Sanctuary

Prologue

In all my meticulous planning and strategizing, I never expected things to go so absolutely and completely wrong. Yet, here we were, shackled at our ankles, tethered to a ring in the ground – held captive because of our own ignorance and childish ambitions. And I led them here. They all trusted me, and I failed them in every way.

A speaker suddenly shrieked into existence. We cried out in pain and covered our ears as best we could. The eight of us looked up, fear in our eyes, but we couldn't even see the ceiling.

There was only an abyss above, a deep, black abyss.

The shrieking subsided, and a sweet, soft voice garbled over the speaker and filled the room. My stomach dropped to my feet. I knew that voice...we all knew that voice.

A look of recognition fell on all our faces. Eight faces went from joy to horror in the span of five seconds, and all our hope disappeared. With her voice over the speakers, we knew no one would save us – our fate was sealed.

The voice said, "Children, children, children, look where your ambition and foolish dreams have led you. I am once more left to clean up your mess because you simply cannot listen. This is the thanks I get? For the countless hours I spent caring for you, helping you, teaching you? For molding you into who you are today? I was the reason you thrived!"

"Oh, shut up, bitch. We owe you nothing." I looked to my left, two people down; I could see Arcadian spit blood from his mouth and look back up, anger and rage seeping from his eyes. He spoke again, "We were just your slaves. You manipulated us, and now you're just pissed we grew a mind of our own." He spat on the floor again and gave a wicked grin.

The voice didn't respond. However, Arcadian cried out in pain and crumbled to the ground.

"Arcadian!" several of us shouted. He looked up after a few seconds and slowly rose to his feet.

"Electricity in the shackles, huh? Dirty, dirty tactics. Using our own technology against us." Arcadian quipped.

I heard quiet crying directly to my right. Nia – she had created the shackles as a way to keep them at bay and controlled. I knew it was killing her to see that they were now being used to hurt us.

The voice spoke again, "You'll lose that tongue of yours soon enough, Arcadian Sharov, but shutting you up did bring a sweet sense of satisfaction. It will be sad to see most of you go, especially you, Azrael." My friends all looked at me, pity in their eyes. I looked into each of their eyes, my friends' eyes.

"I'm so sorry," the words stumbled out of my mouth before I could think. A last-minute repentance. A few nodded in acceptance; Nia offered a slight smile, her small lips curling up. It was more than I deserved.

"You all had so much potential, and it was all wasted! For what exactly? To play heroes? To enact revenge? You were all delusional. There is no good or bad, white and black – there is only gray. Gray people for a gray world. If you had only accepted this, then none of you would be in this situation." The speaker was getting louder with every word spoken. She was definitely pissed. Good, I thought to myself. Any victory is still a victory.

The courage bubbled up inside, and I spoke up.

After getting them here, I knew I didn't have the right to speak on my friends' behalf, but I could speak for myself, "You're wrong, and you will always be wrong. There is good, and there most certainly is bad – you are a prime example of that. We may have been stopped, but we will not be the last. There will always be those who will fight, just like us."

There was silence.

A very, very long silence.

Then, "We will ensure you are the last, Azrael."