[Picture of Earth taken during Storm season]
After separating the mothers from their IC children, General Martin Rocha confined the IC’s and strapped them to the floor. The general conducted a series of experiments in an attempt to identify weaknesses and vulnerabilities in an IC.
General Rocha has confirmed that he not only oversaw, but became personally involved in the IC experiments.
The following is an excerpt from a detailed anonymous report of the IC’s torture. Though these reports seemed to be originally meant for objective scientific observation, the writer trends gradually towards sensationalist morbidity. The records appear to be a single doctor's personal recollections from these daily experiments.
The following passage was selected to convey the bizarrely sadistic nature of the experiments.
— Editing Team
ANONYMOUS: SCIENTIFIC OBSERVATION RECORD:
Their delicious scaly skin is perfectly exposed now from having successfully removed their feathers and fur.
When we realized they were vulnerable to the nuclear radiation we felt our hearts would burst.
Every time we dulled a saw or bent a needle on the black mosaic of their skin, our desire to tear their flesh grew even greater.
All the build-up with fire, water, poison, metal, etc, made this discovery all the more rewarding.
We had found it, we finally found it.
Today was the day we finally got in.
We used an adapted circular particle accelerator, or cyclotron, to create radioactive isotopes. We would then place these radioactive objects in the same rooms as them and on their skin.
Just before going home tonight we eventually began concentrating the cyclotron’s beam itself directly on the creature’s skin.
My only regret was how far away we had to be. Even from that distance though, we could soak in the details with the cameras.
Their skin bubbled and burned like boiling butter. It was beautiful. We were only able to go a few layers deep, but soon, I anticipate we’ll reach bone.
I’ve watched the recording hundreds of times now. I have so many ideas of what we can do next.
The dance we now get to engage in is seeing how much damage we can get away with without killing them.
My favorite one to burn into today was Donavan, he’s a bit more expressive than the others and quick to tears.
I’m excited for tomorrow.
[End of record]
GENERAL MARTIN ROCHA: JOURNAL:
They’re the strongest things I’ve ever laid eyes on. Their bones are made up of some kind of metallic looking element we’ve never seen before.
They’re incredible.
They’re perfectly dangerous.
High levels of nuclear radiation burns their thick skin. As we’ve continued to increase the intensity over the past several weeks — though the creatures show tremendous amounts of anguish — they don’t seem to be getting closer to death.
I’m beginning to think the only thing we can do to kill them would either be a full-scale nuclear explosion, or exposure to the nuclear Storm.
I don’t want to kill them yet though. I first want to understand them. Possibly even use them.
I’m interested in how they think, and what they can do at their full potential.
It terrifies and fascinates me to consider.
Given the descriptions the crew provided me with, I understand the creatures have some kind of telepathic ability. This makes sense to me given Anita’s change of tune.
I used to admire Anita. When we were in training together I bought into her vision of a new world. She was selected for the mission and I felt it was an honor to have worked so closely with her over the years.
My associations with her helped me rise through the ranks in my service over these past couple decades.
But now she’s gone soft. She’s no different from the NWO. New world. We don’t need a new world. We need the old one.
The b[….] won’t even touch a gun now. I don’t trust her. Anita’s become a coward. Anita — of all people. D[…]. These creatures did something to her. They’re planning some kind of take over, and they’ve got these women wrapped around their fingers.
It’s sickening.
That’s not going to happen to me.
I’M INTERESTED IN MAKING a connection, engaging in the “mental bridge,” but first I want to break them. Beat them into submission like a bronco. Make them my pets, and have them begging for death.
Then I’ll be in control. They could be the CW’s most powerful weapon, the key to burying those NWO b[…….] in the ground for good.
I’m close.
The biggest one, Carson, he’s the strongest of them — not only physically, but emotionally. You can see it in his eyes. He’s calmer and more still when you melt his flesh. He just stares at you, but not with hate, it’s a sort of pity, and it pisses me off.
I want to see fear. When he breaks, I’ll know it’s time.
[End of entry]
MARTIN ROCHA: RECOLLECTION:
I might’ve been a gardener.
During those months torturing the IC’s I’d return to my quarters, I’d sit at my desk and stare at a plant I’d kept from the many samples Megan had given us.
The majority were taken for study and harvesting — but this one I wanted for myself.
I planted it in an empty ammunition box and it sat at the top right corner of my metal desk. If I bumped the table — the box would rattle for a moment. The metal ammunition box was warped on the bottom and it would teeter on two corners. Every time this happened I quickly looked so I could see the small leaves rustle and sway. It’s like she was saying hi to me. Her bendy branches moved differently than a normal plant, like they were used to a different gravity, like they were somehow both stronger and more flexible.
I studied every inch of that plant. The round waxy leaves — red as blood. The fluffy orange and green mosses that eventually covered the soil like small bushes.
I’d give it drinks from my personal canteen water ration, and it gave me these berries — plump red berries that hang and clump like tiny grapes — little pea sized drops of life, sagging the stems from their weight.
“This is what earth could be,” I would think.
“The NWO blasted us and everything on the earth so far underground we can barely breathe.”
“But they haven’t reached this. They haven’t reached me.”
I wasn’t proud of what I’d done and what I’d had to become, “but if it means we get to see the light of day without fear of being burned down by those d[...] ships, and I can plant this in my garden one day — it’ll all have been worth it.”
I just wanted to go back to what we had — before the nukes, before the fighting, before the NWO.
“And this plant of mine will make the air clean again. And the Earth will heal.”
[Martin paused]
I should’ve been a gardener.
[Martin paused]
The day the plant died was the day I decided to make the mental bridge with Carson. He hadn’t broken yet — but I was tired of waiting.
That perfect little plant dying pushed me over the edge.
It felt personal.
— Martin Rocha
MISTY: RECOLLECTION:
Man […] we were locked away and forgotten for what felt like the entire Prestorm season. A whole 151 days – that’s about 40 weeks give or take a few days.
Our only comfort was each other and a friendly guard.
His name was Michael. He had light brown skin like me and a hopeful look in his eye. He was strong but his touch was gentle. His uniform was a little too small on him, you could tell he’d been working out during his training and it had made his jacket seem like it was shrinking around the shoulders and biceps — and stretched across the back, you know?
He and I would laugh and joke, and he’d help us keep track of time. Every day he’d tell us, “only so-and-so many days before Storm.” It was nice having some sort of grasp on reality. We never saw the sun. We were at his mercy.
He and I would reminisce about the old days. His training was very different from mine, but the core tenets were the same. He was trained to be a soldier and I was trained to be a pilot. But more than that, he was trained in some protocols that were absolutely brutal; things I could never imagine coming out of the mouths of my sergeants. But then again, they were all dead by now – no one to stop the savages from climbing up the ranks anymore.
We both knew the ideals of the CW were dying on the vine. Democracy was a luxury General Rocha felt we could have when the threat was less present.
The CW was a shell of what it used to be: now holding their own crew hostage and torturing our sons for fun.
It started out subtly – but the sentiments of our conversation slowly became mutinous, and that’s when the other women began taking more of an interest in Michael. Michael even started talking dates with us, the specific day he would let us out and how we could get to the boys. We were planning just a few days before the Storm so we could have enough time to take shelter in the caves the ICs had dug for the refugees miles away from the CW base – closer to where the remains of the Madonna were.
ONE EVENING, ANITA TURNED to me after Michael’s shift ended.
“I don’t trust him,” she said with simple clarity.
I would try to explain why he was trustworthy – but she would just look at me with her lips pressed and her eyebrows slightly inclined, you know, like this:
[Misty imitates the “doubting” impression]
I could tell there was no arguing it with her.
To my surprise, Ava suggested we listen to Anita’s caution and make sure not to give Michael too much information about our own plan.
I thought it was dumb. Michael was young and clearly just wanted to help. He reminded me of myself when I was training.
And I knew this was coming at great cost to him.
He described how General Rocha punished rebels.
There was a hatch they referred to as The Taker. It was a large cement cylindrical tank, one that was once used as a construction shaft for ventilation and deliverables during the Pre and Postorm season. But now they just used it to throw people into.
If they somehow managed to survive the fall of about 30 feet they would either starve down there while people threw things at them, or if it was Storm season and General Rocha really hated them, he would seal the tank.
Large thick windows closed around the tank, sealing the bunker. Then General Rocha would open up the top of the tank that led straight up to the Earth’s surface. The nuclear Storm would fill the space and you would watch as the body would get flailed around and burned by the radiation. It was horrible.
Michael shuddered when he talked about it. He’d seen this happen a few times now. This year there were so many people thrown in they stopped cleaning it out and the bodies started to pile up. All the carnage that started accumulating at the bottom made it more likely people didn’t die from the fall. People were able to live a little longer because they would eventually resort to cannibalism.
He said the memory of the screams has never left his ears and keeps him up at night.
And believe it or not The Taker was the place he legitimately suggested we try and escape from.
At first we all thought he was insane, but then when we realized we’d have our sons with us, and that we could climb out on their backs, we felt better about it. On Eden we’d climbed mountains way higher than The Taker. Besides, it was our only shot.
“Only a few more days,” he said hopefully and earnestly as he got up to leave that night.
Anita had stopped protesting, I think she figured something was better than nothing, and the silence from our sons was starting to eat at all of us.
We had pushed off thinking about the worst. We all felt they were still alive – but it got harder and harder each night to stave off the nightmares. The horrible thoughts of what they could possibly be going through, and what might be keeping them from rescuing us. The thought of them dying, us never returning to Eden, and being stuck down there forever burned and snapped in our bellies like oil in a hot skillet. “Was this whole mission a waste?” “Did we kill these beautiful creatures by bringing them to our messed up home?” “How could we do this?”
Yeah [...] something was better than nothing at this point.
– Misty Renae Dawson
MARTIN ROCHA: RECOLLECTION:
When I finally connected with Carson it only took seconds to realize how out of control I was. I placed my hand atop his and could feel in an instant that this thing was way more powerful than I realized. I felt the strength in his arms, the power in his bones, and that he was choosing to stay.
Here we’d been spending weeks trying to rip through just a few layers of skin and in a moment I could feel that there was nothing on Earth this creature couldn’t tear through.
It had willingly endured that pain – all of them had.
I was so baffled by the “why” that I couldn’t speak. I stood there in shock and just stared at his large bright golden eyes – my hand still clapped on his. The thing that scared me the most was the compassion in his eyes, that d[.....] pity. I felt at that moment what the pity really was. I could tell that he knew how I felt, that he had once been stuck in the stupid power climb that I'd been trapped in my whole life, and that he knew the way out – and I didn’t.
A terrifying realization began to settle in my core: my whole life had been a stupid lie, a brilliant waste, full of pointless reckless hate and blood-lust. I refused to know what he knew. I took my hand off his, stumbled backwards and fell. I sat there stunned looking at him wondering why in that moment he didn’t break his bonds, stand up, and dissolve me into ash with a single swing of his hand.
I had two choices at that moment: either I needed to change or he needed to disappear from my life forever so I could slowly slip peacefully back into my poison.
– Martin Rocha
MISTY: RECOLLECTION:
Michael led us out of the prison. It was the dead of night. He took us to the labs where our sons were being held.
[Misty paused]
[Through emotion]
They were burned all over. Their beautiful feathers were gone.
Brock had been burned so badly you could see some of his bones – right here on his side:
[Misty references to the right side of her rib-cage]
[...] You could see his ribs.
We rushed to them – all of us in tears. When we connected hands, of course the first thing Brock did was comfort me. He showed me in my mind how General Rocha had been impacted by their [...] patience? Their goodness. I could feel how deeply Brock yearned for General Rocha to finally feel safe.
I couldn’t believe it. Here in the midst of so much pain and suffering, my son was hoping some sadistic maniac could feel peace. I didn’t have time to dwell on it.
As soon as they broke their bonds we began quietly maneuvering through the tunnels of the underground base. Brock and his brothers, limping, had to duck most of the way.
WHEN WE GOT TO The Taker, Michael opened the hatch. The air flooded with the stench of rotting corpses at the bottom of the 30-foot straight descent. Michael quickly suggested the “creatures” jump down first to be able to break the fall and catch the rest of us.
All of us felt that something was off. Why didn’t he just open the top hatch? The last thing we wanted was to be separated from our boys again. We were going to just jump down in their arms or on their backs. Michael insisted one more time that they jump first.
Lightning fast, Anita grabbed Michael’s hand and forced it onto Rafael’s. Anita then grabbed her son's hand and could feel in an instant what Michael’s intentions were. It was a trap.
Michael had been lying to us about the dates. Storm season had already begun and he was working with General Rocha to plan the ICs deaths. He was ordered to keep us alive if possible, but with the caveat that if we jeopardized the killing of the ICs that we should be killed also.
Before we could even react, Carson looked at his brothers, and they all leapt into the dark pit. They didn’t even hesitate to give their lives so that we could live.
Michael shouted, “Now!”
Immediately, soldiers sprung from the darkness and seized all of us before we could jump after our sons. We didn’t care if we lived. We didn’t want to live without them. The hatch windows slammed shut, separating us from our sons. We pressed up to the glass horrified as General Rocha walked towards the edge and pressed a button on his wrist system.
The roof of The Taker opened up and the nuclear storm flooded the cylindrical cavern. The boys got swept up from the bottom and out the top with the bones of the other victims that had been lying at the bottom. And just like that they were gone.
– Misty Renae Dawson
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