My Entry

Alarms have just started to sound on one of the giant drifting cities in space. All through the corridors of the colossal monolith, guards wearing uniforms of black and green scramble pathetically into each other, lasers grasped tightly in their hands. One young man in particular seems even more disoriented than the others, his normallly pale face ruddy with exertion, his blond hair a mop of sweat. This man is Jordo Frank, first year in the service and one of the few select men and women in charge of prisoner control. He will not return to this position tomorrow, if he even lives to see tomorrow. He is lucky the Command Center has not sent him on permanent vacation to deep space already.

He doesn't really understand where he went wrong. One minute he had simply been doing his normal patrol through the Prisoner Quarters when he came to the cell of Prisoner VIII. She was a beautiful girl with straight brown hair and gentle green eyes and luscious, full lips, but the tests they took when they brought her in had put her at sub-level intelligence. That didn't mean she couldn't still feel fear, though, and her Vacation date was less than four days away. He had come across her crying, and, despite all of his hard-core training, felt his heart melt. He had opened the door for one split second, just to edge himself in to comfort her, when suddenly, too fast for him to react, she leapt up with unnatural agility and body rammed him into the wall with surprising force. He lost his balance, but it didn't matter. She was already gone down the hallway, towards the door that led to the main hallway which, in a few short minutes, would take her to the computer mainframe. He didn't like to think what would happen if she got there...

In a haze, he had somehow managed to regain his feet and fumble to the alarm console. His numb fingers had somehow managed to enter his personal access code, and at once the space city had lit up with flashing red and green lights and the sound of terror in the corridors. Now he stumbles confusedly alongside guards and civilians alike. None of them had ever experienced an escape before, and all the diagrams and holofilms they had watched in training hadn't prepared them for this. One thought reverberates through his tattered mind, and his bleats it out as loud as he can to anyone willing to listen.

"She's going towards the mainframe! She's one of the Rebel Savants, and once she gets there, she can kill us all! "

Without looking to see if anyone hears him, he dashes down the corridor, his mind too fixated on his destination to notice any distractions, though with relief he does catch the sight of two fellow guards catching up to him, the slick back and vibrant green of their uniforms an oddly comforting sight.

The hallway outside of the mainframe is oddly quiet compared to the chaos of the rest of the city. It makes Jordo slightly nervous, but the giant reinforced door of the terminal is still safely shut and locked.

"We should still check and make sure she's not in there... You know they breed their savants to be technological geniuses..." The lady soldier, wearing the tight knit mesh cap of Commander motions for the process code. Desperately grateful that someone else is giving him orders besides his own mess of a brain, he frantically enters in his code. After a moment, the door clicks unlocked and slowly hisses open. The three guards peer cautiously in but it is dark and silent except for the ethereal glow and gentle hum from the giant room-sized mainframe that controlled the entire city and its orbiting suburbs. Jordo lets out a sigh of relief until he hears a laser go whizzing by his face. Shocked, he turns to discover the Commander leveling her laser at him, only she isn't the Commander at all, she is the prisoner, dressed in Commander's garb, which she likely stole. His fingers reach for his own gun but it isn't there. Forget Vacation, this Rebel was likely to kill him. He gazes pleadingly into those soft jade eyes, but they are blank and dull. There is nothing going on behind them.

She stows her gun and for a moment, he allows himself a tiny ray of hope. Then she reaches for him. He tries to turn and run but she is much faster and stronger than he is, bred for perfect physical abilities and absolutely no mental capacity beyond the computer screen. For the second time in less than an hour, she hurtles him into the wall. He watches blearily as she darts into the mainframe and locks the door behind her. He tries to sit up, but it sends a bolt of pain through his skull and everything goes black.

When he comes to, everything is still black. He waves a hand he cannot see in front of his face and panic fills him. Has he gone blind? Then he realizes he can still see the faint light of stars through the windows. The power must have gone out. How could that be? Then, with a flood of memories, he remembers all the events that have transpired. He scrambles up, clawing desperately at the smooth side of the wall for help and stumbles his way to the Process Code screen and clacks in his number, frightened of what he might find on the other side. In a moment of eternity, the door finally opens.

The girl is made even more beautiful in the ethereal glow from the screen as she whizzes through codes and pages.She passes by the air supply and water recycling pages with no concern, but she is totally intent on her work. Silently, Jordo sneaks behind her. At last, she seems to have found her mark, the Gravi-control page. Before she can enter any of the damning codes that would send them and their suburbs crashing towards the nearest thing with gravity he lets out a strangled cry and rushes her. Her face registers surprise and fear, but she maintains her feet and shies away from him, simply trying to get back to the computer, back to something she understands in a way she will never be able to understand her fellow humans. Her fingers whiz across the keyboard, but Jordo isn't about to give up yet. He fumbles insanely for her gun and a tussle ensues. She is still stronger than him, but now that adrenaline has filled his veins, they are more closely matched. Ignoring the pain, he finally manages to wrestle the gun from her. There is very little understanding on her face, but enough for her to know that she is no longer in control. Still, when someone is hell-bent on seeing it through, they don't give up. She whirls around, causing him to fire uselessly into some trillion dollar computer equipment and he sees with horror she had almost the entire code entered. Scrambling, she enters a few more digits and before he can get enough control over himself to fire, the screen flashes the red sign of warning.

He can't speak. He can't move. He can only watch in horror as this girl who didn't really know what she was doing or didn't know what would happen to her when she finished it, sends the control code through. For a moment, it seems as though nothing happens. Then, there is the slightest movement under his feet, and then, a split second later, the city sumersaults onto its side and hurtles through space. Both Jordo and the prisoner go flying, crashing into one of the side walls as their doom approaches. He tries to climb his way back to the terminal, ignoring the girls confused and terrified crying, but the walls are too slick for him to make any progress.

The collision happens much sooner than Jordo expected. He doesn't know what they hit, but he knows it makes a fantastic explosion. That's the last thing he remembers.

Back on Earth, an old man with a grim smile watches his holoscreen as billions of miles away, two space cities crash into each other, ending their corrosive existance. Once the fireworks are over, he snaps off his screen, dons his protective mask, and enters the Breeding room. Before him in dozens of tiny cribs lie dark haired babies with green eyes and blank expressions. The man's smile grows wider. They'd get those alliance bastards yet...