The Test

Twenty-eight

Bianca
The guards let me out of solitary confinement a few days later, after a few solid beatings and another round of questions, to none of which I know the answer. I return to the big room full of groups of girls on the steadfast and iron-clad assurance that if I so much as look at a guard the wrong way again, I'll be getting much worse than a beating the next time.
They chain me to the wall again, giving no thought to the stifled grunts of pain that escape when they force me to the ground of the cavernous space, roughly yanking my shackles to the iron ring on the outer wall. The other girls, those unfortunate enough to be in the middle of the room, surrounded by puddles of excrement that stink like hell, are chained to the floor directly by their shackles, so they are stuck in the tightest space with no room for movement. At least we have a little leeway with the chains. But those girls are the ones who need to be chained to the floor-the "worst ones". The ones who apparently deserve it. What they have done to merit this torture I don't know.
I look over to such a place now, seeing a flash of honey-blonde wavy hair and hazel eyes. My brow furrows. I've seen her before, I know I have. But what really shocks me is the girl chained beside her. Aria. Bruised and pale, exhaustion lining her face. Our eyes meet across the space, and her face clouds, shadows of pain moving behind her eyes. What have they done to her? What will they do? I dread to think-it can't be good.
She mouths something at me, and I blink confusedly at her. What? I mouth back. She says more clearly: Where's Lucas?
Who? I mouth back. If she means the blonde boy I only saw standing beside her for a few seconds...
My boyfriend, she mouths back.
Boyfriend? I thought she was going out with Zach? I ask her as much, and she shakes her head. He broke up with me for Callum's sister, she explains. I shake my head. I can't believe that, but she would never lie. And I have to say I had noticed something going on between Alina and Zach, even though I only saw them together for about ten minutes before I was taken. I don't know, I say, apologetic. Sorry.
She shrugs. That's ok.
I wonder what's going on there, but I don't press. She's obviously been through a traumatic experience. Or two.
A guard tells a few girls in the opposite corner to us to shut up, and we fall silent, instantly submissive. I hate that they can do this to us, but I hate that we can't do anything about it even more. Their stomping footsteps strike fear into our hearts, and you could cut the air with a knife, the tension is so thick.
Then something strange happens. A sort of darkness bleeds though the air, like smoke but thicker, blacker. Maybe it's the darkness inside me, seeping out for the world to see.
But no. The guards look gleeful, and then I realise. It's a form of gas. It isn't a gas I've seen before; it makes the room feel heavy, like I'm wading through treacle. It makes my head throb and droop to my chest, and I close my eyes involuntarily as the gas looms closer.
I do not open them again.
~
Aria
Strange dreams fly about in my mind after the gas takes hold, and I hear a faint screaming. It's not coming from me.
Dimly I register that I'm not in the big warehouse room anymore, so I guess the gas was only a distraction to knock us unconscious, but I still don't like the memories whatever hallucinogenic chemicals they put in there to mess with our brains dragged up. I can still feel the pain now, as if someone had freshly ripped out my heart and forced me to watch as they ate it hungrily, holding it greedily within their two hands. I writhe and squirm, barely noticing the shackles still pinning me down, as if I can physically outrun the memories. I should have known. I can still see Luc's face as he is torn away from me, the fear and loss as I learn that Vi is missing.
The anger when I found out my parents had been lying to me the whole time. They weren't dead. They were just too weak to tell me they were alive, had been the whole time. They still threw me out on the street-I'm still not sure whether that was actually a performance; it was rather convincing, no matter how much Mom says she loves me.
A bucket of water is literally a cold slap in the face, making the faces and memories swirl away down the drain I notice at my feet, with the water. I try not to notice the dried blood, blotchy across the floor. A trail. From the door inwards. Mine?
How long have I been here?
Where am I?
I look up, disoriented. "Where am I?" I ask, voice slow and weak.
A guard, with a shaved head (as they all seem to be here,) with a gap-toothed, sinister smile, answers with a dry laugh.
"Welcome to Eden."
~
Lucas
The day before the gas attack
"We've looked everywhere!" He shouts, slamming his fist down on the table opposite Frex, whose face, even in the dim light of the dining room, is lined and drawn.
"I know." He says softly. "But I don't know what we can do."
"Cone on. Am I the only one getting fired up about this?" Luv asks. "You can't give up now, Frex."
Frex sighs. "I'm not. I'm just saying, we haven't found Buanca yet, and it's been almost three months, so I doubt we'll be able to find-"
"Don't say her name," Luc growls. "Don't say you're giving up and speak her name in the same sentence." He looks sharply at his friend. "What about Vi? Are you so sure you won't find her?" He feels a glint of inward satisfaction at the flicker of pain that crosses Frex's face at the mention of his girlfriend's name. "That's different," he mumbles, looking down at the table. "She didn't volunteer."
Luc starts. "You think Anya volunteered for this?" He scoffs. "I was there. I saw her face. She was taken, literally ripped from my arms, in cold blood, like they'd planned it. I don't know where they took her, but I intend to find out."
Frex's face is white. "They took her?"
"Yes, Frex. They took her. Dragged her. And her parents did nothing."
"When?"
"A few days ago," Luc says. "A week or so after Vi was taken."
"So, where do you think they took her?"
Luc looks up at Frex. "I'm willing to bet that they took her the same place they took Bianca." He stands up from the table, a renewed hope in his face.
"Assuming we even know where Bianca is," Frex says, and Luc glares at him. I was feeling all hopeful there, asshole, he thinks. But he merely nods. "That's why we need to talk to Knox."
~
Viola
A few minutes before the gas attack
Who knows how long she's been here. A week? A month? More? Who knows?
They do.
Time has become irrelevant: Vi now marks it by people. The redhead, scarred girl that got dragged out of the warehouse room they're in, some chained to the floor, some to the walls. Vi is chained to the floor: She has worked out that these, a smaller circle, are the ones who merited it.
The ones who struggled.
She looks around her; another girl who was chained to the floor is being led-dragged, like a rag doll, like they all are, Vi thinks-from the room, and, like the others, she doesn't come back.
Except. There was a black-haired girl sitting in the corner, grim-faced and bruised, when Vi entered; she is being dragged in now. They chain her to the wall. Her eyes catch onto Vi's, and she starts. Bianca?
She found her. Without even trying. They'd been looking for months-how long has she been here? At least four months.
Vi looks around, noticing for the first time that all the people in this room, possibly all the people in this place, except for the guards, are girls. Another glance confirms it. But why? Why are there no males here?
Vi ponders this thought, increasingly confused and no closer to gaining an answer, when her gaze snags on the girl next to her. She dimly notices that that Bianca is talking to her, or at least they're mouthing words at each other. She look more closely. The girl's hazel eyes, her dark hair...her best friend. Aria.
All of them...in the same place. At once. Vi thinks.
The thought knocks the wind out of her lungs, but then she realises that something else is encroaching on her vision. A black cloud.
Girls are coughing, spluttering, as they breathe in this mysterious substance.
Vi soon joins them, sucking in laboured breaths as the black cloud loons closer. The last thing she sees is Aria being manhandled by a guard...where are they taking her? What will they do to her?
Vi's eyes close. She knows nothing more.
~
Viola
When she opens her eyes again, Vi is disoriented, her eyes failing to adjust to the darkness for the few crucial seconds before a bucket of water is slammed into her face. She splutters as it fills up her nose and mouth. Then a damp cloth is pressed against her face, again faster than she can blink, and water dropped steadily onto it. She fights for every breath. "Who planned the gas attack?" A guard asks.
"I don't know," Vi rasps. Drowning. Must get air. Now. I'm drowning. Drowning....
The guard kicks her ribs. "Tell. Me."
"I don't know!" she cries, fighting the sensation of breathlessness, of the weight of the water pressing down... "I told you. I. Don't. Know." her protests grow weaker as the water overwhelms her, and she gasps for breath as black spots cloud her sight. The voices swirl into one as the black spots take over completely, and she loses all sensation.
~
Lucas
"So, we've narrowed it down to a couple of warehouses," Knox says, looking up at Luc and Fex over the map of the state spread over the table in Knox's office, now jokingly known as "the War Room".
"How do we know they're in the same place?" Frex asks, still worried.
Knox shakes his head. "We don't. But given that Viola and Aria went missing within two weeks of each other, it's a safe bet."
"What about Bianca? She's been missing for five or six months by now." Frex says.
Knox shrugs. "Whoever took her are getting desperate?" he says, with the kind of tone that indicates he doesn't know the answers.
"But Anya's parents took her from here, and then she ended up at...wherever she is," Frex says, perplexed.
"And it was almost like they wanted to give her over to the people who took her from them!" Luc says angrily.
"So....how does this relate to Bianca?" Frex says.
"It doesn't. Can we get back to the subject at hand, please?" Knox says. "So, we've narrowed it down to two warehouses..." He trails off and glances at each of them as if to check that they're listening (they are.) "and as there are three missing now, we have more resources to look for them than we did when it was just Bianca. No-one cares about a lone missing girl, but three, and when at least two have been taken under mysterious circumstances...well, the government are listening to our appeals now."
"So they ARE the ones helping us! I knew it!" Frex says excitedly, slapping his hand down in the table.
Knox sighs. "Yes. But that's not the point. The point is, they've confirmed that it's one of two warehouses in the Bloodhound district. And because they're all girls," he taps a spot on the map, "we think it's this one."
Luc looks down at the small dot, reads the name. Eden Rehabilitation Facility for Young Women.
He looks up at Knox. "So, how do we get them out?"
~