With Flecks of Gold

I nervously tucked a loose strand of hair behind my ear. My gaze hastily shifted down the length of my paper as I subtly began to chew the eraser of my pencil. I squeezed my eyes shut in an attempt to force my pounding headache to the back of my head. I mustered all of my energy to focus on the work beneath my fingertips.

I slammed my pencil down next to me in a frustrated sigh, dropping my head between my forearms for a split second before using my palms to lift my body from my seat and glide silently over the plain concrete tiles of my mother’s laboratory.

I curiously peaked my head over one of the tanks at the other side of the room. Fish and other marine specimen stared up at me with a curious eye. It made me silently smile to myself as I watched them react to the different stimulus in their small, confined environment that my mother had set up for them.

I averted my gaze from the tank and cautiously scanned the rest of the lab, hoping to find something that would distract me from my homework for just a little longer.

I rummaged around the room, trying to find something that struck my interest. My thumb lightly skimmed past the endless charts and photos of marine life. Growth charts, animal populations, I wasn’t too enthusiastic for that sort of thing. I scanned through all the various files aimlessly, not really having any sort of ulterior motive as I gently drifted my fingers up and down the seemingly meaningless papers, until something caught my eye.

I dug into a file labeled, “Super-volcano”. I pulled out a newspaper article.

At first, I was reading every word, absorbing the information without any of it really standing out. However, that did not last long. My eyes darted over the paper faster and faster, panic spreading across my features.

I slowly lowered the paper to my side, my mind processing what I planned on doing after I had attained such horrid information. Without thinking, my footsteps led me out of the lab, and over to my mom’s office to the left. Not even knocking, I barged through the finished wooden door and stopped in my tracks at the sight. My mom was having what looked like a very heavy conversation with one of her co-workers. I wasn’t sure if I should approach them or not. But I decided that I needed to speak to her about this as soon as possible. Her co-worker could wait until later.

I stormed over to where she sat at her desk and slammed the newspaper article in front of her, completely ignoring the disapproving and rather unsettling glance from her co-worker.

“Lauren, not now.” She whispered harshly, subtly motioning towards the person she had previously been conversing with. I shook my head.

“Mom, I don’t care, what is this?” I impatiently gestured to the article titled “Yellowstone Super-volcano Likely Eruption”. I raised a curious yet questioning eyebrow at her blank, emotionless stare. I shoot a look at the awkward man whose presence still remained in the room; he was giving my mother a worried and panicked look.

Did they think they could just hide something like this from me?

“Hon, aren’t you supposed to be doing your homework?” She put on one of those fake smiles that she always plastered on her face when she desperately wanted me to leave the room. I stood my ground.

My voice turned low and my tone sounded hurt. “Mom… what is this? What’s going on?”

“Nothing you need to worry about.” The man ever so rudely cut in. I shot him a death glare as I snatched the paper back up quickly into my hands and proceeded out the door. The look on his face was intimidating. He was tall and lanky. His dark folds of brown hair cascaded over his eyes, hiding the dark, evil spark that was desperately trying to hide underneath his locks. He was creepy. A chill ran up my spine as I swiftly swung the door of my mother’s office open and stepped outside. Giving my mom one more angry look, I slammed the door behind me.

My mother had become an Earth scientist to keep an eye on the world for me. She wanted to know the ins-and-outs of how our planet functioned so that she always knew what was going on. She wanted to know how to prevent disasters that could put us all in danger.

Personally, I thought that was a load of bullshit. I loved science, though. Sharing the interest almost as much as my mother did but for a different reason. She wanted to change things, and I just wanted to watch the earth move and function at its natural, undisturbed state.

I wanted to watch God work his magic.

The silly thing was that she actually thought she could make a difference. She actually thought she could change the cycle of the Earth just to keep me safe.

Long story short, she’s thinking a little too big. A hero for me would be a mother who had paid attention when I tried to cut myself, or a mother who wanted to talk to me when I was feeling down.

But, no.

Being Wonder-Woman comes first.

I rolled my eyes as I reminded myself of her insane ways of thinking.

At this point, I was wandering aimlessly in the hallways I was trying to burn off some steam. I mean, if she tried so hard to protect me from natural disasters, why hadn’t she told me about this volcano that was potentially going to cover the Earth in a thick blanket of smoke?

I poked through random doors and traced the walls with my fingers as I proceeded to walk down the hallway.

A certain door caught my attention.

It was large and made of steal. I furrowed my brow. Why in the world would they make such a suspicious looking door smack dab in the middle of the facility? Obviously they weren’t thinking straight. I looked around me.

I take that back. I had sort of wandered to the outskirts of the research lab. I was in a place where I could tell wasn’t visited often. I could smell dust from where I was standing. It smelled like an old basement. I scrunched my face up in disgust and stepped forward, placing a single hand on the large metal handle of the door and tugging lightly.

Nothing. It wasn’t opening. I looked to my left to find a small device attached to the side of the door. It almost looked like a solar panel or some sort of scanning device. A scanner. Of course!

I raised a cautious finger and poked the exposed screen with my index. I stepped back, startled when the thin screen suddenly lit up. It was a bright, chemical green.

Before I could observe further, a beam of light hit me straight in the eyes. Surprisingly, it didn’t hurt. I stood there motionless as the light went up and down my face, checking and judging my every feature.

It stopped and I stood there unsure of what I should do next. Was I supposed to wait for it to do something?

“Calculating…” The device rung through the empty hallway, a voice without any sort of human emotion or soul. “Olivia Selnad. Access granted.”

I heard what I believed was the sound of the door unlocking and a dramatic puff of smoke briefly burred my vision before the door opened and presented what was hidden behind it. I smiled to myself. The device thought that I was my mom.

Feeling rather confident in myself, I strode inside. The smug grin on my face did not last long. I nearly crumpled to my feet at the vision in front of me.

Robots?

Something of that nature.

They were tall. They were white, a piercing white.

Even more white than the teeth in toothpaste commercials. They were cold and lifeless. Apparently, not even finished yet. Wires and computer chips lay askew all over the room.

There were four robots total. Each had a long, dim, blue light running up their arms and legs. They looked almost as if they had a furious expression upon their faces.

It was cold and lifeless. My eyebrows creased in concentration, I hadn’t fully processed the information in front of me yet.

These machines looked invincible. Not even the worst of attacks or the strongest of enemies could break these things.

I suddenly felt afraid.

Fear was pooling in my stomach and spilling out of my pores. I was oozing it. Something felt off about this whole thing. Questions were buzzing through my head.

Why would my mom need robots?

Were we going to be destroyed by a volcano?

What is going on?

Who was my mother talking to?

Why was he so scary?

Did he have anything to do with this?

I shook my head. My mind was a-buzz and I was getting myself nowhere. Taking one last glance at the towering figures surrounding me, I walked out of the room, unable to see more. I squeezed my eyes shut and took a deep breath as I closed the door.

Maybe I should just forget this whole thing even happened. I shook my head once again, trying so hard to rid myself of these prying thoughts in the back of my mind. But I couldn’t help myself. None of this seemed to add up or make any sort of sense whatsoever.

The fear inside me began to turn into panic. What was my mom planning? Did she even know about this?

I huffed and slumped against the door, bringing my fingers to my temples to ease the burning thoughts and questions in my head. I tried to think back to that guy that my mom was with. I was so keen on getting my mother’s attention that I hadn’t really paid all that much attention to him. He was certainly suspicious.

His stance, his aura, his tone of voice. It lead me to believe that there was something big going on that I did not know about.

Then again, maybe I was just over-reacting. Maybe I was just looking into this too much.

But I couldn’t help feeling lied to.

I took a deep breath, and decided to put this all behind me. There was nothing to worry about; my mother would tell me if there was something I needed to worry about.

I reluctantly lifted myself from the door and proceeded to turn the corner. To my surprise, I had come face to face with the man that had scared the living daylights out of me earlier. He bumped right into me, knocking me off guard.

His facial expression instantly changed form surprised and apologetic to what looked like anger. I gulped, but nonetheless, smiled reassuringly. It was a tight smile. I felt I was trying more to convince myself everything was okay more than trying to convince him.

Now that I was so close to him, I really had a chance to study his features.

His eyes were that of a thick forest. It reminded me of grassy plains when the sun is just beginning to peak out over the horizon in the early morning. They were captivating and abysmal. A breath-taking green. They shut me right up, whipping the not-so-confident smile right off of the features in my face. All I could see was a cloud of hazel.

All of the sudden the features on his face grew more irritated. He had tried to say something to me.

“W-What?” I stuttered, trying to sound confident and composed, yet failing miserably.

“I said,” He began again, annoyance clear in his voice, “What are you doing back here?” His tone grew more serious.

“I was just wandering.” I replied honestly, yet it wasn’t the entire truth. The look on his face was telling me that he didn’t buy it. “I was bored.” I continued awkwardly, trying to make my story sound more convincing.

“You shouldn’t just be wandering around here.” He announced, not breaking eye contact with me. Who did he think he was? He didn’t even look much older than I am.

Finding a new sense of self-confidence, I crossed my arms and huffed. “Says who?” I pushed, a mocking smirk teasing the corners of my lips. His eyes grew a shade darker. My breath hitched in my throat.

He took a step forward and I could feel my stomach flip over at his sudden close proximity. “Watch your tone.” He threatened.

I wasn’t one to be pushed around. I had little to no tolerance for assholes. I lightly, but sassily, pushed his shoulder with my palm and got in his face. There was no way I was going to let some guy I didn’t even know scare the living hell out of me. That just isn’t who I am. And it is never who I will become. “Step down off your pedestal.” I spat, anger prominent in my voice and in my features. This just seemed to make him angrier. He looked both ways before getting in my face once again.

“Look,” He began. “Your mother tells me you’re a fighter. A feisty little girl.” There was a glint in his eye that set me off guard. “But you better stay out of this, or there will be consequences.” He obviously knew that I had seen or figured something out, I realized, otherwise he wouldn’t be speaking to me in such a way.

“You’re no older than I am!” I countered, being extra careful not to let my voice falter with my words. “You should be careful, too, otherwise you might break a nail.” As a smirk played across my face, he did the complete opposite. Next thing I knew he had me pushed against the wall.

I couldn’t breath. I was afraid. And the look on his face told me that it was showing through my eyes.

“Naughty girls get spanked.” My mouth dropped to the floor at this comment. So, really, he was just a perverted teenage boy who thought that he could get whatever he wanted from me. Not in this lifetime, he couldn’t. My confidence returned as I tried to shove him off me. He wasn’t having any of it. I gave up and shoot daggers into his eyes with my own.

“My mother wouldn’t like this very much do you think?” He immediately backed away. Instead of doing what I thought he was going to do, walk away in defeat, he grabbed my wrist. I struggled in his grasp but he didn’t even struggle to keep his grip on me. Panicking, I opened my mouth to scream.

But before I could utter a sound, he slapped his palm to my open mouth. “Don’t you dare make a sound.” He warned.

Notes

AHHH!
I really hope you liked this chapter.
I put my blood, sweat, and tears into this stuff!
FEEDBACK WILL BE VERY MUCH APPRECIATED!
What do you think will happen?
What do you want to happen?
What do you think of this dark side of Harry?
MORE IS TO COME! Hang tight my lovelies!