[Summer 2014] AoC: Rogue Heroine

It’s the year 2014. The UN, several decades before, acted to create an artificial series of islands, later named Oxrell, in order to create a place of equality where everyone could live together in harmony. However, at this time, humanity began to evolve to the point where the impossible became possible. Things that could only ever been seen in movies and comic books became reality: Flight, telekinesis, the ability to create energy, etc. It all became possible in a blink of an eye.

But this change was all too sudden and the isles that had been created with the hope of becoming a utopia turned into a dystopia. Equality turned into prejudice against those who evolved, now labelled as Mark 2’s, and they were maltreated as well as being labelled as something not even human anymore. They did not fall under the human rights act since they were no longer considered human, it took years for them to receive rights. But even now, they are still treated as lesser beings as they are kidnapped, tortured, and arrested for minor crimes or even in situations where no crime has been committed at all.

The islands themselves are separated into four different islands all names after their set direction: North, South, East and West. They are all interconnected by a large bridge that is stationed several hundred feet above ground level and meets in the central point between the four islands. The islands themselves are governed by a single man, who is elected to have complete authoritative control over the islands with a staff that work under him. All decisions regarding the islands laws and regulations must be preapproved by the UN however.

In more recent times, a global economic crisis struck the world in an unimaginable way, not long after the evolution took place. The worlds superpowers quickly crumbled into lawless states, civil wars broke out for control over the crippled nations. Some countries weren’t affected as terribly, whilst some actually managed to profit from the wars being fought along the warring nations. After the dust had settled after at least a decade of fighting there were three old, but still new, powers that stood tall: The Central Communist Party of America (Or CCPA), the Remnant of European Democracy (RED) and the Asian Federal Collaboration (AFC). Other nations had either completely disbanded or been sculpted into a completely different shape. Oxrell remained as a beacon of hope, people fled to it in the masses, completely outnumbering the Mark 2’s from the humans around them; forcing them to live in terrible conditions since the humans always won favour over housing and employment.

Even in a drastically changed world humans still didn’t have the ability to put aside their fears of the Mark 2’s and accept them as one of their own. And this led to the creation of enemies, infighting and terrorist organisations taking action against either side depending on their views.

An aircraft carrier sat in the middle of an ocean with no visible islands or land masses in any directions. The aircraft carrier itself was blanketed in a series of purple and black flames that plumed dark smoke into the sky. Soldiers in grey camouflage laid across the ship with multiple wounds, dismemberments and decapitations. No a single sound stirred around the entire ship apart from the crackling flames and creaking metal that was giving way from the destruction caused to the ship.

A single soldier led on the ground with blood running from his head. He groggily came back to consciousness and spotted his M4 assault rifle several metres across the ground from him and his eyes immediately exploded in life as he saw the object of his salvation. He slowly began crawling, his legs were completely numb with pain, so he was forced to drag his entire body forward with nothing but his arms. He came to grasping reach of the weapon, his fingers tingling with excitement and also great fatigue as he inched his way towards it. However, at the final second, a black combat boot stomped onto the gun and shattered it into oblivion; shards flew off in all directions. His eyes shook with a great fear as he looked up to the singular body that had destroyed the weapon.

A woman with shoulder length blonde hair in a black trench coat, white military leggings and black combat boots stood in front of him. She looked down on him with a quiet contempt and clicked distastefully with her mouth at the sight of the soldier “Pathetic. Completely pathetic” she clenched her hands that wore white gloves with a rectangular hole on the back. The man was surrounded by a peculiar purple aura in the shape of his body and was lifted into the air against his will until he was held up to the woman’s face. He got a better look at her: Hey eyes were a pale blue and her face seemed young and beautiful but with a harsh expression that never left it. An unrelenting stare came from those eyes and she tightened her hand, it seemed to have some kind of effect on the soldier as his limbs were being pulled into four separate directions causing him an intense pain. “I’m going to give you one chance to save the pathetic thing you call a life and one chance only: Got it?” she waited for a response but didn’t seem to have any interest in the response itself as she moved on to her actual question. “Where is my little sister?” her eyes seemed to grow in rage at the mention of her own sister.

The soldier managed a small chuckle before moving on to an insane cackle, the only reaction evoked from the woman was a vague sense of curiosity in her expression “You Mark 2’s are all the same…MONSTERS! DESPLORABLE AND SICK MONSTERS!” He yelled “THERE’S A REASON WE KEEP YOU ALL IN CHECK! IF WE LET YOU RUN WILD-” His voice was cut off by the sound of all four of his limbs ripping from their sockets. His torso, now spilling blood from the four wounds, fell to the floor as he rived around in pain. A searing, indescribable pain that exploded all around his body in the same ratio as his screams of agony.

“I’m not the one who takes children to the headsmen’s block just because their amino acids line up differently to my own” She retorted, although it was pointless given how the soldier was too focused on the pain she had just put him through “I can stop the pain. Just tell me where you were going to transport the prisoners aboard this ship” no response came, as she crouched down to him, other than his insatiable screams. She took a large sigh and stood up “Very frustrating” she admitted before disappearing into a flash of purple smoke and reappearing 150 feet above the aircraft carrier in the sky, floating there in that spot. She raised a single hand into the sky and a ball of black and purple aura began to expand from her palm until it was the size of a cars wheel. She pointed it directly at the centre of the vessel and fired it. It travelled at an unmeasurable speed before crashing straight through the centre of the carrier causing it to split in two before erupting into a huge explosion completely vaporising the vessel.

The girl stood there in the sky for several seconds before taking a large sigh “I’ll find you Annie…Your big sis’ won’t let anything bad happen to you…” She gripped her necklace with a cross at the end of it so tightly that blood trickled down it “I won’t let anything bad happen to you again…”



A short few days passed by since the event occurred on the aircraft carrier. Two men sat on a talk show, both of them smartly dressed for the occasion. The host of the program sat behind a desk with his guest sat on the opposite side at an angle so he could still face the audience as he talked.

“Why hello ladies and gentlemen! Today I am here with Hector Gilson: The U.S secretary of Defence and current chairmen of the Oxrell project. It’s great to finally get you on this show!” he spoke in an upbeat and entrancing way: Perfect for getting the masses to do whatever he wanted. They exchanged some pleasantries and let the audience react before the point of the show got underway “Let me give you all a small history lesson on the topic just in case you didn’t know: The Oxrell Project was a project jointly worked on by every country in the UN to create an artificial island where all people, regardless of ethnicity, could live in peace. However, soon after this certain individuals began developing, or evolving, to the point where they gained supernatural powers! Amazing stuff!” The host explained.

“Yes that’s exactly how it happened, we tried to integrate these †˜Mark 2’s’ as we call them, into society. However, their powers were all too extreme and caused a massive loss of live. So we tried to separate them into different areas so they couldn’t harm anyone besides their own. For the most part it worked…” he said with a solemn expression. The woman looked on at his lies. Never had there been such an attempt to try and help the Mark 2’s. But of course he would say otherwise, to try and demonise the Mark 2’s and create a basis for him and his fellow humans to be considered heroes.

“But recently there have been talks of a resistance group among the Mark 2’s that have made it their aim to overthrow the Oxrell government and bring about the ideal of being united for both humans and Mark 2’. Most recently, there was the attack on the US aircraft carrier transporting known terrorists to a secure prison island. The attack resulted in the deaths of every crew member and prisoner on board the vessel” the host offered some sympathetic words for the families of the men on the ship “So Mister Gilson: What is the government planning to do about these attacks! We surely can’t allow a force that is powerful enough to destroy an entire aircraft carrier to just run around; can we?!” he asked with an aggressive tone and posture with the entire audience yelling in agreement. The woman tightened her hand on her glass, cursing his name. Not once did anyone ask for what reasons this attack was made or see through his transparent lies over how he had left the Mark 2’s no reason but to fight back. If you strike an animal, no matter how obedient, it will eventually strike back.

“Of course not! And that is why we will have our most elite teams sent to track down the individuals responsible! We don’t have many solid clues as to who-” the TV broadcasting the show was switched off by a bartender in a bar as he shook his head.

“Who in their right mind would think it’s a smart thing to sink an entire ship? That’s not going to help the Mark 2’s…” he said while shaking his head.

The woman lifted her head up from her drink, despite the fact the channel had been changed the reflection of Gilson was reflected in her stormy eyes “Are you an advocate for Mark 2’s to be given equality?” she asked looking at the bartender as he stereotypically dried out a glass with a rag.

“Huh? Oh yes I am. There just has to be a better way to sort this out without killing them or separating ourselves from them” he said in a resigned way “But that won’t ever happen…”

The woman swigged down the last of her drink and slammed the glass down as she wiped of the liquid that remained on and around her lips “Thanks for the drink” she fished out some money from her pocket and placed it on the table in front of her as she turned and headed for the exit. Her thoughts remained primarily on Gilson. Her attempts to find her sister being transported on the aircraft carrier that always carried Mark 2’s that were seen as being †˜Too dangerous’ offered her no new clues as to the location of her sister, who had been kidnapped in the dead of the night for the exact same reasons as any Mark 2: Fear. Fear that they could realise they could rise up and overthrow the humans who used them for slave labour and restricted their rights to the bare minimum. Her sister, Annie, had begun to realise this: She had started taking part in protestor rallies to try and persuade the government to change their ways, she had taken part in graffiti tagging of government owned facilities and blackmailing of high-up government contractors. This combined with her minor powers were seen as ample reason for her to be taken away. The woman thought of Gilson again “If I can’t find her by myself. I’ll just go to the source” she decided as she stepped out of the bar to find herself in a sand covered road in a small town in a desert, several miles from the nearest large city.

Her eyes turned to the nearest city “There. The talk show should be being broadcasted there” she finished her sentence and her heightened senses from her powers picked up on the cocking of a gun, she rolled out of the way just as the bullet was about the impact the back of her neck. Jittery feelings rolled up her spine but she quickly composed herself and locked up at a small building down the road where a small glint of the scope of a rifle could be seen. “So they caught up with me again?” she growled as another shot was fired at her. She held up and outstretched palm that gave off a wavy-purple aura and the bullet stopped a metre ahead of her. She held up her other palm and fired a ball of black aura that obliterated the building the shooter was on; sending it up in flames.

She took a quick glance along the other buildings and both sides of the road, everything looked clear until the sounds of cars engines started powering to life. Both ends of the sandy roads were cut off by military Humvees with large guns placed on their roofs with gunners operating them. There was roughly 6 in total; 3 on either side. A speaker was activated on the side the woman was facing “Rebecca Slate, we have you surrounded! Drop to your knees and place your hands on top of your head!” the soldier operating the speaker demanded.

A snicker came from Rebecca as she placed both hands in the air “Not likely” Rebecca fired two shots of aura, one from each hand, and destroyed the entire line of Humvees in a tremendous explosion. She swivelled on her heel and faced the other line of Humvees as they began unloading their weapons without mercy. She used her aura to create a shield in front of her to ricochet the bullets in different directions. “Too close” she admitted with deep and concerned breaths. She stood up and took several steps back from her shield “It’ll start to falter when I move too far from it, so I better get prepared…” she formed to more balls of aura in her hands “Gotta make it count; I’ve only got one shot!” she dived backwards and her shield disappeared. As soon as this happened she launched her two shots of aura and they incinerated all bullets they passed through before continuing on to mirror the same kind of destruction Rebecca had handed out to the other line of Humvees.

She slid onto the ground and scuttled to a halt some way’s down the street. She dusted herself off and took some deep breaths. A soldier stood behind her with a combat knife, he had horrific scars from the explosions Rebecca had caused. He prepared to strike when her senses kicked into action, she swept him off his feet with her leg and kicked the knife into the air before shooting a blast of aura and destroying it.

“What the Hell are you?” The soldier asked as he began to squirm away but found she had grabbed him by his collar and swiftly kicked him in the chin.

“I am Rebecca Slate: Ex-Delta Force operator before this stupid government of Oxrell decided I was too dangerous to be integrated into the racist society they have created against my kind. My powers give me increased endurance, senses, strength and allow me to create an incredibly dense ball of energy that can tear through almost anything” she throw him onto the ground and formed a ball of said energy in her hand “I can manipulate this energy into anyway I want, so unless you want to die here you better answer my questions” Rebecca confirmed her power by firing a random shot of her power off into a nearby building, reducing it to rubble. “I want to know where the Secretary of Defence Gilson is staying and for how long”

“I’m not telling you shit!” the soldier said in defiance as Rebecca reshaped another ball of aura into a sharper shape and began slowly cutting down his arm until blood began shooting out “AHHHHHHH! OKAY, OKAY I’LL TELL YOU!” He began screaming and Rebecca let up, but kept her weapon close to his body. “He’s…he’s staying at †˜The Golden Spire’ Hotel in the city! Please don’t kill me!” he wept as he pulled himself into the fatal position.

Rebecca let her weapon retract itself back into her hand and began walking off towards the city on the horizon “I’ll find Gilson, get him to tell me where Annie is…and then kill him” Rebecca said as she looked onwards towards the city with a look of contempt “I’ll save you Annie…don’t worry” she promised as she took hold of her cross, swearing it like an oath.

Rebecca sat on a bus that was barrelling down the sandy road towards the city. It was filled with tourists admiring the desert scenery, outfitted with t-shirts and gift shop hats as well as cameras hung around their neck with some kind of strap attached to the camera. Clearly the type of individuals who weren’t used to the environment or those who simply couldn’t afford to go to some kind of extravagant island paradise.

Rebecca seemed out of place, sat by herself in the corner of the bus while the rest of the tourists all huddled together. Sometimes someone would turn to stare at her and try to figure out who she was, but all Rebecca did to pay back their interest in her was to offer a scowling and terrifying gaze back at them. They would practically spin back to face their kind. In a way it was a perfect representation of the life she had been forced to live. Years upon years of people yelling abuse towards her for being some kind of †˜monster’ as they said. Or there was the alternative, where they would ignore her in her time of need and pretend like she was some kind of unnoticeable ghost that couldn’t hear her screams for help.

Rebecca scowled at the thoughts and memories of those people, what made it even worse was that she wasn’t the kind of person to hurt another person unless they provoked her. It was ignorance, plain and simple. Nothing more, nothing less. Perhaps if those in charge of the governing of the world she lived in had taken the step to learn about the Mark 2’s instead of lining them up ready for the execution squads then there could have been some hope for Rebecca and Annie. But no such luck existed for them. They would be doomed to live in the world where the cycle of hatred would be repeated for ever and ever. The only thing Rebecca could do was to protect Annie and hope to cause as much damage as possible.


Rebecca flicked her phone open and checked the date: †˜27th June 2014’. How long had that made it for Rebecca in searching for Annie? A year and two months? It seemed to have dragged out much longer than just that. How many leads how turned out to be backstabs? How many had turned out to come up with nothing useful or sent her in the wrong way? How many times had she come to the brink of death, only to drag herself back from that precipice? Too many, simply too many.

The trip organiser, a woman dressed in bright colours with a t-shirt and shorts with a hat on walked up to Rebecca and leaned close to her, almost ignoring Rebecca’s death-like stare. “Hello ma’am, it seems you’re causing quite scare for our customers” she darted around the point.

“Your point being?” Rebecca said back, unimpressed by the woman in every way.

“I’d appreciate it if you didn’t stare so harshly, it’s not good for business” she replied.

“Then tell them not to stare at me” Rebecca stood up as the bus came to a halt right on the edge of the city “Never mind, enjoy your perfect holiday, as well as everything else you humans don’t deserve” Rebecca said the word †˜humans’ like it was the most insulting, disgusting thing she could think of.


Rebecca walked her way around the city until she found a cordoned off city block surrounding the gold-painted hotel labelled as †˜The Golden Spire’ in the centre of the city. There were televisions announcements being broadcasted along the buildings themselves. They were broadcasting images of Rebecca as well as small clips of her destructive powers, warning civilians to not interact with her and run as soon as she comes into view as well as to call the authorities as soon as physically possible. Clearly the news of her destruction in the small town she had been in had spread quickly and the secretary of Defence had taken the appropriate measures to protect himself.

Military personal were stationed around the streets where the hotel was stationed: Outfitted with Humvees, heavy artillery and similar weaponry capable of destruction. Rebecca even heard the sound of an all too familiar sound: A tank. Rebecca couldn’t sneak passed them, there were far too many of them and no noticeable openings. Even if she managed to sneak passed the outposts on the most outer point of the defence that had been set up, the patrols and the number of them would eventually find her and force her to fight whilst being attacked from all sides. However, there was one flaw in the most outer point of their defence: They were all stationed in narrow streets with tall buildings on either side. Rebecca could fire down into the small spaces from atop the buildings and funnel them into the smaller spaces, making them an easy target for her.


Rebecca quietly flew to the top of the building (Using one of her powers that allowed her to defy gravity) and looked down towards the dozens of men that occupied the street below. She bit her thumb nervously “If I do this, my odds won’t be very good. I’ll be outnumbered and there’s no guarantee Gilson will even be here. Still, it’s not like the odds have ever really been in my favour since this all started” Rebecca formed the ball of energy in her right hand and stared into its seemingly infinite space “Here goes nothing!” she yelled and threw it towards the most outer part of the defence at the end of the street. The entire line of vehicles exploded into a series of orange and bright red with the flames chasing after the soldiers who ran for their lives. Some were so surprised by the sudden attack that they stood still as the flames engulfed them, leaving nothing but ash behind.

The soldiers eventually realised the trajectory of the attack and looked up to see Rebecca staring down at them “Up there! It’s her!” one yelled as he fired uncontrollably towards Rebecca as she turned away from the edge and quickly pondered her next move “So far so good. Although I never gave it a great of thought about what to do next” she sighed and shrugged her shoulders “I guess I’ll just wing it” she accepted and turned back to meet the gunfire with her own barrage of energy blasts that consumed the soldiers, killing them all by either exploding on impact or using their dense weight to crush them into a bloody smear before continuing to bounce around the area like a pinball.

Rebecca’s heightened senses kicked in and she flipped over a rocket that had been launched from behind her and exploded in the area she had been standing, leaving just a hole behind. She spun around in the air and saw an attack helicopter hovering in front of her as its mini-gun began to spin. “Well that’s not good!” she yelled as she launched herself away from its line of fire and landed on a roof across the street. It turned to face her as it began firing again, Rebecca this time opted to run and jump across the buildings as she formed a ball of energy in her hand “I haven’t got time for this shit!” she yelled and tossed the energy into the side of the helicopter which forced it into the side of as building causing a large explosion.

Rebecca leapt down to the street below and was immediately met with more soldiers “You guys don’t give up…” she managed a small smile as they fired on her. She crouched down and formed a shield of energy to protect herself before darting off into an alley between the buildings.

The soldiers lowered their guns at her disappearance “She ran into the alley! Let’s go!” an officer said as they all ran into the alley, only to see that she was nowhere around “Where’d she go?!” the officer asked and his men shrugged.

“Hey dumbasses!” Rebecca called from atop the roof “You make it too easy sometimes!” she launched to balls of energy and vaporised the men below before she leapt across more buildings and saw that she was only one block off from the hotel. “Not far now, I just have to deal with the guards protecting the hotel” Rebecca said as she took in deep breaths from all the fighting. She felt physically drained, as was a side-effect of using her power too much, but she didn’t have a choice at this point. She had to continue on.


The door of a seemingly otherwise empty presidential suite broke open with it shattering into wooden shards with a smartly dressed man flying through it. He was middle aged with a receding hairline. The walls outside the room were stained with blood with several bodies of armed soldiers and secret servicemen laid up against the wall. Dead.

Rebecca walked in to the room with her hands in her pockets and kicked the man in the chest and laid some of her weight on him, holding him to the ground. “Chairman Gilson, nice to finally meet you face to face” Rebecca said with a straight face as she spoke with a voice full of hatred.

“How the hell did you get in here?” Gilson wheezed as she applied a tad bit more pressure onto his sternum.

“Easy question, simple answer. I killed every single man you had stationed here. And soon: You’ll be joining them” her words made Gilson pant in fear before she relented in crushing his body “But first I need you to answer my questions. I need to know where my sister is, you should know that given the comprehensive background check you did on me when you started a worldwide manhunt for me. Plus I know it was you who took her from me” Rebecca accused.

“Is that what this has all been about?! You’ve murdered hundreds of men for your sister?!” Gilson couldn’t comprehend how someone could go to such lengths, lengths that now ordinary person should be able to go to.

“And how many of my people have you murdered? How many have you condemned to death based on a sequence of Amino acids and nothing else? No breaking of laws, no morally negative decisions? What you have done is worse than anything I have ever done or will ever do, I have killed to avenge my people and people wrongly killed and accused based on nothing more than simple ignorance. Karma has simply caught up to you Gilson” Rebecca kicked him in the point of his chin with her boot and pressed deeply with her boot onto his chest, causing him to gasp for air. “I’d advise you to answer the question, or I’ll break every bone in your body” Rebecca warned. Eventually Gilson couldn’t stand the pain she was forcing him through and gave in to her demands.


“Okay! Okay! I’ll tell you!” Rebecca eased up but kept applying pressure as Gilson took deep breaths in and out “I’m not sure exactly where but…I know who has her and the general area of where they operate…” Gilson said quickly as he hacked out a cough.

“Did you say †˜who has her’? So you don’t have her?” Rebecca raised an eyebrow in suspicion.

“That’s right. A group of renegade Mark 2’s who have become a terrorist organisation bent on overthrowing the government called †˜The Chains of Freedom’. They said she was crucial to their plans and they needed her. Usually we wouldn’t deal with terrorists but it was one Mark 2 and they were offering a large body of money that we were using to hunt you with. It seemed like a good deal” Gilson explained.

Rebecca’s expression harshened to the point of pure bloodlust “You…you sold my little sister? And for what? Money? You really are a sick, sick bastard…” Rebecca looked dead into him with eyes full of pure hatred “Tell me where she is right now, or I’ll rip off every single finger and toe you have and feed them to you until you tell me” Rebecca shook with anger as she spoke.

“The most western island of Oxrell! Our intelligence tells us that’s where they’ve been operating recently! If you cause a big enough stir out there I’m sure they’ll come to you! Now please…!” Before Gilson could finish his sentence, Rebecca had grabbed him by his collar and had started pulling him out of the room as he struggled futilely against her.


Rebecca dragged him all the way to the top of the building and held him right on the edge of it, leaning him over it just ever so slightly. “No please! I’ll call off the hunt! Claim it was someone else, I promise!” He begged as Rebecca looked over the edge to see all of the TV crews waiting behind a police line outside the hotel.

“So long as people like you are willing to harm my people, I won’t let a single one of you live” she refused his bargaining and slid a note into his pocket “That’s a handwritten suicide not. I forged your handwriting so no-one will know the difference. How about this for a headline: †˜Chairman of the Oxrell project commits suicide because of the guilt of murdering so many Mark 2’s as was claimed in his suicide note’?” Rebecca asked sarcastically.

“It’s awful!” he barked at her.

“Well…” she pushed him off the edge of the building “…I was never much of a writer” Rebecca turned and began walking down the stairs of the building as she now knew exactly who had her sister and where to find them.

Rebecca slowly walked her way through the modern city that was designated as †˜The Western Island’, huge buildings dominated the skyline and looked beautiful with their pristine elegance. However, when one looked down you would see the true reality of the world Rebecca lived in. Dirty, unkempt streets with faltering housing made out of cheap materials: The terrible conditions the Mark 2’s were forced to live in while the humans lived in royalty-like buildings in comparison. The people looked malnourished with rags for clothing. Rebecca spotted several children who were making an unbearable coughing sound while their parents (If they were lucky enough to have any) cuddled them close and offered calming lies like “You’ll be fine” and “It’s nothing to worry about”.

This was the world they had to live in, Rebecca had repeatedly contemplated the point of it all, when everyone was treated like this based solely on genetics why even bother fighting? It served no real purpose. Rebecca had considered suicide a fair few times, but two things always kept her from seeing it through: 1. Her unquenchable bloodlust and rage towards the humans who mistreated her kind. And 2. The desire to at least liberate her sister.

Beyond those emotions, all Rebecca had been was a machine assigned its duties; nothing more. Her emotions were simplistic and cynical in nature with unwavering mercilessness. But at least she killed based off of vengeance and not some kind of ignorance about amino acids and nothing else. That always remained as the one things that convinced what she was doing was at least justified in some way, even if no-one would ever agree with it. It wasn’t ever like she craved the attention of others so it hardly mattered what others thought of her actions. So long as she could save Annie, the world could label her as the worst person in history for all she cared.


Rebecca walked down the street, with no idea at all where to start looking. If she started an all-out brawl with the local forces then she not only risked losing the precious incognito-status she had but also risked killing any potential leads in the firefight. But by luck and luck alone, a sharp tap was felt by Rebecca on her shoulder. She turned and gave an unrelenting stare of hatred “Who are you?” she asked quietly.

“Someone who can help you find what you seek” a man stood in front of her, he had short brown hair that was neatly trimmed at the sides and slightly jelled into spikes at the top. He wore a formal suit attire and a trench coat not unlike Rebecca’s. His pale blue eyes stared into hers as she did to him and forced her back. For some reason his stare gave her a feeling of absolute fear, but his expression did not convey someone who wanted to cause fear; only help.

“And what do I seek?” Rebecca scoffed back after recomposing herself silently.


“Why your little sister of course!” he chuckled at her feigned ignorance. He handed her some kind of location device with an X and Y coordinates on it as well as a grid like structure on its screen. “If you follow the waypoint I put on that device you should be able to find your little sister and the people who have her” he turned around and began walking off but stopped suddenly “Just a quick question: Do you plan on killing them?” he asked without meeting her eyes.

“Not at this moment, they do plan on taking down the government right? Then I have no reason to want to kill them. Unless they truly have done something to what I seek…” Rebecca answered and the man laughed quietly before waving goodbye. His laugh confused Rebecca, it almost sounded like the laugh of victory. But even still, this was a lead for Rebecca. She hadn’t had the time to even begin asking questions from how quickly the man seemed to move, placing the device in her hands and then moving halfway down the streets in the blink of an eye. But it all seemed so suspicious to her, why would this man help her and who was he? Did he work for Oxrell’s government and simply wanted her to destroy the potential threat to their seat of power? But that wouldn’t make sense after the way he laughed, unless he knew something she didn’t. Rebecca decided it was her best move to follow the coordinates, she had no other lead to find †˜The Chains of Freedom’.


Only after looking at the exact coordinates and the distance she would have to travel did Rebecca realise just how far she truly was off in her searching. The location of the base was at least 25 miles off from the city in some remote location near the western coast of the island. The area was completely abandoned, at most it could be called a dumping site with skeletons of broken cars, boats and even planes just left to rot on the sand bed. The roads were broken and useless as roads with pot holes as big as the cars themselves on the sand bed. The road itself led to a slightly more mountainous terrain with three hills placed around each-other in a small space with huge metal double doors at the base of the hill that led inside. Clearly not the most secret of bases but the area hardly looked like it was checked for the sort by anybody, let alone looked like the area anyone ever came to.

As Rebecca walked up to the doors some turrets popped out from the ground from some metal plates built into the ground, and their laser-guided systems zeroed in on her before firing. Rebecca put up her shield and angled it downwards in such a way that the bullets from one gun were ricocheted into the other, completely destroying it. Rebecca spun out from behind her shield and threw a ball of energy, destroying the turret and continuing on to explode on impact with the metal doors; destroying them.

Rebecca walked onwards into the dark innards of the base, it was too dark to see but she could immediately tell it was a single room. Slow clapping came from somewhere ahead of her. Lights from in front and above her shone into action and temporarily blinded her. As her eyes readjusted to the situation she spotted a single body in front of her. Annie stood in a plane white dress with long flowing hair, she looked around the age of 17, as if she hadn’t aged a single day from when she had
been taken from Rebecca. Rebecca hardly knew how to react at the sight of her sister, but all her emotions willed her to move forwards as she began running towards Annie with watery eyes. She had only started running when a gunshot was heard and Rebecca fell onto her side and slid a few feet clutching at her knee as blood flowed from a gunshot wound. She grunted in pain and saw a familiar face: The man who gave her the coordinates to this location except he held a gun with a smoking barrel.

“Very well done Annie, good girl” he patted her on the head and looked back to Rebecca with the same smile as before.

“You?! Bu…what’s going on?!” Rebecca tried to raise herself but buckled under the pain and fell back down.

“A very easy question, with a very simple answer. My name is Alex Howards: The leader of †˜The Chains of Freedom’” he explained.

“Y-You’re the leader of the organisation who want to overthrow Oxrell’s government?!” he nodded “Then what the hell is happening?! Why do you have my sister?!” Rebecca punched the ground as she heaved in pain.

“To control you of course. Let me explain, when we saw the destructive lengths you went to in order to find your sister I hatched a plan: If you thought the government still had your sister without knowing, then you would keep attacking them and draw their attention. This would allow us to operate in the dark without being noticed at all as you kept them occupied by destroying aircraft carrier after aircraft carrier and label yourself as their true adversary. It finally allowed us to gather the strength we needed to overthrow the government and finally create freedom for our people!” To demonstrate this his army of several hundred soldiers all yelled in agreement, lifting their various weapons into the air. “So thank you for being an appropriate puppet. Without knowing it, you were obeying our orders and will help us fulfil our goal: Of destroying all humans and replacing them with Mark 2’s!” he said with a maniacal ring to his voice.

“I don’t understand! I thought you wanted equality!” Rebecca said in a daze of confusion.

“There can’t be such a thing as long as humans exist. They fear what is different: Stomp it into the ground and pretend it never existed. It’s what they do to things that could alter their way of life. So if they die, then we never have to worry about that issue ever again” Alex explained. “You played your role perfectly, but you aren’t among the main cast of this little play I’m afraid. You’ve killed too many of our undercover informants, by mistake of course, but it means you have outlived your usefulness and…” Alex fired a shot straight through Annie’s back “So has she…”

“NO! NO, NO, NO, NO!” Rebecca yelled as Annie lay face first on the concrete whilst her blood quickly ebbed from her body “YOU BASTARD!” Rebecca yelled as her emotions of despair, sadness, rage, confusion and many others all mixed into one. A second shot came from Alex’s gun and pain spread though Rebecca’s chest. Blood began flowing out of the centre of her chest in large quantities.

The sound of helicopters and Humvees came into audible range and Alex cursed under his breath “We’re moving out! The government forces have found us!” the sound of vehicles and the boots of soldiers under Alex’s command started up and began quickly leaving earshot as Alex bent down to Rebecca “Well done Rebecca, because of you we are a large step closer to our goal. You’ll be remembered by our people for your good deeds, don’t worry” he patted her gently and got into a vehicle before driving off.


Rebecca managed to pull herself up onto her knees to see that Annie had done the same. Both of them were drenched in their own blood. “Big sis…” Annie wrapped her sister in a hug and Rebecca did the same.

“Guess our endurance was enough that we just about survived that shot huh?” Rebecca kissed Annie on her forehead and continued their embrace as the sound of soldiers aiming their weapons at them from the entrance of the base could be heard.

“Big sis…what happens now?” Annie asked.

“Don’t worry…your big sis won’t let anything bad happen to you…” She gripped her necklace with the cross at the end of it so tightly that blood trickled down it “I won’t let anything bad happen to you again…” she gripped Annie tightly and kissed her once more.


And then the guns fired in an unmerciful volley of bullets.


The End.

I smiled and enjoyed myself as I read Rebecca displaying her prowess in destroying aircraft carriers, slaughtering regiments guarding the city only to be subdued with a single gunshot. At least she is sent off in style as she and her sister were cruelly pulverised in a volley of gunfire when a few shots in the head would suffice. It felt wondrously anticlimactic. (You might know that I enjoy an anticlimax where the author gives a very elaborate setup only to disappoint the reader's expectations in the end.)

Rebecca's character was icing on the cake. She is never happy, always grumpy and snappy. I love imagining comedic situations where unsociable characters are placed with normal people. The tour guide she encountered in the journey to the city wasn't necessary but the interaction between them did add to the humour of the story. I nearly laughed as I picture her snapping at the tour guide with a one-liner.

Thank you so much for the scene where Rebecca dispatches Gilbert (with another one-liner) and the suggestion that she would pen his suicide note and even went into detail about how she learnt to forge his handwriting. It is very obvious that Rebecca had no intention to cover up the murder, especially after so many were killed.