The Institute (15 page)

Oh right, I
guess you really would get the best insight.

It’s obvious I
have lived a sheltered, naïve life. I thought I was so knowing, so
on top of things. I was even quite cocky really, thinking that I
knew more than the others around me. Every year I would be so
suspicious of those tours, why we would have them, whether the
information they were giving us was right; I knew that they were
hiding something but I had no idea they were covering up this much.
In my mind it was black and white – if you’re Defective you live at
the Institute, you have no rights, no visitation and no freedom.
You will never see the outside of the Institute walls. I had no
idea, no little inkling that there was a whole other world here. A
world where you are hired to find others like you, to bring them in
to be beaten and tortured for information about their ability and
what they can do. And if your ability isn’t valuable, you get sent
to do the jobs no one else wants. What would they have me do if
they found out what I can actually do? Would they send me out into
the world like Drew? Or would they want me here, interrogating
others? I don’t think I could handle doing that to someone, I’ve
only been on the receiving end of it for a short time and I want it
to end. Inflicting this kind of pain on someone is not what I want
to use my newfound ability for. Is that why Drew did what he did?
They made him do it?

‘
Who is
Drew?’ Tate asks. ‘Your boyfriend?’

Oh sorry,
that’s going to be hard to get used to, remembering that you can
hear everything I think.

‘
No, I’m
sorry, I have the habit of listening in when I guess I probably
shouldn’t. You don’t have to talk about your boyfriend if you don’t
want to.’

Well actually,
I guess I can’t really call him that anymore … or if he ever was my
boyfriend to begin with. It’s a really long story.

‘
Well I have
nothing but time,’
Tate responds.

Short version?
You know, it’s your typical love story – Boy meets girl, girl saves
boy from a fiery car crash, they bond over the death of his friend,
the disappearance of hers, they spend every moment thinking of each
other and spend every day they can together. Her brother is going
to be arrested so her boyfriend offers to run away with her brother
to protect him, to save him, only she is the one who gets arrested
and when she is taken in to be interrogated she finds out he is the
one who put her there. It would make a best seller don’t you
think?

‘
Wow. Just
wow.’

I still can’t
believe I was that stupid, that naïve. I’m sorry I’ve just dumped a
heap of emotional crap on you; I don’t even know you.

‘
Hey, don’t
worry about it. It’s actually been good to talk to someone again
without actually having to talk.’

I know what you
mean. Well not the whole, not having to talk part because this is
still really weird for me but it has been good to talk to someone
who actually wants to give me answers.

‘
Well I’m
here if you need anything else.’

I do have
another question … last one I promise. How do I turn down everyone
else’s volume? I have constant chatter in my ear now. It started
off pretty quiet but now it’s just getting louder and louder. I
can’t even make out most of it, it just sounds like I’m in a really
crowded room.

‘
Ah, I
remember when it first happened to me, it almost drove me nuts. I
find filling my head with white noise usually does the trick … most
of the time anyway.’

***

I don’t even
remember falling asleep, but Tate’s white noise tip helped a lot. I
am awoken by the clanging of my cell door opening and two men
coming in, grabbing me and dragging me out of bed. I’m worried
about where I’m going, Tate said he was put through weeks of
interrogations and beatings and my face is still aching from my
last ‘questioning’. How long was I asleep for?

I’m taken to
the same room as yesterday. At least, I think it is the same room
and I think it was yesterday – although if I was only eating
breakfast before I went to sleep, maybe it’s only the afternoon.
Maybe I should stop trying to work out what time it is. There is no
table or chairs in here today, just a small square, empty room.

“When you’re
ready to talk, just hit the button,” a voice commands. I look
around but I am definitely the only one in here. I think it is my
ability, the one Tate has shown me I have, but then I look up and
see there is a speaker hanging in the corner and some sort of
camera. I look around for the button but I cannot see it. “It’s on
the wall near the door,” the voice says, obviously that camera is
taking video of me. I walk cautiously over to the door and see a
remote control sitting in a stand that is mounted to the wall. The
remote has a single red button in the middle of it. I take it out
of its stand and carry it around in my right hand. Should I tell
them what I can do, now that I know what it is? I want to hit the
button I do; I definitely don’t want to endure more of yesterday
but one thing has me questioning whether I should or not. What
would they make me do if they found out about me?

I pace around
the room thinking. Could I really do what Drew does? Could I really
be that heartless? Fooling people into thinking that I cared for
them, just to betray them and ruin their lives forever? I throw the
remote on the ground, defiant. I won’t do that. Tate is right, they
would exploit this ability even more than Drew’s. I don’t want to
be responsible for interrogating people and knowingly hurting them
if they give me the wrong answers.

A bright white
light, and I mean really bright, comes on overhead. It’s brighter
than the sun at noon. I put my arm up to cover my eyes, I get an
instant headache from the illumination. So this is what they are
going to do to try to get me to talk. Okay, it’s time to really
focus on what I want and right now and that is to keep my ability a
secret.

I don’t know
how long it has been since the light was turned on but I’m sitting,
huddled in the corner and facing the wall with my hands resting on
my knees and my face buried into my hands. I have my eyes closed
but the light is so bright, all I am seeing is the colour red. I
put pressure on my eyes to try and make it darker and it helps a
little but still have that tingling, annoying feeling in between my
eyes; the feeling you get right before a migraine starts.

Everything goes
black, I lift my head and the light is off – either that or I have
gone blind. I am so relieved I let out a happy sigh, and that’s
when the light comes back on. I swear it is even brighter than
before and this time it is accompanied with the sound of an alarm
bell. It is a constant ringing sound and I no longer have to wonder
when that migraine will hit because it’s here.

Normally when I
get a migraine, I need a dark room and pressure applied to my eyes
but with the ringing in my ears and the light, there’s no chance of
that happening. I sit back in my corner, block my ears with my
hands and my eyes with my knees and rock back and forth. This is
not helping at all, but it is distracting so I continue to do
it.

When the light
and sound stops this time, I know better than to sigh with relief.
I get up and stretch, taking every opportunity they give me to try
and stay as strong as I can. My back is sore from being curved, my
hands tense from tightly gripping my ears.

When the light
and sound starts back again, I almost want to hit the button, I
want to give in. But this time, the light just isn’t on and the
alarm just isn’t ringing, they are both pulsing intermittently.
Even if I wanted to find the button, I couldn’t; I threw it on the
ground earlier and I have no idea where it is, I can’t see with the
flashing light. I know my previous tactics won’t get me through
this time.

I have an idea
but I don’t know if it will work. If I do ever get back to Tate I
must ask him how he was able to endure weeks of this kind of thing.
I take my shirt off, thankful that I kept my bra on that I was
wearing when I was arrested … although this just makes me realise
how long it has been since I have had a shower or had a fresh pair
of underwear. That thought alone is making me want to find that
button. I rip the shirt to give me a longer piece of material to
use. I roll it up like a bandana and tie it around my head tight,
covering my eyes and my ears. It in no way helps on its own, but
when I apply the added pressure of my hands and my knees again, I
almost find peace … it’s quiet and dark enough for me to tolerate
anyway.

I finally find
real peace when the noise and light finally switch off completely
and I am being escorted back to my cell by two guards. I have a
high pitched ringing still in my ears, but it’s nothing compared to
what I experienced in that room. I kind of wish I had a spare
change of clothes, I’m about to be paraded past rows of cells full
of people in just a bra and my blue pyjama pants.

“You can go on
break if you want, I’ve got this,” the woman guard says. The second
guard doesn’t even hesitate, he turns and starts walking away from
us. We get to a door which does not lead us back to the cells, but
to a shower block. “You missed your allotted shower time this
morning. Normally we aren’t meant to let you shower when it isn’t
your time, but I can’t sit by and let them treat people that way …
not if I can do something about it anyway.” I give her an
appreciative smile. “But you will need to hurry up, I can only give
you a couple of minutes.”

I shower as
quickly as I can, it’s hard not to stay under the running water for
hours. When I get out, the guard hands me a towel and new pyjamas.
I don’t even feel self-conscious being naked in front of a stranger
– I just needed a shower that badly. I’d probably feel different if
it was a male guard though.

“Thank you,” I
say, “and not just for the clothes.” I’m really thanking her for
everything she just did for me. I hope she doesn’t get into
trouble.

I get back to
my cell and I immediately lay down on my bed, exhausted from the
events of today. The loud chatter starts in my ears again, for a
moment I thought the torture today had drowned their noise out but
no, I have a high pitching ringing and crowd noise from all the
thoughts I can hear in my head. I don’t think I’m going to get much
peace in here.

I know there
are other things I should be thinking about and worrying about
right now, like when my next interrogation will begin, but all I
can think about is Dad. He warned me to stay away from Drew. He
knew it wasn’t a good idea and I thought I knew better. I don’t see
how he will ever forgive me, not that he will ever have the chance
to though anyway. Has he told Aunt Kenna what I did? Has she been
told about Shilah and me? I can’t imagine what both Dad and her are
feeling right now, but then again, I guess I am experiencing it
myself. I don’t know where Shilah is, I don’t know what happened to
Dad when I was arrested, my family have been ripped away from me
and I don’t know if they are okay, they don’t know if I’m okay. I
want to try and rest but I can’t get Dad and Aunt Kenna’s faces out
of my head.

The buzzing of
my cell door make me realise, I have really wasted my down time. I
could have been sleeping, stretching, doing something to get me
ready for what’s coming and now it’s too late, guards are at my
cell door again, new ones. I guess I have an answer for when my
next round of torture will start. The guards escort me out and I am
expecting to be taken to the same room I was just in but we only
walk through one of the buzzing doors before I am taken into a new
room. This one is larger and more terrifying, there’s a gurney in
the middle of the room and what looks like medical equipment around
it. I have no idea what is in store for me but by the look of it,
it can’t be good.

The guards walk
me over and tell me to lie down, I want to scream and fight but I
know it won’t get me anywhere and could even make things worse. I
don’t comply quickly enough for them though and I am pushed onto
the makeshift bed and restrained. Two other people in white scrubs
come over to me and attach wires and plugs and hook me up to the
terrifying device. As one of them is attaching some sort of band
around my arm she looks me right in the eye. She can see the
terrified look on my face just as clearly as I can see the
affliction in hers. She doesn’t look excited or happy about what
they are doing to me like the others do. I begin to wonder how she
ended up working here, doing what she does. If what Tate said is
true, does that mean she’s Defective too? The band on my arm starts
to tighten until it becomes almost painful. The two of them walk
over to a booth inside the room; it’s tiny and I can see through
the window that there are desks and computers in there.

I hear a door
open and footsteps heading towards me, I lift my head slightly, I
can’t manage to lift it far as I’m strapped onto this bed but I can
see that it is Monobrow man.

“So are you
ready to tell us yet?” he asks. I stay quiet. I can see a flash of
disappointment in my interrogator’s face as he looks over to the
little room and the two people inside it. I see him nod and without
warning my whole body forcefully convulses as a surge of
electricity goes through it. It’s over with quite quickly, before I
have a real chance to process or respond. What it was, I am not
sure – what was it meant to achieve? “I think it’s time you give us
some answers,” he says.

I want to
scream, I want to yell at them to stop but I know it will be
frivolous. Is it really so much to ask that I am just told what is
going on? All I seem to know is that they know I’m Defective and
are trying to get me to tell them what they want to hear. Where
will I go if I tell them what happened with Tate? What will happen
to him? I’m trying with all of my effort to listen in on the people
in this room, but I can’t; I hear nothing. I think about earlier
today and I couldn’t hear any of my guard’s thoughts either. The
voices and constant chattering left me this morning too but
returned when I got back to my cell. Is fear stopping me from
hearing them?