On Our Own (gxg)

Chapter 7 - A bad night

A/N: Here we go, another chapter. This is a little different. You get to know a little more about Rayen's past since you see her dreaming. Nightmares. Flashbacks.

I zoom into my room. My old room, no, actually it's the living room of my father's and my quarter. I look down to find my body being non-existant, my perpective is from the upper corner of the room, oddly similar to the perspective a surveying camera has got. I see my about 14-year-old self, sitting on the couch, playing some ArEn. My father walks in.

Since my whole surrounding is taken by the ArEn my younger me does not nitice him at first, a dangerous mistake. He slaps my hand causing the ArEn to shut down, my younger self blinks at him in a sudden loss of orientation.

From my odd perspective I see how tensed my father got as soon as he sensed that my younger me didn't notice him immediately. In his crazy point of view that must be a complete disrespect to him. He just bursts out. Loses control. I can only watch my younger me getting beaten for no reason, getting choked and shouted at, being scold for something I hadn't done wrong.

My bodyless me remembers that it's not the expectations my father had that I didn't try hard enough to reach. I tried a million times to be the perfect daughter he wished me to be. It's his ill soul, his attitude, his anger that is breeding narrowly beyond the surface, the stress at work, the sorrow for his wife, his distorted view on life and family.

The beating doesn't end, but I can't look away. It's like passing by a car accident. You really don't want to look but can't help but gazing. I remember the beating too well. Every single one. I want to scream to my younger self, want to tell me that it's not my fault.

But without a body I don't have a voice. I am doomed to watch his fist hitting the face over and over again. The room begins to tilt and I zoom out, greyish shadows rushing past me. I reach out for them, but I still don't have a body. The stream slows down and I zoom into a room that I will never forget in my life. I was seven years old.

And it's the same as before. I can see the little innocent girl that used to be me. Her eyes are puffy, she is still sobbing, her suit is black. There are a few other people in the room, but except for some chairs it's empty. My father is there, too. If sorrow had a face you could easily replace that with his expression in that moment. The people gathered in the room look out of one of the rare windows of the Alatis.

I wat to hug my younger self so had right now. I don't remember if I knew what was happening. If I knew that the corpse of my mother was treated with some chemicals to make the valuable and rare elements the human body consists of remain on Alatis. I guess I only knew she was gone. She was my anchor, she held me. But as I watched her remnants being released into the endless space, I think that's the moment that I was no longer there. My body remained, but the real me, my soul was absent.

I would have needed my father in the years that came, but he wasn't there. He even pushed me farther away, made me lock my soul up even deeper. I existed - but I didn't live anymore. No one knew me. All theyknew was the surface I created for them.

I see one single teardrop run down the cheek of my 7-year-old self. I want to wipe it away. I want to protect her from all the violence that is about to become her life. I hate that I have no body, I want to fight my doom to only watch, over and over again.

I wake up because I am sobbing and cramping. There is no light in the dorm despite the blueish white gloom of the screen in the corner. My pillow is wet from the tears I must have spilled in my sleep. It's not unusual. Bad dreams are not particularly a rare thing to me. They are almost always flashbacks, I live my life again in third person perspective, I can never move or do anything. It hurts my soul even more.

My holo tells me it's 0.27 a.m. I need to sleep but I am far too agitated. I st up and slowly move towards the edge of the mattress. I climb down avoiding any noise. Asmy feet hit the cold ground I stop, reassuring me that I didn't wake my roommates. But they breathe on evenly, I can even hear a little snor from Ling.

My bare feet feel very alive - they were used to a floor that adjusted to their preferred temperature, not the ground remains the same. I like that. Slowly I pad towards the bathroom door. It swishes open almost without sound andcloses behind me. The light brightens the room. I sway over to the sinks andlook into the mirror propping my weight on my elbows. I am not very cute or anything, but I would describe me as cute neither. I hadn't had any relationships yet. I blame my hidden soul for it. No one would date an empty shell, and honestly, I didn't exactly try to go out with some stupid guy neither. I just had to have a give birth to two children until my 30th birthday. But there's plenty of time left.

I think about that, one of those sleepless midnight thoughts, while I splash cold water to my face in order to wash away the bad dream. Then I silently slip back into my still warm bed, still wondering about any guy I met yet I can't even think of one as cute or interesting.

As I drift into some sleep again, my mind is still unsettled.

I find myself in the white square classroom I attended school in for 12 years. It's a strict and though schedule. It basically teaches everyone to stick to the Laws. We also learned all the basic stuff. Reading, writing, calculating up to a high level, science and biology, history, computer coding, at chances some P.E. Everyone gets the same education but there are 4 schools at whole Alatis. I sit in my usual seat in the back row. It's break but that doesn't matter, I stay at my chair and watch all those superficial people around me. That stupid douchbag Mike throws something through the classroom. I can't identify the object as I look up from my hologram. That little object hits the shoulder of June. She sits two rows in front of me, next to her best friend Cammie. They are like super close. Cammie picks the object out of June's beautiful wavy long hair and chuckles. Then she throws it back at Mike. June looks at him angrily, but still her blue eyes are cute so the message doesn't get across. I smile oddly until I catch myself doing so and snap back to my emotionless pokerface. Somehow, only June can make smile. Sometimes I wish I could be friends with her, but firstly se ist already friends with Cammie who I don't like, I send angry gazes at her as se touches June's arm in their conversation. Secondly, my father doesn't want me to hang out with her since "her family has no importance to the community". Thirdly, I don't want friends. Friends are people and people are bad. They disappoint and hurt. I don't need people.

My view looses focus and it seems like I experience a time lapse sitting in that chair in the back row. Time normalizes the moment I see June for the last time. She exits the door as we are told she changes school, just like Cammie. But everyone knows that they have been too close and they wanted to avoid them 'becoming homosexual'. She looks back once and for the fraction of a second her blue eyes meet my green ones and I feel oddly free and happy. My vision goes black.

I don't have any more confusing dreams that night, still I sleep tensed and I am right awake as the holo-alarm in the room goes off at 5.30 a.m. as Malone told. I crumble my hair asI try to remember my dreams but they are gone in fog in my head. Maybe that's for the best, anyway.

I need to be fresh for the day - my first day as a Alatis Army recruit. And I think I even care a little about how it's going to be. I am not directly affected by my father anymore - so I dare to let down my guard a tiny little bit, enough to feel a little excited for the day to come.