Firewall (Book 1: The Fall)

The outline of a figure is traced in red and blinks against my visor. Just a few meters away from me a small girl with minty green hair is standing in the middle of the road with her back to me.

She turns to face me, and her pink eyes widen in alarm. We gasp at the same time. I jerk my handles to the right, and the bike swerves at a ninety-degree angle. The turn throws me off balance, along with the bike. It skids on its side, and I feel my leg scraping against the pavement. My skin stings hotly against the surface. When I finally come to a stop, I push the heavy bike off me and shakily get on my feet.

I rip off my helmet, “What’s the matter with you? I could have kil-!”

The small girl is nowhere to be found. A large crowd of people are standing in front of me, right in the middle of the road. I look around to see that I am not the only one to stop for this crowd. Cars on both sides of the road come to a stop, and people are getting out of their cars. What is going on? I look again at the crowd and realize the people are looking up, their faces contorted by confusion. I follow their gaze and pointed fingers and feel my heart rise to my throat.

Above our heads, hundreds of telescreens float ominously together in a mass. Black and white lines squirm across the screens like snakes gone mad. The screens bump into one another as they slowly assemble into rows. I steal a glance around me to see the entire street crowded with people looking at this strange phenomenon.

It’s so packed that I can’t move without bumping arms against the person beside me. When I look back at the telescreens, I see that they have formed a single large rectangle. Maybe there is some big announcement...A hush falls over the crowd. The screens burst with color again.

Two individuals sit in a dimly lit room. Green wallpaper dangles off the walls behind them, revealing a rotting wooden interior. There is a smiley face mask on the one to the left, as well as a purple hoodie pulled over their head. On the right, the taller one wears a pink hoodie with a blue frowning face peeking out from underneath the hood.

Happy face raises a black-gloved hand and waves at the camera, “Greetings!”

I infer Happy to be a boy by his voice, and a young adult by his pitch.

“We are Phantom. We have an announcement that you might find shocking,” says a lower, slightly more mature-sounding boy. I label it to be coming from Sad face.

Happy tilts his head, “You have been lied to.”

“There are chips in your head,” Sad face says.

Of course there are,I reflect to myself. Everyone gets a Micro Identification Chip implanted in their heads when they are born. Scientists created them to replace inconvenient things like social security numbers, credit cards, and other means of identification. There is no need to worry about getting a credit card stolen or having to carry one around. There is no need to carry around a drivers license or any kind of permit. Everything about you is stored in the chip. They store important and useful data to the convenience of its users.

“I know what you’re thinking,” Sad face continues, “You have been told they are harmless...but they have functions that you didn’t even know existed.”

Happy face claps his hands, “Like, they can make you go bonkers.”

“It happened before...but you were never told...”

The screen switches scenes to a dark-haired man in a hospital gown. He stands barefoot in the center of a white room. A metal door in the corner of the room opens and a bald man with a long laboratory coat strides across the room. He passes the man without glancing in his direction as he approaches the camera. His icy blue eyes are wide and restless as they dart around the crowd. I feel myself shrink underneath his gaze.

He whispers quickly, “Trial 89. We will be testing the subject’s obedience to the chip. I will give him two commands!”

He walks away from the camera, and I suddenly realize that there is a small handgun in his right hand. He stands beside the man and extends his arm holding the gun.

“Take the gun,” he orders, as if commanding a dog to sit.

The man in the gown lifts a pale, ghostly arm. His bony fingers curl around the handle.

My eyes widen as the camera zooms out, showing another man in a gown chained to a wall.

“Shoot him.”

My heart pounds against my chest.

Impossible. This is impossible. He won’t do it-

He pulls the trigger. Screams from the crowd overpower the gunshot. I watch, frozen in place, as the screen twitches to a woman and a man in the same white room. The woman looks to be young, her long golden hair reaches her back. She holds a revolver in her hand, aiming it at the man in front of her. His deep green eyes stare at her, determined.

“You can overpower it,” He says calmly, despite his situation, “You are stronger. That chip is not as powerful as your mind. ”

Her arm shakes.

“I can’t.” She whispers.

Her eyes sink to the ground, and her thumb pulls back on the hammer.

He points to his face, speaking to her gently, “Eyes on me, eyes on me, honey. Look at me. Look at me!”

She lifts her head to meet his gaze, her shoulders rising and falling with each breath.

“I’m trying...” She sobs.

He smiles, “You’re doing great bab-”

His body snaps backward. A drop of blood drips down his forehead. The woman holds her face and bends over, her blue eyes wide with horror.

A series of blood-curdling screams cut into my soul. The knot in my stomach tightens. She dives to the ground and throws herself on top of him. Like a mother with a child, she cradles his head against her chest and rocks him back and forth on the ground, sobbing loudly.

The screen twitches to the boys in the masks. They stare at the camera, neither saying a word. I’m paralyzed underneath their silence.

After what feels like an eternity, the one with a happy face speaks up angrily.

“5,000 innocent men and women were killed by the mind-control chip experiment!”

Sad face continues.

“It was conducted by a group of scientists acting under Haven’s orders. When news of their experiment got leaked, people were outraged and demanded to know the truth. Your government tried to cover up their steps by disposing of all the files and copies of the experiment results. They claimed to have no knowledge of the experiment that the scientists were doing, and had them all imprisoned, saying it would not happen again.”

Happy sighs, “But you know what your silly Haven officials failed to think of? They forgot an itsy bitsy little thing...The same chips are in your heads!”

He laughs psychotically, lifting a bag of chips to the camera.

“But you know what?” He rips it open and thrusts his hand inside, “We love chips!”

“And why is it that we love chips, Happy?” Mr. Sad face asks his friend.

Happy face holds a chip up, “They are so delicate. So thin and crisp...easy to crush to pieces.”

He shoves one under his mask. The crunch from the speakers causes many in the crowd to shudder.

Happy waves his hand around in a philosophical manner, “You go about living, shopping, complaining about your hair. All of you are blindly living like idiots while your government does their freak experiments. You think you are in control...Those who rule over you think they are in control... ”

“Well now...,” utters Sad Face.

The camera zooms in on Happy’s mask. His grin appears to grow wider and wider with each second before he speaks in an odd, slow voice.

“We are in control.”

The mass of telescreens twitches to black. Four red words across them burn into my mind.

“We are in control.”

Screams ring in my ears. People are pushing and shoving, but I stand glued in my spot, watching the phenomenon in slow motion. Bodies, one after another are dropping around me like flies. I can not even count how many-they fall together in masses, landing on top of one another in piles.

A man with black and yellow hair beside me tumbles to the ground. His misty blue eyes look up at me, his mouth open in a silent scream.No...no.A heavy wave of silence pushes against my chest, and I find myself shaking. I slowly rip my eyes from his cold body to search for anyone left standing beside myself. My stomach churns as I look past the bodies lying at my feet, staring at me quietly.

I turn around and spot just five feet away the small girl with minty green hair. We make eye contact. Her fluorescent pink eyes blink at me, then sink to the bodies below her. She covers her face and whimpers softly.

I find myself calling to her.

“Hey...!”

She looks up at me from her hands, terror weighing down her face. I search myself to find the right words, anything to give her some kind of assurance. I wanted to tell her that it’s going to be okay, that we were going to make it out alive. Even if we had the smallest chance of survival, we could make it together.

I open my mouth to speak but no words come out. I stand there, mouth parted and silent. A small cry escapes from her throat before she drops. I stand there in shock, staring at her stiff body, the look of horror on her face, the paleness of her skin.

I shut my eyes.

Too much.

I am the last one.

My heart races in my chest. I open my eyes. I take a deep breath to prepare myself for death, but before I can fill my lungs with air, everything goes black.

~~~

Black, white, and red.

Time is a blur. Everything around me moves so slowly, yet I am moving so fast. My brain can’t keep up with my movements. I am here, I am there.

I am everywhere.

What is this weight I feel on my shoulders? It is slowing dragging me down. My legs are heavy. I try to pick myself up. I fall down. I breathe, and the air is sucked from my lungs. I cannot seem to escape this thick cloud around my head. I take a breath. No air. Push it away, run away. I can’t.

Black, white, and red.

My hands...my hands, I cannot lift them to my face. I shake, I sweat. I scream. I yell. Can anyone even hear me?

No, they can’t.

Black, white, and red.

Where am I?

Where I need to be.

My entire body is numb, all except a hand. Right or left, I do not know. I cannot tell. A heavy object weighs it down.

Black, white, and red.

Its surface is icy cold. Cold. Cold. Too cold. I do not like it. Throw it, break it. Get rid of it. Destroy it.

Foolish!My hand grips it tighter. My finger curls around a smooth ring.Pull it. Pull it. Pull it. Again.

Black, white, and red.

Kill. Kill again. And again.

Loud noises ring in my ears. Faceless bodies drop to the floor.

Black, white, and red.

What do they look like?

It does not matter. Keep moving.

I look back. Tears, twitching arms.

My neck twists back around.

Never stop again.

Heavy object swings in my hand.

Pull, pull, pull again. Pull again. Pull again.

Black, white, and red. Black, white, and red. Black, white, and red. Black, white, and red. Black, white, and red. Black, white, and red-

~~~

My body hits the ground.

Tap, tap, tap.

Drops of rain lightly hit a surface. The throbbing hits my head in a wave, beating against my forehead. I peel my eyes open. Neon lights blur my vision. I shut my eyes briefly, then open them again. Slowly, my vision adjusts. A dark figure hovers over me. Their shoulders rise and fall.

Are they out of breath?

I cannot make out a face. Small pins prick against my skin and my nerves respond by burning savagely. I cry out in pain and am lifted off the ground.

My body becomes numb. A car engine roars loudly. My vision worsens. Blinding light pierces my eyes, disorienting me.

Voices echo in my head.

“Oh, crap!”

“What happened?”

“Are you alright?”

“Are you crazy? How could you bring her here?”

“Who is she?”

“Is she dead?”

The pain in my head worsens. I cry out again. Every nerve burns. My muscles keep twisting around my bones.

“Place her on the table, hurry. Someone get me my tools.”

The tinkering of metal follows.

“Max, sleeping gas.” Something covers my face.

“All of you, get out of the room.”

My head becomes lighter, and the pain lessens. The voices slowly fade away. My forearm is pinched by something sharp.

I lose consciousness.

~~~

Welcome to Firewall. It’s going to be a fun ride, my friends. Please leave your thoughts in the comments about the story and give it a vote if you liked it! Thank you for reading my story. Until next time!*

~RiverGardenGirl