Prologue:

So here I am. Sitting. Looking at a bleach white wall, not moving, just, staring. Wishing to be above the ground on top of this mountain I am trapped beneath. I wish to be under the dark sky full of the dancing sliver of the night. I wish to be with my mom, my dad, my sister, my brother even, but no I am here, waiting.

 

Men In The Dark Glasses

 

 

It all started on June fifteenth, two days before school let out. The ambiance of summer floated lightly around the room. Everyone was beaming and wiping their desks down. No one but my friend Kris and I noticed the burly policeman with dark shades that had just swept in and took Kris into the hallway. I glanced up at Ms.Jopkins (my fifth-grade teacher) and she didn’t seem to notice either. As minutes passed I became slightly concerned. Being the curious person I am, I had to check to see what was happening. Kris is the kindest, quietest and best-behaved person I’ve ever met (to be fair, which is not a lot of people) - what could she have ever done? I slipped closer to the door and pressed my ear to the cold metal.

 

“She did nothing” Kris exclaims.

 

Who is this “she” I wonder?

 

A deep voice answers, “Are you sure, girl?”

 

“Yes,” she manages to croak out.

 

I hear the policeman opening a case and pulling out a clunky metal machine that I suspected to be a polygraph. I peek around the corner and find that my suspicions are correct. I hear Kris being hooked onto the machine. I know that sound by heart because my mom is a policewoman in another city. She once told me that polygraphs aren’t very reliable, you can “beat” them by simply calming your nerves. I sneak one more glance around the corner and see Kris’s panicked face. I try my best to mentally communicate to her to calm down! I almost yell out to her but I quickly remember the policeman standing next to her and I refrain.

 

While this is going on I had not noticed that my teacher is handing out end of the year report cards. I hear Kris’s name being called and I walk over to pick it up for her to do her a favor.  Ms.Jopkins doesn’t seem to care about this. My packet is next since Kris’s last name is Warren and mine is  Ziegler.  Ms.Jopkins gives me my report card but hesitates a second and says “Elle you had an extraordinary report card - I suggest you partake in advanced mathematics”.  I nod in agreement and walk away toward my desk and sit down. I pull out my report card and find that I have all A’s. I don’t have much time to soak in the glory before the policeman walks back in with a handcuffed sobbing Kris. Now he has the whole class’s attention. The looks on their faces are all saying “Really, Kris?”  He walks over to Ms.Jopkins and whispers some harsh words to her. She nods, and he walks over to me and handcuffs me as well! I freeze in shock as he drags Kris and me out of the building and shoves us into a police car. For some reason, the police car has no light on top.

 

He turns out the sirens and we speed off. Kris looks at me for reassurance but I can’t offer much. We just sit there in silence staring at each other. Finally, she manages to squeak out “Elle, we're gonna be okay, right?” Knowing that Kris has anxiety issues I try my best to reassure her by nodding a little bit. She sighs a bit. Then I timidly ask “are our parents being called?” He nods gruffly and keeps driving. I sit there for what feels like hours. I smell a funny garbage like smell. Suddenly I fall asleep.

The next day in the Bentley Hollow Journal:

Missing, two girls accompanied by a policeman. Last seen at Bentley Elementary. Eloise Ziegler is an 11 year-old caucasian female with blond hair and brown eyes, last seen in a green shirt with a blue jacket and blue jeans about 5 foot. Kris Warren is a 10 year-old pale caucasian female with red hair, pale blue eyes, and freckles last seen in the purple shirt with a flower on it and blue jeans about 4 ft 5 inches. Policeman(name unknown)is a male (age unknown) with brown hair and brown eyes last seen in policeman's outfit about 6 ft 3 inches.

I wake up in a white room with nothing in it. As I gain consciousness I realize I am sitting in a gray metal chair. Not only sitting but I am tied down to the chair! Then it all hits me.The car ride - the funny gas - and Kris, wait where is Kris? I start panicking even more than I already am. I struggle against my restraints for a couple minutes but get nowhere.

 

An hour later a tall slender man with dark glasses strides in and places a plate of food in front of me and says to eat. He unlocks the chains restraining me and walks away. I am left staring at a plate of awful looking food but I do what I am told and eat. I take bite after bite of the green pile of mush and slowly spoon some into my mouth and attempt to swallow; it barely makes it down. I continue this process until my green mush is gone.

 

About two uneventful days have gone by. They never turn the lights off so I am not totally sure exactly how many days have passed. Every day the same thing happens, the man slips through the door with green mush, unties me, leaves, I eat green mush, he comes back to pick up the plate and ties me back up again. I am guessing they have cameras somewhere in the room but I am yet to find them. I try to sleep most of the time but it is hard because of the blinding lights.

Just as sleep starts to fall over me I hear the blaring of sirens and my door opens all the way. A scruff malnourished boy peers in and curses and says “wrong room” and almost slams the door but then says “What the hell? Come on, you ready to get out of here?” I nod my head enthusiastically and he grabs me and runs. I say “wait, what about my friend!” And he replies with “Forget about it, you can tell the police later. But for now, do you want to live? Answer Yes. Well then let's go.” He opens another door and a small boy is curled up inside. He runs out with the small child in his arms and shouts “GO! GO! GO! GO!”, even though it sounded more like “GOGOGOGO!”. He takes some very weird winding and confusing turns while sprinting at top speed, which is much faster than I could ever go but somehow I manage to not fall too far behind. We reach a big metal door and he tells me to stop and stay here with Chase. He hands me the small child and runs down a different corridor. It is just me, the sirens and this “Chase”. I wonder where the guards could be but my thoughts are interrupted by the rumbling of heavy footsteps. We have company. The kid who broke me out appears by my side and the door pops open.

 

A line of heavily armed men wearing glasses face us and the boy whispers ”Don’t move”. I freeze. I pretend that there is ice seeping into my veins slowly freezing me. The men don’t move either. We stand there for five minutes and suddenly the men nod to each other and leave. We walk straight out of this horrid place. We are left facing a raging river.

 

“The ‘glasses’, they only sense movement.”

 

I look at him dumbfounded.

 

“My name is Jasper by the way”.

 

“I’m Elle”, I reply breathlessly, “ How do we leave this island?”

 

“The ‘copter should be here in three, two, one...”  

 

A helicopter touches down right on top of the building. We grab Chase who is still asleep and scamper up the white dome that just ten minutes ago we had been trapped inside. The helicopter driver is also wearing those glasses. Jasper approaches him and starts punching him in the guts. While the guy is holding his gut, Jasper sneaks up behind him and takes him out. “Grab Chase and get in the ‘copter.” I do as I am told. “Do you know how to fly one of these?” He replies “Um no.” He reaches down into his pants pocket and extracts a pair of the glasses that all the guards were wearing. He tells me “Once I put the glasses on I will know how to fly the ‘copter. But once we touch down, do all you can to get them off me. Because if they are on too long I will get addicted to them”. “How do you know all about these glasses?” I ask. “‘Cause I invented them.” Then he slips on the glasses and the copter takes flight.

 

The flight lasted about an hour until we started to see land. Jasper began to lower the helicopter into the middle of a street. I got ready to wrestle the glasses from Jasper. The heli touched down and I grabbed Jasper and in one swift movement, yanked the glasses off. “Thanks” he murmured.

 

“What just happened?”

 

“Well, I just landed a ‘copter in the middle of a street in...I don’t know. Now where is Chase?”

 

I hand him the sleeping child. “We need to get him to a hospital now!” Jasper exclaims.

 

“Well I think our ride has arrived.”

 

About twelve police cars surround us. We slowly get out of the copter with our hands up. They point all their guns at us. Once they see we are just kids, they all motion to lower the guns. We drop our hands and who I believe is the police chief approaches us. He takes one good look at me and says “Hey, aren’t you that missing girl from Bentley Hollow?” I nod slowly. “Where is the other one then?” I look at the ground. He nods. The policeman looks at Jasper and shouts to his men “cuff him”. He grabs me and pulls me away from Jasper. “Stay away from this one - he is one of the most wanted criminals”

 

We are shoved into different police cars and taken to the station for interviews.

 

A couple hours later I am on my way back to Bentley Hollow without Kris. That's what hurts the most. I overheard that the small child Chase was taken to the hospital and is doing a lot better. The police tell me they are rescuing all the kids trapped in that facility. I still wonder what went on there but for now I am satisfied.

 

Epilogue:

Jasper’s Police Report:

Jasper Cengi Lacelooth is a 16 year-old male.Against his will he got involved in helping the Truce Company create a testing site for mutating children. Jasper and his brother Chase were one of the first kidnapped to be tested on. They soon realized that Jasper was a technological genius. He was threatened with his sanity and his brother’s life to create the glasses. In a couple of months, his picture was leaked and he was added to the most wanted list. The glasses were finally done but Truce realized there were two major flaws. One, the glasses weren't able to sense movement and two, if you wore the glasses too long you started to get “addicted” to them. One man kept his glasses on too long and started putting the glasses on all the others at Truce and soon no one could take the glasses off.  Jasper had already been locked away so he had no knowledge of this. But when the people who entered to feed him,  they always made the same exact path towards him and did all the exact same movements. He put two and two together - all the men were being controlled by the same program, his program. He didn’t know what to do so he made a plan to escape with his brother. He had thought his brother was in Elle’s room but he was wrong and that is how he met Elle. They eventually found his brother and escaped by helicopter and landed on a busy street in Stuart, Florida.

Kris was found later and brought home to her delighted family.