Once Upon a Daydream

Repossessed

500-word max flash fiction written for the Welcome to The Blumhouse Contest

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What do we do?

When our worth is depleted and there is nothing left to take?

Where is our value then?

What is the line between human and being?

.

Plip.

Plop.

Plip.

Plop...

The dripping sound drags me towards consciousness. My limbs feel like lead, my head like a cracked porcelain bowl. The pain radiates from my left ear and spreads across the rest of my scalp. My lips utter a moan as the sensations catch up with my mind. I try to reach instinctively to touch my head, but I can't.

My wrists are trapped, strapped to my side by smooth, leather straps. I try to move my legs and wriggle my torso, but it's no use. I'm locked in.

Within seconds of the panic sending adrenaline coursing through my veins, my eyes bolt open and my chest rapidly expands and contracts to bring more air into my lungs. I'm in a dark room, with nothing but a bright circular light aimed straight at my face. It's blinding, but I can't look away.

"Ah, she wakes."

My heart sinks at the tone. It's nonchalant. Playful. The cat has his mouse.

I can't move my head to look at my captor, but I hear him moving metal instruments and swiveling on a rolling chair behind me. "What...do you want?" I barely manage to whisper.

"I don't want anything." He hums to himself, squishing what sounds like a liquid pouch to me. I start to detect a foreign accent to his voice with each word. "I'm just carrying out another repo."

"Repo?" I close my eyes, wondering what drug-induced dream my batshit crazy dealer gave me this time? He's screwed with me once before...

"Yes," he continues on with business as usual, flicking on switches before elaborating. "You have defaulted on your debts for the last time."

I scoff. What else is new? I've always found another couch to crash on, another stash of cash from a friend or family member who pities me. I know of people in worse shape than me that weren't strapped to a table.

"You aren't afraid?" he asks with a chuckle. "To pay with your body?"

Ohhhh, that's what he means? Piece of cake. Not a bridge I haven't crossed, buddy. "Not my first rodeo, Dr. Frankenstein," I joke defiantly, trying to incite him to lose control and come just close enough to me to figure out some kind of escape from this hellish dreamscape.

He rolls his chair beside my head and all I can see are his crow's feet and piercing gray eyes behind his glasses, the rest of his face covered by a mask and surgical cap. "I'm afraid you misunderstood. You will pay with your body, but you will no longer be with it."

He flicks on the light at the top of his surgical cap and I wince, feeling him dig a needle into the exposed crevice of my forearm.

"You, my dear, are being repossessed."