by JA Huss
So maybe some of her story is true.
Not all of it, obviously. But some of it. Maybe.
Logan begins to shout at the woman. “You’re a bunch of sick fucks, you know that? You keep people here? You experiment on people and you want us to believe that any of you are innocent?”
“We didn’t choose our jobs any more than he chose his!” the woman spits back, indicating me with one sternly pointed finger.
“Enough,” I say. “Let’s go. Open the fucking door, Darrel.”
Darrel shuffles over to the wall, presses some hidden pressure point and a panel slides open. Logan walks over to watch him as he starts entering a code and I stay back to make sure none of the captives get any dumb ideas.
The wall begins to slide open and Logan rushes in, assault rifle at high ready. “Clear,” he yells, backing against the wall. Then he points to Darrel and says, “Lead the way.”
I motion for the rest of the pack to follow, and Logan hangs back, bringing up their rear.
I go in last, sick feeling in my stomach.
The smell is the first thing I notice as we make our way down a proper cave tunnel. Not death. Not even the filth of the cell I found Megan in. Something else. The walls are ragged rock and the floor is littered with stones. Someone up ahead trips, stumbles forward, but doesn’t go down.
We stop at a steel door. This time, no fancy security panel. Just an old-fashioned vault lock. Darrel begins twisting the dials with the combination without even being told and just a few moments later he pulls on the door and swings it open.
A girl gasps on the other side. She’s young. Very young. Definitely not of age. She’s got on a full hazmat suit that includes the full hood, faceplate, and gas mask.
“Darrel,” I say in a low, angry tone. “If you lied to me—”
“It’s just a precaution,” he says. “I swear. She has to wear the suit when she’s working. It’s a standard level four regulation. But there’s no leak in any of the cells or the air filter alarms would be blaring and this place would be on lockdown. I didn’t lie. I’m not lying.”
I look at Logan. He shrugs. “Too late now if he did.”
The young hazmat girl is talking. Like… a lot. “Who are these people? What’s happening? Why do they have guns? Is this a terror attack? What are they going to do?”
Logan places one hand on her shoulder and places a finger over her faceplate where her mouth should be. “Shhhh,” he says. “You’re pissing me off.”
The girl’s eyes dart around frantically.
The older woman says, “It’s OK, child. It’s fine. Just do what they tell you.”
“Oh, my God,” she whines. “Oh, my God. They’re going to steal it, aren’t they? They’re going to kill people—”
That’s when I notice she’s got a little glass tube in one hand with a stopper in the top.
My heart skips. I point to the tube with my gun. “What is that?”
“Jesus Christ, child!” Darrel shouts. “You’re supposed to have that inside the hood! Secure that tube! Right now!”
“What the hell is it?” I ask.
“That’s not regulation!” Darrel says. Still outraged.
“Sorry,” the girl pouts. “I was taking a sample for the audit.”
“Is there a problem here?” I ask Darrel. He’s breathing hard and for a moment I worry he’ll have a heart attack. Not the youngest spring chicken in this room, is he? “Darrel? Is there a problem?”
“There’s no problem,” the girl squeaks. “I was just about to seal it up in here.”
In her other hand is a stainless steel canister.
“So do that,” I say. “Quickly.”
She nods her facemask at me, then turns her back to a desk with what I’m going to assume is the hood Darrell was referring to, and slips her arms inside, underneath a ventilation fan.
We all watch in silence as she drops the sample into the steel container, then pushes a rubber stopper over the top, hooks it up to a vacuum, sucks the air out, then screws a second top back onto the canister.
“That it?” I ask. Suddenly wondering if I’ve just been infected with something I’d rather not know about.
“I have to keep this refrigerated and—“
“Listen,” I say, raising my voice. The hazmat girl looks at me, eyes wide. There’s a speaker on the outside of her gas mask so people can hear her talk. But all I hear now is amplified heavy breathing from her mounting panic attack. “Shut the fuck up. Now.”
The older woman pulls her towards her and starts to take off her hood. When the young girl protests and starts to back away Logan steps in, holds her hands, and helps the woman take off her gas mask.
“It’s fine,” the woman soothes. “There’s no leak.” Then she glances back at me. “But these men are here to look things over. That’s all. It’s all part of the standard audit, I’m sure.”
I almost laugh at her delusional rambling.
Standard audit. Sure. We’ll go with that if it’ll keep everyone quiet.
This seems to pacify the girl, but Logan points his rifle at her and motions for her to join the group of others once her hood and mask are off. She slinks back against a wall and slides to the floor.
Logan shoots me a look that says, This isn’t gonna turn out well.
I shoot him one back that says nothing.
But he’s right. It’s not.
I move forward through the small space that was clearly not designed to hold ten people at once. It’s some kind of security room that also holds supplies. Computers covered in plastic to prevent contamination. Monitors on the wall that show the cells on the other side of a biohazard door. People in beds on those monitors.
“I’m going to need a list of names,” I say, pointing to the monitors, trying to maintain some semblance of detached calm. Because all the people in the cells are women, and all the women are very pregnant.
“I can get you that,” Darrel says, sitting down at one of the monitors. His fingers tap out commands on the plastic-covered keyboard like this is just another day on the job for him too.
And sure enough, just a minute or so later a list pops up on his monitor. He pushes back from the workstation so I can see, but I say, “Is Charlotte Kane on that list?”
Every single head swivels in my direction. Like I just uttered the magic words and they are under my spell.
“Is she?” I ask again, doing my best to ignore their reaction.
“No,” Darrel says hurriedly. “No. Miss Kane was here. For a while. But…”
He trails off.
“But what?” I ask.
“She died last month.”
“Died of?” I wave my gun at the cells. “That infection?” No one says anything. And this kinda pisses me off. “Darrel,” I say, crossing the few paces that separate us so that my gun can press against his head. “I don’t like to repeat myself. So you have two seconds to answer me before—”
“They don’t ever live through the course. They all die. She finished and—”
“She finished what?” Logan asks. And now he’s getting pissed too.
“They finished the treatment and—”
I shoot him.
The only person in the room who screams is the young assistant, but when I turn around to glare at her, she covers her mouth with both hands and begins to pant into her palms.
I point my gun at the older woman and say, “Get me a list of every single person who has ever come through this facility.”
She nods her head and says, “Yes, Mr. Boston,” and then scurries off to another computer and frantically taps on the keyboard.
I turn to Logan as we wait. He raises his eyebrows at me and I shake my head.
“Here,” the older woman says. “This is everyone since the facility opened.”
I walk over to the monitor and start scanning the list.
But it’s in alphabetical order so it only takes a few seconds to find what I’m looking for.
Christina Boston. Trial Successful. Released.
I stare at it for a moment. Just focus on the letters of her name lit up in green text on a black screen. “I thought Darrel just said they all die.”
“They do now,” Jane says hurriedly. “But… Mrs. Boston was part of the early trials and she…”
“She what?” I snap.
“She… lived, of course. That was before you were born.”
I squint at the monitor and find the date. And sure enough, whatever they were doing to her here, it was a very long time ago. Probably when she wasn’t much older than the little hazmat girl sitting on the floor.
Then I look up at the monitors. Ten of them, seven have… prisoners inside. Most of them are in bed but one is naked and crawling around, dragging her swollen belly on the floor as she goes.
Another is slumped in a corner, head slack and tilted to the side. Maybe she’s sleeping, but I doubt it.
I turn to the woman and hand her the drive. “Put it all on here.”
She takes the drive without comment and plugs it into the computer.
“And when I say all of it? I mean all of it.”
“It’s going to take a while. There’s a lot of data here.”
I stare at her for a moment. Then change my mind. “You know what? You’re right.”
And then I shoot her in the head, take my drive back, and then proceed to unplug all the hard drives and throw them into a backpack lying on the floor.
People are screaming now. All of them.
Because they know.
They know what they did.
They know who I am.
They know what’s coming next.
I leave that place with the backpack filled with hard drives, the young girl in half a hazmat suit, and Logan.
“You can’t leave it like this,” the girl is saying. “You can’t leave it. Those women will die. And I was only here to—”
I stop on the path back to the beach and shake her by the arm. “They’re already dead,” I snarl in her face. “I don’t want to hear another fucking word from you or you’ll end up like your coworkers back there.”
Two of Logan’s men have come back to join us so I hand her off to one of them and say, “Tie her up and take her back to the yacht. If she gives you any trouble, throw her over the side and let her swim.”
Then Logan and I push past them and make our way to the beach.
The first thing I see is Megan lying on the sand and she’s been stripped down to her tank top and shorts.
“What the fuck?” I ask.
The only other woman on the team is standing over her when I approach. “She fainted. Probably from the heat. So we took her clothes off, but then she came to and started slugging people, so we gave her a sedative. She’ll be out for another few hours, at least.”
“For fuck’s sake,” I say, swiping my hand across my brow. “Take her out to my yacht—”
“Wait,” Logan says. “You’re not coming back with me?”
“I will, but I need to talk to Megan in private. I’ll meet you in Freeport tomorrow.”
“And then what?”
“Then… I dunno. I came here looking for Charlotte but now she’s dead. So I dunno. I need to call Joey and Jesse and let them know what we found.”
“What did we find?” Logan asks.
“I… don’t really know that either. That’s why I need a night alone with Megan. She knows more than she’s letting on and I think I can get it out of her.”
“Uh… I think you lost all your cred with her, Johnny. If she’s involved in this, she’s not telling you shit. At least not the truth.”
“Give me one night,” I say. “Then, if I still think she’s holding back, we’ll move on.”
“OK,” Logan says. “But what about those people back in the lab? Won’t they be missed?”
“No. This was a set up. No one’s going to be missed.” I glance down, scowling at Megan’s unconscious body.
She lied to me.
Granted, I knew this last night. But it still fucking stings today.
I turn away, but then I turn back. “Don’t kill that hazmat girl yet. I still need her.”
“Even if she mouths off?”
“Just… gag her and throw her into a room. I’ll come back for her tomorrow.”
Chuckles from Logan’s team.
Psychopaths all the way around.
CHAPTER EIGHTEEN - MEGAN
I feel like I’ve been here before. The rolling motion of an ocean beneath me. The confusion, the sick feeling in my stomach, the too-heavy eyelids.
I float in that state between waking and dreams until it all comes back.
The dungeon. The starvation. The thirst. The humiliation. The threats. The way out.
Johnny.
The island.
Death.
I open my eyes and everything is on repeat. The same cabin where I woke up just a few days ago. The same darkness outside. The same quiet dread.
Only this time my head is pounding like a motherfucker.
I unexpectedly laugh.
Swearing. Did Johnny Boston have a conversation with me about swearing?
I laugh again, only this time hidden deep inside the laugh is a small sob.
“You awake?”
I look over at the open door and find him standing in it. His face is backlit by the lights from the hallway so he’s nothing more than a shadow.
“How do you feel?”
I close my eyes and turn over on my stomach. Burying my face in the pillow.
The soft sound of bare feet on the floor let me know he’s coming towards me.
I turn over again. Showing him my back.
“I think you fainted out on the beach. Probably heat stroke? The tactical gear was pretty heavy. So they started taking your clothes off—”
“Fuck you,” I whisper.
He sighs. “They took your clothes off and you freaked out. So they gave you a sedative.”
I close my eyes and say nothing.
“I had them bring you back to my yacht. We’re not done yet.”
“Oh, we’re done,” I say. “We’re absolutely fucking done.”
“Megan, I need you to help me understand—”
I turn over, fuming. Practically on fire with rage. “Help you understand? I need to understand! Me! You… you are some kind of psycho-killer! Did any of them make it out alive?”
“One,” he says. “The teenager.”
“Oh, my God. You killed them, didn’t you? You killed that entire lab!” I sit up in bed and point my finger at his face. He’s very close to me now. Too close to me. “They were just doing their jobs!”
He grabs my wrist and holds it. “So was I.”
“Really? You’re what? A scientist exterminator now?”
“Do you have any fucking idea—”
But that’s as far as I let him get. I scramble to my knees on the bed, wobbly and lightheaded still, but I reach up and slap his face with my free hand. He grabs that wrist too and we struggle. But I’m still weak from the drugs and he overpowers me easily, throwing me backwards on the bed.
“What the fuck?” he yells.
“What the fuck? What the fuck? You’re a goddamned murderer! Take me back. Take me back to the island where you found me. I’m getting off this ride. You just fucked up everything! Do you know that? You fucked up everything! I’m going to go back to that dungeon, chain myself to that wall, and die! I’m so fucking done with this!”
“Don’t be stupid,” he snarls. “I’m not taking you back to that dungeon. We still have a lot of shit to do before this can end and I need your help.”
“My help?” I scramble back up on my knees and then crawl out of his reach and push my back up against the bulkhead. “My help to do what? Kill more people?”
I’m hysterical. I get it. I’m confused, and I feel like shit, and I just took part in a mass murder.
“If that’s what it takes.”
But it was a rhetorical question. I didn’t expect him to answer.
I close my eyes tight. Squinting them. Then I whisper, “I don’t want to do this anymore.”
He sighs. And then the mattress sinks down and I open my eyes.
He’s sitting down, his back to me. Hunched over with his head in his hands. He rubs them down his face a few times. Like he’s tired.
No. Not tired. This… this is nothing like being tired.
This is weariness.
He’s weary.
He went on a long journey, was weary…
I know because I’m weary too.
“I’m so fucking sick of this shit!” I yell. “All of it! I’m done! Do you hear me? I’m fucking done!”
He shakes his head a little and then straightens up, staring ahead at the other side of the room. “I don’t want to do this anymore either, Megan.” His voice is low and tight with control. “I didn’t ask to be me. I wasn’t given a choice when they put me in charge of shit. I don’t want the money. And if my soul had been told… if there’d been full disclosure when the essence that is me was told it was time to be born into this life… I’d like to think I’d have said no.”
I frown. “What the hell are you talking about?”
He flops back on the bed.
…returning he rested…
His long upper body erases almost all the distance I managed to create between us. His hair isn’t long, but I can feel the soft edges of it against my toes. I can feel the warmth of his head brushing up against my feet.
He stares up at the ceiling with wide, blue eyes.
…he engraved on a stone the whole story.
“I have this theory, you know?”
“What?” I ask sharply.
“About how we get here. About how we end up with the lives we have.”
“Oh, for fuck’s sake. What are you talking about?”
“I think it’s like… you’re given a choice, you know?” He tips his head back so his eyes can catch mine. “Before you’re born. There’s some asshole in the ether directing soul traffic.”
I shake my head at him.
“Handing out destinies, you know?”
“God?” I ask. “You’re talking about God?”