“Come on let's get you to medical and let the Healers check you out.” The Marine First Sergeant told Emily as she struggled to bring her breathing back to normal. He pulled back looking her over with a smile on his face. For the first time since she first met him on the grinder, she saw him smiling. Once she got her breathing under control he guided her towards a golf cart that was just pulling up. A monitor was driving but he got out and back away letting let the Marine First Sergeant take the golf cart. The First Sergeant motioned for Emily to take the passenger seat. Without waiting for the monitor the First Sergeant drove off.

The First Sergeant drove around the building towards the back where there was a small dirt path. Emily shivered as they passed the back of the building. She could still smell the overpowering smell of the gas. The path wasn't all that long and it ended in a paved road. Emily looked out in disgust. They had been marching since three am this morning in the woods with nothing but a compass and a map to guide them when there was a road not too far away from them.

“If we found this we could have been here hours ago.” Emily thought with disgust.

The drive to the hospital was a quiet one. Emily sat staring out into the woods her emotions muted. She felt great physically more than great. All of her problems from the gas and darts were gone. She took a deep breath full breath and it was like what had happened was just a bad memory. Her eyes were fine. No stinging pain, in fact, looking out into the forest the colors looked deeper more complex. It was like she saw more colors like different shades of greens she never noticed before. She took a breath through her nose and she could smell an electrical smell of the golf cart. It wasn't overpowering or anything it was just there.

She looked down at her hand and made a fist. She didn't feel any stronger but she could feel her muscles move under her skin. It was a very strange sensation. She reached out to the side of the golf cart to the aluminum post that held up the roof and squeezed it. The post didn't get crushed no matter how hard she squeezed.

“Not super strong.” She thought to herself sadly. “I feel different but am I a super?”

The road deadened into another road and the First Sergeant turned right. Emily closed her eyes and leaned back in the seat. After a few seconds, she started to categories all the sounds she was hearing. The loudest was the whine of the engine. No, she could hear three different sounds in the engine making the whining sound. She could hear the tires on the ground making a sort of grinding noise. The wind made a couple of sounds as it passed over the golf cart. She could smell a faint smell of dust in the air may be from the golf cart kicking up dirt as it drove down the road. She wasn’t sure.

“Four days,” The First Sergeant said out of the blue.

Startled Emily opened her eyes and looked at the First Sergeant.

“That's how many days left in the program. This was the last chance to awaken. After today it's all downhill. We do a lot of team building exercises and really relax the rules after this. Today was the last day we try to awaken you guys. You really waited until the last second to awaken. Hell, you waited until the last moment. You already went through the gas chamber for your last time before you awoken.” The First Sergeant said shaking his head.

Emily blinked in surprise. She had lost track of how long they were there but she never realized just how badly she and her Platoon mates had gotten the dates wrong. The best guess they had was there was still at a week left. “Chalk one up again for school for playing mind games.” She thought to herself with a snort. When the First Sergeant turned to look at her curiously she realized she snorted out loud. Blushing she looked out the window.

The First Sergeant picked up a radio that was attached to the dash. “Command from two.” He said speaking into the handheld mic.

“Go ahead two.” Came a reply from the speakers.

“Headed to the hospital with an eighteen year old female new Alpha. No distress. No injures. No code gray at this time. Will need decon. Alpha is covered in CC Gas residue.”

“Copy two. No distress, no injures, and no code gray. Will inform the hospital about the decon.”

“CC Gas?” Emily said getting concerned.

“So you do speak.” The First Sergeant said chuckling putting the mic away. “CC stands for crowd control as in crowd control gas. The stuff we hit you guys with is like pepper spray but a hell of a lot stronger and slightly different so you guys don't go blind.”

“Well, at least I'm not going to go blind.” Emily muttered closing her eyes again.

She must have fallen asleep because seconds later the golf cart jerked to a stop in front of the hospital. They arrived at the back of Fort Rida Hospital where an ambulance was parked. Waiting on them was the Major and a bunch of people in scrubs.

“Were here.” First Sergeant said sanding up. Emily followed suit. They both saluted the Major as she walked up.

“Private Emerson.” The Major said returning the salute.

“Ma'am.” Emily said dropping her salute.

“If you would head towards the decon door to your right. Inside you will find a shower and some new clothes. When your done with your shower please put your uniform inside a yellow bag and leave it with your boots inside the room.” The Major said nodding to an open door to the far right of the emergency room building.

“Yes, Mam.” Emily said heading towards the showers her inner geek squealing in delight. “Fort Friggin Rita Hospital,” Emily thought to herself smiling. “This is going to be so awesome.”

The decon room turned out to be three rooms. Emily walked into the first door from the outside and closed it. She found a large white placard hanging from the wall above a white plastic bench explaining what to do. According to the stick man drawings on the placard, the first room was where you took off your clothes. The second was the shower and the last room was to put new clothes on. She looked around in wonder smiling. She wondered what famous super had been through this room. She ran a few names through her head smiling picturing them standing where she was standing. She looking into the waste bin wondering if someone had left anything from their super suit in it. It was empty and the yellow trash bag looked new.

Shrugging Emily made sure the first door was locked then took off her clothes putting them in a waste bin.. She wondered briefly if she should put her boots in side the bag. “If the trash bag is strong enough to hold a Utility belt it’s strong enough to hold my boots.” She thought to herself dropping the boots in with her soiled uniform.

The shower was not like normal showers. For one thing, the shower head was huge and sticking out of the ceiling. For another thing, there were no shower handles to turn the shower off and on. Nor were there any way to adjust for hot or cold. There was only a chain hooked to the shower head. Leaning away from the shower head Emily pulled on the chain. Freezing cold water exploded from the shower head.

“Can’t see any supers being ok with this.” Emily muttered to herself only to look around in embarrassment when she realized that she spoke out loud.

After a few seconds, Emily took a deep breath and jumped into the icy cold shower. Once she was wet she let go of the chain and turned to look for some soap. On the wall hanging inside the shower stall was a single pump bottle of soap. Pumping a few squirts on to her hand she scrubbed herself clean and rinsed off with the cold water again. In the last room, she found a white starchy towel and a set of scrubs. Once she was dried off and in her scrubs, she looked around for something to wear on her feet. One thing she learned in the military was that you never went anywhere barefoot.

She stuck her head out the door and found a couple of nurses sitting at a desk in front of the decon room. “Ah, can I have something to wear on my feet?” She asked them.

“Oh sure honey, hang on.” One of the nurses said getting up. The nurse found her a pair of yellow socks that had black dots on the bottom and a smiley face on the toes. “I'll take her down.” The nurse told the other nurses when Emily came out of the last decon room with her new socks on.

The nurse led Emily through the maze that was the hospital to an elevator that took them down to the basement floor. They walked past a few patient rooms with people inside them. Emily had to peek inside of them to see if she could spot a super but all she saw was just a few normal looking people. The nurse led Emily through some more confusing hallways to a lock door that lead to a huge gym looking room with two people in white lab coats working on tablets.