We were in the city, down in the alleys, the cars hovering over us. The air had gotten too polluted for the cars to fly down below, so they resorted to flying above the city. Nowadays the alleys are filled with poisonous gases. Gases that fill your lungs with dust and within a minute, kill you. It’s almost impossible to go down there now. Almost.

Rosie and I managed to steal some of the masks from the Healing House, and we lived between the poisonous alleys, thinking we were safe. Until the Tentaclemen came. All I remember is them snatching her away from me. Her high-pitched screams still haunt my dreams, her eyes flashing with fear, and the tears rolling down her flushed face.

Rosie. My little sister. She was my own remaining family member and friend. Without her, I have noone. Without her, there’s no point in trying to survive in this depressing scrap of a city. She used to sing me to sleep every night, with her sweet voice. It would almost let me forget the horrors we had to face for the days to come.

Now she is gone. They took her away, to do things to her I do not want to know. Their tentacle-like hands grasped her, the suction cups bruising her marble skin. The Tentaclemen don’t need masks. They live on this type of gas, however, they need our cells to create an immunity to it. So they take whoever is alone, or lost. The Tentaclemen have pitch black eyes, the colour of the darkness around the stars that people used to see in the sky. They sky is orange now. They are vaguely humanoid, but their entire body has slimy, white tentacles, the blood of their victims still encrusted to the suction cups. They used to be human, before people started experimenting on them. Cloning and crossbreeding, things like that. They were the only successful experiment, however the term ‘successful’ can be debated. They were the most intelligent as well, even smarter than their creators. Then they turned on all of us, experimenting on us, instead of the other way around. When they’re done experimenting on us, they devour us. Perhaps one of the most gruesome and twisted things about them is that they love playing with their ‘prey’. They will spend weeks creating an entire game just for one person, to amuse themselves. They are vile, devious creatures. If heaven exists, they would be beings of hell, working for the devil.
Now they have my sister, and it’s my job to rescue her.

I was in front of the their hideout. After they took over their creators, they took over their compound as well. They however lack any clean instincts, because the building’s original cream colour has turned into a moldy brown color. The windows are all shattered, and the pipes have been ripped off a long time ago. I smelt the putrid scent even before I walked in. The rotting body parts, that the tentaclemen don’t care enough about to even throw away. The doors aren’t locked. Why should they be? No sane person would enter this building. I took a deep breath, and walked inside. It was day time, so most of them are sleeping. The laboratory should be in the back, the safest part of the building. Or in my case, the most dangerous. I make sure that every hallway is empty before I enter it. One Tentacleman I can take. Two? Maybe. Any more than that, and I can’t fight. Tentaclemen hunt in packs for a reason. They are vulnerable in one spot, between their eyes. It paralyzes them, because ink sacks erupt within their body. If you hit them quickly, you can get them. Take anytime longer, and you’re done for.

I pass through three hallways until I finally run into one. I roll a ball on the ground, towards the tentacleman. It turns around, distracted. I quietly, but quickly, sneak up on him and then punch him with all my force between the eyes. I don’t look back, I know he’s slumped on the ground, ink ‘bleeding’ out of his eyes. Two hallways later, I arrive at the door. It has a big, faded ‘toxic’ symbol on it. I knock on it twice and go to the side of the door. I hear no sound, so I open the door.

It creaks, which jolts my nerves, but then the door swings open, and I arrive at a white hallway. At the end of the hallway, is a bed with a patient, her face hidden by the blankets. I see a tuft of black hair. Rosie! It must be her, she has black hair like mine, slightly curled as well. I don’t know anyone else who has hair like ours, mainly because everyone nowadays dyes it weird colours.

I go towards to the bed, and pull the covers down. I find... not Rosie. Not a stranger either. Someone eerily familiar, who must have the same blood as I do running within their veins. The person is unconscious, with bruises running his neck and wrist. Its a boy. A fifteen year old boy. A boy with a sister. The sister who is supposed to be in this bed, but she isn’t. It can’t be. No. No. No. This is trick. I take a step back from the bed. My body starts to tremble as I take it in. There are cuts on my arms. My eyes have dark shadows on them, and I’m so thin that I look like I’m almost a skeleton. A beard has started to sprout, the hairs scattered randomly across my face. I have lost all the muscle I spent weeks working for, to be stronger and better at protecting Rosie. Look how that turned out.

Then I start to scream, I scream until I see the dots in front of my eyes, and everything is a blur. I scream and scream and scream........

I wake up. My head is pounding, and I feel my eyes fighting to stay closed. I’m alone in the room. I’m in the bed, and there are large tubes with red and blue liquids in them that go into my nose. Blue and red liquids.... In the year 2930 they created the sleep solution and in 2974 they created the reality solution. The sleep solution was meant to be as a substitute for anesthetics and sleeping pills. The reality solution has a more complicated purpose. Its purpose it to create a virtual world for its patient, a sort of ‘dream world’. Video games and the military used this solution, to train or amuse its users.

Those two combined..... This doesn’t make sense. They kidnapped Rosie, not me! I remember it. Remember. Member. Memory. Me. Rosie. I have to find here. I rip the tubes out of my nose, the liquid splashes onto my arm and burns me. I’m in my underwear. Clothes. I need clothes. There is one drawer next to the bed. Inside of it, I find, what must have belonged to the creators, a lab coat. I slip it on, and look around. There’s a window, but it has bars, keeping me contained like an animal in a cage.

I decide to risk the door. The entire hallway is empty, and all the hallways after that.
My suspicious side of the brain is lighting up, but I’m too eager to get out. The cracked walls seem like arrows leading me out of the building. I get out and run as fast as I can. I run so fast everything passing me is a blur, as if I’m underwater.

Suddenly, I start wheezing. I can’t breathe, and the coughing starts.

I coughed so hard, that blood erupted out of my mouth. I realized that I accidently ran into the gas alleys. My eyes were watering, and I was choking on my own stupidity. I crouched down to the ground, and held my throat. “Lucka? Lucka, where are you?” an angelic voice called out. No one other than Rosie, has such a pure voice. The Adrenaline bursts throughout my body, I stand up and follow the voice. “Lucka? Lucka?”

I run out of the gas alley, into an abandoned shoe factory. “Rosie?” I whisper out tentatively. “Lucka?” Her voice repeats, that soft melody that always soothed both of us to sleep on bad days. Tears escape my eyes, as I walk deeper into the pitch, black factory. Rosie is standing in spot where some light managed to finds its way through the cracks of the panels. The light illuminates her face, and makes it look like shes in a spotlight, for a show.

She’s exactly as I remember her. Black hair, in a braid, her lips the colour of roses and her eyes, the eyes that always reminded me of an innocent dog. Big, brown and innocent. I run towards her, and open my arms to embrace her. I close my eyes, and grab.....nothing. Shocked, I open my eyes, to find a hologram. A shiver runs through my body. The air in the room suddenly became 10 times colder, and I feel the burning, evil eyes of the tentaclemen on me. “Shes dead. Now its your turn” A garbled, muffled voice of one of the tentaclemen pierces me. The 9 tentaclemen close in on me, their tentacles waving in the air, a warped smile on their faces. They come closer and closer. I feel how their tentacles wrap around me, suffocating me.

I should feel pain, but I’m numb. I’m just staring at Rosie. Its fading away from me, just like my life is. The hologram of Rosie shuts off. It flickers. Once. Twice. Gone.