As quickly as the image appeared on screen, it disappears again.
I am so grateful the picture quality is bad in here. I couldn’t see Lucie’s face properly; her head was facing the opposite wall. Caleb didn’t hide from the camera at all.
“She wasn’t facing us,” I say. “Do you think he told her we were watching?”
Theo scoffs. “Yeah, I think that’s exactly what he did.”
Jesus. He is pure evil.
“It’s usually a day in there?” Hazel asks.
“Yeah,” Priya replies. “Do you think they’ll keep showing it?”
“We agreed to turn off the TV,” I say, standing. “We’re not watching Caleb torture Lucie.” I jab my finger on the button and turn the damn thing off. There’s no guarantee that they won’t switch it back on, but I have to try.
Theo looks up at me as if he thinks I’ve made a mistake, but he doesn’t say a word because we all agreed.
No matter what, we don’t watch each other.
If the TV is turned back on, we could just leave the room. We don’t have to watch this.
“Do you think there will be backlash?” Hazel asks.
I shrug. “Maybe. We need to get into that waiting room anyway.”
“I don’t want to get in there!” she snaps, clenching her teeth. Hazel’s dark eyes fire bullets. She’s so petrified of going into a room. We’ve all gone multiple times, and she hasn’t done any yet. I think part of torturing her is making her wait, getting her so anxious about her name being called. They make her stress and worry every day that her turn is coming up.
“No one wants to get in there!” Theo says. His voice is hushed, but he’s clearly irritated. “Suck it up, Hazel.”
Someone needed to say it. Hazel needs to be a team player right now. We all do.
“Shut up, Theo,” she whispers. “This has nothing to do with me. You and Piper are the ones wanting to knock down walls.”
“So if we manage to do it, are you going to stay in here or are you going to leave with us?”
Priya and I sit back. Usually I would be the first person to jump in and defend Hazel—she’s my best friend and I have a lot of practice sticking up for her—but Theo is right. She can’t take a step back and do nothing to help.
“You can’t force me to do something I don’t want to do, Theo!”
“Shh!” I hiss. “Lower your voice again, please. The last thing we need is for them to hear what we’re saying.”
Hazel snaps her mouth shut and folds her arms. She’s acting like a spoiled child and annoying me to no end. We’re all going to have to do things we don’t want to for the greater good.
I need to be ordered to one of those rooms soon, so I can check if there’s any sign of a window.
Better still, I need to get back outside to double-check there actually is a window we can get access through. But going outside again seems unlikely. Unless they want to see if anyone else will run. We’re going to have to have a conversation about how we go forward, get everyone to agree that we can’t run, but we can check out the outside of the building and report back.
The speaker above us crackles. “Piper, turn the TV on,” Owen says, his voice rattling over static. “You’re not going to want to miss this.”
No.
“I can’t,” I say, looking up at the camera. That’s what they’re waiting for. If they wanted us to watch, they could turn it back on themselves. They want me to do it. Do they have no empathy at all? Is there nothing human about any of them?
“Piper, turn the TV on, or Lucie will be waiting for you in room zero.”
Priya gasps. “Just do it, Piper. No-watching pact is over! I would rather be watched than forced to kill or be killed.”
She’s right.
I swallow a thick lump clogging my throat and pick up the remote.
My eyes are glued to the screen as it pings to life.
Lucie is still lying on a gurney-style bed. But now there is a second one in the room.
“What the…?” Theo whispers.
“Why do they have two beds?” Priya asks. “Has that ever happened before?” she asks Theo.
Theo shakes his head slowly, his mouth slightly parted. “Not that I’m aware of.”
“Do you think it’s for Kevin?” Hazel asks.
No, I think it’s for me.
My heart rate rockets to the point where it’s all I can hear, and I’m sure the others must be able to as well.
No one has been in any of those rooms, beside room zero, with another person before. Isn’t part of the torture that you’re in solitary confinement? We only have ourselves.
Why would they change things up again when it’s been this way for more than a year?
“Piper, please come to the waiting room.”
My heart freezes as they confirm my fear. Twice in one day. No, this has to be a mistake. I can’t do it again.
Yes, you damn well can!
Hazel grips my arm. “You can’t do that room.”
They’re testing me. Two rooms in one day is too much for anyone. But what choice do I have except to fight them at every turn? They know I won’t give up, so they’re going to keep pushing until I’m as timid and afraid as Hazel.
They want me to believe that I’m going to die down here.
Well, I’m not.
I stand, my vision blurring, and tug out of Hazel’s grip. “I can,” I reply.
Take Priya’s coping mechanism and become someone else.
My legs wobble as I step toward the door. Theo, Hazel, and Priya don’t make a sound, but I know they’re with me.
This is the one I feared most, and it’s finally happening. It’s happening just hours after room one.
You can get through it. Soon it will be over.
I place my palm on the door, and when it clicks, I push it open. Caleb is going to torture me with water.
The door closes behind me, clicking locked as Owen ensures that I can’t go back. I couldn’t anyway. Not with the threat of room zero, knowing that things around here are changing, and fearing that Caleb, Owen, and Matt are developing a taste for killing.
Will they start killing us in the other rooms? Or will they let us outside the building again, giving us the false hope of escape?
I’m certain they would like the hunt. Where is the glory of killing someone locked inside a room?
I know that Theo, Hazel, and Priya wouldn’t give them the satisfaction of running, but I’m not at all convinced that Lucie, even knowing what they want, wouldn’t run anyway.
She said she would rather die trying. But she wouldn’t even be trying because there is no hope.
The wall, Piper. Check the damn wall!
I glance to my side and lean against the wall. Hopefully to them, it will just look as if I’m panicking. I can see the slight ridges where the joints of the plasterboard sheets have been taped and filled, and where they then painted the wall white.
Pushing myself back off the wall, I make sure my knuckles knock against the plasterboard and hear that sweet sound I was hoping for. It’s hollow behind. They have built the wall in front of something, and odds are, it’s the window. Why else would they need to build it out if there wasn’t something in the way, like the frame of the window sticking out just past the metal siding of the building?
Ignoring the fact that there could well be something blocking the window and preventing it from opening, like bars, I suspect we could potentially get out this way.
I walk toward the empty room, and the door in front of me clicks. Owen is watching me head to Lucie, unlocking doors as I go.
He has all the control here. I bet his smile is wide, his heart racing for the opposite reason mine is.
My mind doesn’t take anything in as I walk, too busy thinking about what’s about to come and what I’ve found in the waiting room.
There is still the big question of how we would get out. It’s unlikely they stay overnight here since they have homes and families. People would miss them. There are periods where things are quieter than others, like mornings, but that doesn’t mean they’re not watching or that they don’t take shifts.
I stop at the door in front of me. Beyond it is the corridor to hell, lined with doors to rooms that hold nothing put pain. I take a ragged breath as the air around me thins, like I’ve just climbed a mountain. Stepping forward, I reach out and twist the handle.
The hallway to hell stretches out in front of me.
Room five’s door is open wide. I’ve only been along this corridor three times, but the doors have only been open an inch before. As if they like to make us open it ourselves.
I straighten my back and walk to the room with my head held high. They will not get the better of me.
On the outside, they will see me as calm. On the inside, I’m hit by a wave of nausea. I press my hand to my stomach as I round the corner into the room.
Two pairs of eyes settle on me. One full of fear and heartbreak. The other burning with delight.
“Hi, Piper,” Caleb drawls with a smirk.