It Begins in Memory

The hallway seemed endless, vast and white. Every step echoing off of the white walls and ceilings, whose blinding lights obliterated any trace of shadows. Doors, tall and shinning of metallic metal stood, firmly closed. At intervals along this hallway of doom. Each door held but one, small, square window. So that its occupant could be observed. Even the rooms were bland and empty, housing a sink with a mirror, a trashcan and a bed. Each held a door that led to a small bathroom. No windows permitted the rooms occupants a glimpse outside of the lab, which was stationed on the 56th floor of the accursed building.

Everything was white… everything reeked of medicines and antiseptics. Everything smelled sterile, clean, so familiar and nostalgic. The clothes that the… many ‘specimens’ as the head scientist so eloquently stated, were white. The scientist himself wore a white shirt and lab-coat, and black slacks and shoes. The doctor’s attires were the same. The nurses, how few of them their were, wore white sleeved shirts and skirts, stockings of white and white shoes…. or their attire could mimic their male counter parts.

Eye’s of mediterranian blue swept over the oh-so familiar settings. Metallic tables bearing latex gloves, and other things of that sort were the only furnishings of the hall. No one spoke to her, everyone, the scientists, doctors and nurses were cold. Their eyes steely and bitter. To them, she and those housed in the rooms were nothing more than specimen. To be tested and stated as nothing more than a number. She hated this place… but this was the only home she could recall. The doctors, always watching and surveying, taking notes on clipboards and relaying results from tests unto paper. It was sickening. To them she could have been no more than a rat… but that is all she was and all she had ever been. A lab rat. To be tested and shoved back into a locked room. Only to be doused in some nameless blue substance and pocked with needles again.

She felt anguish well up inside her. She did not speak, what need was there when they cared nothing about what she had to say. Her eyes stung from unshed tears. Long ago she had abandoned crying. Had abandoned all hope of escaping this lab. She hated them… she had succumbed to that hate to the point of bitterness. She felt no attachment to anything. Hate and rage boiled her blood, and poisoned her mind and heart against all humans. Was she human? So long had she asked herself that question. But now it rippled as little more than a reminder, that to them. She never was and never would be human. She would be a result for their testing, and entity to squabble over and poke and prod as they pleased. She hated them.

The footsteps of the doctor before and behind her began to slow as the door at the very end of the hall came into focus. The hall turned to the right, but she had never been taken past this door. The hall led to other places in the building. Places that, she, as a specimen was not allowed to go. The first doctor opened the door, tapping a pen against his clipboard impatiently as he strode inside. He cleared his throat to get the scientists attention. The man turned, his cold, smirking face reflecting in her eyes. His black eyes boring into hers. He had glasses and stood slightly stooped forward. He had shoulder-length brown hair that was held in a tail at the back of his neck and glasses that obscured his eyes. The doctor in-front of her spoke, he had brown eyes and brown hair. But his hair was short and well groomed. But his voice was harsh and raspy. “Specimen no. 25653…” He began but was cut off by the sharp, harsh voice of the scientist. “Yes, yes I know which specimen she is.” His eyes glinted maliciously as he gazed down at her. The doctor nodded curtly, clearly offended. Before stalking off to a table, the other doctor, he had blonde hair and blue eyes, shuffled around the room. She watched them only a few moments before she turned her attention back to the scientist. His smile widened, cruel and empty. As he gazed at her.

She could she her reflection in his spectacles. She was small, and lithe, white platinum blonde hair fell to her shoulders. Some falling over her face, slightly obscuring her left eye. Thin, compared to some of the other children housed in this prison, she was deathly thin. But regardless of the amount of food she consumed, nothing changed. Frail, her body looked as though to touch it would snap it. One could trace a finger down her collar bone, and limbs seemed to thin to have even the strength to hold her up. But that was to one who had not been scratched, bitten, kicked and other blows of the sort. The doctors and nurses, so many of them had walked out with broken noses, bleeding arms and black eyes. So long ago she had given up screaming at the top of her lungs, a high soprano which made the doctors and scientists cover their ears. Tears had dried up and no longer stained her face, and she no longer fought to be rid of the needles, pills and medicines.

She was six years old, short for her age by most standards and far to thin. Her pale, skin seemed to glow in the light and would look unhealthy on any other living creature. Deathly unhealthy. But it was natural for her. Just as her mediterranian blue eyes were natural, and white platinum blonde hair.

The scientist stepped toward the child, bending over to observe her face. He spoke not a word to her, and paid no heed to the slits that were her pupils. That had been noted down too long ago for it too surprise him. The pupils that were slit like a snake or cats eyes. He picked her up, none too gently, and placed her on a lab table. The table, like everything else, was metal and covered in a white sheet. For sanitary reasons.

She allowed her feet to hang over the edge, gazing about the oh-so-familiar room, while the doctors and scientists prepared for their experiments.

Machinery and computers cramped the right side of the room, cords and tubes. Screens and monitors flashing and snaking around, filling the white room with the hum of machinery. She liked that sound, it was calming and steady, unlike anything else in her life. The other side of the room bore a long counter, metal, like everything else. A stainless steel sink, jars with cotton balls, needles, and a large variety of other swabs and sterile things. The cabinets above the counter that was fixated to the wall, contained vials, glass jars, and many other liquid filled containers. And things she had no name for, and was not keen to learn the name of. There was also a great many file cabinets, black, filled with files and paperwork. A door, thick and glinting coldly sat in the far back corner of the right wall. A desk with a monitor on it, showing an empty room sat opposite the door. The room was small, some 4ft x 4ft, its walls white as was its ceiling. The floor, though, was like a vent. The vent that showered the room with the blue gas that they had said something about placing her in. She shivered slightly, though not from the cold. The lab and rooms and halls temperatures had never exceeded 60 degrees. And she was used to the cold now, she had to become adept to it. They only provided plain, blindingly white shirts with short sleeves and white shorts for her. And all of the other ‘specimen’ to wear.

The scientist turned back to her, a cringe held in one hand an alcohol covered swab in the other. A chill laced her spine as she gazed at the exotic liquid in the cringe. It was a swirling mass of shades of blue. She suppressed the urged to pull away at the scientists harsh grip on her arm. He twisted her arm so that the under side of it was visible. She watched as he slid the needle into her arm, the blue liquid vanishing from the tube. He let her arm drop before stepping back and picking up a clipboard he jotted something down. He then picked up a stethoscope and slid it along her back, listening to her breathing and heart rate.

The child’s stomach clenched into a knot, her throat felt constricted and she felt sick. The edges of her vision were fuzzy and she felt disoriented. The feeling remained for a few moments, as she swayed from side to side on the table, but vanished soon after. Her breathing rasped a few moments as the feeling faded away and she blinked Mediterranean eyes, her cheeks were flushed a light pink and she felt tired. The scientist, his tag, she gazed at for the nth time in her life read simply, ‘Professor Dankon’. He sighed and picked up the clipboard again jotting down information about her. After completing his notes he placed the clipboard on a lab table, picking up instead some kind of documenter. “Specimen 25653 is showing little progress. After her fourth booster, little has changed but perhaps the booster’s are not strong enough.” He paused a moment looking back at her, “Specimen No. 25653 is a weak, failing experiment. It does not talk, and no longer responds to the electric therapy.” He shut of the documenter and walked over to her, one hand behind his back. “You are weak, a failure. If you do not display better testing results, I shall have to find some other use for you.” He drawled coldly eyes boring into hers as he took her chin roughly and one hand and held her face so that she could look no where but at him. He sighed, releasing her chin and turning around, mumbling something incoherent about her.

- - - - - - - - - - - - - -12 Years Later

Silken threads of deep green and light green danced about either side of the lithe figure that sat in their midst. Long, fair blonde hair fell just a small bit passed the thin shoulders. Mediterranean swept over the landscape that the hill of green grass descended into. The small valley, littered with rock and crumbling ruins, poles of old metal rising up to meet the cloud whisked sky. The sun played shadows across the sea of green that rustled with gleams in the wind and sun, how peaceful it all seemed now. How much it had all changed, for the better in her opinion, now that the lab lay in ruin. Not a sole dared to return to this place, the scientists that heard of the catastrophic events to which this land lie witness to. Did not dare to try and rebuild their lost research facility, for fear that the same fate would befall themselves. But she still returned, even though terrible things had happened within that lab. How could she not, as much as she hated and loathed this place… it was her home. The only home she had ever known, a place where she had spent her childhood, a part of her missed it. But she hated it all the same, even if she loved it in a strange way that only one who bore no home throughout their life but one. Even if terrible things had occurred there, it was her home…

Author's Note: I am trying something new, so please review and tell me what you think. This story might be a little slow, the events will take a while to build up throughout the story. So it will be potentially lengthy. Please read and review, critisism, as always is welcomed and feeback is appreciated. Thank you.