I’m on the run. Three months ago I was a girl named Penelope with brunette hair who lived with her parents in a small house, but now my name is Elliot, I have blond hair, and the government is looking for me.

The year is 3240 and not only do we have flying cars and teleportation, but we also have a controlling government with a narcissistic president. Im part of a group called xci. My older sister tyra created xci eight years ago after the government took away my mom for objecting a search without a warrant. They found her guilty for drug distribution and executed her. If that's not horrible enough they publicly do it, as if we were in the 1700’s, and the sicker thing is the civilians love it. The idea of stopping all of someone's bodily functions and ruining a family must give them some psychotic rush. After that we ran away, and we found a group of other run aways on our way. By the time we got three cities over we had 12 plus kids following us. They looked to me and my sister for orders and advice, it was all going smoothly, we built houses and farmed, we were free. Once every couple once we went to the nearest city right next to Quebec, Canada to collect supplies. On our last trip we saw a newscast saying our city was going on lockdown, and the government is building walls. This intrigued us, what sick plan did they have that they didn't want anyone to know about. 

Me and a group of kids from my city snuck out of camp in the middle of the night, to see what was actually going on. Once we got to our city which was about a two hour walk, there were walls so tall you couldn't see the top surrounding the perimeter of the entire city. We all looked uneasily at the wall and started climbing up the side putting our hands between the cracks of each cynderblock. About an hour later we made it to the top, my hands were so raw blood was coming out of my fingernails and I had gashed down my legs from slipping. The weirdest thing was there was no security at the top of the wall, we made our way down to the ground without any hassle, it was almost too easy. Once we made it down our whole city had changed, there were billboards the size of planes and skyscrapers taller than the clouds. All of us just stared in awe at the city infront of us, our old small cozy town has turned into some business engulfed city that only cares about income.  Suddenly we saw a security car checking people for some type of tag on their arm, almost like a barcode. This interested me. Why would they need to scan everyone? Were they checking something specific, I wondered.

My best friend will tugged my shoulder yelling “ what are you doing we have to run”, I was in my own world till I saw five police when chasing us. We ran and kept running till we made it to the other outskirts of the city, and climbed the wall to the top, reopening any gashes from climbing in. Once at the top I looked back and noticed anything peculiar, in the city center there was a perfect square of people marching almost like an army. On the billboard above them the president pops up he says “ wow what a beautiful army, we are going to take over”. Two hours till light, as much as I wanted to stay and investigate if my sister ever found out we left she would have killed  me. We made it out of the walls and ran straight to the train tracks that would lead us back to camp. When we were half way I took a headcount to see if we had all 8 kids. 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9.. What there was a tall blond boy crouching in the back of the pack, I tackle him to the ground and pull my knife up to his neck “who are you”, I asked. Scared and shakily he said “ My name is will, I saw you guy leave the city and I came with you, I want no part in  their horrific plans”. I thought about it for a second, he knows what's happening in  the city he could help us understand. I cuffed him to my arm and kept walking at a fast pace to make up the time that was wasted. Once we made it back to camp I quietly snuck back into my house and cuffed will to the couch and slept.

The next morning I interrogated Will. The only thing that he did was cry, so I gave him time to think about everything. The curiosity was killing me, I wanted to know what was going on. A few hours later I brought him food and ate dinner with him, after a few minutes I broke the awkward silence and asked how he was, he replied with “i'm ready to talk”. This surprised me, I got so excited, I stayed humble on the outside but inside I was jumping like a kid on a sugar high.Hesitantly he began to explain how they took him away from his family and killed everyone that wasn't fit enough to fight, they then tagged them with the barcodes. These barcodes give them the ability to take over anyone one's mind at any time. He told me they are planning on taking over the whole country, and are making people fight against their will, they are even making siblings and couples fight each other to the death for survival. I was speechless, I could not believe the  state of my old home. I didn't know whether to cry or scream. After Will and I had our conversation I went straight to my sister and explained the whole thing. Tyra was furious and immediately she started plotting a plan to destroy the government. At first I thought we were thinking over our heads so were many of the other kids. We kept planning weeks after that, making us believe in ourselves more and more. Even Will helped us by telling us the grid plan of the city. After almost two month of planning and training, the day finally came. We went to the city in groups, 5 different groups of 15. With this group system if anything happens to the first group we can pull back the second, potentially saving many lives. Tyra studied the Aryan culture and used many ancient military tactics like shields, bow and arrows and swords. This gave us an up against the city considering their inexperienced warriors and low ammunition.

Twenty minutes after Tyra led the first group into the city, the second group and I go full force straight into the city, once we entered it was suspiciously quiet. The hair on my neck was standing straight up, I didn't like the feeling of this so I told my group and groups behind to fall back. As we started to retreat I got shot straight in the shoulder by a sniper across the lot, I also saw my sister and the first group captured in hand cuffed. Tyra yelled, “Run” the only thing I could think about is the throbbing pain in  my shoulder. My feet were moving so fast, I just kept running for miles and miles not paying attention to any surroundings. Then everything went black.