After Life -- Chapter 1: In Another Life

[parallax23]

Chapter 1:  In Another Life

 
Zack had been watching the news.  Everyone had been.  It wasn’t every day that a group of transgenics took a place hostage in front of an entire news crew.  Transgenics had barcodes on the back of their necks indicating the designer labels of a covert government military operation.  It was a mark he bore himself but had no memory of how.  Was he the same?  The only difference was that he wasn’t in Seattle, where most of the paranoia was.  That was the earliest place he could remember being after his accident.  He had always suspected something was off when he still couldn’t recall anything from his life before it.  The girl from the waiting room was still stuck in his head, even if he didn’t know her, he liked to remember her.  She was beautiful, but her eyes were filled with tragedy, as if she had lost someone dear to her.

 

Suddenly, there she was again on his TV screen in his apartment.  Riding a hover drone.  Transgenics.  Hostages.  Seattle.

 

“Max,” he finally choked out.  “It’s Max!”

 

The memories began rushing back to him.  Max.  Logan.  Zane.  Jondy.  Exchanging his life for Max’s.  He had to get to them and fast.  How could she let him abandon them?  He should have known she would be the one to compromise everything.  Getting to them was all he could think about as he packed his bag.  Everything had been compromised and he hadn’t been there to stop it.  He grabbed the keys to his truck and thought about the life he was about to give up – his friends, his family.  No, his real family was being held captive by police barricades.  They needed him.  A soldier never abandons his unit.  It would be a long drive to Seattle and he would have to be prepared for anything when he got there.