Uhm, uhm… I dunno, creepiness abounds, and this is for Ren's October Ghost thing.
Dedication: To randomly being creepy. Hi Sonya! :D
---
They never expected me to live long.
That was the problem; I wasn't expected to live long, I wasn't built to live long. But I did. A genetic anomaly – a hybrid of genes, twisted and blurred around the edges until they got me.
My people are scientists. We procreate only to experiment.
It is a cruel way to live – existence as an experiment is not all it's cracked up to be.
I have never seen my mother's face, and I have only heard tales about my father's genetics works.
I was the result of that genetics work – a beautiful, beautiful girl, with eyes the colour of a dew-drop of the sky, and hair the colour of a live flame, I am beautiful. I know that, from the way the other experiments look at me.
The experiments are usually boys; it's very lonely, being the only girl. I am also one of the youngest accidents to still be alive.
Because that is what I am. I am an accident.
They never expected me to live that long.
---
The intention, with me, was to create a living, breathing, feeling 'fae'.
They got what they wanted – primroses grow where I walk, no matter what time of year it is, and I have a monarch butterfly's wings growing out of my back. They shimmer –reds and browns and golds– languidly in the autumn light, and I shiver, a little, in response.
Winter is coming, and the world is dying, again.
I watch it all, even as fresh buds sprout at my feet in the concrete of the wall, with a sense of exhaustion.
I want to fly – I want to leave.
But my wings aren't strong enough to take me farther then this farthest wall – the first defense of the compound of Scientia; they say it means 'knowledge', in Latin.
They tell me Latin is a dead language.
I don't believe them for a second. How can any language really ever die? It was there in the first place, and it–; no, I think, not now.
(they never expected me to live long)
The frail sunlight gently touches my skin, and I blossom, just a little, in the light.
But the sun is going down.
The sun always has to go down, eventually. And, eventually, I have to go back to the compound. I send one long, last, longing look out to the emptiness that is the Beyond.
They tell me that the Beyond is dangerous; anything uncontrolled is dangerous. And that's why they keep us little experiments under such a close watch.
We're uncontrolled.
We're dangerous.
It makes the Researchers and the Keepers nervous. We make the Researchers and the Keepers nervous, because sometimes, we push the line. We never cross that line, because as soon as we do, they put us into Isolation.
No one ever comes back from Isolation.
Or so they tell me.
The flight back to the Compound is short, and my butterfly wings are so, so weak; not meant for long flight, not meant for anything other then beauty,
(they never expected me to live long)
fragile beauty. My feet touch concrete, marble-cold under my bare skin, and the growing begins. I can feel the concrete shattering, deep, deep down, below the ground, as roots push themselves towards me.
But I am hurried inside the Compound, and the growing dies.
I feel the death of the plant-life like physical pain.
A Researcher pushes me down the white-white white washed concrete hallway, touching me as little as possible, right on the shoulder. The bruises are forming even under his light touch, and I almost jerk away.
I know that they tend to forget how delicate I am.
The Researcher opens the door to my cell for me, his glasses flashing in the dim lights. I can't see his eyes behind the shining bits of glass, and for a moment, I am afraid. There is no reason for the fear, but it is there, all the same.
I am afraid of these people who think that I'm uncontrolled, and dangerous. I am afraid of them the same way I afraid of fire; it is all consuming, and it terrifies me.
But they do not know of my fear, and that is my only consolation.
I slip into the cell that has been mine for my entire life, and the door closes behind me. The light in the room entirely disappears, and the growing swell of primroses seethes into the room.
I sigh in relief, and the fear is chased away by the scent of growth – safety – happiness…
---
I am not breathing, when I wake.
I gasp for air, and shudder, as my hart begins to beat once more. I dreamed I died agin, last night.
Again, again, always again.
I pull away from the lushly growing grass around me, feel the life-force-wanting fingers almost fade away, and my heartbeat turns a little more regular.
(they never expected me to live this long)
A weak heart. A fragile beauty. Like glass, breakable, shatterable, the sweet scent of blood clinging to the wind after a murder.
I breathe, slow, slow, enjoying the feeling of fresh-stale air permeating my oxygen-deprived lungs. The air is always fresh-stale –thick with the fresh scent of growth, and yet, so, so stale, because the air itself never moves–, inside this cell. Always.
Then the cell door opens, a Keeper standing in the doorway, and I am forcibly drawn out into the horrible fluorescent lights of the hallway.
The Keeper who has come to fetch me is skittish. She does not look me in the face when she says I am requested to bring you to the Research Facility on the Fourth Floor, miss – but I am already past listening. We head quietly to the elevator (we experiments reside on Basement Level Two), and we wait, the tense silence raining down all around us.
When we reach the fourth floor -six floor above my cell, to be precise-, the Keeper passes me off to a Researcher. I see the agitated glance they send each other, and I quietly scoff, to myself.
(they never expected me to live long)
The Butterfly Effect, dangerous?
No, never.
But, even so, I start to shake (just a little), as the Researcher hustles me through set of white doors after set of white doors.
I really despise the colour white, sometimes, I think. It's so clean and untouched and pure; so much the opposite of what goes on in this Research Facility that it almost makes me sick.
---
Before I am even shoved into the Waiting Room, the screaming starts.
It's all I can do to clap my hands over my ears, and wish that it would all go away. Most of the other experiments are here – Flick, Flack, Shiver, Micro-Scope, Techna-logy, Parabola…
I sit down on the smooth-marble concrete, next to Shiver, and I clasp my hands in my lap. He nods at me, and I see the recognition in his eyes. Butterfly.
We sit in silence, and listen to the screaming.
Accompanying the screaming are bursts of flame-the-colour-of-my-hair and an increase in the temperature of the whole Compound.
They're testing Glow, today, I guess.
The heat continues to rise, and Shiver -still next to me, quiet-, makes a face. He manually forced the temperature down; I watch ice crystals form in his hair.
They say that Glow and Shiver were twins, once.
I tilt my head, and look at Shiver. He's been here in this Compound longer then I have – I am never sure by how much time; days tend to blur together, in my mind.
Shiver was an accident, too. He's a pretty boy; all white skin, blue hair, and eyes made of chips of ice.
But an accident, all the same.
(they never expected we'd live this long)
Another inhuman scream tears through the air. Shiver and I both wince, at the same time. I look down at my clasped hands. My knuckles are white.
Always, always white, that brainless, horrible colour…
I shake, entirely, for a moment, and the fear from before comes screaming back.
Irrational fear, irregular fear, it shimmers on the edge of my consciousness. Paranoid, I am so paranoid; because they want me dead; because I am the Butterfly Effect; because I am dangerous.
And then I am running.
I am shaking, and breathing, and hurting, and my weak, fragile heart is pumping much too fast–
I am unconscious before I reach the white doors.
(they never expected me to live long…)
---
A breakable splendour. A meek heart. The Butterfly Effect. Trouble. Chaos. Danger.
When I wake –again, again–, everything is slow, and almost painful. My chest hurts when I try to draw breath, and my head aches oddly.
I sit up, little by little, and my stomach heaves. I cough and cough, until I am utter vacillating with the hacking, wet coughing that rises from my chest. My hands are over my mouth, and I am trying to stem the flow of the sound.
Primroses curl about me, growing out of the solid concrete floor.
When I pull my palms away from my lips, I am shocked to see that they are covered with my own green-tinged red blood.
Horror washes over me in tidal waves. I tremble a little, and wipe my blood-red hands against the white-white Infirmary sheets.
I am dying, I realize.
(they never expected me to live this long)
The sterilized white room around me is quiet, and I contemplate the fact that I am fading.
What a strange thought, I say aloud, to the empty room. I am going to die.
There, in that quiet room, I make a decision, for myself. If I am going to die, I am going to die on my terms.
---
I leave the Infirmary behind me, my jaw set in place. The Beyond will take me back. The Beyond has always called me back.
And I will die in the Beyond. I will not let one who is not me dictate my death-day. I want to fly, I think angrily. I want to go. I do not want to stay here, anymore!
My wings oblige –for once– and I am suddenly running so fast that my bare toes barely touch the ground. My weak, tired heart screams joy as I fly-run.
And then I am outside of the Compound, the October sun shining fiercely, like fire. I think of Glow's screams, and move faster.
It is warm, today. Indian Summer. That's what they told me this was called. Indian Summer – after the first frost.
The wind is cool against my face, and I wonder if this is Freedom. The Researchers and the Keepers are bound to want me to come back –
But I can not. Not now.
Not ever.
I fling myself to the open air, and head for the farthest wall. The farthest wall…
It is the longest flight of my life.
When my naked feet touch finally touch the concrete of the fathest wall –gray, so gray, and rough–, I stop to rest. I am tired.
My eyes feast on the Beyond. It is so wild. So free. And it is so close – so close, I can almost taste it.
So this must be Freedom.
(they never expected me to live long)
The wind pulls me a step forwards, tossing my hair. We both want this long, drawn-out game to be over. We are both tired, the wind and I –; and then I am standing on the edge of the farthest wall, my toes curling over the egde.
Breathe, breathe, I tell myself softly.
And then I fall, the ground reaching up for me – to welcome me home, to make me safe, to finally sleep, and not dream…
---
Experiment number 4173. Current status: Dead.
Body Found: Outside the Compound, and precisely eleven-twelve A.M., on this day of October 31st, year 12 of the Undying King's reign. Found amongst primroses, blood on hands and face.
Body Status: destroyed. Femur and hip-bone shattered. Four spine vertebrae destroyed, shards of bone embedded into spinal cord. Wings crumpled, heart stopped.
(We never really expected her to live this long)
The Butterfly Effect experiment successful.