Shay in the Grey - pipTalk Forums

How to Join	Member's Area	Private Library	Search	Sanctuary		Login
Main Forums	Discussion	Tech Talk	Mature Content	Archives	A home without a wall, Our haven without ends, A circle we all call Our Family of Friends!

Passions in Prose

Shay in the Grey

RenaissanceRomanceRunsRed
Senior Member

since 2007-06-11

Posts 1062
In Love <3

0 posted 2008-12-23 08:44 PM

Shay in The Grey

My hands held the wheel as I stared blankly at the goings on around me. The hum of radio a depressing bleep in the back of my mind. Then unexpectedly I saw a flash and hold of red, abrupt and sudden, I let off the petal and quickly pressed the brake. The car behind me was going to fast to swerve, and they couldn’t stop. We spun as I heard the crunch of metal. I looked to my sister, the horror I felt in my face reflected in exactness in her own. Then, as the grating of metal continued I was smothered in white and gravity was pulling in the wrong direction.
“Bleep . . . bleep . . . bleep . . .” I reached to the left to knock off my alarm clock. The sound could not get me up today. I reached with still closed eyes, but my hand ran into cords . . . ‘Where am I?’ my mind searched its memory while I opened my eyes to the white speckled paneled ceiling.
“What?!” I turned to see what had blocked my hand . . . an I.V.? My eyes followed the cord and saw that it fed into my veiny arm, looking foreign and frightening. I turned my head in the other direction and saw Greg asleep in a chair in a heaping pile.
Suddenly a nurse rushed through the door. When she saw that I was awake she went to wake my sleeping fiancée.
“Greg, she’s awake.” Groggily he rubbed his eyes, and when her words finally hit him, his eyes popped. Nearly in tears he grabbed me, hugging my very sore body to him.
“She’s just been in an accident, be carful!” the nurse scolded.
The frantic look on his face was replaced by horror at the prospect of my pain.
“I'm fine,” was all I could say clearly through my battered lungs.
“I should have been more careful.” he mourned.
I looked over myself as best as I could. My arm, besides being invaded by the clear plastic I.V., was covered in purple, yellow, dingy green and brown. I couldn’t see any  more of me, but a web of cuts covered the bruises and made ribbons of criss crossing scarlet upon my hand. After I finished my self inspection, I turned my attention back to the nurse on the phone.
“. . . Yes she’s . . . well, now she’s awak- . . . not as serious as the other . . .” the nurse’s words were broken by pauses and some words were so soft I only heard parts. I was so nervous . . . what was not as serious? All of the sudden, Greg was staring at me, trying; it seemed, to find a way to tell me something.
“Whittney, I'm sorry . . .” he looked more pained that I’d ever seen him. He looked hard at me, seemingly trying to ponder what to say. Then it struck me- Shayla. She had been with me, spinning with the car. Fear and horror written on her face.
“What happened to Shay?” my eyes widened and I couldn’t breathe. “Where is she?!” I demanded hysterically. He looked as if his heart would break and I suddenly couldn’t feel anything but the burning in my nose.
“I'm so sorry . . . your sister . . . she’s in critical condition . . .” he paused; I tried to understand what he said.
“What? When?” I didn’t even know what I was asking anymore.
“Two days ago, but she’s gotten worse, well, so said the doctor.” He said suspiciously.
“Wait, Shay, what happened to her?” I said unsure if I had already asked that yet.
“Whittney  . . .” he said, his voice distressed. “I really think I should let your parents explain, this isn’t something I should tell you.” I saw him suddenly look up and nod his head.
“Why don’t you get some rest now sweetheart?” he said as he reached over to kiss me.
“But, wait,” I said as I reached out. “No, don’t . . .” but it was too late. The nurse put a sedative into my I.V. and I heard Greg wish me sweet dreams under a worried frown as I drifted back into the blackness.
It was a closed-casket ceremony to spare the sight of my sister’s mutilated face. So, all we had to look at was a picture of my sisters face . . . of my face. A dinky half foot picture in a glossy sliver frame was the only thing that we had to showcase her light colored skin, fluffy honey brown hair, laughing green eyes, and strawberry colored lips; every feature identical to my own. So I refused to stand near the coffin at all during the ceremony. Not wanting to be a live exhibition of the dead.
I don’t remember much of what happened at the grave site. I cried as I threw my dirt on the casket, I couldn’t believe it, my twin was dead. After me and my parents, Greg went up to pay his respects, he mumbled a few words that I couldn’t hear and then came back to stand besides me. I looked back as we walked away. Slowly the men shoved the dirt over her grave, covering her cold dead body with the wet wormy soil forever.
A month later I woke up sweating. It was the night before my wedding. Well, morning, I suppose, is more accurate my clock read 2:58. I had had a terrible nightmare. I pulled my cell phone and hit the speed dial number for Greg.
“Hel-” he started as I drew in a shaky breath
“Love, what’s wrong?” he sounded concerned.
“I had such a terrible dream  . . .” I started to cry as I told him of the terrible things that had gone on in my head.
“She was there, alive, but there it was all wrong, she was dirty and sitting there, cuts all over her . . .” I chocked on the last part. “It was terrible.” I cried shaking. With that I fell asleep while Greg said things I couldn’t comprehend into my unhearing ears.
The wedding was beautiful- everything I wanted but exempt of my sister, who was to be my Bride’s Maid. I couldn’t bear to think of her the whole day. I just couldn’t see the fairness in that- in ruining this day that was Greg’s and mine. So I put my sister behind me for the day, though I knew that night would be an entirely different matter.
I screamed. I work up and emptied my lungs of their air. This of course woke up my husband. He jumped up, grabbing the small gun in the side of the bed and clutched me with his other arm, eyes wide looking for my attacker. Finally he lowered the gun and put it away.
“Another nightmare?” he asked tenderly. I nodded my head into his chest.
“You want to tell me about it?” he prodded gently as my lungs shuttered as they pulled in their next breath and I started talking.
“She was lined up with hundreds of people, they were all lead and beat by these horrible men,” at that I broke down again crying for a half hour or so until I fell asleep.
We were in South Africa at this point in our honey moon. It was Greg’s idea. He thought that it would be good for us to be as far removed from the entire situation as possible. He had gotten in contact with a man who owned a South African coastal region who had suggested we take a tour of the little villages around the coast. As we were going down a forest path I saw people passing through, quickly and quietly. They looked linked together . . . or maybe that was just my imagination. I knew that if I told Greg, he would find some way to persuade me away- he wouldn’t think it was safe. Which, in all honesty, it wasn’t. But my dream . . . I just couldn’t turn my head and walk away.
“Greg! I found one!” being a veterinarian and zoologist we had been helping out a reserve since we got here, gathering any animals we found that were hurt or injured. I pretended to see a bird with a broken wing since Greg wouldn’t let me stay with anything bigger by myself.
“Hurry, go and get the cage and net! I also need a better splint, my last one broke.” I climbed up into the tree and reached up, pretending to start tending the bid.
“Whitt, be careful,” Greg warned.
“Go quickly then.” I asked, praying it would work, I was running out of time.
Of all the luck it did. In a few seconds I was watching him disappear behind the bend in the trail. I hastily wrote a note with the pen and pad, weighed it down with a rock, and then prayed I could find the people in chains.
“Uhhhhh,” a throaty groan resounded to my ears. I ached everywhere. It was dark, as if swathed in the blanket of a starless night. Then I heard the clatter of a metal door squeaking and heavy boots coming down metal stairs. There was then the frightening sound of metal entering and turning against an iron lock. I worried as I waited for the heavy books to draw nearer.
But as my eyes adjusted to the light the open door let in, I saw the man was hesitant. He stopped to whisper to a man outside the door- but I heard him anyways.
“I don’t want to go in there, what if she gets me like she got Tommy? I don’t think Milly has the stuff to fix his nose up right.” laughter boomed loudly into my cell and the hall.
“Oh, afraid of a little girl?” he mocked. He chuckled again and shoved the nervous man into the open door. I thought about what they had just whispered . . . I had hurt a man, why didn’t I remember that? Then I saw why- the smaller man came at me with a rag, reeking of some pungent smell I vaguely remembered. I turned my head away as he came towards me.
“Benjy- come on, she needs to eat- or the boss’ll get you. You know he wants his customers to get top rate products.” He said with a chuckle. He then walked in again, this time the booming guard accompanied him, keys jangling in his massive meaty hands.
“Welcome to The Grey sweetheart. Here you go doll,” he said as he fit the key in the lock. “How about a kiss for my services sugar?” she asked his breath foul as he leaned towards me. I spat in his face and he pulled a way as he growled wiping his face.
“Ha!” Benjy snorted and then laughed. Voz stared with enough menace in his eyes to burn a hole through Benjy’s head.
“Shut up!” he yelled as he unlocked the fetters and grabbed me roughly. I grunted in pain- provoking a comment from my abuser.
“Oh, sorry, too rough for you sweetheart?” the acidic sarcasm nothing compared to the loss of circulation and shooting pains in my arms and wrists. I hated Voz.
He shoved me outside and I saw hundreds of people. All of them bruised and dirty, but well fed. Then I remembered Voz’s words. “She needs to eat . . . he wants his costumers to have top rate products. To have the people remember The Grey for that.” Products . . . I felt sick. We were stock.
Unexpectedly, a tray was shoved in my hands and I looked up. A tight lipped man put some kind of oatmeal substance on my tray. I took a spoon and sat down along the fence. I took one look at the gray Jell-O/oatmeal and set it to the side to look around. I was surprised. There were infants and young children- guarded by the uniformed men who worked in this hell they called The Grey.
After a few minutes, a strange man came and sat down by me. He started to eat his mush and then looked up at me after a minute.
“Aldon Say?” His words slurred and I wasn’t exactly sure what he had said, but said yes anyways. I looked the other way and surveyed the grounds.
“Whrych tirdsay?” the man garbled at me again.
“What?” I asked. He swallowed and then spoke.
“Why are ya tired Shay?” Shay . . . my world stopped.
“What did you say? How do you know that name?” my eyes opened in horror, this place was hell . . . wait, my mind speed and I uttered a laugh of insanity, this is a dream that’s all, a dream. Nothing was real.
“That’s ya name girl, Shay. Ya told it to me, that ya did, ya did.” He nodded his head.
“That’s impossible, Shay was my sister, my twin, but she’s dead . . . Dead!!!”
“Errrr, twin, ummmm. Well, if she’s dead like ya say, whys do I know her?” he asked me in a way that only a true idiot could.
“You don’t, you can’t! She’s DEAD!!!!” my eyes spilled over and I shook as I cried. The odd man looked at me awkwardly, as if he wasn’t quite sure how to console me. He left after that and I cried myself into a fitful sleep.
“Whittney . . . wake up Whittney.” My own voice was pleading to me. Wait, that didn’t make sense, but that would mean . . .
“Whittney, it’s me, Shayla. Your sister.” I opened my eyes.
“Shay?” I looked up at her face. It was different from mine now. I could see underneath the layers of dirt, crisscrosses of scar lines over all of her face. They were mostly healed, but I knew her too well not to see them
“You really are alive!” I waited for the tears, but they didn’t come. I stared at Shay- taking in the impossibility of what was right before my eyes. My face- but scarred, my hair- but dirt crusted- my eyes, but glazed with weariness; all these things looked back at me, reflecting and quietly waiting for me to speak.
“Shay, what happened to you?” I asked.
“It was the doctor . . ." she cupped her hands to whisper it in my ear almost afraid of saying those words too loud.
“The doctor?” I asked in a regular tone. Shay’s eyes bugged and she shushed me. I repeated myself quietly and Shay nodded. She was just about to speak again when the guards started yelling and pulling of the prisoners out of their cells.
“Someone’s crossed into The Grey- all prisoners to the pits!” to which all the “prisoners” shuddered. I asked why everyone was so nervous and Shay explained.
“The people who go there never come back. No one knows what happened down there but they never come back.” Fear gripped me as I neared the stairs. The pit was black and became blacker still when they shut the doors.
All of the people went into a panic, pushing and shoving- screaming at the top of their lungs. Then the lights kicked in and the guards that had gotten stuck in the herding of the people all moved forward to the doors. We all parted for them as we heard the loud clank of their boots treading on the metal stairs.
I had been backed in towards the back of the room, but as I backed into the wall it didn’t feel like a wall. It was bars, just like a prison. The light extended into the pit to what looked like a surgery room. There were all sorts of medical instruments laid out on a table not 10 feet away from where I stood. To my left was a shelf. I started to read some of the labels and then I felt sick. “Heart”, “liver”, “kidney”; all these labels stared back at me, stored on ice. Then I saw through the clear containers and saw the containers empty of organs. Then a woman in a doctor coat came down into the room. She brought with her a woman carrying a small child and a man.
The doctor started talking with the other woman. They pointed and looked over at all me and the other people I was stuffed with. The woman pointed to me directly and then turned around; I panicked. I turned to Shay and I tried to explain but before I could a guard came through and grabbed me. He pulled me to the right side of the room and threw a door in the wall which led to the adjoining room I had been looking at. Shay was screaming, but suddenly the sound was cut off. I twisted around to see what it was that had stopped her and saw a large hand smothering her mouth as her eyes widen.
The doctor also had the men bring in an infant. They woman looked over the infant and began to speak in a strange language. They took the infant back and brought in a new one. I looked back over to the table with the instruments and the shelf. Then it hit me- we were stock alright, stock for live organs. I tried to think of someway to get the baby and me out of this.
I looked around but couldn’t find a way to get out. Then the guard came back and grabbed me, pulling me on to a table. I kicked at him, struggling anyway I could to get free, but he held my legs and called in a second guard. They got me on to the table and strapped me down. I screamed unthinkingly only to have them shove a dirty rag into my mouth.
The doctor, who now I could only assume was the Milly the guards had been talking about, started cursing in English. “I only have enough of anesthesia for two adults. Sorry,” the woman looked at me. “I guess you’ll have to go without.” I was going to die. I knew that. Milly then took a knife and came towards me. My heart raced and adrenaline pumped through my system. I prayed asking for some kind of deliverance.
She took the knife and with precision she severed my shirt in two and cut it at the arms, throwing the pieces to the ground as she sawed them off me. Then Milly took a marker out and marked out lines above my heart. She took the knife again when her assistant said that they needed to check my blood to make sure the transaction wouldn’t kill their buyer.
Milly grumbled at that but began the process since the woman had heard. She pricked my finger and put the blood onto Petri dish and handed that to her assistant. After ten minutes the assistant came back and nodded his head.
“She’s fine.” He stated, handing Milly he knife back. Milly brought it down onto my flesh and pressed in. I screamed in pain as my blood spilt while she carved the first line of the X she had drawn on my flesh. Suddenly the lights flickered and Milly pulled the knife back, the lights went out and people murmured loudly in confusion. There was a clatter of metal objects falling to the floor and I heard Milly shout, scream, and then gurgle. The baby wailed and drew near to my ear. My wrists were freed and someone helped me to sit up. The baby was placed carefully in my hands as my rescuer fought my ankle restraints. I was free! The person helping me tried to take the child from me, but I was not giving the baby up.
“Whittney, let me hold the baby while you put on my jacket.” Greg whispered in my ear.
“Greg? How did you manage to get in here? I'm sorry I ran off, I . . .” Greg cut me off telling me how important it was that we get out of there as soon as possible.
“But, Shay, she’s in here.” I said as I tried to take the child from Greg’s arms.
“Whittney, you’re bleeding and badly hurt, I need to fix you up a bit.” Greg said as he used his free hand to rummage in a drawer and pulled something out.
“How’d you know what that is?” I asked while trying to take the child again.
“Tape, it’s tape, I saw it earlier, when that woman . . .” He stopped there shaking his head in anger and then took my arm and started to lead me out.
“It’s dark and there are guards all over the place how are we going to get out, and Shay, we have to find her I won’t go without her.”
“Your sister’s dead Whittney, I think you have been over stressed to put things lightly, come on, we need to leave.” I began to be frustrated, I knew she wasn’t dead, I had seen her, talked with her, been with her right before they grabbed me, she had to be here.
“Please, please Greg, can’t we just look for her?” Greg kept pushing threw to the door way, finally giving me the baby so that it would be better protected. He acted as though I hadn’t asked. This wasn’t like Greg, even under the pressure of my sister dying and my accident he had been calm and collected. There had to be something terribly wrong for him to be acting this way . . . or he really did think I was crazy at the moment.
We finally reached the top of the stairs and the lights turned back on. Everyone was heading out the door and we followed. In the panic of all of the events and what everyone had just seen the guards were over run and the fences were trampled. Greg pulled me out and far into the forest. He laid the baby down on the jacket quickly as he taped my wound with medical tape. I waited patiently because I knew that I couldn’t get out of him fixing my wound as best as he could. When he was done I pushed Shay again.
“Greg, Shayla was there, and I don’t intend to let her stay in there.”
“Whittney, we’ve been over this, she died, your sister is dead.” He paused, trying to think of course. “Besides, even if she had been in there she could be long gone by now.”
“No, I know she’s not, she’s in there, please, Shay’s still in The Grey, please Greg.” He sat down and thought for a moment.
“Alright Whittney, but you’re staying here with the baby, with your wound you can’t help anyways. And I can’t do this unless I know you’re safe. Will you do that?” I agreed and watched Greg’s figure disappear as he set off to save my sister.

	⇧ top of page ⇧
All times are ET (US). All dates are in Year-Month-Day format.