Page 1

CHAPTER 1

Alice thrashed like a rabbit caught in a trap, battling the cruel, strong hands of her captors. She had only one goal—escape. It didn’t matter that there were at least four burly orderlies dragging her along, didn’t matter that she was in an isolated, locked-down facility. She didn’t belong here. This was a mistake.

This was a crime .

“Would you dose her before she kicks me in the balls?” one of the men said.

A man on her other side grunted. “Hold her still and I will!”

“No!” Alice swung her legs wildly until hands with viselike grips closed around her ankles and calves. “You can’t do this. Let me go! I know the police chief, and he’d put a stop to this!”

“Why didn’t you idiots sedate her while she was in transit?” asked a woman with a voice as cold and hard as granite. “Get her against the wall.”

The orderlies turned and shoved Alice forward, slamming her face first into the wall. The impact jolted her, knocking the air out of her lungs; for an instant, her struggles ceased. Her captors took full advantage of the respite, forcing her arms behind her back and pinning her against the wall with their bodies.

A large hand grasped her head and forced it to turn, pressing her cheek to the wall. Her breath heaved out of her, lifting the tangled strands of blonde hair that had fallen into her face. The men around her were made into featureless monsters in the dimly lit corridor. A smaller figure stepped forward—the woman—and raised an arm. The device in her hand looked like a gun.

The woman touched the gun to the side of Alice’s neck. Before Alice could resume her struggles, there was a sharp click, followed by a stinging pain in her neck. The device hissed.

Alice flinched and tried to pull away as an icy sensation spread outward from her neck, but the men holding her only further tightened their grips. The chill raced through her veins to permeate her body. Against her will, her muscles relaxed.

“No,” she cried, hot tears spilling down her face. “Don’t do this. This isn’t right. I…don’t…I don’t belong here.”

Her strength faded as the coldness intensified, and, soon, she was held upright only by the unforgiving holds of the orderlies.

One of the men chuckled. “They all say that.”

“But this one isn’t like the rest,” another man said. “This one’s pretty. I wouldn’t mind a taste.”

A hand slipped between her chest and the wall to squeeze her breast.

Terror slithered through Alice, coiling tight around her lungs and heart. She strained to fight back, to shake out of the orderlies’ restraining grasps, to move at all, but her efforts only produced a sluggish twitch of her fingers.

“This one isn’t for you,” the woman said. “She’s here under the director’s personal watch. Do you understand?”

“You spoil all the fun, Doc,” the man grumbled.

Alice’s vision blurred, making the forms of her captors even more indistinct; she didn’t know if it was because of her tears or the drugs they’d injected her with.

The woman—little more than a shadowy mass slightly smaller than the rest—turned away. “Bring that gurney over here. She’s to be put under immediately.”

The corridor spun around Alice wildly as the orderlies pulled her away from the wall and turned her toward the hazy white object that must’ve been the gurney. Despite her limbs refusing to respond to her commands, her captors’ fingers bit into her flesh with a surprising sting—as though the ice in her veins were real, leaving her skin hypersensitive to even the merest touch.

The men lifted her off the floor and laid her on the gurney. Their hands kept her arms and legs pinned atop it while they walked down the corridor. She stared up at the hazy, hypnotic lights, which wove strange, blurred patterns in her vision. The sounds around her—the grumbling orderlies, their heavy shoes thumping on the floor, the squeak of a wheel in need of oiling—echoed impossibly, growing louder and louder with each passing moment.

Her eyelids fluttered; she kept them open only by sheer force of will, though it made little difference—everything around her was a mess of gray and black shadows that merged with each other, separated, and retreated from the overhead lights in a nauseating cycle perpetuated by their motion.

The gurney swung around suddenly and came to an abrupt halt, making her stomach lurch. There was a beep behind Alice; she let her head loll back and looked up to see a dark door open. The orderlies wheeled the gurney through the doorway and into a room lit only by several cones of white light that wavered in her unreliable vision, each separated from its neighbors by patches of relative darkness.

The gurney turned again, granting her a view of several large objects along the wall. She blinked rapidly to clear her eyes for a moment; the long, box-like objects were all identical except for the numbers on their lids. The haze returned to her eyes.

Coffins . They’re going to bury me alive in a coffin, just like my dad was put in a coffin, and I’ll scream and scream but no one will hear me.

She blinked again, struggling to think clearly.

Coffins? No, that isn’t right. This is…this is a psychiatric hospital.

There wouldn’t be coffins in a psychiatric hospital. But then what were those boxes? What was this room?

Why was she here?

The gurney stopped.

“Strip her,” the woman ordered.

The orderlies finally released Alice’s limbs to instead grab at her clothing. They tugged off her shoes, her pants, her shirt, bra, and underwear, their predatory, invasive touches sparking fresh flares of discomfort across her too-cold skin and panic in her chest. Their fingers seemed to touch every inch of her body in the process. She screamed inside her mind, unable to move, unable to fight, unable to cry for help—not that anyone would come for her. Tears of anger and helplessness dripped from the corners of her eyes.

They left her naked and vulnerable atop the gurney. The air settled with odd weight over her bare skin, and she could feel the orderlies’ gazes raking over her. At any moment, she expected their hands to return to her body—to her breasts, her thighs, and between her legs rather than her wrists and ankles.

“Get her in a gown. I want her under as quickly as possible. It’s going to take a little time to build her profile. She is a rush job,” the woman said.

“Come on, Doc. Just a little fun?” one of the men asked.

A shadowy figure moved beside the gurney, and a rough hand settled on Alice’s upper thigh.

This isn’t real. This isn’t real. It’s just a dream. I’ll wake up and it’ll all go away.

“She’s not for you,” another man said—a new man, his deep, smooth voice somehow even colder than the woman’s.

“Shit! I mean, sorry! Sorry, Director Koenig,” the first man replied, yanking his hand away from Alice and retreating.

Heavy footsteps approached the gurney. A moment later, Alice’s vision was blocked by another dark figure looming over her. Director Koenig. Her eyes strained as she struggled to take in the newcomer’s appearance, but all she could tell for sure was that he wore a dark, expensive suit.

“Alice,” the director said as he brushed some of her hair back from her cheek. “You’re as beautiful as they promised. And such spirit .”

Something about his touch was unsettling enough to help Alice find her voice.

“Please,” she rasped. “Jon…athan. My…” Getting those few words out left her lungs burning with exertion.

The director leaned closed, placing his mouth next to her ear. “Who do you think sent you here, pretty girl?”

Her heart skipped a beat. “No… He wouldn’t?—"

“But he did . You’re mine now, Alice.”

No! Why would Jonathon do this? Why?

But he wouldn’t do this. I’m his sister, we grew up together. There’s no way…

Director Koenig chuckled. “How long will it take to get her loaded into the simulation, Doctor Kade?”

“As soon as she’s under, sir, it should take two or three hours to construct her profile and spawn her in,” the woman replied.

“Good. It’s going to take me some time to finalize the adjustments to the simulation, anyway. Have her brought to Winters for her… orientation .”

“Are you sure, Victor?” the doctor asked. “As you said, she’s…spirited, and Winters has something of a temper. If you’re making the proposed changes?—”

“He knows better than to defy me,” the director said firmly. “Finish up here, Doctor Kade. I expect her to be ready as soon as possible.” He stroked the tip of his finger along Alice’s lower lip. “Alice…I’ll check on you soon to make sure you’re assimilating.”

Alice poured as much rage as she could into her eyes as she stared up at the director’s shadowy visage.

The director chuckled and moved away from the gurney, his heavy footsteps sounding toward the door; they were quickly drowned out by Alice’s pounding heart.

“Don’t just stand there slack-jawed,” Doctor Kade snapped. “Get her dressed. We don’t have all day.”

The dark forms of two orderlies appeared on the sides of the gurney. They were even less gentle than before as they took hold of Alice’s upper arms and dragged her into a sitting position. Her head lolled forward and her hair fell into her face, fully obscuring her view, as the orderlies tugged a garment over her extended arms. She swayed helplessly while they pulled the fabric into place and tied it along her back.

“Now get her into the immersion chamber,” the doctor said.

No, no, no!

One of the orderlies slipped his arms beneath Alice’s from behind, looping them around her chest—brushing his fingers over her breasts and nipples in the process—and dragged her backward. Another man took hold of her legs. They lifted her off the gurney. Her head tipped back, and her hair fell to clear her vision. Her captors carried her toward one of the coffin-like pods along the wall.

This isn’t real. This isn’t real.

I’m still in my bed. I’m going to wake up any moment in my room, in my house…

The orderlies brought her to the open pod and lowered her onto the soft cushions within. Her body was impossibly heavy. She felt herself sinking into the cushions, felt like they were going to swallow her up, and it sparked a fresh wave of panic in her—not that it was enough to get her body moving again. New tears fell from the corners of her eyes. The walls of the chamber rose over her on either side as dark blotches in her peripheral vision; they seemed to be getting higher and higher as the sinking feeling intensified.

This isn’t real! This isn’t real!

“Is she in position?” Doctor Kade asked.

One of the orderlies leaned over the pod and brushed his fingertips across Alice’s cheek. He muttered, “Lucky the director’s got his eye on you, or?—”

“Is she in position?” the doctor repeated, a hard edge in her voice.

“Yeah,” the orderly said, withdrawing his hand. He grinned, leaned down so his mouth was close enough to Alice’s ear for her to feel his breath, and whispered, “Welcome to Wonderland, Alice.”

The pod hummed to life around her, and Alice could only lie there, mentally screaming, as sharp, unseen objects pierced her skin from all around. There were too many of them to count, too much pain to fathom; they pumped fire into her blood that mixed with the iciness of her fear to become something that seared her very soul.

But the peak of her agony didn’t come until something pushed up through the cushion beneath her, parting her hair to sink into the back of her neck. It felt like a knife slowly pushing into her flesh. The object clamped down on her spine, and she heard— felt —metal scraping her vertebrae.

The pod lid, which was hinged somewhere over her head, swung down. Darkness reigned in the pod, broken only by the dim, diffused bit of light trickling in through the small window directly over Alice’s face.

No sounds existed in the pod except for those of her ragged breaths and thundering heart. Her vision darkened and narrowed as the heat inside her grew. She focused on the little window, willing herself to keep her eyes open, to stay awake.

This wasn’t real. The pain wasn’t real. It was all a bad dream…

Despite her struggles, the light faded, and even the sounds of her body fell silent. The last thing she heard before darkness claimed her was a whispered voice rising from her memory.

Welcome to Wonderland, Alice.