The United States government ran a lot of prisons, and recently, they'd build quite a number to hold prisoners of war and terrorists. This one, out in the Nevada desert on an Air Force base, reflected the experience of being able to rapidly erect a place to hold a lot of people very quickly. So-called 'Bremer walls" of steel-reinforced concrete topped with wire fencing that created a dome overhead (to prevent the flight-capable from leaving) were ringed with guardposts and security all over the place.

This wasn't a jail for terrorists or prisoners of war, though many called them just that, but other Americans.

It started when some congressman argued that the 14th amendment applied to human beings and that the Emergents were no longer human. Challenges took a few months to reach the Supreme Court, and a 5-4 decision returned the verdict -- nope, not human. Using the national defense authorization act of 2011, the federal government used their powers and a variety of resources to stick Emergents, anyone that exhibited a hint of magical ability (and some people suffering from epilepsy and similar conditions, because small town cops got jumpy) into a camp that was guarded by military troops. Sure, there was some outcry, but it wasn't from the people that said that FEMA was conspiring to take their rights away before Emergence. Those guys were cool with 'the freaks' being stuck in cages. This was some of the relatives, some of the friends and people that believed that these people were still people.

Sometimes, it was hard to believe all this was happening, after months of wearing an orange jumpsuit, being referred to by last name by some high school educated asshole of an SP and being more or less resigned to the deprivation of rights. Brian hadn't done much, he certainly hadn't harmed anyone. Someone else did something and he glowed. As it turned out, it was a sympathetic response. Boom -- in public, out in front of his lecture hall at University of Texas and boom, he was coldcocked by some Phi Kappa Episilon broski that thought he was doing the world a favor and held down by a couple more for the cops. 

There was a fight on in the outside world about the treatment of Emergents, and that fight raged on, but nothing seemed to move at all in the Nevada Desert, in Nellis AFB. It was day after day of cafeteria food slung to prisoners, guards keeping an eye on things and researchers trying to figure out the how and why of things. 

Brian Underwood of El Paso, Texas, didn't know that there was a very loud, divisive debate going on out there, because they didn't get any radio or TV here and especially no internet. FEMA provided books and that was it. All the same, news came in with the new arrivals, some of them blasted out of their minds on the doses of anti-whatevers the screws fed them. Out in the hot, dusty desert air every day, the inmates gathered in the cafeteria tent and in their air conditioned temporary shelters to discuss affairs, and managed to put together a picture of what was going on -- society was having a raucous debate about Emergent rights, spirits were popping out of the trees (notably, nymphs in Golden Gate Park, apparently spurning the drum-circle hippies in preference of the company of bikers) and everything was going haywire. Churches and churchgoers, of course, were often losing their shit, but there were surprising allies among the religious for Emergents too.

Brian was involved in all that stuff, but the word that came down today, in the camp, was that the overnight construction, where they moved a section of wall and put up chainlink fence, guarded by troops, was a press visit -- pressure had been put on the DHS to let in a bus of reporters to record conditions, from a safe distance, of 'the Freakville.'

It seemed just another day in March of 2012, warmer than most because it was the desert and things didn't change much out here, when the rumble of diesel was heard in the distance as the bus started to pull up. 

And Brian was standing there watching when the signs unrolled -- slogans about rights and the Constitution, the things the government took away from them. And he joined the crowd alongside some folks he didn't know, shouting his words and raising his fists. The SP's seemed unsure of what to do, there in their camouflage, berets and combat gear, unwilling to open fire on people shouting, but some martinet took control and a bullhorn and yelled, "ALL PRISONERS TO THE GROUND NOW!" A desert-camouflaged humvee with some sort of radar dish rolled up and someone yelled, "Fucking ADS! Watch out!"

Someone flung something -- it might have been soap, it might have been shit, and it didn't even come close to hitting the jackass and the response was for him to yell something off the bullhorn. Seconds later, the electric buzzing sound of something drawing energy and then the sensation of burning warmth on the skin.

Whatever it was, it set off the Nellis Uprising.

---

The stories would say such -- that Colonel Jays was an idiot, that the ADS was not tested on Emergents and it caused the Emergents to fear for their lives enough to panic-access their latent abilities, abilities that were unlocking slowly with effort...but that came flooding out in terror as the subconscious, as human nature would have it, grabbed for whatever weapon it could find and use it to stop the pain. The ADS wasn't lethal, but the deep-brain that formed the fight or flight response didn't know that. Not all Emergents had dangerous offensive abilities...but enough people in that sweep of the ADS did. 

The cameras caught it all. The court martial found that he'd been excessive. That didn't matter.

The cameras caught the huge sandstorm that blew into Nellis out of a clear sky. Small, concentrated tornadoes that pulled helicopters out the sky as if guided there. It caught, for the whole world, the sight of just how little the government knew about Emergence and it let everyone know that the Emergents could put up a fight.

But it also caught the mass escape of Emergents; the ones that hadn't fueled the magic, for whatever reason, grabbed their friends who had, the ones that were practically on their knees from the expended effort of magic of that magnitude, magic on a level no one had ever seen or knew anyone was capable of, and ran for it while the military was fighting nature itself – it wasn't just windstorms, it was things of rock and sand, animated by some sort of power, bringing massive fists crashing into the Bremer Walls, overturning vehicles. The cameras caught the panicked gunfire and terrified screams of the soldiers who seemed so capable, so tough, now looking impotent in the face of their giant opponents who smashed into the ones that didn't run or find cover or just cower – and many of them did.

Armored vehicles didn't do much better – the escape was on, as the Emergents took their chance to get the hell out. Some stayed, unsure what to do, or knowing they'd merely burden their friends, but most took the golden opportunity. Many reasoned that the government would mistreat the ones left behind even more – take revenge on them the way the US government did on captured terrorism suspects with the torture after 9/11. It'd happened before.

Brian had help, so did a couple others -- he couldn't remember who grabbed him and pulled him, because he was completely exhausted, jelly-legged and mush-armed, but he knew that someone dragged him into the desert. He'd been one of the ones whose terror broke the barriers of his abilities, and the shock of it left him a catatonic; or at least, to the outside world he seemed so. In reality, he was experiencing what had to be some sort of awesome trip on peyote; it was numbers and letters flashing across his vision like lightning, half-illuminated and slipping away, chanting voices, whispers and singing coming in and out of hearing along with the roar of wind and the subtle rumbles of the earth in its infinitesimal movements, the crackle of fire as it consumed and the rush of water as it eroded, all overlaid with a thrum of power that reminded him almost of an AC unit kicking on at night. Once in a while, he muttered something, but it was incomprehensible. His world was the universe distorted through a lens of hallucination, mundane things became imbued with meaning and the most innocuous things screamed for his attention. It was as if reality was whispering with hot breath in his ear so only he could hear, though he could only make out a tenth of what it was saying.

He came to in unfamiliar surroundings, a motel room somewhere, and the first thought that came to mind was, 'on the run.'

The first words the lanky young Texan with the sandy blonde hair and the brown eyes and the southwestern tan spoke were, “Hello? Who are you, where are we?”

Those eyes were brown originally. Now they glowed slightly around the iris with a faint blue fire that stood out in the darkness of their room.