[Past] The snake eyes 1

"312, 311, 310, 309…"

The girl's voice echoed, flat and lifeless, bouncing off the stark white walls of the cuboid room. It was a perfect box—white ceiling, white floor, three white walls sealing them in like a tomb. No windows, no slivers for sunlight to sneak through, just an unrelenting brightness from the ceiling LEDs that painted everything in a cold, clinical glow.

In place of a fourth wall, two blast-proof glass doors stood rigid, their surfaces gleaming with an electronic sheen, locked tight by a faint, persistent hum. Beyond them stretched a hallway of identical cells, a sterile maze where light and shadow played no games—only the harsh glare of artificial day.

Figures in white lab coats drifted through the corridor, their steps soft as whispers, clipboards clutched like shields. One paused at the glass—a clean-shaven man, his glasses slipping down his nose, his pen scratching as he peered inside.

Two girls lay on narrow cots, heads sunk into thin pillows, their small bodies swathed in plain white gowns. He jotted a note, his gaze detached, then shuffled to the next room, a phantom among phantoms.

Inside, the girls paid him no mind. Their eyes—wide, unseeing—stared at the ceiling, chasing ghosts in the blank expanse. The counting rolled on, a threadbare tether to sanity in this bleached void.

"308, 307, 306…"

The girl's monotone unraveled, slow and steady, a ritual she'd clung to for hours—maybe days. Time dissolved here, a shapeless haze of repetition.

This room had become their world three days after their mother traded them away, her face a smudge they'd already started to scrub from memory.

The old house—its sagging roof, the shouts, the gnawing hunger—faded fast. Here, at least, meals arrived steaming and rich: broth with tender chunks of meat, rice that didn't clump, vegetables that crunched. Twice daily, a lab coat delivered fruit jellies—vibrant orange and red cubes that quivered on their spoons, a treat they ate under stern supervision, savoring each bite like a secret.

They'd bombarded everyone with questions at first. "Why're we here?" they'd demanded of the lab coats. "Where'd Mama go?" they'd pleaded with the black-suited guards stalking the halls. "What's that buzzing thing?" they'd chirped at the woman who hauled in buckets of tepid water for their baths, her expression as blank as stone.

Even the twitchy kid across the hall—pale, all elbows and staring eyes—got a "What's your name?" through the glass. Silence answered every time, a wall as solid as the ones around them.

A week in, their words dried up—tales of home, half-remembered games, dreams of trees and wind. So they turned to each other, spinning stories to fend off the emptiness. The girl with light brown hair, her locks a soft cascade past her shoulders, wove a tale of a princess locked in a tower, her voice trembling with hope as she described the prince's silver sword.

Her twin, identical save for the faintest differences in their light brown strands, countered with a cunning fox outsmarting hunters, her tone quick and sly. They laughed over a fantasy of riding away on horseback, then fell quiet imagining this place—a fortress of secrets, its depths humming with unseen life.

"305, 304, 303…"

A month slouched by, each day a dull echo, until one night ruptured the pattern. After their jelly—tart, sticky, a fleeting joy—a voice pierced the room, the first they'd heard. "They're ready," it said, sharp and low, crackling from beyond the glass.

The sisters froze, spoons clattering, their eyes locking in the dimness. Sleep eluded them, that phrase circling their minds like a vulture.

Morning dragged them awake, not on their cots but strapped to beds in a new room—white still, but alive with menace. Machines loomed, their metal limbs studded with wires and blinking lights, their hum a predator's growl. For the first time, they were apart, belts cutting into their wrists and ankles, electrodes clinging to their skin like icy leeches.

Surgical masks hovered above, eyes cold behind visors, hands gloved and precise. It started with a needle—a quick jab in their arms, a pinch they shrugged off.

Then the pain hit.

Their bodies seized, spines bowing as electricity roared through them, a wildfire that scorched their nerves and choked their screams. It wasn't just hurt—it was a theft, a remaking of their marrow, their breath, their being. They trembled, minds blank, drowning in agony and the faint, desperate wish: Stop.