Under Worlders

Four

Strange, I thought. Experiments. I liked that word. It had a funny sound to it. The way you pronounced it was strange too. Ek-sper-uh-ment. I smiled slightly. This experiment thing could not be bad if it was named such a funny thing.
Zara pulled out a sharp little clear container, holding some kind of substance I had never seen before.
"Experiment number vwone. Reaction to needlez." Zara pulled me down on to the table, sitting me up straight at the same time. She steadied my shoulder, with her empty hand and prepared the 'needle' that she was holding. "Don't vorry, it iz juzt penizilin. I'm not putting anyfing in you dat you don't want." Zara explained, and realisation of what she was doing dawned upon me.
"No tiny knife in shoulder!" I cried, jumping quickly off the table and trying to make a break for it. Luke grabbed me before I could make it.
"Woah there, Spark! It won't hurt, don't worry!" Luke said reassuringly, but I shook my head and tore myself free. I ran past Luke and and towards the door when it shut suddenly, making me jump back hissing.

I looked around at them furiously. "Open!" I pointed to the door as I said it. Luke shook his head and Zara's eyes glimmered.

"Exzellent! Dese resultz are betta dan I firzt dought!" She exclaimed, grabbing a green board holding small white sheets with its shiny silver grabber. She began what looked like carving words, but the white sheets were undamaged.

"Experiment number dwo, reaction to pen and paper!" Zara looked pretty keen on this experiment, and I became afraid. She held out her hand for me to grab, and slowly, I did. She led me towards an empty room with nothing but a table and chair. She motioned for me to sit down on the chair and I did so, believing she was going to give me more food. However instead of placing food down in front of me, she placed one of the white sheets and the thing that she was carving the white sheet before with.

"Paper." She pointed to the white sheet in front of me. "Pen." She pointed to the small little object next to it.

"Paeper." I tried my hardest to repeat what she said. "Pin." At this she laughed, muttering something about her accent that must of thrown me off proper pronunciation. She then walked out of the room, leaving me alone staring at the paper and pen placed in front of me.

"Paeper! Pin!" I cried out, as if tasting the sound of the words on my tongue. I shook my head, knowing I was saying it wrong. "Paaper! Pan!" I cried out, shaking my head again, knowing I was close, but there was still something wrong. I continued to yell out the words, over and over again, changing the sound slightly as to get the right one.

"Paper!" I yelled out. "Pen!" I smiled, and applauded myself. I had found the right words, I knew it. I looked around to see if anyone else shared my happiness, but then realised I was alone. I frowned. There was no point being proud of something if no one else was.

I looked back down now on the paper and pen, wondering what they did. I picked up the pen and studied it, looking at all it's features. I began trying out different ways of holding the pen, when something clicked loudly. I dropped the pen in surprise, thinking I had broken it. But when I looked again, the only thing that had changed was there was now a little point stinking out where a hole had been before. It wasn't a sharp point, so it didn't concern me. At the other end of the pen, the small dome-ish thing had shrunk. I pressed it, trying to see if it would shrink again. It did, and I was pleased. But as soon as I let it go, it popped out to it's original size. I frowned. I looked at the other end of the pen to see if the point at least was still there. It wasn't. It had disappeared back into the hole. I played around with the pen a bit more, discovering what other secrets it hid. After about an hour had passed, there were several bits of the pen all over the desk, after I had twisted the top off and pulled out all the pieces that were inside.
The door to the room opened and I jumped up, and grabbed the chair I had been sitting on.
"Woah there, Spark! Put the chair down, I'm not gonna hurt ya," Luke said and I slowly, maybe a little reluctantly, put down the chair.
Luke gave me a warm smile. "I'd say that's enough excitement for today huh? Come on, let's get you something to eat and then you can go to bed, how's that sound?"
I nodded, as I realised then that I was starving.
Dinner was what they called their night meals. It was pretty similar to what we had at midmeal, which they called lunch. The only difference was that there was a different type of meat (which was called lamb and the meat from lunch turned out to be called sausage). I had been told that I had to cut the meat to eat it, but I found that absurd as it was small enough to pick up and eat with your hands. So I did so, earning some strange looks from the people around me. So I looked at them strangely as well.
After the evening meal was finished, I went back to my room by myself as I remembered the way Dilan had taken me earlier today.
When I arrived, I noticed that the curtains (the long fabric that was covering the windows) had been pulled up a little, letting a little of the afternoon light in. I pulled the curtain down, wincing a little as I did so.
I wondered then who had opened the curtain as I had no recollection of doing so.
Shrugging the thought off, as it seemed unimportant, I crept into the bed and closed my eyes slowly.
Within minutes I was deeply asleep.