I pushed the food around on my plate as I zoned out, thinking about how far we’d come. Everyone was healing nicely from the supply run incident, and even Lucas and Isabelle were mostly back to normal. It had taken a lot of time, but the wounds were healed for most of us. Alex sat across from me. He’d finished eating and was now staring at me, clearly amused at how lost in thought I’d been. I blinked a few times to refocus my eyes, and gave him a sheepish smile. He chuckled and started to tell me about some of the work that needed done today after training. I listened intently until he stopped talking and started to stare over my shoulder. He had a confused look on his face, and gestured for whoever was there to speak.

I snapped my head around to see Lucas standing there, a concerned frown planted firmly on his face. Lucas scratched nervously at the stubble invading his chin, he looked to be stalling for time, as if he wasn’t ready to speak yet.

“Can you both come with me?” he said, barely above a whisper.

He shifted around impatiently as he waited for Alex to return our dishes to the kitchen and clean up our table. Once we were ready to follow he turned around without a word, and led us towards the lab. He walked at a pace that was awkward for me, it was too fast for me to walk, but too slow for a run. I did an awkward jog to keep up with them, puzzled as to why he was acting so strange. Once we reached the lab Lucas threw open the door and moved off to the side for us to pass him. I followed Alex inside and turned to look for Lucas, who had already closed the door behind us. Isabelle was sitting at her desk as usual and I couldn’t help but feel a twinge of sadness as I looked around the room. It was another closed door meeting, but we were one person short this time.

Lucas swiftly took a seat on the other side of the desk from Isabelle, and gestured for us to sit with him. Alex sat next to Lucas, looking as confused and worried as I was. I opted for the chair on the side of the desk, closer to Isabelle, so I could see the computer she was so intensely focused on. I tapped my fingers on the metal desk anxiously as I waited for Isabelle to speak.

She looked around at us nervously and cleared her throat. “Hey um, so this is a first and I’m completely stuck on what to do,” she started, still obviously stalling.

“Go on,” Alex said, raising his eyebrow.

“So uh, well just look at it,” she said, flustered.

She grabbed a few papers and passed them out to us. They were copies of an email. She had one in front of her as well. Her copy was marked up with a pen and highlighter. She’d clearly spent a lot of time analyzing the email. I grabbed my copy and carefully read the contents of the email.

Dr. Charles,

I’m formally requesting a detailed update on your studies into the specimen thus far. I expect that your work is nearing completion. We mean to move you to a new facility to begin administering the formula to new soldiers as soon as your work there is complete. This will of course come with a hefty pay raise and a renewal of your non-disclosure forms, provided of course that you are able to obtain all necessary information from the specimen that we have provided to you in a timely manner. I don’t need to remind you that the people above me are not pleased about the extra expenses incurred due to your previous negligence.

I’ve been kind enough to give you a few extra weeks to provide an update on your own timeline, but the delay has become nearly unacceptable, and they are now breathing down my neck to reign in your behavior. I’ll give you one more week to respond with a full detailed breakdown of the properties and limitations of the experimental drug, as well as a treatment plan for the next round of soldiers. This must include a timeline for completion of treatment so we may begin the next phase.

If all of the information I requested is not provided within one week I will have no choice but to pay your facility a personal visit and commandeer all assets. I trust you remember the contract you signed initially, and what that would mean for your well-being.

I look forward to your prompt reply,

Governor Barrett

At the bottom of the page there were a series of numbers, letters, and symbols that looked like a keyboard was mashed down haphazardly, but I doubted the governor was so careless. It was likely a code that needed a response, and that was why Isabelle needed us. I glanced over Isabelle's copy of the email to confirm my suspicions, and sure enough all of the marks she’d made on the page were efforts to break the code.

My head spun violently from the shock of the email. I read it over several more times, trying to make sense of it all. For one thing, they weren’t going to stop the experiments even after creating us by accident. Up until this point I was working under the assumption that the cover-up and the mass killing of Oddities was to permanently bury the story of their abandoned project, but it wasn’t abandoned at all. They were going to make more Oddities.

The other shocking detail was the mention of people above the governor. Part of me had hoped that this ended with the governor. That one official had stepped over the line of his power and upon exposing him the whole mess would be over with. I’d stupidly believed that other parts of the government had no knowledge of the crimes, and that the corruption didn’t run that deep. Now fear ran through my veins as I tried to imagine how deep this actually ran, and if it was still possible to come out on top of this if the full power of the government was behind the governor. It was terrifying to think about, and I had to shove the line of questions down so I didn’t have a full on panic attack right then and there.

This tale has been unlawfully obtained from Royal Road. If you discover it on Amazon, kindly report it.

“I can’t break the code. There’s nothing in the lab or the computer anywhere on it,” Isabelle choked out, sounding ashamed of herself.

“There’s no point,” Alex said angrily.

“Agreed,” Lucas chimed in, sharing in the anger.

I stared at the two of them, waiting for an explanation. Why would we just give up now? With everything we’d already accomplished I couldn’t fathom that a code would be the end of the line. We had to try right? We had a week. I opened my mouth, intending to plead with them to reconsider, but Alex started talking before I could form the right words.

“Look at what he said. We aren’t the doctor. We don’t have anything he wanted, and clearly they aren’t on the best of terms. Even if we cracked the code and replied as him with some bullshit excuse and he by some miracle believed it, they’d still come here to take all of the Oddities back. That was clearly a threat. “Give us what we want so we can make more Oddities or you’ll be killed and replaced,” Alex mocked viciously.

Lucas nodded in agreement, they were clearly thinking the same thing. Isabelle sighed and slumped in her chair with an air of defeat about her.

“So what then? We just give up? Run away? This can’t be the end,” I spit out desperately.

“Oh, no. We’re going to reply. But not as the doctor. We’ll reply as ourselves. It’s about time I talked to Governor Barrett face to face, don’t you think? We’re ready for this,” Alex said, sounding determined.

“Fuck yes!” Lucas chimed in, “I knew you were right to lead us. Let’s show them who they’re dealing with.”

Isabelle mumbled her agreement to the plan, and folded her copy of the email up, tucking it out of sight.

“Okay then, good. Let's get to work,” I smiled.

We spent the next few hours forming a plan. We’d tell everyone today what was going on, and give them one final chance to run if that’s what they wanted to do. Then we’d spend the next few days preparing for war. The governor would be coming, that was for sure, and we needed to be ready for anything. Before the week was through we’d send our carefully crafted reply, and then we’d wait.

After the meeting was over we went straight to it. We called everyone together and told them the news. The governor meant to take back his facility, and we meant to put an end to this, one way or another. The crowd around us was dead silent as they listened to the plan in shock and awe. As I expected, none of them took our offer to leave. They didn’t want to start over and forever hide what they were. We were wronged by the government, and we intended to right that wrong here and now. The meeting rallied everyone together. The general feeling around the facility was one of eagerness and excitement. We were as ready as we’d ever be, and it had to be now.

We got to work, bolstering our defenses and training our hearts out. In the evenings Alex took suggestions for our terms to the government. We needed to set a clear list of demands for the upcoming meeting. Near the end of the week we stopped training, and started conserving our energy. We instead spent our time tirelessly assigning battle stations and strategies to each member of the facility. We had it all planned out, and each person would fight together as one seamless unit. We all knew where to report when they finally arrived. They would wait on our signal to attack. We held on to the slight hope that he would talk to us reasonably, and thus ordered everyone to stand-by, and only attack if the need arose.

The week went by in a flash. It was finally time. All that was left to do was finish our reply, and hit send. We stood around the computer as Isabelle finished drafting our reply. We scanned over the email one final time, and agreed that it was finished.

“Do it,” Alex said.

“Sent,” Isabelle replied with a sigh of relief.

Governor William Barrett,

We regret to inform you that Dr. Charles is dead, as are the rest of the researchers and soldiers posted here. Not to fear, the facility has been well taken care of by us, the specimen you said you’d reclaim. As such, the research you requested has not been completed, nor will it be. You will not be reclaiming us, as we are no one's assets.

We don’t know who you take your orders from, but we’d love to discuss the matter face to face. We do of course have some demands that you should be ready to comply with before your arrival to our facility.

First, All Oddities will be free from your relentless persecution. This includes any Oddities, here or elsewhere. We will be cleared of any potential charges, and allowed to return to our lives. We did not choose to become your enemy, you forced our hands. We will be given full immunity for any actions we were forced to take.

Second, The full matter will be made public knowledge. All of the cover-ups will cease immediately. The public will be made aware of the true cause and identity of the Oddities, as well as your attempts to hide it. The public will receive full statements detailing the number of innocents killed during this ordeal, as well as an apology from you or the people giving you your orders. Either will do.

Finally, we would urge you to halt any further attempts to create more Oddities. If you would agree to shut down any operations pertaining to the creation or study of any new Oddities we could be convinced to help the government in the future in their absence, should all of our demands be met.

We look forward to your cooperation on these matters. We wish for nothing more than to return to our lives that you so cruelly ripped away from us. We are innocent citizens, caught up in your failures, and we only want to see the government take responsibility for its failures on this matter and let us go back to our lives, with the knowledge that this will not be swept under the rug. The losses we suffered are too great to be buried by you or anyone else.

Failure to comply with our demands, or an attempt to attack our facility will result in great losses for you. We have become the elite soldiers you strove to create. You cannot hope to take us down quietly. We will continue to stand up for ourselves, and tell the public ourselves what transpired if we must. We think it’s in your best interest to get to the press before we do. You will most likely handle it in a more tactful way than we would. Take this not as a threat, but as a promise that we will fulfill if you are not willing to negotiate.

We look forward to your prompt reply,

The Oddities

I squeezed Alex’s hand in mine as I read over our email one last time. It was either the beginning of the peace talks we’d always hoped for, or the beginning of a war. Either way we’d stand firm on our demands. We would accomplish everything we’d promised to. It was just a matter of doing it the easy way, or the hard way. The four of us looked around at each other and let the weight of the step we’d just taken sink in. Now, we wait.