Hi everyone, this is my first fanfiction so please be kind! :) I've had this huge story in my head for a very long time already and I'm sort of impulsively posting this online. The first chapter is sort of an experiment to see if people will like it. I really hope you will like it! Update: sorry I deleted and reuploaded this chapter, I needed to change something only to realize you can do that without having to delete your story lol.

Chapter 1: Welcome to...

I remember the day I woke up. It remains, to this day, the most confusing thing I have ever experienced. I remember seeing the insides of my eyelids. They were red, indicating that wherever I was, it was light. Although, at that point, I couldn't process such information.

It did feel like a certain amount of time had gone by. Like I had been on a journey, up until the moment of waking up, but I couldn't remember it. I couldn't remember anything: who I was, where I was, what had happened or what was about to.

Had I woken up from a dream?

All I could see was red and all I could hear was a bleeping sound, repeating itself in a constant rhythm. That was when my brain started registering the pain. My entire body hurt immensely.

I tried to open my eyes but it was too light to see anything. Out of reflex I attempted to lift my right arm as to shield my face from the light, but I couldn't, it was being held back by something. Slowly, very slowly, I managed to open my eyes, but everything was a haze. I couldn't see clearly and everything was moving, like I had been spinning in circles for hours. Through the dizziness I managed to see the blurry image of my arm, chained down and covered in blood, right before it moved out of focus again.

I didn't feel anything in particular upon seeing this image. I suppose it would make anyone feel frightened, scared. But not me, not then. I merely felt confusion and curiosity. And pain. I was still in a lot of pain.

Everything was sore. It felt as if I had been beaten to pieces with a baseball bat and then left there to die on my own. For all I knew, that's exactly what had happened. I managed to see that my other arm was chained down and splattered with blood as well.

Once the dizziness started to fade I came to realize that my entire body was chained down to what could only be described as an enhanced dental chair. I was wearing a white pair of pajama shorts and a matching top, both stained dark red. My legs were relatively clean, apart from a trail of blood here and there, leaving a warm sensation before it dripped on the clean, white floor.

There were little round pieces of tape pasted on my chest and there was a clear tube protruding from my right hand, leading towards something behind me, but I couldn't see what it was, I couldn't tilt my head that far. That was when I realized that the bleeping sounds matched my heart rate. I supposed I was in a hospital of some sorts, though if that were true, it must've been the most lugubrious hospital I had ever been in.

Wanting to make sense of things, I looked around the room, but there was not a lot to see. The room was entirely white, except for the wall in front of me, which was black. Quickly, I noticed it wasn't a wall, but what appeared to be a screen. This made me wonder… what was behind it?

For a while, I lay there, staring at my own reflection in the pitch-black glass in front of me, unable to recognize myself. Was this me? I couldn't recall ever seeing myself in a mirror. I certainly couldn't remember ever seeing myself like this.

I continued to marvel at the screen and the possible world behind it. Were there people behind it? And if so, were they watching me? And if they were watching me, why were they? Why weren't they helping me, since I was obviously in a lot of pain?

Why was I here?

Ignoring the pain, I tried jamming my arms loose, but the metal straps were too strong and they were tearing at my skin. I fidgeted with my legs and tried pulling my feet through the holes, but no such luck, there, either.

Soon I realized there was no way I was getting out of there. I was stuck. No memories, nowhere to go.

Then, I saw it. It was right there above the top of the screen. It was tiny, very tiny, but I saw it. A tiny little black dot.

Was it a camera? It must've been. I stared at it. Right at it, without blinking, as if doing so would let me see the possible spectators standing at the other side of the screen. I jammed my arms once more, all the while not looking away from the tiny camera. As if to say: let me out. Let. Me. Out.

And then I heard myself say it. It was quiet and hoarse and unrecognizable.

"Let me out."

"Good, you can speak."

The voice was loud, amplified, booming through the room, a female voice answering almost instantly, confirming my suspicions that there were people watching me closely ever since I awoke.

Almost right after I heard the voice, a door I didn't know was there slid open in the right hand corner of the room. Figures entered the room and approached me. I couldn't see who they were as they were wearing some sort of tight-fitting spacesuits. I also couldn't comprehend how many figures there were as my mind was still kind of foggy.

The tapes were being removed from my chest and the tube was being removed from my hand. A cold, wet cloth removed the blood from my legs and arms and I was being carried out of the chair and onto a brancard. The movements and the change of position made my head spin again and my body was still aching everywhere. I wanted to know what was going on, but the dizziness shut me up. I knew that if I tried to speak, I would probably throw up.

The figures wheeled me towards the exit, proceeding through the automatic door while I turned my head and shot one last glance at the white chair in which I had woken up just minutes earlier, which had a deep red puddle in it and a big splatter on the headrest, right before it disappeared around the corner.

All I could do was lay back my head while the spacesuited figures wheeled me through what seemed like endless hallways, barely taking any turns, going straight ahead towards an unknown destination. There was nothing to see but grey walls and the lights above, coming and going, coming and going. They were bright, hurting my eyes whenever they passed. At times I'd open my mouth to speak, but when words failed to come out, I'd close my mouth once more.

These hallways looked fairly different compared to the white room we had just left. It almost looked like a bomb shelter or a dungeon of some sorts, lit with flickering TL lights instead of the sleek, modern lighting I had woken up to. It made me think we were underground, and that not a lot of people ever set foot in this place, wherever it was.

After a while, the lights stopped, as I was wheeled through another automatic door into a long, rectangular room, just as dark and moody as the hallways, though slightly less cold and abandoned-looking, and lit with lights that were a lot easier on the eyes. There were several hospital beds placed in a row against the far back wall, but they were empty. I was rolled towards one of the beds and they carried me onto it, the movement making me nauseous, only this time, I couldn't control it anymore.

I quickly rolled to the side of the bed and hovered over the floor as I started gagging. Then I threw up.

The team of figures was alert, cleaning up my vomit immediately, as if they had expected this to happen. While they did so, I rolled back onto the bed and let out a tired sigh as my eyes closed and I drifted to sleep.

I woke up feeling slightly better. Opening my eyes, I noticed a group of people standing in front of me. Slowly they came into focus, and one figure stood at the front. She was wearing a blue blazer and a skirt and she had blonde, shoulder length hair. She was holding a clipboard under her arm and she looked at me with a proud expression on her face.

"Hello," she said cheerfully, "welcome to Erudite."