“What is your name?”
The question comes with its usual answer, and its usual answer is followed by unbearable pain that flows through Eren’s body like acid in his veins.
He rests on a metal table, looking at the reflection of his own naked body. Tubes secure themselves into his veins, pumping him full of a faint yellow liquid that brings with it a longing for death.
“What is your name?”
“Eren... Pierce.”
The acid claws and scrapes and burns at his insides, as it does every time. His body never gets used to it. The pain never eases, it’s never enough to give him the sweet release of unconsciousness either.
“What is your name?”
“I... told you... so many... times.” Eren gasps, his lungs burn, his eyes burn, the fluid they pump into him makes everything burn. Every orifice, every hair, every thought, every breath utter agony.
A voice crackles from somewhere, a smooth, easy voice. It’s accented, somewhere norther he thinks, distorted by the artifacts of a speaker system. “We will try again tomorrow.”
As the voice fades, a loud, inconsistent buzzing plays over the room's speakers. Always fluctuating, always on. He can’t sleep—ever. He feels like he’s going crazy, he probably is going crazy.
It always tries again tomorrow, it's been trying again tomorrow for god knows how long now.
After surrendering on the ground that night, each one of them was split apart, hauled into the back of a different vehicle, forced to breath in a pungent gas, and that was the last Eren remembered.
Ever since then, he has been here—asked the same question hundreds of times, burned hundreds of times, cried hundreds of times, and wanted to die many, many time more.
By what Eren thinks is the end of the first week, he finds himself staring up into a set of unfamiliar eyes. They belonged to his face, or what he thinks is his face, he spent so long looking at it he doesn’t know any more. But the eyes, the eyes aren’t his.
“What is your name?” the voice calls again, putting an end to the endless noise after hours, or days, or weeks, who knew.
“Eren Pierce.” He whispers, watching his mouth move, watching his eyes watching his mouth move.
Agony again, always expected but always insufferable.
“What is your name?”
“I....”
“What is your name?”
“Eren Pierce?”
Fire, licking its way into the capillaries of his body to claw with angry nails and burrow into his skin.
“What is your name?”
“I don’t... I don’t know...” Eren responds. It’s the most genuine thing he has said in his life. Every time he spoke, every time he said his name his body was set ablaze. This is the first time he said he didn’t know, and this is the first time the pain never came.
“What is your name?”
“I don’t... know.”
“What is your name?”
“I don’t know my name.”
That has to be the case. The burning isn’t coming, the burning finally stopped coming and it’s because he truly doesn’t know his name. Eren stares into his own unfamiliar eyes. Those eyes don’t belong to Eren Pierce, they couldn’t. This face isn’t Eren Pierce. It has to be someone else's. Of course he doesn’t know his name, that is the only logical solution.
He has been lying the whole time. He thought his name was Eren Pierce but now he knows better, now he knows not to lie. This is it, this has to be it.
“What is your name?”
“I don’t know.”
“You do not have a name.”
“Oh...”
“You do not have a name.”
“I do not have a name.”
Eren braces for the pain, but the pain never comes.
“You do not have a name.”
“I do not have a name,” he repeats enthusiastically. He is getting somewhere, he’s answering correctly. If he answers correctly he won’t be hurt any more.
“Let’s continue tomorrow.” The voice says.
His body tenses against his restraints, eyes wide, mouth struggling. He was doing so well, he was saying the right things, why tomorrow? Why why why would they want to try again tomorrow? This is what they wanted right?
“No no no, wait! I don’t have a name! I know that now, I know that now we can keep go—Agghh!”
The liquid flows through his veins, makes his eyes roll in the back of his head, burns the nerves at their base, scorches the taste buds of his tongue.
The noise returns, the horrible awful deafening noise, the unending painful agonizing noise. It fills his ears, his dreams, his pores, his skin, his souls, his blood. He wants the fire, he wants the acid, anything anything anything anything anything anything but the noise.
“What is your name?” it comes so suddenly.
Did time pass? Did a new day happen? Did he sleep? Did he dream? Did he imagine it all?
“What is your name?”
“I don’t have a name!” He shouts at the top of his lungs, excitement bubbling and growing and festering. He wants to please the voice, he wants to answer correctly, he needs to answer correctly, maybe the noise will stop if he pleases this voice.
“You do not have a name, correct. You have a number. You are 03.”
“I do not have a name, I have a number. I am 03!”
The pain doesn’t come, and he has never been happier.
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“What is your number?”
“I am 03.”
“You are 03.”
“I am 03!”
“Where do you live?”
“I... don’t know where I live.”
Agony once again. 03 wants to smash his head against the table, but the thought of moving his muscles alone sends his mind into a frenzy.
“You live nowhere, you have no home.”
“I live nowhere, I have no home,” 03 pants through clenched teeth.
“You are a product of Site 51. You are not a person, you are property.”
“I am a product of Site 51, I am property.”
Where does he know that from?
As soon as the thought enters his mind, the pain returns in a way 03 never thought possible. It lasts for twice as long, an eternity, it's going to kill him, it's going to kill him.
“What is your name?”
“I do not have a name, I have a number. I am 03!”
“Where do you live, 03?”
“I have no home, I am property of site 51!”
“Good... very good progress. Chloe beat you, you know. So did Jessica.”
Chloe, Jessica. He finds his mind drifting at their names, drifting to the names he didn’t hear but wanted to. Should he ask?
“Chris? Tony? Hayden?” He mutters their names under his breath.
“More resilient, stubborn even,” the voice crackles in silence for a moment. “They are making it harder on themselves. The sooner you all accept, the sooner it will all be over.”
“What is this?”
“This? This is the first step. I look forward to watching you all take the next one. We will continue tomorrow.”
“Please please please don’t go. Please don’t go! Don’t go! Don’t go don’t go don’t go!” 03 screams, but he is too late. The voice is gone, the noise returns, and this time much much louder.
The cycle of questions, the noise, the acid in his veins, it lasts for hours, days, weeks, it doesn’t end. There is no sleep, no rest. The noise is all encompassing, all surrounding. 03 can feel his mind shattering under its weight, cracking under the torrent, drowning in the mass of its infinite presence.
He cries, until he can’t cry, and then he screams until he can’t scream. 03 bucks and fights against the restraints until the strength leaves his muscles burning with more pain than the acid pumping tubes. 03 fights until he can’t fight any more, until he is a shell, a husk, a ghost, a corpse laid flat on the table, staring into someone else's eyes.
Once 03 has stopped, stopped trying, stopped crying, stopped fighting, stopped everything, he sits there, still.
“You are a tool, designed to be used.”
“I am a tool, designed to be used.”
The hours shift into bloody smears, his mind drifts, but never too far.
“You will obey any order you are given.”
“I will obey any order I am given.”
His body is a ruin, dissolved into nothing, only to gain shape at the doctor's words.
“03, are you ready to move on?” she asks
“I will move on, if you tell me to move on. I will stay, if you tell me to stay,” 03 responds.
His voice is distant, so impossibly far away. It sounds like a stranger. It is a stranger, but it’s also his. The voice of 03 emerges from 03’s mouth. This made sense. Of course 03’s voice would come from 03’s mouth. He’s wrong for thinking any other voice would come from any other mouth.
“Good... very good. In that case, you are ready to move on.”
How long has it been, he wonders? Does it matter? Likely not. Wondering about how much time has passed doesn’t in any way benefit the doctor, or himself. It’s a useless thought from a different person, one that should be expelled. His only concern is what the doctor wants, that is all there needed to be.
The room fills with unfamiliar eyes, the rest of their faces hidden under medical masks. Gloved hands work and pull at his flesh, removing the tubes from his body, tearing the sticky nodes from his skin, tapping away information into the tablets they hold in their hands.
Their eyes watch him, linger on him. Is that fear he sees? Poorly disguised by a mask of clinical apathy. Pride maybe? Some strange combination of it all?
He doesn’t move until the voice of the doctor behind the glass orders him to.
“Sit upright.”
He obeys, his muscles and bones aching.
One of the doctors in the room with him, sticks him with a stim. He watches as the needle is pulled from his skin, and struggles not to scratch at the painful itch that rolls its way over his entire body.
“Very good.”
It’s such a simple phrase, and yet it carries with it a pure euphoria he didn’t know he was capable of feeling. He thought any pleasure in the world had been burned from his veins, buried under the noise, but here it is.
His entire body prickles with relief, a weight shifting from his shoulders and making him feel as light as air. He needs to please her again, make her proud again, he needs to do exactly everything she asks of him, anything she asks of him, so long as it keeps this feeling going, and keeps away the noise.
A door opens, and from beyond, a woman appears. She is tall, dressed in a white lab coat, and wears her hair in a loose ponytail, framing a square face accented with round rimmed glasses. Behind her, four armed guards dressed all in black appear as well, shadowing her every move.
“Hello 03, I am Doctor Yiva,” She says, eyes examining the tablet in front of her.
“Hello, Doctor Yiva,” 03 responds.
She remains quiet then, tapping at her screen for a time before finally speaking again.
“Are these numbers correct?” She asks. 03 doesn't know which numbers but he feels himself yearning to answer, begging to understand so he can give her the information she needs.
“They are, yes,” one of the other doctors responds.
“You triple checked them?”
“Yes, we all did.”
“Good, very good. Let us prepare the next test then.” Doctor Yiva finally examines 03 with her own cold, calculating eyes.
On queue, the doctors in the room place down a layer of plastic on the floor around him, and produce a scalpel, placing it on a nearby tray.
The four armed guards raise their rifles to 03, who watches Doctor Yiva’s every movement intently.
“03, pick the scalpel up from the table beside you,” Doctor Yiva commands, and he obeys, holding the slim piece of metal between his fingers, waiting for her next order.
The guards shift steadily, flick the safeties off, and place their fingers on their respective triggers.
Did they expect him to try and escape? Why would he do something like that?
“03, use the scalpel to slit your own throat.”
Her words drive him unlike anything he has experienced in his life, he needs to obey, he needs to do this. If he doesn’t, the noise will return, the acid will return. Anything is better than the acid, death is better than the noise. He will do anything, anything she asks, so long as she doesn’t bring back the noise.
Without a second's hesitation he brings the scalpel to his neck and runs the blade against it.
His breath catches as the warm blood splatters from his throat, soaks his skin, saturates the plastic underneath him.
“Very good 03, very good.” Doctor Yiva's voice is like warm honey, her praise a drug he needs more than the blood flooding from his neck. Bliss surrounds him, as his vision turns black and his body grows numb, content at having satisfied her.
