ACCLIVITY(Being Revised)

Prisoner In Fiji

"Dear Amnesia, 

If I am to be locked inside my skin I at the very least want to remember what it was like to love and be loved."

_______________________________

I laid on the couch bed, arms splayed above my head. The voices inside were gaining volume again, their murmurings becoming an urgent roar, like static catching speed. Each thought was a sharp stab, a frenzied scramble within the chaos of my mind.

The room was drowned in black, the only light coming from the dim bar, casting long shadows against the walls. Tbor and Pin sat across from each other in that half-light, exchanging sparse words. They spoke off and on about the life they used to have. There was nothing normal in their conversations—no wives, no friends or family. Just the weight of their military pasts, memories built on the backs of fallen comrades. Brothers in arms. People above them, people below them. Always a hierarchy, always blood in the soil. When the room went silent it felt like their eyes were boring into my skull, relentless. I stayed still, letting the quiet press down on me. All they can do is sit around, waiting for something to happen, trapped in the thick, oppressive air.

“The redhead is the one doing the shipments of SubdueX,” Tbor finally murmured to Pin, his voice barely carrying over the silence. “Grey.”

“Ah yes, Grey,” Pin echoed, his fingers tapping rhythmically on the laptop keys, the sound unnervingly sharp in the otherwise muted room, "also from the sounds of it, using SubdueX on others." What time was it here? I had no idea what the time difference was anymore.

“Doing so, he’s killing his own people,” Pin said flatly, the screen casting a faint glow on his face. “Then they kill each other, or themselves, if the drug doesn’t get them first.”

“Population control,” Tbor whispered, his words swallowed by the room’s emptiness.

Pin's gaze narrowed, his voice becoming more deliberate. “My prediction is Grey’s after information. He’s going to hunt down the data... and Anna.”

“He can’t perform the procedure—”

“—or can he? We know basically nothing about him.” Pin’s eyes flicked up from the screen, a question hanging unspoken in the air.

“He’s a psychopath—” Tbor began.

“Careful,” Pin interrupted, his tone cool. “We ourselves aren’t much different. All the three of us care about is SubdueX and the results.”

“At least we’re humane,” Tbor muttered under his breath, almost as if he was trying to convince himself.

Pin didn’t miss a beat. “How are we humane?” he threw the challenge back, knowing full well the answer.

“At least you don’t smile about it,” I said, my voice hoarse as I sat up, my head bobbing forward. The image of Grey’s unnatural smile seared into my mind—his lips stretched too far upward, as though mimicking humanity.

They froze. I doubted they were surprised I was awake, but maybe it was the comment that unsettled them. I turned my nauseous head toward them. They sat on either side of the counter, shadows cutting across their faces.

“If he’s in town, why are we still here?” I asked, crossing my arms over my chest as I stood, my body feeling too heavy.

“There’s a lot of unfamiliar ground for them to cover,” Pin replied, his tone measured. Fair enough. I shuffled over to them and sank into one of the black spinning stools, the metal cold against my skin.

I could feel their unspoken thoughts—they wanted me to go lie back down. “I’m not going back to sleep,” I snapped, cutting them off before they could even say it.