The Game

Chapter 1

I wake up in an empty room. My mind matches it. All I know is I'm Piper, but do I even have a last name?

Where am I? What's happening? What led me to have no memory? What if I'm trapped in here forever? There will be nothing to comfort me. Maybe I did something bad, so bad that they don't even want me to remember. Am I a bad person? Who am I? Am I nice or mean? Smart or dumb? How do I act when I don't even know myself?

I take a deep breath and lean against the wall. I need to compose myself and calm down; I won't get anything done in this state. It isn't necessary that it's bad that I'm here. I look over to the door. That is the answer to my worries. If I can open that door, I am not bad and there's another reason, but if it is locked...

I stand up and walk over to the door, foot in front of foot, just at my own slow pace. I feel my heart hammering in my chest, legs trembling and brain whirring at the possible meanings of my next action, but I ignore them all as nothing matters, but this. It seems like it takes forever to get to the door, but it is only mere seconds since the room is tiny. I put my hand on the door handle and pause. I don't know if I have the courage to open it, but if I don't I will never know. This is the deciding moment; whether I am free or will be locked up for the rest of my life; lonely and empty. I push down on the handle and push forwards and nothing happens. I feel myself breaking down, but then I remember that doors don't work just one way so I pull the door and it swings open. Relief floods into me as I step out into the white corridor; there is hope and another, hopefully more appealing, purpose to this whole thing.

I look out into the corridor and everything looks the same; just a stretch of white with doors dotted along at regular intervals. What if there are others in those rooms? People like me. I walk across the corridor to the door opposite, which is only a short length; about the length of my room, but it seems a quicker journey than the one across my room as now I have hope. I slowly open the door so I won't startle anyone inside; if there is anyone inside that is. It could just be an empty room and I could be alone. Alone in this whole compound. Lonely and frightened. Never seeing anyone again. I take another deep breath to calm down and tell myself to stop jumping to conclusions before actually seeing the result.

I finally swing the door open and looking inside, I see a girl. She is sitting in the corner of the room with her head on her knees with her arms around them. For a moment I am not sure what she is doing. Maybe she wasn't brave enough to open the door. Maybe she thought she was locked in. Getting closer I realise she is sobbing and hasn't even acknowledged my presence in the room.

I don't know what to do, so I get closer and crouch next to her.

"Hey," I whisper, "don't be sad, you aren't locked up. See? The door is open, you can just walk out."

She raises her head slightly so I can just see her eyes, but at that moment the door swings shut and she starts hyperventilating even worse. She seems like she is looking around the room in fear and I don't know why she isn't breathing properly, however she reacted when I said she could leave so I am going to try and get her out the room.

I open the door again and I see a guy hesitantly walking past, looking around. He seems to be physically shaking and taking short, but frequent breaths. The fear is radiating off him and I am surprised he even made it out of the room, but maybe he is just taking everything slow. I look back into the room and see that the girl is also shaking now and as frightened as the boy looks she looks worse so I am going to need his help to get her out the room as I am not that strong.

"Hey," I call to him

He pauses and studies me like I am an intriguing thing that he has never seen before.