Savages

"So, who's gonna spill the beans on what the fuck is going on?" Louis crossed his arms over his chest and leaned back into the cushions of the couch, his anger clearly evident.

"I'm curious to know where the hell she came from," Zayn stated with a nod in my direction.

Paul cleared his throat and sat himself down on the ledge of the window, his eyes hovering over each boy that occupied the couch before falling onto Meghan.

"Show them," Paul urged. Meghan let out a hefty sigh, her fingers loosening on the black portfolio in her hands, and tossed the object on the coffee table in front of the boys.

"What's this?" Liam asked as he slowly opened the cover.

"That's all the information we have on you and the other targets that the Savages are trying to take down," Meghan explained.

"Savages?"

"The Savages are a large group of people that have lived underground for nearly three decades now. They are the outcasts of society and rejects from government positions that are in the process of up-rooting every solid belief the public have about themselves," Paul elaborated. Rubbing a hand over his face he continued, "Their main objective is singling out the things and people that the public idolize and completely wiping them off the planet. The red 'exes' are the targets that have already been neutralized."

"Whitney Houston, Steve Jobs, Michael Jackson," Liam's voice trailed off as the boys continued to flip through the pictures.

"Those are just the most recent ones. As you can see, they're aiming at celebrities. The deaths of course were covered up by our organization to look like natural causes or drug related incidents, but sooner or later the public isn't going to be so naive."

"Your organization?" Harry looked up from the photos and raised a brow at the two people in front of him, his brain still trying to fold over all the new information being fed to it.

"The O, standing for organization, was formed over twenty years ago by people related to the Savages. The mission was simple, stop them. Keep them underground for as long as possible and make sure the public knows nothing about them. Somewhere along the way, the Savages started getting outside help from diplomats all over the world. We're still unsure how, but the fact of the matter is they need to be stopped."

"How are you involved Paul?" Louis kept his icy glare on the bodyguard.

"I'm the assistant to the second in command of the organization. I was assigned to your group after you had been formed on the X-Factor to keep a close eye on the people you got involved with. We had a hunch that you would soon be added to the list."

"Wait, let me get this straight," Liam rubbed his temples, "there are people out there trying to kill us, at this very second? And you're supposed to keep that from happening?"

"More or less, that is correct."

"And you, Meghan, you were planted in this building on purpose, weren't you?" She bit her bottom lip and avoided Louis' gaze but nodded, wringing her fingers together with the bottom of her shirt.

"Her father is second in command for the organization."

"This is all just fucking great!" Louis slammed the portfolio shut causing the other four members on the couch to jump. "For the icing on the cake I'm going to take a wild guess and say that you and Elle aren't related then either, right?"

"No."

"Then please, tell us, how she fits in the fucking picture. Assuming she's a she, should I be calling her an it?"

"Lou!" Liam shoved his friend hard in the shoulder and lifted his brown eyes to my figure standing on the other side of the window with my gaze focused out the glass fixture.

"What?! Do any of you not see how fucked up this whole thing is?!"

"Just, calm down."

"My name isn't Elle," my voice instantly caught their attention, "not officially."

"I never would've thought that," Louis muttered earning himself another smack in the arm.

"I was the only one out of 40 test subjects to survive the genetic modifications performed over the course of 19 years. Before being released I was only ever referred to as number 37." I pulled my eyes away from the small group of birds that were perched on the building across the street and turned to the curious bodies, all 7 pairs of eyes now focused on me. "I was never treated as a human being, never spoken to outside of the tests and trials, and spent every night in a cement room up until the day I was released. The only human interaction I had taken part in was with the scientists and nurses that continuously poked needles into my skin. If my memory serves me correctly, I have close to 15 different abilities that no other human on the planet is capable of. There may be more that have yet to develop."

"How do you know you're human?" Niall asked quietly.

"My mother abandoned me when I was 9 months old. She sold me to a man in a clinic for five hundred dollars. That man was Henrick Jacobs, the leading scientist in the underground facility I was raised in."

"If you have all these, super-human abilities, why are you here? Shouldn't you be out stopping those people?" Harry's gaze was belittling, his green eyes dark and narrowed, but I didn't look away.

"I was sent here by the organization to protect you and your band mates. The Savages will not stop unless you are killed and I'm here to make sure that doesn't happen."

An awkward, tension filled silence settled in the room and I listened to the boys shuffling on the couch, each one holding a different heart beat, until Liam finally cleared his throat.

"So, uh, what are we supposed to do?"

"Keep living your lives like nothing happened. The only way to make it hard for the Savages to get to you is to stay out in the public eye. Shows, interviews, benefits, everything you've been doing for the last two years."

"You're asking us to live like we weren't just told someone wants us dead?" Zayn couldn't keep his mouth from hanging open.

"Yes."

"This is bloody ridiculous. You can't honestly be serious," Harry snapped.

"If I could change the situation, I would in a heart beat. You have no idea how hard it is to keep something like this from you guys. But I will fight to the death for each and every one of you," Paul gushed, his eyes glazing over slightly as he spoke.

"Can we have a moment to talk? Alone?" Liam looked to the three of us and Paul stood from the ledge first, heading to the front door and holding it open for Meghan and myself.

"We'll be right out here."

Once the door was shut both bodies to my left released heavy sighs, Meghan's hands immediately going to her hair and tugging softly. Paul just stood still against the wall and stared at a random speck on the ceiling with his hands shoved into his pockets. Turning away from both of them I let my feet carry me to the door that lead to the stairwell, Meghan's questions left unanswered as the door slammed shut behind me.

A light breeze picked up the loose strands of hair around my face while the sun painted the sky a tint of orange and pink. Standing along the southwest corner of the roof, I replayed the conversation like a broken record in my mind, analyzing the movements and words.

How do you even know you're human?

I asked myself the same question years before while crying myself to sleep in the darkness of the 'cage,' wondering what I had done to deserve what I was going through.

Physically, I was the perfect figure for a woman. I had well-rounded breasts, slim torso, lean legs, and slender fingers. My hair was soft, brown, and naturally wavy when left to dry on its' own and my eyes were the perfect shade of blue, mastered by Henrick and his comrades at an early age.

Emotionally I was unsure. I thought logically, acted on impulse, and was in a constant state of calm. But was it enough?

Surely I had passed as human for nearly a week, a normal teenager living with her cousin in a foreign country. The way my body reacted to Harry's touch proved human enough, unsettling my state of calm rather quickly. The warmth that spread through my body when Meghan laughed or told me I did something right, that had to mean something.

Maybe it wasn't the question of whether I was human or not. My brain told me I was a human being.

Could I ever feel human? Share the same emotions? Experience love or hate?

Those were the biggest questions I had to face.