Crimson Lace

Chapter 22

WARNING: This chapter contains subjects that may be triggering for some viewers. Including but not limited to: violence.

ELLE
CHAPTER TWENTY-TWO

Just a few more trials, they said. A few more and you will go back to living your life. They lie. I try not to hold onto false hope. For all I know this could last forever. For all I know they are doing this to kill me slowly. Very, very slowly.

There seems to be an infinite amount of ways to hurt me. But the funny thing about
torture is, after a while you don't remember to feel it. But just when I think that I have built up a tolerance to the pain and my screaming halts, they switch up their method and I am stuck relearning the works of agony. Everyday is a new kind of hurt.

Yesterday they cut me open to see if I could heal myself.

I bled.

Friday my hands were set on fire to see if I could control the flames.

I burned.

Thursday I was stuck in a freezer to see if I could manipulate snow and ice.

I froze.

Wednesday I was forced to run for twelve hours straight to test my speed.

I collapsed.

Tuesday they dropped concrete slabs into my hands to assess my strength.

My wrists shattered.

Monday they strapped me to an electric chair.

I think I died.

Today is Sunday . . .

I thought I'd be used to the terror by now, but nothing could have prepared me for the giant water tank. I am dressed in white spandex and a matching shirt. Simple clothing that sticks to my skin when wet.

The water is cold and I find myself already struggling to breathe. A hose continuously fills the tank. It is almost to my chin when Carlyle enters the lab, dressed in a white coat with his long blonde hair in a low ponytail.

"E2456N21W05," Carlyle has refused to call me by my name since he started facilitating the trials. I think it helps him feel less guilty about what he is doing if he thinks of me as so less than human that I don't even need a name. "What do you feel when surrounded by water?"

It laps around my face, flooding my mouth as I try to speak. "Like I'm drowning."

He sighs, slamming his clipboard down onto a table. "The less you tell me than the less I learn. Are you trying to make this difficult? Do you expect an award for your audacious petulance?" His tone of voice spits frustration like a sprinkler.

My words gargle as the water level reaches my mouth. "For you, blondie, I'd be irritating for free." I cough up fluids as my lungs begin to fill. The sensation burns as I gasp for oxygen.

"I loathe you, kid."

"Don't call me kid." I gag down another mouthful of water as I speak.

"Don't call me blondie." Carlyle chuckles, amused by the sight of me struggling to breathe. He sighs, approaching the wall and pounding his fist on a red button. The water stops flowing before it reaches my nose. "Well it seems that this was another dead end, kid. You don't possess the ability of a Hydro, that is for sure."

He exits the room dramatically, leaving me to prune in the freezing water. I try to climb out but my wrists are bound above my head by the black straps that lowered me into the tank.
I'm shivering, unable to wrap my own arms around myself for warmth. I use the last bit of my strength to hoist my legs above the water. They feel heavy, like deadweight, but I manage to swing them over the side of the glass. My ribs ram into the edge of it as I lower myself to the ground. Vomit rises in my mouth as my side makes a cracking sound against the rim, and I force myself to swallow.