5. Five
It’s a horribly familiar feeling, waking up after regenerating lost or mutilated bits of myself. My skin feels prickly from the nerves waking up, and my head feels like it’s on the verge of exploding. I keep my eyes screwed tightly shut, hoping that it will stave off whatever migraine is brewing.
The recovery technicians, along with that Mark guy, must have skipped over the step of giving me IV bags while I was out because I’m also feeling extremely dehydrated. Not the norm for freezing, at least as far as I can remember.
Wait, was it freezing?
No, dogs. It was dogs. That has to be what finally got me.
I have to suppress a shudder at the memories flooding into my mind. I’m out of that Tank. I’m not going to open my eyes and see those dogs again.I’m not. It’s over, and I can only hope they’ll give me a few days to fully heal before preparing the next one.
I groan at the thought of whatever would come next and turn over carefully, wary of the edge. That’s another familiarity I would like to leave behind, rolling out of bed immediately upon waking up from a Tank and spraining something new.
But there’s no edge.
I reach further and further across the sheets, and I can’t find where the end is supposed to be. Not only that, but these sheets feel so much softer, so much warmer, than the ones on my little bed.
My heart rate instantly ratchets up and I risk the pain of opening my eyes too soon because I am quickly becoming aware of the fact that I have no idea where I am. I only know that I am not where I’m supposed to be.
One at a time I pry my eyes open, my vision is doubled and blurry, but I notice several things in quick succession.
First, the lights in this room aren’t the humming, harsh fluorescents I’m accustomed to.
Second, there’s something on the bedside table that looks a hell of a lot like a gun.
Finally, this is absolutely not the facility.
I blink a couple times, begging my vision to clear, begging that I’ll be able to assess my surroundings quickly. Far too slowly that L-shaped piece of metal comes into focus, only for it to split into two hazily detailed guns. But that’s exactly what it is, a gun. Not attached to a Minder, just sitting there. Right in front of me.
Panic and hope war inside of me, and I can’t get my body to move with even a semblance of coordination. I shouldn’t even be expecting it to obey my commands, I know how my body works. I know that it wakes long after my mind does, but I’m desperate for my groggy, still healing limbs to cooperate.
This might be my chance. The only real chance I’m ever going to get.
My legs tangle in the sheets almost immediately, the soft fabric holding me back, keeping me away from my freedom as surely as the walls of the facility. Still, I try. I turn and try to crawl to the edge, crawl towards what might be the dull metallic key to the rest of my life. That gun could equal my freedom.
Why is this bed so damn big? Why am I still so far away?
Finally, my fingers brush against the cold metal, but I can’t feel the contact through the static buzzing and little zaps that cover the skin on my right arm. Normally it’s just a minor discomfort, an inconvenience, at most. Now, these struggling nerves are a devastating hindrance. My scrambling only succeeds in knocking it off the table, sending the gun clattering to the floor.
The sound of it against the wooden floor might as well have been the loudest sound I’ve ever heard in my life. Every individual tap and skitter might as well be the alarms in the facility announcing my attempt at escape. I watch as the blur slides below the dresser three feet from the bed, the distance at once so small and impossibly vast with my useless body.
I dive after it with all the speed I can muster, and my knees slam onto the floor. The tingling in my right leg now amplified to an agonizing drone from the impact.
A chair is knocked over somewhere outside of the room and a pair of heavy footsteps rush towards me. A man’s voice shouts, and I know I only have seconds before my one, and possibly only, chance is ripped away from me.
I shove my good arm underneath the dresser and swing wildly until I feel my palm brush against the metal. I nearly shout with victory when my fingers wrap around it. My grip is finally beginning to cooperate when I wrap my other hand around the base of it. I clumsily shove my arms forward towards the door, trying to mimic the couple of times in my life that I’ve seen a gun drawn.
I force my attention to the door and point to where I can only hope it actually is, aiming for the empty center between the two blurry images.
Straight arms, finger on the trigger.
I can do this.
The door opens, and I pull.