The Scarlet Knife

Moving "forward"

"I have what...?!" My voice echoed through the cell. I felt furious hot tears lining my eyes and my heart sped up to a mile a minute. The look on Romeo's face was that of a four year old who was getting scolded. I'm sure mine was of the angry mother.

"One more week. You have a week until the procedure. I wasn't supposed to tell you, but it was eating me alive keeping it from you!" His voice was high, and panicked.

"Why would you care? You're the one keeping me here! You're my so called guardian, you can let me go right now if it's truly eating you alive." He stayed quiet, then shook his head. His mouth stretched into a sick smile. One I could never forget.

"You're right. I shouldn't care. The procedure is next week. We will be inserting a chip into your skull. Only for a brief time. We want to know what's going on in that pretty head of yours. Your courage and skills could be very useful in future experiments."

"No. You can't do that! You can't use me for your benefit like that, I will not help you injure more children. Never! I'm not like you, and I don't want to be! Me giving you my information to use on others is the same thing as me operating on the kids myself!" My body trembled, I couldn't let them do that! I would be helping the enemy! And I was trying so hard to stop them...

"I don't think I gave you a choice Aura." The way he said my name gave me chills, it was such a dark sound. "You could be holding valuable information and resources we need to better the world!"

"How do you know that? How do you know that risking my life is going to better the human race? How do you know any of this is? Killing off kids, dissecting the human body, creating mutant freaks! How do you know any of this is going to help?!" I gave in to my emotions and just screamed, and it felt so good. To finally get it out, to ask one question I knew they couldn't answer. How do they know?

"We just do." Was his only response. So I pushed him a little more.

"Oh you do huh? That's why this facility is still a secret? Because the world supports you so much that you need to keep hidden. Because people agree with you hurting babies? Well? Do they?"

"We're still working out some rough areas but we are doing good! I'm sure there are people out there who agree with what we're doing. They understand the importance of moving forward."

"Oh yeah, it's so important! To see the chemicals in the air, to hear beeping non stop. It's important to have kids not know what a tree looks like, to make them grow up only knowing smoke and pollution. There was a time before all of this you know. A time when trees were green, and everywhere. Pollution wasn't that big of a problem then, and the air was clear and not slowly killing us by the hour. But that's what's important right? That's what it means to move forward!" I could see his ragged breathing and I for some reason found it amusing. It meant I was getting somewhere. He might actually be understanding. Might...

"What are you talking about?" Maybe not... "It's always been like this, this is normal. What do you mean trees used to be green, and since when has there not been an air problem? You're making this all up aren't you? You have to be because that makes no sense... The world has always been like this Aura, always." He started laughing, but he didn't smile.

"I'm being serious Romeo, imagine how sad it is that these kids will never know true sunlight and fresh air."

"There you go again making things up. I thought they didn't experiment on you yet... what did they do to that little head of yours? Cause you're talking crazy." He looked so serious. But he couldn't be, could he?

"Romeo... when was the last time you left the facility?"

"Left the facility? Never. I've always lived here." He said it as if it were obvious. Though I suppose in this case it was.

"Romeo... There's a world outside of here! Don't you know that?"

"Yes I know that. It's a world of flaws and filth. Of lazy men and women who have no interest in moving forward. Why would I want to leave here? This place of perfection and future technology?" He was standing so close to me. Too close. I backed up.

"But it wasn't always like that! There used to be a world full of color and love. A world with people who spent every day trying to move forward, humanly. Not savagely like you're doing." He looked so confused. I almost felt sorry. "It wasn't during your lifetime, or your fathers, but it happened! I promise you it did! There were trees and plants that produced air, not factories. There was a time when rain water wouldn't burn holes in your clothes, when everyone would contribute to 'moving forward', you have to believe me!"

"Listen to yourself Aura, do you know how crazy you sound? Who taught you this? Whoever they were, I hope you were the only one to believe them."

...

After a while I stopped running. I couldn't breathe and my leg hurt terribly. I looked around and could barely make out a small shed in the distance. I dragged my burning leg along with me down the path.

Once I reached the small shack I opened the rusty door. The entire structure was metal and was slowly disintegrating from acidic rain and age. But it soon became my first home.

I would walk every other day from the shed to the local dump and find food. It wasn't so bad. The scraps people would throw out weren't exactly scraps. They would be bags full of old bread that went stale, or fruit that had been overly ripe. Nothing that I could complain about.

I was digging through a pile of trash when I found a huge brick, only it wasn't really a brick. It was made of paper, and it was super heavy. The papers were falling out, and it looked like the part keeping it all together was torn. But I was fascinated by it.

Because when I pulled the papers apart I found writing and pictures. The writing was English, but I couldn't read at the time. The pictures were stunning. Hard to see, but still beautiful. There was a blue sky, and green grounds. Pretty little plants of rainbow colors covered the ground, they looked like funny circles where the outside was pink or white and the inside was yellow.

They showed a place where war was something people wanted to avoid. A place where anyone could work anywhere. A place totally different than mine. I decided that I wanted to live in this place, not in my little shack.

...

"No one taught me, I just know alright?" I wasn't going to tell this idiot how I knew. That was my own little secret.

"Well if you say it's true then it must be! What next Aura? I suppose there was a time when adults went to school too!" He sounded panicked almost. As if he was in denial. I suppose he was.

"There was Romeo, you have to believe me!"

"I believe this operation will benefit both of us."