28

Part One

The white dug into her eyes, like ink layering on a glass film, staining it with a colour that bled into her retina. Even when she averted her gaze from the blinding light, splotches of fuzzy black splattered her vision and warped the walls. And there wasn't much else to look at, the room bare of anything interesting and its tiled floor reflecting the light from the ceiling.

Sleep wasn't easy either, the bed beneath her was as hard as steel and the thin sheets provided anything but warmth. Not to mention that any peace was interrupted regularly by the presence of bustling nurses or cleaners.

There was nothing to do but wait.

Wait for what, she was unsure of, but moving wasn't an option. Not only would she be punished for the hassle of coaxing her back to bed, but she doubted her thin legs could hold her weight without order. Breathing was difficult and laboured in the cold, and leaving the minimal heat of the blankets could cause a multitude of problems.

She had seen many other patients make the mistake of quick movement, only to have their muscles seize up and fall down, sometimes breaking bones in the process.

Distantly, she heard the heavy thud of metal clad boots heading her way. She was one of few in her wing, all the subjects either being eliminated due to lack of resources or by their own hand. She had shown promise, the doctors keeping her alive to test. She had frequent visits, nurses with beeping monitors and syringes came knocking on her door often, ordered to take blood, measure her heart rate, give more medication and the like.

Her mind had just started to drift off again when the footsteps stopped abruptly outside her room. The door burst open, the handle hitting the wall with a clang.

A man with neat cropped hair in a thick, blue uniform stood in the door frame, his jaw set and eyes glittering. She had seen him around before, he was one of the heads of this experiment.

He stayed there for a moment, surveying the girl before him, before his eyes hardened.

"Stand," His teeth gnashed at the words, the order vibrating through her bones. Her body rose on by itself, pain flaring through her spine.

She was right, had she done this on her own, she would have crumpled to the hard floor, but the words held her like a vise, preventing her from falling.

He watched her, his eyes following her every breath.

"Come with me," He said harshly, turning his back to her. "There has been an... accident."

His face contorted into a horrid grin, the skin around his gums stretching upwards.

"We are short staffed, so you get the pleasure of cleaning it up." He began walking forward, the girl stumbling after.

As soon as the words left his mouth, she knew it was a lie. It was just an excuse to torture her, then ridicule her reaction. The man in front of her was so consumed by greed and evil it leaked from him, leaving puddles everywhere he stepped. She would scrunch her nose with disgust, if she had any facial movement, but a dead eyed glare would have to suffice.

As she trailed after him, she made note of the numbers on the doors in the blindingly white hallway. Many were scratched out, showing the subjects that hadn't survived. Her own door was engraved with a messy '28', which was the name that had been used for her for a long time now. She only just clung to the memory of her previous name, which was never once spoken in the years she had been trapped here.

The man halted sharply, causing the girl to nearly walk directly into his back.

He looked at her with disdain, mouth tugging down slightly in a grimace.

He jerked his head toward a door in front of him.

"Clean," His voice was flat. He turned on his heel and strode back down the hall, leaving the girl alone. The pounding of his boots against the hard floor echoed loudly as he rounded a corner, disappearing from view.

She flicked her eyes up toward the room in question, where the number read '20' in sprawled lettering. She reached her hand toward the handle, a hiss escaping her mouth at the freezing metal. With a firm twist, the door swung open with a creak, revealing the 'accident' the man had mentioned earlier.

She almost stopped breathing.

Tied from a metal pipe that ran the length of the ceiling, hung a thick rope knotted in a loop.

A boy with dishevelled black hair was suspended by his neck, hands grasping at the rope around his throat. Just by his feet stood a chair that had been tipped over.

The boy appeared to be dead, the last of his strength sapped out of him.

She tilted her head, studying the body, noticing the bruising and cuts painted on his skin.

I guess he couldn't take it anymore, She thought lamely.

The sudden twitch of his foot thrust her back into reality. She flinched backward, focusing her gaze on the boy's face.

He yanked desperately at the rope suffocating him, his legs swinging wildly in open air. Stangled gasps shuddering through his body.

Oh, Her eyebrows raised slightly. He's still alive.

Tears began to leak from his eyes, and she doubted he could even see that she was there. He must have gotten unlucky, not having a clean break of his spine.

His muscles began to spasm, his body moving in sudden and random ways. It didn't take long for the movement to stop, his arms falling limply by his side.

The girl had no sympathy for this boy. He had chosen to do this to himself. He was weak and couldn't survive, not even killing himself properly. He was a coward, so no wonder he died, it would have happened eventually.

The girl let out a sigh before standing on the fallen chair to untie the rope.

Pathetic.