Maximum Ride Fan Fiction ❯ We Were Colored Outside the Lines ❯ shades of green and grey ( Epilogue )

 

We were Colored Outside the Lines Sequel

 

Shades of Green and Grey

 

“Max, honey? I need you to stay awake…” It was in vain. The men had injected a lethal dose to both of the teenagers. They weren't going to wake up. Still, the woman pleaded with the girl. She was pulled away by an officer. The scene was quickly evacuated by all except the paramedics, who declared death on arrival, and people with cameras. All types of people. News casters and their camera men, scientist and police collecting evidence.

Flashes went off a mile a minute. The woman started to yell at the people looking on in awe and broadcasting the death of the two.

“They are people too! They are Human too. What right do you have to broadcast something so,…so….” She broke down in tears only to be led away again.

The doors to the secluded room were shut on the faces of the onlookers. Police and scientist documented everything. They took into account the size of the crates, the amount of empty crates and the way in which the two were murdered.

“Why does it look like these cages weren't empty for long?” They looked about in awe struck horror. No one would voice the thoughts running through their heads.

What kind of sick bastard would do this to children?

One woman, new to her job shed tears. She made special care to photograph their outstretched arms and intertwined fingers. Another photo was taken. One of the entire span of the room including the cages and occupants of said cages. The other empty cages were in the picture as well.

Hundreds of more pictures were taken in the span of a few minutes.

No one wanted to break the silence, no one wanted to move, but they all knew they had to face reality.

Yes, people really did this to other people.

Yes, people really did this to children.

No, they had no compassion.

No, they didn't care who was hurt or died.

Yes, they had euthanized them, in their panic.

Yes, they probably would have died painfully had they not been euthanized.

 

After all reporters threatened, they leave the scene, the coroner began their real job.

The first cage was opened. It took two men to carefully pull the girl from the metal trap. It took one to carry her to the stretcher that was waiting for her. Her body folded onto it like a child that was just laid to bed by her father.

The man half expected her to open her eyes slightly, and murmur that she was still tired and did not want to get up for the day yet.

He had a daughter of his own about the same age.

They had been fighting over getting her hair dyed.

His argument was that she would be exposed to possibly harmful chemicals.

How many hazardous chemicals were these kids exposed in the name of `research'?

A scientist in dark brown, having been called away from his bed in the early morning hours, pulling a double-shift marked off a clipboard with a survey like paper on it.

 

Name: Ride, Maximum

Age: Estimated 16 years

Hair Color: Brown/Blonde

Eye Color: Hazel

Height: Estimated 5'4

Weight: Estimated 94 lbs.

Time of Death: 4:21 AM

Date: October 6th

 

He latched the clipboard onto the side and pulled the cover up and over her serene face. It was scary.

Scary how she looked calm in the face of her death.

Scary how the face of a teenager was calm in death, was dead.

Scary how people could do this to others.

Scary how people could do this to children.

Scary how people could do this to the innocent.

 

It took two men to lift the boy out of the cage. It took three to carry him to the stretcher. The needle marks that covered his torso were simply chilling.

How had he with stood the pain?

Was he under sedation?

By the cruelty of these scientists, that was highly doubted.

 

Name: Fang

Age: Estimated 16 years

Hair Color: Dark Brown

Eye Color: Dark Brown

Height: Estimated 6'1

Weight: Estimated 104 lbs.

Time of Death: 4:20 AM

Date: October 6th

 

Again, he pulled the white sheet up past the boy's face. The thin sheet settled on the body showing every mountain and valley of the body.

They were wheeled out and placed in a van with about ten others.

Slamming the doors closed, every one breathed a heavy sigh. This could only get worse.

A ray of sun light hit the horizon though and through it a magnificent and some what wonder-filled gazes turned on the groups being carried and led from the warehouses.

Dozens among dozens of children, ages ranging from that of babies to adolescents.

All of them had a large deformity not normally known to children.

Fear.

Fear for their lives.

Police officer after scientist, after news station worker came out carrying a child. Some had no legs or arms, some had fur or scales. Some had eyes of a cat and whiskers; some were the size of large foxes. They were all different in their each unique way.

The man who had documented Max and Fang's statistics came out holding a little girl with pale blonde hair and white eyes. She had the delicate white wings of a moth folded around her. She clung to him and whimpered when brought into the sunlight. She was quickly removed to a dark police car.

A large rescue and recovery operation started up as an unmarked white van drove down a packed road. Only few were found dead. Only two had been euthanized.

Many of the children would have to be euthanized. It would be inhuman to let them die by starvation or such a cause brought on by the change in their DNA.

 

The world was at a stand still. Every person, whether young or old, woman or man, religious or a believe in science, held their breath.

How could someone turn a child into this? How could someone make a child suffer like this?

After the raid of that one warehouse, three more had been discovered, all larger in capacity then the next.

For some, the police had arrived too late. Many were dead by the time they got there. Few survivors, many tears and broken lives.

That was all that was left in the wake of these cruel scientists.

 

Messages clogged the server that held a single blog domain but the domain owner kept it up, updating every now and again seeing as how the blog owner would never touch it again.

People crushed into a small vigil set up at the house of Dr. Martinez. Her and her daughter both wept and cried, unable to be comforted.

Agencies upon agencies reached out to the hospitals and laboratories that were holding the genetically mutated children for one reason or another, offering up thousands of dollars to pay for costs or medical procedures, food, clothes.

 

One Week Later

 

It was time.

It was now, they were being buried.

They were being given a solider procession, each casket covered with a bright flag.

Angel's light colored casket was first. She was laid to rest with care and was settled into the dirt bed. Her gravestone would be that of an angel, head upturned to the sky, clinging to dove.

The engraving would read:

Angel

Born: Unknown

Died: October 5th 2008

Age: 8 years

“The innocent shall never be forgotten…”

 

Gazzy was next. His casket was simple, a pale oak.

His tombstone engraved with a lamb and

 

Gasman “Gazzy”

Born: Unknown

Died: October 5th 2008

Age: 10 years

“Our children change us... whether they live or not.”

 

Breaking the ladder, Iggy was next laid to sleep. His headstone was craved with a sun. It read nearly the same.

Iggy

Born: Unknown

Died: October 6th 2008

Age: 16 years

“The dead cannot cry out for justice; it is a duty of the living to do so for them.”

There was a break in the procession to allow family members and loved ones of the three to step foreword. There was only silence. Only one woman stepped forward, laying a pale flower at each of their hearts.

There was no wake. There wouldn't be a wake. The bodies were not fit to be seen.

They had been in waves of pain.

They had been tortured to the very end, but none ever gave in.

None were ever broken.

It was evident from the signs of struggle.

They fought to the end.

They fought for their lives.

They were just children.

What more could they have done?

What more could the world expect from them?

 

Nudge was laid next. Her casket was a peach color with a dark cover.

She too had an angel, but this angel was standing high on her toes, reaching for the sky.

 

Nudge

Born: Unknown

Died: October 5th 2008

Age: 12

“So long as little children are allowed to suffer, there is no true love in this world.”

 

The four graves were next to one another.

To some, it felt like a mass burial.

There were four more graves in a parallel formation at the back of the plot. Between the two lines of graves people already mourn the bodies that lay in the crypts.

The pictures had been circling the world.

The two teenagers in the cages, hands intertwined with the other's.

It had been published in nearly every newspaper across all continents.

Dr. Martinez had made sure their final moment was set in stone.

The stone Max lay on her stomach facing the boy.

The stone Fang lay on his back, his head turned toward the girl.

Their stone arms were stretched as far as physically possible, their stone fingers barely able to grip one another.

One change.

There was one change to this picture.

She had her wings back.

She could fly as high and as far as she wanted now.

She had her wings back.

They were free.

They would no longer be hunted and tortured.

They would no longer fear for their lives.

They were free.

 

 

Two Years Later

 

It was a sad day. It was an anniversary if there ever was one.

But it was also a happy day. It was a day of celebration.

After two years of trying to understand all of the genetically mutated children, they were now being allowed to be adopted.

They would have families.

They would now have homes.

They would no longer fear.

They would no longer be in pain.

 

One man and his sixteen year old daughter left the hospital in the dead hours of the morning, before the sun had even awoken.

On the girl's hip she carried a small child who clung to her hair.

She was four years of age with pale blonde, almost white hair with pupil-less eyes. She was blind.

Her multicolored wings fluttered happily yet nervously.

She had been given a new name, Motte.

She was headed to her new home.

 

The man turned the television on. He and his eldest daughter were just settling down after introducing Motte to her new room and toys. She soon passed out on the bed.

The man and eldest daughter waited for the president's speech on the open adoption.

After some minutes of fumbling with microphones on behalf of the newscasters, it started.

 

“My Fellow Americans,

My countrymen from around the world,

 

I don't know what to say. I had a speech prepared, but it doesn't seem to address the situation at hand.

We were a ignorant people.

We let children slip through the system and they suffered.

We now have the chance to make it better for a few of them.” He paused for a second and looked out among the cameras.

“We have six children to thank for the rescuing of all of these other children. They risked and lost their lives at the hands of the men and women who created them.

We owe them our gratitude and utmost thanks.

It is heartbreaking to me, and I assume to most, that they are not able to be present as we, the world, start a new chapter in this story.

We are now a combined race.

We are all equal, in the eyes of god and in the eyes of one another.

May we work so that another catastrophe like this doesn't not happen again.

Now, if you would please, I'd like to hand you over to Doctor Martinez.” He stepped down and she strode up.

Her head was held high and tears stained her face.

“Thank you.” She turned to the crowd.

“I'm not here to hand you a story of how we can make the world a better place. I'm here to tell you a story of six very brave kids who knew very early off that they would have to fight for their survival and that they would never be excepted into society.

Max once said to me `Death is the enemy. I spent 10 years of my life single-mindedly studying, practicing, fighting hand to hand in close quarters to defeat the enemy, to send him back bloodied and humble and I am not going to roll over and surrender.'

Don't any of you, for one minute think they were defeated. They will go on to win battles we could never dream of. They already have won battles we could never dream of.

They fought to make what is happening today a reality. They fought to live.

They lost, but in the long run, they really won.

Trust me when I say, this isn't the last we've seen of Max and the Flock.” She left in a flurry of a lab coat and claps from the audience.

 

Five Years Later

 

A man about mid height and age with faded brown hair and pale brown eyes stood off to the back. His daughters were kneeled in front of a set of graves. He nodded at the crypts, feeling vaguely foolish for thinking that the spirits of the dead could see or hear him. The daughters returned to his side. They turned to leave, starting off up the small incline. The youngest of the daughters, a seven year-old with white eyes, hair and wings stopped as her father and sister continued on without her. The elder sister turned quickly when she did not see the girl at her side.

“Motte? Is something wrong?” The elder sister came to Motte's side. The white haired girl shook her head, stating that she thought she heard someone call her name. Taking the small girl's hand, the elder sister looked back at the graves, once more thanking the lost souls for here sister's life. Had it not been for them, she surely would have been killed in some horrid way.

A dark shadow caught her eye.

A couple dark forms hid in the shade of the trees. She smiled when she saw the brisk of wings, like shaking the feathers loose from being pulled to close to the body. One of her little sister's friends with the prettiest parrot wings did it frequently.

She smiled wider when she saw two with their hands intertwined and her heart rose.

She was met with deep dark chocolate eyes that seemed to brood over the tiniest idea and bright hazel eyes that were serious and heavy with burden.

They both looked so happy.

They all looked happy.

They all sat or stood around in a circle, relaxed, talking amongst themselves.

The hazel-eyed, brown-winged one gave a small wave.

The dark haired one with the near black wings gave curt wave.

The two smiled at each other and she had to turn away.

It seemed like such a private, intimate thing.

Like it was a smile meant only for them two.

It was time to move on.

They had.

They held no grudges against those that had lived.

Just before leaving, the twenty-one year old sneaked a look back at their stone marks to read the quote once more to give her strength.

“Courage is the mastery or Fear”