Lauren’s head was swimming as she woke. Her vision was fuzzy. Her eyes refused to focus. A bright light beamed down on her from above and off to the side.

  Something was way wrong.

  She tried to raise her arms to cover her face, but found that she couldn’t move them. Straps looped around her wrists and biceps, keeping them down. This sent a jolt of panic through Lauren. She grunted as she shook back and forth on whatever table she was on, trying to loosen anything. Her vision was taking forever to clear. Her whole body felt sapped of energy.

  “Oh, Lauren,” came a chiding voice. The sound of it made Lauren’s blood run cold. It stole whatever momentary determination had surged through her. She knew exactly where she was.

  “Why do you always insist on struggling?” Dr. Smythe asked from somewhere off to the side. “Where would you go? Who would make you better?”

  She was able to see the ceiling of the lab beyond the lights. Slowly, she turned her head to the side.

  She saw the profile of the doctor, standing with her back to Lauren. She fiddled with something on a table that Lauren couldn’t see. She turned and walked over to stand over Lauren. In her hand was a needle filled with clear liquid.

  Lauren hated, despised, how normal her captor looked. She was just a woman in a lab coat, with frizzy hair, brown eyes, and slightly blemished skin. No big scar, no acid burns, nothing that marked some dark backstory. She smiled with wine-red lips as she gazed down on her helpless lab rat. There was no malice in her eyes. If you saw her as a stranger, she’d be a lab technician. A nurse. A pediatrician. Any professional you would pass in a hospital without a second glance.

  Dr. Smythe’s calm, professional, even sympathetic demeanor sometimes made Lauren feel crazy, like she was the one out of sync with reality. Maybe she had some kind of psychotic break, and this was all just some hallucination. But these thoughts were fleeting. She remembered the life she had before. They couldn’t take it away from her.

  Now it was only Dr. Smythe, with her serene smile.

  “What are you doing?” Lauren asked through gritted teeth.

  Latex-covered fingers swept over Lauren’s forehead. Maybe it was supposed to be a soothing gesture.

  “You know everything we do here is to help you. Your work with us is invaluable. You’re being so brave.”

  Lauren tried to shift again as the doctor brought the needle near her arm.

  “Lauren, please be still. This will only hurt if you don’t cooperate.”

  “I don’t want it,” Lauren pleaded. She tried to keep her breathing steady. It was hard not to panic.

  The doctor sighed and set the needle down somewhere out of sight. She leaned down until her face was hovering over Lauren’s, eyes level with her.

  “Can I tell you something Lauren?” she asked in a whisper. Her humid breath billowed over Lauren’s clammy skin.

  “I am quite excited for this next phase of our work. It just may be the apex of everything I’ve accomplished so far. I am going to give you the greatest gift I have ever offered anyone. And I have given incredible gifts to incredible people.”

  She stood upright again. The needle reappeared in her hand.

  “But if we are to receive life-changing gifts, we must be strong enough to bear them. Let us continue our work.”

  Lauren shuddered as the needle pierced her skin.

  She awoke gasping. Her bedroom was dark. She was still at Rosewell.

  She sat up. Her pajamas clung to her. She reached over and turned on the lamp, soft light brightening the room. She took a moment for her breathing to calm.

  The indentation in the sheets where Lauren had slept was soaked completely through with sweat. It matted her hair to her forehead. The temperature in the room was stifling. She needed fresh air.

  Without changing out of her pajamas, she got up and threw on her jacket. She crept out of her room. The apartment was dark and still. She pulled on her shoes and left through the front door.

  It was fully night outside, a slight chill in the air. Campus was lit intermittently by evenly-spaced pathway lights. Lights were also spaced between each door of the dorm building.

  A roof felt like a good place to get away right now. There had to be access somewhere close.

  Lauren followed the outdoor hallway to the end of the building, past the last dorm door. The overhang ended, and there was a ladder that led upwards to the roof. A metal slat was inserted that blocked off the first five feet of the rungs.

  Lauren stood on tiptoes and was easily able to grab the unblocked rungs. She held tight and got a grip with her feet before climbing upwards. In a moment, she was on the roof.

  A waxing moon above provided plenty of light to see by. Enough to see that there was already someone up here. The figure sat on the edge of the roof, facing the twinkling lights of Pacific City downhill. They turned as Lauren approached. An ember spot glowed near the silhouette of their hand. Lauren smelled cigarette smoke.

  Lauren couldn’t make out who it was until she was a few feet away. Then she saw it was Mara, the girl who went against Grace in gym. She wore a dark zip up and sweats. Her curly hair sat in thick strands on her shoulders and down her back.

  “Hey,” Mara said.

  “Hey. Okay if I join you?” Lauren asked.

  Mara gestured to the spot beside her.

  Lauren took a seat on the roof’s lip. It was at least twenty feet down to the top of a bank that sloped down to the fence surrounding the perimeter. Lauren wondered how many guards, cameras, and hidden devices were set up in those woods by BASTION. Surely it couldn’t just be a fence.

  The two of them sat in silence for a moment. A night breeze rustled the tall pines.

  Mara reached her cigarette over to Lauren.

  “Want some?”

  Lauren accepted it and took a drag. She held it, then exhaled out of her nose.

  Mara watched her as she puffed. Lauren glanced at her when she handed it back.

  Mara had a gaunt look about her, but was still pretty. Just in a way people might overlook. Her lips were full but chapped. There were a few rough patches and shallow scratches on her face, and it appeared that something had put a dent in her nose. Her olive skin weatherbeaten. Overall, she looked like a girl who was getting out of some rough years. Lauren could relate.

  “You a street kid?” Mara asked as she exhaled. Her voice had a mild east coast gravel.

  Lauren grimaced. “Is it that easy to tell?”

  Mara leaned back on her hands. “Maybe by another street kid.”

  That would explain her look.

  “Where’d you grow up?” Mara asked.

  “A gas station junction called Callis,” Lauren answered. “Sister and I lived in an abandoned garage. Stole shit for hoods, mostly.”

  “Mm.”

  “What about you?”

  “Me? Beacon City,” Mara answered with a gleam in her voice.

  Lauren looked back at her. “No shit?”

  “Mhm. Seven years on my own. I was the Rat Queen of BC.”

  “That must have been a trip,” Lauren said.

  Mara sat up and pulled a knee to her chest. “I had street living down to a science in the big city. I knew where to eat, where to find clothes, where to sleep and stay warm. My critters helped a lot, of course. They looked out for me, and I looked out for them. I was basically feral. Just a part of the pack.”

  “And then Invasion Day happened?” Lauren guessed.

  Mara’s brown eyes turned downcast. “Yeah. My critters actually warned me about it, believe it or not. I guess they could sense something in the air. I tried to warn people. I cared about that city, even though most people were happy to step over me. But who wants to listen to some guttersnipe? My pack led me somewhere I could hide, deep beneath the streets.”

  “You stayed throughout the whole invasion? What was it like?” Lauren asked. She could still hardly imagine that level of destruction. She could barely even picture a big city.

  Mara shrugged. “I only heard it. Buildings collapsing, and people dying. And felt the shaking. I was down there for days with no light. It got quiet eventually. I thought the whole world might be gone.”

  She took a shuddering breath and another cigarette hit. “And then a rescue team found me. Then BASTION. And now I’m here.”

  “And none of it feels real,” Lauren said.

  “Exactly.”

  Lauren accepted the cigarette again.

  “Do you ever think about fucking off?” Mara asked. “I mean, this school… this is all rich, shiny kid shit, right?”

  Lauren exhaled. “It is. And I’m gonna. I just need to find my twin first. She’s somewhere down there, I think,” she said, nodding to the city.

  “Did you two get separated?”

  Lauren told Mara about going from Callis to the lab, about her escape and her feeling.

  “Shit,” Mara said. “That’s wild.”

  The cigarette Lauren handed back was almost dead. Mara threw the butt off the roof and held up a hand.

  “Wait a second.”

  Lauren had no idea what she was doing, but Mara seemed to be concentrating. There was a scrabbling sound, then a sleek grey rat jumped from the darkness into her lap.

  This book was originally published on Royal Road. Check it out there for the real experience.

  Lauren couldn’t help but recoil in surprise at the rodent that had come out of nowhere. It didn’t do anything besides sit on its haunches and look up at Mara, nose twitching. Mara gave it a pet.

  “Hey buddy,” she said gently. “This here is Lauren.”

  The rat turned and cocked its head at Lauren. Its ears flicked.

  “Lauren is looking for her sister,” Mara explained. She looked at Lauren. “Identical, right?”

  Lauren nodded, still a bit wary.

  “Lauren’s looking for a girl who looks just like her. She’s somewhere in Pacific City. Can you ask your friends and family to keep a look out for her? And if you see her, will you come tell me? We’d appreciate it.”

  The rat gave a squeak. Mara took something from her pocket and let the rat eat from her palm. It scampered out of her lap and back into the recesses of the roof.

  “Is that really going to work?” Lauren asked.

  Mara shrugged. “Who knows? Critters care less about what I ask them to do the further they get from me, and the longer it’s been. Pacific City is a big place. I spent years building a network over all of Beacon City. I don’t have much of a bond with these guys yet. Rats are communal creatures, though. They spread messages well. I’ll keep asking.”

  “I… Thank you,” Lauren said. She wasn’t the best at expressing herself, but she was touched. “I… didn’t expect to meet so many people who cared here. I kinda thought I was gonna be on my own.”

  Mara patted her on the shoulder as she stood. “The world’s a mean place. Us street kids gotta look out for each other. Just tell me before you jump ship, huh? I might wanna come with.”

  Lauren nodded.

  “I need to finish sleeping. See you around.”

  Lauren stayed up on the roof awhile longer. She watched Pacific City from afar, yet closer than she had ever been in her life. The feeling that her sister was down there somewhere was omnipresent, so persistent that she was worried she might be mistaking it being something else. But what else could the feeling be pointing her towards? It had to be right. She just wished it came with a distance and direction indicator.

  Something would turn up with her leads. And if they didn’t, she’d make more of them. It was as simple as that. She was maybe just starting to believe people around here really wanted to help. Maybe she could let herself relax. Just a little.

  The faintest hint of light began to rise from behind Lauren. She stood and went back to her dorm. She probably wouldn’t be sleeping anymore tonight. Despite her nightmare, she felt rested. Soon was the first trip into town.

  A few hours later, the four roommates were eating their first breakfast together. Lucy texted Thalia to let her know she and Lauren wouldn’t be at the cafeteria. Grace and Harper had elected to stay in before class too, Grace coming out yawning and Harper following in a silent shuffle. They all sat at the small dining table and ate cereal, of which Lucy had asked for a variety of.

  “Are you two going out after class?” Grace asked.

  “Yeah! We’re gonna go get a feel for the city, maybe do some shopping,” Lucy told her.

  “Awesome. Cleo and I will come with,” Grace said without asking.

  Wonderful. We’ll have a whole field trip, Lauren thought.

  “Did you want to come out?” she asked across the table to Harper. Might as well bring whoever wants to come at this point.

  Harper looked up at her. “Ah, no,” she said quietly. “It’s too… sunny.”

  “You have shadow powers, right?” Lucy asked. “You had a super cool demonstration yesterday. I mean, you totally scared the crap out of Kenny, but I’m not the biggest fan of him so far. Your powers seem useful.”

  Harper shrugged. Her face puckered. She seemed uncomfortable with the attention.

  “Yeah. I dunno. I don’t use them that often.”

  “Well, that’s okay,” Lucy said. The fact Harper carried a bit of conversation clearly cheered her. Lucy was definitely someone who liked to make friends.

  Dishes were rinsed and put away and they each got ready for their one Friday class. Lauren, Lucy, and Harper all had the same art class. Lucy told them how she loved to do art, especially painting.

  “Too messy for me,” Grace said. She flipped her blonde locks over her denim jacket after she emerged from her room. Red and blue star earrings dangled from her lobes. “Can’t ruin the fit. Y’all have fun though. I’m off to learn politics.”

  “You have a politics class?” Lucy asked.

  “Uh, yeah? I’m not dumb. I need to know how to influence people if I’m gonna be a super-mega star. I might even be president one day.”

  “Well, that would be something,” Lucy said.

  Grace put on her heeled boots and headed out.

  “Seeya for our trip after!” she called.

  The three remaining girls headed out together a minute later. The morning outside was already pleasant, and had that tinge to it that let you know it was going to grow into a hot day. Must’ve been one of the last remnants of the dying summer season.

  Harper wore a white hoodie and kept the hood up as they walked under the sun. She also had on small dark sunglasses since they left the dorm. Lucy wore a flowy green summer dress and had her hair back in a band designed to look like vines. Lauren had just thrown on the first pair of jeans and t-shirt that she grabbed in her dresser. She wore her jacket, but wondered if the day would grow too hot for it. There were other options in her closet, if she needed to grab something else.

  The art classroom wasn’t too far from the dorms. They found D4, which turned out to be a spacious studio with tall windows that let in plenty of sunlight. There was a row of pottery wheels towards the back of the room, and many wide tables with low seats. Smocks and aprons hung on a row of hooks by the door. Doors spaced around the room looked to lead into storage areas and maybe an office.

  A tall man was standing at the front of the room, already wearing a paint-stained apron. He had on a beanie, and a ginger beard reached from his face to mid-chest. His sleeves were rolled up, showing colorful tattoos on his forearms.

  The three roommates sat down at one of the broad tables off to the side of the room. The tables were so large that the entire class could probably sit at one and a half of them out of the six in the room. As students came in, they drifted to different tables alone or in small clumps.

  It wasn’t even just this class. Both Spanish and English yesterday felt like they could easily accommodate double or more the amount of students. The school felt strangely empty for its size.

  Lauren leaned over to Lucy. “Have you noticed this school is like, way bigger than the amount of students it has?”

  Lucy shrugged. “Sure, yeah. I’m sure they built it to hold what they expect to be a full class size eventually. This is the first year of it. We’re probably just a trial run.”

  “Huh.”

  There were seven other students in art besides Lauren and her roommates. She recognized Benedict, the boy Thalia fought, and Reuben of course. He came over to their table when he spotted them.

  “Mind if I sit with you?” he asked.

  “Of course not,” Lucy said.

  One of the students was Reagan. She sat off at her own table on the far side of the room from them. In her dark jacket and cap, Lauren thought she looked like a fed. Maybe she was some kind of BASTION plant. If she was, she was doing a terrible job of blending in.

  White-haired Vivian was sitting beside a girl Lauren couldn’t remember the name of, just the fact that she had blasted Adam’s roommate across the mat in gym. She had layered, messy black hair and a copper skin tone. Something about her looked wild. Maybe it was the wide look in her eyes.

  The last two to come in were Annabelle, the stretchy, kinda fake-looking girl who had apparently hit on Adam, and the guy who had turned into a puddle of tar during gym. His oily hair went down to his shoulders, and he had some scruff at the bottom of his long face, just below his mellow grin. He wore a shirt that was two sizes too big, and had a design about growing plants that was no doubt meaning drugs. His flip flops slapped against the floor before he found his seat.

  The man at the front of the class clapped his hands together once everyone was seated.

  “Alright! Welcome everyone. I’m Mr. Davis, and this is Art 101. Hopefully this will be an easy, breezy mellow class for us all to end our week with. Let’s get started…”

  The first hour of class was mainly Mr. Davis introducing himself, the classroom, and its facilities. He walked through how the class was open-ended, with students being able to work on pretty much whatever project they’d like as long as they were working on something creative. There would be lessons on pottery making and other art forms at certain points. At around the halfway point, Mr. Davis handed out easels and small canvases for students to introduce themselves through a painting. The goal was to paint for 45 minutes and go around sharing in the last fifteen.

  Lauren was feeling increasingly queasy throughout the demonstrations, and the feeling was reaching its height now that she sat with an empty canvas in front of her and the clock ticking down. She hadn’t the first fucking clue how to do art. The only art she ever saw in process was kids spraying graffiti in alleyways in the middle of the night. Her hands were getting clammy at the daunting prospect of picking up one of the fresh brushes and putting paint on her palette. She felt more nervous than when her name was called to fight.

  Lucy was merrily humming to herself as she expertly mixed paint on her palette and applied it in deft strokes. She was off in her own world.

  Lauren scooted over to her.

  “Lucy? What the hell do I paint?”

  Lucy looked up.

  “Hm? Oh, that’s up to you. Whatever you feel represents you.”

  “Well what are you painting?”

  She stuck her tongue out as she tilted her head to her canvas.

  “If I have to spoil it, it’s going to be me walking through the gorgeous woods outside of the city. Although we don’t have much time, so it’s going to be a bit impressionistic.”

  Lauren huffed as she sat back in her own space. What the hell represented her? An empty corner store parking lot? A garage with two mattresses in opposite corners?

  She shook her head to clear it. There was no way she was drawing some sort of landscape or space. There was already less than forty minutes left. She’d just have to draw… something. Impressionistic, like Lucy said.

  She grabbed some colors and dabbed them onto her palette.

  The rest of the painting time passed quickly as Lauren fell into a rhythm. She was unsure at first, second guessing every touch of paint, but eventually her thoughts fell away. She just let her hand be guided by her feelings. It still didn’t come naturally to her, but at least she was getting something down. She could always throw it away later.

  “Five minutes left!” Mr. Davis called as he walked around the classroom.

  There was certainly… something on Lauren’s canvas by the end of it. It kinda looked artsy. She thought. She started rinsing her brushes and collecting the paint.

  Mr. Davis clapped his hands together and called out to the room.

  “Alright everyone, let’s do a quick cleanup and then circle up and share.”

  People bustled to clean their pallets and put brushes back. In a few minutes, the ten students gathered around Mr. Davis near the front of the class. Each person kept their canvas turned close to their chest.

  “Great work today guys. I can tell you were each easing into it in your own ways. Let’s go around and hear a bit about what you made. Who wants to go first?”

  Benedict raised his hand first. He had come dressed in white overalls over a three quarter tee. Paint had been smeared on his clothes in what attempted to look like spontaneous accidents.

  “Mr. Davis? I would love to go first.”

  The teacher ceded the floor to him.

  Benedict turned his canvas around.

  “I call it, Can I Truly Be Seen?”

  He actually wasn’t a half-bad painter, at least in terms of technical ability. On the canvas was Benedict, clearly nude, his body covered by one of his wings which were currently invisible in real life. The other wing was stretched into the air and was disappearing into petals that drifted away off panel.

  He turned his head away dramatically.

  “I know. It’s vulnerable. It’s bold for the first day. But it was just something I had to get out.”

  Everyone followed along with Mr. Davis’ clapping.

  “Thank you, Benedict. I look forward to seeing more of your work in the future. Let’s go around the circle.”

  Reuben flipped his canvas and showed a series of shrinking, overlapping blobs that he said represented his powers.

  Reagan was next. Her painting was a small, blotchy figure towards the bottom, with two massive hands painted in black reaching down towards it.

  “It’s, I dunno,” she said tersely. “It’s dumb. Let’s just move on.”

  “No one’s work here is ever dumb,” Mr. Davis said. “We just need to get more comfortable creating and sharing. Thank you for giving it your best.”

  Vivian painted rolling green hills, with silver ovals in the blue sky.

  “This is my home, Ollyria,” she said. “It’s an amazing place. I already miss it so much. These little dots are all the people who fly across the sky. It’s pretty much the only way we travel.”

  The girl who sat with Vivian, apparently named Sola, flipped her canvas next. Her painting was of a tower made of levels of jagged red and orange rocks, which small figures were ascending in a spiral.

  “I am also from another world,” Sola said. It was the first time Lauren had heard her speak. Her accent wasn’t like anything she had heard before. It was harsh and filled with hard consonants. “This is my home, Kormoris. I am princess here. This is the blood tower of my house. Here, our thralls are happy to build it higher to honor me. Many die during the work.”

  She pointed to the tallest segment of the jagged tower.

  “This layer is me.”

  She smiled. Everyone else looked around at each other.

  Sola looked to Vivian. “Did I present right?”

  Vivian nodded reassuringly. “You did great.”

  Everyone clapped.

  Annabelle’s painting was a series of looping swirls in a rainbow of colors.

  Harper rotated hers without any commentary. It was her hands and shadowed face, with the rest of the canvas blank. Her white clothes were hidden somewhere in the empty white canvas.

  It was only Lucy next, and then Lauren. Lucy showed hers. In the short time they had, she had managed to depict herself walking among the massive trunks of redwood trees, sunlight streaming in from the boughs.

  “Walking out in the woods is probably my favorite thing to do,” she told everyone.

  Then, Lauren.

  She still had no idea what she had made, but she willed herself to turn it around and present it.

  Almost the entire surface of her canvas was a weird, dark, angry blob. It was red and black and brown, blotchy and uneven. Things that might have been spikes and tentacles and other weird appendages came off it. It had white ovals on its surface that might have been eyes.

  Lauren had no idea where it had come from. She wasn’t consciously trying to form it. She really didn’t know how to explain it.

  “This is just… yeah. It’s weird. I don’t know what it’s supposed to be, really.”

  Her ears burned as everyone stared at her.

  “S-sorry.”

  “It’s all good! It’s totally good!” Mr. Davis said. He looked at the clock. “It’s just about time to let you all go. No homework, I’ll see you next Friday. Enjoy your weekends!”

  Lauren went back to her bag, canvas in hand, still flush.

  Lucy came up beside her.

  “That was… wow. I didn’t know you had that in you. It’s very expressive,” she said.

  Lauren shouldered her bag. “Please don’t start. Let’s just get out of here.”

  “I mean it! That was good!”

  They walked to the door, each holding their art.

  “...Did that girl say she was an alien princess with slaves?”