Today, it seems, they were finally ready for me. Kacy bust through the door of my cell, her scars made her smile unnaturally sinister. Her red cape was gone, swapped out for a pristine, white lab coat.

“Good morning, sunshine!” She sang as I sat up with confusion. Was it morning? I couldn’t tell. “We’re finally all set up and ready for you!”

I stumbled to my feet. “What do you mean?”

Kacy smiled wider. “Your first tests!”

“T-tests.” My heart jumped into my throat.

“Avery. It’s okay!” I heard Jonah’s voice faintly. “The first tests are just-”

“You aren’t supposed to be talking to other experiments, 215!” Kacy banged on the wall, shutting him up.

“Is… that a rule?” Worry that I was about to be punished flooded through me.

“Only for him.” Kacy turned back to me. The unnatural purple of her irises glittered with a sadistic pleasure. Kacy grabbed my arm. “Come on, follow me.”

Kacy led me down the rows of cells until she led me into yet another office on wheels. I was instantly confused. Standing before us looked like a small workout center. It had a couple treadmills, ellipticals, various weight machines, and a small corner with a chair and what appeared to be a medicine cabinet and a sink.

Kacy directed me into the chair. She pointed at me. “Sit there.” She commanded and I sank into the chair. She began rummaging in the medicine cabinet and pulled out a stethoscope, a blood pressure monitor, and a clipboard. She reached into her pocket and pulled out an otoscope. She peered into my ears, made a small noise of approval and scribbled something down on her clipboard. She walked around me and checked my eyes, nose, and mouth, taking notes down on the clipboard with each new poke or prod around my face. She pressed the stethoscope to my chest, nodded, and swapped instruments to the blood pressure monitor. She took my blood pressure, wrote one final note down on her clipboard and turned back to me.

“Get on the treadmill.”

I nodded slowly and walked up to the machine. Kacy hit the start button.

“I want you to run a mile as fast as you can.” She instructed.

I felt a little lump of terror in my stomach. I’ve never been the type to see myself as physically fit. Now I had to somehow do well on this in order to prove to some creepy scientist that I was up to her standard? I huffed and steeled my nerves. Fine. Let’s do this. I started jogging. For a while, it wasn’t horrible, I could breathe fine, I was making plenty of progress, but, at about a fifth of the way through the mile, my lungs began to burn. I forced myself to continue running as it became harder and harder to breathe. But I wouldn’t slow down. I couldn’t let myself slow down. Not while she was watching me. My throat started to burn as much as my lungs. I wasn’t going to make it. I couldn’t do it. But I had to. Despite every molecule of my body screaming at me to stop, I somehow couldn’t force myself to slow down. Suddenly the treadmill beeped. The conveyor belt began to slow down until it slid to a stop. It was all I could do to not collapse in a heap.

Off to the side of me, I heard Kacy chuckle. “Interesting.” She scribbled something down onto her clipboard. “Looks like we’ll be doing this checkup every day for a while, then.”

My veins froze. She knew. She knew how difficult that was for me. And she enjoyed it. I’d had the suspicion for a while, but this one moment convinced me. Kacy was a complete sadist.

And I was locked in a room with her, alone.

--

Promptly after the physical, I was returned to my cell. Every joint in my body burned. I was having trouble seeing straight. Pained, I slumped to the floor and clutched my head. Despite the cold metal seeping uncomfortably into my bones, I couldn’t find the energy force myself to climb into my cot.

“How did it go?” Jonah’s voice waded through the fog in my head.

“Bad.” I moaned.

“Really?” Jonah sounded confused. “What did they do?”

“Kacy made me run a mile as fast as I could.”

Jonah fell silent for a few seconds. “Kacy?” He finally asked.

“The… the pale woman, with the scarred cheeks?” I frowned. There was no way he didn’t know who she was, right?

After another few moments of silence Jonah piped up. “Do you mean Soma?”

“Soma?” I hadn’t heard that name before.

“Yeah. It’s what she makes all the experiments call her.” Jonah let out a bitter laugh. “I think it’s her supervillain name.”

I didn’t know how to respond to that. I juggled the idea in my head. Kacy… is a self-proclaimed supervillain? So then…

“Are there superheroes?” My voice sounded ragged.

Jonah let out a snort, almost like a laugh. Apparently I’d caught him off-guard. “Superheroes?”

“Well… you… you said Kacy is a supervillain. Is there a superhero? Is there-?” My voice cut out in the middle of speaking. “Is there someone who can save us?”

Jonah fell silent. For a long while he didn’t speak up. Eventually, his voice came back, but it was much more uncertain than I’d ever heard him. “I’ve… heard… rumors. Of a superhero breaking in. He sometimes frees prisoners, but most of the time… he gets fought off before he can help anyone.”

“R… really?” Hope sparked in my chest. “There… there’s really someone out there?”

“Mm.” Jonah affirmed my question. “The workers around here call him… Lightbringer.”

My eyes narrowed as I juggled the name in my head. “Is that…”

“I don’t know if the workers named him that or if he did it himself.” Jonah interrupted me, already knowing what I was going to ask. “I just know that he’s called Lightbringer and he has some sort of superpowers.”

My eyes widened. “Future Tech isn’t the only company?”

Jonah let out a bitter laugh. “I don’t know.” He said. “I’ve kind of been confined to a cell for years.”

After a few moments of silence, he spoke up again. “For all we know, he could be working alone. Someone who made his powers himself. The Future Tech employees talk about him a lot. They don’t know either.”

“What are his powers?”

“No one knows. Every story I hear about him gives him a new power.” Jonah paused. “Mind control, shapeshifting, seeing into the future…” He trailed off. “That’s just some of what I’ve heard.”

“... Wow.” I leaned back against the cell wall, finally gathering the strength to prop myself up. “Sounds like he ripped you off.”

“W-what?” Jonah sounded utterly confused.

“Shapeshifting.” I smiled, if he could have seen me, I would have winked.

“Shape… oh!” Jonah started laughing. “Oh, no, I can just do the stretchy thing!”

“Yeah! And he saw that and thought ‘gee! I could do that too!’ and he made his shapeshifting powers!” I did my best to hold back laughter. “He copied you!”

“No he didn’t!” Jonah was laughing almost too hard to respond.

“You inspired our rescuer!” I traced my hand in an arc through the air.

Jonah quieted down. He was quiet for almost a full minute. “Yes…” His voice quivered with hope. “Maybe I did.”