CHAPTER 10

ADARA

I usually woke up feeling well-rested and ready to start the day, even if it took a click or two for my brain to start properly functioning. Brain fog wasn’t exactly a new thing for me, but what I was experiencing now was like trying to push through a strong current attempting to sweep me up into its imprisoning embrace.

My limbs felt heavy, my eyes refused to open, my chest felt like something was sitting on it and my lungs were struggling to take in air. And despite my eyes remaining closed my head swam with a dizziness I had only ever experienced while black-out drunk. I didn’t particularly enjoy the sensation, especially with the way it made my stomach churn enough to taste the bile that tried to rise up my throat. I hated feeling sick, which was why I didn’t drink. And when I did, I kept it light and fun, stopping well before my limit.

So I wasn’t drunk, but that didn’t help provide an explanation for my current plight. Had I been drugged?

I tried to think back to what I was doing before I went to sleep, but I was drawing up a blank. It was as if my memory had been wiped. The last thing I remembered was heading into Reece’s trial because Xander wasn’t going to make it in time…

Oh, fuck.

Fuck, fuck, fuck…

Dredging up as much strength as I could muster into my arms and legs, I tried to move them. Unsuccessfully. There was no sensation whatsoever. Not even a tingle in my fingers or toes.

Okay, so that didn’t work…

I changed tactics and tried to pry open my eyelids, but it was like they were glued shut. No matter how many times I tried, or how hard I screamed inside my head for my body to move, the connection between my brain and my body seemed to be cut off somehow. I couldn’t feel, I couldn’t see, nor could I hear when I strained my ears to try and discern any sound. I was paralysed, senses and all.

But just when I came to that conclusion I heard something. It was quiet, muffled, and indiscernible, but that was definitely a sound. Just a mere whisper of something brushing my eardrums to let me know my physical form was still functioning.

Things began to progress after that. Though the sounds were still muffled, they were definitely present, and my skin began to tingle. Then the tingle became an uncomfortable prickle, like millions of tiny needles just barely stabbing at my skin until they got deeper and deeper and started scraping at my muscles.

I needed to move, the urge intense and overwhelming, but I was still incapable of even so much as a twitch. My arms and legs felt like wet noodles that wouldn’t even manage to even pick up a grain of sand. My eyes were still shut, but with my senses returning it felt less like an inability to open then and more like they were taped down.

I was surprisingly calm, and I wasn’t sure if it was shock or some sort of drug running through my system that blocked my brain from communicating with the rest of me. Either way, my heartrate was slow, my breathing steady and my mind was just sluggish enough to prevent a full-on panic attack.

Still, I needed to find a way to get my limbs moving so I could get out of whatever situation I’d found myself in.

Bits and pieces were coming back to me, but none let me know where I was or what had happened. I recalled giving the councillors the evidence proving Reece’s innocence, and I remembered how they tossed it aside, literally shattering my holo-tab before declaring me guilty as well.

But what happened next up until now was a black hole of nothing, and that was the most concerning for me. I managed to make my finger twitch, which let me know that my body was slowly but surely coming back online. I couldn’t say for sure until my senses were working again, but I didn’t think I had obtained any physical damage. The blank spot in my memories was the most concerning factor at this current stage. Brains were a delicate thing and the least understood out of all the anatomical parts. If I was experiencing any form of amnesia there could be an array of causes that I wouldn’t be able to resolve in a prison cell.

Was that where I was? I knew they had arrested me so it was the most logical conclusion, but these people didn’t behave logically. For all I knew, they’d locked me up in one of their top-secret laboratories and intended to cut into me like they did with Artemis.

Fuck, I missed her. I wished she were here right now. I missed the way she would get annoyed with that one piece of hair that constantly got in her eyes and she’d flick it away. I missed her laugh, rare as it may be, and the way her eyes would light up when she felt she was being accepted into the group. I even missed the adoration in her gaze whenever she looked at Prince Brommyt, despite my wishes that she would aim that affection towards Xander and he would return it.

And Xander… I had no doubt he was beside himself with worry. And the guilt he’d feel over asking me to fill in for him would be eating him up inside. I needed to find some way to at least get a message out to him that I was okay. It was mostly true.

The pins and needles spread faster and with increasing discomfort throughout my body until I was writhing around, the need to get up and move a desperate urge now. But with the prickling came more ability to move and more sensations. That was how I figured out that I was unable to move my limbs not because of paralysis but because they were strapped down.

I was laying on some sort of metal table, cold and hard with zero give. The cuffs around my wrists and ankles were made from the same material and dug painfully into my flesh whenever I tried to move. They were so tight I was surprised I was getting any blood flow to my extremities at all.

But the even more concerning aspect of my current situation was that there were no clothes on my body. I felt the cold of the metal beneath me seeping directly into my skin were it settled bone-deep inside of me, right beside the sheer terror for what they were going to do to me.

It was clear now that I was in no jail cell, but the worst possible scenario had become my reality. The Program had taken me for their own nefarious purposes. I was going to have to brace myself for what was to come, because there was no doubt in my mind that it would be painful, traumatising and insufferable.

If Arty can do it, so can you , I reminded myself. She was strong enough to endure the hardships of being one of The Program’s subjects since the age of early childhood. I was a lot older than she was when she’d first been exposed to the horrors of The Program and its scientists. I could do this.

I would do this. For her.

‘Ra… Dar… Ad… Ra… ’

The sound filtered through more clearly than before, and though it was choppy I managed to make out that someone was calling my name.

I wasn’t alone.

With great effort I succeeded in throwing my head to the other side of where it currently rested, towards the direction of the speaker.

‘Adara…’ the voice croaked again, and the familiarity within his pleading tone gave me enough willpower to crack open my eyelids.

The light was blinding, and I had to blink away the sting of the obnoxiously bright overhead fluorescents. I wanted to rub at them and my arms tensed to move before the shackles that bound me dug even deeper into my skin. A stark reminder of how miserable my situation was.

Even worse, when I finally managed to peak through my eyelashes without wincing away from the light I found Reece in the exact same position across from me. Naked and bound to a metal table, his bones stood in stark contrast through his skin. He had lost a lot of weight trapped inside a solitary cell for the past solar. His face was covered in a thick scruff, his typically braided hair loose and knotted, spread out on the table beneath him and cascading over the edge.

The dark purple bruising under his eyes belayed his exhaustion.

‘Adara…’ he tried again, his voice barely above a whisper. When was the last time he was given any water?

‘Reece,’ I choked out before coughing at the dryness of my own throat. When was the last time I’d had any water?

The relief in his eyes was palpable. ‘Oh, thank the stars. I was beginning to think you were too far gone to come back.’

‘Still here,’ I whispered to try and save my poor vocal chords from any more stress. It didn’t work. I had to swallow my saliva a few times just to get it out, but I struggled to produce enough liquid to help and ended up in another coughing fit.

I opened my mouth to ask what was going on, needing the confirmation so I could move past the panic and find a way to escape, but the sound of a mechanical door whooshing open followed by heavy booted footsteps had me snapping my jaw shut immediately.

‘Shit,’ Reece swore. ‘We’re out of time. They’re coming back.’

‘What do we do?’ I asked him, hoping he’d had enough time to figure out a plan while I was still unconscious.

‘Endure,’ he whispered. ‘Be strong and endure.’

That wasn’t a good answer. That wasn’t good at all.

My breathing had increased along with my heartrate when the footsteps became louder. Closer. Inside the room.

My head was still turned to face Reece and my energy was too low to try and move it again to face the newcomer, but it allowed me to see Reece’s reaction. His healthy pallor was already ridiculously pale, but this unhealthy one was sheet-white and he looked almost like a corpse when he rested wide, terror-filled eyes on whomever it was that had come to stand beside my metal table.

Definitely not good.

Plastic covered hands gripped my head and adjusted me so my nose was pointing at the ceiling and I could finally see. A man was leaning over me with an expression that could have been mistaken for kind and compassionate if it weren’t for the dead look in his beady little eyes. He was a Terran, and although his salt-and-pepper hair and gentle wrinkles in the corners of his eyes gave away his middle-aged status, he was an objectively attractive man. Skinny, tall, and handled me with gentle care, it was all fake. The chill that trickled up my spine was enough evidence for me to know that this man was pure evil.

‘Hello Miss Brin. There’s no need to be afraid. I’m a doctor, and I’m here to look over you and ensure your continued health,’ he said, his voice smooth like silk and his accent indicated a well-bred social status.

It didn’t escape my notice how he address me by name but refused to introduce himself. That could only mean one of two things: he was protecting his identity in case I revealed it to someone else, which would indicate I would have some level of freedom to converse with people of a high rank within his organisation, or he didn’t view me as someone worthy of his name. Unfortunately, I was leaning more towards the latter. If I had any sort of freedom I wouldn’t currently be strapped to a metal table. Metal tables were typically used for autopsies because they were easy to clean.

None of this was looking promising for me or Reece.

The process of de-personifying us had already begun.

‘I’m just going to check your vitals and your responses. You might feel a tightness over your arm or a pinch from a needle, but I promise to take good care of you. There’s nothing to worry about,’ he informed me, but I didn’t believe him. Sure, he might only be taking my vitals and checking my responses, but there was definitely something to worry about. Plus, if there was a needle involved then he’d be taking blood. Why would he need my blood other than to run tests for his experiments?

Because that was the only reason we’d be here rather than in a prison cell. We were The Program’s newest subjects.

The doctor glanced at Reece, his expression dropping its compassionate mask. ‘I’ll get to you in a moment, rapist,’ he spat.

I wanted to defend him but the words stuck in my throat as I felt the blood pressure cuff squeeze my arm. Then came the first pinch of a needle in the crook of my elbow. Soon enough, he had multiple vials of my blood stacked neatly in a rack on a trolley I’d missed before. He then moved on to checking my reflexes, flashing a light in my eyes to check my pupil response, and then stabbing my fingers and toes with a needle to assess my ability to feel.

When he was satisfied I felt another pinch of a needle, though this time instead of drawing blood I felt the distinct cold sensation of drugs being pushed into my system. The chill spread throughout my body, travelling through my veins. It was quickly chased by numbness that was followed by a dizzying exhaustion.

I managed to turn my head to make eye contact with Reece one last time before I succumbed to a drug-induced sleep.