Chapter 1: Twenty-five

(( Playlist: Burn it Down by Linkin Park))

Have you ever seen betta fish tanks? The smallest ones in the market? They are the size of water bottles, with each containing a single fish. Despite being tiny itself, the fish could not swim around in such a tank. Sometimes, a large tank is divided into multiple compartments of that size.

Now Imagine rows and rows of those rectangular glass compartments, increase the scale of the size and replace each betta with a human, more accurately, a small human, and there you have it home sweet home for nameless children.

The entire floor comprised a hundred of those transparent coffin rooms. It was bedtime, and the light was dim. They were all supposed to be sleeping on their narrow beds in their rooms. Unlike betta fishes, they were not expected to bump into the wall or go into a fight with another male. They were as obedient as a human could be.

The walls were not ordinary glass though they looked it because ordinary glass would not send electrical shockwaves into your body whenever you pressed it a bit too hard. Such as when you would hit it in an attempt to escape. Not that these boys on this floor would ever try that, because they had learned enough.

Each room included a sparkling white and multi-functioning single bed, a shower, and a toilet in plain sight. In fact, everything was in plain sight and there should be no secret whatsoever.

A bright green digital number showed at the front of every room. Those were a glaring sight on the transparent walls under the dim light. Most numbers were three or four digits and only one was a two-digit: 0025.

Inside the room, with the number twenty-five, lay a boy on his bed, just like the boys in other rooms around him. He was around 13 or 14, looking one of the oldest, though he was not one of the biggest. But to be fair, no one was big in this place either.

Besides being so thin and pale, every exposed skin that was not covered by a white shirt and white pajama pants looked visibly unhealthy with bluish spots and yellow skin patches. They were probably the only colors in this see-through sparkling white room.

His eyelids were twitching as though he was dreaming.

“I hate it here,” said a tiny voice, followed by a hiccup. Subject 25 was not sure who said that. While he was still wondering that question, a gigantic monkey was in his room, filling the entire space and it turned out the monkey was him. Suddenly, it was dinner time. There was his dinner plate filled with metal insects that would cut his guts.

He tried to run away when a blinding white light appeared. He was looking at the back of a child about four or five, in white clothes similar to what he was wearing. Short hair, brown, was a shade lighter than his own. The child took a few steps forward and then disappeared into the white light, which was shocking to him even in the dream.

Before his surprise ended, a big laughing face was blocking his view. “You are not a human. You are a subject, twenty-five,” said the woman while laughing. His dreams abruptly stopped, his eyes flew open, breathing hard and his heart beating so loud under the ribs.

“A new day has arrived,” a melodious feminine voice announced from somewhere. “Let’s rise to the day and fulfill our duties.” Simultaneously, all the rooms were brightened up.

The boys got up from bed immediately. There was no one trying to get more sleep, except a couple of them who did not move at all. One was the kid in the room next to twenty-five's. A few years younger than him. Twenty-five knew what was going to happen to his neighbor, though the most part had already happened. Anyway, a new kid would arrive in that room the next day. He was used to it.

There was no time for curiosity or any kind of emotion. The mystery voice was instructing what they were supposed to be doing. Without giving a glance to other rooms, though everything was transparent, the boys cleaned up themselves.

All the while, the voice was announcing in a pleasant voice the punishments for disobeying their duties and not meeting the standards they were supposed to fulfill. The punishments were in different ranges, starting from reducing meals to the shock-wave and “the ultimate duty”.

The noon had arrived, and they had never left their coffin rooms. The beds folded and disappeared into the floor and other things came out such as the walking machine or a chair. Changes of clothes dropped into each room from the ceiling, along with the packets and bottles for their meals.

“Subject 0025, prepare for your health improvement, dear,” said the voice, gently, like a mother or an aunt would talk to their kids. Twenty-five flinched, followed by self-loathing and self-pity for that flinch. He hated how he couldn’t help but be scared whenever he heard that phrase “health improvement” followed by his number.

Exactly two minutes later, the front wall rose into the white ceiling. He stepped out into the corridor to the waiting person. No, he knew it was not a person, though he had never been told otherwise. Despite appearing as a grown-up man and behaving exactly like a man, he was not a man. He was something else.

The man beamed at him as though this was the most wonderful moment for twenty-five. Together, they headed toward the end of the floor along the narrow corridor. From his peripheral vision, he could see other kids were watching him from within their rooms from left and right. He knew they would be secretly relieved because he would have been if someone else was in his place.

Most kids wouldn’t have survived over five times in that place where he was going toward. But he had survived exactly twenty times. He had always been here. There was no other memory other than the ones inside this gleaming white world. This could be his last day. No one could possibly survive twenty-one times. Fear was growing inside his stomach along with the steps he was taking. He did not want to die.

***

From the thick, dark clouds emerged more than a dozen hovercars to the bright sunlight. All neon blues and round and compact. In the direction they were heading, stood a cylindrical building rising several miles from the ground.

“Entering the stratosphere. UV protection increased. Anti-bacteria mode activated,” the systems informed the passengers inside the vehicles. As the vehicles got closer, a small hole expanded on the circular rooftop before finally creating an open space.

All hovercars opened the doors except one hovercar, pouring out men in black suits, all tall and extremely well built. They surrounded one particular hovercar where the last man emerged. With blond hair, dark blue suits, and shining boots, he was neither particularly tall nor imposing as the rest.

In the hall below the rooftop, an awaiting crowd ran toward the man in the dark blue suit just as an elevator door opened. “Mr. Wafford. President-elect Mr. Wafford,” they shouted. Mr. Wafford smiled easily at the anxious people, showing his pearly white teeth, looking charismatic and trustworthy as a leader would be.

The crowd threw him the questions that journalists would usually ask the presidents-elect of CNA - Continental North America. The more outrageous comments they received from him, the better the headlines would be.

“Are you confident that you are going to win this continental elections, Mr. Wafford?”

“What is your response to the remark of your rival, Ms. Prisillica?”

“Do you deny her accusations?”

“Are you trafficking arms as the rumors claim?”

Mr. Wafford sighed as if he was trying to be patient with the immaturity of the crowd. “Ms. Prisillica is not my rival. I don’t consider her one,” he said softly but clearly. “Because I am not competing with her. Not for the power. Not for the status. I am trying my best to gain a chance to serve North America and I believe she is doing the same. As for her accusations, maybe she was getting a little too anxious. Thank you.”

Surrounded by his bodyguards, he strode toward the other end of the hall in confident strikes. In his wake, reporters scurried to the elevators around the hall whose walls were now showing the video clips of Mr. Wafford, waving, smiling, and greeting.