[GARA'S BACKSTORY!!] I FINALLY FINISHED WRITING ITTT It would've been faster but, I <3 procrastinating
I tried not to make it too long, since I love overexplaining and writing i might've done more than I meant to...but i think its not too bad :3
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CW!!!: Child abuse, child neglect, medical experimentation, mild body modification/amputation, implied child death, and psychological trauma--however no descriptions of heavy gore or blood whatsoever!
Nobody knew what Subject 170's name had been before she arrived. If she had one at all. She only remembered being transferred from one person to another.
The researchers certainly didn't care enough to write it down. They hardly ever did.
She was small when she was brought to the facility, little more than a frightened toddler wrapped in clothes far too big for her. She didn't remember her parents...or maybe orphanage workers? Either way, they were long gone.
She cried through the entire intake process. Her head was shaved clean. Her pinkies were removed. A tube was implanted into her arm so blood, medicine, and whatever else the researchers desired could be taken without struggling to find a vein each time--finally, the number was burned to the back of her neck, and there was a little mark on her nose. Like ink beneath the skin that never healed properly, only bled and ran.
By the end of the day, she wasn't a child anymore. She was Subject 170, or 'yo-yo'. Because that's all they had given her, a single, scuffed yo-yo.
The facility existed for a single purpose.
To manufacture Givers.
Givers were rare to come by just relying on chance. They knew organizations, people, who would pay fortunes to have them amongst their ranks. As workers, fighters, healers...
Researchers believed that every Giver was born from profound attachment to an object. Love transformed ordinary belongings into extraordinary ones. They couldn't explain why.
They couldn't recreate it.
So they decided to force it, instead.
Each child was given exactly one object.
Nothing else belonged to them.
No other toys.
No other blankets.
No other books.
No other keepsakes.
Their hair was shaven, identities dismantled with only a number, or their 'instrument'. They were each given a face mark--ink that was injected beneath the skin, though never cleaned or bandaged correctly. It was often it bled and bloomed into a splotch. Another identifier of the facility, not them. So that if one somehow escaped, it could be easily recognized.
If attachment truly created Givers, then stripping everything away until one object remained should have guaranteed success.
The experiment wasn't designed to raise children.
It was only designed to produce results.
Whenever 170 thinks back to the facility, in her own mind, it sounds more like a poorly maintained dog kennel now.
The children were fed enough to survive. Their injuries were treated only when they threatened the experiment. They slept in cold rooms with little more than thin bedding spread across concrete floors, cramped together like sardines in a tin. Days blended together beneath artificial lights, interrupted only by testing, examinations, blood draws, and endless notes scribbled onto clipboards.
Nobody tucked them into bed.
Nobody celebrated birthdays.
Nobody asked if they were afraid.
Without guidance, the children became something closer to stray animals than people. Packs formed naturally. Older children claimed territory, food, even stealing others instruments if they werent satisfied with their own. Or breaking it, if they thought another child had a better chance to succeed.
Children who got closer to succeeding were always better cared for. A thicker blanket. More food.
And, to avoid over-crowding..if a child was there for too long, got too old and too independent, they were simply...gone.
Fights broke out over scraps of food. Some children followed the strongest among them.
Subject 170 belonged to no one.
She was too small, too quiet.
Too weak.
Too frightened to defend herself. She learned to stay stay down, even if she often got picked on--that stupid yo-yo was all she had, so she protected it with her life. Toys were seen as more valuable--after all, they had no other source of entertainment.
If your instrument got taken from you? Too bad.
If it broke? Too bad.
The laboratory also housed hundreds of rats. They weren't pets.
They were replacements.
When procedures needed testing, the rats came first. New medicines. Surgeries. Chemicals. The children watched enough to understand exactly what happened to the animals before those same procedures reached them.
The researchers never bothered containing them well, and soon rats lived everywhere. Inside vents. Between walls. Under beds.
Sometimes Subject 170 woke to tiny feet skittering across her blanket.
Sometimes one curled against her for warmth.
She never screamed or cried, she wouldnt dare do that at night when other kids slept around her.
She simply waited for it to leave, even if it scared her.
But needles became the thing she feared most.
Even as a toddler, she couldn't bear them.
The moment she saw one, her stomach twisted. She cried until she couldn't breathe. Sometimes she vomited. Sometimes she fainted before the needle ever touched her skin.
The researchers weren't concerned, only irritated.
Every delay meant wasted time.
Eventually, they stopped asking her to cooperate.
They simply held her still, and other children aswell would get angry at her for holding the line. Even if they were scared themselves. A delay only meant it would take longer.
Despite the bullying, the hiding, and the constant fear of the other children coming to hurt her or take her Yo-yo away, subject 170 remembered another child, or atleast, she thought so. A voice, maybe a smile. Someone who sat beside her during meals, someone who might have held her hand once. She remembered them being loud and rebellious, standing up to the older children, even the adults.
But perhaps nobody had. She didnt remember their face, their mark, their number or their item.
She couldn't remember. Though to fit her own reimagining, she tells herself they were real. Maybe a sister or a brother, or simply a best friend.
But there came a day, the adults stopped coming. Morning arrived, but the lights didn't shut on. No footsteps. No announcements. No testing. every door remained shut.
Hours became days.
Food stopped appearing.
Water ran dry.
They didn't know how to work the systems, even the most observant children were still children.
The older kids turned on one another almost immediately. The strongest stole what remained, and the weakest disappeared. It was constant fighting, walking on eggshells to avoid stepping into anyone's 'territory'.
Subject 170 was too small to fight. She couldn't be brave. Her bestfriend told her what to do, they were the brave one. They said to hide, and run away. So she hid.
She crawled through broken maintenance passages and forgotten vents, chasing cold drafts that smelled...different. she was hungry, and thirsty, and hadn't eaten in days. She only had her yo-yo, and best friend to guide her.
It smelt weird. And though she was scared, and didn't want to go any further, she was urged on.
Eventually, the tunnel ended. Tiny fingers pushed against rusted metal, and the grate gave way.
She climbed out into silence. Soft earth pressed beneath her bare feet, and she froze. It wasn't concrete, or cold tile. Wind touched her face without permission, Above her stretched something so impossibly enormous that her mind couldn't understand it. The sky.
She stumbled backward in panic, or started crying. Birth wasn't her introduction to the world--this was.
She waited for a long time for her friend to come out of the tunnel too. It was light, dark, and light again. They didn't. 170 debated going back inside to check, but she couldn't stomach the thought of being back there. So, she began to wander instead.
And wander,
And wander,
And wander,
She grew to adapt, after awhile. Maybe two years. She was eleven now--that's what they told her. She didn't really know her own birthday, nor did she celebrate it.
Death was the thing she feared most, he main motivator for stealing food and hiding in filthy alleys. Eventually, she figured out she needed a name. A thing for people to call her. She hated 170. She hated her little facial marking, she hated her hands, she hated her yo-yo,
In her mind, 170 was simply a tiny, weak crybaby who waited for delusions to crawl out of tunnels with her. And she wasn't any of those things anymore. She found a people who wanted her, or atleast, said they did. Even if they weren't good people.
Gara, they called her. Though, it's unknown whether it has a meaning, or if they simply got it off the side of a dumpster. They said it meant 'bad character' or 'looking rough'. Still, she took it in stride.
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Little gara and friend..rip friend if they were ever even real, I feel like this is how she remembers them🤫
