The Woodlands

I felt a shiver of dread run through me. I wasn’t sure I could even ask her the next question.

“What happened to them?” I could hear Clara sniffing. She was crying, a choked, crackly sound.

“I heard two of the people in white talking while they were cleaning my room. Something about a waste.” She hesitated and took a breath before imitating the conversation she had heard, “What a perfect waste of time and money, a waste of two perfectly viable fetuses and two good breeders.”

I could hear her wiping her face with her arm as she uttered, “I think they killed them. No, I’m sure they’re dead.” For the first time, she sounded as hopeless as I felt.

I felt the need to protect her, to preserve that shining light. “Maybe they didn’t, Clara. Maybe they just moved them to another place. Gave them another purpose.”

“Maybe,” she said breathlessly, but I don’t think she really believed me. I didn’t believe it myself. If life in Pau Brasil had taught me anything, it was that the Superiors were not merciful.

“You need to sleep. Shut your eyes and we’ll work it out in the morning,” I said, trying, unsuccessfully, to sound soothing. Trying really hard not to sound petrified. Because I was. If the girls were from Clara’s room, it wouldn’t be long before the white coats worked out what we’d done. And once they did, acting dopey wasn’t going to save us. I was sure they would be coming for us soon.

I woke up coughing, tears filling my stinging, itchy eyes. Clara was coughing too. The lights were still off, but as I watched, strips of light started illuminating the floor like miniature airstrips. It felt like my lungs were on fire. It wasn’t like smoke from a fire. It was odorless but leaving a bitter taste in my mouth when I exhaled. I couldn’t see where it was coming from and it was filling the room fast. I thought—this is it. They have finally worked out that we are aware. They were going to gas us to death. I fumbled around, trying to disco

I could breathe a little better, down on the cold, linoleum floor. I called to Clara, my voice raspy and hoarse, “Clara get down on the floor.” I could vaguely see the shadow of her awkward form climbing carefully out of bed as the photo wall flickered images I’d never seen before, a window with grey wool curtains, a desk with a photo frame on it, stacks of Woodland textbooks dog-eared lying in the corner. An old wooden chair projected over Clara’s back as she used the wall to support herself as she got down on the floor. I cursed her careful movement and wished she would move faster.

We started crawling towards the door, an oppressive cloud of smoke hovering just over our heads. The machines started disco

“No‚” she responded quickly. “I think it was my bag of fluids.” Relieved, I reached for the handle. I was about to open the door when it slammed into me from the outside and knocked me to the floor. Someone strong picked me up under my arms, dragged me out the door, and then went back for Clara.

What I saw in the poorly lit hall was absolute chaos.

It was a war zone: girls coughing and screaming. Disoriented and frightened. The white coats were trying to get them into a line, but they kept wandering off, banging into walls, into each other. Each of them lost in their own foggy panic. Clara and I were pushed towards a wall that had a long bar ru

Finally the darkness lifted; I could see Clara in front of me. I put my hand on her shoulder, determined not to lose her in the crowd. Now that I could see better, it was apparent the gas was a curious, dark purple. I held my breath for a minute but buckled quickly, watching the gas move into my mouth as I breathed in and seeing it, as it came out, like it was almost solid. Clara’s breath was the same. Other girls were mesmerized by the same phenomenon, but when they breathed out the smoke was tinted pink.

We walked passed a window. A real window. Clara was right. We weren’t that far underground. Sunlight was streaming through it like an invitation. We were on the surface. One of the people in white went to the window and tried to open it. He heaved and strained, his face showing his panic and exertion, but it didn’t move. “It’s no good, it’s sealed‚” he said to the one that had a hold of my arm. “We’ll have to take them outside.”

I felt the grip on my arm tighten as I was strongly guided to two large, locked, security doors. One of them typed in a key code and spoke into a microphone while the other one pushed his fingertip into a jelly-like substance. There was a sharp beep and then a voice said, “Prints incomplete”.

“You’re too sweaty,” one of them said in frustration, girls squashing him up against the wall. “Wipe your hand and try again.” I could see the purple cloud thickening around us. Bubbling and pushing into the corners. Some of the girls were on the floor, survival instincts telling them they could breathe better down there. The coughing was deafeningly loud. The room kept filling with girls as more and more of them came up from below. Just when you thought no more would fit, more would come, and you were forced to compress yourself further.

“Verification complete,” the computer voice said and the doors swung open. The men repeated the process again, at the second set of doors, swapping who used their fingerprints and who used their voice as verification. The second set of doors swung open but the first set of doors we had walked through was trying to close, banging against hapless girls. Continuously knocking them over, as they were carried through on a wave of bodies. I saw one of the white coats take off his shoes and shove them under one of the doors, jamming it, so the girls could get through. It creaked and groaned as it tried to pull back to closing.

I stumbled into the outside world, turning around to see purple smoke billowing out the doors and into the sky. Fighting its way into the air, like a hundred purple worms, intertwining, squirming, and pushing out in different directions. Girls were spilling out, some crawling, some being dragged, some kicked along by impatient white coats. There were hundreds of them, they just kept coming and coming.

I looked down at my feet, registering the squelchy, wet feeling between my bare toes. I inhaled deeply, enjoying my first taste of the sweet, fresh air. Delicious. Sca

Heels of hands pushed us backwards, as far away from the doors as we could get, so we were right up against the rough, puzzle piece bark of towering trees. I was eased down onto a moss-covered log. The smells of damp, decomposing wood made my heart do little flips. Clara was right next to me and was guided to the ground as well but by pale, willowy arms. It was Apella. “Stay there,” she said, fa