It Begins

Earlier that night.

Teu and her prisoner stood within a large white room. The floor, walls and ceiling were padded, and there was naught but a single large pillow in the room. A metal door led to the bathroom; they had 'jumped' in.

Teu's eyes had repeatedly scoured every inch of this boy's body. The more she did so, the more unease she felt. The bestial nature hidden behind her eyes was fighting to take over- urging her to take action.

These feelings irked her more than her hatred of menial tasks, and she continued to search the boy's body for any plausible explanation as to why she felt this way.

She could not understand why her every instinct was trying to alert her to the fact that she was in incredible danger. He was just a child, was he not? What could she have to fear?

The boy's eyes were dim, but he looked around the room with intrigue. There was a placidity to him that belied his position as a prisoner, and a carefreeness to his demeanor. If Teu did not know any better, she would assume that she was nothing at all in front of this boy.

"This is where you will spend the rest of your life until the New Regime makes a decision regarding your fate. As we explained to you before, your ability has been completely suppressed. You will obey any and all instruction given to you by my staff and do nothing else. Understood?"

The boy sat on the soft floor and stared at it in what seemed like surprise. He did not act as though he had heard Teu's words at all. Instead, he poked the floor a bit and then spread himself out on it.

"I think I like it here. Thanks for letting me stay."

The boy's dead eyes just barely attained a hint of brightness, and he smiled a pearly white smile that, for some reason, did not suit his appearance. His long black hair had been trimmed down by the prison staff, which exposed more of his face than when he had first arrived.

Teu's confusion abounded, but only intensified.

"I get it now. You're a good person on the inside, aren't you?" The boy closed his eyes and gave her a truly heartwarming smile. Teu would have scoffed at this and simply left, but the instant he smiled at her she could feel that sense of danger vanish.

She stifled a gasp and watched with trembling eyes as the boy rolled around on the floor. Teu could not be sure, but she felt like her sense of dread had arisen only due to the fact that the boy had been cautious of her.

His caution alone had put her in grave danger- at least, that was what her instincts told her. She took several breaths and calmed herself, giving the boy one last look before she jumped out of the room.

The boy continued to roll around on the floor, reaching from one end of the room to another. He was having the time of his life, and seemingly would continue to do so as long as he found things to entertain himself with.

In such a place, the passage of time was impossible to track. Time would slowly become irrelevant as the mind abandoned it as a concept, and the devastating weight of being completely alone would begin to wear down even the most capable minds.

Fortunately, the prison guards here were tasked with checking in on these prisoners every few months. A well-trained guard would jump into the room, and have some form of interaction with the prisoner, whether they took them to the gymnasium, to see one of the physicians, to the pool etc.

There was one guard for every hundred prisoners, responsible for these occasional check-ups. Once the boy had been having fun in his cell for three months, a guard jumped into the room and greeted him with an odd expression.

"Good night," the boy said, smiling. "Are you friends with the kind warden?"

The prison guard was a tall, dark man. He wore his uniform loosely, with a few buttons still undone, exposing his black t-shirt and necklace. His thin locks fell to his lower back, tied with a red string. He glanced at his A.S device and turned his wrist over; his was a black metal band that went around his wrist.

When it detected the movement, it projected a tiny screen that showed him the time- among other things. It was 11 PM.

"How did you know it was nighttime?"

The boy frowned and looked up, then tilted his head dumbly. He genuinely could not understand why this person had asked him that.

"Because... it is?"

The man sighed and shook his head. The screen went away once he stopped looking at it, and he put his hands into his pockets as he stepped closer to the boy.

"Anyway, I'm Juma, and I'll be your assigned officer for two years. What's your name, kid?"

"I don't have a name!" Sounding proud, the boy struck a pose as he answered.

"You don't?" Juma wasn't all too surprised; he had come across such situations before. "Well, how 'bout we give you one?"

The boy furiously nodded.

"What do you think of... Steve."

The boy violently shook his head.

"Alright, what about... Kidney?"

This time, the boy cringed.

"You're bad at naming people, aren't you."

Juma grinned, but a vein popped on his forehead.

"Save it for someone else then. I'll call you Scar... with a 'z.' Scarz."

"That just feels lazy," the boy scoffed, but he stood up and walked over to Juma.

"So, did you come over to play with me? Wanna roll around?"

Juma looked at the floor and saw that the padding was actually indented, and his brows furrowed. "How long have you been rolling around in here?"

Without pausing, 'Scarz' answered, "Almost ninety-four days."

Juma found the boy's expression to be very weird. His face was that of a lifeless, uncaring person, but his mannerism and expressions betrayed someone who was the very opposite.

He was lively inside, but he looked dead instead.

"Well, since it's your first time, I'm gonna take you to see every available distraction. Most of them cater to the mental health of the inmates, but there's one that's particularly popular among the guards."

"Oh..." He stood cluelessly at Juma's side, and then they vanished. Juma took them to the first of their stops, the gymnasium.

This was a huge, well-lit space of more than half a million square kilometers, housing all manner of utilities for physical activity. Scarz' eyes widened and he exclaimed in surprise. "This is so cool! Can I play here too?"

Juma nodded.

There were currently a few thousand prisoners in the gymnasium with their assigned officers, and Scarz seemed excited to rush off and go meet them.

"We won't be staying here. After all, we have to go see the others."

"Aww..."

"This is the gymnasium. Listers are brought here only one day in the year, and are allowed to spend that day doing whatever they wish. Most of them have been here for more than 5 years, and their mutations aren't able to keep up with the starvation and dehydration. Those Listers just choose to sit down and do nothing all day."

Scarz looked around and saw that there were, indeed, a lot of people just sitting around doing nothing. They didn't even notice that him and Juma had arrived. Some of them did, and they started chatting amongst themselves.

"Who's that kid with Juma?" One officer asked another.

"Must be new, but the only new inmate I know about is the one the Wardens all brought here, and they haven't shared any info."

"Hm."

Once Juma thought Scarz had seen enough, he activated his A.S and they jumped once more, arriving at the pool. This pool was a singular, massive body of water, reaching depths as low as 20,000 feet. There was an entire structure within the pool as well, and the inmates were allowed to explore it as they saw fit.

"This is the only pool in the entirety of the Hypogeal War Prison. No other branch was built in a suitable enough location for accommodating a large body of water other than this one. Of course, prisoners from each branch and their assigned officers come here."

"That's so amazing," Scarz said as he stared into the crystal clear water, glistening with the light of the giant bulbs above.

"I can't believe everyone gets to have all this fun here."

Juma shook his head, "Not everyone. Only the well-behaved prisoners get to go to any of the recreational areas. If you aren't well-behaved, you lose any and all privileges you might have had."

"Eek," Scarz tensed, as if the very idea of not being able to have fun was a threat to his life.

"Alright, let's go."

Juma took Scarz to the cinema, then to the lounge, the physicians' wing and a number of other places. When Scarz saw the showers, he freaked out and ended up running toward one of them.

Even so, Scarz had no idea how to use the shower, so Juma had to show him. After he marveled at the way running water worked, his spirits fell; Juma told him that Listers did not need showers, and so were only given a shower once a year as a courtesy.

Utterly defeated, Scarz did not much enjoy the rest of the tour.

Finally, the time had come to see the final recreational area. This was the one that Juma said was the guards' favorite. Apparently, they would pull some strings with the schedule to make it so that the prisoners would be taken here twice a year instead of just once.

That was how badly they craved whatever this activity was.

Scarz and Juma arrived in a massive arena, dimly lit by flickering light bulbs, but light well enough for the thousands of prisoners and guards seated in it. There were flamethrowers lined up all throughout the arena that spewed flames occasionally for dramatic effect, and a large stage at the very center, also lined with flamethrowers and glowing lights.

Currently on the stage, twenty-four individuals were fighting it out in a fierce free-for-all. Scarz was immediately entranced with the show.

"This is the War-Prison Arena, us guards' favorite place in the whole world. We get to kick back, relax, and watch Listers fight it out. It's not everyday you get to see something like that- and even with their abilities suppressed, they still give us quite the show."

Scarz saw one particular individual, a woman, effortlessly tearing through the competition. She sidestepped, twisted and leapt over dozens of attacks, all the while countering with devastating blows to each of her attackers. Wherever her fists or legs went, they would do serious damage.

Scarz was taken aback by her movements, but then he suddenly frowned and began to... growl... ?

"What's up with you?" Juma asked, but Scarz did respond. Instead, he kept emitting a strange sound from his throat, like growling but not exactly that. It was like he was expressing the purest form of anger possible, and in the simplest way he could think of.

There did not seem to be any attempt to mask it, nor was there any attempt to make it seem worse than it was. It was just plain old anger, raw as can be.

Juma was about to reach out and touch Scarz to get his attention, but the boy found a strange spurt of energy and used it to dash forward at an insane speed. He leapt over the seated guards and inmates, landing all the way at the bottom of the arena before jumping onto the stage.

Juma was still standing where he was with his hand outstretched, shocked by what he had just seen.

All the people that Scarz had leapt over only then realized that something had whizzed past them, but the boy was long gone. When they looked back at the stage, the spectators were already shouting about this sudden interference.

They did not sound upset, but rather excited. This was the kind of stuff they loved to see- this was why they enjoyed the arena more than anything else. This kind of random, chaotic, wild entertainment was their entire reason for living.

Scarz stood at one of the stage, glaring at one individual in particular. The inmates atop the stage all ceased fighting for a few seconds, puzzled as they looked at this child that had appeared on the stage.

Scarz slowly raised his hand, and with a single finger he pointed at that woman. No one knew why- or even where he had come from- but he clearly wanted a piece of her.