Flash Fiction / writing prompts

The Facility #2

Chris Hall74 Comments

You finger the neatly folded garments which you’ve been instructed to put on; slippery to the touch and with a rainbowlike sheen, they are both inviting and intimidating; they are not the kind of clothing you are accustomed to wear but, without even asking yourself why, you dress in the unfamiliar items: underwear, bodysuit, socks and slippers, subconsciously yielding to yet another level of disassociation.

A vague feeling of contentment enfolds you and you cross to the window to observe your surroundings, surprised to find yourself on an upper floor, when you’re quite certain, so far as you can be, that you haven’t climbed a staircase or entered an elevator since you tumbled through the front entrance to… where?

The view overlooks an atrium enclosed on all four sides by lofty blank-windowed blocks, stretching up to graze a surprisingly bright blue and cloudless sky; the ground below is covered with the greenest grass you’ve ever seen: surely it must be synthetic? You study the featureless buildings, but no faces return your gaze.

You move across the room and slide open the bathroom door; there’s nothing remarkable here, although you notice there is no means of locking the door which you find vaguely disquieting but not, you assure yourself, any cause for alarm.

You return to the bed and lie down, your eyes roving over the ceiling and into the corners of the walls; spotting a pinprick of dull red light, you suppress a cry – a camera – you are being observed.

Confused? You might be! Read the first episode of The Facility here.

Written in response to two challenges:

– Di of Pensitivity101‘s Wednesday’s Three Things Challenge – WHY, CRY, SLY
– Denise Farley of GirlieOnTheEdge‘s Sunday’s Six Sentence Story Word Prompt – BOWL

Photo credit: Scott Webb on Unsplash

Join us at the link party for more Six Sentence Stories here!

74 thoughts on “The Facility #2”

  16. excellent world/reality-building. You’ve employed words that apparently possess carte blanche to whichever parts of my brain are responsible for visual imagination.

    (p.s. as a bonus, it triggered a memory of my time in a college dormitory. only four floors, but designed as a hollow square.)

    good Six

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  18. So here’s the deal – part of my imagination can’t keep but surmising perhaps, just perhaps, this is all taking place in the character’s mind. Not that something else isn’t going on (clearly there is!)
    I am left to ponder until next installment 🙂 This is a slow tease, Chris, lol

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  24. I also find it creepy when places look a little too perfect – like if they’re too clean or if they use synthetic grass to make it look unnatrally bright green. It’s sort of unnatural for things to be that perfect. Ooo and a camera. I wonder if the main character knows what they’re there for? I guess I’ll just have to keep reading to find out 😊

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  25. I’m still with Kafka in this, Chris. It’s a frightening world you’re slowly building up here, and doing it so well. I already want to hammer on the door to get out. Not that I think it would do me any good!

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