Okay. Finally, pandorad24 updated, so now I can as well.
By the way, pandorad24 wants me to let you know that she has a TERRIBLE SECRET. SHE….. IS AFRAID….. OF PUFFINS!
Okay, not really. But I am. No, seriously. I was traumatized when I busted my big toe on coral and was bleeding everywhere and needed stitches and couldn't really walk, but my mommy was all like "go find your father, I'm looking at the puffins." My dad was back at the summer house. Like, two miles away. Up the beach and a steep hill. I ended up riding home piggyback on the back of the woman who we were staying with. Hence, I detest puffins. I can't even stand the cereal.
Ha, now you have a little fact about me. I'm also a needle-phobe…..
Max POV
My eyes snapped open and I stared at the ceiling. I felt a tightness in my throat, as if I was almost choking. There was a coldness in the pit of my stomach… I felt sick.
Iggy… had cut himself? It wasn't true. It couldn't be true! How many times had I looked at his arms? How many times had he smiled and waved at me? How many times had he worn short-sleeves in the summer? Was I really so ignorant?
I would have had more time to be shocked and horrified by the revelation, but… at dinner I had slipped Angel a sleeping pill so that she wouldn't have another sleepless night. And if she didn't wake up, apparently, the memories didn't stop…
My mind was foggy as I steadily came to consciousness. My head ached as if it had been bashed by Erasers. I felt the normal bruises across my chest and hips throbbing just as painfully as ever… and my eyes hurt.
And it all came rushing back.
Accepting the surgery. No, asking for it. So that maybe, just maybe, Max would finally be proud. I mean, I was going to have super night-vision after this, right?
But the pain. The agony. I could remember it. Like hot knives poking straight through my eyes and into my skull. As if nails or screws were boring into my head. Just horrible, horrible pain…
"Subject 9."
It was Him.
I nodded, showing that I had heard him. I had learned long ago not to speak in his presence unless he specifically ordered it.
"A very unfortunate incident has occurred."
At His voice, a thousand instances suddenly ran through my head. Max or one of the others had died or been grievously injured. There were so many different ways it could have happened, so many horrible ways… gosh, and I had just been in here, while they had been going through so much more…
He had apparently seen my expression and chuckled at my reaction.
"The rest of your 'friends' are safe. No, the incident was to your eyes."
I stared towards Him, wondering what He was getting at.
"You're retinas have been permanently damaged. You are… blind."
I didn't react. I was blind. That was odd.
What did it mean?
He sighed, and then answered my unspoken question.
"You will never again be able to see. Your eyes don't work anymore."
I froze stiff. I should have known. Ever since I went in there and saw the gurney and the shiny silver tables with scalpels and other tools all over them. I should have known, what with all the pain I'd felt. I would have known, if I'd know that becoming blind was possible.
But it was.
I was an idiot. It was my fault. Get an offer to become better, and I take it without a second thought.
But I'm young! I thought that all needed to increase eyesight capability would be pills, or a change in diet, or maybe a couple more injections than usual. No. It had to use sharp objects.
And then it hit me. I was blind.
Everything seemed to zoom into sudden focus, even though I couldn't see anything. The whole world froze. Everything was standing still. I could hear the echo of air by my ears. Everything was spinning around and around and around…
I was blind.
I couldn't see.
Couldn't dodge.
Couldn't fight.
Couldn't walk.
Couldn't look.
Couldn't see.
Oh gosh.
They wouldn't want me anymore.
My eyes suddenly burned, and I reached up with quivering hands to feel them. Wide open. And unseeing.
"We'll take you back to your 'flock' now… I wonder what they'll say when they find out…" He chuckled, and everything clicked back into place. He turned to talk to other scientists. "Take it back to its 'family'…"
"NO!" I screamed, tears suddenly streaming like a river out of my burning eyes. "NO! DON'T TAKE ME BACK! KILL ME! KILL ME! PLEASE, JUST KILL ME!"
My throat burned from the volume at which I had screamed, but I didn't care. I sank to my knees, holding my hands out, palm up in surrender. "DON'T MAKE ME GO BACK!" I shouted again. "DON'T! JUST KILL ME! KILL ME! KILL ME!"
A crushing blow hit the side of my head as His boot connected with my cheek. But I didn't care about the pain. I was used to the pain. I lived with pain. I hardly noticed it anymore.
"Shut up! Don't talk! You're going back!"
I shook my head furiously, so hard that I could have sworn my brain rattled around in my skull. Tears continued to pour out of my new, sightless, painful eyes. "No. No. No no no no no no no no no no no no…"
"I said be QUIET." Another blow across my face. Right on my right eye. I felt a large bruise forming. Then a kick to my stomach. I felt the air whoosh out of my lungs. I gulped in great quantities of precious oxygen to make up for my loss.
"Please, no… just no… please… please…" I begged, sniveling and wincing on the ground at His feet. "Kill me. Kill me."
He sighed and I heard him bend down.
"Do you really want to die?" He asked in a sympathetic voice.
I nodded wretchedly.
"Then," he continued with a sneer in his voice, "You are going to live a long time yet."
My eyes widened and I started to panic. "NO!"
Large, rough hands grabbed my arms and lifted me into the air. I struggled, but it was useless. I was too weak. I was always too weak. That's why, now that I was 'blind'…
"Take him to our… special room," He commanded, and a scream tore from my throat.
"PLEASE DON'T! NOT AGAIN! NO! JUST KILL ME! KILL ME! KILL ME! JUST DO IT! PLEASE! I DON'T WANT TO LIVE! LET ME DIE!"
I didn't want his rough hands all over me, not again. I didn't want it. Not now that everything had been taken away. I had always wanted to die, but not so much as I did at this moment. I was useless now. The flock wouldn't need me anymore. They would never love me, never accept me now. I was now a hindrance.
Max would never love me.
And now he was going to touch me…
"I WANT TO DIE!"
The pain of the bruises all over my body suddenly flared up. I felt as if a fire was growing in the pit of my stomach. Growing and roaring to life. Eating me whole.
I wanted so much for that to be true. Anything so that I wouldn't have to bare this anymore. I didn't want this anymore. I just wanted it all to end. I didn't care if I was going to disappear forever. 'Nothing' was better than this.
"Please, no, don't, not again," I pleaded in vain. But nonetheless, I was dragged away, my eyes still burning painfully, the bruises throbbing, my head aching, my heart feeling as if it was being wrenched apart.
They didn't want me anymore. They couldn't. They had most likely never wanted me in the first place.
A door opened and my back met cold concrete. And I was taken to the place against the wall, where my clothes were torn off and my arms chained above my hand to incapacitate me. Not that I would struggle much in the first place. I was too submissive, and I knew it. I would do anything He told me to, because… because if I didn't, he was going to kill them…
His footsteps echoed as they walked into the room. It was dark in here, I knew from experience.
The door clicked as it swung silently closed, and then the echoing of His footsteps got closer. So much closer. I listened until they were right in front of me. Then he bent down.
I shivered and bit my lip, staring towards where I knew he was. My eye was quite swollen by now, and my cheek ached to blazes. I felt painfully exposed, as I always did. I never got used to it. The chill of the musty air, stinking of mold and mildew. The cold of the concrete, pressed against my back and my legs and my wings. His horrible hands…
He reached forward until his palm was resting on my stomach. My skin quivered under his touch, but he dug his filthy fingernails into my skin. More bruises formed under his harsh touch.
"I thought you knew not to make a noise in my presence," He said, and his voice was cold, low and deadly. I knew I was in trouble.
I looked down a nodded silently, feeling more tears drip down my cheeks. Then began to punish me, violating every inch of my skin. I struggled not to whimper, because I knew if I did he would drag it out longer.
More bruises were forming. It was always a mystery to me why I wasn't just permanently colored purple.
I let out a shuddering breath.
"You're going back to your 'flock' whether you like it or not," He growled suddenly, at the same time as he pulled a feather from my wing. I bit my tongue so as to not cry out, and shook my head. "You will do as I say. Or you know what will happen."
My eyelids fluttered and I nodded, my tears finally drying up. My sightless eyes still ached, but the pain was by no means over…
That's when the voices first started speaking to me. Whispering words of hate and fear into my ears. I didn't know where they were coming from; I had thought no one else was in the room besides me and Him.
And there wasn't. I knew it for sure. He never did this in front of people.
So where were they coming from?
Look at you pitiful weak awful heartless die just pain die please die it's not going to stop hurting it's going to keep hurting look at you crying there I want to laugh at you it's just so funny you can't see stop trying they won't care they stopped it's die just they won't they're going to die don't listen die pain they can't hear you you're screaming too die loud voices in your ears I'm whispering you can't plug it up stop die trying to make it go away but you can't pain die just stop die ha pitiful die weak don't try it won't work you can just die stop now just die…
That's when I knew I was insane.
Wow. This chapter was hard to write. But I feel like I did a good job. Please review! Tell me how you liked it! I tried really hard!
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