Translucent (Solangelo AU)

4. The Screams Are Calling

They didn't bother sedating me.

I was bound to a cold, metallic table for two hours, seven minutes and twenty-two seconds. I counted, ticking the seconds off on my fingers because it was all I could do not to go mad. If I could visualize it, see the numbers changing and merging behind my closed eyelids, I hoped it would distract me from the pain, the not knowing. They hadn't even touched me yet. The guards strapped me to the hard surface and left without a word, leaving me to wait for the Scientists on my own while I lay in boredom and slight panic. Were they taking so long because they were discussing different forms of torture? Since I had waited so long, would that mean the penance would be so much worse? Or was this the torture, the solitude and leaving me alone with my thoughts, the very things that could be as deadly as a knife if they struck hard enough. The Scientists were waiting to see how long I would last, how long it would be before I tore out my own eyes and fed them to the hungry wolves. They were starving me to see how I would react to the feeling of utter emptiness. Little did they know, one can only live off of tomatoes for so long; it wasn't anything I wasn't used to.

I lost count after the fourth hour and time only seemed to go slower from there on. Could it be possible that they had drugged me? That perhaps this could be a stimulation? A test? Did they want me to act out? Questions and thoughts tugged at my brain, the density growing uncanny and nearly making me sick again. The worst part was that I couldn't push them away. They were louder than usual, leaving my ears ringing and adding on to the noise. That's it, I thought, they were trying to drive me insane. They wanted me to bleed and burn at my own hands so they could brush it off and call it an accident, a freak of nature. They were using me against myself. They didn't need knives or scalpels or screwdrivers, they just needed to expose me to myself and watch as I slowly self-destructed.

Well fuck that. And fuck them. The Scientists, the Creators, the oligarchy, all of them. They couldn't control us all as if we were attached to strings that they were allowed to toy with at their leisure. They chose our status', our educations, our partners, our friends, our jobs, our homes, even our goddamn children were hooked around their wrists and all they had to do was snap and everyone would fall to their command.

I opened my eyes with a new rage behind them, as if the action itself ignited the fire that burned deep within the well of my spirit. There was only one thing I could think to do at that moment; I had to get out of there.

I pulled at my wrists and found the leather binds to be loosely tied, making it easy to slip out of after several unpleasant tugs. I managed to sit up, my back aching with every movement and my wrists burning at the sudden exposure. I freed my feet with much more speed, considering I finally had the use of my hands. The room came into focus as I stood up and I found myself staring into a pair of wide, brown eyes that were contrasted by skin so pale it looked deadly. It was my reflexion.

I tasted blood. There was no door, no opening, no exit. Only rows upon rows of mirrors. I wanted to look away, to distract my eyes with anything, anything other than what filled my vision from every angle. It had been so long since I had looked so sickly, so dead. I felt like a spider, with six eyes and eight legs, only I had absolutely no control over them.

And then the reflexion changed and I was no longer staring into brown eyes, but blue ones. The most magnificent blue, not quite like the sky or the waters but something in-between, almost as if they were made of fine glass and were filled with the richest, most brilliant shades. I knew, I knew I had seen those eyes somewhere before. I don't know how I could even forget, they were stitched into my mind with a string made of pure gold; impenetrable. But then his golden hair and freckles came into view and I was finished, gone completely from all existence. It was Will, the strange boy from my English class. He smiled, and my insides imploded at last. He undid me in only a matter of seconds. I finally understood why they took me away, why I was flawed—it hit me the second I saw the boy materialized. It was because I didn't want a Partner, I didn't want to be with a woman, I didn't want to be given an instruction manual on how to properly live my life. I wanted to be able to choose, to have a say in my future. And somehow, they had come to that conclusion before I could and now I was caught; trapped.