The Exhibit
- Luvv A Sanwal
- Sep 14, 2025
- 4 min read
Sci-fi short story that explores captivity, and the resilience of the human spirit. When the last five humans awaken in a strange futuristic enclosure, they realize they are no longer free - they are being observed. Blending science fiction, dystopian themes, psychological tension, and human adaptation, this flash fiction forces readers to question freedom, control, and the price of survival.
“Congratulations!” it boomed with unnerving cheer. “You five humans, the last surviving members of your species, have been selected to become the newest attraction in our Intergalactic Zoological Park!”
The five of them - Evelyn, Marcus, Priya, John, and Malik... stood in a sterile, glass-walled chamber. Beyond the shimmering barrier stretched an impossible panorama: neon skies, silver towers that bent like molten glass, creatures with too many limbs and eyes pressed close, staring in.
Evelyn’s throat was dry. “What the hell do they mean last humans?”Priya was trembling. “Maybe… maybe Earth—”
“Don’t worry about Earth,” the voice chimed. “Your planet has been… relocated to new galaxy. What matters is you! You will exist in a custom enclosure, designed to replicate your primitive ‘habitat.’ Trees, water, artificial skies, even climate control—deluxe package!”
And as if on cue, the walls shimmered and shifted. In seconds, they were standing in what looked like a lush park—oak trees, a gentle lake, manicured grass. But the air felt too clean, too precise. Like a stage set.
John pressed his palm against the sky. It rippled like plastic.
The crowd of alien visitors outside roared in delight. They were on display.
At first, they were given comforts. A home. Beds. An endless supply of tasteless gray paste that sustained them. And every day, a different holographic projection announced their “feeding times” and “play periods” for the amusement of the crowd.
Marcus had tried to hang himself with a bedsheet. He awoke an hour later, unmarked, lungs filled with air again.
Evelyn had taken a rock from the lake and smashed her head against it. Same result.
Malik slit his wrists - only to watch the blood vanish, the skin knitting smooth, as if time itself reversed. If they cut themselves, the wound sealed within seconds.
The voice was cheerful as ever:
“We won’t ever let you die! That’s our guarantee! Billions of visitors enjoy seeing you—over and over, forever!”
By the second year, the five stopped speaking much. Words felt useless under the eyes of billions. But the crowd always demanded more. The aliens didn’t want quiet humans. They wanted drama. They wanted conflict. They wanted despair.
So every month, the enclosure changed. Sometimes it was a burning desert. Sometimes a flooded city. Sometimes a dark forest filled with echoes that weren’t theirs. Always designed to push them into breaking.
Priya cracked first. One morning she began screaming, tearing at the fake trees until her fingernails bled. The aliens loved it. She was revived each day, reset to keep playing the role of “the wild one.”
Malik hushed, “They don’t want us happy. They want us to be their story. Their entertainment.” His eyes glinted with something desperate. For years, Malik started… watching.. studying... every wall, every light flicker, every glitch in the holographic sky. He memorized patterns when the feeding systems dispensed paste, when the environment reset, how the projection voice glitched if two announcements overlapped.
“Don’t you see?” he whispered one night. “They’re.... They’re machines. And machines can be broken.”
He began testing them - speaking certain phrases aloud during announcements, repeating rhythms by tapping on the enclosure glass, syncing his heart rate to the pulsing floor sensors. Slowly, deliberately, he found ways to overload the system’s feedback loops.
The onlookers thought he was mad and were enjoying his weird acts, until one day the lights stuttered mid-cycle and an alien roar of confusion thundered outside the walls.
Malik’s lips curved into the first real smile they had seen in years. “It’s listening to us now.”
All smiled in unison hearing this.
On the five-hundredth “Earth cycle”.
They stood hand in hand, silent, still, staring not at each other but directly at the glass where the audience gawked. Billions of alien eyes blinked, leaned closer. For the first time, the humans weren’t breaking. They weren’t fighting. They weren’t crying. They were watching back.
And then, as one, they smiled.
Evelyn spoke for them all, her voice steady, carrying. “We know you’re watching. And we know what you want. You want us to be animals in a cage. But there’s one thing you don’t understand about humans…”
She pressed her palm against the glass. Marcus, John, Priya, and Malik did the same. The crowd hushed.
“We adapt. We always adapt.”
The lights flickered. The glass trembled. Somewhere deep in the alien system, Malik’s “feedback loops” had multiplied - every camera, every microphone, every sensor now running his signals. Their story wasn’t entertainment anymore.
The zoo’s network twisted. Other exhibits flickered. Creatures in cages began to scream as their own walls fractured.
“Exhibit 5—escaped. Containment breached.”
The five smiled wider.
For the first time in centuries, humanity wasn’t extinct. Humanity wasn’t free. Humanity was everywhere.
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