Chapter Six (part one)

“I wouldn’t mind if you held a deep grudge against me, but I have things that must get done before the Administrators get involved—” Venessa stops looking down at a pair of arms wrapped around her waist.

“Finally, I got you,” Kuniva said, tightening his hold on Venessa’s waist.

He’s alive? That was a direct hit… It was then she realized why the explosion didn’t kill him, on his back was a shell of debris mimicking a tortoise shell. He’s clever.

A smirk swept across Kuniva’s face and said, “Took you long enough to get the picture. I can feel the movement of any metal object in close proximity through magnetic fields; it's like having a metal detector.”

Venessa claws Kuniva’s arms to get loose of his hold but no matter how much she fights injuring Kuniva his hold was like a vice tightening as she fights her way free.

“Hey, Electric Knifefish are fascinating creatures capable of incapacitating their prey with 600+ volts of aggression, most people know what it's like to be tazed by one. Do you?”

“Tch!”

Links of rebar burst through the piles of wreckage and raced towards them. Venessa had the intention of taking both of them out without thinking about her own safety but her mind was made up.

Kuniva clenches his teeth and tightens his hold as he releases a stream of electricity from his body into Venessa’s body.

Whips of electricity crackled and buzzed through the air. The attack was instant, giving Venessa no time to escape.

Venessa goes limp from the electric shock. Kuniva braces her. “That was close, a voltage more she would have died but that should keep her out for a—”

A sudden faint static voice echoes in his head. What is this noise? He looks around but it was only him and Venessa. “Where are these voices coming from?” Kuniva takes a quick glance at Venessa. The static smothering the voice begins to fade. He leans in closer to Venessa and the static dissipates revealing the laughter of children.

Kuniva wasn’t sure what was going on or how he’s hearing these voices that he doesn't recognize, he hovers his hand over Venessa’s head. As he inches closer, the static electricity from her hair connects to him, bridging their minds together.

Kuniva falls to his knees squeezing his head groaning. Faces of children flashed in his head. Who are those people? Are these her memories? The interference clears up and the voices become more audible.

“Are you sure professor? I’m still inexperienced.”

“I chose you because of that exact reason. You do have a teaching license, am I correct?”

The young woman nods her head.

“I don’t see the problem in you teaching children, that isn’t strange is it, Venessa?”

“N-no Professor, it’s just that... I want to keep my focus on researching--”

“You’re still young and new to this line of work. I expected this to happen. Everything around us is an experiment, even life itself, Venessa.” The woman turns in her chair.

“But Professor please?”

The woman stood up from her chair, leaving the room without saying a word. Venessa looked confused; she wasn’t sure if she annoyed her Professor. She thought to herself. Did I anger her?

“Come on now, I have other things to do,” the woman said.

“Oh okay.”

They stroll past a large glass window, on the other side of the glass window were a group of researchers observing children hooked up to machines moving various objects and solving puzzles with their psychic abilities.

“Listen Vanessa, I’m not asking you to give up on your research and cut ties with the Institution.” The woman stops by the window watching the children playing on the playground.

“On the contrary, I’m making you the head of this project.”

Venessa felt her heart race hearing that she was being appointed head of the project, a sense of joy projected from her, but she kept a composed face. “Are you sure—”

“When I make a decision it's final. See those kids out there, they're orphans without biotic abilities. We labeled them Imagery Children. After the third world war, many children were abandoned across the nation so they are sent here, California, Illinois, and Texas. Also, those children are regents for our research.”

“Uh, excuse me I’m not sure where you’re getting at Professor?”

“I want you to be their teacher.”

Venessa was shocked that her professor asked her to be a teacher.

“I know what you’re thinking but this can further our research and the data that we need requires a… gentle approach. This experiment is paramount to our research and development.”

Venessa takes a moment to think. She looks down at the children huddled in a group. She sighs and replies, “I’ll do it.”

*******

“I’m your teacher from now on. My name is Venessa Wingate, please to meet you all,” she said with a sluggish tone.

All the children greeted her with a hello.

I can’t believe I agreed to this, this is getting annoying already. But to push the project forward I need to gather the data, just bear with it.

Kuniva glanced over at Vanessa. These memories are her memories, It’s like having a direct link to her brain. I accidentally amplified the signal and now I'm receiving her memories.

Why children? Venessa stares down at her open desk drawer full of soaked papers.

The boys in the back of the class giggled and whispered.

She stares blankly at the running black ink.

“Are you okay Ms. Wingate,” a girl asked.

“Yeah, I’m fine,” Venessa said as she removed the soaked papers and put them on the desk.

The girls glared at the boys, they walks over to Venessa’s desk and hands her paper towels.

As she cleans out her drawer, she notices her pants were soaked. She sighed and continued cleaning out her desk. Loud, no manners, annoying, they don’t think critically, and need constant attention.

After school was over, Venessa stood outside watching the pouring rain. She opens her umbrella and exits the school when she turns the corner and sees one of her students standing under a tree looking at her broken umbrella.

“What happened?” Venessa asked.

“The wind broke my umbrella.”

“You can come to my place and take a bath and I'll wash your clothes.”

The girl nods and follows her teacher standing close to her.

Venessa was in the bathroom filling up the tub with warm water.

The girl walks around the bathroom looking around looking amazed. “Wow~ this is what a bathroom is?”

“Have you never seen a bathroom before?”

The girl nods and says, “The facility only has showers and doesn’t look nice like your bathroom. The showers don't work sometimes when it gets cold, sometimes we have to come to the facility for a shower.”

“Is that so? I wouldn’t hold it against the institution to waste money on something like this.”

The girl stares at Venessa confusingly. Venessa knew that her student wouldn’t understand what she was talking about.

“Don’t pay attention to me, go on and get in before the water cools.”

The girl takes off her clothes and hands them to Venessa and climbs into the tub. She splashed around in the tub as she pretends to swim. “I can’t wait to tell the others.”

Venessa takes the clothes and puts them in the washer machine.

“Ms. Wingate? Do you think I can become a powerful biotic if I continue working hard?”

Venessa leans on the wall next to the bathroom. “I can’t say for sure at this point. Most biotic achieve their powers through physical changes— anyway, are you pushing to be a high ranked biotic?”

“Hmm~ Not really, I just want to make my mom and dad proud.”

Venessa was shocked to hear that type of response from a child, anyone would stride to be a high ranked biotic. However, that wasn’t the case with the little girl.

“We don’t have parents to look up to so we have to build an image of ourselves or a role model. I want to help this city since it’s my home now.”

Venessa didn't know what to say to her student to think a child her age would give a speech to an adult, she walked away deep in her thoughts. She stops and pats her student on the head.

"Thanks for the peep talk, kid." For a second a tingling warm feeling enveloped her before fading as quick as it came.

Sometime passed, after the girl finished her bath and homework, she was laying in Venessa’s bed fast asleep.

After adjusting the air condenser's temperature, Venessa sits in a chair out on the balcony. She took out her phone but didn’t use it. She taps the flashing display. So much time wasted when I could be following up with the project in person.

She leans her head back and closes her restless eyes.

They have no manners. But, it's in their nature.

*******

It took four years to cultivate a new equation for calculating neural dynamics, to get a deeper understanding of the human psyche through electro dynamics, with permission from the Council of Science and the Military Government and support from the Chief Science Officer, I have the necessary funds for this experiment. My role as teacher has been relinquished. Venessa walks to the pod and picks up her student’s chart.

“Graduation is just a week away, you'll be going to high school, Are you scared?” Venessa asked.

The girl smiled at Venessa and replied, “Nope, your taught me everything that need to know but I still have a lot more training to improve on the knowledge you gave me, Ms. Wingate."

"What do plan to do after you graduate from high school?"

"Well, I've already have something in mind... I mean I've decided a long time ago."

"Oh and what's that?"

A sudden tension gripped Venessa, her restless eyes widened as the girl smiled and took her hand responding to Venessa’s question.

This… this isn’t right.

"Maybe I should stop--"

Her student grabs the sleeve her lad coat. "No, you can’t! You worked so hard to find the cure to brain abnormalities. We have to keep going."

Her peers announced the all clear signaling her to the control room. Venessa stood in the middle of the room overlooking her colleagues and the test room lined with pods against the walls.

"Professor Wingate, all systems are operational. We're ready to begin on your word."

A wave of uncertainty washed over her the longer she looks down at the test room. She exhaled giving the go ahead.

20 Minutes into the start of the experiment things had taken a turn for the worst. Alarms blared, holo-monitors flashed red, the researchers scrambling adding to the chaos.

“All of their brain waves are spiking rapidly!” a engineer said.

“The auto-disconnect isn’t responding, switching to manual!”

“The sedatives aren't working!”

"Branch one through twenty are experiencing cardiac arrest, begin Cardiac massage!"

"Branch twenty-one through thirty, brain waves have flatlined, I'm unable to regain access to the Synapse System!"

Venessa stood at the center of the chaos as others scrambled around her as her student's words cycled in her mind as their plea for help echoed over the comms. Her face drained further of its melanin, her body tensed up keeping her rooted to the floor, all the movement began to slow and the sound fades. What have I done? What's going to happen to these children? My students!

"Branch one through seventeen has malfunctioned. I can't get a read on their vitals!"

“Get the medical team—”

“Let’s not be hasty, we've gotten this far. They’re expendable no one will bat an eye about them going missing. I’ve already taken the liberty to inform the others to stay quiet and prepare the hospital. All they know is this experiment has been concluded. You didn’t see anything, and you won’t say anything.”

A woman with magenta sliver hair and brown skin said as she walked over to the window watching the other researchers on the ground floor scrambling to free the children from their pods.

"How could you?! The ethics committee will not let this go under the rug, you'll be stripped of everything, Professor Aisha!"

“The Ethics committee is nothing but a shell of its former self, throw them some money and they'll act as nothing happen. You should see this as an accomplishment, yes the children were such a pity, but every experiment requires subjects to progress further, answers don't just appear out of thin air, my dear Vanessa. Remember your reason for this project.” She steps closer to Venessa staring into her eyes, patting her student on the shoulder, she moves closer whispering something in her student's ear.

The alarms finally stopped. Venessa, scowls at her professor, her eyes full of anger and pain.

Professor Aisha's smile radiated a deep wickedness. “You don’t need to feel bad about what happened. Emotions only get in the way of perfect results, ethics and morals have a tendency to digress results. I’m holding you on a high pedestal. Keep up the good work.”

Venessa was still rooted to the floor. A colleague escorts her to the door on the way-out beds of children rolled down the hall in a single file line. There was a sigh of relief but the guilt clung to her but the sudden anxiety washed out that relief. “Wait there's one more, Michelle Seacrest, where is she?”

Her colleague didn’t say anything to her and continued escorting her to the ground floor. As she enters the room, Venessa notices a group of doctors and researchers gathered around one of the pods.

Venessa breaks free from her colleague's grip and walks over to the group. Her heart throbbed with each step she took forward. Her head was filled with the smile of her student. I don't want biotic abilities, I want to be like you Ms. Wingate. I want to be a researcher just like you. Making a change to the world.

She squeezes by to the front, when her eyes laid the pod time stopped. No this… this wasn’t supposed to happen. Please let her be OK. Please!!!

Kuniva pulls away from Venessa slowly as she gets back up on her feet. She paints heavily, scowling. “Now I have to kill you!”

Ice shards form but instantly shatter, Venessa shreaks at the top of her lungs pulling on her hair.

I will never forgive her! She took someone precious to me, now I'll repay her greatly... by crushing what's her's.

Venessa's cry of grief shifts into wicked laughter. “It was an experiment to understand how stigmata nodules interact through stimuli and how to create a human neural network. They disposed of the children’s bodies after the first human trial. But to my beliefs they were still conducting the project in secrecy and they were.”

“I don’t understand. Why didn’t you report the accident!?” Kuniva steps to the side dodging a piece of flying debris.

“66 times! That’s how many times I was rejected from using Alexandria, I wanted to fix the mess I created, my children… I did this to them. I'll show her not to take me lightly!”

“What you’re doing is no different from them!” Kuniva said sliding across the ground dodging flying debris.

“You saw what happened, how twisted they can be. I know how crooked this city’s overseers and their leaders are and how far they’re willing to go to achieve their personal goals. I won’t let them get away with this and I won’t stop even if everyone becomes my—Ghak!” Venessa stops and looks at her hand. Her nose bleed worsens and wept tears of blood from her cyber eye.

“Administrator privilege revoked. Fail-safe protocol… denied.” A distant voice spoke.

“No…” loose debris begins to levitate and moves towards Venessa, as the debris closes in around her, the wreckage disintegrates into a white glowing matter.

The glowing sphere of matter coagulates above her head, reconstituted into a female humanoid figure. Venessa groans as the unknown entity pulls on the umbilical cord separating itself from Venessa.

Venessa bellow stopped as she collapses on the floor as the entity hovers over her unconscious body.

The entity’s body twinkled and radiated like a bright starry night sky, it’s eyes fixed on Kuniva before her lips began to move, letting out a eerie chime.

“What… I’ve never seen an ability like this. Matter Conversion? What is this feeling in the air? The feeling of… agony.”

*******

The entity’s eyes shift from a blue hue to crimson, shrieking shattering the earth beneath her levitating frame.

Pillars of ice rose high into the sky hitting the highway, bringing down a portion of the elevated road.

Marquis sits up and fights his way out of the half crushed vehicle. When he drew a breath, he shivered and walked to the end of the separated road looking down below.

“What is that?”

He looks up as snow begins to fall. “Snow? In the summer?”

*******

The entity raised its hand reaching out to Kuniva and held it out.

Without giving it a thought, he held his hand out as a spark of electricity hit the tips of his fingers. His vision turned to static.

Voices and images flood his mind.

“I’ll work hard from dusk to dawn. I was considered the best and I was confident that one endeavor will pay off but when I heard about the introduction to allow abilities into sports I felt…out of place. All my hard work went to waste.”

“Come on bro, let's give up, we can’t win this race. This isn’t track anymore, it’s useless."

“Hey, can you help me with my abilities?”

“Uh, do I know you?”

“Umm, no but I heard you have the same power as me. If it’s ok can you teach me to understand it—”

“Haha, you know what I think I will help you. You have to understand how your ability works…”

“I see!”

“Hey, want to get something to eat?”

“I can’t right now…”

“It’s been a few days since I saw that girl…”

“Haha, that’s mean! How can you say that even though you were the one who asked her for help.”

“Who cares! my Hex Hand is far better than hers. I have no need for her. This city is cruel after all, they rate, categorize, and separate prominent biotics from the liabilities. It puts them in their place.”

“As an instructor, it’s my job to teach students who were dropped from the program because they held no aptitude for being a biotic. They were then labeled Imagery Children.”

The entity tilts its head and clamps it’s hand shut. Kuniva catapults into the air dodging a hand made of earth. “Geo-kinesis.”

A sphere of electricity surrounds Kunviva, the heat from the electricity thaws the snow from beneath his feet, allowing the iron sand to move freely around him.

A ball of iron sand the size of a baseball forms at the tip of his index finger. He pointed the electrified ball of iron towards the entity and said, “I saw this on a video a few weeks back about this girl who uses coins as sabits. Firing a sabit up to mach 7 using electromagnetism with that much speed comes enough kinetic energy punching a whole through the thickest armor.”

Kuniva fires the metal projectile, a projectile moving at mach 7 was a sure hit leaving the target unaware of the attack.

Suddenly the projectile ricochet off the entity, just as the railgun shot. There was a flash of light between the entity and the sabit of iron.

That wasn’t supposed to happen! That flash of light when the sabit made contact the energy was dissipated across a large area. The field of electricity dissipates, he looks down at his ankle. His leg was shaking ready to give out on him from its overextended use. Gathers iron dust he manipulates it into a cast around the sprained ankle.

The entity begins to weep, tears trickling its face. It reached its hand out to him again.

Kuniva dashes away to the left from a sudden wall of chilling energy. Ready for a counter-attack, the entity's attention suddenly shifts to the expressway. What is going on? It’s not focused on me?

He looks over his shoulder. “It’s after Ms.Wingate.”

The entity scowls at Vanessa releasing a barrage of needles made from ice; however, the needles of ice are intercepted by a wall of iron sand.

The entity turns to Kuniva as he carries Venessa away. The entity weeps again reaching out to him. Then suddenly changes its focus to the expressway above.

Kuniva rests Vanessa against the wall, watching the entity receive a hail of gunfire from above.

*******