Bloodline

Chapter Two

Chapter Two

The guardians were up to something.

I knew it the moment I stepped into the canteen in the morning. The guardians were talking amongst themselves, voices low, only to shut up the moment I appeared. It continued through classes, guardians eyeing me suspiciously, like I'd taken the last apple at the fruit bar last night.

Unfortunately for them, whispering didn't work around me. One of my defects was hypersensitive hearing. I wasn't entirely sure where it came from, or how it was even a defect, but when it was revealed to my guardians, they'd simply sighed heavily like someone had given them bad news.

"... making a move for Atlantis, so be on guard. Do not leave him alone. He's good at sneaking around and blending with the shadows. I'd say he was infected, but we already tested him twice in the past week." One of the guardian's was saying when I'd entered the arena later that day. And I knew they were talking about me because I'd been tested twice for the shadow illness. It was a mental illness that manifested physical symptoms. To put it bluntly, it was depression in its rawest angriest form and though it was rare nowadays, they still tested for it just to be sure. They tested us for everything.

But they especially ran tests on defected things, to make sure we weren't nearing a breakdown.

"Shut up," Micah snapped at the guardian who had approached him, "He can hear us." Nothing more was said and I cursed that Micah actually knew about my defect. I said nothing, didn't even look in his direction as I lined up against the wall with the rest of the soldiers in training, who were all around my age.

They were up to something. Moving to Atlantis? What was moving to Atlantis?

I'd never been to Atlantis. I knew nothing about it, aside from the basics we'd learned in our studies. I didn't even know how to get there without teleporting, considering I couldn't. Besides, that was where, if gossip held true, my genetic carriers were located. Were they going in to capture them? The idea seemed preposterous. My genetic carriers were powerful creatures. And while all the artificials had been warned to avoid their genetic carriers, ours in particular were supposed to be incredibly dangerous and murderous. I wasn't sure if that held true, but I wasn't really eager to find out either.

No, it couldn't be related to them anyway. Why would that have anything to do with me if I was supposed to avoid them? The only thing we shared was genetics and that wasn't enough for me to go hunting them down or anything. Genetics really meant nothing to me at this point. I was created in a test tube for the sole purpose of destroying the Mother's enemies.

So what about Atlantis? What about me?

"Stand to attention, brats!" Micah's bark jarred me from my thoughts and I cursed under my breath, narrowing my eyes as Micah marched in front of us while we all straightened to face him like a row of ants. He paused to look at me and I glared back at him. He curled his lip and turned to face me fully.

"We'll be playing Target today," he announced, earning some laughter and smug grins from the other soldiers, making me grind my teeth together, "All of you line up on the opposite end of the arena, save for Seven. And, of course, Bait." I said nothing as the other soldiers jogged to the opposite end of the arena and Micha approached me smugly, his arms tucked behind his back, eyes narrowed down at me.

"Let's see you keep that look of confidence today," he mused, then walked toward the center of the arena. I cocked my head, cracking my neck a couple times to loosen up and prepare for the ass beating of a lifetime.

I approached the opposite end of the arena from everyone else, watching one of the doors open as a soldier came out with Bait.

Bait was a lot like me, and it was honestly kind of fucking terrifying to see where I would've ended up if I had been completely botched. At least there was something to me that would be able to fight.