If she was my mate, then it was already decided by the fates that we should never be parted. What would happen to me, if they kept me away from the missing half of my soul? Would I just waste away in this cell, until death came for me without Claire’s sustenance to pull me through? Each minute that passed without her made that strange reality seem more possible.
I was thickly wrapped in my depression, feeling bitter and defeated, when Dr. Grant returned. A tiny ember of hope flickered inside of me, hoping that this woman came with some news on the only subject I wanted to discuss – Claire.
But instead, she resumed the same line of questioning as the day before. She was a little less friendly and a bit more aggressive today. Her face still had that masked look, but her impatience was beginning to come out around the edges. Her words were clipped and insistent, which only made me feel badgered. Annoyed, I sullenly refused to speak.
No technique she used could’ve gotten me to talk. I was very suspicious of this woman. I didn’t trust her and was wary that anything I said would only give her power over me. But her current demeanor was even more off-putting than the old façade, making it easy to keep my silence. Nothing that she said could motivate me to answer her questions.
“Fine,” she finally said tersely, giving up. “Have it your way. If you don’t want to work with me, then I’ll take the information I want through test samples. My men will be in to collect.”
Huffily, she exited the lab through the only door. I wondered what, exactly, she’d meant by that. But I didn’t have to wait long to find out.
A few minutes later, two big men shuffled through the door. They were different from the ones who brought me food. I didn’t recognize either. Both were tall and stocky, with big broad shoulders and muscular arms. One was slightly shorter than the other, but his body was dense and wide, and he likely weighed more than the taller one. He had his blond hair cut into a crew cut, which made his thick, square neck and face even more prominent.
The taller, dark-haired one carried a tray full of little tubes, vials, small jars, and envelopes. The blond one had a small bag over his shoulder. I furrowed my brow, wondering what was inside it. Somehow, I doubted it was anything good.
They stopped at the keypad outside my cage, and the blond man pressed a button. It was the same pad that the other men used when they cleaned my cage. I walked to the wall furthest from the door, as the other men had instructed me to do earlier, and waited for the door to slide open.
But instead, to my confusion, a strange cloud began to fill the cage. Some sort of vapor was coming from small vents in the metal bars. It didn’t take long for the space to become foggy. I gasped for breath, feeling smothered, and felt my lungs burn.
Whatever it was, it was clearly some kind of toxin. I could sense that as soon as I inhaled it. I began to feel panicky and disoriented, unable to see clearly through the mist lingering in the air.
I tried to hold my breath, but it was no use. There was no clean air left, and I couldn’t wait forever. Eventually, I had to take another deep breath. My head began to swim, and everything around me seemed to be spinning. I couldn’t tell if I was standing still or moving, or if it was just my impaired senses that gave the illusion of motion.
I coughed harshly, my body trying to expel whatever the strange substance was. That only forced me to take more of it in. Between fits of coughing, I began to stagger around, as if my brain still believed that there was anywhere I could escape. Finally, I slumped to the floor, my muscles unresponsive and unwilling to support me any longer.
The door slid open, though I heard it before I could see it. Two shadowy figures approached. Though my body was no longer cooperating with my brain, I was conscious enough to be aware of their movements.
The taller one shuffled across the cage, standing at my head. The noise reverberated in my skull, sounding painfully loud to my ear pressed against the floor. I could feel my chest tightening, my brain sending signals that I was under duress. My body, however, could do nothing about it.
He set the tray down. Then he knelt, jamming one knee into my back. It knocked what little air I still had out of me, and the force left me breathless. The blond man came to stand by my four legs, performing a similar move. He yanked the two left legs together, pinning them under his own, and then did the same on the right.
I could hardly see what they were doing, my face jammed into the cold, hard floor. I was already on edge. If my body had responded to my commands, I’d never have tolerated this rough handling. But it was defiant, broken by whatever they had put into the air and made me breathe.
The final straw was the stabbing of a needle into my side. I sucked in my breath, and it was as if time stood still for a moment. All my senses came sharply into focus. The pain. The lights. The smell of that drug that lingered in the air.
I reacted involuntarily, my fight or flight instinct kicking in. Everything went red as I bucked wildly, determined to remove the invaders from my personal space. I wasn’t aware of my instinctual reaction, and everything happened in such a chaotic blur that I could hardly recall the events later.
I bucked the blond man off my legs, sending him scrambling across the floor. He accidentally knocked over the tray, and the commotion sent my nerves even further into disarray. I managed to reach my arm out, hooking it behind the free leg of the dark-haired man kneeling on my back.
I dragged my arm outward, forcing him to lose his balance. He fell against me and rolled, hitting his head loudly on the floor. The blond guy charged at me then, attempting to grab my arms into a restraint behind my back.
From my position on the floor, I twisted my torso, slipping my arm out of his grasp. Then I grabbed for his shoulder, trying to fling him off me.
I missed in my haste, and our arms became tangled. I could hear the crunching sound of bones breaking as we both pulled, trying to extricate ourselves from each other. Relief came over me a few seconds later as I realized it was him, not me, who had been injured.
The dark-haired one grabbed the tray and beat me with it a few times, clobbering me in the head. The blond cursed and shouted, trying to hold his limp, mangled arm in place. They hurriedly grabbed for the tools, shoving them into the bag and high tailing for the door.
Dr. Grant came rushing in at the sound, bursting through the main door of the lab. She entered just as they were slamming the door of my cage shut.
“What happened?” she asked, her eyes zeroing in on the man’s visibly deformed arm.
“He’s too violent,” the blond man snapped. “We couldn’t get any samples from him without getting killed.”
“Go to the infirmary,” she instructed. “Give me those.” She pulled the bag away from them, holding it by her side. “Both of you, go get checked out.”
They offered no argument, obediently doing as she said. She walked across the room, closer to my sealed cage. I was still lying prone on the floor.
Although I wasn’t completely paralyzed, and had managed to defend myself, my body was largely unpredictable and unresponsive. I didn’t have the control of my muscles that I normally did, and was unable to pull myself up from the ground yet.