48. Kyra
48
KYRA
K yra's eyes fluttered open to hazy, overlapping shapes in a room she didn't initially recognize. Pain pulsed at the back of her skull, each beat intensifying until her vision blurred with it. She tried to breathe slowly, but the air felt stale in her nose, tainted with something metallic she knew all too well. Blood. Or maybe rust. She couldn't tell which was stronger.
Her mouth was so dry it felt glued shut. She swallowed once, failing to summon enough saliva to soothe her throat. Everything was dim, like a nightmare half-lurking in the corners of her consciousness. Her arms wouldn't move like she wanted. She tugged, too sharply, and a jolt of dull agony lanced her shoulder.
A surge of panic hit.
Chains. A rasping clank told her what she had already sensed. They were heavier than she remembered. The cold metal bit into her wrists, pinning her arms to the bed frame with no slack to spare. Her legs were similarly bound, ankles strapped in place. With every attempt to shift, the cuffs pressed into her skin.
She blinked, letting her eyes adjust to the gloom. The overhead bulb cast a sickly yellow light over peeling walls. A tiny portal near the ceiling was barred. Fresh iron, by the look of it, the metal glinting in the faint light.
The doctor.
That single word cut through the fog in her head like a blade. He had found her. Recognized her in the hallway, ripping away her scarf and calling her by name. She remembered the look of triumph on his face, then the sudden flash of pain.
After that, nothing.
A memory—or maybe a hallucination—flickered at the edges of her mind. Glimpses of a white coat from her nightmares, a smirking mouth, the prick of a needle sliding into her vein. She wasn't sure if it happened a minute ago or twenty years prior. Her thoughts felt scrambled, spinning just out of reach whenever she tried to pin them down.
A wave of nausea rolled through her gut.
She forced herself to breathe.
Focus .
She needed clarity, but the sedation that weighed on her was heavier than any chains. It clung to her limbs, pulling them into the thin mattress. She tried bending her elbows and testing the cuffs for a weak link, but the metal was thick and unyielding. This time, they'd accounted for someone with her strength. Not that she felt strong at the moment.
The drugs had siphoned out all her strength.
"Damn it," she croaked, voice barely above a whisper. The dryness in her throat made the words come out cracked and small. Another wave of panic washed over her. She forced a deep inhale, willing calm into her pounding heart. Panicking would do nothing but tighten the chains holding her.
From somewhere beyond the thick walls, a scream sliced the silence. It was distinctly female, echoing down a hall or maybe from a room next door. She froze, listening. She wasn't the only one trapped in this place. Something wretched tightened behind her sternum. She recalled the new girls the doctor had just brought in. What were they doing to them?
She tugged again, though she knew it was pointless. It was instinctive. She was like a trapped animal that would claw its way to freedom, even if it meant dying in the process.
A flash of memory returned. The door to her cell was identical to the one in the asylum, with its small barred window. Her arms were strapped to a gurney, a needle pricked her skin. The sensations merged with the present until she couldn't separate them. She had escaped that nightmare once, unleashing a strength she hadn't known she possessed—ripping away the restraints, snapping the lock. But it wouldn't happen this time. She could feel the difference. These cuffs were thicker, the frame reinforced, and the sedation coursing through her veins had robbed her muscles of their superhuman strength.
This time, though, someone knew where she was. Maybe her people would come to free her once they realized she'd been captured.
They would know as soon as night fell and she didn't return.
Her eyelids fluttered shut, dizzy with the swirl of drug-induced confusion. She wanted to believe a rescue was possible, but the two brain cells still functioning in her head knew the cruel truth. She might remain locked in this cell for weeks until her people staged an operation to free her.
She didn't deserve the sacrifice, the many who would fall.
They'd tried to warn her, and she'd refused to listen. It wasn't their fault that she was here, chained to a bed and drugged.
Another scream raked her nerves. She squeezed her eyes tight, wishing she could cover her ears. The chains clanked again as she shifted, painfully aware that her ankles and wrists were spread in a degrading, vulnerable position.
That was how they'd kept her before, wasn't it? In that asylum.
A memory surfaced of the doctor removing her clothes, half-lost in the haze. He'd pressed down on her stomach, sneering. He hadn't done it to examine her. Had he laughed? Maybe. She couldn't quite remember. But she felt the humiliation all the same. The memory burned, spurring her to twist again in the present, rattling the new restraints.
" Khorafeh ," she mumbled under her breath—nonsense. Her mind spun in circles, mixing Kurdish, Farsi, and English in one swirl. If only she could stand or even sit up. But all she managed was shifting her hips a few inches. The bed frame creaked ominously. Every movement stole energy she didn't have, and the sedation made her arms feel like lead.
Cold sweat trickled down her temple.
She braced herself for the door to slam open, for footsteps to echo on the linoleum. She expected the doctor to stride in at any moment, or the commander, or one of those enhanced guards.
Kyra didn't want to think of the horrors awaiting her. The horrors she'd seen them inflict on Twelve.
A tear slid down her cheeks.
They were both doomed. No one was coming to save them.
A clatter outside the door jolted her, sending her heart racing. She strained to listen, but it was only the echo of distant metal clunks. There was no sign of footsteps entering her cell. She should be thankful.
She turned her head, the slight movement draining her fragile reserves of strength. Her pulse throbbed painfully in her temple. The sedation pressed down on her, heavy and unrelenting, dragging her into a thick haze of half-sleep. She blinked, fighting it, but it was a losing battle.
Her mind drifted, images swirling. Distant in her memory, a small child's face—brown eyes with flakes of gold like hers, hair streaked with chestnut. In the vision or rather hallucination, she cradled the girl, singing her a lullaby. Or maybe that was a dream, too. Her reality was this vile nightmare with real chains and real pain.
She'd never felt so powerless.
"Help…" The word was a whisper, strangled and trembling. She wasn't even sure she wanted to be heard. Because who would hear her anyway? The only ears that might listen belonged to the bastards running this place.
Kyra sank into the darkness, a spark of defiance flaring in her chest even as her consciousness ebbed, and she was lost in that half-world between waking and oblivion.
She would endure just like she had before.
Clutching that final thought, she let the blackness swallow her once again.