Escape Route (Decode Sequel)

Chapter Twenty Two - If You Love Me Let Me Go.

They had locked me away from civilisation for three weeks. They filled my mind with uncontrollable, evil, unwanted thoughts. I don’t know what they wanted to achieve with everything. The drops they put into my eyes became reoccurring. They had found one with the desired effect and took it to the next step. I didn’t know what they were doing, the needle was pressed into a vein in my arm strapped to the chair not allowing me to fight them off. It was another sedative. 

When I came around my eyes burned badly. I couldn’t cry and just opening my eyes was painful. But they looked ecstatic with their work. I didn’t know what they had done until they shoved a mirror in front of my face - that was when I realised I couldn’t cry. The tears wouldn’t flow and my eyes wouldn’t change back to normal. What this was supposed to achieve was still unbeknown to me. 

After they finished using my eyes as an experiment they moved onto changing my mind. They fitted a device in my ears for control. They used impulses through a network of wires to change my thought process. It was unbearably painful. My body jerked with each shock sent through me. I didn’t know what was happening until they took the straight jacket off me and pushed me back into my cell. 

I was hoping it was ending but it was only just beginning. The impulses changed the way I thought. Their voices sounded through speakers in the room loudly. They told me to become angry, punch something, myself, the wall, anything. Before I wasn’t a violent person but I found myself slamming my fists against the wall without even realising. The room may have been padded but once their taunting and demanding stopped, my hands ached and screamed in agony. I hadn’t realised what I was doing and that scared me most. Their control made me lose sense of who I was and what I was doing.

Once they let me go I tried to control myself but their voices overpowered my own. They way I thought was no longer normal. I was scared of hurting someone so I stayed inside. I knew they were watching me, they knew where I was and they still tried to control me. I had a scarf wrapped around a bed post ready for when the voices came. I tied my hands up so I couldn’t hurt anyone. I tried to scream over them but it never fully worked. 

Jason and Emma never even questioned my return, they shoved the rent letter in my face five minutes after walking through the door. The spare key was still under the welcome mat. I had no way of even getting rent money but that was the least of my problems. 

The walk through the city that night led me to the East rather then the South. They screamed in my ear to hurt him, torture him until he begged for mercy. I knew once they had my mind under control through the moment of madness there was no way to stop it. I couldn’t cry but every step I took in the opposite direction caused my heartrate to slow but I couldn’t feel anything. I didn’t feel guilty and I wasn’t even sure if I could feel love anymore because I found myself at my old flat rather than in Harry’s arm. I couldn’t hurt him, he could protect himself but I could never forgive myself. 

I didn’t know who they were, what they wanted or why I was their toy to stick needles in but I knew it wasn’t the end of anything anytime soon. Harry would probably hate me for not going back to him, but I was doing this for our sake, his sake. Whether he would understand that would be a different matter. I was fully aware I couldn’t stay inside forever I just hadn’t figured out where to run to. I knew it couldn’t be anywhere in the city, it had to be far away. I was terrified they were going to instruct me to kill. Their actions had to have an incentive.

I fell asleep on my bed rather than under the covers. My arms were still wrapped around my head as I slept for a few hours. I expected to be woken by my housemates or more likely their voices. But I was woken by neither. I jolted awake when I felt a hot breath cascade across my face. I bit the hand that pressed against my mouth, recognising the voice by the sudden ‘ouch’ emitting from his mouth - Harry. I started to panic, he couldn’t be here. The voices could filter through my ears at any given second.