Extraordinary sample chapter

The room is white from the tiled floors to the seamless ceiling. Along one wall, a bay of mirrors casts the image of an unfamiliar girl back at me. Her muscles are thick along the shoulders and cable down her bare arms. Her clothing is stark, black, like death. A fury burns in the copper eyes glaring at me.

Not a strange girl. Me. Bianca Pond.

Anxious and confused, I pull my long dark hair over one shoulder and begin braiding it loosely as I investigate my situation.

The small, square room has no door. Only the single metal chair and the wall of mirrors. Even the lights are recessed into the ceiling so deep I cannot see where they are as if the ceiling itself glows with light.

Anxiety presses against my chest and makes my vision swim. Where am I? How do I get out? Maybe breaking the mirror will do the trick. I ball my hands into fists at my sides and watch as the muscles in my arms swell in size. Such strength! It pulses and hums in my muscles, intoxicating in its primal power. I pull back a fist and slam it into the mirror.

The mirror vibrates and my reflection quakes as the mirror absorbs the impact, singing a dull song of mourning. But it doesn’t break. It must be reinforced with Naturalist Power, I think, surprised by the sound of my voice in my head.

“Do you remember where you are?” a man says. His voice emanates from all around me.

I tilt my head back to gaze at the ceiling and turn in a slow circle.

“Do you remember where you are?” he asks again. His voice carries the same inflection as before, as if the question is a recording.

I close my eyes, dig in my mind for memories, but can only grasp flashes. A funeral. Two caskets. Someone beside me with his arm draped over my shoulders. He has the same eyes as me. A squat, long government building with giant fluted columns and a balcony on the top floor. My finger pressed against a tablet.

I open my eyes slowly. “The Department of Military Affairs.”

“Why are you here?” he asks.

“To protect the city and the citizens from acts of terror,” I say. The words don’t register with my mind, but they sound right as they slip past my lips. “So they don’t lose their families to the radicals like I did.”

Silence.

I turn to face the mirror again. Someone must be on the other side. “Why am I here?”

“To protect the citizens of Elpis from radicals,” he says, spouting my answer back at me.

I shake my head. “No, I mean why am I here?” I wave toward the doorless room.

“You volunteered to be here.”

Volunteered …

Again, the memory of pressing my finger to a tablet surface flashes through my mind, but it feels foreign, like it isn’t mine. Despite the odd sensation, I do recall volunteering for a special DMA project. Radicals killed my parents, and the DMA offered me this chance … or someone did. A man, whose face I cannot quite grasp, extended me the opportunity to join this secret project with the promise that it would help me avenge the murder of Mom and Dad. It would make me stronger, faster, better.

Anger burns in my chest as I step toward the mirror again, examining the way my deltoid muscles are so defined, the increased size of my biceps. Clenching my fists again, the cabling of each muscle in my arms becomes more distinct. With this level of strength, I could punch a fist through the giant fluted columns I recall from outside the Administration Building. I could crush a man’s skull with a single blow.

I could exact my revenge on the radicals.

“I am ready,” I say with confidence, simmering anger and hate burning in my voice.

“Not yet. First, we need to run you through some tests to assess the efficacy of your transition. Then you will be assigned to a unit and begin your training.”

The metal chair disappears, replaced by a treadmill. I step back, but this is familiar. A simulation, perhaps.

“First, we will test your endurance and speed.”

This test is unnecessary. I already know my capabilities, how fast I can run, and for how long. The knowledge is burned into my mind, as if pressed into my muscles by the sheer memory of having run it before. A desire to scoff and tell him I don’t need to run rises in my throat, but I step on the treadmill as if it was a natural, given movement. My body betrays my thoughts.

And I run, my feet only grazing the treadmill as the speed of the belt keeps easy pace with me. Run until I can’t run anymore, he says, and so I do without question even though I have plenty to ask. Once again, my body betrays my mind.

It’s impossible to know how much time passes. The treadmill has no timer, no distance. No display. It’s simply the belt, the rollers, and me. My breathing is evenly paced, matching the rhythmic whisper of my boots across the belt. Hunger burns in my stomach, yet I haven’t even broken a sweat yet. I run for hours. How far have I gone? Miles? The longer I run, the more that hunger eats away at me until, at last, I hop off.

“Have you reached your limit?” the mysterious male voice asks the moment the belt of the treadmill stops whirring.

“I’m hungry.”

“Have you reached your limit?” he repeats.

“Yes,” I lie. I haven’t reached my limit, but the hunger is overwhelming, as if my insides are eating away at themselves.

“One seventy-seven in five fifty-four,” he says, though I don’t believe he is talking to me.

What does that even mean?

My stomach rolls painfully and I clench my gut. “I need food.”

The treadmill vanishes. A small pedestal table appears in the corner of the room, piled with cooked fish and linguini noodles, along with a loaf of French bread. I sink into the single chair beside the table and dive into the meal, eating with a voracious hunger like I’ve never experienced before—or at least, I don’t think I’ve ever experienced it before. Everything goes down so fast I don’t taste any of it. They could have given it to me unflavored and I would not have noticed.

As I press the last piece of bread into the crumbs on the plate and wash everything down with my third glass of milk, the treadmill reappears.

“Again,” he says.

With a full stomach, I am prepared for the next run.

As I run, my mind drifts to my parents. Mom, with her heart-shaped face so much like my own. I can remember her warmth, kindness, compassion, yet I can’t seem to recall anything more specific. The same issue surfaces as I think about Dad. His presence is always strict, expectant, yet loving, and I remember that I have his eyes. But no specific memories will rise to the surface. Except for one.

My burning desire to avenge them. So as I run, I imagine their killers in front of me and it hastens my steps.

The rest of my day continues much the same. After running and eating three more times—the time getting longer, as well as the distance—a bed replaces everything in the room.

“Rest,” he says. “We will begin again tomorrow.”

I settle into the bed, wondering if they will require me to do nothing more than run again. The comforter is warm and soft, if a bit institutional white, and the pillow welcomes me. I drift off, thinking about what awaits.