I’ve got no strings…  

The bitter cold stings the exposed part of my torso.

...to hold me down…

I try not to sit up, my legs can keep my soft flesh warm, I regret not moving so much when I was in the box.

...To make me fret… 

This seems nice enough, if I just lie here and stay.  

...Or make me frown… 

It’s not like I was made for the Outworld anyway.

...I had strings…

I should have stayed in the box, at least then I knew I wouldn’t die.

...But now I’m free… 

Something shifts beneath me. The coldest thing in the universe licks at my back. I don’t think it cares that I’m wearing clothes.

...There are no strings on me!

Suddenly I feel only freezing, amorphous Nothing I try not to move, but I have to or the Nothing will swallow me. I have to try harder to breathe. It’s so cold. 

In the distance there’s something moving toward me very fast. It’s blurry and bright in the flat color of day. 

Then nothing. Everything is gone and I’m still…  so cold…

1.1

My eyes burn quietly as I stare into the blue light of the curved screen.

It’s slowly killing me, but they don’t care. I’m just a number, a 01001110 01001111 01010100 01001000 01001001 01001110 01000111 in binary code on a screen somewhere off in the Ether that I’ll never get to see. 

The false sunlight sheds a bland veil of yellow on my plain uniform. I only have one, only need one. 

Enough bellyaching, I have some work to do. People to feed, deaths to prevent, clothes to distribute… 

Great googly-moogly I’m going to die in here. 

Let me introduce myself, I named myself Seymour. After Suddenly Seymour from Little Shop of Horrors, which I hack the walls to play when I’m feeling not okay.

I like Seymour, and it's much better than ‘77A-3740’ which is what I was called in the pen. 

The number is a tracking thing, and I found where they put the transmitter. 

They think they’re so smart, putting it near a vein so we can’t remove it without them knowing. But they don’t know that I know how to sidestep the death by cutting over about half a cubit and reaching in.

I’m not going to do it though, I mean… I could never.

Stupid fake walls, stupid keyboard clicks. I’ll find a way out, just you wait, just you wait.