Marked

Marked


Chapter 1: Fates Mistake


          Kayla Dawn Montgomery Jones was marked approximately 3 hours and 6 minutes after she was born.  It was a bit of a mistake actually. 
             The old man whose job it was to distribute such marks was looking for a boy, preferably the blond haired, blue eyed, Adonis type with whom he'd had so much success in the past. 
         Though he was cleverly disguised in a doctors white lab coat and stethoscope, he'd managed to raise more than a few suspicious eyebrows by the third time he'd wandered lost through the same identical white hallways in search of the huge state hospital's maternity ward.  He spied a nurse warily picking up the phone when he finally slid into the nursery and knew he had only a few seconds to spare. 
         Ignoring the wail that went up the moment the door closed behind him, he cast his practiced eye around the room and found the perfect candidate immediately.  He headed toward the gurgling pink bundle at the back of the room and prepared to work his magic.  As he reached the foot of the bassinette, however, something completely unprecedented happened.  Fate stumbled. 
         Instead of falling forward, he fell sideways and found himself looking into the deep chocolate eyes of the brown skinned girl child whose crib he'd just intruded upon.  Before he had time to correct his mistake, the door to the nursery flew open and 2 nurses and a security guard piled in. 
         After a moment of frozen confusion, the nurses rushed into action, attempting to placate the wailing babies.  The security guard drew his gun and glanced suspiciously around the room.  He made his way cautiously to the last row of cribs where a healthy looking boy with a slick tuft of blond hair was letting out a particularly indignant sounding howl.  Sheathing his gun, he gave the crib a few awkward shakes and mumbled some ineffectual coos before he happened to glance at the bassinette to his right. 
         From inside, the baby girl looked up at him with a distinctly puzzled expression then let out an ear-piercing wail of her own.  Sighing, he gently rattled her crib with his free hand then jumped back with a yelp when a small spider appeared at the edge of her blanket and quickly dropped to the floor. 
         With an oath, he stamped at it, but the spider scurried into a crack in the wall and disappeared. 
               He looked again at the little girl.  As an angry red bump began to appear on her forehead, he could have sworn he heard an old man's wheezy, rasping laugh. 


Chapter 2: The Subway

          Being an infant at the time, Kayla had, of course, no recollection of the event.  She had always had a strong aversion to spiders but whether that was a naturally developed neurosis or the result of a suppressed early memory is anyone’s guess. 
          About 5'4", with deep almond shaped brown eyes and skin the color of milk chocolate, Kayla led a fairly unremarkable life in an unremarkable community in a metropolis similar to any other. 
          Being so thoroughly unremarkable, Kayla was completely unprepared for the remarkable events that began approximately 23 years, 5 months, 4 days, 16 hours and 47 minutes after the spider disappeared into the crack in the hospital wall. 

It was a Saturday.

          Although it was her weekend, Kayla was on her way home from the library where she worked and spent nearly all of her free time.  Like most of the unremarkables that grazed the face of the planet, Kayla found and clung to her portals of escape.  Without many friends or distractions, books were a much needed solace and substance.  The worlds that existed on the countless pages that she read, blended and twisted together in her mind until they belonged as much to her as they did to any of their progenitors. 
          On this particular Saturday evening, Kayla had just replenished her supply of reading material and was on her way back to the small apartment she shared with 1 or 2 negligible roommates.  She was so immersed in one of her latest finds that she didn't even notice the man that had been eyeing her curiously ever since she got on the train at 14th street.  By the time the train had wound its way uptown to 86th street, the man had moved down the car until he was seated directly across from her.  At 103rd street, another man got onto the train and sat to the first mans left.  At 110th, a third man joined them and sat to his right. 
          Kayla felt rather than heard the commotion around her and, reverie broken, looked up from her book. 
Across from her sat 3 absolutely identical men; from their khaki jackets with one corner of the left collar negligently turned up, to their un-tied right shoelaces, to their slightly tilted heads peering at her with the same curious and slightly puzzled expressions. 
          Startled, she stared back.  If they weren’t obviously flesh and bone, she would have sworn they were photo copies. 
Someone at the far end of the train coughed softly and, distracted, she turned to look.  What she saw caused her to jump for a second time; for she realized that she was all alone at one end of the car with the strange men while the rest of the cars occupants had migrated to the other and were watching her and the men warily. 
          The train stopped at 125th street and not surprisingly, all the occupants of the car, save the 3 men, silently filed out of the farthest doors, casting final suspicion filled glances at the spectacle they had become. 
Fully spooked, Kayla attempted to rise with them but realized with a flash of panic that she couldn't move.  She dropped the book to the floor and pushed at the seat with her hands but it was as if her butt was fused to the seat and her legs were completely locked. 
          The doors began to close and Kayla turned to stare desperately at the people lining the platform.  They stared back, some wearing an expression of concern, other pity, but no one made a move to help. 
          The doors had slid shut completely and the train was beginning to move before she found her voice. 
          Turning back to the 3 strange men, Kayla opened her mouth and screamed.  The train moved forward into the waiting tunnel and without warning, the lights went out, plunging them into pitch black. 
          In the darkness, the train seemed to pick up speed until it felt like they were flying.  Wind began to blow through the car as the windows cracked and broke around them and Kayla's screams were soon drowned out by its howling.  She could feel the litter from the floor of the car hurtling through the air around her and still the car seemed to be picking up speed. 
          Dizzy with fear and lightheaded from all the screaming, Kayla suddenly felt a hand grasp hers and fainted. 


Chapter 3: The Desert


          When Kayla woke up, sunlight was streaming onto her face and the whole world felt shaky and oddly slanted.  Her throat was dry and kind of scratchy and her thoughts blurry and unfocused.  Gradually, she could feel something cold and uncomfortable pressing against her back.  She cracked her eyes against the sunlight and was surprised to see everything tilted at a strange angle.  She turned her head until the horizon through the broken train window across from her looked... horizontal, then closed her eyes again.  That was better.  A few seconds later, her eyes flew back open and she jumped up and stumbled to the ground.  Train!  Darkness!  Strange men!  She grasped the bar against which she had just been leaning as the memory of her recent journey came rushing back and she began sliding down toward the far end of the train.
          Glancing wildly around her, she realized why she felt so horribly off balance.  The train was inclined at approximately a 45 degree angle from the ground.  Outside the windows, sand and sun stretched as far as Kayla could see in either direction.  Struggling against panic, Kayla inched her way toward the window and peered at the ground.  There was a good 50 foot drop as the train was illogically frozen in a perfect diagonal, the furthest car aimed rigidly for the sky about 40ft above her.  Kayla scanned the ground quickly for the 3 men, but they were nowhere in sight. 
          Ducking back inside the car, Kayla grasped the pole and stood still, allowing her reeling thoughts to spin through her mind like a revolving door.  Where was she?  What had happened?  Where were those men?  How could she get down?  Did she want to?  Was she in danger? 
          As the last thought filtered through her mind, panic and fear launched her into action.  She glanced wildly around her for some type of weapon.  Inching her way to the far wall, she found a soda can and grabbed for it.  If only she tear the metal apart to form some sort of point, she could use it like a knife!  Twisting at the top of the can, she popped of the tab and put it in her pocket.  Focusing her concentration, she crushed the can and bent it back and forth until the crease in the middle was deep enough for her to tear it apart.  Triumphantly, she held up the two halves, but upon seeing how utterly inadequate her rounded, flimsy, aluminum weapons were, succumbed to the tears of frustration, panic, and fear that had been threatening from the moment she'd woken up.  After a few minutes of helpless fury, she forced herself to stop crying and decided that first things first, she had to get down.
          Although she was terrified of leaving the relative safety of her car, rescue didn't seem to be forthcoming and her position dangling 50 in the air seemed to hold few advantages.  Besides, she could always climb back up if she needed to and she would be quiet so as not to attract attention from anyone, or anything, on the ground. 
          Gathering all her reserves of courage, she slowly began to inch her way down to the open doorway of her car to move carefully to the bottom.  She made it to the doorway of her car without incident and cautiously peered into the next.  All clear.  Moving slowly and with a little more confidence to next doorway between cars, she congratulated herself on keeping her head and doing what was most practical and logical when she slipped.  Letting out an unwitting scream, she slid noisily and painfully down to the very first car, landing in the cushioning pile of trash that had gathered at the base of the slope.
          Crouching in the trash and holding her pathetic soda can weapons ready, she inched toward the nearest door and tried to peek out of its broken window.  To her alarm, the moment she leaned against it, the door slid open, spilling her out into the hot sand and, as she realized once her eyes adjusted to the sunlight, right at the feet of the three identical men around whom this whole peculiar adventure seemed to be centered. 
          She gazed up at them from the sand, frozen, and they stared back at her.  They were really quite normal looking she realized, except for the whole carbon copy thing.  All three were about 5'9" tall, with brown hair that swooped into a cowlick in the middle.  They had green eyes that stood out against tan, freckled skin, and a rumpled, college student look that rendered them more silly than threatening.  They were still wearing that intrigued expression she remembered from the train when all the sudden, all three faces broke into a unanimous smile. 
          Startled by it suddenness, Kayla fell back, but the three men, continued to beam and simultaneously lifted their left hands and beckoned her forward.  The walked a few steps away, looked toward the horizon, back at her, then beckoned again, their message clear. 
          Kayla looked at the train behind her, and back at the three men.  Cautiously, holding her can weapons in front of her, she got up and began to follow.  There didn't seem to be a whole lot more she could do.


Chapter 4: The City in the Sand


          What seemed like ages later, having dropped the soda can somewhere in the endless desert, dripping with sweat, and parched with thirst, Kayla was far more annoyed and exhausted than wary.  While the men had remained silent, despite her early attempts to elicit information, the wide, friendly smiles they had adopted outside the train had never faltered and seemed genuine.  Even though their boundless energy in the sweltering heat was irritating beyond belief, for some reason, Kayla trusted them. 
          At first, she struggled to keep their tireless pace, for when the train began to recede into the distance and the bright blue sky and hot sand showed no sign of stopping, she realized how utterly lost and helpless she was without them.  But as the heat and sun began to take its toll, she couldn't help dragging her feet and finally stopping.  The men stopped a few paces beyond her and looked back with patient smiles.  Having already decided they were mute, Kayla tried every communication device she could think of.  Through her attempts at charades, pictographs, reenactments and frustrated screaming, they smiled calmly and politely.  When she finally gave up and fell motionless in defeat, they walked forward a few steps, and looked back at her expectantly.  After glaring at them for awhile, she sighed and followed, earning a sympathetic smile in response.  A few minutes later, one of the men turned and flashed her a quick smile and a wink over his shoulder.  Somehow relieved by that gesture of independence and solidarity, Kayla started a one sided conversation with the men that ended only when she ran out of the saliva needed to form the words.  In response to the information she gave about herself and what she was feeling, the men gave her smiles of encouragement, interest, and understanding  when appropriate, sometimes simultaneously, sometimes one at a time, but nothing more, which, of course by this point, she had begun to expect. 
          They had been walking in silence for what must have been about an hour when the men suddenly stopped and turned to look at her with their widest grins yet.  She had been focusing on the ground in front of her, willing herself to put on foot in front of the other and barely paying attention to her surroundings when their sudden halt caused her to look up in alarm.  She glanced at them in fear, wondering if they had brought her all this way to do something terrible to her, when she realized that behind them, seeming to rise abruptly out of the desert was a cobblestone road.  The cobblestone road led up a short hill and disappeared over the incline.  The three men suddenly seemed to vibrate with excitement and they started walking again at a quicker pace.  Anticipation rising within her, Kayla hurried to follow. 
          Up the slight incline they went and when they reached the top, what she saw caused Kayla to stop in shock.  The cobblestone road continued down the other side of the hill for a ways before gradually turning into gleaming back asphalt.  The asphalt road wound its way through more bright sand before running abruptly into a bursting metropolis.  Like a rigid shoreline, the sand bordered the ocean of a city as far as she could see to her left and her right.  The city stretched in front of her to the horizon where the sun was just beginning to make it's decent.  Allowing her a moment, to take it in, the men beamed in front of her, then beckoned again, encouraging her forward. 
          It seemed to take ages more to reach the city.  Fatigue forgotten with her mounting anticipation, Kayla matched the men’s rapid pace, and by the time they entered the city, they were closer to jogging than walking.  The moment they crossed the shoreline of sand, the sound and hustle of the city seemed to hit them like a wall.  Suddenly there were cars and carts and noise all around them.  Skyscrapers shined in the setting sun above their head while, small, medieval looking shanty's crowed at street level along side picket-fenced homes and adobe dwellings.  The town was a mixture of every civilization she had ever heard of and like nothing she had ever seen. 
          People were everywhere, in every shape, color, age, and size imaginable.  At first they seemed to ignore Kayla and the three men, but as they made their way down the middle of the busy avenue, people began to stare.  At first there were a few nudges as people looked at her whispered to each other.  Kayla moved closer to the three men.  Soon they had a small crowd following behind them.  As they wound through the street, more and more people came.  People were taking out cell phones and talking excitedly into them.  Some started snapping pictures and the air of excitement rose.  The three men shot her supportive smiles but otherwise ignored the commotion around them as the walked purposefully and quickly ahead.  Anxious to keep up, Kayla trailed at their heels and glanced at the crowds through the corner of her eyes.  Most people looked excited and happy, many waved when they saw her looking.  When Kayla tentatively waved back, they sent up cheers.  A few in the crowds did not look so happy however, and glared at her with open hostility.  Others seemed merely intrigued. 
          They passed streets that looked crowded with expensive shops and from which delicious smells rose, bordered by streets along which barns loomed and farm animals wandered.  Suddenly the main avenue along which they had been traveling opened into a wide park in the middle of which was a huge ornate building that looked like cross between a palace and expensive office building.  The crowd seemed to fill the park around them. 
          They marched straight through the park and to the main doors of the huge  building.  Half expecting a jump-suited jester to announce their arrival, she was more than a little surprised when the three men escorted her right up the front steps  and into a huge lobby, followed by as many members of the crowd as could slip past the police barricade that had suddenly appeared to contain them.  Arriving at the vast, cream and gold bedecked lobby area, one of the three men pushed a button and within moments the four of them were sailing upward in a large glass elevator, watching the rogue crowd members being cajoled back outside by more uniformed men who had arrived from inside the building to help the police. 
          Inside the giant glass elevator, the silence was punctuated by the tinkle of very ordinary elevator music, creating an environment so surreal, it was almost funny.  Trying to hold back her laughter, she felt the absurdity of everything she had experienced melt away any remaining fear. 
          After what seemed like 50 posh looking floors had whizzed by the huge elevator doors, it finally began to slow and stopped in front of a wall of green.  The doors slid open and leaves spilled in.  Pushing threw overhanging vines the three men stepped into what looked like a jungle.  A few tangled feet from the door was an overgrown security desk, behind which two khaki uniformed men were lounging.  As the group pushed their way through the plants toward them, they looked up in surprise.  Seeing the three men, they seemed to freeze in shock, but upon glimpsing Kayla, they jumped into action. 
Bowing to the three men, they began mumbling something that sounded like apologies but the three men simply smiled benevolently and lead Kayla threw the dense forestry without pausing in their stride.  Sharing a glance between them, the two men jumped up and followed. 
          After a few more feet of tangled green, the forest ended as abruptly as it began and they were suddenly surrounded by piles of books.  The three men navigated around the piles and stopped in the middle of the room.  Glancing behind her, Kayla saw the two men get down on one knee and bow their heads.  Turning back around, she waited expectantly. 
          From somewhere above her, she could hear movement and then one of the largest piles in front of them began to teeter ominously.  Everyone edged back as the pile, seemingly in slow motion crashed to the ground raising a massive cloud of dust.  As the dust began to clear and her coughing began to subside, she became aware of a huge pair of black glasses, behind which two big brown eyes blinked.  As she waved away the dust, an incredulous sounding male voice echoed in the silence, "SHE'S the one we've been waiting for!!?  SHE'S supposed to be our HERO?!"