Chapter 10

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The water droplet falls from a lock of red hair, splashing onto the linoleum floor beside my foot. I hug the towel tighter to my shivering body. At long last, I muster the will to drop the towel and pull a pair of warm, dry sweat pants over my legs and slip into a shirt. My eyes avert up to my reflection in the rusty mirror. The veins in my eyes are prominent from the water and the irises are particularly grey. I take my time in separating my hair into three parts and winding them into a braid down my back, securing with a band. When I reappear outside the changing room, Hatchman shoots me a grin.

"Come on, Elizabeth," he says, waving his hand and marching towards the door opposite us. "I will lead you to your holding room."

"Holding room?"

"Yes," Hatchman nods, grasping the door handle. "We will place you in a holding room for 48 hours while we monitor the way your body reacts to the virus. This will be done through your tracker and via a camera that is placed in the room. We will also take a scan of your brain every so often to see the developments of it."

I allow Doctor Hatchman to get another lot of brain scans from me in the next room without fuss. He then, with his unnerving grin, begins leading me down the hallway to my holding room. We pass countless others, door after door after door. With each one that we pass, my mouth dries in fear. There must be so much more people to be tested, so many people to be subjected to the fatal virus.

At long last, Hatchman pulls to an abrupt stop. He glances around to speak but his words are drowned by a gurgled scream. The sound scrapes its fingernails down my spine, awakening my fear anew.

Hatchman scrambles towards the sound a few doors along and I stumble after him. He throws the door open and I stand at the doorway as he goes in. The bed sheets are soaked in blood. Red splatters the white walls. And laying on the bed is a person. His body is splayed in a horrible angle, head snapped to the side, bloodshot eyes bulging in their otherwise sunken sockets. His skin is a sickly yellow and his mouth hangs open as he gasps. The man's body suddenly convulses, thrashing towards the ceiling and he lets out another strangled scream. Blood bubbles from his lips. His head cracks to the side once more and his eyes meet mine.

"Kill. Me."

Hatchman glances at me wildly, eyes widening. "Elizabeth, what the hell? Get out!" He sharply shoves me backwards as two figures dressed fully in biohazard suits dart into the room. The door slams shut but it does little to muffle the sound of the scream.

Wide-eyed, I sink back against the wall, chest rising and falling rapidly.

"Elizabeth?" Edward's confused voice echoes down the hall. I turn my head to see him hustling towards me. "What are you doing here?"

At that moment, Doctor Hatchman re-emerges from the room. He glances between Edward and I and his lip twitches. His hands are stained crimson.

"I will take you to your holding room, Elizabeth," Hatchman sighs.

"Um, no, you won't," Edward cuts in. His face is pinched in disgust. "You are covered in blood, Cedric. I will take her myself."

Hatchman looks taken aback but rightfully keeps his mouth shut. I cannot help the smirk that works its way onto my lips as I follow Edward back to the holding room. When I glance over my shoulder, Hatchman watches us as we go, dumbfounded.

"I assume you saw Candidate 145 just experience the final stage of the virus," Edward says casually.

"Experience the final stage of the virus? Are you kidding?" I snap, my hands clench in a feeble attempt to stop the rage from erupting from me. I must quicken my pace to keep up with him. "That man just died, Edward. A horrible death and you instigated it, you allowed it to happen!"

"His death was a necessary sacrifice, Elizabeth," Edward bites back, his voice low and on the brink of anger. All at once, he comes to a stop and turns to me. "It is one step closer to finding a cure, to having a chance at bringing humanity back to how it once was."

"And killing innocent people is the way to do it?"

"We are not killing innocent people. We are simply conducting fair tests to figure out what makes people like you so different from the rest of us!" By the end, Edward is fairly shouting, the sound echoing off the walls.

"And people are dying, Edward!" I yell right back. "People are dying. I know you desperately want to bring humanity back but this is not the way to do it."

His jaw clenches, hands balling into fists by his side. "It is the only way," he hisses through gritted teeth. "This is our only solution."

Then without another word, Edward turns on his heel and marches several feet down the hallway. He stops at one door, pushes a key into the lock and swings the door open. "Here we are," he says, gesturing inside.

Glaring indignantly, I stomp past him, across the threshold. "If this is the only solution, Edward, I hope you are proud of what you have achieved so far." I gesture in the direction of the room where the man just died. "It is certainly something to behold."

Edward's Adam's apple bobbles as he swallows forcefully. "I will collect you again in the morning, Elizabeth. We will monitor the way your body reacts to the virus through the tracker."

When the door shuts, I stare after Edward for only a few moments and shake my head. This room is like the room I have in C Hall, only much smaller. There is also no window. I lay on the bed and stare at the cracks in the ceiling.

I soon forget where I am, why I'm here.

But when I close my eyes all I can see is that man dying and it quickly snaps me back.

Had I not already been exposed to the virus all those months ago, when I jumped in the River back in the Floodgates, I would be anxiously awaiting how my body would react right now. But instead, I spend the next 48 hours in boredom, lost in thoughts far away. I try to sleep. But I am only met with the red stain of the man's blood haunting my nightmares.

If that is the extent that the Red Movement will allow a human being to go to further their studies, then it needs to be stopped. I must escape the Red Movement again. I must get back to the Floodgates, to Ruben, to rally together a group to bring them down. Edward is wrong. There cannot be only one solution. We must look further.

And so, during the 48 hours that I spend in that holding room, laying on the bed, or pacing back and forth, I begin to devise a plan in my head. One that, if successful, will mean that I can reach home again and we can begin the fight against the Red Movement. And I will be able to see Ruben again. 


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Thank you so much for reading! 

~ Emma 

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