Dark Room (completed)

2

Reese raised an eyebrow in curiosity. The answer was blatantly obvious, as children they were told the three safe emotions. And always since then, they remembered.

"Pain, fear, and shame," she rattled off, staring observantly at the odd man.

He smiled, still gazing straight ahead with perfect poise. "Yes, that is correct. Pain, fear, shame. The only emotions people unlike you and I can feel."

She scrunched her eyebrows together in confusion. "You and I, sir?"

He laughed and Reese felt some measure of surprise. She thought being brought to Leadership would mean being purged of emotion, but this man was clearly akin to her.

"Yes, Ms. Reese, you and I. We are special. We are different," said he. "We can feel beyond the three safe emotions."

She blinked and looked back to the hallway, it seemed to go on forever.

"Why?" She asked

"Why, what?"

Reese thought for a moment. She wanted to know why she could feel beyond the three safe emotions, but was cautious and decided against too specific of an answer.

"Why are you telling me this, Sir?"

He hesitated a moment and cleared his throat. "Ms. Reese, do you know why there are three safe emotions?"

She made a pondering sound and turned to him. "I suppose I've never thought about it," she said.

The man nodded and went on. "Well, the truth is, the safe emotions were not chosen. They were just impossible to suppress," Reese breathed out a sound of surprise. "Yes, I know," he sighed. "You see, these three emotions were the emotions they were trying to eradicate. But, when it failed, the Founders turned to a different solution. They reasoned that if they removed all other forms of emotion, fear, pain, and shame would be impossible. They said that if you have no other emotional attachment, you cannot relate those three to them. . . At least, that was the theory."

He sighed again and reached up to tug at his ear. Reese watched as the man pulled a pen from his pocket and quickly wrote something on his palm. It was gone before she could decipher what.

"The process is irreversible," he continued walking. "The safe emotions have already been established over generations and now our children are naturally born with only three," she nodded in understanding. "But what the founders truly didn't anticipate was the mind clinging to its three forms of feeling," he stopped and turned to Reese. "Over time the three emotions have become fully integrated into them. Now they are constantly feeling. But they are constantly feeling only negative emotion. Do you understand?"

Reese was stunned, but she nodded compliantly anyway. The man smiled and patted her on the shoulder.

"But you, Reese, you are special."

She smiled hesitantly back. "And you, you are special too?"

"Not quite as much as you, my dear," the man admitted, turning to a door on their left. He pressed his thumb to the recognition board and there was a soft click indicating the door's opening. "Now, it is time we begin with learning how special you truly are."

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He ushered her inside. It was dark, very dark. So much so that she couldn't see exactly where the walls ended. Her hands instinctively went out in front of her. Reese listened as the door behind her clicked shut. Now the darkness was so resolute, it almost felt as if she was floating. Her hair raised slightly. Had they taken her here to silence her? Was this to be her prison?

She turned, looking for the man.

"Sir?" She called out to him.

There was the striking of a match and his ghostly face appeared among the tiny flame. Reese began to calm.

"Sir, where are we?"

He didn't respond. The man walked past her holding the deteriorating match in hand. She watched him go and after a moment began to trail after him. They walked for some time in silence, but the match quickly began to grow short. They stopped and at the moment before it burned out completed against his fingers, he threw the match to the floor. It blew out and there was dark again for a moment before the light flared up in a brilliant burst. Before them was a fire.

The man turned to her. "Come forward, Reese," he whispered.

She did so cautiously.

"Sit."

A log appeared.

Reese sat and stared through the fire at her guide.

"Are you afraid?" He asked.

Reese paused and slowly shook her head. "No, just curious, sir."

The man nodded and turned to the flames. "It is normal to have a singular emotion that you cannot feel, even if you are someone like us."

They waited and stared into the fire. But the wood didn't seem as though it was burning, it was more as if the flames hovered over it. An illusion, surely. Reese thought. She waited and stared until the tension was no longer easy to bear.

"Sir, what are we doing here? What is this place?" She asked.

The man, very slowly, turned his gaze to her and smiled. "We, Reese?" He answered. "I believe the true question is: where are you?"

And suddenly, she was alone.

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Reese blinked and rubbed her eyes. She stared into the darkness and stood up to search around her.

"Hello?" She shouted. "Sir?"

She walked some ways away from the fire and into the dark. But an odd feeling on the back of her neck made her turn back and stand by the fire in wait.

"Sir?" She asked again.

After a moment there was noise around her. Not loud noise. Quiet. It was random and spaced apart. She turned towards it, searching. But the darkness was brutally deep and the only light that could be seen was that of her fire. After a long time of searching, Reese sat and stared at it, wondering why the man had brought her to sit in the dark, alone. Her feet rubbed against the floor, cement, and her hands curled up in her lap.

"Sir?" She whispered now.

To every noise she asked the same.

In the deep dark she could hear her own voice echo. If she spoke too loud it would whisper back in her ear. Reese could hear it now, bouncing back to haunt her. It was the noises she thought she heard. "Sir? Sir? Sir?" It taunted.

She breathed deeply and felt a very slight tickling in her stomach.

"I dislike the dark," Reese whispered, and in the distance she could hear herself reply.

"I do too."

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A/N: So I'm being hit with a wave of inspiration. Vote and comment if you liked it!
-Raven