- AUTHORS NOTE - 
I don't normally write these, but this is just a little note to say thank you so so much to all of my readers! Why? Because this book just hit 1K views! Thank you so much for that, I actually cannot express how grateful I am in enough words. I hope you are all enjoying this book as much as I enjoy writing it. Thank you again! 

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Manipulation Room victim no. 20192
Name: Celeste Yankee 
Age: 17 years old 
Occupation: Student 
Family Member: 17-year-old brother, Judas 
Description: Throat under immense pressure from strangulation, death after 7.5 seconds of choking. 

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I woke up to the sound of yelling echoing around my cell. It was a sudden noise that had caught me totally off guard. I sat up, groaning as my limbs felt weak and painful. My back felt numb from the ground too. The chill from the cold had penetrated through Ezra's coat and the bare skin from my belly was completely desensitized. 

When I looked to Ezra, I found him grasping the bars to the front of his cell with his healthy hand, his eyes burning with fury. In his intense silence he somehow screamed with his whole body. The eyes wide with horror, the mouth rigid and open, his chalky face gaunt and immobile, the fists clenched with blanched knuckles and the nails digging deeply into the palms of his hand.

That was before the shouting began. "Put him down, you f**king monsters!" He yelled, pressing his forehead against the metal bars as his expression grew desperate. A chill ran through my spine as I heard his yell. It made me shudder as a freezing cold wind would wake someone. My blood ran cold and a bead of sweat dripped down my face. I sat there helpless, not knowing what to do and too scared to even think. What was happening? By the time he had finished yelling, his voice was so hoarse he could barely speak. "Mr Allen-Blue!" He cried. "Cedric. Ezra, it's Cedric." That was Mr Allen-Blue (or apparently, Cedric) , his voice hoarse and thickly coated with fear. He was trying to make light of the situation, with a light-hearted joke but it failed miserably. 

"Ezra! Ezra, I'll be okay! Tell Lyric not to worry!" He added, the fear still strong in his voice. I sat up fully, arching my back, my whole body shaking from fear. "Ezra, Ezra, what's happening?" I stood up, flinging myself at the bars and seeing passed them. That's when I saw it. 

Two large soldiers were holding each of Mr Allen-Blue- sorry, Cedric's arms forcefully, dragging him out of his cell that could be partially seen from the front of our cells. He looked exactly the same as he had a month ago, but somehow completely different at the same time. His hair hung around his neck in scraggly, brown strands, greasy and coated in dust. His face seemed blue, covered in long, jagged facial hair from a lack of shaving. His eyes were blood-shot and tired; it seemed that no amount of sleep would get rid of the tears, eye-bags and dilated pupils. Even his clothes were a picture of pure despair. He was wearing the same shirt I'd seen him 'die' in; it was clinging where it shouldn't and hanging loose where it shouldn't. His jeans had rips too, but I don't think that was a fashion choice. 

When he caught sight of me, watching him with pure terror, he tried his hardest to smile. It just crumpled from the pain of the two soldiers, and he pressed his eyes shut as more tears fell. "Lyric." Ezra exhaled, moving closer to my cell. "What are you doing? Let go of him!" I cried, glaring at the soldiers as they violently pulled him away from the cell. "It's okay, Lyric. I'll be okay." Cedric sighed, tears trailing down his cheeks. Ezra stared at him uncertainly; we both knew he wouldn't be. 

I banged my hands against the bars, close to tears, "Let go of him! Where are you taking him?!" 
"You're twisted! The lot of you!" Ezra yelled, pressing his forehead against the bars and cursing under his breath. "Oh, shut it!" One of the soldiers growled,  pulling Cedric forcefully by an arm and tugging him through the dark room. And that's when one voice cut through all the others. 

"Did he take Capsule Kartika B-7?" Thanatos asked, walking out of the darkness and into the light. One of the soldiers grunted a response, "Yes, Sir. He took two doses yesterday with chromium fluoride and distilled water to make it comestible."
Thanatos nodded, "Good work, Sitka. Take him away. You know where I want him." 
The soldiers didn't await any further instruction. They pulled Cedric by the arms and dragged him into the shadows. I heard his squeal as he was pulled away, flashing me a worried glance before he was gone completely. 

"Where are you taking him?!" I pleaded, turning to face Thanatos whose eyes were glued on Cedric's now empty cell. "That's none of your concern. You two stay out of trouble...I'll be back for you both." He replied. 
"Where will you take us?" Ezra demanded. 
"You both ask too many questions."
"You give us too many actions to question." 

"Where's Cedric going and where are you planning on taking us?" I demanded, gripping the bars tightly with both hands. "If you really think I'm planning on telling you, then you're not as smart as I thought you were." Thanatos cackled, shaking his head. "And if you do anything to him, then you're just as much of a monster as I thought you were!" Ezra spat back, his blue eyes burning with fury. Well, the hottest fires always do burn blue. I saw that when I looked in his eyes. Ezra was the kindest most genuine boy I knew, but he had an anger that could burn down whole buildings. A fire that was too bright in him to extinguish. 

Thanatos ignored him and stared at the bare skin on my belly, raising an eyebrow, "Is it really that hot in here?" 
"It wasn't-" I cut myself off. I didn't need to explain myself to him. He pointed from Ezra to me, "Unless you two have been-" 
"-how dare you! We're in separate cells, pondering our near deaths. Not that it would be any of your concern anyway!" Ezra interrupted, staring at the ground, his cheeks tinted pink from a mix of fear, anger and embarrassment. 

"Well, there's no denying you two are more than friends." Thanatos chuckled, enjoying seeing Ezra so rattled. I wasn't as easily frustrated, but Thanatos was clicking all the right buttons. "Don't claim to know anything about relationships; you're just a sick, twisted man." Ezra folded his arms, wincing as he touched his bandage. Thanatos stared at it, a sinister smile twisting on his lips. "Ah, I see. How...sweet." He muttered. 

He pointed to Ezra's coat and fleece vest, lying in a hap-hazard pile on the floor of my cell. "You two love sharing your clothes, don't you?" He chuckled. "That's what happens when you care about someone...you should try it some time." Ezra mumbled, rolling his eyes subtly. Thanatos folded his arms, fixing Ezra in a deadly stare. "You may not believe me but I loved someone once." He uttered, cracking his knuckles slowly and with an eerie determination. 

"And I care because?" Ezra really was not putting up with Thanatos at all. He was braver than I could be. Didn't he know this man could kill him? He was sentencing himself to death! Thanatos ignored him entirely, turning to face me instead. "Her name was Celeste, and she was very dear to me. Do you want to know what happened to her?" 
"No, not particularly." Ezra mumbled, sarcastic and careless. I tried to catch his eye, to tell him to tread more lightly, and be more careful. I couldn't catch his attention though, as he was silently staring at the floor. 

Thanatos sighed, "I killed her." 
At that, we both looked up, our eyes filled with fear. We knew this man was capable of causing harm, but to kill someone he cared about? Maybe Ezra was right. He couldn't truly care about anyone. He cleared his throat, "The Manipulation Room may not serve it's true purpose now. But it did, once. And once, I was a victim. Forced to kill my own girlfriend at age seventeen. I strangled her." 

Ezra gulped, biting his lip as he stared at the ground. "I hate that goddamn room more than anything! It took everything from me!" Thanatos yelled, punching a wall and causing Ezra and I to flinch. "Death...you think I like death? I don't, I hate it. I hate it! Death and dying and...you don't understand. You never will and I don't expect you to." 

I breathed in before I spoke, "If you hate it so much, why is the Manipulation Room still in use? If not for the population crisis." 
He stared at me, pausing, "I kept the Manipulation Room, but I changed it's use. It no longer holds death. It's quite the opposite actually." 
The opposite? I folded my arms, determined, and cleared my throat, "If the Manipulation Room isn't for killing people...what is it for? Why is Cedric, and probably all the others still alive?" 

He chuckled, shaking his head, "I've already said too much. It isn't of your concern." 
"You're not going to tell us?" I spat. He raised an eyebrow, "Why should I?" 
"What are you planning on doing with us?" Ezra demanded. Thanatos waved over two soldiers, that I hadn't seen standing in the corner of the room. When they stepped out of the shadows I saw that one of them looked familiar. He was the same soldier from a few days ago,  who we'd overheard say 'they're onto us.' The same soldier who'd hit on me and caused Ezra to become jealous. 

When he saw me, his eyes widened in stunned surprise before he caught Thanatos looking and his face turned to stone again. It shocked me how he could simply turn off his emotions like that. "Officer Palatino, your shift has ended. Silvera, come with me. I must tell you what I have planned for them. You can call on Raven for help, if you require it." Thanatos ordered. 'what I have planned for them' I flashed Ezra a worried look and he gave me a reassuring smile, though there was uncertainty in his eyes. 

The first soldier, who I had recognised, saluted before standing at attention, "Yes, Sir." He squeaked, his confidence from our first meeting dissipating into thin air. The second soldier stomped off and Thanatos looked Ezra up and down before doing the same to me and then disappearing with Silvera and escaping my line of view. The first soldier stayed where he was standing. 

Ezra fixed the soldier, whose name I knew once but had managed to forget, in an angry stare. "Hello...Lysander." He mumbled, still gripping the bars tightly with one arm. That was his name...Lysander. Of course. Lysander glared at him, though not with nearly as much fury. "It's Officer Palatino to you." 
Ezra scoffed, rolling his eyes again, "You wish." He really couldn't have cared less about the government and their so-called 'authority'. He had no fear. I admired that deeply. 

Lysander's eyes drifted to the bare skin on my stomach and I was immediately uncomfortable. This wasn't like Ezra seeing my skin, which I was incredibly okay with and actually liked. This was a boy I barely knew and didn't plan on knowing either. I pointed to both of my eyes and fixed him in a glare that could've frozen a whole lake. "My eye's are up here." 
He cleared his throat and looked up, "Yes. Of course." He wasn't nearly as intimidating as he tried to be and it was somewhat laughable. 

"How are you?" He asked, after a long and incredibly awkward silence. He smiled at me and I smiled back, for a reason I don't even know of. I'm not sure why, now that I thought of it. Ezra was glaring at him and he was glaring back. The hostility between them was increasingly evident. "Don't talk to us like you're a friend. You work for him, correct?" Ezra didn't wait for a reply. "Then you're no friend of ours." He pushed himself away from the bars and sat on the floor at the back of his cell, wincing as his bandaged hand hit the floor. When he looked at the bandage, the fabric, which was previously lilac, had turned red. Crimson was breaking through the soft lilac colour and it was clear the bleeding hadn't stopped. 

I turned towards him, staying at the front of my cell, "Ezra, are you okay?" 
He peeled back the fabric and grimaced before tightening it with extreme difficulty and groaning with the pain. "I'm fine. Don't worry about it." 
Lysander cleared his throat, "If you're injured, I could call a medic. Thanatos will want you in fit condition for what he has planned. 
"Then I'd rather die." Ezra spat, pressing his back against the back wall of his cell. I stared at him concernedly as he frowned in a pained expression. 

I turned to face Lysander, "You said you liked a challenge?" 
His face was blank for a second before he remembered what he had said to me a week ago. "Yes..." He whispered, creasing his forehead at me.

 "Then I have a challenge for you."