The Amnesia Experiment: A Young Adult Dystopian Novel

by Caroline Wei

  One thing I admired about Alle was her warmth. It could either burn blazing hot when she was passionate about something, or it could roll off of her in waves when she was helping people. Right now, it was the rolling-waves kind. She smiled at the lady as she went off with her supper, and then reached for another cluster of dandelion leaves, this time to assist a young girl.

  I was next to her, dishing out food as well. Though there was a thin atmosphere of tranquility about the Cube, I kept waiting for it to break, as it undoubtedly would. It was impossible for everything to be over—there was still Trial Three—and what made it worse was that there was no perfect way to prepare. I wanted everyone to be safe, but it went beyond my control.

  “Are you okay?” Alle asked, keeping her eyes on the girl she was serving. “You clench and unclench your hands when you’re agitated.”

  “I do?” I hadn’t even noticed that. “I’m...I’m feeling…” What was a word to describe this? “Trepidation.”

  Alle nodded. “I am, too. But for now we’ll just do what we can.” She waved on the last person in line, an older man. “There will be a way, Malchin. Even when times are hard, and you don’t know where the road will lead—I mean, if there’s anything I’ve learned in the Cube, it’s that you don’t have to be afraid if you don’t want to.”

  The last man left, and I felt a surge of emotion. “Come here,” I mumbled, pulling Alle’s waist to mine. I traced her lips with my fingers, feeling how soft they were. She looked up at me. “You’re brave, do you know that? You are kind and brave, and sometimes I’m glad I was put in the Cube. You wanna know why?”

  Alle lowered her eyelashes. “Why?”

  “Because it means I met you. Bad things may have happened, but out of all of it, I got one good thing. One golden, glorious thing. And that was my life crossing with yours.”

  Alle blushed and looked away. “Stop it, Malchin. You’re such a sweet-talker.”

  I put my hand on the side of her face. Her eyes were the color of brown sugar. “No, I think I’m just a truth-teller.”

  She put her hands on my neck, and my skin sparked to life. Her face was getting closer to mine, her fingers winding into my hair. My body felt like it was on fire, and I tightened my grip on her waist.

  Alle waited until her nose was brushing against mine before she spoke. “Don’t make me use Adisa’s lie detector on you.” And then she pulled away from me and started running.

  I felt empty without her for a split second before I started sprinting. “Come back here!”

  Her answering laughter got tossed in the wind, forming a twinkling breeze that sounded like it was all around me. Her armlet glittered in the fading light, making it look like it was made of stars. Both of us still hadn’t broken them, so we didn’t know what things would come from it yet. I could only hope they were useful in either protection or survival.

  I finally reached Alle, grabbing her hand and swinging her around until she was flush to my chest. She was laughing, her hand clutched to her mouth.

  “Quit it,” I murmured, pulling her hand off. “You’re blocking the way.” I leaned in to kiss her, wanting so badly to feel those soft lips on mine, and that was when the glass wall behind us shattered into a million pieces.

  16

  ALLE

  I snapped my head up at the sound of the explosion, but it wasn’t an explosion. The wall had broken, and now one side of the Cube was completely gone.

  ‘To be used in Trial Three.’ Now I knew what it meant.

  For a moment, everyone was quiet, some with their mouths open. Then, like a ripple, people started moving, one after the other. I could almost hear their thoughts as they ran towards the outside, the real outside, where we weren’t hindered by the Cube. We weren’t jailed anymore. We were free.

  And we didn’t know how long this chance at freedom would last.

  I looked at Malchin, and Malchin looked at me, as the storm of people roared past us. Their eyes were wild with hunger, their hands outstretched—they just wanted to get out of here. Something felt off, but who wouldn’t escape from prison when given the chance?

  “Let’s go,” I said, and we were off.

  I tried to outpace the freezing wind that was blowing at us, surging in from outside the broken Cube. I remembered when I had seen the stark contrast between the inside and the outside, and now it was even more apparent.

  I ran out of the lush green field full of flowers into the sub zero tundra. The sun had set, and the warmth it had provided was gone. The sky was rapidly darkening, but I thought I had never been in a place closer to paradise.

  These were my first steps as a liberated girl.

  Malchin stood beside me and took my hand. I couldn’t believe this was happening.

  “Trial Three initiated,” a cool voice that seemed to be all around us said.

  Okay, I could.

  ~.~.~.~.~

  Adisa was fuming.

  We had been exploring for the past thirty minutes, and nothing catastrophic had happened. No one had died, and no one was injured, but in the time we had been out here, the glass wall that had shattered was replaced by another glass wall. People kicked and banged on it, even threw rocks at it, but it was not shattering again. I suspected the first had broken on purpose, and the material was much stronger than we realized.

  After feeling around for a bit, I also found out that we were stuck in another Cube—just much bigger—and the walls were invisible. If you tried to walk straight forward, towards the horizon, you would eventually bump into an unseen barrier. People were unable to walk around it or through it at all, so basically this was just another nightmare, only a thousand times worse. We couldn’t go back into the warm safety of the old Cube, and now we had to try not to freeze to death in this hostile new one.

  No one was free.

  Malchin had called a meeting, and Adisa was there, along with a lady named Anna. From the looks exchanged between them, it was clear they had feelings for each other.

  For now, though, Adisa looked nothing like a lovebird. More like a vulture who had just found out all of its chicks had been eaten.

  “They’re a bunch of micro-inch cowards,” he spat, fists clenched. “How could they just do this to us? What did we ever do to them?”

  “How are we supposed to eat and farm?” Galen asked, his features twisted in worry. “How are we going to live?”

  “There’s no water either,” Anna commented. “No river here.”

  “There’s zero use going on and on about what we don’t have,” Victoria said, her voice matching the frigidity of the landscape. She refused to look at me, instead focusing her gaze on Anna. “We need to find shelter, skin any animals we can find for food and clothing. We also need to get a fire going.”

  Malchin set to work right away, pulling at the little red plants growing around us. I thought they were brave for daring to call the tundra their home.

  Before long, we had a decent pile of brush we could burn, but no way to get a fire going. There were no random sticks lying around that could be rubbed together, and anyway, they would have been dampened with snow.

  “I could use my armlet,” I said, “and use the sun’s rays to refract light, but it’s nighttime now. We’re going to have to wait until tomorrow.”

  “No,” Victoria snapped. “We’ll all freeze to death by then. You never have any good ideas, do you?”

  I drew back, stung, and felt Malchin’s hand on my shoulder, steadying me. I decided not to say anything back.

  By the time an hour had passed, I understood what Victoria meant.

  It was so, so cold.

  I hugged myself, and it was freezing. I folded my arms inside my shirt, and it was still freezing. I tried jogging to warm myself up, but it was also freezing. Everything was freezing, and the biting air was omnipresent, always finding a crevice where it could sneak in and attack.

  Most of those who hadn’t broken their armlets did so then, trying to break the invisible walls
or gain something of use. We were beginning to call the objects ‘signatures,’ and it became a way of identifying people. Anna’s signature was a silver blanket that stopped pain wherever it touched skin. She handed it off to people who were getting frostbitten to provide them with relief.

  A group of farmers that were under Galen’s charge were lucky enough to have weapons as their signatures. With a scythe, a hammer, a pickaxe, and even a gun, they attacked the invisible walls, trying to find a weakness and escape. It was to no avail, even though signatures were different from ordinary objects and were usually either stronger or had a special ability.

  “We’re going to die out here,” I said to Malchin, trying to keep the tears from my voice. If I let even one drop fall, it was sure to solidify on my face. Night had truly descended, and the tundra—or rather, the simulated tundra given by the Cube creators—was ruthless.

  “That’s exactly what they’re testing,” Malchin said. “Survival skills.” He wrapped his arms around me, and though I knew he must have been really cold too, somehow I felt warm. Together, we watched the darkened horizon.

  “We need to prove them wrong,” I murmured into Malchin’s arm. “We need to stay alive. We’re going to.”

  “That’s right.” It was Clarice, and she had her hands stuffed deep into her pockets. Her skin was a little blue, but then again, so was everyone’s. Her teeth chattered as she spoke. “Whatever they do, they can’t dampen the fire inside.” She nudged my chest with a quivering hand. “Aren’t you always saying something cheesy like that, Alle?”

  I didn’t have enough warmth to nudge her back. “Ha-ha, Clarice, you’re a riot. How did you know that joking around was exactly what we needed right now?”

  “I’m a master of timing.”

  “Go get Anna’s silver blanket thing. You look like you’re going to turn into an ice block.”

  Clarice waved at us. “So do you. Except you’re going to be in an ice block with your boyfriend.”

  Miracle of miracles, heat rushed into my cheeks. “Watch what you’re saying, Clarice!”

  Clarice gave me a lopsided smirk and stumbled off in search of Anna.

  Malchin lowered his face to mine, and I could feel his chin on the top of my head. “What’s so bad about being stuck in an ice block with me?”

  Nothing, I wanted to say. Nothing at all. But my lips seemed to be frozen shut.

  It started raining twenty minutes later, and soon after that, someone died.

  That’s what woke me up.

  I went to see the body, and Victoria was there, talking to a medic about hypothermia.

  “Let’s all huddle together,” Victoria instructed. She was probably the least affected of all of us, although she did have icicles in her hair. You couldn’t really tell, though, since her hair was basically the same color as snow.

  Everyone squeezed together in one group for the sake of body warmth. Malchin was a few paces away from me, and Clarice was somewhere behind Galen and Adisa in the distance. I was smushed up right next to Victoria.

  “Let’s not get too buddy-buddy,” she muttered.

  “We don’t have time for that, Victoria,” I retorted. “Everyone needs to work together, or else we’re all going to die. We have no food, no water, no shelter, no adequate clothing—how long do you think someone could last in those conditions?”

  Victoria pinched her lips together.

  “I think you should break your armlet,” I said when she stayed silent.

  “Why?” she snorted, but it came out more as a cough. “Why should I do anything you ask me to?”

  “Everybody else has no more energy to expend force on breaking something. They’re all using it to conserve heat. You, on the other hand, seem the most alert. You could do it. Maybe your signature could save us.”

  “If you like talking so much about what others can contribute, then what about you? What can you do, Alle?”

  I considered. My face felt numb.

  “Exactly. Absolut—”

  “I’ll break mine if you break yours,” I said. I could do that. Especially if it would help everyone. I didn’t want any more deaths if I could help it.

  Victoria frowned at me, her silver eyebrows drawn downwards. “Fine,” she said reluctantly. She stepped back, pushing into the man behind her, and slid off her armband, which was coated in rain. Then, with a grimace, she smacked it hard against a rock on the ground.

  It cracked open in two perfect halves, and immediately, mysterious liquid started pouring out. On the snow, it solidified into a tiny metal box.

  “That’s stunning,” Victoria said dryly, raising her eyebrow at me.

  “I’m sure it does something,” was what I managed to say. I felt like my teeth and tongue were sticking together. It hurt to talk.

  Victoria picked up the little box and examined it in her palm. “Nope,” she said. “Your turn.”

  Grunting, I reached for my armlet. My hand burned in protest against the wind and rain, but I forced it to work. Before long, I had broken my armlet too. Victoria and I watched the steel-colored liquid on the ground transform first into one object, and then another, until I realized they were a pair.

  A pair of glass slippers, to be exact.

  I gawked at them. They were beautiful yet simple, and they looked like they were made out of precious jewels, each angle of the shoes a different facet. I hooked them onto two fingers and let it dangle in front of me, despite the screaming from my freezing skin.

  “They’re so pretty,” I whispered.

  Victoria stared for a moment, then snapped out of it. “Yes, great. Pretty little stilettos will certainly save us all from starvation and death. Great thinking. Now we have nothing to help anyone with, and we have to carry these things around with us.”

  A flash went through my vision, and suddenly I could see a hallway. The walls were white, but the floor was made of glass, and a boy in blue was holding up a locket. Inside was my picture. I recognized myself—I was younger, my hair longer, and I was smiling. We have to carry these things around with us, echoed Victoria’s voice, except it wasn’t Victoria’s voice anymore. It changed until it was deeper, a little scratchier, like what a tree would sound like if it talked. The boy’s voice.

  “This way I can carry you around with me wherever I go,” he said, grinning at me. His teeth winked under the lights. “Okay?”

  And then I was back in the tundra, so cold I could hardly breathe.

  “What was that?” I looked around wildly, trying to find the hallway and the boy.

  “What was what?” Victoria was scowling.

  “I saw...I saw something—there was a boy—”

  “People who get hypothermia hallucinate,” Victoria said matter-of-factly.

  I rubbed my eyes. She was probably right. If she wasn’t, I was too busy turning into a glacier to argue with her.

  “Stay strong,” someone said, his voice cracked from the weather. I realized it was Malchin's. “We can’t let them beat us down.”

  We huddled there, and as we got colder and colder, we got closer and closer together. More people were dying, but I didn’t know what to do. I didn’t know how to help them.

  I hated the feeling.

  When I lost track of time, everything seemed to move in a blur. There was nothing I could focus on, nothing I could see. And I was so, so tired.

  I laid down on the ground, deaf to the protests around me, and fell asleep.

  ~.~.~.~.~

  There was something warm on the side of my neck.

  It moved away.

  Then it came back, almost insistent.

  It felt nice, like a ray from the sun when you least expected it, making me feel like there was a candle inside my belly.

  I turned my head, but the warm thing was still there. My fingers stung, and so did my toes. Actually, I was glad they did, because before, I couldn’t feel anything at all.

  Before.

  “Get better, Alle,” someone said against my neck.
A boy’s voice. His lips pressed down onto my skin again.

  Oh.

  My heart flew to life, and I tried to gather myself before opening my eyes. When I did, Malchin was next to me.

  “There you are.”

  “Hi,” I mumbled. “What happened?”

  “You decided to be lazy and conked out on us. Victoria was not very happy with you. You can freeze to death like that, you know?”

  I tried to sit up, but my elbows were getting attacked by sewing needles. Malchin braced his arm against my back so that I was leaning against him.

  Above my head was a stretching ceiling, and below was a floor crowded with people who looked worn and ragged. They were coughing or rubbing their hands together, their faces scraped raw with wind. I was sitting among them, and I saw my fingers were crusted blue with frostbite.

  “This is impossible,” I said. “How are we inside a house?”

  It was a very simple house, shaped rectangularly, and reminded me of the Cube. There were no lights, but the ceiling glowed ethereally, providing some way to see. It was nowhere near hot inside, but it was much better than the wintry blast it shielded us from.

  I connected eyes with Victoria across the room and immediately regretted it. Her gaze was made of steel.

  “Victoria made it,” Malchin said. “It was her signature.”

  Shock coursed through me. “What? No way. Her signature is a little box this big.” I placed my index finger and thumb barely an inch apart.

  “It changes size on command.” Malchin tilted his head and smiled at my expression. “You don’t seem very happy about it.”

  Poisonous jealousy veined through me and then was gone in an instant, replaced by another thought. “I have a pair of glass slippers!” My head jerked around as I tried to see past the torn clothing and cold people. Malchin furrowed his eyebrows.

  “It’s my signature,” I explained, still searching for it. They had been beautiful, and I wondered what they could do. The curiosity was like a tangible thing, tugging at my heartstrings.

  Malchin found them, holding them out to me. My eyes were glued to the glass wonders, sparkling in what little light there was, but I was distinctly aware of Malchin looking at me. I reached out to take them.