Silence awakens me. The dense, claustrophobic pressing of nothingness weaves its way into my brain and chills me. The weight of my eyelids holding themselves up above my eyes tells me that my eyes are open, but it is as if they are not. I blink furiously, but all that remains in front of me is vast empty darkness. I try to think back to last night, to dinner, to school. I rack my brain but come up blank. I shuffle, hunched over, around the space I am in.

Cold concrete penetrates through my socks and chills my feet. Socks. Why am I wearing socks? I have little time to ponder this thought when my outstretched hands hit a wall. I gratefully straighten my spine and continue my shuffle down the wall. Barely a meter away, my fingers hit a piece of plastic that I know to be a light switch. I flip it on and am blinded. My aching eyes squint open, but still don’t adjust to the light. From this, I know that I have been in the dark for quite a while. I shake my head, wincing, and lower my head, taking in my surroundings. An unfamiliar room glares back at me. Grey walls rise up around me and that’s all. I frantically try to remember what happened; how I could have ended up here.

I run the back of my hand along the wall and feel the tightly packed indentations of drywall. The silence grows stronger around me and I dodge my head in an attempt to relieve my ears of the heavy pressure. A shape catches my eye and I turn - silence forgotten. A white container about the size of a shoebox lies on the cold floor. I walk cautiously over to it and notice a clear panel on top. A quick glance around me shows that there is no one else in the room. No way for the box to have appeared where it currently lies. I breathe in nervously, but kneel down next to the box. The inside of the box is lined with grey. Inside, a shape is kneeling over something on the floor. A shadow passes over my head and I look up with lightning speed but am somehow too slow. Before my eyes can reach the ceiling, everything becomes black once more and the silence intensifies. I grope around for the box, but it seems to have disappeared. I have just begun to panic when the lights reappear. The box in gone and my ceiling is, too.

Up above my head, I am greeted with cloudy skies. I sense that I need to get out of the room and do so fast. There is no ladder, staircase, or even vine in sight. I throw myself at the wall in frustration. The wall gives under my weight like slime, before propelling me back with frightening force. It doesn’t take me long to understand how to escape. Before I have fully comprehended my plan, I realise that I am halfway up the wall. All it takes is kicking my feet into the wall like I’m climbing and moving up faster than the wall can react. I have almost reached the top when, caught up in my own accomplishment, I am a second too slow and am slammed into the opposite wall so hard that I feel my brain hit my skull. I growl in frustration and charge back at the wall and scale it with ease. When my body breaks past the ceiling, the clouds briefly flicker and then dissolve into a tile floor. I look up in shock and find myself staring down a seemingly endless hallway. The cream walls are bare and the tile floors look pristine. I immediately know that I am in a hospital or laboratory of sorts, although I don’t know how I know this.

Behind me, I hear footsteps clacking against the floor and whirl around to see a woman wearing a white coat walking towards me. I have no clue where she came from, as the hallway appears to be infinite in that direction as well. Upon nearing me, the lady smiles a commercial smile and says, “Hello, darling.” My mind instantly places her, but as what and who, it will not tell me. I instinctively take a wary step backwards. She stops an arms-length away from me and continues, “My name is-”

“Dr. Coldack,” I say involuntarily. I startle as these words, unsure of how I know this.

“Oh, very good, dear. I am glad that has stuck with you through this all.” Traces of a British accent are obvious in her words.

I step back once again and glare at this familiar woman. “Where am I?” I ask skeptically. I regret revealing my uncertainty at once. She tilts her head and smiles pitifully at me.

“You’re in a mental hospital, dear. Don’t be scared, I’m only here to help you. Come along, we’ll get you right as rain soon enough.” She reaches out to take my hand but I snatch it back before she can reach me.

“Don’t touch me.” I snarl, trying to look tough. “And don’t lie to me. Why am I here? What are you doing to me?” My voice rises to an almost shriek as the time’s events catch up to me.

“Shh, you’re okay, dear. Don’t worry. I’m only trying to help you.” I whimper like an animal. Yes, that’s a good girl.” she says as I reluctantly allow her to take my arm. “Come along now, let’s get you out of here.”  

We walk, her in front and me lagging behind, down the endless hallway until, miraculously, we arrive at a door. An ‘Exit’ sign glows red above it and I excitedly run at the door. My hand reached the metal bar and I push hard against it. The loud sound of the door opening hurts my ears, but I’m so excited that I barely hear it. The door is but 10 centimeters open when it slams back into me, hitting me square in the nose. I cry out in pain and grab my nose, feeling warm blood rush to greet my hands. The woman walks up behind me and rubs my shoulder comfortingly, saying, “Oh dear, you poor thing.” I jerk away and cower. It seems that whenever I am around her, I revert to very basic levels of functionality and I don’t like it - it makes me feel weak. “There, there. No need to get upset. We’re just trying to help, darling.” I try desperately to think of a snarky response, but am saved from having to reply by a man wearing a similar coat striding towards us, arms outstretched.

“How’s my favourite girl?” He asks, smiling broadly. He looks at the woman and then at me before noticing my nose. He tuts and says, “Ah, our girl got a little too eager, didn’t she?” He smiles at me with a mouth full of too many teeth. “No worries, doll. We’ll get you fixed up good as new. Now if you’ll just follow me.” He turns to the door and punches four digits into a small keypad lying to the left of the heavy doors. I hear chains retract from the other side and watch the man pushed the door easily open.

Through the doors lies a gigantic warehouse of sorts. Tall, rusted, red shelved rise high up above the ground far from where we stand. I stand just inside the doors gaping and taking it all in when the man turns to the right and leads me and the woman to a machine of sorts surrounded by a knee-high, metal fence. Figures wearing floor-length white coats and a hazmat mask stand at control panels just outside the fence. The woman, sensing my fear, says, “Oh, don’t worry about this. We just need some figures from you and then you’ll be able to join the rest.” She sounds so genuine and she gestures so pointedly for me to walk up a ramp into the machine that, for some reason, I do. As soon as I am inside the gates, they snap shut and I feel an unsettling feeling inside my stomach. A man grabs my hands behind my back and I scream, turning to look at the lady. She points expectantly at the machine. I can see the man walking out of the doors we came in through as I am forced up the ramp. The ramp leads to a bubble which houses a small hospital bed. The man pushes me into it and straps spring up around me.

I struggle and cry out, but the man ignores me and begins working diligently at a computer. He sits down on a small stool and I see a flash of purple, slimy skin from underneath the man’s lab coat. I freeze. My eyes slowly travel down; afraid of what they will find. Multiple legs protrude from beneath the stark white. They have been sectioned off and forced into sandals. On his neck, the purple transitions into a brilliant blue before morphing into the face of a man. Of a boy.

A ding startles me out of my horror. A similar creature walks in and sets its - her? - bag down on a chair. I shy away into the hardness of the bed when I see her face, if one can even call it that. Where there should be a face, a vast emptiness lies. The man in the coat greets the faceless creature. They communicate pleasantly, in a language of gurgles and harsh sounds. Scrubbed figures suddenly appear on either side of me and place a large tube over my face. I hear a mechanical voice counting down. I have a sudden urge to sleep. Despite my best efforts, my eyes start to close. I become vaguely aware of a screen above me. Against a cloudy background, I see a net containing masses of clothed individuals - children - with smooth, cream surfaces where their faces should be. No, not a screen, I realise. A window. One child writhing in pain catches my eye. She suddenly slumps backwards, still. It’s me, I understand. My eyes close for the last time.