Breakfast was a quiet hush. Maybe there were a couple murmurs here and there, but nothing more.

I guess it was better than fighting.

We shoveled awfully small portions of breakfast into our mouths. The only upside to eating tiny was that we didn't have to stomach the taste of this… "food" for that long. Hell, was this even food? Were these "eggs" actual eggs? Because they tasted like piss. Was this place serving toast? Because they tasted like bricks. Was I eating real stawberries? Because they looked like flesh covered in blood.

Just how long would I have to eat this for? My life? Hell no. I couldn't accept that.

Adalynne's words screamed out loud in my head: "Remember that part of this is on you."

That replaced my anger with pure guilt, once again. 

Right, right.

Part of this was was my fault…

The second 10:30 hit, a chime rang all across the room, and we all glanced up. 

Three guards walked into the cafeteria through the door at the front, Kody in the lead.

"Throw out the trays, then follow us," he said, coming to a halt. 

We hesitated for a couple moments, but then Elaine got up, hands trembling slightly, and made her way to the industrial-sized trash can in the corner of the room, tossing her tray in. Melissa, Cassian, and I stood next. Adalynne threw out her garbage in a hurry, and I snuck a glance at another table.

The youngest kid out of all of us was sitting next to an older one, his head plopped down on the table, whimpering and sobbing. Cillian sat next to him, rubbing his shoulder comfortingly.

Just looking at this hurt. PowerGen really took a child — someone so young, with their whole life left to live — and plopped him here? What would happen to his old life? What about his future? 

I knew the government couldn't care less about such a thing… and that was the worst part.

Averting my gaze from the scene, I stopped in front of the guards. When we alll gathered, they escorted everyone out as a cluster, leading us down the hallway to my right. The corridor opened up to a large area, walls spaced out, multiple doors lining either side of the rectangular space. Each of the white doors were labeled from one to ten.

"This is the experimentation site, or ES," spoke one of the guards: a tall woman up front, her name tag reading: Myra. "Head to the door with the same number on your monitor band. The scientists inside the room will instruct you on what to do next."

Scientists. They were going to inspect us, prod and poke at us, make us their lab rats. Just like I always predicted. 

And now it was coming true, right in front of my eyes.

Nobody moved for one second. Two. Three. Four.

Kody sighed and tapped me on the shoulder. "You, go first."

My stomach dropped.

"I-I…"

"C'mon, we don't got all day. Someone's gotta start. So go."

While under both his and Myra's intense gaze, Kody nudged me forward, and with shaking legs, I stumbled over to a door labeled '01.' Twisting the knob, I pushed the door open. I craned my neck, looking over my shoulder to see others doing the same. Looking straight ahead, I stepped into the room, shutting the door behind me.

With tiled white walls, a carpeted blue floor, and lights hanging on rails from the ceiling, the room was a vast expanse, cool air circulating throughout and chilling my skin. Two people in white coats stood by a long table that stretched from the lower left corner of the room to the upper. Multiple objects lined it — syringes, jars, vials, tubes, I could go on. 

The first scientist held a clipboard. The sight of her — the shoulder-length black hair, cold blue eyes, slim build — rattled me to the core. It shouldn't have, but it did. 

She…. She looked like Kennedy. 

The second scientist was a man with short, cropped hair, dark as his eyes, with a burly structure. 

Just like Shiro.

And together, combined, these two created the nightmare fuel of my past. 

I couldn't see scientists anymore, I couldn't see researchers. All I saw were the deranged teenagers trying to set me on fire again. 

Blinking rapidly, I steeled my core and redirected myself to the present. This wasn't Shiro. This wasn't Kennedy. These were two scientists, and that was all. 

…Right?

My heart was still thrumming rapidly and my knees were about to buckle. Damnit. Reassurance wouldn't work.

In her low voice, the first scientist said:

"Talia Mako, recruit 01, is that correct?" 

I nodded once, swallowing. My gaze went back and forth between the woman and the man next to her — who looked even scarier, by the way. My throat was dry, and anxiety reverberated throughout my body. 

"Take a seat." Scientist Two patted the chair between him and his partner. "We need to ask you some questions first."

I made my way to the chair, legs trembling violently.

"Superpower?"

"Hydrokinesis." 

Stay calm. Stay calm. Stay calm. Kennedy — I mean, no, the woman questioning me — wasn't grinning with madness. She held a lighter — wait, no, that wasn't a lighter. She was holding a pen. A pen. She was holding a pen and recording my answers on her clipboard. Not a lighter. Not a lighter, not a lighter, not a lighter… just a pen…

And yet my vision kept flickering from the present to the past. From the room I was currently in to the dark, gasoline-drenched hallways of my old school. From this place to a dangerous one. From the current events to haunted memories.

I could barely even breathe as I answered the next load of questions. 

"When did you get your ability?" she asked.

"Born with it."

My fear was broken briefly by a sense of unease at the answer. Was I sure it didn't just develop somehow? Or I got it a different way? Even though I knew that I had powers for as long as I could remember, so I was probably just born with it, something about that always felt… incorrect. Like my mind was wrong, and so were my memories.

"So you've had it for… twenty-one years? Your whole life?"

"Yes."

"Are there any strange habits or qualities to it? For example, does your power spazz out of control at times?"

"No."

"How often have you used it?"

"Not often."

On and on, the questions were endless, moving from my power to my background history, but what did that have to do with anything? I just wanted to run and burst straight through the door in front of me. I aimed my gaze straight at the ground, fiddling with my clammy, sweat-drenched hands.

Finally — finally, finally, finally — the male scientist stepped forward, raising a hand to signal his partner to stop. 

"Alright, that's enough for the questions. We just have one last thing for you." He walked over to the counter on the side of the room. 

I mustered the courage to look up again, and instantly regretted it. 

He swiftly snatched a syringe from the table and turned back to me.

"Could you roll up your sleeve? PowerGen is looking to extract blood samples from superhumans for a DNA test."

There came the flickering again. I was fighting so hard against reliving the entire memory all over again, but it was hopeless.

Shiro had attacked me with a syringe — one that looked exactly like the one this man was holding right now. Why did the resemblance have to be so uncanny? Why did I have to get trapped in this situation, of all things?

I clenched my jaw as I battled the memories and fear pressing against my mind. I needed to get out of here. My heart was beating too fast, my head was spinning, and I was this close to slipping from reality altogether. I had to get out of here. Had to, had to, had to. 

As he came closer, the last surge of adrenaline made me snap. 

Jumping to my feet, I bolted straight for the entrance.

"Hey!" the female scientist shouted. "Where are you —"

SLAM!

I threw the door open, breathing and panting heavily, almost on the verge of tears, as I raced out of the room.

A hand grabbed me, skin cold and thin, and I screamed.

"Let go of me —"

"The hell are you doing?" 

The voice, just like the hand, belonged to Kody. That was all I knew. 

"Get back in your room!" he shouted. 

"No! Let me go!" I screeched, my voice turning inhuman. Incensed.

Insane.

Another scream resounded throughout the experimentation site, but I paid no heed. Wriggling free from the guard's grasp, I bolted down the hall, my mind reeling. 

Kennedy's and Shiro's screams reverberated throughout the corridor. Were they real or not? They echoed against the walls and rang clear in my ears, but where were they coming from? I couldn't see them anywhere.

"Get back here!" Shiro screeched.

"Little bitch, stop running!" Kennedy shouted.

I suddenly tripped, slamming into the floor that was once white, but now looked blue, like the tiles of my high school's hallways.

"NO!" I screamed, trying to scramble to my shaking feet. "Please, please, don't —"

"The hell is wrong with you?" barked a voice from far away that snapped me right back to reality. 

It was Kody. It wasn't Shiro or Kennedy. It was just Kody. 

I blinked a few times, glancing at the white floor — white, not blue — as flecks of black danced in my vision. Footsteps echoed off the walls, sounding almost like eruptions. 

Trembling violently, I stood up, glancing at Kody, his gaze as dark as his flaring eyes.

Clenching my fists and feeling my fingers, I slid my hand down my left arm. It wasn't bleeding like it had been when my bullies had chased me down the school hallways that fateful night. I was fine. I was fine. I was fine.

Physically, at least.

"You."

I looked up.

Kody loomed over me.

"You're followin' me back. Now. What's up with you?"

Not waiting for a response, he grabbed me by the wrist and started dragging me through the hall. 

"Could… could you…" 

Damnit. How did I ask this question?

"Could ya shut up and stop trying to wriggle away?" he snapped.

"Could you get different scientists for me?" I blurted out. 

"Why?" He glared over his shoulder.

In spite of the situation, I wanted to roll my eyes. Why? Why? Oh, I don't know, it was just that seeing them made me relive a severe traumatic memory, that was all. No big deal, clearly. 

But before I could reply, screams and shouts erupted from the ES. 

"What the hell?!" a man shouted.

A woman screamed. "Did this kid just melt a goddamn —"

"I'm sorry! I'm sorry!" cried a little boy in the midst of it all. "I don't know what happened! I — the scientist was being all scary and my power… I can't control it —"

"You monster! How the hell could you do something like this?"

"I'M SORRY!"

Kody dashed to the scene, dragging me along. I almost tripped as we raced straight to the experiment site, heart thrumming rapidly in my chest. 

Goodness gracious, what the fuck was going on now?

Myra, the other guards, and a few scientists circled around the scene, wide-eyed and trembling.

The little boy who cried in the cafeteria was on his knees here, crying with full hysteria. He was on his knees, shaking with sobs, irises small and yet fresh with pure terror. 

My blood froze when I looked down at the mess displayed in front of him. 

A peach-colored blob pooled out on the floor, tiny faint blue lines — veins — appearing along the surface. In the mess, a distorted brown eye that could still be made out. Covering the glob was a white lab coat that was slowly getting soaked.

A word from earlier came back to mind— melted. The one word that pulled everything in place. The one that made ice run down my spine, freezing my bones in place.

This little boy just melted a whole person, flesh and bone and all. 

And it was completely out of his control.