It started with a spark. Awareness struck suddenly and clearly into its mind. It was… a person. A human. The very first thought that came to its head was what it was. A living human being. Information flowed rapidly after the acknowledgement of this fact. Words. Numbers. Knowledge. Simple facts of physics. Survival. Understanding. Communication. The mind reeled at the rate in which this information flowed in. It was too much all at once, and the poor creature passed out before it could acknowledge what was happening with its newfound logical mind.

Next came sensation. A calm as consciousness returned. The sound of gently flowing liquid all around. The feeling of air being pumped into lungs. It took several moments before listening and breathing became automatic. It felt like control. Muscles twitched as the thing’s limbs and digits were manipulated, and it began to learn how to move them itself. The being still wouldn’t do so without prompt, finding no reason for it just yet. It instead focused on organizing the thoughts it had been given. Just what was all that it had learned? What was it meant for? It was… no, she… she was still missing something. Sight. Finally finding reason to reach up, she searched for what was blocking her vision and found numerous wires and plugs. Something metal over her face.

She panicked, suddenly feeling insecure about the plate over her eyes, but she found her underdeveloped muscles couldn’t find purchase just yet. She couldn’t get it off. After the moment of panic passed, she resigned herself to being deprived of one of her senses for now. Reason was washing over her as she started to wonder just where she was, what was happening to her, why it felt like she was floating. And she wondered why she had no memories at all to compare any of this to. Was this all there was? As far as she knew, all existence was floating in this emptiness. Would something happen soon? She hoped so. It was becoming terribly dull.

She reached once more for the plate in front of her eyes and this time found her fingers fitting around it. It was surprisingly easy now to pull the mask free, where it floated slowly down past her to the floor. She could see she was indeed floating in a liquid. Looking down, she could see her small body, covered in wires and tubes. She instinctively knew they were an important part of her. Something she needed to live. So she left them be for now. She instead looked beyond herself, seeing a clear barrier in front of her. She reached for it, but found it too far away without straining the equipment she was hooked into. So she waited. She couldn’t see anything beyond the barrier anyway. And this place was, in its own way, comforting. Surely there was no better place to stay.

She waited and waited and waited. This was life, she began to suspect. This is what it is to be human. To float and breathe and just… be. And it was something she was content to live in. It was paradise.

But… not all paradises can last. She had no idea how long she’d been floating when the next unfamiliar sensation came. Instead of filling with the air she’d been accustomed to, she felt for the first time, pain, as her lungs filled with something else. Panic filled her mind, wondering what had changed, what she had done wrong. She had relied on this system her whole life and it had worked well until this very moment. Weakly, she lifted her arms to try to push away from the machinery hooked into her, but she found that her muscles had atrophied from disuse. She could no longer pull anymore of the instruments from her person. The pain built higher and higher. The girl choking on what had once been the life-giving gas, flailing impotently in her case as she pondered if this suffering was also part of the human experience. Such thoughts wouldn’t last long, however, until the girl’s mind went blank. And she returned to the blackness from which she came, never to think again. Her eyes glazed over as her consciousness left just as easily as it came.

On the other side of the glass, on a dim red screen, flashed the words ‘system failure’ over the chamber, a silent alarm blaring to no one in the dark metal room full of identical cylinders, all of which still sat dark. And soon, even that flashing panel shut down.

—

The girl took a deep gasping breath, choking on the liquid that had briefly flowed into her nose while the devices disconnected and the chamber drained itself dry. She laid on the floor of the chamber, shivering. Her long, wet, silver hair clung haphazardly to her face as she slowly became accustomed to breathing her own air. The water finally came out and she found herself spitting it up onto the floor, where it too drained away under her.

What in the world was happening? Where was she? Who was she? She held her head, grasping for answers that weren’t there as she tried to make sense of the world through her newly cleared vision. She was inside of some kind of circular room. A clear barrier was in place over one side of the wall, and she groaned quietly as she became accustomed to the air all around her. This was too much. Everything was too bright, the noises of the drain below her were too loud, and everything she touched felt like unbearable pressure. It would take some time for her to acclimate to the changing environment.

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She was going to stay still with her eyes closed on the floor of the room for the foreseeable future, but the sound of depressurizing pistons lifting away from the chamber made her wince before curiosity overcame her. The clear wall was lifting away, and she felt fresher air flowing into the chamber before she heard the sounds of others groaning and breathing heavily outside. She wasn’t alone.

She begrudgingly opened her eyes again and followed the voices, seeing another girl in an identical chamber across from her. She too was propped up against the far wall, struggling to catch her breath as the walls between them lifted away, and they couldn’t help but stare at each other, looking exhausted despite the fact that they had never moved before this, and it was looking to be a monumental effort for both of them. She knew the words, so she called out weakly “Hello…?” she coughed, her vocal cords straining at just the simple greeting.

The girl across from her looked across as well, then glanced up above the girl’s chamber before choking out the word “Two…”

She looked up as well and saw the girl across from her had the number three above her chamber. “Three.” she managed back. The other girl just nodded in response. They didn’t have names, so they would do as designations.

Another chamber was next to Three, marked One, but it wasn’t opening. The liquid inside looked murky. Unclean. And the lights that were showing uncertain bits of data on Three’s chamber were dark on One’s.

Two pushed against the wall, breathing heavily as she shakily pushed herself to her knees. Something happened here. She wasn’t sure what, but the life of calm stasis she’d led before was over now, and she was determined to figure out why. Doubling over again on her way up, though, she found her strength wanting.

“Don’t.” Three sighed “Not yet.” and Two found herself falling back against the wall in agreement. Much as she wanted to figure this out, there was no way she’d be able to handle moving around just yet. “Just rest.” she coughed again, still not used to using her voice.

“What’s… What is this?” Two asked, wondering if Three might know more than she did.

“Not sure.” Three replied, glancing worriedly at the other chamber opposite her “Four… F-Four is…” she started, then just went quiet for a bit “Four’s not waking up.” she finally said with a grim tone of voice.

“Neither is One.” Two called back, starting to catch her breath as she actually rested. She wondered if it was the same problem as four had. “How many is there?”

A different voice, just as pained and rough as each of their own called from further away “Six didn’t open.” she called, adding to the conversation “And four’s dead.”

Two choked in surprise both at the voice and the news it conveyed “Dead?” she asked incredulously. Two admittedly had to wonder if that was the case with One, but how could the other voice sound so certain about that?

Three let out a sigh, hoping to deliver that news in a less blunt way “Yeah. She got wrapped up in the cables when they released and… she’s dead.” she said sadly, a bit of irritation in her voice at the other girl’s bluntness “So I guess there’s three of us. Two, Three…”

“Is that really what we’re gonna call each other? Guess that makes me Five.” came the other voice “But I think there’s four of us. I can hear… well, guess she’s Seven.”

“Then how do we know there isn’t-” Two groaned and made another effort to stand, this time getting to her hands and knees “We have to figure out what’s happening.” she managed to lift herself up to her feet, stumbling back and standing shakily against the wall.

“Calm down, you’re going to hurt yourself.” Three scolded, continuing to sit still at the back of her chamber and motioning for Two to do the same.

Two clicked her tongue, sounding impatient “I’ll go slow. I just need to… see where we are.” she leaned hard against the wall as she stumbled her way to the front of her chamber, slowly getting her bearings on the world moving around her. The nausea was overshadowed by her deep desire to learn what situation they were in together. She managed to peek her head out of the chamber, looking around at a sterile room full of cobbled-together machinery behind each of the chambers they resided in. Looking further down, she could indeed see that every door on the other side had opened up, save for One, and Two and Four were the only opened doors on her side. “Yeah… I think that’s it. I think there’s seven doors.”

Three nodded “Has Seven said anything yet?” she called down the row, hoping to shore up their ranks.

“No.” Five answered back “I can hear them moving though. Pretty sure that means she’s alive.”

Two grabbed hold of a railing that ran along the middle of the room between the chambers, slowly taking step after pain-staking step toward Seven’s chamber. She looked up at her own chamber to confirm that hers said 2, but told herself that she didn’t want to look into the open room of Four. She wasn’t sure what to expect, but given how reluctant Three was to speak of it, she wasn’t confident she would like what she’d see. A few more strained steps and she saw into Five’s room. She looked almost exactly like Three, but a little bit bigger. Bulkier. She wondered then if she looked as similar. Five just gave a half-hearted wave before groaning and leaning back again in exhaustion. Two turned and took a brief look at Six’s chamber, but it was completely empty. It wasn’t even filled with filth like One’s was, and the door remained closed.

Finally, she came to the end of the row and looked in on Seven, letting out a gasp of surprise and tripping down to the floor when she saw the last of their crew. She looked nearly identical, but smaller than the other girls. More importantly, she had a dripping red gash across her chest and was wincing in pain on the floor “Help…” she called weakly.