1 Before A Billion(1)

It was deep in the night and the moon was beautiful as always. With the relaxing sound of nature, there was something particularly enchanting about that hefty ball of light in contrast to the dark sky. It was like taking a stroll all alone and it was there accompanying you.

In a trance, she thought of what could happen if the stars weren't there to accompany the moon anymore.

BANG!

She visibly flinched as the door was loudly opened, clearly hinting that the person was impatient and agitated. "Why haven't you quickly solved that yet— mmpffh!" The person who barged in the dimly-lit room was a man, but another person's hand clamped around his loud mouth, muffling his voice. As they fought each other, they knocked into the little girl sitting on the floor beside a table.

The wind behind the man's back was like frost prickling his spine. He was falling, but so is the other man. In a situation where people know is not to their benefit, they would abandon anyone else to save themselves, a sign that one is selfish. Like how right now felt like an eternity had passed and the thunders of their heart and their sighs of relief muted the crash of tiny body against the hard table.

The girl was knocked unconscious with blood oozing out from the side of her head, her body lying limply on the floor. Her face appeared in peace, tranquil without a ripple, surprisingly.

Stumbling onto their feet, one of them carried the girl and the other called an ambulance and then proceeded to inform the others.

✒

Darkness was the closest to what she loved, if she ever did. If possible, she'd like to stay in this darkness forever. But alas, fate and her were not good friends.

Muffled voices compelled her to open her tightly shut eyes. She squinted her eyes at the bright lights. Seeing that she had adjusted to glare of the offending fluorescent, what appeared to be a nurse came into view, smiling at her.

She didn't smile back. Her guts told her she was one of those fecal people. And her guts were never wrong.

As she was finally able to sit up, after struggles and the nurse's attempts of stopping her, she noticed her mother on the phone, sitting on the sofa located at the far left side of the room. Her chatter was showing no signs of stopping, much to the nurse's dismay. Noticing that the star of the day was finally awake, the woman hung up on the phone.

"Faith."

Somehow, the little girl knows that the voice of that woman will forever remain odious to her. That woman she used to call Mother. Faith looked up to that woman who was now standing beside the hospital bed she was currently sitting on.

"Behave yourself. Concentrate on getting better. You'll be discharged after two weeks as you only cut your forehead. You can't miss anymore tests or you'll end up useless. Understand?" without waiting for the girl's answer, the woman headed straight for the door without even looking back.

The little girl stared at the door for a while and found herself drifting off. Those eyes that her mother used to look at her were like looking at a treasure she can't afford to lose. Gone was the woman who loved her, gone was the warm eyes, gone was the gentle touch, gone was her mother. All that was left was a person blinded by money and treated her daughter as a source of wealth.

But so what? She ain't givin' a damn anymore.

Two weeks have passed and Faith was back to the lab. The room she was in was completely white with little decorations. There was only one window but it was huge that five grown men could fit. It was according to the request of the little girl with the purpose of seeing the moon.

Currently nearing to lunch time, her hands didn't stop writing and her brain was solving countless equations. This girl was able to solve the hardest math problems that even math experts were having a hard time with.

The door opened and a guy entered carrying a tray of food. Faith abruptly stopped her movements and turned her head, eyeing the tall and thin guy approaching. He was called Gab short for Gabriel, her long time caretaker. And no, he wasn't as amiable as his name sounds. Quite the opposite actually. Knowing that he'd gained the girl's attention, he said, "The superiors said you should finish ALL of these. Otherwise, I would get scolded."

Faith paid no attention to his lofty attitude, instead defying what he said, "I believe I already notified them to cite my request that I will cook my own food from now on. Unless they are a bunch of useless bozos who call themselves this organization's superiors and they don't even remember this?" Her eyes looked at him with a hint of mockery. Gab, seeing this, infuriated him to the point that his fists where shaking at his sides. He knew, and everyone in this island, that he was inferior to her like the rest of them. And because he knows this pissed him off even more.

But he calmed himself down. Apparently, being scolded by the higher-ups was the last thing he wants. "I obviously know nothing of this fact. Why not just eat this meal? It's food anyway." His dismissive tone at the end was so overt that it irked her, which was surprising considering that she never lets anyone get to her. The thing that she hates the most is people interfering with how she lives her life. Having these scientists dedicate her life on researches and experiments was the only thing she will tolerate and nothing more.

Forcing herself to calm down, she felt like an idiot. Getting peeved because of such a trifling reason made her taste the bitterness of pathetic self-loathing. She mentally berated herself as she remembered her oath of never giving someone a piece of herself, not her expressions nor her emotions. Back to her previous self, she was once again a blank body with thoughts.

She sat down on the floor and attempted to continue her work, aggravating the poor guy even more so than before. But he didn't make a move of hurting her. This room was the room of the most treasured person in the world, it wouldn't be a surprise if it was filled with surveillance cameras and microphones at every angle. Of course he would be in deep, deep, deep trouble if he so much as touched a hair on her body, the irony of being her caretaker. Although he already knew he'd be chided by some of his mentors because of the conversation he had with the girl earlier, at least it wouldn't be by the superiors themselves.

Gab, regaining confidence, he again tried to convince the girl to eat.

It was like any normal day. Disputes with the little girl, going back dejected, it was the same as before.

Or so he thought.

Because right now, the room was shaking so badly he stumbled down.