Two stared at her bleeding companion for a few moments before she called back across the room to the others “Three! Five! Seven’s injured!”

“Great, so only three of us…” Five groaned from deep inside her room.

On the other hand, Two could immediately hear Three starting to heave herself up off the floor “H-How injured? Is she dying?”

Two shook her head, unsure how to assess the cut she was looking at. “I-I dunno, I heard her asking for help though. She’s got a cut. A big cut. It’s bleeding.” she tried to remain calm, but she was becoming anxious at the thought of losing yet another and being left to just three.

Three managed to get through the door of her room, peeking out and marveling at the rest of the room for only a moment before she too began crawling along the rail Two had used “Is she still breathing?”

Two looked in at the girl, but all she could see was the bright red gash dripping slowly “H-How do I tell?” she asked the still-distant Three.

“What? You don’t know…?” Three started, then shook her head and continued forward at the same slow pace “Is her chest moving up and down?”

Two nodded. That made sense when she thought about it. Paying attention to the details, she saw Seven taking shallow breaths and reported back “Yeah, she’s breathing.”

Three panted, looking in on Five as she passed and motioning for her to get up “Come on, she’s got the right idea. We need to figure out what’s happening.” she muttered before she continued forward “You… I mean Two, you need to look around. Find bandages… cloth even. Anything like that.”

That, Two understood. She nodded, pushing herself up to her feet again. It was easier this time. Her exhaustion was starting to fade, slowly but surely. She still needed the rail to balance on, but she continued further into the room regardless, toward what looked like an array of lab benches. Meanwhile, Three walked in to Seven’s room and dropped to the floor again, her legs giving out just as Two’s had earlier “Take a deep breath.” Two could hear her saying “I know, it hurts, just let me see.”

Two gulped, hoping this wasn’t for nothing. She managed to break away from the rail and slammed into one of the lab benches, using it as a crutch to take a look around the room. Almost immediately, she spotted something on the wall. A lab coat hanging from one of several hooks. Cloth. She stumbled her way up to it and dragged it down to the floor with a gentle tug. The girl reached out her arm and felt her muscles begging to go further, stretching out and letting herself relax at last, the strain all but disappearing all at once. Seemed her body was done complaining about simple movement and got with the program. She took the coat back toward the chambers and walked into Seven’s room.

Three sat over top of the other girl, holding one of her hands before she looked up at Two, astounded to see her moving so readily “A long scratch. But it’s just a scratch. I’ll dress this up, but we’ll need to find disinfectant soon. She’ll live.” she reached for the coat and Two let her take it.

“Good. That’s good.” Two sounded relieved as she grabbed hold of the rail again. Functioning muscles or not, she was still tired. She looked over to Five’s chamber to see her beginning to climb out at last “I don’t suppose any of you have any idea what… any of this is?”

Five panted and shook her head. Now that she was standing, Two could tell just how much bigger she was. Not that much taller, but she looked like she was stronger. Bulkier. They all looked like the same person, but with slight differences.

“No idea.” Three concurred while she began wrapping the shirt tightly over the wound, eliciting whines from Seven “I just know I woke up in that room, the water drained away, I watched Four die and here I am holding a laceration shut.”

“Yeah, that’s about where I’m at too.” Two nodded, wondering if she should inspect the lab again “Umm, okay, let’s see. We… We’re sisters maybe? We all look alike.”

“Could be. We all look like a family.” Five chimed in, making her own way up to Two and proving that she was actually ever so slightly taller “I don’t remember much of anything though.”

Two held her head “Amnesia?” she asked, wondering what they must have been like before this.

“Maybe.” Three said, tying a tight knot in the fabric and looking up “She shouldn’t be moving around in this state anyway. Let’s try to figure this out. Two, you didn’t know how to check for breathing and you couldn’t assess this wound. Right?”

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“I guess I just panicked and didn’t think.” Two looked away, embarrassed that she didn’t think of something that now seemed so obvious.

“Nono, I thought you’d know because I know.” Three explained what she was thinking “So… we don’t all know the same things. That’s something.”

Two nodded “Good point. Maybe you were a doctor?”

Three shook her head “I’m too young to be a doctor.” she started to try and push herself up, but Seven let out a whine and she went to grab her hand again “It’s okay, I’m gonna stay here with you.” she assured the smaller girl.

“Seven’s even younger.” Two noted “I think Five might be older than us?” she said uncertainly

“That mean I’m in charge?” Five wondered, glancing back toward Four’s chamber and wondering if she was supposed to have been the oldest.

“Is that really what you’re thinking about right now?” Two asked incredulously as she followed the rail back toward the lab “We need to figure out so many things, it’s too soon to think about who the leader is.” she said as she started to open cabinets and drawers, looking for some kind of documentation, anything that might hint to just what this place was. No papers anywhere, just a few glass and plastic slates of some kind and a lot of glass lab equipment. She intuited that this must have been a chemistry lab of some kind.

“Find anything?” Five asked after her after a few minutes passed.

“I… don’t know.” she mumbled, picking up one of the slates. It was thin and light. Several shaped holes were on all the edges and one side was a glossy reflective surface “Any idea what this is?” she held it up for Five to see. She shook her head and Two just put it down on the table. She went to a different station only to find it was a lot more of the same. She eyed a heavy metal door on the other side of the lab and wondered if there might be answers outside, but there was no way she’d be able to open such a large obstacle herself, so she passed it by. In the next table, she found another slate, but this one had a wire sticking out of it “That’s different.” she muttered to herself as she looked at the end of the cable, seeing if it might plug into something else she’s seen.

Now she looked around at the stations themselves, and the walls and floors, seeing if there might be a port to plug it into. She’d found almost invisible buttons on the edges of the slate as well, but they didn’t seem to do anything. Two pursed her lips in frustration as she continued to search out somewhere to plug this device into.

She was broken out of her concentration when there was a loud thump from the other side of the room “What was that?” Three called out from inside Seven’s chamber. Hurrying back to see what happened, Two found Five looking into Four’s chamber. She looked back toward Two approaching and shook her head “Her body fell… You don’t wanna see it.” she sounded sick as she spoke. Two looked down, her imagination flashing her gruesome images as she thought about what the noise might have meant.

It was then that Two looked over the panel of Six’s empty chamber and saw a familiar opening in the bottom of its computer. Testing to see if it was what she thought it was, the cord attached to her slate slipped right in “Huh…” she muttered as the slate lit up. A screen. It was a handheld computer, it just needed power.

“Hey… you figure that thing out?” Five asked as she walked over to look over Two’s shoulder. The screen showed a battery indicator slowly filling up, and then a circular logo with the letters WSI embedded into it as the device loaded up “Oh, it’s a computer.” Five nodded.

“Yeah, I guess the battery was dead.” Two mused as the screen started to display a small file directory. It threw an error saying that the central data center couldn’t be reached, however. She was a bit puzzled though. She hadn’t been able to identify this as a computer until now, but she was perfectly capable of navigating it now that it was on. Something missing in her memory, perhaps.

“Let’s see… uhh… time, let’s start there… ugh, seriously, it’s tied to the data center?” she clicked her tongue “Local files only… Hmm…” she looked into the directory and saw several programs related to the function of the chamber the slate was connected to. But there was no indication to what any of the data meant. It wasn’t very readable at all to someone who knew nothing about it. “Uhh… this one throws an error for time. File named ‘science’ here. Bunch of nonsense inside it though.”

“Maybe this one’s broken. Nothing in it after all.” Five posited as she tapped experimentally on the glass.

Two nodded and disconnected the slate from the chamber before walking opposite it and reaching to plug it into Seven’s.

“Hey, don’t do that!” Three spoke sternly “I don’t need you accidentally reactivating this thing with us in it.”

Two shrugged. She could see the logic in that. So she stepped to the side and instead plugged it into Five’s empty room, being careful not to turn around. “Timer works on this one… but it just shows… ‘6 years, three months, twenty days-’ it’s just counting up from something.”

“Six years ago…?” Five leaned back against the railing, seeming to be in thought “Six years from what?” she asked, her eyes going wide as she stared at the ceiling.

“Oh, and the file that was ‘science’ says ‘labor’ on this one.” she mumbled “Science and labor…” she was trying to make a connection with this, but she felt like she needed more to go off of. Disconnecting the slate, she hurried to Three’s chamber, plugging in and finding the file said ‘Medical’. “… Maybe it’s…” she unplugged again and turned around to check her own chamber “’Recon’.” She announced “These are… they’re roles. Three knows doctor stuff, I got out and explored, Five’s… big.”

She looked back over to see Five still staring at the ceiling, a fearful look in her eyes. Two walked up to her and followed her gaze, looking to the roof as well before she let out a gasp. There, above them, was a small window to the outside. And through it, they could make out numerous stars and the surface of a blue planet, rotating gently around them.