16. No One Will Ever Know.

The room is filled with guard-like men holding metal contraptions, all staring at me.

Should I turn around and run back to the village, or would they capture me before I could even open the door? Should I pretend to be lost? Should I fake faint and hope they drag me back to the orphanage? Should I act like I am one of them, just not wearing the same clothes? 

All these thoughts rush through my mind in an instant....

"Hey, kid. Weren't you that girl that came here and fainted? Didn't they warn you not to come back?"

All options become void in that second, and I take my only remaining one. I turn and jab my foot at the door. It doesn't budge. I look for a handle, no handle. I whirl back around to see a few men stepping closer to me and one of them whisper something like, "Yup, she's the one."

I dart my eyes all around the room looking for an escape. To my right, a long hallway stretches and a guard is running away, nearly to the door at the end. Jake's killer. I dash down the hall, though not wanting to go near this guard, the door seems to be the only way out. In an instant, a dozen guards stop sneaking and start running after me. Shouting and holding their contraptions the same way Jake's killer had. I burst through the door with renewed drive, yet, oddly, the guard is nowhere in sight.

I continue on, but then a shiver runs down my spine and through my legs and I nearly stop and slump to the ground right here and now. This is the hallway for the outcast! I am in the Zermedine's outcast hallway, looking through the glass to the other two "assignment" hallways! I crash into the door at the end, and stumble to the ground. I roll and jump back to my feet- too late. Four hand clamp down on my arms, and I recognize the red carpets and table and chairs. Even the marked X where I was standing.

"Commander Buxton, Sir, the intruder has returned and is ready for trial in room x3466" One of the guards calmly reports into a box clipped to the collar of his shirt.

I tug against my captors' grip, but know that won't work. I lift one leg and jab the rubber heel of my shoe into one of the guards shin, then kick the other in the shin also. I let my legs fall out from under me and crash to the floor on my chest. My breath is knocked out of me, but my captors release  their grip. I gasp for breath, jump up and dash toward an opposite door. The door swings open in front of me and I stumble into another man in a black uniform. I fall to a sitting position and look up.

"Mr. Buxton!" I scream.

"Hmmm..." he mumbles  and two guards rush past him and grab me. They yank me to my feet and drag me back to the X. Mr. Buxton whispers to the guards by the hallway door.

I kick the two guards holding me, but they are wearing padding and, I can tell, none of my movements help. Mr. Buxton marches over to me and stands too close for comfort. I attempt to pull away, but my captors are like stone.

"My guards tell me that you were here before, young lady."

"Yes, but... Mr. Buxton! It's me! Kayla! Kayla Dalery! Don't you remember? You said that I would make it to the ZAG! You said I had a great future!"

"Hmmm..." He mumbles again.

The hallway door opens and... it's the evil, smiling man who seemed so eager to have me be outcast on my assignment day.

He chuckles in a eery way and says, "Ah, Kayla. Welcome back, agian."

He gives no time for me to speak, but wrinkles his face into something like a hateful smile, "I understand that you were found here before, by commander Buxton, only you were unconscious." He pauses to chuckle again. "We had thought, at first, that you had simply not received the information transfer and you were suffering from a completely empty memory. So, last night, we tried again. But, it has just occurred to me that, perhaps the problem was actually the the original brain wash, failed-"

Brain wash? I gasp.



A strong hand slaps across my face and I snap awake again.

"No passing out while the moment is rich, missy!" The evil man shouts "As I was saying, we will simply have to keep brain washing you until you either forget your past life in the Zermedine, and can return to it with out wondering what else is out there, or... until you die."

Another man enters the room, and I recognize him, also from the day I was outcast.

"Ugh, the moment must end. Take her away, but make sure it WORKS!"

They march me down a long hallway following the man in a long white coat. A door is open and I am shoved in. In the center a giant glass cylinder reaches from floor to the tall ceiling and in it, swirl green beams which eerily light the room.

I strain on my human bonds, but I might as well be trying to punch don't the wall around the fortress with my bare hands. It's useless. I am shoved into the cylinder and before I can jump up to my feet, the door is closed and locked.  I scream and kick the glass, but the green lights continue to swirl around me, taunting me.

Then, as I am smashing my shoulder into the glass, a wind starts to circle around me. My hair blows over my shoulder and away from my face. Lights concentrate at my feet and I begin to lose my balance. My feet lift off the floor and I frantically reach for something to grab. I float in the center of the glass cage, I reach to grab onto anything, but my arms are useless against this glass cage and the powerful green beams around me.

I am going to be brainwashed and no one, not even myself, would ever know about what had happened. None of my questions would be answered. No one would find these horrid people or this horrid place. No one will ever know...

I turn my head and try savor the last moments I will have controlling my own brain, my own movements, my own thoughts. I notice a line of vents all along the ceiling and - Wait! Is that a... A FACE?

My feet go numb, but not just like a cramp, they become paralyzed, useless. Then my legs, hands, and arms go, floating uselessly. I can feel myself  begin to lose control of my brain. My eyelids close on their own... then... my brain is taken from me.

-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-<->-

Kayla Dalery dashes down the familiar hallway, past the shop, to the plaques with the names of all the ZAG members, grinning at the man who stands there with a tool in his hand as he polishes the newly carved name 'Kayla Dalery'.

"Good morning, Kayla- or should I say, miss Kayla."

He winked and she beamed at the honor her new assignment bestowed. She skipped on, into her first ever ZAG briefing. No trace of memory from her life before, her secret chamber in her bed, her friendship with Rachael, her lost brother, her doom in the outlands, the town, the field, Miss Biltnee, Jake, or the face she saw just before her mind was taken. 

The End