The bottoms of my feet, the top of my head, every inch of me is being prodded.
With each second, the pokes come at a greater speed and intensity. Moments drag as my heartbeat is drowned out by my screams. I am going to die, I know it. I now know how it is possible that the others might die if they have already been through this once.
At the moment I think I can’t take another second of this torture, the buzzing ends, and the needles go back from where they came from. Moments pass by without any sound or actions. No one removes the lid, and nothing more happens. I can feel the blood draining from my body in an odd sensation of pain and pleasure.
A side panel slides off the box as a slight bit of light floods into the box. I was right, there is blood everywhere. For someplace so white, there is sure a lot of red.
A hand reaches in from the side of the box, grasping my right wrist, pulling it out into the open. My arm follows, but with no control from myself. Whoever the hand belongs to, has complete control of my movement, I couldn’t move now if I tried.
Suddenly, my wrist receives a small pinch. It hurts at first, but not as bad as the needles did. The hand pushes my arm back into the box, but they leave the panel open, allowing my eyes to become adjusted somewhat to the minimal light coming in. I try my hardest to see what is on my wrist. I can still feel whatever it is there.
Out of the corner of my eye, I see a needle in my wrist with a tube of red liquid connected to it.
“Blood,” a voice calls out from nowhere.
“Why blood?” I respond to the mysterious voice through a raspy tone.
“Look up,” the voice instructs.
I look up at the lid. There is a foot by foot panel on it, there is a screen where I can see the two women standing at a bank of computers.
“Why blood?” I squeak again.
“You need it after all the blood you lost during the first two parts of The Cleansing,” the one on the right says.
“What is all of this for?” I ask.
“It removes your Methrodine dependency,” the other one says.
“For good?” I ask curiously.
“We think so.”
“You think so?” I croak.
“Yes, we have done this to all our members and about three hundred others have bargained us too,” the first woman begins. “It has worked on all of us.”
“And we have only lost three people during the process,” the other woman says, proud of that fact.
I can see why some people could have died during this horrendous process.
“So, no more Methrodine?” I ask. “For any of us?”
“This is true. We know some of the members of your group were given a defender which woke them up from the drug,” the first woman says.
“But that only woke them up and defended them against death, not got rid of the drug dependency all together,” the second woman finishes.
“So, you have got to strip me down, take my skin from me and my blood, and put someone else’s blood into me, but you haven’t once told me who you are!” I say, sternly. “How does that work? You know my name and every inch of me.”
“This is true,” the first woman says. “My name is Rita; I am a Bath House nurse at The Facility.”
“And I am Cloe,” the other woman introduces herself. “I am a nurse in training,” she smiles.
“Nice to meet you Rita and Cloe, well not nice to meet you, but anyway, what can I do?”
“Is there something wrong, miss?” Rita asks.
“Is there something wrong?” I begin to raise my voice. “Is there something wrong? You mean besides me laying here half dead with someone else’s blood coming into my body. Not to mention all of this was against my will! Not one person asked if I wanted to do this. And on top of that, it confuses me that if you guys are a part of The Elected who is putting Methrodine into us, why are you taking it out?”
The nurses who have been nice to me this whole time speak to me with gentleness, yet there must be some sort of anger behind the surface somewhere.
“First,” Cloe starts, “it isn’t someone else’s blood, it is yours.”
“Huh,” I huff, not comprehending.
“The acid shower took the dirt and grime off your skin,” Rita begins, “it cleansed you for the second process which took needles to take your blood, putting it into a tank under the table.”
“What happens in the tank?” I ask the women on the screen.
“Your blood is aerated with a mix we call Metho Agent, it is a solvent designed in our lab and approved by The Elected, that takes the Methrodine out of your blood.” Rita smiles.
“Then we hook a tube to the tank below you, insert it into your arm, and put your blood back in at the very moment you are about to run out,” Cloe smiles. “What blood is left in your system is so little it purifies on contact.”
“I see,” I say with a decrease of temper. “That just leaves, why this was done without my permission and what is the point if you are part of The Elected and they pumped us full of the
