Another tumblr prompt. Very short. Enjoy!
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Experiment
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"Look at me. You are not an experiment."
The boy on the other side of the arena showed no sign of having heard her. He did not raise his gaze from his bare feet.
Sam tried again. "You aren't a slave. You don't have to do what they tell you. You don't have to do this."
The speakers set into the arena ceiling crackled to life, making her jump. "Experiment D-5541. Begin extermination procedures."
Danny's head snapped up, eyes flaring red.
Sam blinked.
He was directly in front of her, a spike of ectoplasm an inch from her eye.
"Danny?" she said, her eyes flicking between his eyes and the glowing collar around his neck.
"Experiment D-5541, finish the procedure. Exterminate the subject," ordered the voice over the speaker.
Danny didn't so much as breathe. From this distance, Sam could see how thin he was, how pale, how dirty, beneath his ghostly aura. There were bruises and puncture wounds around his wrists.
A long sigh made the speaker crackle. "For the log entry, please note that, once again, experiment D-5541 refuses to carry out extermination procedures on a human being. This is the conclusion of trial 48. Hopefully team two will have better luck with conditioning." The last was added almost as an afterthought. "Sedating subjects."
As before, the arena filled with a white gas that soon had Sam's eyes fluttering closed.
All she could think about was how much closer the spike had been this time.