Pretty Painful by K.A Knight
Dabria
The first time I woke up, I found myself in a windowless room. I was stripped of what little clothing remained and there was a needle mark on the inside of my elbow with a bruise growing around it, meaning it wasn’t fresh. How long had I been out?
Rachel.
It all came rushing back and a sob racked my body as I curled up on the cold floor, screaming into my arm and biting it to stifle my cries. I wept my heart out, leaving it in little pieces on the floor. I wanted the numbness again. Anything was better than this…this…grief. This heartache. I stayed in that position until my tears dried up and my limbs started to ache, and then I slept again.
Days, weeks, hours, I don’t know how much time passed as I curled up in the corner, reliving the terror of losing my sister, and trying to build myself back together again. It was a blur, an eternity dragging on and on until a bang had me jumping, bringing me out of my thoughts and memories, and back to the present.
I climb to my feet, my legs unsteady and weak from lack of food and water, and the position I’d been locked in during my grief. My whole body protests the movements and I lean back against the brick wall. Shouldn’t I be cold?
The door opens and I blink, how did I not realise there was a door there? It’s steel with a slat halfway down, and it slowly creaks open to reveal a man in a white lab coat. He doesn’t speak as he heads my way. I watch him from the wall, my eyes peeking through the fall of my long, blonde, tangled hair. I listlessly notice blood drying in it.
He grabs my arm, producing a needle from his pocket, and stabs me, all without saying anything. I don’t even flinch. Let him do what he wants, I’m already dead. I know that, I’m not getting out of here alive.
“Who are you?” I ask, my voice croaky.
He turns and leaves without a word, the door banging shut, sending me into another flood of tears as I slide down the wall to the floor. I fall asleep again after that and when I wake up, I start to pace to stretch out my muscles. I explore every corner of the room, noting the scratch marks and broken fingernails embedded into the concrete. I find myself tracing a claw mark down the wall before carrying on with my inspection.
Nothing, nothing to help me. Disappointed, I sit next to the door, leaning my head on the cool metal while praying for it to open, but also praying for it to never open again. Will they leave me to starve? But now that I think about it, I don’t feel hungry. There’s a cottony taste in my mouth, but it’s not unpleasant.
Time passes slowly as I stretch out against the door and close my eyes, but Rachel comes to mind straight away. I lose myself in our pasts until whispers outside the door interrupt my daydreams.
“Well, tough shit, they can’t have her yet. I haven’t even run my tests. She has only been down here for a month,” a man hisses.
“Do we need to remind you who pays for this little operation? No? Good. They want a woman, and she’s the only one you have at the moment. Bring her or I will be forced to remind you who pulls your strings,” a harsh voice threatens, as footsteps head my way, making me scramble back to the wall, crouching slightly. The door opens, revealing the man in the lab coat and another man.
He’s dressed simply, black jeans and a black top. A skull is tattooed on the side of his neck and his eyes are dark and mean. He checks me over, almost clinically. “She will do. Drug her, I don’t want her awake until we get there,” he orders, turning away without another word and leaving the door frame.
I push farther back, his words making me cower as the doctor sighs and pulls another syringe from his pocket. He heads my way, muttering to himself as he goes. “Fucking pricks, I had high hopes, but nooo, just do as I’m told.”
I blink, barely breathing as he grabs my arm, but I slip away, trying to race past him to the door. I think I’m about to make it, my foot slipping past the door frame before I slam into a solid chest. Looking up into those mean eyes, I shiver in fear as he smiles, revealing he has no teeth. “Hello, pretty one. Goodbye, pretty one,” he jokes, just as I feel a needle imbed into my neck, making me thrash against them both as they laugh.
Everything tilts and my eyes shut without my consent, dropping me back into the void of darkness.
