The sirens woke me up, but the screaming and pounding on my door were what actually alerted me that something was going on. The covers flew across the room in my fervor to get to the door, a high heel was in my path and with a loud crash, I tumbled to the ground. The pounding on the door had only gotten louder, and the alarm was starting to spew out words instead of high pitched shrieks. Once I managed to stand up, the taste of copper swell in my mouth. The door suddenly swung open, flashing red light streaming into the room and casting horrifyingly grim silhouettes of Hunter, Cierra, and Jackson. Jackson spewing out a slew of curse words, Cierra was holding Hunter tight, Hunter standing emotionless in the doorway. The disorientation of sleep had finally faded, and the words coming out over the speakers made the tone of the room even more worrisome.

THE COUNTRY HAS ENTERED THE STATE OF WAR BETWEEN THE ELECTI COUNSEL. ALL MILITARY PERSONAL ARE TO FOLLOW ORDERS A6 GREYS 00. NO ADMITTANCE BEYOND THE WALL UNLESS INSTRUCTED BY CLAUDIUS GREYS. FAILURE TO COMPLY TO ALL ORDERS WILL BE VIEWED AS TREASON AND RESULT IN EXECUTION. ALL DOUBLES AND SPECIAL AGENTS MUST ASSEMBLE IN THE TRAINING ROOM FOR NEW PROTOCOLS. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. WE ARE ON THE HIGHEST LEVEL LOCKDOWN. THE COUNTRY HAS ENTERED THE STATE OF WAR BETWEEN THE ELECTI COUNSEL. ALL MILITARY PERSONAL ARE TO FOLLOW ORDERS A6 GREYS 00. NO ADMITTANCE BEYOND THE WALL UNLESS INSTRUCTED BY CLAUDIUS GREYS. FAILURE TO COMPLY TO ALL ORDERS WILL BE VIEWED AS TREASON AND RESULT IN EXECUTION. ALL DOUBLES AND SPECIAL AGENTS MUST ASSEMBLE IN THE TRAINING ROOM FOR NEW PROTOCOLS. THIS IS NOT A DRILL. WE ARE ON THE HIGHEST LEVEL LOCKDOWN. HE COUNTRY HAS ENTERED THE STATE OF WAR BETWEEN THE ELECTI COUNSEL. ALL MILITARY PERSONAL ARE TO FOLLOW ORDERS A6 GREYS 00. NO ADMIT-

There was no more air left in the room, something had sucked it all up and taken it so far away that it would be foolish to even attempt to find it. The reds and blacks intertwined in the room, and all the shapes were twisting and contorting, all sound had become muffled. We couldn't do new protocols, we couldn't do new protocols, we couldn't do new protocols, we couldn't do new protocols. A hand was suddenly rubbing my back gently. I looked up and the room's lights had been turned on. Cierra was gone, but the door was still wide open, Hunter was taking my pulse on my left wrist, while Jackson was rubbing my back. How did I get on the floor? I ripped my wrist away from his grasp and curled even tighter into myself, closing my eyes helped lessen the shaking. The alarm was still blaring, and Hunter was clearly scolding Jackson about something, but I didn't care enough to try and listen. I didn't want to do protocol again.

It took a while, but I managed to calm down enough to stand up, Jackson and Hunter standing on either side of me to make sure that I didn't try and run away. Sala, Cierra, Mark, and Hugh were waiting for us outside of the training room. Ingrid was inside yelling at General Smith, Greys was on the projector board, studying the conversation intently. I put my hand against the door, looking to Hugh, he gave me a sad smile. I didn't want to do protocol again. I slammed my hand against the glass, letting the shards fall to the ground. Ingrid and General Smith whipped their heads towards us, our group filing into the room.

"Ingrid! You just let them break your doors?" Greys was furious, but no one paid him any attention. General Smith marched over to me, ready to slap me for being reckless when Ingrid pulled him back. The looks they exchanged told a better conversation than some of the greatest writers in history could have done. Smith straightened out his sleeves, looked at me curtly, and walked out, the glass crunched underfoot as he went. Ingrid glared at me, I felt small again. Ingrid was the most sympathetic out of all of the trainers, but once you get on her bad side there was no going back into the good.

"My seven have returned, how lovely. Now, new protocol time. Everyone should know the drill, don't make me repeat it." We all started taking out clothes off, shirts and pants in piles on the floor in front of us. It really must have been a group night, Sala was wearing a little something special that matched with Mark and Cierra's undergarments. Hunter stood frozen with his pants still on. "Take them off, you know the drill, Blue," His eyes went wide with fear, silently pleading with Ingrid. Her hand started to reach into her back pocket when Hunter spoke up.

"I don't have any underwear on underneath," It was barely audible, but Ingrid understood. She rolled her eyes and started walking to the back of the room. Hunter had turned bright red, staring at the floor like it could save him from what was about to happen. Hugh grabbed his hand and squeezed it. A small tear ran down Hunter's cheek faster than he could wipe off. Ingrid came back it a pair of underwear, we all looked away as Hunter put them on. He cleared his throat, and Ingrid reached back for her back pocket. She pulled out a small metal rectangle and opened it up, inside was two different blades. One of the blades had jagged edges, the other was sharp and smooth. Ingrid's eyes flickered over to me, scanning over my body and seeing how she was to approach. We all turned around and faced the broken door.

"What is your sworn duty now?" Ingrid was whispering, she felt guilty for having to put us through the protocol. "Indigo, answer!"

"Protect Monarch Greys, even if it means the death of ourselves or fellow workers!" Everyone was holding their breath, waiting to see if he was right. When Mark let out a scream, we knew that he was wrong.

"Green?" Ingrid was yelling now, in the moment she was just a tool to getting us to the ability needed by our country.

"To keep the Electi from overrunning our country!" Cierra let out a shriek.

"Orange?" Ingrid was next to me, I could feel her moving to get in position. I made the mistake of glancing back. The jagged blade was covered in blood, the tips of Ingrid's fingers were a similar hue. She was stone-faced, unmoving, not hesitant. She saw me looking. "Punishment to Red for breaking protocol." Ingrid grabbed my arm and yanked me down, a knife in each hand, both were jagged now. I started kicking and screaming; I flailed and grabbed for anything I could, hair, clothes, appendages, anything. Ingrid had the upper hand, she grabbed both of my wrists and slammed her head against mine. She dragged me over to the back, near the storage room. During this kind of punishment, no one else was to see. I had stopped fighting, there was no point. My wrists were chained to the ceiling, and my feet couldn't touch the ground. Ingrid started spinning me around faster and faster until I couldn't tell what I was looking at. I heard a faint "Please forgive me", but everything turned an awful shade of black went she pressed the knife's edge into my skin. A red spiral formed around my torso, dripping blood down my legs and falling onto the floor. She stopped me from spinning, and held the knife up to my back, ready to reopen the healed over 'X' slash. I could hear her breathing heavily. "Posy, what are you supposed to do now in wartime?"

"Follow out my orders for the good of the country as a whole, no matter what the cost, no matter who I have to kill, even if I have to kill Greys,"

"Shit, you got it right, but you know that I still have to do it," I could hear Ingrid's voice start to crack. We were friends, I just had the misfortune of being an agent who disobeyed protocol. I only hummed to respond, I didn't even make a noise when she slashed the blade into my back. I closed my eyes, and let her unchain me. The ground felt nice and cold against my skin. Everything was sticky and sweaty. "Come on, you gotta get up, you gotta get back in line," I let Ingrid lead me out of the room, small droplets of blood leaving a trail behind us. The group was facing us, breaking protocol, but I doubt that Ingrid was follow through with it this time. I looked up long enough to see a tear or two roll down Hunter's cheek. As I stumbled back into my spot, the rest turned around. "Orange?"

"Follow all orders to completion!" Jackson's voice was raw and hurt. I shouldn't have looked.

The questions kept on going, every wrong answer was a new slash on the back, just right on top of the old one. Mark also had to be taken into the backroom, Sala had reached her arm out to steady herself after Ingrid had pulled the knife out, and Mark had caught her. Sala was sobbing as Ingrid dragged Mark into the room, the rest of us were too scared to speak. Mark had a deep gash on the right side of his face, streaming steadily down his body as he walked back out. Mark held his head up high and smiled, he was much better at this than I was.

"That was the last question, let me gather my things and then I can escort all of you to the medical ward. Feel free to talk amongst yourselves. Training started tonight. Cierra and Sala rushed over to Mark, all three of them were shaking and sobbing, Mark was still smiling; he had a sad, broken smile. Hugh was holding himself tight against Hunter, both swaying silently in the darkroom. I let myself fall backward, the black spots had been swarming my vision for hours, but I knew that if I fell down either I or the team as a whole would be punished.

"Red, Red, Red, comeondon'tpassoutonmenow, Red!" Jackson was pleading and crying, voice cracking and shaking on every other word, desperate. Something warm was touching me, wrapping me up and holding me close. Everything became bright as cold air rushed past my head, the sounds of feet pounding against the floor beat in tune with my heart. The sounds seemed to be growing slower and slower, fainter and fainter. A small gasp came out of me when I felt myself be set down on a soft surface, I think it was a medical bed.

"Posy, please!" That was the last thing I heard before everything went black.

I woke up and saw the blurry image of a snowflake tattoo in front of my face. The nurse was changing a bandage that was coiled around my head. Jackson was sitting in a chair on the other side of the bed, his face was scrunched up in worry even as he slept.

"I can wake him up in a second, but I wanted to talk to you first," I blinked, someone must have been addressing me. "Darling, can you hear me?" I slowly looked at the nurse, she stood up tall and had a sweet smile on her face. "Ah, you can. Well, I know that you are an agent and this kind of procedure is common protocol, but I saw some marks on you that might not have been protocol, do you need me to get someone about it? I looked down to my stomach. I could feel the wrapping all over my torso, but I didn't think that the nurse was talking about the spiral around me. I shook my head no, and the nurse smiled a little less now. "Did the protocol make you want to do that to yourself? Does your boyfriend know?" My eyes widened.

"Brother!" My own voice was creaky and scratchy, but it was loud enough to make Jackson jolt awake. He stood up and held onto the railing.

"Oh, my! I'm so sorry, I just assumed," the nurse was bright red, not even daring to look at me in the eyes as she babbled on. Jackson cleared his throat.

"Is she ok? Will Posy be able to take a break from training tonight?" I looked at Jackson, he never calls me Posy. How close was I to dying? How rattled was he?

"She's actually fine, none of the wounds, except the back maybe but if its the back you know that there is nothing we can do, are deep enough to cause major damage. She should be fine to train tonight as long as she eats enough food. We did some testing and she was extremely dehydrated," Jackson nodded and the nurse almost ran out of the room. Jackson's face was pale, too pale; his eyes were red and puffy, and he was shaking ever so slightly. I reached out and put my hand on top of his. His breath hitched. The tears were coming out of both of our eyes rapidly, holding each other close as the sobs filled the room.

"I'm sorry, I shouldn't have looked," Jackson tried to shush me, but all that came out of his mouth was garbled nonsense. The door creaked slightly and Jackson whipped around, his stunner gun presented without the slightest quiver.

"Whoa, you both look like shit," Hunter was carrying some food in bags, the others in tow. Jackson let the stunner back down and shoved it into his holster. Sala threw one of my pillows at me and smiled. I laughed and wiped some of the remaining tears off of my face. We all stayed in the room for an hour while the medical ward was processing my incident reports, food and stories being shared. We were all ok.