The Decay

Chapter 60 - Prison

60

Alexia sat in the corner of her cell. She had lost count of how many days she'd been stuck in this damned cell. They had treated her like a common object, ignoring her despite her screams for answers. They fed her twice a day; the same stale bread and the same glass of water.Twice, she had been given a form for pill as well. She had been reluctant to take it but apparently it contained nutrients to keep her going. She had no idea why they were keeping her alive or why she had not been interrogated more. Two days after arriving she had been interrogated but she had said very little. It seemed strange that they would let her stay in the cell without torturing her, but evidently they didn't have much urgency in gaining the information she knew. Perhaps they simply deemed her to be of questionable importance, or perhaps they had obtained their information elsewhere.That still did not answer why the insisted on keeping her alive in the hell-hole of a prison cell.

It was mostly dark around her, a small lamp the only source of light.She occasionally heard other prisoners moan and groan, but they seemed far away. Was it her imagination? At one point the lamp had malfunctioned and she was left in total darkness. The hallucinations had started after some hours. Had it not been for her terrifying screams disturbing the guards, they would almost definitely have left her with the broken lamp.

She had often wanted to curl up in a ball and die, but thoughts of Richard kept her going. She remembered seeing him on the screens in the control room from the drone cameras, yet she had no idea what had happened. Was he still alive? If he was, why had he not come to get her out yet? Did he even make it back to the Resistance alive? Her questions were interrupted by an explosion which, considering where she was, should not have been heard that loudly. The whole place started to shake. She curled up in her corner not knowing what was going on and started sobbing. A few guards shouted and the place lit up.

As she looked up, she stopped sobbing even more. She had wondered why the place was always dark. Now she knew. Ahead of her were four prison cells, each insulated. Mutilated bodies hung from walls, body parts scattered across all of the cells except for hers. In the last cell, another prisoner was still alive and in the same condition as she was in. The prisoner was vomiting, presumably as a reaction to the mutilated bodies so close to him. This was not a prison. It was a slaughterhouse.

As she felt on the verge of sobbing again, the images in front of her become too much and her vision blackened as she fainted, her body resting against the cold, hard wall.