear.
It hadn't done any good. The man under me was not guilty of any crime. He was not anything but a spectator, fellow prisoner. I was a freak. And I had become someone else, someone other than myself. The old me had buried herself somewhere in books and escaped through the solving of problems or satirizing the entire situation.
But this – this was not me.
The lab rats rushed in and carried my partner away, whispering in hushed tones and darting shocked glances at me.
And I was suddenly so tired.
But footsteps came behind me. And the most beautiful, regal, powerful voice I had ever heard said in my ear: "Don't be ashamed. Strength cannot be contained."
I knew what he meant. He meant that I was held prisoner by the schedules and physicals and routines that the lab rats and the doctors pushed upon us were our prisons. But they had created us, they had created these monsters – they had created pure strength. And then they expected to contain it? No.
We wouldn't – couldn't – be contained.
"All you have to do is learn to channel it in the right direction."
Every hair on my body prickled at his voice, his breath on my ear. That was the day I came alive again.
That was the day I found a new purpose.
