The Camp

Chapter 19

I woke up to a camera drone, hovering a few feet in front of my head. It was a strange sight at first, seeing the little robot eye fluttering bout in front of me. It moved as I moved and when I rolled over onto my other side it followed, floating across y body and hovering in front of my face. So, we'd got to this point in the competition, the split screen constant viewing that only happened when they were down to the last fifteen competitors. I sighed and rolled over onto my back, watching the confuddled droid hover anxiously before adjusting its camera down into my face. "Alright, alright, I'm up!" I swatted at it with my hand and caught the sharp edge of the blade on my pinkie finger. "Yowch!" I cried as I swung my legs round and bent over my hand, it stung a little as I sucked the blood away, just like Ma had taught me as a child. Leaving a metallic taste in my mouth, I grimaced and proceeded to slip on my shoes. My head ached a little from the previous night, so much so that I realised I'd forgotten about visiting ack and my eyes went wide. Why didn't he come to wake me like before, I thought with panic then a sudden feeling propelled me towards the door, my hand folded around the handle and depressed it, but nothing happened. Normally it wouldn't be strange, but it was considering the fact that they normally left it unlocked. I tried again, this time wrapping both hands around it and pushing as hard as I could. Nothing. Then something...

"Please refrain from pulling at the door. Its very sensitive technology and breaking it could render you trapped."

I froze, the nasally voice of whoever was speaking to me was somewhere inside with me. My heart jumped, this morning I hadn't thought to check on the other two. I'd been too preoccupied with the nosy little drone that had been incessantly following me around. I turned back to the bunks and headed for the lumps in the other girls' beds. They were still asleep, seemingly oblivious to the voice and our predicament. I knew that because the shape of their bodies lay in various positions as they had all night. The camera dived for my face and I had to duck to avoid it. "Do you mind?" I asked it sarcastically, already imagining the greying scientist on the other end snorting to himself because he'd responded to my rhetorical question with 'Not at all.'.

By this point I had at least figured out one thing, that the voice who had warned me about the door had not come from inside of the lodge but rather a small black speaker, hanging from the top corner of the wall. I didn't remember it being there yesterday but then again, the engineers here could have easily fitted it while we were out. I squinted at the camera, suddenly becoming aware of the fact that there was only in the room. My breath caught in my throat as my eyes drifted to the bed of the red head. There was hair and the shape of a body but no movement, no breathing. Something was definitely wrong.

My feet carried me over to stand over her, staring down at the white sheet pulled up to cover her face. Its not uncommon to sleep like that, my Grandma does it, so I wasn't suspicious before but looking back on it, it was highly suspicious. My hand reached down, trembling as it made the descent to remove the covers and in one swift movement, I ripped the sheet from her body.

I stepped back, allowing the sheet to drift gently to the floor. The drone took its chance, zooming in on my shocked expression as I gazed upon the mannequin. With rising panic, I dashed to the other bed and ripped the covers from the quiet girl revealing again what I'd expected. It was a decoy, a fake. I was really locked in here alone. The camera attempted to zoom again but I swatted at it for the second time, forgetting completely about the slash oozing blood down my finger.

Drawing a hand to rest on my chin, I thought. About a million different answers entered my head: brute force, reasoning, even bribery but then again, I wouldn't know how t use any of them. In the end I found myself teetering from the top bunk of an empty bed and reaching up to the speaker. I found what I was looking for, a ridge along the side and began to pull, slowly but surely separating the front of the speaker from the back. The drone watched me from a few feet back, moving every now and then to get a better shot. I could already see the curious faces of the viewers. With a pop the front of the speaker broke away and exposed its bare insides. A few cables ran around the edges and hung into the centre but that was it. I put my foot on the wooden barriers at the sides of the top bunk and used a thin ledge on the wall to pull myself up higher so that I could get a better view and low and behold there lay a key, flat against the bottom of the box and glistening in the light. I removed one of my hands from the ridge and grabbed it, tipping back as I did and feeling the whole bunk wobble. I was then catapulted backwards from my stand and flung to the ground with a thump.