Big Brother | They're Immune (Ch1)

“What do you mean, my children aren’t Pure anymore? They can’t go to Superbia.” A man with ruffled black hair demanded, his dark blue eyes full of worry. He was tall, at least 6’6” in height, wearing a white coat and a long scarf. With one stiff hand he pushed his rectangular glasses up higher on his nose, shaking with a mix of fear for his children and anger to the people that had come to him. “They’ve done nothing wrong, you can’t do this. They’re all I have left, since Brenice died!”

“Oh, that’s too bad, Phyllis--”

“Megalos. It’s Megalos, Crane. I had my name changed for Frank’s sake.”

The other chuckled, a warped smile coming onto his face. He had messy, dark hair, with an ornate eye patch covering his left eye. The other was a blank gray color, having a soulless, amused look in it. A scar crossed over the space around the eye patch, stitched firmly closed. He wore a coat with black and red on it, and the insignia of where he worked: a white flame-looking logo with the word ‘H.E.A.T.’ printed beneath it in the same color. “Mheheheh. I don’t care, Phyllis. Your children have the genes that makes Purity not work on them, what if they rebel? You have three days to do something about that, or it’s off to Superbia for them.”

The other man sent a glare at the man with the eye patch as he turned around and left with his hands in his pockets, laughing to himself. That man is insane. he thought, pressing the button inside the door frame to close his front door. Why did they let him of all people be the CEO of HEAT, let alone be in charge of this place?

~

Today was off to a good start. Ib and I were-- wait, do you even know us yet? I’m Adonis Megalos, and my twin sister is named Ib. I guess you could use a visual on us, too? I have messy, kind of long brown hair, that curls a little into my green eyes. Think of the colors like the color of milk chocolate, and the leaves on trees in the summer. Those kinds of colors. Today I’m wearing a kind of weird outfit, considering that I can admit my sense of fashion is stranger than a clown’s. It’s an oversized white shirt with black stripes, as in the sleeves hang off my hands like that one Jatta kid from the game about dangling grandpas. Over that is a weird brown vest, and some casual red jeans to top it off. Don’t look at me like that, it’s fashion.

Anyway, Ib and I were sitting in the kitchen, eating some toast. I like my toast with too much butter, she just lathers on like half an inch of strawberry jelly on the whole thing. Her hair was more like the color of caramel, pulled into two thick, long braids. The back of her head was covered with a green knit cap with a yellow ribbon tied into a bow on it. Her eyes were the same color as mine, though her skin was lighter - we both had olive skin, being half-Greek. She wore a shirt similar to mine, except cream colored with wide, navy blue stripes, and a wide collar and shorter sleeves. She also had on camo pants.

“Who was that at the door, dad?” Ib asked. Our father was a scientist working for a big place called HEAT. I try to ask him what the acronym means, but he never tells me. Just that the T stands for Technology. That place was in charge of making almost everything in Levis - the nation we live in - technology-wise. High-tech prosthetics, security systems, androids that help out people who need it, so many things! Dad was in charge of the team that made sure that each model of the security systems were foolproof. HEAT also distributed a chemical known as Purity required to be circulated throughout all of Levis, though Ib and I didn’t really see the point. It’s just a chemical, what gives? People act like robots when there’s a lot of it in the air. Anyways, my dad’s name is Gus. It’s just Gus, not short for anything.

“...nobody. It was nobody, kids, don’t worry.” Dad answered, looking very upset and tugging at his scarf, loosening it around his neck. Whenever he was upset he would tug at his scarf a lot. He wears that big scarf so much because he has a nasty-looking scar there on his neck, all stitched up over his throat. It makes him feel self-conscious and act weird if people talk about it, so most people are wise enough to ignore it if it’s visible. Most.

 I decided to be brave and ask some more about it. “Was it that Crane guy again? I heard you say his name and something about mom.” Crane’s full name was Dr. Alistair Crane, and from what I heard about him from dad, he was an asshole. Don’t look at me like that, Ib and I are like fifteen, we’re old enough to know when someone’s an asshole. And our mom… she died giving birth to us. From seeing her in pictures, she was a beautiful woman. Brenice Stills. She had golden hair always made into a loose braid hanging over her shoulder, and pale brown eyes. She was a free spirit. Sometimes Ib and I feel kind of guilty that we were ever born because she died putting us into the world, but dad says not to be. It’s not our fault.

“...yes. It was. What he said doesn’t matter, though. It’s not a problem. Daddy’s gonna fix everything.”

“Fix what?” Ib remarked, a frown coming onto her face. She finished off her toast, licking a smudge of strawberry jam off the side of her mouth and wiping her face with a napkin. I happened to do the same thing after finishing my own toast. Even though we were pretty different, but we were still twins. We still sometimes had moments of duality. Funnily enough, our birthday is May 31st. That makes us both have Gemini as our sign.

Dad sighed and went into the living room, sitting down in a chair with a huff. “...it doesn’t matter, kids. We’ll get through this.” At that, he leaned back, dozing for a while. Even though he had just woken up at the same time we did and downed at least two full mugs of coffee, he was still tired. We let him take his little naps, though. He uses up a lot of energy at work.

With a smile to each other, Ib and I went outside to head to another uneventful day of school. The schools seemed to be especially thick in the air with Purity, which had a somewhat sweet, strawberry-like smell to it, so students acted like zombies, never acting up. We had to play along, since not being affected by the stuff was treated like a crime, or some kind of debilitating mental illness. It wasn’t fair.

Oh well. Here’s to another boring day, huh?

~

“Are the preparations ready?” A tall woman with a stoic outlook and black hair remarked. Her hair was pulled back into a long braid, with some of her hair loose and hanging into her eyes like bangs. She had piercing brown eyes behind rectangularly-framed glasses, and a stitched scar crossed over her nose bridge. Much like the others around her, she wore a white lab coat. Underneath she wore a pastel blue dress shirt with no tie, and black work pants. She looked over at another man barely below her height expectantly, waiting for an answer.

This man she was looking to was Italian, with a previously brown, shaggy undercut bleached to be a pale blond color. He had blue-green eyes, the right one being covered by a medical eyepatch. His coat was buttoned shut halfway down, sitting over a light pink turtleneck. He had a small soul patch on his chin, and a silver earring hanging from his left earlobe. A curt nod was shown by the sudden jerking gesture of his head. “Yes. All we need now is a subject.”

“Gᴜs's ᴋɪᴅs sᴇᴇᴍ ʟɪᴋᴇ ᴀ ɢᴏᴏᴅ sᴛᴀʀᴛ. Tʜᴇʏ'ʀᴇ ʟɪᴛᴛʟᴇ ʙʀᴀᴛs ᴛʜᴀᴛ ᴀʀᴇɴ'ᴛ ᴀғғᴇᴄᴛᴇᴅ ʙʏ Pᴜʀɪᴛʏ, ᴛʜᴇʏ ᴡᴏɴ'ᴛ ʙᴇ Lᴜᴍɴɪᴀɴs ғᴏʀ ʟᴏɴɢ, sᴏ ɪᴛ's ᴘʀᴀᴄᴛɪᴄᴀʟʟʏ ʟᴇɢᴀʟ!” A body was visible on a long, vertical screen. A pale-skinned girl with a black bodysuit, marked by glowing, red, TRON-esque lines. Black headphones with red accents and cat ear-shaped bits on the band sat on her head. She was a corrupt AI, meant to be scrapped. Originally made to be an advanced security system, she now spied on people and stole data. “Yᴏᴜ ɴᴇᴇᴅ sᴏᴍᴇᴏɴᴇ ᴛᴏ ᴛᴇsᴛ ᴛʜᴀᴛ “sᴇʀᴜᴍ” ᴏɴ, ʀɪɢʜᴛ?”

The man looked over at the AI, a grin coming onto his face. “...right. Yeah. You mean the crappy thing I snatched from Frank? Sure. That’s just an excuse to experiment on a couple of teens, you know? But yeah… the Megalos kids. Hate those little brats almost as much as I hate Gus himself.” He cackled a little, eager to do something that was potentially extremely illegal.

“Blake, settle down. We’re not doing this just yet.” The woman sighed.

Blake protested, frowning. “Aw, why, Keira?”

“They’re still in Lumnia. We have to wait.”

“..ugh. Fine.”