The Project

Chapter Twenty-Seven: Fire

Mark and I have been sitting in this room for hours now. It's almost dinnertime and I'm fucking starving. My stomach growls loudly and Mark glares at me. "It's not my fault. Unless you're willing to use your newfound strength to rip off that door and go get me a fucking cookie, then you can stop staring at me like I just stepped on your damn cat."

He rolls his eyes at me and crosses his arms, huffing. "I can't." He starts to pace the floor with his hands tightly folded behind his back. "Don't you think I've tried already?" He stops dead in his tracks and looks at his hands. "I'm not strong enough." 

His voice shakes and he clenches his fists in front of his face, bringing them down onto the wall. "Woah. What did the wall ever do to you?"

He lowers his head, his fists still positioned onto the wall. "How long have we even been here?" I look up from my lap and point at him while scowling. "I don't know how long YOU'VE been here." I point back to myself. "But I've been here for thirteen years."

He looks back up at me as if noticing me for the first time. "You. You're human. You have to eat sometime." I narrow my eyes at him. "You're human too Mark." He rolls his eyes and cracks his neck. "Right." 

"I'll stand behind the door.." He trails off and steps behind it. "Then when the door opens, I'll pounce on whoever-" I cut him off by raising my hand and he growls. "You're forgetting one tiny thing. How the fuck they got you in here in the first place." 

His shoulders slump for the first time in a while and he sighs. "Fuck!" This.. whoever this is, acts kind of like Mark with his stupid ideas. "Hey wait, remember when you said we had lighters?" He nodded, narrowing his eyes and fixing his shirt. "Your point?"

"Well.. the trays slip through that slot, right?" He nodded again. "If the guard is posted outside that door.." I trail off and he raises an eyebrow. "So you're saying we should burn him? How the hell-" I cut him off again. "I'll reach my hand out there and burn his pantleg, Baby Arms."

He growls at my new nickname for him and purses his lips to form a straight line. "Ready?" I don't give him enough time to respond before I get on my stomach, surveying the hall for a foot. I crane my neck to see and there he is, right beside our door.

I reach into my pocket and grab the lighter, just enough fluid. My hand snakes its way out and under the door and I start the flame. After a few seconds, I retract my hand and get up, brushing myself off. He gives me a look as I hold up my hand. 

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Our door swings open with a pissed off looking guard, his pantleg smoking and charred black from the flame. "What the fuck-" Before he could finish his sentence, Mark's fist collides with his face, knocking him unconscious. He nods to me and we both dart outside.

While I'm trying to find our friends rooms Mark's trying to find a way out of this hellhole. "Mark, what the fuck are you doing?" The monotone voice cuts out and static fills the air. My heartbeat quickens and I start to panic. The fucking box is dead.

"I'm trying to get us out of here, can't you see that?!" I frantically point to several doors and he clenches his fists at his sides, growling. "Screw them, they'll just slow us down!" My eyes widen and I stalk toward him, about to tell him off when I realize that the box is dead.

He smirks and pats my shoulder. "Truly a mute." I glare daggers at him and his eyes land on something behind me. He puts his finger to his lips and shushes me, beckoning be over to the shadows. He tugs me away from the hall and flattens me, his arm crushing me to the wall.

Three guards approach us, examining each wall like a hawk. Their eyes scan over us, completely missing our obvious forms. I narrow my eyes at Mark and he shrugs with a goofy smile. Some of the tension leaves my body, seeing Mark with his smile. The trio disappear down the hallway and I release a breath I didn't know I was holding.

I guess for the time being I could use some of the sign language my teachers in third and fourth grade taught us. I'm rusty though, so he might not understand. Either that or I'm completely missing the fact that he might not know sign language. 

"What the hell was that?"

Mark looks at me in confusion at first, but then he groans. "Great, another thing you can use to annoy me." I roll my eyes at him and he sighs. "I don't know why they didn't see us, Doc." I glare at him and try to think of the right hand signals. "Bullshit." 

He scowls at me and was about to respond when more footsteps catch our attention. "We don't have time for this, Doc. Let's go!" He grabs my arm and leads me down a series of hallways until we stop at a familiar one. He opens it to reveal a bathroom, but different then the one I was in before.

This one had two sinks, two stalls and two mirrors, one of the mirrors had a long crack down the center and the other one was hanging off the wall like it had been forcefully ripped away. The walls were coated with dirt and other unknown things that give diseases.

 Mark pointed toward a sink cabinet. "I think you're small enough to fit in there." I make a mental note to beat the ever loving dog shit out of him later and got to my knees, opening the door to the inside of the cabinet. 

My legs are definitely going to cramp up again, damnit.