Last summer, I challenged some of my students to help me with some columns over the summer. They gave me the first and last lines of a potential fictional short story. My task was to take those lines and write the middle. It was a lot of fun, so I’ve asked my students to help me again. This week’s inspiration was again provided by Jordan Horejsi.
I was surrounded by a ball of light when all my buddies decided to wake me up with their flashlights. We were out on a camping expedition in the woods outside of town, something we did on a regular basis during the summer. I had been the first one to nod off, so they figured they’d get me this way rather than the old warm water on the wrist trick or something equally dree.
After I rubbed the sleep from my eyes, everyone decided to settle in for the night. Of course, I was wide awake now, but it wasn’t long before I was surrounded by chainsaw sounds from my snoring friends. I figured to go for a little walk in the woods to try to relax.
You might think, what are a bunch of kids doing unsupervised in this day and age? Our small town in Utah might seem like the stereotypical area where nothing bad can happen since everyone knows everyone else. If you think that, you would be right. But on this night, that stereotype would expand to the one where something terrible happens anyway.
I was making my way through some familiar areas, brightened by the full moon overhead. It was a brisk night, with a light breeze and bugs sounding off from all directions. Suddenly I tripped over something on the ground and hit the forest floor with a thud. I was, once again, surrounded by a ball of light as floodlights turned on.
I had tripped on a wire that was one of many criss-crossing the ground. Before I knew what was happening, a cage sprang up from a tarp on the ground with the top lowering from a pulley system above. I was so startled that I didn’t even notice the people rushing up to the cage from the north, the direction of the local highway.
I turned around when I heard one of them gasp. “Oh no,” another said.
I stayed back from the bars of the cage, having seen enough movies where there’s electricity running through them to know better. “What’s going on?” I asked, trying to keep my voice much more calm than I felt.
The three people who had arrived turned away from me and huddled together. One of them finally pulled out a phone and walked away as he began a conversation with someone on the other end. “Come on, let me out!” I shouted. I was about half a mile from the campsite, so it seemed unlikely any of my friends would hear me, especially with the racket they were making with their snoring.
The man with the cell phone came back and hurriedly discussed something with the others. A woman pulled out a syringe from her jacket pocket and moved toward me. “Whoa, whoa, whoa,” I said, backing away from her. “That looks like a bad idea, lady.”
I was suddenly grasped from behind by someone I hadn’t seen initially, but who must have come from the opposite direction. Well, at least I knew the bars weren’t electrified. The woman came around to that side of the cage and put me to sleep with a push of the syringe.
For a third time that night, I was surrounded by a ball of light. I was strapped to a table inside a sterile-looking laboratory with bright lights shining down on me. I tried to test my bonds, but there was no give. These people were professionals.
A tall man walked in the room, wearing a lab coat and joined by the woman who had drugged me. “Young man, it is unfortunate that you are here,” he said.
My snarkiness emerged. “Well, there’s an easy solution to that,” I responded. “I’ll leave. If you would be so kind?” I raised my wrists as high as I could.
The man gave me a wry smile. “We meant to capture some animals from the forest, some foxes or raccoons perhaps. They would have worked to do some of our trials upon. But since we’re a bit, how should I say this?” He pondered for a moment. “A bit outside the legal bounds of testing, we can’t afford for anyone to know what we’re doing, and unfortunately, teenage boys tend to talk about everything.”
“I can keep quiet,” I said.
“Oh, I’m sure you will,” he replied. “But first we’ll see if this serum we devised will have an impact on your physiology.”
“What is it meant to do?” I asked, more than a little frightened and trying to stall for time.
“Heal a creature from devastating wounds,” he told me.
“But I don’t have…” I trailed off as I saw him take a knife from a table.
My throat began to dry out and my head felt like it was on fire. I strained against the ropes holding me down again and thought I felt some give this time. But it was too late. The man stabbed me in the leg and I let out a scream of pain.
And then it happened. The heat in my head spread to the rest of my body and I flexed and burst out of the ropes. The man was so startled that he stumbled back and inadvertently stabbed the woman with him in the arm. Her scream drew his attention away from me.
I raced for the door and quickly found my way out of the building. We were on the outskirts of my town in a big shed that hadn’t been used for years. I headed straight for the police station and sent them to that location.
Once I had explained my story, the police and my own family attributed my escape to one of those rare bursts of adrenaline that you hear about, like when someone lifts a car to save another person, but I prefer to think that’s how I discovered my powers!
Word of the Week: This week’s word is dree, which means tedious or dreary, as in, “The dree lecture seemed like it would never end until a power outage provided an unexpected release.” Impress your friends and confuse your enemies!