This is life at The Academy: We eat. We sleep. We exercise. We eat. We sleep. There are tests taken.
But they aren’t normal tests. The Academy is for scientists.
We are The Experiments.
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I am an Experiment. So is Mark, and Frillie, and Tab, and Fish. There are hundreds others like us here at The Academy. My name is Duo.
I’m a Clone.
My “Other Half” is a Scientist. His name is Flex. At least that’s what everyone calls him. Therefore, I call him Flex. He is my brother. But he isn’t, though we’re the same on the outside. Actually, I am only two years old. But I look like Flex, who is almost nineteen. I age when he ages. I feel what he feels. I dream what he dreams. I will die when he dies. We are connected, but he is superior.
Mark is fourteen, and able to conform himself to any container, or stretch himself to impossible lengths, or make himself as short or tall or skinny or fat as he wants. Frillie is his eight year old sister, and she can change color to blend in, like a chameleon. Tab is just six years old and very small. But he can do anything with his eyes. He can move things or kill a person just by saying, “Move,” or, “Die,” while looking at them. Fish is part fish. He lives in a tank because he can’t breathe air, only water. He is four years old.
And We Are Tired Of This Life. We want to see the World. We don’t want to be locked in cages, naked and scared, while strange people to strange things to our bodies and minds.
“So We will escape. Someday, somehow, We will escape.” I finish my speech, standing on an empty crate in what used to be the Workroom but was now our room to eat and sleep in.
The Experiments stare at me blankly, then Mark starts to clap with giant hands. Frillie joins him in a second, her skin neon orange and yellow. Then Tab starts applauding, and even Fish attempts, though nobody can hear him because he is underwater.
The rest of the room erupts into noise. I hold up my hands, and the room goes silent. “There is one problem.”
“We can overcome it, Duo!” Mark shouts.
“Well, I can’t,” I reply. “Because it includes killing all the scientists.”
“What’s the problem there?” Frillie says.
“When we kill Flex….” I pause, not sure where to go from there.
“When we kill Flex, you’ll die,” Mark realizes.
“But, Duo, isn’t there any way to stop it from happening?” Frillie asks.
“No. I’m so sorry. But who cares about one Clone when hundreds of other kids could escape? Are you with me? Are you with me?”
There is a cheer. Only two kids are silent.
Myself and a girl in the crowd.
Her name is Twinzy. She, too, is a Clone. And my age. And beautiful.
Her hair is red and curled, hanging down to her waist in lush waves. I could go on…. She is very pretty, that’s all that matters.
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That night, Mark slides under the door. It is quite a sight, seeing him shrinking and stretching like Jake the Dog™ from Adventure Time™. Yes, We’re allowed to watch TV. Fish especially likes Teenaged Mutant Ninja Turtles™, but this is all irrelevant to the subject.
The point is, Mark squeezed himself under the door. “Are you out?” I whisper.
“Yeah,” is his muffled reply.
“Go. Quickly,” I say.
His footsteps recede. Seconds later, there is a shout. Mark. The door opens and Mark is tossed in, unconscious but alive. “Well, that didn’t work,” Frillie says quietly.
“I have an idea.” Everyone looks around for the source of the voice and finds it in Twinzy.
“Yes, Twinzy? What’s your idea?”
“I’ve made a bomb.”
“A bomb?”
“YES, Duo, a bomb. Are you DEAF?”
“NO. I was CONFUSED.”
“WhatEVER.”
“Will you two SHUUUUT UUUUP?!” Frillie screams. We both turn to look at her. “What is your PLAN with the bomb? How did you make it? What are you gonna do with it?” Frillie asks Twinzy.
“Well we’d go for our usual health test,” Twinzy explains, “but I’d take the bomb with me. I’d set it, then give the signal. We’d act.”
“What d’you mean, ‘act?’” asks a boy about Frillie’s age named Watt who can conduct electricity.
“I think she means, ‘kick those badasses in the head then jump out the window’ act,” replies a girl named Were (she can change into any animal).
Twinzy nods. “Exactly. We’d kick those badasses in the head and jump out a window. Then we’d wait for the bomb to detonate, which would free us.”
“What about Fish?” Watt asks.
As one, we turn to face Fish, then look back at Twinzy. “Um.” Twinzy has gone a funny shade of green. “Ideas, anyone?”
“Nothing,” Watt mutters.
“Look!” exclaims someone in the crowd.
Fish is climbing out of his tank! “Look what I dood!” he says.
“Ohmigod,” Were breathes. “Fish can talk- and breathe the air!”
“No worries there!” I say. “Ooh, and here they come now.”
++++++++++++++++++
Twinzy makes a finger gun inconspicuously. The bomb is set. She looks over at me and winks, and I carry the signal onward. Soon, every Experiment is making a finger gun.
We Act.
There is a brief span of chaos where blood and teeth fly, and also a few scientists. Then all the Experiments are jumping out the window and We Are Free! But not all of us are cheering.
Twinzy and I stay silent, waiting for the inevitable.
She looks at me, and I at her. We both have the same thought, and we run to each other, holding each other in our arms in fright and knowledge of what is about to happen.
We see each other’s tears and know this is the end as the bomb detonates.

And We Die.