Unplugged: The Hidden World (#2, Unplugged Trilogy)

Chapter Twenty Six

Enna

Gale sits up in her cage, and I pull my muscles taught, ready to be yelled at. But she just turns her head towards me a little and whispers over the sounds drifting over from the caged victims: the man who repeatedly screams "My name is Greg Parker!" and the small child who cries and whines in a language unfamiliar to me.

"I'm sorry for what I said to you earlier. You know..." At first my exhausted brain can't salvage the old memory, but then I remember when we'd arrived here a few days ago, how she had screamed at me and told me that this whole situation was my fault. I shake my head.

"It's okay. I already forgave you." She turns her head even more, and I can't help but cringe. Her cheek is red and raw for sleeping on the cage wires, and her skin is wan and pale. Probably like mine. Gale smiles the tiniest bit before re- situating the position of her body in the cage. I would do the same, if I could feel anything below my belly button. When I awoke after passing out, I saw that the bandages hastily wrapped around my arm had staunched the blood flow from my wounds. And then I remembered seeing Matthew. That's when the tears started.

"He'll be okay," Josh mutters beside me, as if reading my mind. I squint through the darkness so I can see him. His bright eyes reflect the fluorescent lights hanging above us. "When I knew him at the Depot, he worked harder than anyone else I knew. He won't give up on us." He motions weakly to the cages surrounding us. The other prisoners from the Depot. I take a moment to swallow the growing lump in my throat before nodding.

"I know." We all sit in a contemplative silence for a while. Then the door slams open, shedding bright light onto the prisoners and casting a man's shadow onto the stone floor. I hold my breath. Matthew?

"Rise and shine." A guard's sneering voice. My lungs deflate at once. All I can hear are the Worker's footsteps, and the prisoner screaming, "My name is Greg Parker! My name is Greg Parker!"

"No it's not, you lunatic!" The guard replies. He comes into view: a tall, muscular man with small eyes and a wicked grin. "You're going mad, you hear me? Mad!" Greg Parker continues to shout his name, and, to my horror, the man stops in front of my cage. He flashes a predatory grin that makes my skin crawl, and tightens his grip on his flashgun. Just to scare me.

"Ready for testing, sweetheart?" He whispers. I hear Josh's small gasp, Gale's little moan. Horrified, I just shake my head, roping my arms protectively around my torso. I try to force a defiant expression onto my face, but it turns out looking like I tasted something bad.

"I don't have time for this," he replies flatly and, before I know what's happening, he reaches through the cage and takes my unbandaged wrist, plunging a syringe into a vein and slowly emptying its contents. I shout angrily and then slowly begin to fade into a deep blackness as my heart propels the anesthetic to my brain. Slowly, I lose control and slump over, leaning on the cage wires. The last thing I hear is the frantic, desperate shouting of the man who hopes he's not going insane.

* * *

Blinding white light pierces my retinas through closed eyelids, and I hear voices and scuffling fabric above my head. Instantly my breaths quicken. Calm down, calm down. After a moment, I squint open my eyes. Then I close them again, blinded by the brightness of the overhead lights. I start to panic. I flail my arms and legs, but they don't move an inch. They are tied to the table I lie on, metal by the feel of it. Instead of completely losing it, I force myself to pay attention to my surroundings. Quiet mutters from above my head, strange noises from my sides, the sounds of beeping machines... Then a cold, rough hand examining my bandaged forearm, observing my bruises, checking for my pulse.

"Why isn't she wake up?" The person whispers in a rough, strangely forced accent.

"Because the lights are blinding me," I spit, before I can help myself.