The Experiment by Cassidy Shay (top non fiction books of all time TXT) 📕

look like it’s Mathew’s baby. But do I let him know that it’s really Collin’s? Or do I just tell him that I want to get this whole experiment over with, so let’s get it on? I’m still wondering what to do when he walks in.
“Hey, Penny,” he says. “You hungry? They’re making hamburgers for dinner.” If you’ve read the first book, you’ll know that the food on the lower floors was pretty bad. Half the time, it looked like mush. Except for when our parents were there, it seemed inedible. But on Floor 6, just the smell of the food fills my stomach.
“I actually have something to tell you,” I say. He sits down on the bed. “So you know that I went to see Collin today, right?”
“Yeah. Did you have a good time?” In the week that I’ve known Mathew, I’ve learned a few things about him. The first is that when he talks about having a good time, he doesn’t mean anything sexual. He merely wants to know if I had fun. It would make sense, because you usually have fun around your friends. Even though I know he doesn’t mean it in that way, I feel heat rush to my cheeks.
“Actually, I did. That’s, um, kind of the problem. We may have had a little too much fun.” I mumble this, but he hears every word. It takes him a minute to understand my meaning. When he gets it, he remains silent. “And I don’t know for sure, but I’m almost positive that I’m pregnant.”
He nods. “We’re going to have to make sure that we keep this one alive. I know that you’ll want to keep a child of his.” It’s my turn to nod, and I can’t look him in the eye.
“But that’s not the only thing. They can’t know that it’s Collin’s. They have to think that this baby belongs to you.”
“Oh,” he says. He looks at the bed, which has a censor. I don’t know exactly how it works, but somehow the Academy is able to tell exactly when we… uh… yeah. If I’m going to keep the father’s identity a secret, then Mathew and I have to make it look like it’s his.
“Sorry to make it awkward,” I say, looking at the floor. “You know I wouldn’t do this to you if it wasn’t extremely important to me. If they find out that she is Collin’s baby, I don’t know what they’ll do to her. I can’t let anything happen to this baby.”
Several minutes later, he’s leaving the room while I finish getting dressed. I don’t feel good about making him do that. I know that he hates the experiment just as much as I do. So making him do that for me makes me feel like a horrendous human being.
But I would feel even worse if I let something happen to this baby. I think about what Collin said about being sick, and I nod to myself. This will be difficult.
The next morning, I wake up puking over the side of the bed. Why am I already puking? It’s too early for me to be having morning sickness.

The noise wakes Mathew, who looks at me with pity. “I guess it’s a good thing that you sleep on the outside of the bed,” he says, and then reaches over to grab my hair and pull it away from the mess.
When I’m finally done puking, he helps me sit up. I lean against him and he wraps his arms around me. He looks over at the mess. “I just hope you didn’t throw up the baby,” he jokes, and I force myself to laugh.
A couple hours later, I am in the doctor’s lab being examined before even more surgery is performed on my body. “Penny, it looks like you’re pregnant,” he says. He walks around the table that’s under me. “This means that we can’t reshape your body for another nine months.” He starts speaking rapidly, making no effort to show his enthusiasm. “Unless we remove the fetus from the womb. Then we can place it in the lab and help it grow, and wait only a few days for the surgery.” He goes on to explain the scientific breakthroughs that could happen, and I stop him.
I know that he is talking mostly to himself, but I still have to voice my thoughts. “Um… doctor?” He snaps his head around to look at me. “Can we please just leave the baby as it is? No removing anything, no injecting anything, or any of that. I want to look at her and know that science had nothing to do with her being born, with her turning out however she turns out. I want to be confident in the knowledge that she is my daughter, not the victim of some stupid science experiment.” He overlooks the small insult and nods reluctantly.
“Very well,” he says. “But so that the baby actually does survive, you’re being put on bed rest for the next two weeks. If by then, we feel that there is enough of a foundation there, then you can continue life as you have been. At the first sign of trouble, you’re going back on bed rest.” He looks at the ground and then back up at me. “If there’s still a big risk at the end of the two weeks, you’re going back on bed rest until further notice.” I nod in agreement, and then walk back to my room, where I sit on my bed.
I wait there, knowing that soon, someone will come in to talk to me about the rules of bed rest. I don’t have to wait too long before Dr. Pender walks in and sits at the small table in the corner.
“Have you chosen a name for yourself?” she asks me.
I shake my head. “I did not choose. I let someone that I love choose my name for me.” She glances at me with a questioning look. I know that she’s wondering why I don’t just tell her the name. “I’m telling you this so that you’ll know who I am. I am someone who won’t give up my past. You may try to separate me from all I’ve ever known, but you will never take away the knowledge that I have, or the person that I am. I won’t let you take that away from me.” I don’t know why I’m telling this to Dr. Pender. Besides Collin, she probably knows me better than anyone else. She’s familiar with all of my moods and most of my thoughts.
Still, she seems puzzled for a second. Then her expression changes to one of exhaustion. “Just tell me the name that you, or whoever else, chose. I’ve got things to do and I don’t have time for your rambling today.”
“Meagan,” I say. “My new name is Meagan.”
“Alright. Now you’re on strict bed rest for the next two weeks. Someone will bring you food and water, and someone will come in to check and make sure that you don’t move out of the bed. I don’t even want you getting up to go to the bathroom. We will have a tube rigged up within the hour so you don’t have to worry about it. Okay?” I nod.
“That’s all I have for now. I’ll be back later. Right now, get some rest.” When she leaves, I crawl under the covers and fall into a deep sleep.
When I wake up, I’m glad that I’m on bed rest. My body feels so weak that I know I can’t move at all. I look around the room and I’m shocked to see Collin sitting at the table. “Collin?” I say, reaching for him. He stands and steps close to me, but the moment that his hand touches mine, he disappears. Great. Now I’m seeing things.

I sit up a little bit and look around again. After discovering that there is nothing for me to do, I sit and wait. No wonder I’m going crazy. When this is over, I’ll need a strait jacket.

“Hey, Pe-. I mean Meagan,” I hear a few minutes later. It’s Dr. Pender with a tray of food. “How are you feeling today?” She puts the tray down on the table and then takes out a pad of paper from her pocket. As I tell her that I can’t move and that I feel like puking, she writes it down. I do not, however, tell her about seeing Collin. That’s something that I want to keep to myself. I don’t even know if I’ll tell Mathew.
Dr. Pender gives me my meal and talks with me for a while. When I’m done eating, she gathers everything up and stands. “I’ll bring in some cards and books for you to pass the time. I’m afraid that there aren’t many interesting books left in this world, but I can try to find a couple that might entertain you a little. And if you want, I can teach you how to play some card games by yourself.” She smiles. “Right now, I have to go. Lots of reports to file. I’ll be back with your lunch, and hopefully something for you to do.” She leaves the room then. When the door clicks shut, Carl appears at the bottom of my bed.
“I don’t know why I did it. I’m sorry, Penny.” He turns to look at me, and then vanishes. I sink into my bed as much as I can. Since I’m already lying down and the mattress is pretty firm, I don’t sink very far. Even though he’s gone, and I know he wasn’t really there in the first place, a cold sweat breaks out all over my body and I shudder. The one part of my old life that I’m willing to let go of followed me here and refuses to release its grip on my mind.
The rest of the day is extremely boring. Dr. Pender brings me in some books and a deck of cards, but I soon grow tired of them. So far, the only friend that I have on this floor is Mathew. Although he is an Azulate, he has been assigned tasks while he’s living on Floor Six.
Life in the sixth floor is very different from life on the residential floors. On Floor One, there is almost never anything to do. You draw Memories for mere seconds, eat meals, and hang out in the cells. Besides that, there is nothing. Even prisons in the past had recreational activities, but the Azuli Academy has nothing.
In the sixth floor, everyone has a job. Although mine wasn’t officially assigned to me, my job is child-bearer. They have cooks and cleaners as well as doctors, scientists, and a few people that manage things on the main floors. Mathew cleans, and since so many people go to so many different rooms and hallways on this floor, he’s busy most of the day. The Assignments surprised me when I was transferred here. On other floors, Floor Six residents are seen as lazy, without a care in the world. After getting to know the system, though, I’ve learned that some of these employees haven’t had a day off in years.
Another surprise was the lack of Vipero. I’d always assumed that the Vipero live on Floor Six. In reality, their living quarters are below Floor One. They come to Floor Six about as often as the Azuli do.
Because schedules are so busy, I don’t have much time to make friends. And now that I’m on bed rest, it will become much harder. I suspect that I’ll become friends with the nurses that to check on me throughout my