Free Web NovelChapter 152: A Highlight Move (1)
In a scene like colorful paint blooming in a plain puddle, color splashed into the lifeless and dull world around.
Kestrel glanced about, seeing things that once seemed frozen now bursting with bright shades. The whole science center sprung to life, with everything beginning to stir right from where she stood. frёeωebɳovel.com
"Excuse us, coming through!" shouted some scientists in white lab coats, rushing a shiny hospital bed past her.
Kestrel moved out of the way, spotting a man on the bed. He was strapped down, looking super confused. His eyes stared blankly, his mouth was wide open, and tears and drool slid freely down his cheeks.
His skin showed funky yellow and black stripes. His stomach and legs looked all weird and melty, and soft hair sprouted on his face. He looked nothing like a regular person anymore.
Suddenly, a chilling scream sounded from behind her. Whirling around, Kestrel caught sight of another bed drenched in red. On it, a creature that was kind of human-looking thrashed wildly about. It had creepy blood-red eyes popping out everywhere, and its skin was lumpy with huge reddish bumps.
The chains holding it broke, and the monster with tons of eyes pounced, gobbling up a scientist wearing a white lab coat.
Terrified shouts filled the air as everyone ran in different directions. From above, three big-time pulse guns dropped down. They blasted in a triangle, sending out super bright white lights. The intense energy spread everywhere.
After a few seconds, everything went quiet. The eye-covered monster and the unlucky scientist were just burnt leftovers on the steel bed.
There, in shock, Kestrel tried to make sense of it all. She pieced together that she was in a place that used to be part of the underground city. Everything she saw now had actually happened in this research building.
The sounds of people chatting and walking got louder. Many rushed by, not even looking, as if seeing half-human monsters was no big deal.
"Yet another alpha’s mutated. Those alphas out in the fight zones can’t keep it together," they muttered.
"We need more betas out there."
"Betas are kinda rare though. We’re stumped. Maybe we should give Unit-01 more time?"
"We should pick a few more sacrifice."
Kestrel felt herself gently lifting up, as if someone was holding her hand and guiding her skyward. It felt like she was a drone, soaring over a vast landscape, getting a bird’s-eye view of everything below. She could see every little detail: scientists rushing around, people chained to beds, machines humming and buzzing, and menacing weapons, poised and ready. Right in the middle of it all was a gigantic chasm, sealed tight with an electric barrier.
Below that barrier, creepy dark-red tendrils wriggled around, while a super shiny white altar stood tall with a lot of stairs leading up to it.
People called the secret area in the research place the "temple." Even in this super modern research hub, there was a basement they named the temple, where smart scientists had some weird practices, like offering stuff to a spooky god or something.
Kestrel’s view kept going higher, showing her the whole massive underground city.
It was like a gigantic hidden city built by people. It looked like it used to be full of life. Kestrel could see soldiers rushing around with news, a lady looking like she was about to have a baby, kids in a classroom learning about mutants, and an old soldier with some missing parts, just standing still among lots of tombstones...
Finally, Kestrel felt like she landed in a small, dimly lit room. Outside, there was a super long hallway with lots of tiny rooms like the one she was in. All the rooms had thick metal doors and bars. It was hard to tell if this was a jail or a place where soldiers stayed.
In front of Kestrel, sitting on a not-so-comfy bed, was a girl with a blindfold.
"Hey, it’s you again," the girl said, tilting her head toward Kestrel.
"I’m Arya. What you’re seeing right now is my last memory of this place," she explained.
"Arya?"
Even though Arya’s eyes were open, they looked kind of empty, like she couldn’t see anything.
That was when it clicked for Kestrel. Arya was inside Taja’s body, guiding her and sharing these memories. Everything happening right now was a flashback from Arya’s life.
Suddenly, the sound of footsteps bounced off the walls. Two guys in those familiar researcher outfits walked up to Arya’s room. One of them played around with a touch screen on the wall, flipping through some pictures until he stopped at Arya’s photo.
"She can’t see and she’s not strong, so she’s no good for fighting. But, her psychic powers? They’re off the charts," he told his buddy.
The other dude brought up some info about Arya on a screen, took a quick look, and then nodded in agreement. He brought up a bunch of choices, and his finger hovered over the one that said ’sacrifice’. He then tapped the checkmark next to it.
The sound of footsteps got quieter, and the lights went kind of dark.
Next to Kestrel, Arya, still holding her hand, whispered softly, "Back then, I had no clue about what was gonna happen to me. I didn’t know I was gonna be the one they’d use as a sacrifice."
Inside that room, the younger Arya didn’t know that they were planning to offer her up. Feeling the bed’s sheets with her hands, she laid down, peacefully shutting her eyes.
Arya was born blind, so she never saw stuff like sunsets or what light looked like. Her family was super poor, so they were desperate for some cash. That’s why they gave her to this crazy research place that did experiments on people.
They gave her some kind of shot. Luckily, she didn’t die. Instead, she became what they called a beta. Even though she still couldn’t see, Arya got these special "eyes" that let her see the psychic world.
Living in that locked-up place could’ve been super boring, but not for Arya. When they weren’t testing stuff on her, she’d "see" all these amazing things in the psychic world. She saw feelings like pain, happiness, and even stuff like true love or wild desires.
Her favorite thing was to close her eyes and check out that world until she started dreaming. Her dreams were just as awesome and colorful. That is, until the day they put her in a metal box and dropped it way down into the ground.
She ended up in a fancy place with a big staircase and a bright red carpet.
There, the blind Arya was put on a stage made of some shiny green stone. She was the main event, the offering to some creepy monster.
"You’ve seen this place before, haven’t you?" Arya asked Kestrel.
The two of them, hand in hand, seemed to float in empty space, both staring at the younger Arya up on that stage.
This was a flashback of Arya’s from like hundreds of years ago.
Kestrel felt like she had seen that stage in her dreams. So many people had been offered up there. Those scientist guys used people’s psychic energy to feed this weird rock that looked like a bug, helping it to hatch.
"This is where they made Unit-01. Once they saw how cool it was, they made loads of those bug rocks. They started making a bunch of alphas and betas with all sorts of superpowers."
"Back in the day, people thought they’d found the ultimate weapon to fight against the creepy mutants up top," Arya said with a sigh to Kestrel. "They didn’t get that they were actually setting themselves up for disaster."
On that stage, Arya heard the sound of dripping water, and something wet and squirmy started coming up the steps. She couldn’t see it, but she could sense this big energy getting closer.
"Who are you?" She tried reaching out with her mind, gently feeling the thoughts of this comer.
"Me?" The creature seemed a bit surprised and then replied, "I’m kinda new to all this. But they named me Unit-01."
Maybe it was because Arya wasn’t scared or that she tried talking, but the tendril things didn’t attack her like they normally did.
Instead, they wrapped around her, taking her further into the fancy place.
"Unit-01 was really innocent back then; she was just being herself," Arya told Kestrel.
"To be honest, hanging out with Unit-01 was cool. We’d just chill and I’d share stories with her about people, my dreams, all sorts. She always listened like it was the best story ever."
"She was super sweet to me, finding me all sorts of weird snacks, kinda like how you treat your alpha friend."
"Wait, what?" Kestrel looked confused. "Treat which alpha? Are you talking about Ren? When did I ever find weird food for him? I don’t remember doing that."
"Right, it’s slipped your mind," Arya said. "You and Unit-01 have some things in common since you’re sorta related."
It took the researchers a while to figure out that Arya, who was supposed to be a goner, was actually alive and well in that temple. Instead of being lunch for the monster, she was chilling with Unit-01, being looked after and totally cool with all the tendril stuff. She was still in one piece, and nothing bad had happened to her.
When the researchers heard about it, they freaked out, in a good way.
They thought they’d hit the jackpot and found something new to look into. So, they went full-on action movie, did some big damage to Unit-01, which cost a lot, and got Arya out of there.
After that, things got tough for Arya. They saw her as this super special test thing and ran all sorts of painful tests on her. She was tied up on an experiment table, getting hurt by people like her, all because some bigwigs wanted more power.
