Death Penalty

Ch 3 - Random Execution

Cosette-

My eyes flutter open, bright fluorescent lights shining down so harshly that it feels as if they're drilling into my skull. For a second, I'm disoriented, grappling with the overwhelming brightness and the remnants of a dull, throbbing pain that wraps around my head like a vice. Confusion reigns until the memories of yesterday surge back, flooding my mind. As I shift in place, the coarse fabric of the grey shirt and matching trousers scratching against my skin.

I take a moment to absorb my surroundings. The room is worse than I imagined my prison cell could be: a filthy mattress, stained and sagging in the middle, and a sink with a shattered mirror. My reflection stares back at me, distorted in the cracked shards, framing a face that looks as hollow as I feel. My hair is limply stuck to the back of my neck, damp with sweat, and I quickly twist it into a neat braid, trying to regain some sense of control.

With an unsteady breath, I stand and approach the door, its cold metal surface contrasting sharply with my warm fingertips. I push it open and step into a nightmarish scene, one that looks like a macabre set from an old horror film rather than a real place. The circular compound stretches out before me, with doors lining the perimeter, each leading to a different room. I take in the two stories—this prison—filled with the hopeless faces of others. We're all equally lost, trapped in this hell they've devised.

In the center of the compound, a giant spinner wheel is on the floor, its vibrant colors dulled by the atmosphere of dread hanging thick in the air. upon taking a closer look I realise It is our names. Above it, a massive screen flickers to life, displaying the word "WELCOME" in red.

Before I have time to analyze what I'm seeing, a voice booms through the speakers, deep and authoritative, cutting through the panic like a knife. "WELCOME TO THE DEATH PENALTY PROGRAM. TODAY YOU WILL UNDERGO A SERIES OF EXPERIMENTS. COMPLIANCE IS NOT ONLY CRUCIAL BUT MANDATORY. THEREFORE, MEASURES HAVE BEEN IMPLEMENTED TO ENSURE THE INTEGRITY OF OUR TESTING PROCESS." A chill runs down my spine as the voice pauses momentarily, and in that silence, I feel something tighten around my neck. I reach up in a panicked frenzy, fingers brushing against the cold metal of what I couldn't even comprehend as a collar.

The oppressive voice continues, "LET US COMMENCE WITH OUR FIRST EXPERIMENT. IN EXACTLY ONE MINUTE, ONE OF YOU WILL BE EXECUTED. WE AT FISHERS AND CO. EXTEND OUR GRATITUDE FOR YOUR NON-VOLUNTARY PARTICIPATION." I let those words sink in. at first I though I heard it wrong but the gasps and the shocked faces of others confirmed that I was right.

"Random execution? What is that supposed to mean?" a guy shouts, his voice tinged with alarm. It pierces through the mounting chaos as he rushes towards the door, desperately slamming his fists against the metal. The sound reverberates, but there's no response; it's as if this place is designed to punish any further attempts at escape. People begin to murmur, fear thickening the air, while others scream in a panic—the cacophony underscored by confusion and desperation.

My mind races. When the announcements talked about human subjects, I pictured something sinister but contained within the parameters of science—drugs, testing, maybe conditioning. Not this. Not an execution .

Suddenly, the noise recedes as if someone pressed a mute button. Suddenly, every became quiet and the only thing that I could hear was a beeping. I searched for the source and it was coming from the guy's collar. He clutches his throat. Then there's a deafening explosion. Boom! The guy drops to the ground, a lifeless heap. Screams erupt once more, echoing in the concrete walls, but the voice returns over the speaker, chillingly calm as it recites the instructions once again, this time emphasizing the word "compliance" as if that would erase the horror we just witnessed.

Silence grips us like a vise. The speaker declares, "LET'S COMMENCE." The wheel begins to spin. Everyone's faces flicker across the screen, one after the other, a twisted roulette of survival. The sound of the spinning wheel seems to stretch into eternity, an insidious countdown to doom.

As the wheel slows down, my heart races alongside it. I watch it closely, maybe to try and find a way out of this. But it stops on each face for a moment too long—each flick of the wheel heightening the tension. I saw my face- plain and somber, but then it moves on, flicking to someone else.

Finally, it lands on a name: "ELI PERDSEN." I turn to look at the boy on my left. Its him. In that moment, a wail erupts from his throat, raw and filled with despair, resonating with the gut-wrenching anguish. The collar around his neck detonates, another explosion marking the end of another life.