5. The Man in Black

“What!?” he asked. His face had a look on it that could curdle dairy. It was a mix between confused and enraged. I assumed that, though he did not know how I knew about Room 42, (I wasn’t even sure myself) he must have thought that one of his workers had tipped me off. What he didn’t know is that voices in my head were telling me what to do, which is never a good sign.

“I said, I had only one request. And that is to take me to Room number forty two.” I said with a smile on my face.

“How did you,” he stuttered, “who...” He was at a loss for words. Probably for the first time in his life, he had no idea what to say to change the conversation so it worked in his favor. 

“You want to know how I knew? Unlock me from these restraints and we’ll have a pleasant conversation about it all.”

“Not on your life.” His suave voice had melted away. This voice was more unnatural. It was more sinister. It terrified me but I kept my composure. ‘Always keep your cool in a heated situation!’ That’s what my father used to say. One time, when I had gotten in a fight at school, I came home with a bruised up eye and bloody nose. My dad asked me how the fight started and I had to tell him the truth. I told him that another boy was picking on Nick because he liked to sing and dance rather than play football or baseball. I told my father that when I saw this boy start to push and shove my little brother, I lost control. I ran over to him, turned him around to face me, and clocked him square in the nose. He dropped to the ground, cupping the blood in his hand. Soon, the blood stopped and he stood back up to face me. I put both my hands up, signaling I wasn’t going down without a fight. But, since this was my first real fight, I never realized that you put your hand up to also protect your face. My hands were just a little too low, and he knocked me right in the eye.

“I’m sure he deserved every bit of it,” my dad told me, “but do you think you would have a black eye and bloodied up shirt if you had tried to have a civil conversation with this boy?” I shook my head. “If there’s one thing that I should teach you as a father, it’s that violence is never the answer. Even when your enemy is in the wrong, and you know it, and he knows it, never solve anything through a punch to the face. You’ve gotta keep you cool in a heated situation! When he sees that you don’t want a fight, it will be easier to talk things out.”

I applied this information to my current heated situation. The man stared at me with fire in his eyes.

“Listen,” I started, “I’m not looking to get out of these locks, beat your face in, and then try and somehow escape this place when I know full well that your people will stop me with one sedation dart. However, I am looking to sit down with you and have a civil conversation to get to know you better. Besides, my neck is starting to hurt from looking at you from this angle.” He paused at my demands. After a moment, he looked at the security camera and nodded to it.

“There will be four guards, all with dart guns outside this door.” He said. “If you try anything, and I mean anything, you’ll be sedated before you can say a word.” He walked over to me, reached in his pocket, and pulled out some sort of remote control. He approached my slowly, never looking away from my eyes. He raised the remote to each brace that held my body to the metal table. With one click of the small, blue button, the metal seemed to dissolve away into fine power. “Mendelevium. Such a curious metal.” He said as he turned each metal brace to dust. “Most people don’t know that this  rare metal responds magnificently to radio waves. You see, in the form of a powder, each grain of mendelevium will attract around the wave itself. The wave, trying to escape, and the grains of metal, trying to attach themselves to it. This creates such a unique phenomenon, one can only believe that a heavenly being is behind its creation. The metal, solidifies due to the immense amount of pressure. Almost nothing can break the bonds created, making mendelevium the strongest solid metal in the universe.”

“Almost nothing?” I asked. He was on the last brace now. He stopped.

“Surely the strongest thing in the world has to have a weakness. Simply, radio waves also undo the bonds made. It confuses the metal, therefore making the bonds void. Curious how the one thing that makes it so indestructible, also is the source of it’s demise. You can relate, can’t you Derek? Your brain, giving you the ability to be stronger than any man... for only a mere thirty two seconds? Because, your brain also emits a chemical that knocks you out for an entire hour. Now, I don’t mean to be rude, but that’s pathetic. And not to mention, your dear departed brother...”

“He’s not dead.” I interjected.

He laughed. “Of course he’s not. He’s just pale and lifeless on that table over there for the fun of it. Interrupt me again and you can stay chained to this table. Now, where was I? Oh! Your brother. As much as may have loved him, Derek, and as much as he meant to you, he was your biggest weakness. Love, is your biggest weakness. You wouldn’t go anywhere without him. He needed your constant protection. Well, look where you ended up because of that! Because you loved him so much, because you had to save him from danger, you were the one that ended up chained to a metal table. As for him...” He clicked the blue button, transforming the metal back into powder, and walked over to my ‘brother’. “He wasn’t so lucky.” 

The mess of grey metallic powder covered the floor. I slowly sat up on the table, being careful not to injure my neck any further. My joints were stiff and my muscles ached. I’m sure the way I moved my body, he could tell. I turned and faced the man in the suit.

“Let us properly introduce ourselves. As you know, my name is Derek Sorensen. I am twenty years old. I was born to my parents, Nancy and Chris in the year 1991. Two years later, my younger brother, and only sibling was born to our family. My mother named him Nick. We grew up in a town formerly known as Garmont. When I was seven, The Primal War broke out all across the world. My father left our family and never came back. One year later, my town was discovered to be a weaponry and was later destroyed by what you call, Ion Bombs. My brother and I were exposed to the radiation. Living from city to city, my mother, Nick, and I did what we could to survive with nothing. When I was sixteen, my mother left us just like my father did. My brother and I were left alone to fend for ourselves. The day after my mother had left us, men came to our apartment and tried to take Nick. For four years we were on the run. Every city we went to, every abandoned house we lived in, someone found us and tried to take us. For four years, we trusted no one but ourselves. Then, the other night, when we were scavenging for food in a local Soup Kitchen, three men tried to take my brother. Not only did they take my brother, but they took me too. Now here I sit, after being strapped to a metal operating table, after a man I know nothing about tells me radiation mutated my brain, after he tells me I have super human strength, after he tells me my brother is dead. Now it’s your turn. Who are you?” I finished.

“Well that was certainly long and unnecessary.” He said. “Fine, I’ll tell you my name, and my name only. No need here for the biographies. My name is Bradlee W. Skinner. You may simply call me, Skinner.”

“Why have you taken me?” I asked, prodding for more answers.

“I took you because you displayed the qualities of those we possess.”

“And who do you possess?” I questioned. His answers were short and sweet. This was exactly the opposite of that I wanted. I wanted to know every detail, from the number of tiles in this room, to the color of underwear the guards outside the door were wearing. Clearly, all Skinner was giving me was the necessary information to the questions I was asking.

“We possess those who were affected by the radiation. ‘Supers’, if you will. The people who developed super abilities after being exposed to ion radiation.”

“What do you do with the people you take?” This was my most important question. Not only did it tell me what was in store for me, but it might give me a hint to what happened to my brother. I knew he was alive, but where were they keeping him? Obviously, Room 42. The voice in my head had told me so. 

“We.... cure them.” He said. The pause in his words gave me chills. You know in movies, when the bad guy always pauses when he’s lying? When the hero asks what they’ve done with a specific person, and the villain simply says, ‘We’ve... Taken care of him.’ This was no different. Death. That’s what happened to the people they captured. He continued to speak. “I’m sure I know exactly what you’re thinking right this very second. You’re thinking that we kill the people we take,” (This guy was good...) “oh no, no, no, no, no! All of you are too valuable to human life to murder. In reality, what we do is what I just said. We cure them. If it just so happens they die in the process of curing, that’s too bad. But sometimes, we don’t cure them. After we research what they are capable, and just exactly what they can do, well, sometimes we keep them.”

“You recruit them to work for you, don’t you? You use them to help you catch more like us!”

“Keep your enemies closer.” Skinner said with a smile. “Now, is there anything else you’d like to know, or can this conversation be terminated, I am a very busy man, after all.”

“Yes. What, exactly, is in Room 42 that you don’t want me to see.” Skinner was about to open his mouth to say something, but the noises of yelling and gunfire could be heard from just outside the door. Then, just as quick as the noise had come, it went silent. The door to my room could only be opened by key card, which Skinner was the only one who had access to it. The attempts  to break me out were useless. Just then, the door came flying off it’s hinges as if an explosion on the other side had caused it. But, there was no smoke or fire in the hall outside. 

“WHAT IN THE...” Skinner yelled as sedation darts went flying at him from the open doorway. One found a spot in his right thigh. He went down hard, and fast, right on top of my brother’s body. As he did, the table holding them both came crashing down with a loud smashing sound. A bright, blue light glowed from underneath the wreckage. With one last breath of consciousness, Skinner looked at me and said, “I’ll see you soon.” He closed his eyes, in a deep sleep.

The blue light vanished as I ran to my brother’s body. Maybe Skinner was telling the truth. Maybe my brother really was dead. I bent down over Skinner and the lifeless body, who was now face first on the floor. I pushed Skinner off of my brother, and rolled his body over. But, to my surprise, it wasn’t the face of my brother that I stared at. It was the face of the man that I pulled out of the window of the church with my brother, just the other night. His neck looked as if it had been sliced open. He must have landed on the broken glass from the church window. Must have been a painful way to die... Slow too. I shuddered at the thought.

“Cloaking devises. They had one in my room too that looked like you.” a voice said from behind me. I turned around. There, in the hall outside the doorway stood two people. The first, I didn’t know. He was tall, with dark brown hair and brown eyes. His skin was tan and his complexion was nearly perfect. “This is Austin, by the way. He’s the one that decided it would be a good idea to make a grand entrance. He has telekinetic powers! Isn’t that sweet?! He totally blasted that door with his brain!” said Nick, standing next to Austin, alive.

“I knew it!” I said as I ran to him. “I knew you weren’t dead!” I hugged him so tightly and for so long, that I’m positive Austin felt awkward just standing there, watching us. “How did you escape?” I asked.

“Don’t freak out, ok?” Nick said. “But, I’m not the only one that isn’t dead...” 

I didn’t notice him before. He must have been in the few shadows that lined the hallway corridors. His sandy blonde hair was the first thing that I noticed. Then his blue eyes, his slightly crooked nose, his lips, his chin with a small amount of barely visible scruff on it. His mouth never moved, but I heard his words like he were standing next to me. I heard the voice in my head that had tipped me off about Room 42. 

“Hello Derek. I’ve missed you so much.” He said to me in my head.

“Dad?” I said aloud, for everyone to hear. 

4. Numbers

Everything was quiet. No birds chirping, no breeze rustling the leaves of the trees, no dogs barking in the distance... Silence. I wondered where everyone had gone. The searing silence only made the fact that I was alone worse. I was alone in the world. I continued to walk down the empty street. The houses all the same bright white color, with small white picket fences separating the lawns. White mailboxes lined the curb for as far as I could see. Why was everything such a pure color? It seemed as if I had been placed into the middle of the ultimate suburb. Everything was matching. All the houses the same, all the yards the same. I walked. I wondered. That’s when I noticed it. Each mail box that I passed had something in common, apart from their color. The number 42 was embossed neatly on the door to each and every one of the mailboxes. 

I continued down the street, checking every mailbox. Sure enough, the same pattern continued on and on. 42... 42... 42... I started running, the street never ending. 42... 42... I ran so far and for so long that I couldn’t breathe. I walked again. Everything was so perfect, so precise, that there had to be a reason this neighborhood looked this way. Each box was spaced out so precisely. I counted my steps beginning at one mailbox, with my sights set on reaching the next one. One, two, three, four... The box drew closer and closer with each step. “Twenty-three, twenty-four, twenty five...” I had begun to count out loud making sure that I didn’t skip a number, having to start over. The box was within my reach. “Thirty nine, forty, forty one, forty two...” I stopped. The mailbox was parallel with my body. I looked at the mailbox, and sure enough, the embossed 42 stared me in the eye. 

There was no possible way! I ran back to the mailbox I had started my counting at. I walked swiftly, counting out loud as to not lose my place. “Twenty nine, thirty..” I said aloud not taking my eye off the next mailbox. I stopped again when the box was directly across from my left shoulder. “Forty two...” I said in shock. I ran again. 42.. 42.. 42 everywhere! On the mailboxes, the houses, even the speed limit sign read, “42 MPH”. Where was I? Down the street I ran, away from the silence, everything still the same. The never ending street behind me and ahead of me. There was no direction to run besides forward. 42.. 42.. 42! My running footsteps the only sound.

I ran for as long as I could before I felt my knees giving out. I had always had weak knees. One time, during a hot summer day, back when everything made sense, Nick and I were playing on the youth tee-ball team. I wasn’t older than seven or eight, Nick probably five. I remember because this was the first game Mom and Dad came to. I was up to bat. I stepped up to the tee. I could hear my mom cheering from behind the fence, on the bleachers. My dad whistled his unique ‘WHOOP’ sound, kind of like a cattle call. It was the loudest thing I had ever heard. My dad loved to whistle. He’d whistle while we played catch in our backyard. He whistled while we built our treehouse. He whistled as he would tuck us in for bed at night. My mom got irritated with it mostly. I just assumed she was jealous of his talent.

As I brought the bat up to hit the ball, I heard the ‘WHOOP’ from my dad. I turned around to tell him to be quiet and that I was concentrating. The crowd laughed. I inhaled deeply, gripped the small metal bat, and swung. The ball flew from the tee and I ran for first base! The crowd cheered, my dad whistled, and I ran... Much like I did just now. Running away from home base, with first base in sight. Growing up, I always watched the pro games and was amazed how they always dropped to the ground and slid to first base. I thought I’d try it, not to escape from getting out, but just to impress my dad. I fell to the ground and that’s when the pain sent me into a fit of tears. When I had dropped, I sort of forgot to keep moving to make me slide, and all my weight landed on my right knee, popping it out of it’s own socket. My dad was the first one to reach me. 

“That was an impressive slide, son!” he joked. 

“I didn’t slide Dad!” I managed to choke through the sobs, “and you know it!” My dad was never properly taught that you don’t use sarcasm around a seven year old. 

As I stopped running, feeling my knee begin to pop out, I hobbled over to the curb side. I sat down to try and move my leg in a way where my knee would just pop itself back in. I had gotten pretty good at it since it popped out almost every day. Feeling the pain as my knee fixed itself, I stood backup. I stopped running, due to the fact that I now had a slight limp. The haunting mailboxes still lining the street. The number 42 every where I looked. That’s when I heard it. The first noise I heard besides my heavy breathing and loud, clunking footsteps. A car! 

A car moved swiftly down the road. I waved my arms in a frantic way to make it stop so I could get a ride to where ever it was going. I wanted out of the white suburb, and most of all, I needed to get away from the number 42! The car was a white Mazda, with tinted black windows so you could barely see inside. “STOP!” I yelled, “I need a ride!” The car slowed down and stopped feet in front of me. The driver inside, killing the engine. I winced at the silence. It was nice to have at least some sort of sound around me. I looked towards the license plate to get some sort of idea where I was, knowing which state I was even in would be nice. But there was nothing on it. There, on the white car, was a white license plate. Written on the plate was a simple, two digit number... 42. The door slowly opened. As it did, sound filled the air again, whoever was driving the car was whistling the tune of Zipadeedoodah. As he stood up, out of the car, I fell backwards with a startle. 

“Dad?” I stuttered in shock. 

“Forty two.” He said. “Nick, he’s in room forty two! Wake up!”

I awoke from the dream in a cold sweat. I opened my eyes and looked around. I was strapped to a bed, this time with metal instead of cloth. I was in the same room as I was before. The familiar machine beeped it’s usual chorus, and the mysterious John Doe was still covered to my left. How long had I been out? Long enough for them to lock me down with metal braces. Surely this was to ensure that I didn’t escape next time. If there was a next time. What exactly had happened to me in the first place? All I remember is that I felt a rush of strength fill my body and the next thing I know, I’m passing out on the floor.

“Nice of you to rejoin us.” said a voice. I looked in the direction the voice had come from, and there sitting in the corner, was the man in the black suit. 

“I recognize your voice, “ I said, “you were there that night at the church. You only wanted Nick until you saw what I could do.” 

“And what, exactly, can you do?” he said, his tone unwavering.

“I was hoping you could tell me that.” I said, my tone matching his.

He snickered, “Clearly, there are things that we need to discuss.” He stood from his chair, and walked over to me. His bald head was the only thing I could focus on. “Why do you think you are here?” he asked.

“I’ll answer your questions when you tell me where my brother is.” I forced. He looked at me, amused. He placed his hand on my shoulder, walked below my table, around my feet and over to the dead body on my left.

“He’s been here the whole time. We couldn’t dream of separating you two.” 

“You’re lying!” I shouted.

“Honestly Derek, after what you’ve been through, you think that I would stoop so low as to tell you your brother was dead if it were not true??” He said in his suave, well behaved school boy tone. 

“Show me then! Show me that my brother is...” I was cut off by the sheet being pulled away from the corpse’s face. The face was almost as white as the room itself and nearly unrecognizable. His cheeks were sunken in and his lips were a deep purple color. There, on the table next to me, was my brother, Nick.... Dead.

I was in a state of shock mixed with anger. The machine that I assumed was monitoring my heart rate beeped faster and faster. “HOW DARE YOU! HOW DARE YOU KILL MY FAMILY!” I shouted, trying to escape my bonds. “WHEN I GET OUT OF HERE...” I hesitated, “YOU’RE DEAD!” 

“Ha!” he snorted, “Not even an atomic bomb could help you break those restraints. Not to mention, at the rate the cortisol is pumping through your body, you’ll be out like a light in no time.” 

The machine could barely keep up with it’s own beeping noises. Derek, calm down. You can’t let him make you angry. It’s not what it seems. Remember, room 42! The voice came from with in the room, but there was no one there but me and this monster. Confused, I asked the suited man, “What?” The heart monitor slowed.

“I said, you’ll be out like a light in no time.” He repeated. 

“No, didn’t you say...” The voice interrupted my speech. Quiet! Whatever he tells you is a lie. That body is a lie! 

“That body is a lie?” I repeated. 

“Of course it’s not a lie, Derek,” the man said, “how can one clone and kill someone? Impossible! Even for people like you!” 

“What do you mean people like me?” I asked. Good! Change the subject! The voice said. 

“Derek,” he said disappointingly, “surely you don’t think that everyone has momentary brute strength? You see, you’re special, Derek. You can... Do things... That others only dream of! For you, our studies have concluded, that your anger emits a hormone called Cortisol, a kind of natural steroid. Now, this steroid that courses through your veins is emitted via high levels of stress, and as we all know, anger equals stress. Now you might be thinking, ‘But everyone has cortisol! Why am I the only one who can lift a double decker bus when I’m on the stuff?’ Legitimate question, Derek,” he stared into my eyes, “why can you?”

Listen carefully to what he says next, Derek. It’s all so very important. The voice buzzed in my ears like a mosquito.

“You remember when you were just a boy, don’t you, Derek? You remember that day when your brother hid in the tree house while the planes were flying overhead to drop bombs on your precious little town? You remember, then, that you didn’t make it down into the bomb shelter and that both you and your brother were exposed to what we like to call, Ion Radiation. You see Derek, Ion Radiation is one of the most harmful things to the human body. It takes your cells, you see, and it jumbles them up so that all they are is mush!” he seemed far too amused by all of this, “But then, the radiation had another side effect. An unknown side effect. See, when they mushy cells were exposed to even more Ion Radiation, they grew back! But, did they grow back the same? Oh no, no, no! ... They grew back stronger! You may recall, that they approximately dropped ten Ion Bombs on your home town. Well, wouldn’t you know it, but ten is the magic number in this little story! Five times your cells were destroyed, and five times they grew back, bigger and better every time. Especially your brain cells. This magical number of ten just so happens to be the point where your brain cells developed an ability. Be it super strength, reading minds, talking to animals, whatever, your brain cells changed that fateful day. In your case, your brain cells take the cortisol that your body emits and turns it into, ‘super-juice’.” he made the quotes with his fingers in the air, “Extra adrenalin, Derek. Therefore, your body reacts the only way a body should when there are extra amounts of hormones running through your blood. It gets rid of it to make room for more. Derek, you have momentary strength because the Ion Radiation mutated your brain cells into a kind of trading post. Your body trades the cortisol for extra adrenalin which makes you unbelievably strong.”

His eyes locked onto mine, then with a single stride, he moved in close to me, our noses almost touching. “Derek,” he said with a crazed look in his eye, “Why do you think your strength is momentary?? Why do you pass out every time your body uses ‘super-juice’?! Because when all of your adrenaline is used up, which takes about 32 seconds, your super brain cells produce a drug called ‘ionastic meprosol’. The glands in your brain are the only ones that can produce this drug. It knocks you out instantly in order to preserve your body so it can make more cortisol and therefore make more adrenalin. Derek,” he backed away to my dead brother again, “you are special.”

Now is the time to mention Room 42. Do it! NOW! The mysterious voice, that only I could seem to hear yelled at me.

“That’s great and all, but now it’s my turn to talk. I know things. One, that I am some sort of super human. You know, the kind of things we read about in comic books. Two, that my brother is not dead. I know you’ve somehow disguised that body to resemble Nick’s. I know that he is somewhere in this building. I ask you now only one question... Where is my brother?” I said. The face on the main never changing.

“You know, for having a super human brain, you’re not very smart.” he said, “Your brother is dead. Here is his body. End of story. Any more questions?”

“No. No questions. Just a request....” I looked at him right in the eyes as he did to me just a few minutes ago. “.... Take me to Room 42.”

That was the only time I ever saw his face change expression.

3. The Room

The cold table on my bear skin woke me up, but only just. In a groggy daze, I tried to look around to see where I was. Nothing in the room was colored. Pure white walls surrounded me on every side with a white door at my feet. A pure white machine flashed numbers across the screen that didn’t mean anything to me. A white table with a single syringe and mysterious clear liquid inside was placed properly on my right. To my left, a larger table was pushed up against the wall. When my eyes came into focus, I saw that the table was not vacant. A pure white linen sheet covered a large mass, yet, leaving the pure white feet of the deceased stranger exposed. 

Coming out of my unconsciousness, I tried to sit up, only to discover just how badly these people that captured me didn’t want me to move. Four white belts strapped over my chest, stomach, and legs glued me to the table, along with white wrist and ankle restraints. Surveying the room once again, in the back corner behind me, was a pure white camera that was also surveying me. I was still too weak to yell at my fullest, but I managed to squeak out, “Nick!”

Outside the door, the sounds of footsteps came closer and closer. Then, the faint beeping sound followed by a lock becoming unlatched. The door squeaked open that almost seemed to harmonize with the beeping of the machine next to me. That’s when I realized I was the thing the machine was monitoring. Small sensor pads ornamented my stomach, chest, and forehead. Not being able to move, not knowing what this machine was actually keeping track of, and especially not knowing where Nick was elevated my heart rate. 

“Now, now Derek. Calm down. One doesn’t want to take drastic measures if you become... uncontainable.” the voice said as it entered the room. A tall man in a black suit stood next to me. His eyes were a piercing green color that seemed to look straight into my thoughts. What little facial hair he had was a dark contrast to his pale skin. It was definitely a contrast to his hairless head that reflected the light from the medical lamps that illuminated the room. But what did he mean by ‘uncontainable’? Clearly, I was very much contained, and there was no escaping this. Not even if I tried. But then, the memories came flooding into my mind like a bad smell when you walk past a dumpster. The night Nick and I were abducted, I had felt something. It was like the heat of the sun had burst throughout my body and the cold night air vanished on sight. I could breath more clearly, hear more crisply, and... lift more. Could I lift more weight? Was it the adrenaline from the moment that gave me superhuman strength? Like the stories of the people who have lifted cars off of loved ones from the adrenaline rushes after they’ve been in a car crash. After all, I did pull two well sized human beings out of a church window. Did these people believe that I had superhuman strength? How long had I been unconscious?

“Who are you!? And what have you done with my brother?!” I yelled, starting to get my voice back. 

“Now is not the time for you to know who I am, but I will tell you that your brother is in a safe place,” the man retorted.

“I don’t believe you,” I hissed, “now let me go and take me to my brother!”

“Patience,” said the man, “you will see your brother again. But, not until our testing is completed.”

“What do you mean? What testing?” I questioned.

“Oh, just necessary precautions before we...” he hesitated, “before we decide on what to do with you.”

“Take me to my brother,” I demanded.

“No.” 

“Take.. me... to... my... BROTHER!” The machine next to me beeped faster. In a fit of rage I tugged on the wrist restraints. A tearing noise came from the left one. The man looked at the security camera and nodded at it, signaling something.

“I SAID, TAKE ME TO MY BROTHER!!! NOW!!!” That’s when I felt it. That warm, tingly feeling I felt that night at the church. I inhaled a long, steady breath, and pulled on my restraints. They tore like tissue paper. I quickly pulled off the sensor pads, which sent the machine into a fit of beeping that, I’m sure if I had still been hooked up to it, would have meant something very bad. 

The door burst open with several men, all dressed in black suits, pouring into the room, guns in hand.

“No,” said the bald man that induced this fury, “this won’t last long.” Who was this man to tell me how long I was going to be beside myself. How dare he deny me my brother, and then tell me what to do. I charged straight for him, like a bull seeing red. There he stood, calmly in the corner of the room, not showing an inch of fear. Then, just as quick as the warmth had come, it went away. I fell to my knees, then my face. I tried to stand up but it was useless. I had no ounce of strength left in me. 

Strength. I had freed myself from the white bonds that held me to the table. How? Does rage release adrenaline? I didn’t think so. So how did I escape? With one last push to try and get off the floor, the familiar blurred vision returned. The man that I tried to attack, the man that I absolutely despised, leaned down to whisper one last thing into my ear before I slipped into unconsciousness. “And to think, what would have happened if I had actually told you your brother was dead... Sleep well.” 

Then, darkness.

2. The Church

It was a cold summer night, probably the coldest July night ever recorded since the bombs hit. Had it only been five years ago? It felt like decades had passed. But, something was in there air. Nick could feel it. I always trusted Nick when he said he could sense something was going to happen, because strangely enough, something always did. We didn’t know where we were headed. All we knew is that someone was after us, and we didn’t know why. We had been running from these people for four years now, ever since our mother had mysteriously disappeared. We were on our own.
We walked up the steps to the old community church. Certainly no one would be in there and it would be the perfect place to hide. But Nick’s feeling never went away. Actually, it got stronger as we entered through the east side window. It was dark, with only the light of the moon shining through the stained glass. I had lost track of what time it was, but I could tell by the angle of the moonlight it was around one in the morning.
“I’ll go find us some food. We’ll rest here for the night.” I said.
“I don’t know Derek,” Nick hesitated, “I’m getting a headache and you always know what happens when I get a headache.” I did know. According to Nick’s instincts, headaches meant one thing. That we were in danger. We didn’t know what kind of danger, but it wasn’t safe to stay where we were.
“Alright,” I said, “I’ll go to the kitchen, stock up on some food, and we’ll leave. You stay here and watch out this window. If anyone comes come and get me.”
The kitchen was just like any other normal kitchen. It had a fridge, a stove, even a microwave. There was something special about this kitchen though. It served as the community Soup Kitchen for the homeless so naturally it was stocked full of food in every cupboard. I grabbed a box or two of Poptarts, went to the fridge and found a bag of apples, and snatched some juice boxes while I was there. I put them in my pack and walked back into the foyer. Nick was standing next the the window with his head in his hands. “Derek, it’s getting worse. We have to go, now!” I grabbed his arm and started climbing through the open window. Nick started to pull me back inside. “Nick we have to get out of here!” I yelled. “Not through there,” he said with terror in his eyes. “Anywhere but through that window.” He was right. I turned back to the window and standing on the street corner, right where we would have been, were three dark silhouettes conversing with each other. I saw one their head turn towards the window where we were standing. I ducked quickly. Had he seen me? I slowly peeked up over the window sill. The three figures were gone. “Let’s get out of here.” I said.
Nick’s headache was getting worse. What were we doing wrong? Why weren’t we escaping what was about to happen? Every window I tried to climb through, Nick would tell me it wasn’t safe. Finally we came to the back door. “Can we go through here or did you see the future and bad things happen when we go through it?” I said sarcastically and annoyed. “You know I can’t see the future, I just sense when something is going to happen. It’s like, I know the feeling of the room we’re in. The room with the best feeling was two doors down, let’s go out through there.” Nick said. We turned around and went through the door of the room Nick said had the best feeling. I knew I should believe him, but I didn’t want to believe. There was no possible way stuff like this could happen. There was no such thing as a sixth sense. We opened the window and started to climb through.
Just then, we heard the window in the room next to us shatter. “DEREK!” Nick screamed in fear. The door the room we were in burst open. There stood the three figures that we had seen just a few minutes earlier. “Get the younger one.” one man said in a suave manner. “NICK, RUN!” I screamed. I was already out of the church. I reached back through the window and grabbed his arm. I pulled him towards me, but one of the men had grabbed onto Nick. “Derek! Help me!” Nick yelled. I held onto his arm with all the strength I had. Adrenalin pumping, I pulled harder in our game of tug-of-war to break the grip of the man holding onto my little brother. “Let him go!” I screamed. My heart was beating fast. At that moment I felt something happen. It was like my brain had flipped a switch. I felt, good. My heart was beating faster than ever. I felt my breathing accelerate. My eyes opened wide and I felt like I could do anything at that one moment. With one final attempt, I pulled on my brother and the man.
It felt effortless. I hardly even realized I had just pulled both of them through the open window. I picked up my brother and started running. He felt so light, it was like I could have picked him up with my pinky finger. We ran to the corner where the men who had just attacked us had first spotted me. This was all my fault. If I had listened to my brother and gotten away from that window as soon as he felt danger, I could have prevented all of this. Nick was unconscious. He flopped like a rag doll in my arms. With every flop, he felt heavier. With every step I ran, I felt all my energy draining from my entire body. I dropped to one knee, breathing heavy. Nick fell from my arms. I couldn’t move anymore. How could it be that I felt so powerful not 30 seconds before, and now I was drained of all that energy? I toppled over onto my side. My body was going numb. My finger’s tingled at the tips and I could feel myself starting to go unconscious like my brother. I stared at the moon as my eyes slowly started to close. Then, as I started slipping away, a dark figure covered it from my sights. It leaned over me and said, “Take this one too.” It was the same suave voice that told the other man to attack us.

1. The Beginnings

It was ten years ago when the bombs dropped. We, my brother and I, were just kids when it happened, but I recall all of the mayhem that happened that day like it was yesterday. My mother was screaming for me to get into the bunker and that Nick would be fine where he was. She didn’t know. She never paid attention to Nick, or me. She had never been the same, or treated us the same since our dad had left. “He’ll be fine, get down here now!” she yelled. I didn’t believe her. I had to make sure that he was going to be perfectly okay. That’s what older brothers do, right? I ran out of the front door, across our front lawn, and into the tree house we built with out dad the summer before. I knew he was there. That’s where we would always go when he was scared. I climbed up the ladder one rung at a time, when I reached the top, I heard the planes. I looked to the horizon... they were coming, and fast. I knew I had minutes, seconds maybe. I crawled through the make-shift escape hatch held together by pieces of twine. The door flew open, and there sat Nick huddled in the corner.
“Nick!” I yelled, “We aren’t safe here! We have to get into the bunker!” He didn’t move. “NICK!” I yelled louder. The roar of the planes had almost drown my scream out. They were right above us now. I waited a few more seconds, but knew that it was precious time being wasted. The planes passed over head. I ran to Nick, picked his shaking body up. There was a eerie silence when we reached the bottom of the tree house. I couldn’t see or hear the planes from where I was standing. Nick wiped the tears from his eyes and grabbed my hand. I knew exactly why he had done so. The siren was sounding. The siren was sounding and we were still outside of the bunker. We had ten seconds at most to get back inside the house and into the basement. “Run.” I said, eyes pinned onto our front door.
The flash of light had drawn my attention from our house to the eastern sky. Then without warning, an ear shattering boom! We were knocked onto the ground form the force of the shock waves. Another flash of light, followed by another boom. Each time we would try to get up, another shock wave would just knock us over again. We were getting no closer to safety. Tears flowed from my eyes, pinned to the ground, ears ringing from the bursts of energy. My hand reached for Nick’s. It found it, and it held on tight. This was the only protection an older brother could give. Assurance that we were going to survive this... Assurance that I couldn’t promise was going to come true.