@Letter Bee
The darkness of the compound was cold and unforgiving. It matched the faces of the guards and cultists who moved the children about and set them to tasks. Mikhail wouldn't know if they were underground, though it would lik ely be his first guess, or if the windowless, gray block they had lived within for the last few months, was in the middle of no where. Regardless, they could not scream, they could not run, they could not fight. The guards carried cattle prods they loved using, and Mikhail could almost be certain they had guns. Perhaps if they could manage to grab a weapon- but it was almost too late.
Tonight something was happening. The guards shifts had changed, closing off any planned escape attempts, and new cultists with black robes instead of the usual blue were walking around, inspecting the other children.
The last few months have been hell. Locked in cages, taken out to be strapped down to tables and inspected, tortured, teeth pulled out and fingers broken, some had received implants, some had been given archaic scars, others were beaten, broken, or outright killed if they didn't pass some kind of test. Directed in chained teams to build machines, taught to wield weapons or use tools, or dig out more of the complex, everyone seemed to be kidnapped orphans, party favors, a menagerie of children from different kinds of families and cultures, but all from near the same area. As the black robed cultists grow nearer to Mikhails cage, one of the other children scramble over.
A scraggly red haired girl near his age named Sarah, kidnapped from a middle class home, Sarah has suffered less than some, but the scars across her arms and legs show she clearly hasn't had a pleasant tome in the complex.
"Mike- Mike!" She would whisper loudly towards you. "We need to get out of here- tonight has to be the night, they're about to do something! The other kids talk about how some of us have been having special assignments lately, digging something- building or fixing some machine- I don't know. But there's a plan. One of us found a way out- a back door the guards use to haul in supplies from a ramp. Look, we've got kids ready to move- steal the right keys, open the right ways. We just need one more thing- you. Those robed freaks will come and when they take some of us down we need you to be ready. You'll be in the middle. Trip your guard and follow whoever's in front of you. I'll be right behind you. If anything goes wrong- keep running. One of us has to make it out. Then we can go and get help."
She would be laying her side against the bars, whispering between passing guards, watching the black priests grow ever closer, inspecting child after child. Some would be marked down on a clipboard by a following doctor. Sarah and even a couple of the other children would be looking at you desperately and waiting for you to agree before the cultists grew too close.
The darkness of the compound was cold and unforgiving. It matched the faces of the guards and cultists who moved the children about and set them to tasks. Mikhail wouldn't know if they were underground, though it would lik ely be his first guess, or if the windowless, gray block they had lived within for the last few months, was in the middle of no where. Regardless, they could not scream, they could not run, they could not fight. The guards carried cattle prods they loved using, and Mikhail could almost be certain they had guns. Perhaps if they could manage to grab a weapon- but it was almost too late.
Tonight something was happening. The guards shifts had changed, closing off any planned escape attempts, and new cultists with black robes instead of the usual blue were walking around, inspecting the other children.
The last few months have been hell. Locked in cages, taken out to be strapped down to tables and inspected, tortured, teeth pulled out and fingers broken, some had received implants, some had been given archaic scars, others were beaten, broken, or outright killed if they didn't pass some kind of test. Directed in chained teams to build machines, taught to wield weapons or use tools, or dig out more of the complex, everyone seemed to be kidnapped orphans, party favors, a menagerie of children from different kinds of families and cultures, but all from near the same area. As the black robed cultists grow nearer to Mikhails cage, one of the other children scramble over.
A scraggly red haired girl near his age named Sarah, kidnapped from a middle class home, Sarah has suffered less than some, but the scars across her arms and legs show she clearly hasn't had a pleasant tome in the complex.
"Mike- Mike!" She would whisper loudly towards you. "We need to get out of here- tonight has to be the night, they're about to do something! The other kids talk about how some of us have been having special assignments lately, digging something- building or fixing some machine- I don't know. But there's a plan. One of us found a way out- a back door the guards use to haul in supplies from a ramp. Look, we've got kids ready to move- steal the right keys, open the right ways. We just need one more thing- you. Those robed freaks will come and when they take some of us down we need you to be ready. You'll be in the middle. Trip your guard and follow whoever's in front of you. I'll be right behind you. If anything goes wrong- keep running. One of us has to make it out. Then we can go and get help."
She would be laying her side against the bars, whispering between passing guards, watching the black priests grow ever closer, inspecting child after child. Some would be marked down on a clipboard by a following doctor. Sarah and even a couple of the other children would be looking at you desperately and waiting for you to agree before the cultists grew too close.