Sometimes I wonder whether there will be one day when the sky turns to an eternal night. When the sun is hidden beyond piles and piles of fluffy marshmallow clouds. I claw at the air, lying in my bed, acting like a playful kitten. Then when I feel like falling asleep again the guards in front of my placid cell take me out for a walk. Or more like a tour. They show me where the bathroom is. Where the closet and test labs are. They show me everything. It’s kind of weird though being explained something that you won’t even need to know.
“Why are you guys even showing me this.” I say annoyed as they start telling me about every single chemical they have in the lab. Apparently they have over three hundred and fifty types.
“Well we’ll wait for the boss to tell you.” they say, leaving me in more suspense.
“Is it good news?” I ask.
“We can’t say.”
“Why can’t you say?”
“Because the boss said we couldn’t.”
“Why do you have to listen to your boss I mean the boss is not your mom or dad or something.” I say rolling my eyes.
“Well we don’t have parents that matter I mean they failed the tests so they’re practically useless and if we wanna wake up with our heads then we better listen to boss.”
“Is your boss a he or a she?” I ask again.
“Gi… Boy.” they say. I stare at them for a bit, suspicious at the fact that they were about to say girl.
“Is he nice?”
The guards scoff. “I guess you can say that.”
“Did the boss make you kill your parents?”
“Um… Yes… No… “ then they stare at me with narrow eyes and shake their heads. “Why are we even answering you anyway? For all we know you might be trying to get some information out of us.”
“Well than why are you still talking?” I ask. They stand in front of me and shake their heads again.
“Whatever. Just contact boss, Lewis will ya. I’m gonna take a break.” the other guard says and he walks off. The guard left of me, supposedly Lewis, takes out a his phone. I guess they couldn’t improve those. He calls his boss and says,
“Hey boss. The girl’s here. Mark went on a break and he told me to contact you and she’s been annoying the heck out of me here.” he pauses to clear his throat. “The Grongula on floor three has been executed for not following orders like you ordered boss.” He than hangs up the phone and then focuses his attention back on me, his face placid and his lips purse.
“Mind telling me how your pathetic sister managed to make the Grongula who had her in captivity all of a sudden follow her commands?” he asked me. The news shocks me and my jaw drops.
“I don’t know. Camila has always been good with animals and creatures while I always absorbed myself in books, television, and video games.”
Lewis stares at his watch and leans over towards me. “Look kid, I don’t have time for your childhood so you can either tell me how your sister did it or just let me go work on the newest species to guard her.” I stare at him, thinking of something that I could say to stall him. What if this newest species rage quits and kills Camila?
“Let’s just say you’re gonna need kryptonite to stop me from getting to my sister.”
He chuckles. “You remind me of myself when I was younger. An ametur thinking I was indestructible. Let’s just say I was wrong and soon you will feel that feeling as well.” he turns around. “Oh kid. Lucky you. We have tons of kryptonite.” I stick out my tongue at him, narrow my eyes, and shake my head to show him I don’t care. The truth is I do.
***
When the boss comes I can’t see their face. It’s hidden beyond a mask with a pattern making out a shape kind of like a crucifix but curvy on the edges and thick in the middle. Even their hair is hidden. Probably in the hooded sweater they were wearing. I guess this boss had to keep their gender secret. Probably something the future was protective about.
“I was here to talk about whether you were the one.” the boss’s voice sounds like a computer program and their hands reach into touch my face. Both gloved thickly.
“How am I supposed to know!” I shout. “You didn’t even give me the opportunity to say something to my sister and look at you! Your face is probably so hideous that you don’t want to show it or maybe there’s a secret that you have and you’ve been hiding it from everyone.” The boss steps away at that. Though I can’t see their face I bet he or she is startled about what I said. Another guard steps forward to me and slaps me across my cheek sending a rash of pain go through my body.
“What was that for?” I ask.
“It was for the way you spoke to boss.” he stepped back in line behind me and the boss continued to speak.
“I was quite curious in how a pathetic human from the past like you could be the key to something so…” the boss pauses, looking for the right word. “Prodigious.”
“I was wondering whether your sister’s brains would work to fuel the machine. Especially since she was able to control our best Grongula.” anger started to rise inside of me. How dare they hurt Camila.
“Don’t touch her okay.” I whisper. “Take my brains once I’m dead or maybe even now just don’t touch her.” The boss chuckles and shakes their head.
“What is with you humans from the past and love? Why is it so important. Without your love you would be much stronger. No weaknesses. Take your son Chandler for example. He is a smart man. He sacrificed you and soon his Father as well will be sacrificed. You know. I’m gonna let you on a little secret. I’m not even from the future and this ring on my hand keeps me young. I’m from the past like you and I started this evolution. Smart, right? I killed my parents with my own hands. I bled both of them to death and then put them in our neighbor’s trash can. Pleading to the police officers to solve the murder.” she pauses with a happy sigh. “They did. They put our neighbors in jail and gave me money to survive. It’s how I made this wonderful dream come to life. You could’ve done something truly amazing as well. Too bad you won’t be able to see it all.” she says and takes her cold, hard fist and knocks me out.
***
When I was little I would frolic outside in the garden in our backyard picking up dead tulips, roses, and rhododendrons. My brother called me crazy and Camila, well she thought I was weird. At the end of every month I would put paper over the whole entire pile and compress them on a sheet of scrapbook paper. Once each of my scrap books were finished I would give them to my parents for christmas. Mom would get the one full of rhododendrons and roses while Father always got the one full of tulips. They loved them and had a box full of them. It wasn’t even close to what they had done for me.
***
Everyone thought I was ten when I was nine. All the big kids thought I was a midget. I knew I was only 4’5 but that didn’t mean anything to me. I would walk around the halls acting like the school was mine. I had a huge ego back then but now my life has changed and I don’t fight for the last cookie in the jar. I fight for the last droplet of blood in a human being.
***
When I wake up it’s morning and the boss is right in front of me. Something’s different though. My arms are unchained and the boss’s mask is off, set beside her. The boss is a young woman with long curly blonde hair that ends at the edge of her waist. Her face is scrunched up and her cheeks look a rosy pink from the blush she was applying.
“Hello.” she says when she finally notices me. Her voice is smooth and she sits on a stool swinging her legs back and forth. “You wanna have a match?” she asks smoothing out her hair.
“What kind of match?” I ask.
“A boxing match.”
“Okay.” I say skeptical as she picks up her blue gloves and hands me some gold ones. “Visitor’s advantage.” she says. “These gold gloves you’re wearing give you double times the power than these blue gloves.” she says pointing to her gloves.
“The fight starts… Now!” she says wildly swinging towards my stomach making me fall backwards. She kicks me over and over again in a violent way making a bruise start to appear on my left knee.
“10! KO!” she says, taking off her gloves. “You know I totally showed you hell.”
***
I don’t like the fact that the boss seems to have eyes on me more than any other patient in the system. I take my time to observe the blue and gold gloves from our boxing match earlier in the morning. The gold ones do less effort on the cell walls than the blue ones. That means that the boss cheated me. It makes me feel better now because without the advantage she would be dead meat.
***
I wake up the next morning with a plate set aside me. it’s filled with some protein, blue shake and a sandwich filled with tomatoes, onions, cabbage, and other veggies. They were trying to keep my blood healthy.
***
The boss comes to visit me every night. It’s creepy how she checks on me like a minion. I bet you she’s not even the real boss who talked to me the first time. I swear the boss might be a boy.
Tonight when the boss comes to visit me, I stare blankly into her eyes and ask,
“How did you kill your parents?” she’s startled I even ask this question.
“With my bare hands.” she says calmly, sitting down next to me, stroking my hair in a weird cat like manner.
“Why did you do it?”
“For the money of course. To start this whole dream of mine.”
“How did you get the money.” I ask.
“Didn’t I already tell you this?”
“Yes.”
“Then why ask?”
“Because I wanna know if you are the real boss.” she slaps me.
“Don’t ask that again.”
***
I don’t understand why the boss has to make such a big deal over the question I asked last night. Maybe it’s personal. Maybe she’s not the real boss. Maybe she is and is offended that I would even have second thoughts.
***
Later that night I hear voices outside of my cell.
“Terminate her.” the ‘boss’’s voice is like sand.
“You mean the one’s sister? then she’ll…” the guard drops his voice. “Kill herself.”
“i don’t care. How dare she ask such a question. Even if I am not the boss boss I am still the boss.”
“Yes ma’am.”
“See that’s what I mean.” she chuckles flipping her curls over her shoulders. “Men go head over heels for me.” the boss continues.
“If only that silly girl knew that Cathy was the boss.” she chuckles. “What a wonderful world.”
My jaw drops at her words. Cathy. The girl who had been the first person she saw after her black out. That crazy woman with the clickety clack heels. She was the boss.