Prisoner 0004C

After the Prisoners Awake

I gasp and open my eyes.

I sit up slowly, my injured wrist jolting with pain. For a short, harsh moment I forget where I am and glance around wildly, my silvery-blue eyes searching for Lucy. But then I hear the groggy stirrings of the other prisoners and the pit of worry in my stomach slumps down, defeated.

"What happened?" Hallie asks, rubbing her head, her fluffy Afro getting in the way.

"I don't know," I murmur. Finn is standing to the side. When I speak he turns and offers his hand to me. I accept it gratefully and allow him to haul me to my feet. Getting someone else's help doesn't hurt. Sometimes.

Many of the prisons are still unconscious, the others waking and rubbing their temples or eyes. The Punished girl lies in the throng of the prisoners, her body in danger of being trampled by the sluggish kids.

"Fuck!" Screams a voice out to the side, and I am unsurprised to see Ida storming around, tossing her magnificent platinum mane. "Fuck!"

Will, the bespectacled hacker, props himself up on his elbow on a space on the floor near Hallie's foot. He readjusts his glasses and turns to Ida. "What's w-wrong?" He stutters nervously, asking the question already forming on my lips.

Ida rounds on him. "Don't you know what this means, idiot?" She shouts, spittle flying from her lips. "It means the fucking Organisation knows what happened, and is now trying turn on those microchips to Punish us!"

Will looks absolutely petrified but to his credit manages to whisper his disagreement. "Maybe she just had a faulty micr-" he begins before Ida interrupts, her voice pitchy and broken.

"No! No! We're all gonna die!" She wails before slamming her fist against a wall and storming off down a corridor.

Jayden approaches Finn and me, rubbing at his long, snout-like nose. "That girls crazy, if you ask me." He muttered darkly"

Finn and I nod in synchronized agreement. A small boy with red cheeks waddles up to us, looking from Finn to Jayden and to me nervously.

"Um, excuse me." The small boy muttered, looking down at his boot-clad feet.

Jayden rolled his eyes, but Finn said in his quiet voice, "Yeah? What's up, mate?"

Reassured by Finn's warm reception the boy lifted his eyes to look at him. "S-she broke the Rules..." he said slowly and nervously so that I could barely hear the words.

Finn's brows furrowed in confusion.

"Who did?" but sudden understanding ripped through my head.

"She did..." I said, gesturing towards the Punished girls bent and twisted body.

Finn's eyes widened in sudden understanding and he looked towards the corridor Ida disappeared down, "Shit..." he muttered.

"What'd she do?" Jayden asked the red-faced boy desperately his voice hastened and breaking.

The boy stared frighteningly at Jayden but he responded rather efficiently. "She was hugging-"

"Don't say her name!" I shouted, interrupting him. The others turned at stared at my outburst. "Name calling. It's against the Rules, remember. We don't know what's happening yet so, just, don't break the Rules." I call out to the other prisoners who are watching curiously.

"Good thinking," Finn muttered to me, running a hand through his hair.

"Well she was hugging um, her," the red-faced boy finished, pointing towards a terrified looking girl with bad acne and a serious overbite.