A Vision of Before--Audrey's Story

The funny thing about the first time Audrey opened her eyes, she didn’t see what the scientists around her saw. Her eyes had a far-away look because her sight was indeed very far away from the creation room. It was actually a half hour in front.

“Is something wrong?” Audrey asked timidly.

The man shook the saddened look off his face with the shake of his head, “No, nothing at all. You’re…you’re new, aren’t you…Audrey?”

“Yeah, my name is Audrey 1242. What’s yours?”

“Clayton.”

“Clayton what?”

“You can just call me Clayton. I don’t really care for the number system to be honest.”

“Twelve forty two? Are you awake? Can you hear me?”

A voice dragged Audrey out of the corridor and into the lab room, where her eyes were assaulted with a flashlight, “Twelve forty two, please respond.”

Audrey squinted hard against the light and gently pushed it away, “Where am I?”

The light flicked off, and the kind face of a scientist looked at her, “You’re in the creation lab in the NAC. You’re isotope number 1242, and you have some very interesting powers, if I do say so.”

“Audrey,” She said abruptly, “Audrey 1242.” Her vision told her what her name was, and prior knowledge implanted in her brain told her that she was an isotope who had prophetic powers.

Well, not necessarily prophetic. Audrey saw the future in short clips; almost like watching a commercial or a trailer for a movie. She could see stuff for longer periods when looking at events closer to the present, and she could see a person’s individual future better by having skin contact with them.

The scientist offered her a hand and helped her up, “Audrey’s a nice name. Maybe I should suggest it to my wife.”

Audrey’s eyes glazed over again, and her grip on the scientist’s hand suddenly tightened. Thirty seconds later, they cleared and she gave him a soft smile, “It’s actually a boy. A boy named Ryan. I think his nickname will be Rye-Rye. But you should hurry out of here; your wife is going to go into labor in about twenty minutes.”

The scientist’s eyes went wide, “A boy…Rye-Rye? Wait, holy crap!” He slid his hand out of Audrey’s grip, “I have to pack…no, get the car. Yeah, get the car, then pack. Oh my goodness, a boy!”

Audrey gave a giggle as he ran from the room shouting, “It’s a boy! It’s a boy!”

Other workers in the room rolled their eyes before attending to the teen sitting on the operation table. Overall, it was just like going through a physical exam. Heart rate, blood pressure, right body temperature, height, weight, eyesight…nothing out of the ordinary.

Even still it took a half hour to complete the medical process, and Audrey wanted the solitude of her room by that point.

However, the second she stepped outside of the creation lab and into the hallway, she nearly ran into the man from her vision.

“Oh!” Audrey exclaimed in surprise, “Hi Clayton! Have you been waiting out here?”

Equal surprise could be seen on the man’s face, “How…how can you possibly still…I don’t understand.”

The teen ducked her head in embarrassment, “I’m sorry, we haven’t actually met yet. I guess my power is the ability to see the future, and I saw us standing out here and I~” She cut herself off when she realized she was rambling, “How about we start over? My name is Audrey.”

Clayton was now staring at her with a look of sadness.

“Is something wrong?” Audrey asked tentatively.

He shook his head; erasing the sad expression, “No, nothing at all. You’re…you’re new, aren’t you…Audrey?”

“Yeah, my name is Audrey 1242. What’s yours?”

“Clayton.”

“Clayton what?”

“You can just call me Clayton. I don’t really care for the number system to be honest.”

Audrey nodded sagely at his words; hiding her glee. It was fun knowing every word that would come from his mouth. However, her glee faded as the sad look on Clayton’s face returned.

Worse, the sadness was directed at her.

“Something happened, didn’t it?” Audrey asked with a crinkled brow; trying to figure out why the man was so upset.

Clayton sighed heavily before putting a cheery smile on his face, “Well, we’d better get you to your room. I’ll escort you.”

Audrey already knew how to get to her room, because it was her number: 1242. However, since Clayton seemed so down in the dumps, she allowed him to rest a hand on her shoulder and guide her to her room.

“So do you feel okay?” He prodded, “Do you remember anything?”

The teen thought for a moment before replying, “I feel fine, but it’s weird. It’s like I know all this stuff, but I have no idea how I know it. Like the layout of the building: I know that we’re going to take a left and then a right. I know that I’m thirteen, I know how tall I am, and I know I hate the orange jump suits the isotopes have to wear.”

Clayton gave her a warm smile, “Actually, there have been a few changes. The jump suits are only optional now. I managed to talk some of the Helli0n officials into letting some of us go on a shopping trip tomorrow so all of you can get wardrobes. Sound good?”

Audrey brightened, “Yeah, that sounds amazing!”

A brief, five second vision replaced the hallway scenery, but Audrey walked through it until it cleared, “Actually, could we wait until day after tomorrow? Belleview is having a forty percent off sale that day.”

Audrey carefully selected a purple shirt and looked at the size. It was a large, but she wanted it to hang off her slim frame, unlike some of the other girls (most notably a girl dragging a much smaller, strawberry blonde girl behind her) who wanted skin tight clothing.

“Make sure you’ll actually wear what you’re buying!” Clayton called out over the bustling mass of isotopes, “This stuff isn’t free you know!”

True, Audrey grimaced at the brief vision that told her the amount of the shopping trip, despite the sale on everything.

“Finding everything you like?” Clayton asked over her shoulder.

“Yep,” Audrey replied, “Though I think there are some of us going overboard.” She nodded in the direction of the red-headed girl and the strawberry blonde. The latter was simply standing with her arms limp at her sides, but the former was ripping items of the racks left and right with abandon.

“Ah yes, perhaps I should give her a word about our budget limits.” Clayton said as he hurried over to the two girls.

With his back now turned to her, Audrey gave the older isotope a dark look. Clayton had been hovering over her for the last two days; constantly asking if she was alright, if she needed anything, and if she had any problems of any sort.

To say that the constant attention annoyed Audrey was an understatement. The worst part was that she couldn’t understand for the life of her why Clayton was so concerned, and her brief visions told her nothing. Every time the older isotope popped in to check on her, Audrey couldn’t help the frustration that sprang up.

“But Clayton, you wouldn’t want to deny Paulina the opportunity of a full wardrobe!” The redhead exclaimed loudly. Clayton’s reply wasn’t loud enough for Audrey to hear the words, but she could detect the reprimanding tone in his voice.

With a smile, Audrey turned to her left and opened her mouth as though to say something to someone standing beside her. However, no one was there. Audrey’s brow furrowed in confusion. Why had she done that?

It was then that Audrey felt a strange hole in her heart. Like someone was missing. Someone who had been a close friend.

“Audrey, is something wrong?” Clayton asked urgently.

The isotope jumped at the sudden voice, and she realized she had been staring off into space with a sad expression. Audrey looked into Clayton’s worried face, and sighed. She had no reason to lie to him, but for some reason, she felt as though she should keep the empty feeling to herself.

Yet since common sense told her she had no reason to lie, she said quietly, “I don’t know. I just…I feel like someone is missing. I can’t think of anyone who is, but I just feel that there should be someone here with me. A friend.”

“There’s no one,” Clayton said forcefully, “You were created two days ago, and you haven’t bonded with anyone, have you?”

Audrey felt startled by the tone of his voice. It was much different from the calm and gentle person she thought him to be. Not only that, but it was almost as if he had ordered—no, commanded—that there was no one.

That right there made Audrey’s brow furrow together in an adorable way. Baffled, but adorable. Was Clayton…hiding something from her?

The older isotope seemed to realize that his behavior was unusual, and he smiled, though Audrey could tell it was slightly forced, “Why don’t you round everyone up so we can all get to check-out?”

Audrey nodded and started to walk away, but stopped and turned before asking, “Clayton…would you tell me the truth, no matter how bad it was, if I asked you anything?”

If she hadn’t been listening for it, she wouldn’t have heard the tiny hesitation before the answer, “Of course I would, Audrey. You can trust me.”

The younger isotope turned around, and her eyes glazed over with a vision.

Clayton and Audrey stood with a good five feet between them. They were in Audrey’s room, which looked like an angry hurricane had been through it. However, it was nothing in comparison to the furious betrayal that blazed in Audrey’s near black irises.

“You lied to me.”

Those four words held fiery rage, unbelievable hurt, and icy coldness at the same time.

Audrey blinked away the vision with her mouth in a perfect ‘O’ of surprise.

What was going to happen that she would regard Clayton with such a murderous edge?

Much to Audrey’s annoyance, she could only derive two things from that vision. One, she was a few years older, so that incident wouldn’t take place for quite awhile. Two, Clayton had obviously told a hugely massive lie to Audrey, and she had found out about it.

After thinking like that for a long time, Audrey’s mind felt like mush. In a way, it was confusing. Seeing visions sometimes made her consciousness of time go haywire. As the days went by, she would think that her visions of the future were the present, and that the present were visions of the future.

“You have to learn the difference between them,” Dante, another Generation One, told her sternly, “Precognition may give you an edge when you’re making strategies, but it will be a far greater hindrance if you can’t even tell which is the present and which is the future.”

Audrey felt like screaming though.

Her visions didn’t come at her beck and call. Well, they did, but that wasn’t the problem. The issue was that they would come at any time and any place without any warning. Audrey could be simply eating lunch in the cafeteria when she would receive a vision of what would be tomorrow’s lunch. She could be in a lesson with Clayton or Dante and have a vision of what the lesson two weeks later would be. Worse, the teen could be walking down hallways or into rooms when visions would come, and she would walk straight into walls or doors (or on one occasion, a large oak tree out in the courtyard).

This happened so often, doctors and nurses at the Helli0n base became well acquainted with Audrey and her various breaks, sprains, and bruises.

It was when Audrey came into Clayton’s classroom with her arm in a sling for the fourth time that he finally reached the end of his rope, “Audrey, you have to start learning! You can’t go through your life like this, and more importantly, Helli0n won’t let you! Do have any idea what will happen to you if they find out?!”

He must have seen the terrified look on her face, because his voice immediately became soothing, “I’m sorry, Audrey.” The older isotope gently adjusted the strap on the sling as he spoke, “I’m just worried for your own well-being.”

Audrey tried hard to fight the hot tears building up in her dark, dark brown eyes, “I’m really trying, Clayton. I know you and Dante keep telling me to tell the difference between the present and future, but I don’t know how. I don’t know when a vision starts or when it ends…they’ve just become so frequent now.”

She couldn’t help the sniffle that followed at the end of her words. True, she was frustrated at times because of her vision problems, but more often than not she felt helpless and hopeless with her situation. There just didn’t seem to be a way to differentiate between present and future.

As though he read her mind, Clayton’s face lit up with an idea, “Audrey, what do your visions feel like?” He questioned eagerly.

The teen gave him a blank look before deadpanning, “Real.”

Clayton rolled his eyes good-naturedly, “Of course they feel real, but I’m curious, do you feel any pain in them? Do you ever have a sort of…out-of-body feeling when you’re experiencing them?”

Audrey gave him a watery eyed look, “Wait, didn’t we already have this conversation?”

The Generation One reached over and pinched the arm that wasn’t injured. Hard.

“Ow!” Audrey exclaimed indignantly; trying to rub her arm with the one in the sling, “What the heck was that for!”

Clayton smiled, not because he was sadistic, but because of how she never used profanities, even when it was justified, “So, do you feel pain in visions?”

Audrey’s brow furrowed together as she thought, “Well…I don’t know. It’s not something that I’ve ever taken notice of. I’m usually focused on what’s happening because I think it’s the present.”

After a quick second of silence, Clayton said with a smile, “I think, I have just found the solution to your problem.”

* * *

“So do you understand?” Clayton questioned urgently.

Paulina nodded slowly, but with a frown, “I...I understand what you want me to do, but I don’t understand why you want me to change my appearance. It seems pointless since she’s already been exposed to the others since her creation.”

Clayton sighed and ran a hand through his already mussed up hair, “True, 1242 has been exposed to the others, but they’re people she has never conversed with, nor would she have even recognized beforehand. If you hadn’t noticed, anyone that she would have recognized has been conveniently relocated to different facilities.”

The frown still in place, Paulina said timidly, “But you think she’ll recognize me…out of curiosity, why didn’t you relocate me?”

There was a sigh from the older isotope before the answer, “Molly would throw a fit if I relocated you, and even if I relocated the both of you, she would still throw a fit. And you know what? There is too much on my plate to add on Molly in a fit.”

“For the record, I don’t agree with this,” Paulina said with disapproval lacing her voice, “You took away the one~”

“Paulina, please,” Clayton begged, “We can’t reverse what has been done, and what has been done isn’t the issue right now. All I’m asking is that you help 1242 figure out the difference between the present and her visions of the future.”

“While disguising my true self from her.”

Clayton wearily closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose, “Yes, that is what I’m asking. You wouldn’t know, but the poor girl gets confused beyond belief because she thinks her visions of the future are really the present. Just today she thought we had already had the conversation we were having. Then, when she does get visions, she can’t~”

“She can’t see where she’s going,” Paulina interrupted dryly, “And she gets injured. Yes, you’ve already told me that.”

“So will you do it?” Clayton pleaded, “You’ll only be helping her.”

Paulina hesitated for a moment, but nodded, “Alright, I think I can show her the difference. Judging from what you’ve told me, it’ll be similar to telling the difference between sleeping and waking.”

Clayton smiled with relief, “Thank you, Paulina. You have no idea how much this will help her.”

“Actually, I think I do.” Again with the dry tone.

“And, if you don’t mind…please don’t tell anyone else what you’re doing. As I’ve said before, I want to keep all of this quiet…”

“Which is why you’ve only been referring to her by her number.”

“Paulina!” Was Clayton’s exasperated response.

“Okay, okay; I’m on it. I think it’s too late to help her tonight, but I’ll do it tomorrow…and you said she’s 1242?”

Clayton nodded, “1242. Black hair, brown-almost black eyes, and she’s only a little bit taller than you are.”

Paulina nodded; committing the features to memory, “Alright, brace yourself, Clayton.”

The ground suddenly opened from underneath their feet, and the earth suddenly grew teeth. No pain befell them, but they could still feel the vague feeling of having their flesh ripped from the bones and their bones snapped and crunched.

No matter how many times the dream-walker pulled him out of their shared dreams, and no matter how much he assured himself he would walk up, the older isotope could never get used to dying in those dreams-turned-nightmare.

* * *

Paulina woke up from the dream, and upon feeling around, she confirmed that she was still in her bedroom. Snores from the upper bunk-bed also confirmed that her roommate, Molly, was still in bed.

She knew why Clayton chose her to help 1242. Her power was the ability to walk through dreams; creating an entire world completely from her own imagination. So, if she was creating a new world, she could easily disguise herself as someone completely different than the small, strawberry blonde, blind and mute girl that everyone at the base knew her to be.

The only problem was that Paulina knew a little too much about the lies Clayton had been telling the prophetic isotope.

Dreams were peculiar things to Audrey.

Usually she was plunked right in the middle of some plot, and she was just swept along with the tide. Running away from serial killers? Yeah, she could handle that. Climbing an unbelievably tall tree to reach a rotten apple at the top? Odd, but no problem. Jumping into a lake when she had no idea how to swim? Awesome, especially because even when she was underwater, she could still breathe.

However, this dream was strange.

Audrey stood with a puzzled expression in the middle of a sunlit field. Amber-gold wheat stalks brushed at her hips and swayed gently in the breeze. Surrounding the field were majestic oak trees; each easily over one hundred feet tall. Their bright green leaves made a pleasant ruffling sound as the wind wound through the branches.

Nothing else was happening.

No serial killers? No trees with apples? No lakes to jump in?

“Hello?” Audrey called out; her voice echoing off into the distance.

“Hi there.” An unexpected voice greeted.

Audrey whipped around to see a tall woman with caramel brown hair sitting at a table. Where had the table and two chairs come from?...oh well, dreams again.

“Who are you?” Audrey questioned; not moving from her spot.

The woman stretched out her hand and examined her nails, “Someone who can help. As I understand, you’ve been having trouble telling the difference between the present and your dreams of the future.”

“They’re not dreams,” Audrey automatically corrected, “They’re visions.”

The beautiful woman smiled, “Come sit down. We have a lot to talk about.”

Audrey slowly and carefully walked to the table before sitting, “What’s your name?”

“Abigail,” She said as she ruffled her short hair, “And you are…1242, am I correct?”

“Yeah, that’s my number.”

With a nod, Abigail said, “So do you have an idea on how to tell the difference between the two different times?”

“Not really, no. I run into stuff all the time because I~”

“Because it’s not really there,” Abigail finished impatiently, “But let me ask you something: do you feel anything in your visions?”

Audrey shrugged, “Clayton asked me that day before yesterday. I’ve tried to focus more on it, but I still don’t really take notice of it.”

“Let me do a little experiment.” Abigail said. She lifted her hand and snapped her fingers. Wind suddenly tore at the fronds of wheat surrounding them, and blew over the table. It howled like a train bearing down on them.

Audrey leapt up from her chair; terrified of the sudden change.

“Do you feel anything?!” Abigail shouted over the angry gale.

Why the hell was she asking that?! They were about to be fricking blown away by a tornado or something!

“It’s a dream, you idiot!” Audrey’s mind angrily yelled at her, “Now focus on what she’s saying already!”

Did she feel anything?

Though the sound was terrifying, and the fronds of wheat were slapping against her skin, Audrey focused on that. No feelings of pain were there. She could see her black hair flying wildly about, but she couldn’t feel it hitting her face, nor could she feel her scalp protesting it.

A moment after this realization, Audrey shook her head, and the wind died down to nothing. The table popped into existence right where it had been, and so did Audrey’s chair (since it had been blown over when the isotope had stood).

“Easier to understand now?” Abigail questioned with a charming grin.

Audrey hesitated before sitting again, “But what about other visions? Like if I get one about a future lesson or something, and I’m just sitting in a desk. No pain involved in there for me to tell the difference.”

Abigail nodded wisely, “True. Not all visions involve pain, but it’s not just about pain. It’s about your senses. Touch the wheat around you.” Audrey obeyed, and just like a dream, she knew she was touching it, but she couldn’t feel the fronds.

“I know my hands have contact,” She finally said, “But I can’t exactly…”

“Feel them?” Abigail suggested. When Audrey nodded, the woman continued, “Use dreams as practice. If you can lucid dream, then you’ll do that much better. Control what you can do in your nighttime adventures. Learn the difference between visions and the present.”

Abigail looked out among the fields with a dreamy stare, “Dreams are truly wonderful. You can do whatever you can’t do in life. You can even get rid of certain hindrances that plague you out in the real world.”

Something stirred in Audrey’s mind, “Wait a second…this is all…a dream, right? You’re not real.”

“Of course.” Abigail said a little too quickly, “But the lessons, my dear, are all true.”

“No, but dreams,” Audrey persisted with a puzzled frown as she tried to recall something, “Dreams and disabilities…hey, are you…you’re…”

“Remember the lessons,” Abigail interrupted, “Remember them, and you’ll be just fine.”

Audrey opened her mouth; her mind on the tip of realizing something big, but the oak trees around them beat her to the punch. They suddenly came to life with a mighty roar, and uprooted themselves.

Before either of them could react, their thick branches yanked the two females from the ground. Through her terror, Audrey realized that she couldn’t feel any pain as the branches ripped her apart. Lesson one: remembered. The branches threw the pieces of her to the ground, but she couldn’t feel the wind whipping past her face. Lesson two: remembered.

* * *

Audrey woke up with a terrified scream. She had been falling in her dream, but she was still falling. With a muted thump, the isotope hit the floor next to her bed.

Pain flared up her injured arm. As Audrey ruefully rubbed it, she untangled herself from her sheets. A peculiar dream indeed. Had her subconscious read her need to tell the present from the future?

Audrey leaned back against her bedside desk with a slight frown. Something had seemed off about that dream. It was almost like it was…staged. Not something from her subconscious. But what else could it be? It wasn’t like someone could bop in and out of her dreams at will.

Or could they?

The prophetic isotope shook her head of such silliness. Yeah, she was on base with a bunch of kids with a bunch of superpowers. But none of them could have powers like that. Helli0n had created them so they could fight; not so they could interrupt dreams.

Audrey climbed back onto her bed with a sigh and snuggled down into her mattress. Time to get back to bed. She had a…long day…tomorrow…

* * *

“You helped her?” Clayton asked urgently.

Paulina nodded, “She’ll remember, but I have some bad news too. I think she was on the verge of realizing who I really was. The thing is though, she’s never talked to me. Ever. She heard about me briefly, but that was before~”

“God Almighty,” Clayton interrupted with a groan, “Why? Why couldn’t this have all just gone differently?”

“She could remember,” Paulina said with a searching look, “You know that’s possible. Test records even before the isotopes show that some people can regain what was lost from their minds.”

Clayton sighed heavily, “Don’t I know it. I just have to keep her away from things that will trigger it. And before you say anything, I know that I can’t keep her away from everything.”

Paulina nodded sympathetically, “Alright. I’ll meet up with you in the morning.”

Clayton closed his eyes; not wanting to see the violent end to the dream this time.

One trick that Audrey discovered for herself was that she couldn’t move in visions. Well, she did, but she couldn’t control it. To help her zero in on the present, Audrey was reminded of a movie she had once heard of; Inception or something like that.

The teen thought long and hard about an object she could carry around with her. Something unique to her, something only she would know, and something that wasn’t suspicious to others.

In the end, Audrey decided on a ring. It was silver with a black stone; the silver wrapping around the gem in a wispy way. Not even Clayton noticed it in their next private session, and not much got by him.
And speaking of…

“Are you making progress with your visions?” He asked with a smile as she sat down.

Audrey shrugged, “Sort of. I’m a lot better at telling the difference between them and the present. There’s only been one or two times where I got confused. Otherwise, I’m really fine now. I just try not to move too much when a vision comes. That way, I won’t run into things and get hurt.”

Clayton raised an eyebrow, “You said ‘sort of’. There’s still something wrong?”

With a frustrated sigh, the teen suddenly burst out, “They’re not always right! I’m supposed to be able to tell the future, but how can I do that if my visions aren’t even true?! Some isotope I am if I can’t even work my powers right!”

“Whoa, whoa, whoa; slow down there,” Clayton looked slightly alarmed by her sudden and passionate outburst, “Now tell me more about this.”

Audrey inhaled and exhaled deeply before explaining further, “When I see stuff…lesson plans, meals for the next day, if a fight is going to break out…it doesn’t always happen. Or if it does happen, it’s not at the time or even the place my vision said it would be in.”

Clayton gave her a sympathetic/apologetic look, “Audrey, I am here to teach you and the other Generation Twos…but I when it comes to your powers, I can do very little. The best I can do is guide and offer suggestions; such was the case with you just a few weeks ago. However, a case like the one you’re presenting, I fear it is up to you to find your own solution.”

The teen hung her head in shame, “I’m supposed to help Helli0n. I want to help them get rid of the Halogens and fight Jvstice. How can do that if my visions aren’t even dependable? How can I do that if I can’t even be sure what’s for breakfast tomorrow?”

Giving her an intense look, Clayton tilted her chin to face him, “Audrey, you’re only thirteen years old. You have many years before Helli0n will even consider calling you in to help. This is a time for training and exploring your abilities.”

After a quick pause, Clayton smiled and leaned back, “It’s also a time to have fun.”

“Fun?” Audrey repeated incredulously. Had he lost his mind?

The G1 gave her an amused look, “Audrey, no one from your generation realizes this, but all of you missed a period in life: childhood. You were thrust into your teen years expected to fight a war. I’ve told this to countless Helli0n officers and countless Helli0n review boards, and you all need to be given a chance to be children.”

At Audrey’s furrowed brow, Clayton laughed, “Yes, I’m serious. Go out and have fun, make some friends, get into trouble…okay, not a lot of trouble, but a little.”

When Audrey left, the weary look returned to Clayton’s face. He meant what he said about being children. Helli0n had created teenagers in hopes to mold their minds to their cause, and had completely ignored that they still needed a chance to grow up.

Clayton had long since been worried about Helli0n in terms of their…intentions.

Audrey’s case was a screaming example of that. It seemed to Clayton that Helli0n was much too focused on keeping their precious isotopes in line. Allan’s memory may have been wiped, but at least he was out of their reach. He knew why he was being sent away.

There were too many lies concerning Audrey, however.