Faces, Names, and Memories (completed)

Chapter 17 - Graduation

Five days, I've been down here for five days and I still haven't managed to figure out how this place works. Today was supposed to be a meal day. But, the guards show no sign of preparing to open the door.

After a while, I drift off, and when I wake back up, guards are sliding the door open.

"Into the commons," One barks, this wasn't one of the two guards I had gotten accustomed to. Maybe the others were busy doing something else.

I push myself off of the bed and follow after Cale.

The "commons" is filled with an unnatural buzz. People are talking in hushed, excited voices and there's an air of news that you wouldn't expect at an orphanage. Cale hurries over to his friends and kneels down to get in on the action while I go over to Tressa who's looking at all the excitement.

"What's going on?" I want to know as I sit next to her.

"Kentley is graduating," Tressa answers. What kind of name is Kentley? Is what I have to refrain myself from saying.

"What do you mean 'graduating?'" I ask instead.

"You know, when orphans turn eighteen they don't have to stay at the orphanage any longer," Tressa elaborates. "Today is Kentley's 18th birthday, so he's leaving and going out into the world. It's a big deal when someone turns 18. That's the only date people keep track of."

"But, I thought you guys didn't know what week, or day, or month it is," I say.

"Well, we don't keep track of every day, but when people get sick the staff upstairs sometimes let's them on the computer, and then they come back with the date and month. "

"Oh," I reply, glancing at the guards that seem about to quiet everybody.

"Shut up!" The guard barks harshly to the whole room. With his hard, coarse voice he doesn't have to repeat what he said, the room went dead silent.

"If you runts thought you came in here to eat, you're wrong," His face breaks into a cruel smile. "But, first, someone's turning 18 today." No one moves and the guard frowns. "Whoever is turning 18 stand up, right now."

The boy I assumed was Kentley stood up.

"Congratulations," The guard smiles again. "Mar, show this young man out," The other guard grabs Kentley's shoulder.

"Let's go," he says. Kentley glances back at all of us, then turns back to the door and let's the guard take him out.

"As, for the rest of you," The guard scowls again. I'm beginning to think he is bi-polar. "You guys got sick, and you got us in trouble with the LE's. Now, you're in trouble with us."

Frightened looks are exchanged throughout the room, including one between me and Tressa.

"All of you are going to go outside, in the rain and you are going run through an obstacle course we set up for you," The guard grins sinisterly. I really didn't like the sound of that.

"And no, you are not going to receive exercising clothes, you will go out there barefooted and in your hospital gowns," the guard's grin got bigger. "Have fun."

The realization set in that they were trying to kill us. These guys were monsters, I bet they didn't have souls. Yet, no one said one word of complaint, we got up and shuffled towards the grounds.

The rain was cold, each drop felt like an icy pin-prick. At the same time, it wasn't cold outside, so it made me believe it was sometime in early spring.

The obstacle course they had set up consisted of tires we had to run in, ropes we had to climb and other typical obstacles. But there also was a mud pit we had to tread across, a patch of nails we had to traverse and a giant swinging metal pole we had to get past. As if it wasn't bad enough that we were barely clothed.

"Move it! Start running and don't stop until I tell you you can!" The man barked and we complied. It was a relatively large group of us doing the obstacle course at the same time so there was a lot of bumping into one another and the mud was slippery beneath our bare feet.

By the time people were about to get back to the first obstacle, everyone was pretty spread apart, and that was the way it continued. I slipped; I watched others slip; I almost got hit; I watched others almost get hit. People lagging behind got beaten with poles. We crashed onto eachother, fell into the mud, got pricked with the various obstacles. Some of the little kids were bawling plaintively, but the guards stood in doorway, and watched the rain pour down on us.

I have no clue how long they tortured us for. But, when they told us to go back inside the sky had gotten considerably darker and the rain had gotten harder. I could guess it was the whole day.

Mud caked my feet and I could barely feel any parts of my body. It was hard to breath. I couldn't even ask if there was a shower, as soon as got into the room I collapsed on the floor. Then I went right to sleep.

"Dr. Vera, are you sure this is a good idea?" A stout man with round glasses and a lab coat asked my dad. I wasn't in the room, it was like it was with a couple of my flashbacks, I was looking into the scene from somewhere else.

"Of course this is a good idea, do you know what we can do with this?" My dad replies excitedly examining a vile of blue liquid.

"There's nothing legal we can do with it," the scientist replies.

"As of now" my dad counters.

"When would they ever legalize human experimentation?"

"This isn't human experimentation, it's genetic modification."

"Yes, genetic modification on a whole new scale, that can never be considered ethical."

"Ethical and necessary don't always go hand in hand."

"Necessary, I would hardly say that this is necessary, doctor."

"Do you realize the problems this kind of technology can solve?"

"The problems it can solve may not the outweigh the problems it could cause."

"Could and can are two different words." The flashback fades out.

I wake up with a start. My head hurts, but the rest of me hurts too. I remember the torture that we had to endure. I look around and see Cale, covered in mud and battered, lying on the floor in front of his bed.

I was still on the floor covered in mud. I sit up and think about the dream I had woken up from. My dad and someone else, a scientist I presume, were talking about some sort of genetic modification. But, the scientist said it wasn't ethical. What was my dad doing with genetic modification anyway, specifically illegal genetic modification? He said that currently what he created didn't have legal uses. Was it legal now?

My head began to hurt and I pressed my palms into my forehead. I'm going to see if there's a shower. I go into the bathroom and there is a shower, but it's not in the best condition, and the washcloths are no more then partially shredded pieces of cloth. Yet again, I haven't bathed in 5 days, so I'd take anything.

I turn on the faucet and the water is ice cold even when I turn it all the way up, it's still frigid. I quickly rub the bar on the wash cloth and take the quickest bath I'd ever taken and jump out of the shower. Teeth chattering, I stumble over to my bed. I don't realize I'm crying until I wake up to a wet pillow.