Radioactive

He screamed. The pain felt intolerable. He couldn’t bear it any longer. It had been days, weeks or even months maybe. He didn’t know. There wasn’t any way in which he could know what was happening in the outside world. ‘They’ had been using him as a lab rat. Literally. He was kept in a titanium cell, provided with no food or clothing. Just medicine. Lots and lots of medicine. Tablets, pills, capsules. All these would only get him ready for the next test. That’s all he can remember. Tests and tests. Sometimes a memory from his early life would pop into his head. His little daughter. His job. He couldn’t remember distinctly.

 But this time it seemed different. He had been provided with a whole platter of delicacies. It seemed like a feast. He had voraciously gobbled it all up. But he knew something was wrong. ‘They’ looked excited for some unknown reason. ‘They’ constantly kept looking at the monitor and then at his cell. All of a sudden, he felt sleepy. This was weird, he thought. All this time he had been given drugs which would keep him awake. He couldn’t think anymore. His eyelids grew heavy and he fell asleep. As he slept he dreamed of his early life. He remembered how his little daughter wanted a birthday cake for her birthday. “Daddy daddy,” she said. “I want a Barbie cake, like the one Jane had.” He knew he couldn’t afford it. It broke his heart when he saw disappointment in his little girl’s eyes when he came home from work without the cake. She had already disappointed her by not being able to protect her mother. And now he had disappointed her again. He couldn't bear to disappoint her again.

He signed the contract. ‘They’ promised him money. Enough to feed his family and buy a hundred cakes for his daughter. The contract changed his life. He lost everything. His life, his daughter, his freedom. ‘They’ lied. Suddenly, everything vanished. He awoke to a warm feeling on his unclothed body. It grew warmer and warmer, until it was intolerable. He screamed. Then, he felt something quite different. It was a tearing sensation near his liver. Suddenly, he was reminded of Prometheus, the Titan who was punished for bringing humanity the gift of fire. Was this some sort of punishment? Is this what he would get for helping ‘them’ in discovering the ultimate race of humans? He screamed again. The tearing sensation had grown unbearable. He felt the skin tissue above his waist separate. The last thing he saw before passing out was the green light from a laser, pointing directly at his body.

When he awoke, he was lying on a bed. ‘They’ were surrounding him, staring at him, their faces filled with curiosity and excitement. He stared at his incandescent body. But as he tried to move, he felt something moving just above his waist. He looked down. He let out a scream and passed out again. “Hope he doesn’t die like the others,” one of ‘them’ said. “This is our most successful project yet. He is the ultimate breakthrough. The extra radiation worked perfectly. Just look at those extra pair of arms. He’s the first human to successfully be radioactive.”

Author's Note

This is actually one of my first writings, so please try and go easy on me :)

Reviews

[OctaBrain]

I think you’ve got a good handle on creating a story and not giving away all the information at the beginning. Too many new writers want to explain everything about their universe and it’s boring. Readers prefer to discover, not be given everything upfront. For your first story, I’d say you did very well. There’s a lot of little things I could pick at, but the important thing to know is that I started the story and I finished it. Didn’t lose interest and it kept my curiosity. I like it.

[Sunsets and fishing nets]

Thank you, I'd really appreciate it if you could tell me the errors in the story so I could correct them later. Thank you sooo much for reviewing my work.