The Beast Within (#Wattys2016)

Why Us?

The door swung open, and Tessa entered the room, a smile plastered across her face, her eyes glinting proudly.
I stared at her blankly, too tired for her praise.
"Eden, I am so proud of you! You did so well!" she said, reaching down to ruffle the silky fur between my ears. I tensed, but did not move.
Her eyes wandered to the floor, and she noticed my handiwork. Her smile dissolved when she read my message, which spelled out by the very tiles that, moments ago, had been synonymous with success.
She froze, a strange look clouding her eyes.
Daniel slipped through the doorway, grinning faintly at me, but then his gaze, too, fell upon those two words that adorned the floor.
Guilt and remorse were scrawled across Tessa's face as she stared at my message, painful silence echoing in my ears. Tears crept into the corners of her eyes, and when she finally spoke, her voice was a hoarse whisper.
"I'm sorry, Eden, I really am."
"Apologizing doesn't change what we've done, Tess," Daniel murmured, his eyes empty and emotionless.
She turned to him, sorrow dripping across her cheeks.
"We didn't have a choice."
Daniel's face slowly contorted in anger, and when he spoke, his voice trembled under the weight of his rage.
"We could have at least tried to stop him. We could have refused to obey him."
"Resisting him is futile, Dan, and we both know it. You know what he would have done if we hadn't complied."
"Honestly, I would rather face his wrath than have to live with the fact that we destroyed so many lives."
I looked from one scientist to the other, trying to make sense of what I was hearing.
"It's not just you that he'd punish. Remember what he told us? He said that he wouldn't hesitate to hurt our loved ones if we stepped out of line."
"He's bluffing."
"You're going to underestimate the man who carefully selected a promising young geneticist and aspiring biologist for his little project, who had them kidnapped and dragged off to his facility, who forced them to participate in his experiment? The man who destroyed so many lives in pursuit of the impossible, who has no qualms when it comes to hurting others for his own benefit?"
Daniel was silent, staring at the tiles on the floor.
"Why us, Tess?" he said softly, almost inaudibly. "We never asked for any of this."
"No, we didn't. Eden didn't ask for this, either. Neither did any of the previous subjects. None of this is right, but there's nothing we can do."
"There has to be something," Daniel replied.
"If there was, we'd have done it already."
"But what if-" Daniel began, before Tessa cut him off.
"Dan, we have to get Eden over to him, or he'll wonder what's taking so long."
He nodded slowly, and gathered up the letters, sweeping my message into the pile of tiles.
My head was spinning, attempting to process what I had just heard, and I did not notice that Tessa had put me back into the cat carrier until we were in the hallway.