School Day
"Stop it!" Clary shrieked. "Get away from me, you freak!" Clary dodged a fat needle and lunged from the corner she was trapped in. She ran right into the big metal table in the middle of the room and collapsed over it. A pair of powerful hands grabbed her by her shoulders and flipped her around.
"Calm down," growled the woman. She was young, in her late twenties. "If you don't calm down Mrs. Enright will be dealing with you. When Dr. Davidoff comes he'll want to speak with you and Jace, and if you're trying to claw his eyes out he'll just sedate you."
"Oh, like you're trying to do now?" Clary snarled, and she threw her body weight against the woman. "Get off me, and let me out of this place."
"Not until you decide to behave, or until you take some medicine. You have two choices." The woman glanced at the metal cuff on her wrist and thought about how easy it would be to make Clary behave. "What are you going to do?"
Clary rubbed her ear. It itched from where the tag had been pierced in. It made her feel like an animal, being tagged. They did that to cows on farms. She wasn't an animal to trade. "I want to see Jace."
"Jace is here. He's upstairs having lunch right now. If you decide to behave yourself I'll let you join him and the rest of the children upstairs. Is that what you want?" The nurse gave her a severe look and lessened her grip on Clary.
"Let me see Jace and I'll behave," Clary spat out. She felt like she was giving into some horrible agreement. Like selling her soul.
"Alright, now, I need to give you a short…briefing, if you want to call it that." She waited for Clary to nod assent. "Do you know where you are?"
Clary glanced around. There were brick walls everywhere and no natural light. No fresh air. The floor was cement. All around though, all over the walls, were medical tools. Needles and knives, and clamps and tools. She saw the huge metal table and the blaring medical light. "Edison Group compound?"
"Not quite. You're at Lyle House, which is a property owned by the Edison Group. It's a home for children like yourself. You'll be going to the Edison Group compound shortly. We need you to all adjust to each other, to being around each other, and then we'll acclimatize you to your new home."
"Acclimatize? Isn't that what you do with dogs?" Clary asked sarcastically.
"Do you know who Dr. Davidoff is?"
"Do I look like I know?" snapped Clary.
"He's the doctor who monitors you. He'll be here shortly to explain everything to you and Jace. Until he arrives, you'll be listening to Nurse Talbot. Understood?" She gave Clary a stern look and Clary was forced to nod in consent. Anything to see Jace.
"Can I see my brother now?"
"What?" the nurse asked with a frown.
"Can I see Jace?" Clary said slowly and loudly, as if the woman were a moron.
"Yes, of course. Just behave."
The nurse led Clary slowly from the basement, taking her time to assess the state the child was in. She didn't like the way the girls green eyes moved erratically. Or how swiftly the girl followed in her steps. With a warning glance Clary's way, the nurse pushed the door opened and gently tugged her out.
Clary's first glimpse of Lyle House was encouraging…at first. It was light and open, with windows giving a beautiful view onto the sloping lawns outside. The walls were all painted a pleasant yellow with white trimming. It smelled of garden flowers. Clary followed the nurse from the room into another yellow and white room, and into another, and into another. Clary began to get a feel for the entire house, and it wasn't as pleasant as before.
Everything seemed too cheerful and welcoming. The illusion she soon realized was that the world was just waiting beyond those windows for her to explore. The fact was, the world was out there, but she could never reach it. So she would just have to settle for this make-believe world, this sunshine daisy yellow world, this prison world.
"Where's Jace?" she asked at once.
In answer, the nurse threw open one of the doors and pushed her in. Clary spun about to yell at the nurse, but the door swung to and the lock clicked. Clary stared at the door, simmering in annoyance, and flicked around to explore the room she was in.
"Clary!" It was Jace, and he was giving her a wide-eyed, somewhat confused look.
"Jace," Clary gasped, and then she ran at him. In a second, Clary had her arms locked tightly around Jace's neck and was pressing her face against his chest. She could hear his beating heart, and it seemed to calm her thoughts. "Oh, thank God! I thought-I thought you might have been…well, I thought that woman might have…"
Jace blinked and the memories came rushing back. Enright, dragging him out of the basement, the fight, her stabbing him in the neck with a needle. He was in a car, in the backseat, hands and feet tied. Enright was telling him how she was going to kill him when Clary failed to show. His stomach was roiling in pain and terror. The warehouse, the darkness, and Clary's voice. She was coming. He was going to live, and Clary was going to be with him. He begged her to run, to go. But she stayed. Enright drugged Clary and tied her up. She loaded him into the front seat of the car and bound him to the seat with magic. The whole ride back to Lyle House, she would tell him things, what they were going to do to him and Clary and the rest of subjects. She called them freaks. And Enright, petting his head like he was a pet dog.
"Clary you can't be here," Jace said against her hair. "You need to get out of here. Quickly, before Enright comes back. Just go out a window and-"
"Too late for that," said Derek slowly. "Jace, Clary's never getting away from the Edison Group. They have her tracked and tagged by now. One wrong move and she's on the ground, while that nice little band on her wrist sends electric shocks through her body. They're not gonna let her go."
Jace pressed Clary against him harder, and then glared at Derek. "I can't have her here, Derek."
"There's no way out, man," said Simon softly. "She's home now. We all are."
Clary pulled her face out of Jace's chest and took stock of the room she was in. It was a classroom. There were three rows of the desks, a blackboard, and even a shelf of books. One wall had a few windows, curtains thrown back. Seated in a semi-circle around her and Jace, were a group of kids. She glanced from face to face, not recognizing a single one.
There was a young girl, maybe fifteen. She was short and slim, and had a pretty face with strange eyes that changed color. Her hair fell in a fine curtain of red gold and fluttered at the slightest breeze. Clary noted how pale she was, and the way the shadows in the room seemed to draw to her. Isabelle would have called her a pixie, Clary was leaning toward something darker.
Next to her was the boy Jace had called Derek. He was tall and muscular with eyes as green as her own. He also seemed to have a face that was in perpetual scowl. Beside Derek was the boy named Simon, who was clearly Asian, with fair blond hair.
To Simon's right was another girl with short black hair. It just barely passed her ears, and it flared out in a mane of black all around her angular face. Clary saw her dark, playfully wicked eyes and wondered what Isabelle would have made of that girl.
"Who are you?" Clary asked. She squeezed closer to Jace when Derek glanced at her.
"We were about to explain that to Jace, so it's lucky you're here to hear it," said Simon with a small smile. "We are, after all, in a classroom."
"Yeah, what is this place?" Jace asked with a scowl.
"School room. We come here every day to learn," said Simon with a strange look. "Anyway, my name is Simon, and I'm a sorcerer. Derek is my brother, he's a werewolf." When Clary gave Derek and Simon each a questioning glance, Simon shrugged. "He's my adoptive brother. Chloe is the small one, and she's a necromancer. And this is Tori, and she's a witch."
Clary and Jace both gave small sharp greetings and then turned back to Simon. Simon looked at Derek, who listened in silence for a moment, and then nodded his okay.
"We don't have much time for this, so I'm gonna do this as fast as I can." Simon met their eyes and then nodded, more to himself than anyone else. "So, we're all called Supernaturals, people who happen to have special gifts. All of us. There's a whole world, completely unknown to normal people."
"We call them Mundanes," cut in Jace.
"Right, well, there's this group of scientists called the Edison Group, who wanted to help Supernaturals. They wanted to make it easier for us to blend in with Mundane society, so they started this…project. It's called Genesis II. We're the test subjects."
"What the hell did they do to us?" demanded Clary, pulling away from Jace and glaring at Simon.
"They changed us. The scientists did something to our genes. They called it genetic modification. And these modifications changed out powers. They started to develop faster and stronger. And they're-well, they're hard to control." He looked from face to face dismally. "These powers we have are unstable and emotion-based. No matter what the doctors do, they can't fix us. And, if they can't fix us…they might kill us."
"But it's their fault!" Clary snarled, a sinking feeling in her stomach. "They did it to us."
"No they didn't," said Jace lifelessly. "We were never at the Edison Group compound. Enright told me."
"Your father," said Derek now. "He wanted to make stronger Shadowhunters, and he knew the Edison Group had the technology. He traded it to them. They gave him their research so he could work on you, and he signed you over to them in return."
"Valentine did this…" Jace murmured, hating his father more than ever. "Valentine knew!"
"Oh yes," said Tori, "you're dad knew. But hey, it's cool. Me and you, we both have asshole parents. Mrs. Enright is my mom."
Jace stared at Tori and wished he had the strength to hate her, but he'd watched her face contort in fear after she'd sprung him. Her words about her mom killing her if she ever found out came back to him. He knew Tori hated her mom as much as he hated his father.
"They brought us to this place, to keep an eye on us." Simon was speaking again. "They don't tell out parents. They drug us. They make us take lessons on what we are. They act like this is how life should be. They tell us to treat this place like home. They tell us this is our home. We can never leave." He gave them a helpless look. "Davidoff, he's one of the doctors who works on us, he said once we were well acquainted with each other, they're gonna take us to Edison Group headquarters."
"We can never leave?" Jace pressed.
"We're too dangerous to be in normal society. One moment we might be acting normal, maybe buying a book or something, and then something triggers it, and we freak out. We can't be trusted in the real world. We belong in a laboratory."
"You most of all, Jace," said Chloe sadly. Jace turned to stare at her and she looked out the window, hungering for the fresh air. "Your father made you to be a warrior. What happens when your brain finally cracks under the pressure of your own power? You'll lose it, go insane, start killing people. That's what Royce did. They can't afford to have you in public when it happens."
Jace bit his lip to stop it from shaking. He never thought he'd be scared, truly scared, of something. And now he was terrified of himself. He heard the truth in Chloe's words about himself. He knew he had that terrible potential in him.
"Who's Royce?" Jace said harshly, catching a reflection of himself in the window.
"He was part of Genesis I. Years ago. They experimented on him and his brother, and-and-" Chloe shuddered and met his eyes with a measure of force. "He went mad. He murdered his little brother. He smashed his skull in with a dumbbell. He couldn't take the power that was in him…And it's gonna happen to us! He said so. We'd all be consumed by the power slowly but surely until all that was left was a monster…we're monsters…"
"Chloe, stop it," Derek said sternly.
"They tried this before?" shrieked Clary. "They knew it wouldn't work but they did it anyway?"
"They manipulated the data, made it look like they fixed the problems," said Derek thoughtlessly. "We're the second generation of subjects."
"That's why they keep us locked up? Because they know what we'll do?" Clary whispered.
"Yes," said Simon with a frown. "We're a bunch of misfit kids, who need to be kept drugged to control the powers they gave us." Derek's head flicked to the door. "Don't trust them. Any of them. None of the doctors, especially."
Clary and Jace nodded and looked at Derek. "What is it?"
"Our teacher is coming," Derek hissed, and he waved them all to the desks. "It'll be Davidoff today. He wants to speak with Jace and me anyway."
Jace pulled Clary into a desk next to him. "What will they do with us once we're rehabilitated?"
"If we're rehabilitated? They'll keep us locked up. We're too valuable a type of specimen to let go," Derek growled.
"Shh!" hissed Tori, dropping into her seat. "Davidoff!"
The lock clicked and door open as an old man came shuffling in. He saw them all in their seats, spotted Jace and Clary, and smiled at Jace. Clary was reminded very much of a vulture, and when his eyes turned on her he waved a polite hello.
"Hello, children," Davidoff wheezed. "I see Jace and Clary are with us today. Excellent. You two should come up and greet the class." He waved them to the front; when they gaped at him, and snapped his fingers. "Hurry up."
Slightly dazed, Clary and Jace stood before the four other members of their class and waved hello. "My name is Clary, and this is my brother Jace-"
"Now, now, now," chimed in Davidoff. "No point in keeping up that ridiculous charade."
"Excuse me-"
"Clary you and Jace aren't brother and sister," he clarified with a simple shrug. "Now, continue."
Clary and Jace stared at each other, eyes wide and faces in utter shock. "I-I-" Clary couldn't make words come out of her mouth. "I like to draw," she finished faintly.
"Excellent, yes, excellent. Now, you may go, Jace." He saw Jace's golden eyes clouded over. "Quickly, we have a class to begin."
"I can play the piano," said Jace simply. He grabbed Clary's arm and pulled her to the two empty seats in the room.
"Yes, very well," said Davidoff, and then he paced before the class. "Today, children, you'll be furthering your creative arts skills. You'll be here for an hour and a half. Then, we'll send out for recess in the backyard. You'll come back here for a half hour lecture, and then class is over. At the end of the lessons today I'll expect to see your work."
Davidoff watched as everyone but Clary took out a notebook. "You may begin."
Jace cleared his throat and tapped Derek's desk. "Creative arts skills? Is he asking me to write about my powers or something?"
Derek gave a sour grin. "Nope. Just wants you to be creative. Write a short story. Keep a journal. You could compose a song. They don't care, just a time for you to vent your…aggressive tendencies."
Jace rolled his eyes and relayed the message to Clary, who didn't even have a notebook, and then stared at his book. The one that had been waiting on his bedside table. The one they knew he'd need. They'd planned every moment of his life from the second he'd set foot in the house.
Jace picked up his pencil and carefully began to write. It was a letter. Not a cry for help. It was far too late for that. Just a letter to let the Lightwoods know he was alive. To let his family know he wasn't going to be killed. He just wanted the people who loved him to know he was still thinking of them, and know he would always be thinking about them and the home he once had.
