Experiment Number One

I was back in the Euphoric River but I was fully aware of my past, present, and potential future. I didn’t drift around in a naive slumber but rather a conscious awakening. I knew that I wasn’t dead yet but instead in limbo. I had to return to the real world to stop Ren Clash and Doctor Taylor from causing destruction. The Dhasl were never the threat; science was.

It was there from the start. Ren Clash was a crazy lunatic who felt he had something to prove to the world. He got the Sword of Warzel to create a defense weapon for Volent just to gain fame and recognition, even if it meant the murdering of millions of people. Before activating the sword, they knew nothing about it and how powerful it actually was. And even though it backfired, he got what he wanted by releasing the Dhasl. Ren would soon be called a savior for eliminating the Dhasl and a genius for creating the Serum M. The world will celebrate him for bring death among them.

Whenever I reminisce back to our first meeting, I think about how Lieutenant Wallace acted. Something was hidden behind his filter; I realized he had an idea of where the experiments would lead to from the start. He knew what my being in the grasp of the government would create. What me just being alive inscribed in destiny.

An enhanced future that only offers death.

Lieutenant Wallace would’ve wanted me to fight my way out of the compound. He would tell me the safety of the world was more important than anyone else. He would want me to leave him for dead. And deep in my heart, I knew it was the only way to ensure Ren Clash and Doctor Taylor wouldn’t create anymore mutants. I had to get out of the compound once and for all to save the innocent souls whose lives were about to be changed forever if I didn’t.

The waters in the Euphoric River picked up speed. I crashed in the waves, letting the current take me wherever it wanted. In that place, I had no control over what did and didn’t happen. It was only up to the gods that looked down upon us to decide whether or not I should deserve a second chance or a third. Frankly, maybe I didn’t. I messed it up the first time, and looked at where it got me. The events of my life felt like a line of dominoes clattering to the end of the world. Did I deserve to get another chance?

The waters led me closer to the speck of light I first felt was so far away, but as I crashed along, it was closer than expected. The yellow beams pulled me towards it, engulfing my shivering body in a hug of warmth. It sucked me in, and I was transported from the Euphoric River into somewhere else.

My first inclination was that I was back in the real world. I started to mentally prepare myself for a fight, but I was laid onto a soft grass field when I touched down. A wispy wind blew over me, sending an aroma of vanilla drifting through the air. I knew immediately that where I was could not be the compound- unless Doctor Taylor and Ren Clash dumped my body in a random field, which seemed unlikely. If I was truly in the real world, my body would be crumbling in a kiln so no one would know about their little experiment.

I got up from the grass and subconsciously drifted along a path of stones before it. I was weightless. Something nostalgic passed through me.

The path led me to a house, more like a cottage. It stood before me underneath the new dewy sky, with open windows and a shiny light glowing warmly from inside. The smell of tomato soup drifted in the air. Something pulled me forward, leading me into the cottage, invading the space as if I lived there.

I did.

The inside of the house was a replica of my home in Lusha. Everything was the exact same, causing something to swell inside me. How bittersweet it was to finally be back in that house. After everything that had happened, all the nightmares of trauma I endured from my childhood, my insides bubbled with excitement. Like I waited a long time to finally be at home. And in the end, it was true. That was my mission from the moment I entered the compound. How ironic.

I heard clanging from the kitchen, the sound of someone making a meal. A jazz rhythm gently filled the house, and the smell of tomato soup intensified, causing my stomach to growl. The invisible force guided me towards it. I entered the kitchen and took in a familiar sight at the stove as she swiftly stirred a pot. My immediate reaction was to turn around and run out of the house because the last time I was in some weird purgatory, my siblings got infected. In truth, after everything that happened, I didn’t think I could relive that nightmare. But the force blocked me from turning around. I couldn’t move anywhere but forward.

I half expected her to whip around and growl at me with the face of an Infected, but she stayed silent. I stopped right behind her, trying to get a good look without alerting her awareness. When I realized I couldn’t, my voice wobbled out a short, “Mom?”

Instantly, she turned around and greeted me. “You’re finally here!” She took the towel attached to her apron and wiped her hands clean. “It’s been so long, baby,” She reached out for a hug, but the force allowed me to take a step back. She was indeed my mother, but she was…different. Not in a scary, Infected way where her face was deformed and leaking a black sludge. No, she looked healthy. Her usually pale skin turned warm and her cheeks were rosy. She had bright brown eyes that sparkled underneath the light and she was actually groomed. I was used to her sickly, drugged form and always wearing her work uniform. I hadn’t seen her look that healthy since way before Amilio was born. Like way before. Maybe when I was around five.

My mother cleared her throat and nodded. She understood why I pulled away. “You had a difficult life, Emerye, and I contributed to that.” She walked over to the table and pulled out a chair; she sat in one adjacent to it. “Come sit and let’s talk.”

I didn’t want to talk. The shock of my mother standing in front of me was over. All the memories of the pain she put me through coursed throughout my body. She was acting so normal. Like the years of torture were nothing to her now. How could she look like that after everything that happened? After everything she’s done?

“You have every right to be angry with me, Emerye. But there is no way of changing what happened, although I regret it so much. The only way to move forward is to leave that pain where it belongs, in the past.”

I pierced my lips. So much for her to say. But the force took over my body and reluctantly pulled me towards the chair. I threw myself down, and just like that, I was stuck. My mother looked at me with a crooked smile. “You know, I have always been so proud of you,” she slowly reached towards my hands and intertwined our fingers. I couldn’t do much to pull away. “You were always so independent. Much more of an adult than your father and I were.”

I scoffed.

She nodded. “I know, baby.” She twists my arms, and I could tell she was examining my scars. She ran a finger over one of them and smiled. “How about we eat some soup, yeah? Ma Ma always said that it would cure the soul.” She got up and poured me a bowl, shortly returning to place it before me. She handed me a spoon and said, “Eat up. It’ll help you.”

I took the spoon from her hands and did as she said. The warm liquid ran down my throat and I hummed in response. Although the compound may have given me better food privileges, it had been long since I had something as good as that soup.

After a few seconds of me devouring the food, my mother spoke again. “You know, Emerye, I’ve been waiting here a long time for you.”

I looked up at her and wiped my mouth with my hand. “What do you mean?”

“She told me to wait here for you. That someday, when you are on edge between life and death, you will come in search of me.” I almost laughed in her face. Why, out of all people, would I look for my mother? I did so well without her for the first half of my life; I didn’t need her then.

“I know what you’re thinking but Emerye, everything that happened in your life was leading up to this moment.”

“And what is the moment? Because all I know is that I’m on an operating table right now getting drilled into.”

She took my hands once more. “It’s the moment of you finally taking control of your life. Not me or your father, not your siblings, not Ren Clash or Doctor Taylor, not even the government. You.” The scars on my hand began to fade, leaving no trace behind. I looked at my mother, bewildered. “Our experiences,” she said. “They are not what shapes us. It’s our reactions to them.” She got up, took my empty bowl, and drifted over to the sink. She found a rag to wash it.

“When me and your father went M.I.A, you stepped up and took care of your siblings. But that was who you were before. Paths have changed and now you have to worry about saving yourself.” When she finished, she returned to me and pulled me out of my chair. “You have all the power in the world to get yourself out of this. You just have to believe.”

“I do believe. I will destroy everything in the compound to prevent any of it from making it out of there.”

“Even if that means destroying yourself?”

“If that’s what it takes.”

She pressed her lips together and nodded for the last time. “Alright, baby. If you believe that’s what you must do. But, just remember, you have to start living for yourself. Not your siblings, not the government, not the world.” Lieutenant Wallace said the same thing to me.

Start living for yourself.

It was impossible. How could I live for myself when my existence affected so many people? I didn’t know how to escape the situation while preventing the world’s destruction without thinking about everyone else. It just wasn’t possible.

“I better send you on your way. You have some business to attend to.” My mother guided me to the door but stopped short before I walked outside. She looked over me as if that was the last time she would ever see me again. Her irises stopped at my wrist, and for a second, I was afraid that the scars had came back. She pulled my arm up and toyed with the bracelet Ren Clash gave me to prevent me from using my powers right before the surgery. My mother smirked and let out a short laugh. “This is nothing.”

I looked at her with cocked brows

“Have you ever tried to use your powers with the bracelet on?”

My throat tightened. I knew she had some knowledge about what was going on with me from all the things she said, but the whole mutant thing was still a new concept to me. A secret that, from my knowledge at the time, no one outside the compound knew about. So when she openly talked about it, I went into a panic mode. But I calmed down when I realized I wasn’t in reality.

“They told me that the bracelet prevents me from using them, so I never actually tried.”

My mother hummed and patted my hand. “Well, if they claim they never met an M-Gene before, how would they know how to tame them?” She winked, and with that, I was pulled out the door and back down the path I came. Soon, the house disappeared. My mother and I were separated once more. Again, without a goodbye.

I was laid to rest upon the grass and fell from wherever I was in the universe, back where I started.