Generation Red

The camera's light bulb flashed brightly. It hurt my eyes. The crowds of reporters screamed questions at me. It hurt my ears. The smell of sweat and perfume was extremely overpowering. It hurt my nose. The air tasted of anger and excitement and danger. It hurt my mouth. The police officer squose my arm. It hurt where he touched.

The entire paragraph above is a complete lie. I couldn't feel anything. When my agent told me to write this book, he said for me add the "human element." Put things like physical pain in the story to make people feel something towards me and those like me. But in truth, I haven't felt pain in years. And I don't think the others have either.

In truth, that day was just a bunch of confusion for me. I didn't feel any physical pain, but there was so much emotional and mental anguish that there might as well have been pain. All those reporters had crowded around me like a bunch of starving animals trying to get at their next meal. The only thing that stopped them was the barricade of police officer that were escorting me to my new safe house.

The safe house, though, consisted of a laboratory built to study and incarcerate those who were from Generation Red. This was the place that those of us who were rejected by our families went. It was for those whose parents were like mine: when I came back, they refused to see me, to touch me, to even acknowledge that I had come back. But who could blame them when just a couple of hours before, my funeral was being scheduled.

The only thing that is relevant about this part of the story is that I think its important. Its the only beginning I remember. People are constantly asking me what it was like waking up from the dead. I have to tell them that I don't know, because I really have no memory of the events leading to my Return. So this is the beginning I am going with.

It was mid-afternoon, and thanks to the ravenous reporters, it had taken longer than need be for me to get to Nex Labs, the safe house. The police officers were considerably kinder than they had to be. I think they confused dead for stupid, because spoke to me as if I were a child or a kitten that needed comforting.

The one that had held my arm was younger than most cops. He was just out of high school at the time. His name was Michael Washington. Later on, he and I became very good friends, but that is, as I said later. At that point in time, he was just some officer that kept squeezing my arm every time one of the paparazzi flung an offensive question my way.

There was only one question I answered that day. It happened as we were moving through. Some guy screamed "How do you feel?" For some strange reason, that was the only question that broke through the wall my mind had put up. I stopped, so did all the officers. Slowly I turned in the general direction. That was when everyone got quiet.

"How do I feel?" I said. My voice sounded strange, ragged and full of so many emotions. "I feel like I've just died and gone straight to hell." I've watched enough recordings of myself saying that, that I know that I was crying. And despite what people said, I did realize the irony in my statement.

The frenzy started all over again. They all wanted to talk to the first girl who had returned from the dead. Not the first person, just the first girl. The first female specimen (after 37 males) to return. Officer Washington had started pulling me along by that point, almost carrying me. I didn't feel my own tears falling down my face, but the cameras captured the whole scene of me being dragged along. Me with my stone cold face and leaking eyes.

---

Nex Laboratory was originally called Necrops Laboratory. It changed its name when there was a huge outcry about prejudice and what not. Some people may still remember that. It came a few weeks after I started off there. All the press started making me out as a poor girl and because of the footage of me crying (the first Gen. Red member to express any emotion) many people started to feel bad for us. Somehow I became the face of Generation Red.

But back to the story. When I entered Nex Lab, I was escorted through long white hallways, much like a hospital. We finally stopped at what I would like to call a reception desk. I would like to call it that, but the woman sitting behind the desk was someone I immediately didn't like. It's not because I'm a judgmental person, but Ms. Lecrois was one of those people who just looked mean and angry all the time, because she was.

When we approached, she looked at me and then the officers with what seemed like an increasingly unpleasant countenance. The frown seemed to deepen on her mouth every time her eyes crossed over me, and I got the feeling that she already didn't like me either. Now, to be fair, the woman was quite old; perhaps somewhere in her late sixties. Working with walking corpses probably wasn't the happiest job in the world, especially since they were all teenagers.

"Can I help you?" She asked in a snide voice. Her eyes continued to roam over us.

"May." A strong male voice said.

Ms. Lecrois, as her name tag stated, looked around confusedly. "Excuse me?"

"The proper way to say that would have been 'May I help you?' By using Can instead of May you were asking if you had the capability to help, something which only you yourself would be able to answer." The voice stated.

I looked around to see where it was coming from. Somehow, I had not seen the guy sitting in one of the many white chairs that seemed to surround the reception area. Maybe it was because his outfit was the same color white as everything else in the room. Maybe it was because my mind was still waking up from death.

But as soon as I saw him, I knew he was like me. Not because of all the rumors about rotting flesh or dead eyes or a grey complexion, it was something about the way he moved and the way his eyes seemed to feel like bottomless pools. That's what most people say our gaze feels like: being swallowed up by the ocean.

"Thank you for enlightening us, Mr. Clarks, but aren't you supposed to be in class?" The old woman remarked.

The boy snorted, surprising for one of our kind, and smirked. "Class was cancelled on account of our new celebrity arrival. The Doc told me to come down here and escort her to Induction."

"Fine. Officers, I believe you can go now. Thank you for escorting it." Ms. Lecrois stated. That wasn't the first time someone had called me 'it' and it wasn't the last. I didn't care and I still don't. If someone calls me that, then that is how they view me and I didn't have a problem with it, although some people did.

"Her name is Rayne, ma'am. She has a name." Officer Michael said. He looked at me and then at Ms. Lecrois, and then he left. The other two officers who were with him looked around awkwardly and then strutted away.

"Fine then. Mr. Clarks, please take Ms. Rayne to Induction." The old receptionist said. The boy seemed to appear by my arm.

"Great," he said, almost cheerfully, "everyone's been dying to meet you. You're a wanted person, you know." He said, his face almost stretching into a grin. Or maybe it just looked that way to me.

Bon Jovi popped into my head as we began to walk away.