The world that her mind built (Redo)

Chapter 6

I started to get fidgety, scrutinizing the area, glancing from left to right, I was sure there'd been one more sign that I'd need to look at, considering the fact that there were 4 doors, 3 were clear, gleaming in pride, while one remained misty, foggy and blur.

I kicked a stone, and to my surprise, it shattered something in the far distance.

I walked over to find shards of glass littered on the floor and a glass sign among many glass vases, of which one was shattered into smithereens.

"Truth is Fragile" the sign read.

I stood up and made my way to the 4 doors.

'Suffer and gain', 'believe everything you see', 'reality as you knew it' and now, 'The truth of a lie' were glaring in my eyes. The glass door had its words embedded in its door, it was completely see-through and fragile as well. In front of all 4 doors, a nice sign read 'choose the one that you resemble'.

I stood back from the doors, admiring the different doors. It wasn't really hard actually, I simply walked through the metal door. I kinda did the 'ini mini miny mo' thing. The door slammed shut behind me, and the sight before me was nothing more than a single chair with a doctor beside it.

"Odd, many are fazed by this door. I want to understand you better. Please sit here." The doctor gestured to the metal chair with cuffs on it.

Sitting on the chair, the doctor fastened the cuffs and put a metal helmet on my head. It was covered in wires and he injected some fluid into me, which made me fall into another black abyss.

"Challenge 2, Test subject 032 please proceed to make your way out of this maze."

I woke up to see myself stand on see-through panes of glass. I must've been sent to the wrong area because the level I was on seemed like the cheats of getting out of the maze. Then the weirdest thing happened. I saw myself standing below me. Another me?

I turned to see what the room I was in looked like. It was dimly lighted, the only light coming from the slightly illuminated maze below me. The room had a warm feel to it, I could barely see the maze in fact and all I could see was a faint outline of the maze itself. The room seemed to be a few acres big, almost like the maze itself. The room was like a viewing platform to see what the person underneath was doing.

The maze was made of tall rose bushes, preventing anyone shorter than 2 meters from seeing anything beyond the walls. The rose bushes had large, sharp thorns that threatened anything that dared to touch it. The maze itself was filled of little traps, the occasional spikes on the floor, 3 foot deep pits, standard weapon positioning and every kid's nightmare, dead ends.

I decided to run to the end of the room, determined to get the maze over and done with. I lurched forward, only to find myself being obstructed by something. I looked ahead of me, nothing. I was being blocked by air. I felt something pinching my skin and I caught a glimpse of tearing skin and cloth.

I pulled back and fell backward as I felt something attacking my stomach. Another blow on my back made me fall forwards and get on my hands and knees. I felt something hard, and coarse graze my bare palms, something much like dust. Before long, I was staring down at the maze. I spotted 'me' doing exactly the same thing, except that I was being attacked by rose bushes lashing out and swinging their long and thick vines at my feet. I noticed that each time the vines that lunged at my battered back, I would feel and bare the same pain as what the 'me' below me should be feeling.

"Figured it out yet?" A man with gold hair and piercing blood-red eyes wearing a black leather jacket, an untucked and messy white collar shirt and black leather pants approached me.

"W-what?" I uttered as the vicious torment reduced me to nothing more than a puny mouse.

"Come on don't tell me you need help for everything." The mysterious man said in a haughty voice.

"Test subject 032 we can't receive signals from you if you keep on talking to this figment of your imagination." The monotone voice dragged.

"Don't listen to them. After all, I'm like you." The man held out a hand to lift me up.

"Test subject 032 we need your cooperation." The voice sounded more and more infuriated.

I stared at the man, his eyes piercing through my soul. Then he got to his knees, placing a warm hand on my battered shoulder, massaging me into submission.

"I know you need help," he whispered into my ear, "Rorel Arielez."

I widened my eyes when I heard my name. The same man who happened to meet me in the previous challenge.

-Dr. Philip Williams' POV-

Rorel was shifting closer and closer to the blur of static. The large screen connecting to a MDP/AUP reader was recently installed, one of which my fellow scientist Henry was proud of. He said it could help us examine the internal thoughts of the test subjects. I was rather doubtful of the 'efficient and powerful computer brain' but slowly I grew impressed with the brain's infallible abilities and accurate recordings of the human brain that no reader could do.

Until now.

The mastermind behind the blur is probably test subject 008 or 023. They both popped in and out people's MDPs. They seemed to have built their own AUP, which was terrifying. They were capable of anything, anything they thought could happen, be it create a living human or something non-existent, anything was possible.

I knew 008 and 023 always seemed to fancy subject 032, but we never expected him to come in so strongly. They wouldn't destroy the whole screen but instead create a few bugs and create a slight static-like filter over their figure, making their facial features still visible.

It was probably 008. He always appeared in vigorous and violent appearances. The stereos started giving feedback, a encrypted code which I practiced remembering. It was like their own language which all I could make out among the sounds was "...come back...avenge..." and that was it.

"Let her go." the stereos started working eerily well. The voice was high quality as always and had a stunningly sharp voice. I was filled with anger and humiliation as I heard 023 speak over the stereos.

"No." I sat back in my chair.

"I will resort to drastic measures. Dragging people into this is against human rights." 023's voice had a noble hunch to it but I always knew his intentions.

"Despite whatever you say, I won't let her go. She is vital to our research." I shot back.

"I warned you."

The screen started to flicker and it started featuring loud siren blares and the screen started to chip along the sides. The cracks started inching its way to the core of the screen, rapid movement, fast pacing, and the inevitable of the screen shattering into shards arrived. I dusted off the shards, quickly making my way out of the room before the whole area suddenly burst into flames.

"Will!" Henry shouted as he made his way to me in the long corridor. 4 by 4 meter rooms lined the long hallway, each filled with useful resources, and it just happens that the room I was in burst into flames. Real funny.

"What happened?" Henry questioned as he examined my leg which had a nasty gash on it. I was a fragile man, puny for my age.

"The 823 comeback." I replied as I tried to stand, only to come falling on all fours.

The 823 comeback is a term the doctors assigned to this area called 008 and 032's motives. They were to stop us from bringing in anymore test subjects. So far, they were successful in hacking into our devices but they were futile in saving lives. Mostly because every one of them refused to be helped, were skeptical, thought they were just another ploy from us or were just downright lunatics.

Even if they did accept their help, in the end, they all committed suicide, either that or we had to terminate them.

Now they're trying again.