Chapter 1

Vapor clouds betray my every breath, cold air searing a path to my lungs.

My body throbs and cries out for rest, my legs burn from running for hours on end. I pause momentarily to catch my breath, casting a glance behind me as the sound of snarling hounds reach my ears.

I need to get away and fast. They will never give up, their lives depend on catching me.

I continue running, my legs are scratched by every brush and low set tree limbs, while the forest is a blur of greens and browns. The pounding of my heart and feet is all I can hear. I trip over tree roots and scramble to get up. I have lost ground. The hounds are close; they are baying to their owners.

I need to gain back the distance I lost and fast.

The light is fading quickly, and I cannot lessen my pace.

As the sky grows darker, I can see my pursuers; they have a slight red glow to them. I run till I hit something hard, falling back on my butt. Pain blossoms through my skull and my vision blurs slightly. Shaking my head in attempts to clear the pain, I stand and feel for what I had hit. It was a wall, an invisible wall. I can see the trees just past my reach. I need to find the end of this barrier. With one hand on the wall, I run in one direction as far as I can. I reach the end of the wall, only to find a corner. I’m trapped in this place. Panic floods my mind.

I have to get out. I have to get away.

I can hear the hounds, and they are close. Pounding of paws on the ground is the only warning I get before a hound knocks me over and I can’t move. It doesn’t attack, that is not its job, its job is to trap. I hear the rustling of the hound’s owners getting closer.

“Well, well, well. Look what we caught” I hear someone say. I hiss and struggle as much as I can. “No use in doing that, little Reaper. You’re dead.” He points a gun at me, a loud bang rings out and everything goes be black.

Groaning I cover my eyes against the light that is shining in them. “Wake up Reaper.” I hear a voice say. It’s different to the one that captured me, but I know this voice, it belongs to one of the men that experiment on me. I open my eyes slowly, trying to let them adjust to the light, I’m in a white room. There’s a door on one wall, and a long mirror on the wall next to the door.

I check the ceiling for cameras, and immediately spot one in the far corner, clearly they aren’t trying to hide the fact that they are watching me this time. I’m sitting in a chair that is in the middle of the otherwise empty room. Slowly I stand, making sure I can hold my own weight.

“Reaper are you going to behave this time?” The voice sounds from the other side of the mirror. I smile back and feign a curtsy. They hate it when I smile and display my sharp, pointed teeth. I hear the men grumble as they leave the room on the other side of the mirror.

I don’t remember who I am or what I am, all I know is that I am just another one of their experiments.

Why do they call me Reaper? I’m different, I know it. I don’t look like the men that keep me here or the woman that comes in to make sure that I am clean and to take blood samples. I look in the mirror and notice that they have cut my hair again. It was down to my waist the last time I remember looking at it. Now it’s just long enough to reach past my chin. It will have to be cut again after the fifth experiment. I am not able to tell the passing of time, but I know that after each experiment I have about ten to fifteen sleep cycles before the next one.

My eyes are a gold color and my skin seems to be ash grey, I feel as if I were to run my hands across the wall I would leave a trail of ash behind. They have changed my clothes since I last tried to run away, so I was back to the stark white shirt and pants that they like to put me in. I hate the clothes, they are confining and uncomfortable. I feel like I should know why I am here but all I can remember is waking up to a woman shaking me. The first time she saw me she started to cry. I wonder why she did that?

There’s a soft knock at the door and I know that the woman will be in to either take my blood or to take me to the lab.

“I’m here for a blood draw Rav-Reaper.” She always says that, almost as if she knew my name before I first woke up here, I’ve never been able to ask her about it, mostly because I’m unable to speak. I have the knowledge on how to, but every time I try to talk I only seem to be able to make a hissing sound. I nod and sit in the chair with my arm out.

“Why do you try to run? You know that you can’t get away.” She says softly, knowing I won’t answer.

I know I’ll be caught, I just want to run. I’m tired of being trapped inside this box. I shrug one shoulder in response to her as she sticks the needle in my arm. I no longer wince at the pain, I have gotten used to it. The woman looks at me with a pained expression as she draws the blood. It’s always the same, she watches me as if she regrets something she has done to me. I smile at her, as she moves to take the needle out.

While she is putting everything away, she cuts herself on something inside her bag. The wound is shallow, just enough to cause a bead of blood to well up and trail down her finger. I watch the blood for a second before I gently grab her hand. The scent of her blood is intoxicating. I pull her hand to my lips and begin to lap at the blood. There is an explosion of flavor that fills my mouth. She snatches her hand away from me. Her eyes fill with fear a split second before she gathers herself and returns to her duties. She hands me my medication and water and stays long enough for me to take it. Before she closes the door, she looks back at me.

“If these next few experiments don’t yield what they are looking for then you will be terminated,” she says.

My heart is throbbing in my ears, loud and irregular, but I barely hear it, my mind is clouded with fear. So I will be killed if the men don’t get what they want, but what is it that they are looking for. What do the men want from these pointless experiments?

I start to pace back and forth, I don’t know how many sleep cycles are left for me before the next experiment. As I pace, a sharp pain starts forming at the base of my head. I’m able to ignore it for a bit, but soon the pain is too much for me to bear. I cry out, the sound that comes from me is more of a primal growl than a cry. I grasp my head and fall to my knees. My ears are filled with the sound of rushing wind. My vision goes black. I can hear the men running into the room screaming before I lost consciousness.

I see something. I know what I am seeing isn’t real, but it feels as if I am watching a video of my life. There is a girl with bright red hair and emerald green eyes and fair skin. She is laughing and talking to the woman. I can’t hear what they are saying, and before I am able to figure out what is being said, the scene changes. First to a classroom full of people then to the lab with the men watching some of the tests being performed. Then there is an accident of some kind and the girl is left on the ground slowly bleeding out. Doctors rush her to the lab and try to save her. Nothing seems to work. The sharp pain cuts through my skull as I hear someone screaming.

I am pulled from the scene flashing before me. My eyes open slightly to see the woman leaning over me, “Raven, goddamnit, I can’t lose you again.”

Who is Raven I wonder? The woman is crying and I lose consciousness once again.

I fall back into the same dream of the red-headed girl. The men from the lab are giving her something every day. Slowly her skin turns a dark ashy color and her bright hair turns black. She is turning into what I am, or maybe she is me. I don’t know anymore. I watch as the girl turns into something that looks inhuman. Then one day her eyes open and she looks around the room. She attacks one of the men. She tears at his throat with her teeth, blood drips down her chin and neck as she smiles. She enjoys seeing the life drain from his eyes.

I am ripped from the dream as pain shoots through my body. I don’t know what’s going on, just that I feel as if every bone in my body is breaking. I wake up bound to something hard and cold. Looking around I see the men ready for an experiment, but this time the woman is in the lab room as well, and she looks angry. The bindings are digging into my wrists and ankles as I try to get free.

“Raven, there is no use in getting away. We will get you back, but not yet. Your body can’t handle waking up yet.”

Confusion overwhelms me as I look around. The room is different this time there are giant containers full of a strange fluid.

I start to panic as I see the girl from my dream wheeled up beside me. I thought she transformed into me. I look to the woman for answers but she just chuckles as she orders the men around.

“You see Raven, we had to put your consciousness in someone that was similar to you before we could make the transformation to make sure that you would survive.” She walks around to the motionless girl beside me and strokes her hair, “This is you, Raven, we were able to use the blood from your body to heal her, to make her stronger. Now we need to put your consciousness back in her before all your memories come back. That way you will accept the transplant from one body to the next.”

I struggle against my restraints even harder. I don’t want to be erased, I don’t want to disappear. I know I’m not the girl that is beside me. I am me! Feral growls came from my throat as I thrash. I bite at any hands that come near me, but nothing helps. The searing pain in the back of my head returns with a vengeance. My struggling becomes weaker as the pain in my head intensifies. The woman is able to inject me with something and my thrashing abates.

“You will be okay. The next time you wake up you will be in your correct body,” she states calmly. I fight as long as I can before my mind goes hazy and I get pulled under into a deep sleep.