by Dale Mayer
Tia smiled. “No. Given the shape I was in, she asked. But how could I explain about the tests ‘to make me healthy’ again.” Her voice took on a mocking tone at the end.
“Wait.” Dean leaned back. “I assumed the tests were parapsychological in nature.”
“They were. But most parents were of the opinion that there was something wrong with us. And they wanted us ‘fixed’ regardless of how.”
“Did Dr. Wilhelm pass his lab off as a place where people like you could be treated and become…hell I don’t know…normal?”
She nodded. “I think so. Then when he figured out what we could do, he wanted to do more and more tests. With me there all the time, he could do more in-depth tests.”
“What kind of tests?”
She laughed. “In the beginning they were everything from the type of food we ate, the type of music we listened to, the colors we wore.”
He grinned. “I gather that didn’t produce the results he was looking for?”
She shook her head. “Not at all. By the end, he wanted us to be better, stronger, have more abilities.”
“Whoa, I had no idea.” Dean stared at her in shock. “I can’t imagine that went over well.”
“At the beginning he always tested to see what made us stronger, then weaker, and poor naive us thought he’d meant to weaken our abilities so we were acceptable in our parents’ eyes. Instead, he was cataloguing our responses to see what made us stronger.” She shoved the pizza boxes back off the table and pulled the thick folders forward. “He pulled some pretty nasty shit in his attempts to see if there was something that would set off hidden talents. If he attacked, could we attack him back, bigger and stronger so to speak?”
“That sounds highly unethical.”
“Ethical and Wilhelm didn’t belong in the same sentence.” She opened the first folder and raised her gaze to Dean. “Especially after I managed to escape. There were only four kids there at the time, but according to them, they were all punished as if they were to blame for my escape. He always assumed I’d had help.”
She kept quiet for a long moment, wishing she could explain the inside fear that had tormented her for such a long time. “I did have help, but not the first time. Like I said, that was more accidental. But the second time…oh yeah, I had help.”
“Who helped you?” he said in a puzzled tone.
“I have no idea,” she whispered. “And you wouldn’t believe me if I told you.”
“Try me?”
She laughed. “All right. It was…I don’t know, you’ll laugh but it was like a ghost. Or something. I don’t know, but it’s like there was a whisper saying to run.” She shrugged. “Whatever it was, I saw that second opportunity and I took it.”
“And the ones you left behind,” he asked in a gentle tone. “Did you never worry about them?”
“No,” she said shortly. “I didn’t have to. You see, by the end, there was no one left. I was alone. In fact, I might have been the only one left alive in that damn building, except for Wilhelm. I figured I’d been forgotten in the padded cell. When the ghost appeared and showed me how to escape, I never looked back. For all I know the place had been deserted for days.”
*
He didn’t know what to think. A ghost? An entity that helped her get out of a locked room from a deserted lab. How bizarre. And what could he say? Nothing. But he had to come up with a response of some kind. He smiled. “Sorry, you lost me at ghost.”
“Yeah, that’s where I lose most people,” she muttered. “Not that I tell many. What about you and your weird symptoms after the attack? Did you see or do anything odd that might make you think there was more to this physical existence?”
He opened his mouth to say no, hell no, only he couldn’t. Why. He closed his eyes and sat back, watching her study the very first page in the folder. He had seen some weird lights when he’d first realized there was a problem. After all, when you looked at a person and saw colors around their head, it was an obvious enough problem to go and ask the doctors about, and he’d quickly learned there was nothing physically wrong. The doctors had immediately turned to his psychological health. He’d been quick to learn that lesson. Not fast enough for a few odd notes in his file suggesting time off and that his mother’s illness might have had something to do with his mental stress, not to mention being a single dad and maybe he should look at getting some help at home. Like that was an easy option. He’d never told anyone else.
“So the answer is yes.” She snorted. “See how it feels. You don’t know if you should say something or not because I might consider you weird or not quite right in the head.”
“It wasn’t much,” he protested. “But along with the enhanced hearing came enhanced sight, only it was real weird. It’s like something was wrong. I saw colors where there weren’t any, edges blurred. After the regular doctor I decided it was likely a visual problem and went to see an eye doctor.”
“But he couldn’t find anything wrong – right?”
“No, he couldn’t.” Dean smiled. “But the symptoms are diminishing now so whatever was wrong is now getting better.”
“Fool you. It’s not getting better, you are getting stronger so you are learning to handle the information better, and it’s not something you see all the time.”
“Information?”
“Yeah, your brain received a lot more information based on the enhanced sight and hearing – way cool that is too – and so it didn’t know what to do with it all initially. Now that you’ve had a few months to figure it out, your brain has been able to compartmentalize the information – store it so to speak.”
“So you’re saying I’m not healing, the enhanced sensations are just going underground?” he asked doubtfully.
“Absolutely. A good way to look at it.” She smiled. “It’s all real, you know. The colors around people’s heads, around objects, the flares when people get mad, the warm rosy glow that surrounds people in love.”
He stared at her. “You see it, too?” he asked hoarsely. “I thought it was just my psychosis.”
She shook her head. “Nope, not a psychosis. It’s simple. You’re able to see auras and are starting to learn to read energy. Way cool.”
She turned the page on the folder in front of her. “It’s all good. You’ll learn to see more as time goes on – provided you are still open to the suggestions. If not it will become an ability you’ll draw on at certain times but will lie fallow the rest of the time. That’s kinda sad, if you go that way.”
“And why not go that way?” It sounded damn fine to him.
“Because this is a good ability. It allows you to read other people. To understand if they are telling the truth. To see if someone is really sick or not.”
He stared at her. “How is that possible?”
“Have to wait and see. Use them sometime, and you’ll see what information is available.” She turned and assessed him. “Considering you’re a cop, this could be helpful. Imagine a runaway teen girl who tells you a story and she’s looking so seriously sad that your heart breaks and you’d bend over backwards only to find out she has a couple of nasty pimps in the bushes waiting to beat the shit out of you.”
He didn’t dare tell her he’d never get into a scenario like that, being who he was, but her point was valid. “How?” he asked bluntly.
“Because energy never lies. People lie. People cheat. People steal. Energy is always energy. If you can read it, then it’s a huge life skill. It will always show you who is lying at any given time.”
“And you, are you lying to me right now?”
She laughed. “Nope.”
“How about this morning when you said, you loved me?”
She gasped in shock. And damn if her outline didn’t start fading away.
“I never said that,” she shrieked.
He laughed. “Gotcha.”
Chapter 29
She snickered. “You’ll pay for that.” And she turned her head to the paper
s in front of her. Inside though, her heart beat like a bird on the wrong side of a window. Why would he say something like that? It’s not something she’d ever say. Never had a chance to ever do so before and, given her history, she doubted the opportunity would arise any time soon. But his words stirred something in her.
Her teen years hadn’t been normal. She’d missed the chance to crush on anyone. There’d been a guy she’d liked at the center, but he’d not been there long. A few months. Then a new younger kid had shown up, and she’d become closer to him but not in any romantic way. Her entire hormonal life she’d been in that damn lab. Since living on her own, she’d had several relationships. Once realizing she was almost safe, only looking behind her shoulder a few times, she’d found a thirst for life and all the things she’d never had.
She’d gotten a job, rented a small studio and had indulged. In a big way. All the food she’d heard about. All the food she’d thought about. She’d eaten until she was sick. Loving some and hating others. She actually took on a second job so she could eat more – this time on the boss’s nickel. The small restaurant had been known for its good home cooked food and she’d learned. First by doing dishes, then doing prep work and finally doing some of the simpler dishes and helping with the rest. She’d enjoyed eating and they’d enjoyed teaching her. They’d kept the questions to a minimum. Maybe she’d made it very clear in the beginning, maybe not. She couldn’t remember. It was a long time ago.
She’d also had an affair. Several of them. She’d inhaled romance books and thought the words on the paper would mimic real life. That hadn’t worked out so well. Groping in the dark, sweaty hands, smelly bodies and bad breath.
Gross. She’d given it a fair sampling with three men, and that had been enough for her. At one point she wondered if she was more in tune with other women and should go that route.
But she never felt the urge to follow it up. In fact, she wanted to read the romance novels – they were much better.
She’d made friends but never close friends. After all, you shared things with friends. Simple things like your history, where you went to school, first kiss. How did one say all three of those had occurred while in an institution?
Not exactly a conversation starter. Besides, she was a private person. She didn’t want to be viewed as an escapee from a mental hospital.
“Heavy thoughts?”
“Sure. Like sex, romance and death.” She snorted. “Especially the last one.” She tapped the papers in front of her. “This patient died.”
He reached over and plucked the sheet out of her hand. He narrowed his gaze. “This was twelve years ago.”
“Yes, I was there at the time.”
His gaze zeroed in on her face. “He died while you were there. Did you know him?”
“I don’t remember him,” she said shortly. “I heard rumors of a death, several, in fact, but it was never confirmed.” She shrugged. “But I didn’t know him.”
“Was he the only one?”
“I don’t know.”
“What killed him?” Dean wasn’t going to let it go.
“No idea. Maybe these papers explain it. They are all about him.” She handed over a paperclip full of papers. “I thought this file was on one person, but each clip is a different person.” She riffled through the folder, counting. “I think twelve people. Hell, there weren’t that many people in the lab at any time.”
“Likely over the dozen years it was operational. Twenty-two participants is hardly anything. You need a lot of people to show viable results for treatments.”
“Not many of us weirdos out there. He was damn lucky to have this many. Am I here?” Her fingers flicked through the stack. “Jason. Michelle. Roberta. Bobby. Jerome. Sergei. Calendar.” She went silent as the memories of all those people rippled through her psyche.
“Jesus. So many.” She went to the second to the last file and pulled it forward. She tapped the top paper in the clip. “He was a pain in the ass. He hated being there, and he’d scream at the top of his lungs for days. We all hated it.”
“How did they stop him?”
She paused and looked over at him. “No idea. But he stopped. From one day to the next he was silent. Actually…” She frowned. “He might have just been kicked out. I remember it was a constant noise in the background and then it was suddenly gone.
Dean flicked through the papers and came to the last sheet. “Or maybe they killed him. According to this, he was dead six weeks after arriving. Are you sure he wasn’t the one who died.”
She reached over and grabbed the papers. “No, it was Calendar. I think that was his name.” She frowned as she read the form on the last page. “He was the only one I knew about.”
Dean tossed another packet in front of her. “This girl died too. And this one and this one.” He dumped the stack in front of her. “Your name doesn’t appear to be here for a very good reason – you’re the only one still alive.”
*
The shock on her face made him want to laugh, but there was nothing lighthearted about the subject matter. If he was correct, all these people had died. And they’d been just kids. Children. Teens. In theory she’d crossed paths with all of them. At one time or another she’d likely met these people face to face, maybe whispered about their crappy lives together. “No,” she whispered. “It can’t be.”
“Why is that?”
“Because I saw some of them leave.” She lifted her shocked gaze to Dean’s. “As in I saw the parents come and take the kids away.”
“And you’re sure it was the parents doing that?” Dean waited for her to understand. When she stared at him blankly, he added, “Maybe it was someone else other than their parents.”
She blinked. “Why would anyone do that?”
“I don’t know, but the thing is we now have something to go on. Something golden. There are names and dates here. We need to get this off to Jones. Have him track these families down and find out what the hell happened.”
“Wait.” She reached for the pages. “Does it actually say what happened to these kids? Given the way they died?”
“No. It just says deceased.”
She shook her head. “This is wrong on so many levels.”
“Yeah, that’s one way to put it,” he muttered. He reached over, grabbed a stack of papers and took a closer look. “This is an intake form. And then dietary restrictions, medical history. There are a few notes as to how the patient settled in. But nothing on the treatment. Nothing on medications given. Nothing on meetings and impressions from the doctor about each new arrival.”
“He was a rabid note taker,” she exclaimed. “There’s a lot of information missing here.”
“Sure, but then why this condensed version of events?”
“I don’t know.” She grabbed the file. “Billy arrived on June 17th. Okay, then he was allergic to dairy. Hey, I didn’t know that.” She pondered that information as if trying to match it up to her memories. “It’s possible I suppose.”
“You don’t remember?” he asked her curiously. “How well did you know these people? Did you have a cafeteria where you could all hang out and talk?”
“Oh no. That wasn’t allowed very often. We saw each other in passing, when someone had a fit, while in the observation room. Occasionally we’d get to talk in the hallways. We whispered at night to each other.” She gave him a crooked smile. “Prisoners do find ways, you know.”
“I’m glad to hear that,” he said forcefully. “I wish you’d had the skills to break free and beat the hell out of your warden.”
“You forget, we were conditioned to think we had no choice. That we were there because we had to be there. And we were kids. We weren’t exactly docile, but for the most part we were accepting.”
“Sounds like a horrible way to live.” And it pissed him right off.
“Oh it was, but it was the only way we had to live. We were always jealous yet hopeful when someone got to leave.” She smiled with memories. “I
t gave us hope that we would make it out of there too. That our families would come and pick us up.”
“And you never saw your family again?” He’d pulled out a notepad from his back pocket, instinctively needing confirmation on these details. He quickly asked her a few more questions. “I’m going to contact Jones right now. See if I can scan in some of these pages for him to use as a basis to track down the families of these kids. Maybe there are others who lived. Maybe find some who would be adults now.”
She nodded. “Is there something I can do?”
“Well, you’re avoiding looking at the second folder, any reason why?”
“Because it feels like a serpent waiting to strike. It’s so fat and obnoxious looking,” she said, an odd note creeping into her voice.
“All of that from one look?”
“One peek,” she muttered. But she stared down at the empty pizza box and picked away at the melted cheese, her gaze solidly not on the folder. Although he wanted to rush away to Jones and hand over all this material, he needed to see what bothered her about this folder.
He pulled it toward him and took a look inside. “More intake, more pages of dietary care. Yet this one is thick.” And the writing is more illegible than the others. Older. This one barely closed for the stack of material inside. Some of it crumpled. Some of it folded and other pieces just stuffed in. “This isn’t a condensed subject folder. This is all one patient,” he said, his voice rising. “This is excellent. We should be able to track this person down.”
“Oh yeah, you should,” she said, shoving the pizza box back against the far end of the table with more force than necessary. “Hell, if you can’t, you can’t really call yourselves cops.”
He snorted. “Okay smarty pants, why is that?”
She turned and glared at him as he stood up, the second folder in his hand, ready to take it to his office.
“Because it’s my folder, damn it. Everything in there is about me.”