walkwithheroes | Fic-Come Little Children

Come Little Children (sung by Sarah Jessica Parker)

Character: River Tam

Come little children. I’ll take you away, into a land of enchantment.

The Academy was the best in the system and River was going to it. She had been specifically chosen, after several interviews and tests. Simon was a little jealous and even nervous; he kept asking her if it were a good idea. River pointy ignored him, as Gen Ed was starting to bore her and this program offered several more courses for her to take.

She left for the Academy three days after turning fourteen. River Tam died that day.

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It hurt. It wasn’t right and she wasn’t progressing. She was…she was being taken down by some hands-blue hands-that she couldn’t quit see. Always pulling and poking. They’re there, but no one can ever see them. River tried to tell them that she was not the right person for what they were doing to her, that maybe they should find someone else, they did not listen. No one listened to her, anymore.

She was speaking nonsense. She didn’t know what she was saying. Was she even still speaking out loud?

Every session, she spoke more and more nonsense. Every day her thoughts became more confused and jumbled. Every day she heard more and more whispers in her head.

It wasn’t right. This Academy was supposed to be a land of learning and enchantment for the brightest minds in the Core; they weren’t supposed to hurt the children. River tried to form plans to escape; she started to write coded letters to Simon. He did things she could never do, he could figure out a simple code. And so, River waited for her big brother to save her. He’d save her like the knight saved the princess in all the old stories from Earth-That-Was.

River waited. After four months, River knew that Simon was not coming. She began to fight her confused mind and the whispers; she began to try and form her own escape plan. After weeks of careful planning, River did try her escape; it was the same day she received her first mission.

Kill your interviewer. He knows too much.

And she had killed him-with a pen. As his blood soaked her hands, River wondered what she had done. She didn’t remember killing him. Suddenly, something tingled in the back of her mind-they were watching her.

I can see you.

She had said it and then she had run. All the way down the stairs. Almost there. And right into a hand of Blue.

River had screamed for days after that. Shocked the hope away, that’s what they did to her; over and over, until she could no longer feel.

The Academy was supposed to have been a place of learning; instead it was a place of torture. A place that killed River Tam the brilliant girl. A place that gave birth to River Tam the broken weapon.