Chp1: [Hospital City] Escape the Hospital

The first story

This artikle is under construction*

*Trigger Warning*

Ellis x9x

Keuren x18x

Alex x25x

(Long)

5 August 2020

Last Night,

I dreamt about the hospital.

A place where experiments happen and machines run control.

The first thing I remember is Ellis and Jonathan being trapped there.

Ellis, so young, was taken to a military boarding school for young children by her father. It was a huge, outdoor school campus that used to be a military base: Empty, dry heat, open dirt fields and sandbags stacked around them. There were many, many children, teens, and not enough adults. The entire school was almost completely adolescent run except for the instructors. The amount of children probably had something to do with the impoverishment of the area Ellis lived in. She stayed close to the lots in a dorm building. Everyday the kids were raised up early for working out, breakfast, military training until noon and then lunch. After lunch they did electives, which for Ellis were music and dance. For military training she started in combat and radio communications. The lunch block that Ellis was slotted for was the very last lunch slot available, and the teen cooks always picked on her for standing out. Ellis had average features, but her skin was so dark, it was almost silver, it glowed against her deep eyes and lightning hair. 

Ellis learned she looked different from a young age...

At one point Ellis was drugged and raped by a circle of the cafeteria boys. They did it repetitively, no matter how much she fought back, or who she told. No one cared, and they called her a whore. When she tried to change lunch shifts she was yelled at by the administrators, who really didn't want to hear it. Ellis would cry out that they were touching her, and they would just laugh in her face. Ellis started getting stronger over the course of the year. She was getting to the point where fighting on her own wasn't a problem, but the food started making her sick because of the drugs. So she stopped eating. A girl with short dark hair noticed and would watch her at lunch sometimes, she said that she knew what they were doing to her and it wasn’t right. Ellis just listened. The girl saw them the day they held the concertina wire around Ellis so she wouldn’t move. And the day they dragged her and held her down on the scorched tire chips. The girl offered for Ellis to stay with her in her personal dorm, so she did. 

The girl was young, like Ellis except maybe 2 years older around 10,  and lived in a dilapidated building with several other people. They lived in an abandoned mock city that was used for training. She had an entire floor to herself though. A large screen tv, a dirty kitchen, a mattress on the ground and only one light in the middle of the entire ceiling above where the mattress was. Everything was a dark wood and you could barely see anything. She had art all over her walls that she created herself. Huge canvases with hot colored cats painted on them. The art seemed to be a mixture of pop and abstract. Some of the pieces were just filled canvases of random colors  that she had painted. They were so large that they should’ve been able to cover a normal sized wall, but because the inside looked more like a warehouse, they just appeared to be average sized art. She had the larger canvases posted so that they were covering the windows inside. In the front room, where the largest window was hung, was "the cat". Behind the canvas, it said, “Love you”. This part of the ink was lighter, but didn't interrupt the art, so the sunlight came through the translucent paint giving the gloomy room natural brightness. The girl plopped down in the front room in front of a large, cracked flat screen tv to play video games. Ellis took a walk around to look for some food. She elbowed past the decorations of puffed up paper mache cat faces strung from the ceiling, “What do you eat?”, she yelled to the girl. 

“There’s some chips in there!” Ellis grabbed the orange bag of chips and sat down next to her. She felt safer here, and eventually went and grabbed her things and moved in. She didn’t have much choice... 

Ellis saw the other people living in the building were older and didn’t go to the program the two young girls did.

“Who else lives here?” Ellis asked her.

“My sister used to. But she only comes back sometimes. She lives with her boyfriend now.” 

“Oh okay.” Ellis would have the girl bring her food from the cafeteria, and sometimes the girl’s older sister would stop in like she said and drop off Chinese or some other take out. Some times some cash for her friend in the building, but that was it. The older sister was obviously on drugs, and would throw crazy parties with Ellis and the girl on any given day. 

Ellis stayed there for almost 2 years until her friend disappeared one day and never came back. Children would often die in training, so Ellis decided that was what happened. She bopped one of the mobile paper mache cat heads hanging from the ceiling and wondered what she was going to do next. 

She went back to the dorms, being a whole 10 years old at this point. Sometimes she would also go back to the house and see her sister Keuren, who wasn’t in any better shape. Skinny, and deprived, she was constantly in the middle of a storm doing their father’s dirty work, all without being killed. Ellis was afraid to tell Keuren about what was happening, because she knew her solution would be to get rid of every single person in the camp. So, she decided to be strong and tough it out on her own. She would finish the program just like her sister did.

There were new cafeteria workers now and there were only one or two of the bullies left behind from that first year so, Ellis was in the clear— but what she didn’t know was that they were working in different positions and were going to make her life hell. They were now counselors, group leaders, and classroom assistants and she saw at least 2 of them everyday.

That third summer, They had their usual military games and exams and they were a little tougher on Ellis’ aging group. The heat outside was unbearable and the sand was littered with trash from the neglect. Ellis’ team won a baseball game where the opposite team’s coach was one of the men from the cafeteria. (Baseball was supposed to teach them speed, distance and physics). Every chance he got stared at Ellis, Ellis would connect eyes with him and wonder what he was thinking. A kid on the team named Jonathan took advantage of the captain's distraction and made a win for them, he also made it a point to be friends with Ellis, just to piss him off further. Even though Ellis was aware what was happening, it made her feel powerful beating that creep in something...and she was grateful for a new friend. 

Jonathan had dark skin that glowed, snowy hair and strong but kind blue eyes. He looked like Ellis and was the same age as her, she always wanted to be around him. One day he asked if she wanted to go smoke with him and his friends after a match. Ellis had never, but she wanted to be cool like them. They walked for a good amount of time until they came to an abandoned shack near an empty lot with dying grass. They sat in the back of it and kicked the trash around, tires and other discarded car parts. 

“What is this?” Ellis asked with her hand out extended. Rolled herbs were placed in her hand

“It’s a plant.” Johnathan answered flatly.

Ellis awkwardly smoked it and burned her lungs doing it. 

“What the fuck!” She coughed for about another minute, and Jonathan and his friends made fun of her.

Then, she felt it - Peace.

“Wow.” Ellis started to feel the high. Everyone agreed in unspoken acknowledgement.

“Who was that guy who was coaching the team? He likes you.”, Jonathan said to Ellis.

“He’s a fucking weirdo who won’t leave me alon-”

“Yo, here he comes.” The coach and one other "now-adult-teen" from the cafeteria were walking towards the group.

“What the fuck are ya'll doing out here?” The coach strutted up.

“Minding our damn business.” Jonathan responded. 

The other counselor instigated in, “You can get kicked out for smoking. I’m reporting you.”

Jonathan stood up, “Psssshh! Yea right! Ellis already told us all about all the drugs yall got. You snitch we’re snitching too!” Ellis’ head whipped, she never said anything about drugs. 

“Ellis get over here.” The coach commanded her.

Ellis’ heart dropped, but she didn’t say anything or move.

The coach stomped towards Ellis and went to grab her arm, but Jonathan and his friends sprang up immediately and started beating on the coach and his yes-man counselor. Ellis joined in and fought and she felt powerful. All of the fighting that she had been taught over the past two years was instinctively flowing from her brain. The two guys ran off with swollen faces and the kids celebrated. Ellis decided to hang around Jonathan for a while after that and they became inseparable. They ended up moving into the empty space from her previous friend, and never questioned why the sister never showed back up, and why everything still worked. For the next two years they stayed there. People would move in and out with them. Friends would die or people would move on. The training got more difficult and more technical, the longer they stayed in it. Ellis’ classical dancing had improved, as well as her skills on the violin and guitar. In training, she was outrivaled the most in "Improvised Mechanical Work" and "Martial Arts", her speed was her greatest strength. Jonathan surpassed in "Battle Strategy" and "Digital Long Range Weaponry", they both excelled in each of their respective courses. Their friends became fewer and fewer as they matured and progressed through the course. Jonathan’s reason for lack of friends was because he was interested in men, and didn’t know how to express himself around other boys anymore. Ellis’ reason was because she only wanted to keep Jonathan to herself.

Out in training one day, Jonathan’s group was tasked with dismantling an old railroad track outside of the course compound. They had to figure out on their own how to remove it. It was tedious work, and Jonathan was sure the school was just being lazy. Jonathan bent over to touch the old metal and was electrocuted with a fleshy electrical burn spreading from his right hand down his side. He was taken to the medic, and no word was given to Ellis about what happened. That same night Ellis was visited, the same men that had raped her when she was 8 came into her dorm. All of them. They beat her badly and held her down while they took turns. Forced her to orgasm, and raped her longer. Ellis was badly injured afterwards and limped to the medic’s office in the middle of the night for urgent healing and to put out a signal for her missing friend. 

When she got to the clinic the lights were out and everything was closed.

“Fuck!”, She was so pissed. She didn’t want to be wounded, not right now.

She banged on the windows until she saw a light from a door opening in a distant room. The figure eventually came through the sliding doors, and it was the course program administrator. The same one who laughed her off when she was younger. 

Ellis walked straight past him and went to find a medic or someone who could help her. Hunched over in pain and limping through the empty waiting room she started opening all of the doors and eventually she found Jonathan inside one of the patient rooms on his backside.

He opened his eyes and turned to see who it was and immediately jolted, “Ellis! They’re gonna kick me out even though I was fucking set up!”

“What?!” Ellis couldn’t understand what he was saying. Jonathan was strapped down on a bed with just his pants on. Ellis could see his inflamed chest exposed. The administrator came in with a medic and asked what the noise was all about.

Ellis had forgotten about her pain for just that moment and explained to them that some men had broken into her dorm. She left out the rape, because she didn’t want the administrator to hear about it and would rather wait until he left. The medic said that he understood and would give her a serum that would help her wounds heal faster. He pulled out a syringe and stuck Ellis in the arm with it, but soon after she passed out and when she woke up it was day light and she was slouched over inside of a helicopter, way above bright, red earth that she had never seen before. 

Ellis was groggy but quickly became alert.  Jonathan was next to her, bound from the shoulders down like he was some sort of criminal. 

“Ellis, they did things to you while you were knocked out. I’m sorry…I couldn’t...do anything...” Johnathan started to sob.

Ellis could feel the pain, but pain was only another mouth to feed

“Stop crying. I don’t care anymore. Where are we going?” 

Jonathan sniffled and turned grimly to her, “To the Hospital, they said.”

Ellis’ eyes expanded and hopelessness set in. She knew what the hospital was: a place they sent souls to be separated from their bodies. They repurposed your spirit, and cut your natural connections from your source. People would come in and not come out, and if an ambulance showed up to a scene that meant trouble; the amount of souls they contained made their power unlimited; they were an undefeatable organization. Ellis tried to jerk her way out of her confines but couldn’t. She was just as tied down as Jonathan was. They struggled more, to no avail and eventually fell silent, which amplified the fear. Fear, Ellis hadn’t felt that in a while. She wasn’t afraid of anything, except for this. She couldn’t even reach her bracelet* to call for Keuren. 

***Bracelets are directly linked to your body’s electrical energy. They’re powered manually by touch and by a limited number of receivers in your pineal gland. 

“FUUUUUCK!” She screamed. “Let us out! Fucking let us out!” Ellis tried to thrash but it was wasted effort. The only other person in the helicopter was the pilot, who was obviously hospital staff. She looked out the window and could see blue water coming up.

“It’s the ocean.” She stated emptily.

Jonathan delivered more bad news, “Yea, you didn’t know? The Hospital is in the middle of the water...” He knew she would figure out the rest. They make it as inaccessible as possible. She looked out and could see a massive warship, bigger than any mass she’d seen in her life. 

Ellis sat back and stared blankly trying to think of a moment when they could escape.

“Ellis, listen…” Jonathan whispered. “The only way out of this is to pretend to go along. When they let their guard down. That’s when we’ll escape.”

“How?” Ellis whispered back.

“They’re going to disable our bracelets. After that is when we’ll run. They can’t track us.”

“How the fuck are we going to run at that point? We’re going to be fucked!” 

“Four days from now. No matter what. That’s when we’ll make a run for it. No matter what Ellis. Okay? If we can come back together on our own we can get out together. Don’t come and find me, just run out. I’ll meet you there. I fucking promise.”

Jonathan’s words always gave her so much confidence, so much hope, but this time she knew though, that one of them wasn’t going to survive. 

They were disembarked from the helicopter by brown uniformed shirts and slacks. These were their Soldiers. Their stretchers were rolled side by side and rolled across a platform of the ship. They faced each other the entire time, until they heard a barrier lift ahead of them and the natural light disappeared.

“Bye, Jonathan.” Ellis said, unable to control her emotions for the first time since she was younger. 

“Goodbye, Ellis.” Jonathan felt that he would never see her again.

They veered to different hallways. 

 The ceiling was rolling past her and she could see streams of code racing back and forth across it; fine like a strings of web.

The inside of the ship was high technology. Every surface was armed and neuro sensitive.

She was rolled into an old exam room that only contained a hospital bed and a sink. Ellis expected a torture chamber, but the ugly green walls made her more anxious. A female doctor came in and hit Ellis with another injection. Only a few seconds later, everything became hazy- blurs of metals, computers and skin. Her mouth tasted like blood. When Ellis woke up again she was clothed in a loose black dress, and all of her physical pain was healed. She was in a bedroom on top of a hotel-made bed and a metal ceiling fan was running.

...Oh…, she thought, ….They’ve already done everything to me…

She tried her bracelet and nothing appeared. She didn’t even know how long or how many days she’d been out. She gasped desperately in a sharp sob but then immediately caught herself. She could not be weak right now. She pushed away her thoughts and got straight up to open the bedroom door.

When it opened, she realized that the bedroom was just a holding room. It sat atop of a small hill of the red earth she had seen outside, but instead she was inside some dark dome. 

There were many women standing on the hill facing a digital wall in the distance. They each had the same dress as Ellis, standing inside of illuminating yellow circles with nameplates in front of their feet, vertically waiting at different levels. They were all older and much more beautiful than Ellis was. With dark hair and hips and full features, but mostly, they were all...happy.

A blonde woman pulled up to Ellis in a hovering mobile that looked like a bulky 90’s jet ski. The blonde had full cheeks and empty eyes. Her hair was tied up in a short greasy ponytail. 

“Ellis Mosha, this is your place until we can find you one. Your name plate is at the bottom there. Go stand by it.”

“How long have I been asleep for?” Ellis asked her.

“Name plate. Now!” The woman commanded.

Ellis scowled but did as the woman said. She found her name plate amongst the women and stood inside the yellow circle. A cylindrical hologram surrounded her and she was given a digital tour of her new: 

"To keep the ship running they have a certain number of women produce children so that the children can be trained to become engineers and mechanics. The women’s minds are already retired, and when they are done producing their bodies are retired as well. The other layers of their souls are recycled for future use for life saving research. Children born with disabilities or disadvantages are sent to a special sector of the ship where they are rehabilitated, or retired. "

Ellis felt something from that statement

...That’s where Jonathan is, I know it…

“There are limited slots for the amount of people allowed in the “Nature Lifing” program. So anyone that’s decided upon is truly privileged.”

...Or so they say...., Ellis rolled her eyes

Ellis’ role would be producing children. The tour explained to her that she was offered the best life a mind could ask for on the ship. 

Ellis looked around at all of the women, they all blinked together at the same time and repositioned their bodies periodically in sync. 

Ellis attempted to step outside of the hologram but the blue light surrounding her thickened into a solid wall,

...Fuck...how do I get out of here…

x. x.

Jonathan was stuck inside of the "Special Sector", completely on the other side of the ship. 

In and out of consciousness, he woke up to horse collars locking his torso down and a row of males restrained the same to his right.

He looked around the room, but didn’t dare look the other men in the face. He was inside of a buff colored, metal hallway and on the far left wall was a dark window the test drivers could see out from. One of them pressed a button behind the glass and then spoke,

"Okay. We’re going to be running a series of tests. They shouldn’t take very long and we’ll do them three times a day.” 

Jonathan and the other men next to him tried to struggle out every way they could. They could hear something like a laser sound swelling, and then what felt like brush burn being pressed into their skin. There was so much pain, it was like he was watching everything that happened to him from above. The experiments were changing him into different beings. First he was transformed into an elephant person, then next a wolf, then next an orange salamander. He screamed in agony after the first round, and the men beside him also moaned in great pain. His own voice was the loudest one heard and this made him realize with large terror that the other men were weaker because they had been there longer than him...he could be suffering for a while. 

“Going again!”

The machine rang again and turned him into a dark man, a carrot with its roots, a warrior man, and an orange salamander. These pulses happened several more times before they recessed. The men next to Jonathan were completely pale and thinned. There was a red headed man directly next to his right that looked like he used to be much bigger. His cheeks were sinking and his skin was thin around his muscles. Jonathan asked him if they fed them or let them use the bathrooms.

“Yea. Bastards. They keep us alive.”

Jonathan could not survive this much longer. By the next period of pulses he was vomiting and shaking. The researchers behind the glass only stopped for a moment. Someone in scrubs brought him a flavored drink and a small fan to mist him, then a towel to wipe his sweat.

A test driver’s voice came over the speakers very sincerely,   

“There’s no need to be anxious or feel bad! You’ll get used to it very soon!” 

They were only half right, Jonathan became exhausted from recoiling and was forced to accept the changes of state he was in and the levels of pain that came with each of them. The second round was finally over, but through his physical suffering, Jonathan recognized something different about himself, something that created a space inside of him: the orange salamander. There was always an orange salamander in each wave, he could turn himself into the small creature if he wanted to. He could probably move it as well. Mid -thought, everyone was released from the collars and the researchers encouraged the group to walk around for proper blood circulation. 

While they paced, Jonathan noticed a slight breeze on his feet and he looked down to his left to see where it came from. There was a gap between the floor and the base of the wall that was just tall enough for him to go through if he changed. He could see shadows of something passing by under it, which meant there was light 

….and traffic...another path….

A strange noise came from the right and Jonathan looked up to see a robot passing through mechanical flap below the researchers’ glass with food.

They each got a few sips of that same drink they were given when they were sick and packaged snack biscuits to eat. After about 30 min of resting, the "window researchers" ordered them back into their seats and soon after, the first pulse started up again. Jonathan was paralyzed in pain. He couldn’t even scream

...This is too much, I can’t do this!..,

The transformations were beyond any pain he had ever felt, and he was looped in an unending hell

On the second pulse Jonathan was turned into an adult version of himself, completely healthy and healed, and the pain from the torture was gone. But it felt too good, and he didn’t want to be tricked, so he focused and started remembering the salamander. He concentrated on the pain he needed to change into him. Before he knew it, he was splat on the floor. The researchers and men all let out a short gasp and the tests stopped. He took advantage of their surprise and rushed towards the space under the wall. It was a little farther than he anticipated but he made it under no problem. When he got to the other side it was an empty metal hallway, so he slithered across it to another door and went under. On the other side, he ended up on a gymnasium floor with a bunch of young men competing at something. Their movements were heavy and loud. He knew he’d be in danger if he didn’t change back quickly. He found himself in the locker and morphed back into his human form. He looked in the mirror, and he was surprised by a different image; he wasn’t himself, but the older healthier version he had been previously transformed into. He was around 17 now? He modeled the body of his older self for just a moment, then quickly found someone’s clothes and shoes in the locker room and headed out. Jogging past all of the dodgeball players he was called out,

“Hey! Where do you think you’re going?” 

Jonathan froze in place and panicked,

...I can’t believe I was caught so fast…There’s no way I can outrun them now…

The brown-haired man with a red sweatband walked towards him, “We’re missing a person. Hurry up! We need one extra!”

...This is another layer of torture…I’m busted…

Except against his logic excitement started to rise and he couldn’t deny how great he felt in this body,

...I could win this…

He tried out his new body and joined the dodgeball players. 

He impressed the teams with his agility, and they cheered around him with attention and comradery when he remained among the few standing. For just this moment again, he was able to feel what it was like to have a group of friends love him. He played carefree for a little longer until very familiar pains started surfacing throughout his body. He abruptly broke away and hurriedly tried to exit through a large gate but stopped short and doubled over when the pain took control. He looked at his arms and legs and noticed them very slowly changing back. Seeing them shrink provoked him into feeling even more unwell, forcing him to lean on the wall for support. His teammates mumbled in confusion and yelled after him. Jonathan knew he needed to separate from them as soon as possible, so he stumbled away, having to roll up his falling pants on the way out.

Jonathan ran down the hallways as fast as he could, turning in whatever direction he thought would get him to an exit. He stopped when he abruptly reached a room with very little light and multiple exits. His eyes went straight for the singular light on a wooden wall. The fixture was a bell shaped flower made of thick glass that had long browned from the constant heat. He got closer and saw the wood was paneling green wallpaper, and beneath the old light were cracked wooden boards painted with the hospital directions. He found “Center Hospital” painted in blue with a direction arrow and didn’t waste any time going to the left. He carefully crossed the old waiting room to the dark hallway and sprinted as soon as his feet hit the hard surface again. The path down the dark hallway stretched for miles it seemed, but to Jonathan everything became a blur. He kept running until he ran straight out into a bright hospital floor busy with doctors and Soldiers. There was an expansive desk in the center with nurses on holographic touch screens working, and groups of hospital staff entering and leaving large rooms. Most importantly, distant ahead was natural light. He slowed down and tried to appear confident crossing the expansive floor. He could hear his own breathing and needed to calm himself. He wasn’t sure what monsters were inside of the doctors, but exerting too much energy around them could signal them. How many others were lost inside those rooms. 

...madness...

Just a right turn at an intersection ahead of him, Ellis shot out from the hallway in a hospital gown. She hit a hard right at the corner and was almost out of site. 

He yelled out her code name, “Mie!” Ellis screeched forward as she changed her momentum, she snapped around and yelled, “Shit!” going back for Johnathan.

She grabbed his arm and pulled him to her level of speed, which was faster than he’d ever run. Their senses went blank as they pushed forward. There was no sound except the massive number of bodies now after them, and their own breathing that miraculously managed on its own. They let their instincts carry them both faster. The mission was the exit, and it was so close. Ellis could see the blinding light from outside

...We fucking made it!

Her emotions swelled up before she even reached the light, and when they both ran outside down the ramp, Ellis’ older sister Keuren and her partner Alex were already posed in the middle of a battlefield of hospital workers that they had absolutely slaughtered. They both were protected by their own digital shells.

“Mie!” Keuren yelled out in disbelief to Ellis. 

Ellis and Jonathan didn’t hesitate for a second and ran straight towards her, with the soldiers right at their heels. 

The second they made it past them, Alex made a swift motion as if she was pulling something out of the ground, and a digital curtain followed her fingertips up into a solid metal barrier between the hospital staff and the runaways

Keuren was already ahead with Ellis and Johnathan, aiming for the driver's seat. Alex caught up and they all hurtled inside of a running car and pulled off at top speed, listening the metal wall being dismantled behind them.

Keuren was breathing and driving faster than the car could go,

“I knew after I couldn’t check your heart beat on my bracelet that something was wrong. This will never happen again.”

And Keuren would make sure of it.

They still needed to get to the Hospital City where there was an exit. They rode in silence as the red earth winded past them and the gloomed city approached.

Keuren makes Johnathan get out of the car, he can’t go any further with them.

Jonathan is left walking down the road by himself a huge rock settles in Ellis’ heart as she knows she can’t even say goodbye to him.

Escape from Hospital City Part III

Keuren, Ellis and Alex become enclosed on the Hospital’s peninsula

The city sleeps in flames beyond them.

Breathing hurts the sweat falling burns. They’ve been running for hours. Hospital City is on alert. 

“Tonight is the night that they’re mobilizing a massive deployment of troops." A familiar voice says over the radio