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door to look down at the rest of the unfortunate ones. Shock must have worn off because now the guards were having to the push the rest of the new prisoners towards those deadly double doors. The sight was awful. They shrieked and scrambled to run away, but there were too many guards. Before long, they had managed to force all of them through the doors to their certain doom. When the last frantically grasping arm had been shoved inside, I knew that there was no hope for them.
    I couldn’t watch anymore. I sat on one of the lower bunks and shut my eyes with my hands over my ears in a desperate attempt to drown out the screaming. That terrible, hideous screaming. This place was hell. I had been sentenced to a three-year term in hell, and I had been foolish enough to think this was some sort of break. I just wanted it all to stop. I prayed silently to make all the horrible screaming stop. Suddenly and without warning, the screams ceased just like they had before, and we were left with the even more disgusting silence.

Chapter Five
    Anna, five years later
    Alarms rang in my ears louder than I remembered anything ever sounding in my short life. The guard was rank with freshly spilled blood, and I struggled not to partake in its flavor. The others around me had inky eyes, so I knew it was hard for them too. We didn’t have time to stop.
    Pushing through the corridor, we tore past a number of armed guards. All of their weapons, all of their training and loud shouts, it meant nothing. Half of them died before the orders to stop escaped their throats. No one could have stopped us.
    We found the laboratory easily. It smelled sterile, like disinfectants and clean metal. Nothing else here smelled sharp and precise the way this room did. It wasn’t natural. That much was clear. I knew this must be the place.
    The scientists were here. They were running around like frightened mice and burning every scrap of paper in sight. The collective thrum of their panicked heart beats echoed throughout the room. It sounded like a collective rolling thunder to us. My throat suddenly felt dry again and the urge to satiate it with the blood of these monsters was overwhelming.
    We dispersed and didn’t hold back. The smell of ash and smoke from the burning papers was overcome by the tangy scent of newly splattered blood on the walls. These were the men. These were the eyes behind that camera that had watched us for years. They had made us animals, and now their pet dogs were rebelling. It would have been poetic had it not been so gruesome.
    I cornered one skinny man holding a large folder in his hand. His eyes were wide and frightened, and the only thing between us was a wooden table. Any time I wanted, I knew I could easily flip that table away and he was mine. All the power belonged to me this time. Not the guards with the guns, not this man with his needles and lab coat. Me, I had the power. He was mine, and I was the agent of sweet revenge.
    “Anna, don’t! I know that you don’t want to kill me.”
    This stopped me in my tracks. He knew my name, my real name.
    “You know my name? You know because you watched me?”
    “Yes. I know a lot about you, Anna. I know you don’t want to hurt people anymore. I know you still feel for humans. Please, I can help you.”
    I dug my nails into the table. “How can you possibly help me?”
    “I can tell you the way out. I can help you.”
    “We can figure it out.”
    I moved to the left and he moved to his right, always keeping the table between us. He knew I could rip the table to shreds any time I wanted. Why was I waiting?
    “I can give you this, Anna,” he said as he held out the file he was holding to me like a peace offering.
    I looked at the worn folder and back at him.
    “What is it, and why should I care?”
    “It’s you. I mean, it’s your file. It’s how we made you. You’re different than the others, Anna. In here are the answers. I know you want this.”
    I stared at this little man