The Tested - Our little horror story has only just begun

1 - The Taking

I could feel myself rocking gently, the motion comforting, yet something was a little off. It was cold and hard beneath me. My body felt wrong somehow. A wash of nausea and a pounding in my skull feels like a weight holding me down. It's almost as if I took a sledgehammer to the skull.
The constant flash of burnt orange doesn't help clear the fog either. It just feels like needles piercing deep into my retinas every time I try to open my eyes.

Suddenly, a jolt threw me across the floor, and a sharp screech came bursting through my ears-Now I remember.... "Hey, hi, Don't be afraid. Sorry, I hate to intrude, but I just need some help. Could I trouble you two for just a second?" The man seemed perfectly natural in his approach. He had this kind smile, though something about him made my skin crawl. He wore a white lab coat with a shiny, golden badge that read; "Dr P. Neila. Head of CTI." The badge was unfamiliar, definitely not anything I'd seen or heard of before. He had a short stubble beard and a full head of brown hair, gelled into a few sweepy spikes, his eyes a pale blue, almost grey. He seemed so genuine that I never questioned what was behind me.

I figured it out too late. This man was just a distraction. A mere decoy. My arms couldn't move, they were locked in place with a vice-like grip. While I was trying to break free, I didn't notice that Sam was also being held down, looking at me with fear. Doctor Neila crouches down beside her. "Myself and my co-workers have been working on this antiserum." From his pocket, he retrieved a small vial of green liquid containing glowing blue flecks. Swiftly taking a large needle and jabbing it into her arm, he pressed down the plunger. Within a second, Sam's eyes faded and her movements ceased.

"This will be revolutionary," Neila said, As I thrashed in protest, they forced me to the ground and held me still, helpless. All I could do was watch as he refilled the syringe and made his way towards me.

"Shhh." He says, "It's a good thing... you'll see." I wanted to disagree, but he already closed the distance between us and pressed the needle deep into my arm. I never even had time to scream....A wash of amber floods the small, cramp space, revealing two silhouettes, "Awake already, huh?" he chuckles deeply, "looks like we gotta tuff one 'ere."

As one leans into the van, he comes into focus, my instinctual reflex being to throw my leg out. A swift kick plants him square in the face. "Sam, wake up!" I shout, crawling towards her haphazardly, my hands being bound by a thin piece of plastic. I wrench at it with my wrists, desperately trying to force my hands apart, but it was of little use. Bloody zip ties.

"Oi, none of that! Now you come 'ere," he reaches in fast, and through gritted teeth, he grabs at my ankles, pulling me out of the van so fast I hit the floor hard, smashing my shoulder on the concrete. Neila interrupts the red-face goon hovering over me;

"What on earth is going on here!?"

"She kicked me! The ungrateful-"Neila cuts him off, scolding him for being inappropriate. "Get that zip tie off her immediately. I want them to be presentable when they get inside. Can't have them looking like that."

The other man, who's been silent the whole time, retrieves Sam out of the van and lifts her over his shoulder effortlessly, before turning to Neila, "What do you want me to do with this one, she ain't awake."

"Take them to the main hall, but put that one in my office for now. There's a sofa in there. I need to get some documents and deal with a presentation first. They can fall into group one when she wakes up." Neila says, picking up his pace as he walks away.

"Here, you take this one to his office. I'll walk the other one in. Don't need you messing up this payday." The man scoops me from the ground, forcing me to stand as if I were a doll. "Now, I'm going to cut those ties and we're going to walk through those doors because it's going to happen either way. So are you going to walk yourself, or am I gonna have to carry you?" Silently lifting my hands up, I make my decision. He slices through the plastic with a small blade before tucking it back into his boot.

"Good choice."

Placing one foot in front of the other was a strange feeling. It's as if a thousand bugs were crawling beneath the skin as the feeling slowly comes back to me. I don't know if I'm in shock or if it's the drug still in my system, but I can barely make out the shapes of the environment as they fade and merge together. I blink a few times. Perhaps it's both.

"This is where I leave you." Almost forgetting my kidnapper was even there, he hands me over to a guard who then uses my shirt to pull me through a heavy metal door, shoving me into a room overflowing with people, bustling together in a herd that moves in one unanimous blob.

Coming to my senses, slowly I mutter out, "Sam? Where's-" I begin to ask the guard, only for him to shove me again. I fall through the crowd and trip on my own misplaced feet, still numb from the journey, and my face smashes against the ground.

'Why can't I catch a break?' I think to myself, deciding to lie there for a moment, with my eyes shut tight and taking a few deep breaths to calm my racing mind. 'Just calm down. Think about this. Taking a deep breath,' I pull myself up and try to think clearly.

It all happened so fast. One moment we were outside and now, stone walls surround us, bodies packed together like sardines leaving no space to breathe. Shaking, I crane my neck. None of the faces are familiar to me, my eyes bouncing off from one person to the next, making my heart beat faster. Pushing through the crowd, the heat floods over my body. I wipe my sweaty palms on my jeans. The sound of muttering and mumbling merges into one monotonous tone that fills my ears. The vibrations bounce around my head. I can't see Sam. She was beside me just a moment ago and the guard that I was dumped on is nowhere in sight.

What kind of kidnapping is this?

The pushing and shoving rock me from side to side, forcing the vomit to rise, burning as it sits in the back of my throat. My hand instinctively rises to cover my mouth. The throbbing in my arm catches my attention, a bruise forming beneath the surface of where the needle went in.What the hell? So much for a pinprick.

I feel sluggish as I wade through the crowd, my vision blurring with each explosion of a megaphone, redirecting my attention to a young-looking man in a lab coat, standing on top of a dining table, tapping on it over and over, calling everyone to him.

"Everyone, please, look this way." I couldn't help but notice the mop of hair on his head as it flops around when he speaks. "The chambers are expecting the members of section 4A for a presentation." The crowd starts moving again, ushering me towards another room as mindless droves of teenagers, not much older than myself, follow the orders given by this scientist guy, packing ourselves into a cramp space with little to no breathing room.

'What is wrong with these people?' I think to myself, 'How are they so calm?'

All the other kids stare past me, fixated, "Hey, do you know what's going on?" I ask, pulling on the shirt of a kid beside me, "Were you taken too?"

"Shhhh." He spat impatiently, waving me off. I turn to see what was there, but them being taller than me, I couldn't see a thing. Lightly pushing past elbows, confusion and curiosity leads me to the front.

The glass window that lines the wall showcases a large white room, where a child no older than ten lay strapped to a table, tears barely visible as they slide down his face. I look at the kids beside me with an unspoken question, their faces morphing into confusion that matches my own. Turning back to the boy, he struggles to claw away at the straps. Instinctively, I try to reach out, but a sudden flash of pure white light burns at my pupils. I cover them with my arm. It only lasts a moment. My eyes blink back into focus as I catch sight of the boy's horrifying state before me.

His face burns a deep, crusted red, bubbling out of each pore as his skin crisps over, the layers tearing off his face. Muscle and tendons beneath become a mass of sludge, glistening with the light, sagging down his cheeks, clumping together at the edges of his face and falling under its own weight, slopping to the ground in a congealed pool of blood. The features of his face were hardly recognisable, his clothes soaked through, hands twitching for a few seconds before remaining still.

Before I could fully accept what happened, the boy shot up, gasping at the air as his face strung back together like time had just rewound itself before my very eyes. Strings of flesh crawl along the muscle, stitching itself until his face becomes whole again.

A large hand grips my shoulder, sending a shiver down my spine. "See, everything will be fine." His voice booms out from beside me. "Now, please make your way to your rooms. The gentleman over there will help you draw out your contracts. We really need your help here, but you do not have to agree. If you do, however, there will be no backing out." The other kids smile at him as they left, muttering between themselves like this was exciting and... normal.

"Now, for you, you're not supposed to be here." Neila grips my shoulder more firmly as he stares into my eyes. Unable to form any words, I gulp, standing there, shaking as the man begins to frog march me away from the crowd and down an empty hall.

My mind was racing. I found no will to argue, still stuck in a state of panic as he swiftly walks me into a small room containing a single cot to the left and a sink to the right. "Take a seat." He finally spoke. I make no protest. Being stuck in a daze, gliding like a ghost and taking a seat on the wafer-thin foam of the bed. My hands feel like they're humming, the vibrations beneath the skin refusing to stop, my thoughts unforming as I just sit there like an obedient dog.

"I don't know whether you remember or not, but let's start again." He says, finding a stool from the corner of the room and sitting down. "My name is Patrick Neila. And you were in the wrong place, Alexandria."I raise a brow at him, finally finding my voice; It comes out hoarse and grainy, "Yeah, I'm supposed to be at home. Curfew's coming up. Sorry, but we can't extend our playdate." Neila's face remains still, unaffected by mere child's play. I'll wear him down, eventually.

"So you're one of those." He says. "What were you doing in that room? You were supposed to follow the guards." His voice is cool and controlled. I find myself irritated at the absurdity. Why am I to blame? My thoughts suddenly becoming accessible again.

"Then you might want to tell them that," I spat. "I did not choose to come here at any point. Why would you think that I would purposefully watch that vile display?" My words grew louder the more I spoke, and the more I spoke, the more I felt in control of myself.

He cuts me off. "That was science and engineering at its finest. Do you know how long it took to figure out the logistics of that machine, to build it in a basement and procure all the radioactive material? It is no small feet."

I give him a deadpan look. "Where's the part where I asked?"

Neila takes a long, deep breath. "I am on the brink of the greatest solution-"

"A time machine?" I interject, finding delight in his defensiveness. It gives me a real confidence boost. The words felt like a warm blanket wrapped around me.

"What? No! How is that a solution? It's merely paradoxical, uncontrollable and damn near impossible." He looks at me for an explanation. I smile sweetly and give the perfect retort."If you built a time machine, your parents can go back and fix their mistake." I gesture with a slight raise of my shoulders, keeping my smile sweet as I tilt my head gently.

Neila's face drops. "Their 'mistake'? I am a ground-breaking scientist who owns six Nobel prizes, among other awards. I am the definition of a poster child! You insolent brat."

"Sorry," I mumble, furrowing my brows and pouting just a little.

"That's alright, I understand you must be frustrated." He relaxes his own shoulders and exhales for a few moments longer than normal. And so I continued;

"That your parents didn't love you as a kid, you must not have gotten all the attention that you wanted, that you needed to seek validation in praise and awards."

"Right, that's it." Neila shoots out of his chair, the legs screeching on the concrete floor. "You are going to sit here and think about what you've done!" He then turns on his heels and leaves the room. The door's lock rang out loudly, declaring my inability to leave. The proverbial bars on the wall had just closed.

That's how this whole thing started.

'It's been three years since we were taken and that boy's face continues to haunt me. Unfortunately, he's not the only one. It's hard to sleep. But tonight will be the last night that I suffer that same image in the same way. And tomorrow, hopefully, we'll be free of this place. I can't wait to see Neila's face behind bars-'

"Alex," Sam interjects softly,

"Yeah, yeah," I say, "I know. I'll sleep now, it's just been a while since I've had the energy to write." Tucking my diary away in the small nook in between the cinder blocks, I settle into my tattered old sheets.

"No, it's just. I'm not as smart as you think I am."

"What are you on about?" I ask. "Is this about what Neila said earlier? Because you were right, it was written clearly on his face. I bet you anything you got every component of that serum correct. He just doesn't want you taking credit."

"No, it's not that. It's this plan." She whispers. I could feel the creases forming on my forehead as my face contorts. "There are so many variables that haven't been worked out" she continues, "I don't know exactly how this will pan out. I mean, what about the upstairs? We only know the basement."

"We'll figure it out when we get there. That's what we do. Find a solution."
"I suppose." She says in a low tone, I could just hear it in the dark, that uncertainty and it annoys me a little.

"We could stay if you want, but it's not going to get easier. You remember what happened to Sofie when she took that test?" I say, squeezing my eyes shut at the memory, and immediately regretting every word I spoke, feeling a flutter in my chest. "It's the test that I'm up for next.""No. No, you're right. I'm just scared, so unbelievably scared. I'm not like you. I can't just crash into the unknown." Her words were a flittered rush. I can sense the air of panic and I knew she was feeling guilty for this now and I want to take away that unfair blame that I had intentionally placed upon her. How can I fix this?

"I don't crash. I glide flawlessly." I retort, as if the words had gracefully floated off in the distance somewhere and I snort at my own quip. "Besides, there's no way of knowing if Neila's telling the truth. We could survive that test and he'll come up with more. He won't let us go. We're lab rats down here."

"You're right... I'm sorry." Her voice breaks at the end, but it's stronger now, more affirmative."I'm scared too." I confess, "But we have each other... and Ruben. You'll see, years from now, we'll laugh about this moment, how we sneaked past Neila right under his nose."

"'I am a groundbreaking scientist! you can't arrest me!'" she imitates. We both burst into fits of giggles and the vibe between us was just like it was before we came here. "I'd be quite the hit to his ego. He'll be so mad, I bet he'd stick his pompose nose so sharply up in the air, he'll strain his own neck," she added energetically. We both burst out laughing, and continued for several hours, with back and forth insults. I could tell she had no room for doubts now.


"Good. He can stay mad." I laugh, "Night Sam."

"Good night, Alex."