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·Cristal·
This story is fully © by me. I got some ideas from someplaces, namly Dark Angel, but otherwise I've used names of things from Nostradamus.
I wrote this for an English Exam in year nine sometime (2001). I only have 40 minutes to write it, which is why it's so short. Tell me if you like it, and what you think needs to be developed or fixed up about it. Thankyou.
I knew I was delaying going out into the big wide scary world of the unknown. I paused yet again to gaze at my appearance in the hall mirror, taking in my reflection. It had been years since I had bothered to check my appearance; I had been too scared to seen how I turned out.
A girl of 17 looked back, green eyes outlined in black, glaring at the reflection, her fingers casually hooked in the belt loops of her blue jeans, still not faded even though they were nearly a year old now.
My reflection lifts her snuggly black warm jumper to reveal a green midriff top, adjusting it as she prepares to face the cold outside.
My scars have nearly disappeared…I run my fingers over the faint lines...
I'm finally content that my clothes are sitting right, and that most of my skin is covered in a double layer, so I walk out the door, not bothering to lock it since you rarely lock any doors on farms.
I started my way down the first paddock where my house and fruit gardens were planted, sub consciously heading towards the marron dam three paddocks down from my house, I thought over my past...what I had escaped from...
I've been on the run since we escaped. I was only nine then, and compared to that place this is harmony...with its quiet surroundings and beautiful nature paths and views. Only about 100 people live in this town, and although quite a few have made as effort to help me settle in, I can tell they're wary of me, they can tell there's something different about me...
I stood on top of a large hill and looked over my new property. We have over 1500 acres to hide in. The gusts of wind blew my long, straight, black hair into my face, momentarily hiding my slightly slanted eyes and my darkish coffee brown skin. When I stoped at a truck stop on my way here, and walked into the shop, I heard the mutter from the back of the shop...
'Asian...'
That's not what I am...if they only knew, they’d be even more discriminative...
I continued walking, finally stopping at the dam and walking down the slope to the murky water's edge.
As I took a glance at my watch, I paused to gaze at the word tattooed on my wrist.
Cristal.
That's the place I spent the worst years of my life, the people who warped my mind, filled it with enough knowledge to control the whole world, to bend people's minds at my will...they are the people who made me...
I looked up when a sound reached my genetically enhanced ears, that Cristal had given me...done to us all...I shook my head to try to clear my thoughts of them and from amongst the trees I watched Danny appear, as he walked over the dam side, smiling at the sight of me finally emerging from the house.
"So Terrie, you've finally shown your face to the Australian sun." Danny said, his British accent that matched mine sounding strange against the gum trees...so different from when we used to whisper together after the lights went out and we were supposed to stick needles and pulses in and on our hands and wrists for 'recharging' as they called it. We now know it was just so they could take blood samples for future generations of their armies, and to mind wash us with thoughts so we'd stay there forever, and never even think of leaving....
"Are you sure they won't find us here Danny...? I can't go back there...I won't..." I half whimpered, my voice sounding scratchy from having not talked since we'd run away.
"Look Terrie, just look where we are. Cristal are back in England, Stevenage...and we're here in the middle of a farming, rural part of Australia, in Monte Gully. Hours away from Perth. They can't get us....ever again..." Danny promised me.
Terrie looked at me, I could tell by the look in her eyes she didn’t believe a word I said. Why would she? That damn place had nearly caught us twice in the first month we'd first escaped, and we're amazed we actually got away from them, without getting caught again.
But we did and here we are.
I had always dreamed of living in Australia, ever since Mr Markham, my weapons trainer had shown me a data-book about it, where he was hoping to retire to.
I was glad Terrie had finally come outside. She spent eight years in the house, locking herself in, nothing I did was enough to get her out. It's enough to drive any guy mad. She was like my little sister and I cared about her like one. She really had me scared that she’d never come out…but now she's out and we're away from Cristal...and were finally safe...there's no way they could find us now.
I offered Terrie a drink from my water bottle; after she refused I tugged gently on her arm for her to follow me. We walked past the sheep paddock; where close to 300 sheep were grazing. This was the perfect life....no rules, no lessons, just nothing. Still after eight years on the run whenever I closed my eyes words flashed in front of me. Duty. Honour. Team Work. Mission. All the horrible needles and exercises they used on us to make us the best warriors the world has ever seen. In 2016 a different organisation called Manicore came pretty close to succeeding, doing the same thing as Cristal, but then, like us, all the kids broke out. It seems like it just can't be done. They treated us like animals and then we behaved like animals. Turning on our masters and ripping them apart with our bare hands.
It was their own fault that they trained us to be able to do that...
I glanced over at Terrie, who was walking silently beside me as we made our way back to the house. She looked Asian while I looked British. We both sounded British as well, but that just goes to show how deceiving the outer shell can be…
Everyone thought we looked and sounded Asian and British because of our parents, or how we were brought up. Farrrrr from it. You can’t have specific parents if you’re been put together from animals, plants, already genetically enhanced ‘humans’, disease and computer parts, which were mainly just a few chips implanted into our heads, and in different nerves. We aren’t human. We weren’t anything. We were just scientific experiments who were too smart to stick around.
Then peace and heaven-like flawlessness was ripped apart as helicopters, hovercrafts and cars tore and soared into view. The noise was deafening as Terrie and I both leapt into a sprint, far faster then a cheetah could ever be. Our legs pushing us as fast as we could go, our long hair flying in the breeze, the dirt making clouds behind us. We ran desperately for our safe haven, our home, but they surrounded us quickly, their plan quickly coming into effect. The word Cristal jumped out at us. The bold yellow and orange on the black of the machines...They were the professionals. Later modules then we were, they had more training and more additional DNA added into their bodies. We were no match for them…
Helmeted men and women leaped out, totally covered from head to toe in uniforms, stun guns and electro-nets at the ready as they started to try to catch us. We couldn’t even tell if it was our old friends who were attacking us or not. We were all supposed to have escaped though…and I could only hope they were all still out there. I saw Terrie go down behind me, as we stood back-to-back, and I screamed, echoing her's as they caught me too.
I saw the fear in her eyes, and she reminded me of a trapped wildcat, and I guessed I probably looked the same.
Cristal had captured us again...
We had lost.
We were roughly bundled into the back of a truck, Danny protecting my back as the adrenalin pumped men stabbed at us with electric shock guns. I saw Danny go into shock as he blocked their jabs at me, and took them on himself. I caught him as he fell onto me, myself falling back onto someone else.
“Terrie!” a low voice exclaimed, belonging to the arms which caught me.
I craned my neck around to see who had caught me, and a smile of relief spread across my Asian features.
“Aaron!”
“It’s good to see you again Terrie…” he replied, his fretful eyes on Danny, who was in the middle of seizures and fits from the stun guns. He had always had a bad reaction to them. This was why we had been the failed project. Too many glitches.
“They got you too?” I asked, examining three tiny cut marks in Aaron’s neck.
He nodded, and sighed. “I’ve been here for hours. We drove from Perth, to Albany, to here, taking different paths to make sure we caught you. The detection device in Danny didn’t work…but as soon as you came out of your house, they had you both on radar straight away…”
I gulped. “It’s my entire fault? I didn’t even know we were tagged with any detection-“
“Yes, well you guys just took off before you learnt anything, didn’t you?” Aaron snapped.
I looked at him, slightly hurt by his words.
“I’m sorry Terrie…you two nearly jeopardised our escapes as well…Tara didn’t make it…nor Blake…”
His words hit me like a sledge hammer.
“I’m so sorry Aaron…” I whispered, as the trucks slowed to a halt.
“The extra helicopters have been called in. They’ll take us to the planes, and then it’s back to HQ for us…or death…” Aaron explained quietly. He had always had the heightened hearing then any of us. It was easy for him to hear their plans and what they had in mind for us. He always warned us when we were whispering in the dorms after lights out, re-charging on, when someone was coming.
“Let’s take them out…” Danny whispered, his jolting subsided.
“What?” Aaron and I whispered back.
“We’ll take them out…as soon as they open the door, kick away their weapons, break their arms, and break their legs…we can do this…” Danny encouraged us, motioning for us to get prepared beside him, ready by the doors to attack our attackers.
We moved alongside him silently, hearing own attackers outside, getting the cages from the helicopters ready to bundle us into. How dare they even try treat us like animals yet again.
The doors opened and Danny pounced on the largest, tackling him to the ground after separating the gun from him and breaking it in two with his above human strength. Danny quickly broke the guys arms and set to breaking his legs as well, before his attacker got over his surprise and fought back.
As this went on, Aaron had taken on one of the other men, leaving me to take on the remaining uncertain looking female.
We made quick work of them, using the left over guns to destroy the rest of them. Our anger overtook us. Our anger that we could never get away, that our childhoods had been non existent, and the fact that we could never have a normal life, just made us tear our once-allies apart.
Ten minutes later we stood together, blood splashed on us and our surroundings, numerous wounds slashed here and there. It had been a messy fight.
“This is the end?” Aaron asked quietly, all of us breathing heavily from the adrenalin of the bloody fight.
“This is the end.” I replied, with strength in my voice as I shot the last alive female numerous times in the chest. Her head fell back, the helmet smashing on a rock from the impact.
What I saw made me gasp. It wasn’t the broken skull; it wasn’t the blood or any other gory details. The fact that the girl I just killed was my exact copy in appearance was what surprised the life out of my.
“…D-Danny…A-A-Aaron…” I stuttered, grabbing Danny’s sleeve and pulling him closer.
“What’s the mat-…what the-…” Danny looked on in confusement.
There, in front of us, died my clone.
Aaron looked on in astonishment, before moving to a helmeted guy who looked to have the same body as him. Sure enough, when he uncovered his face, it was his exact appearance copy.
Aaron grabbed his lifeless arm and dragged him next to my look alike, while Danny went around, smashing open helmets until he found his own look alike.
“There are copies of Max…Tiffany, Lee, Nick, Jessie…” Danny reported in a heavy voice. It felt like we had killed ourselves…killed our friends…
“What happening to them..?” Aaron asked, catching our attention. We looked down at our copies, and noticed their hair was growing grey, and their skin was growing aging lines rapidly.
As we watched them, they seemed to age I front of our eyes.
Soon enough they were just dust. Softly glowing green in front of our eyes, probably from all the treatments we all had to go under every week.
The bodies of us, and our friends just turned to nothing but dust in front of our eyes, and we couldn’t help but feel dead ourselves.
Sure enough, we were free, but for how long?
Only time could tell.
We just stood there…staring at the dust of our own selves.
Keladryie. Uploaded Jan//2005. Made for 1024x768.