Gene. Sys. by Aaron Denius (best ereader for comics txt) 📕

and push one drone over to 80’s legs. “Pick him up and follow me.”

They lift him off the ground, and I speed them through the hallways to the research and development wing where the medical ward is. Every drone we pass stares at us. We reach the hallway with the door with the high-tech lock, and I see it’s about to close.

“Wait!” I yell. The door latches, but a second later, it flies back open. Hawk stands on the other side.

“What are you doing?” he asks as he holds the door open.

“He’s shot!” I say as we run past him.

“But it’s just a drone!” he shouts after me.

“I don’t care!” I shout back. We reach the medical ward and burst through the doors.

“Grant! I need a doctor,” I yell out to the room. I’m not sure if he’s in there, but I know he will help if he is.

Grant runs over to me. “What happened? Who is this?”

“His name is 80. He was shot.” I push past him toward the operating rooms.

He chases after me. “Atom, he’s just a drone. We don’t—”

“He saved my life!” I stop and square up to Grant, our faces mere inches from each other. “I don’t care who or what he is to anyone else. His life will be saved. If one more person protests, they will be next on the operating table!”

The anger that comes out of me is nothing I have felt before in my life. It scares me, but at the same time, I want to push it further. The doctors and scientists must sense that about me because they spring into action. They take 80 from the other two drones and rush him into the operating room adjacent to Rene’s.

“He will live!” I demand as they close the doors.

“Atom.” Grant places his hand on my shoulder. Instantly I feel myself calm down. He tries to get my attention, but I keep looking toward 80. “They will take care of him.” The tone in his voice reassures me, so I turn to him. “Tell me what happened?”

I remember what 80 said about not being allowed to talk to me first, so I make sure not to mention that. “I was heading back to my room when one of the outsiders jumped into the hall and shot at me. 80 pushed me out of the way and was hit with the bullet instead.”

The expression on Grant’s face turns hard. He grabs my arms tightly and looks right through my eyes. “Is he dead? Is the outsider dead?”

“Yes.” I pull away from him. “Those two other drones shot him.”

“Good.” He turns to the drones. “You two. Get every available drone and do a complete sweep of this compound. I want every room checked. Twice!” The drones run off, and he turns back to me. “You come with me. We need to get Ev.”

I look back toward the operating room, where I can see the doctors hard at work. “What about—”

“Now, Atom!” He walks through the doors to the medical ward. I jog to catch up. “When you saw the outsider with the gun, what did you do?”

“What do you mean?” I don’t know what he’s talking about. Was I supposed to do something?

“What did you do? What did you think when you saw him?” He walks faster, and I struggle to keep up.

I think back to what I did, which was nothing. “I guess I just stood there. I don’t remember what I was thinking.”

We aren’t too far from Ev’s room, but he stops and pushes me against the wall. “Your life is too valuable for you to freeze! The drills, the training that I put you through, are not games, Atom. They are to help you survive. You run, or you fight. That’s how you survive. If you just freeze, if you don’t do anything, you will die. Do you understand me?”

“Yes.” I’ve let him down, and I know it. I have never felt so small. Right then, I make a promise to myself to never let him down again.

He lets me go, and we make the last few turns to Ev’s room. He pounds on the door. “It’s Grant.”

A few seconds later, she answers the door and recoils at the bright light hitting her eyes. “What is it?”

“Grab what you need to sleep in the training room. We’re staying down there tonight.” Grant’s voice is a little gentler when speaking to her.

She looks at me, and her eyes grow wide. “Atom! What happened? Whose blood is that?”

I look down and realize that I’m covered in 80’s blood. It’s on my hands, and I can feel the sticky substance on my face. Grant jumps in before I can say anything. “He’ll fill you in downstairs.”

“I’m fine,” I reassure her. She ducks back into her room and reemerges, holding a pillow and a blanket.

We walk to my room. “You can shower downstairs,” Grant tells me before I walk in. I go into my closet and pull out a clean jumpsuit. I look into the bathroom but decide not to go in there because I don’t want to see what I look like in the mirror. Hopefully, there will be a towel in the training room shower. I grab my pillow and blanket and walk out.

By the time we reach the training room, I feel as though 80’s blood has penetrated deep into my own skin and joined my bloodstream. My hands have begun to shake. I throw what I don’t need down and head directly to the shower. I make the water as hot as I can possibly handle, strip down, and step in.

The water pooling at my feet turns from a clean, clear hue to red. My thoughts flash back to the scene, all of my senses collectively remembering every detail. The sight of the bullet leaving the barrel of the gun and drilling itself into 80. The deafening bang that caused my ears to ring. The weight that my hands felt as