“It’s past ten why?” It was after seven. I was expected back for my class. The class completely designed to me.
“I think…” I shuddered as Jared walked slowly to me.
That was when a sensation came over me. Voices spoke in my head. They hissed and wheezed their voices at me and I couldn’t help but listen. It was in my brain that I had to listen.
I heard a whispering in my head that overshadowed all of the other ones. It shook all through my body. “Get them Lena. All of the enemies are in front of you. We will find you if you don’t. Prove yourself.” It shouted to me. Jared grabbed my waist and I moved away from him as fast as I could. Hurt registered all over his face.
“Go away.” I screamed. “They are sending me after you.” Jared looked at me with frightened eyes. No one budged. “Leave!” I shouted as loudly as I could. Holland got up as quickly as she could with her damaged arm and touched my shoulder. She looked into my eyes with a meaningful look before she ran. Jared stood in place. His eyes were bulging out of his head but he didn’t move. “Please go.” I said and I reached out to touch his face.
He pulled his face down to mine and I thought he was going to leave me with a kiss but his lips parted open and he whispered. “I am not leaving you. Not again.”
“Jared, no please. They will come and they will get you this time. Please.” My last plead was cut short when the blackness came over my eyes.
I opened my mouth to tell him to go once more but I heard a foreign voice coming out of my mouth. “I told you once.” I laughed a cruel voice. I felt an inner part of me trying to thrash about and get whatever was inside me to get the hell out. “Now that you didn’t obey, you must die.” I was trapped; I hoped he knew that this wasn’t me. I hoped I was glowing on the outside or something was different to show him it wasn’t me. I didn’t feel Jared’s touch anymore and I hoped he was gone.
These words were not mine and that voice was not mine. I was being taken over, and I knew I would lose myself. My body had a mind of it’s own because I reached in front of me and found a neck.
I gripped it as tightly as I could and felt wind rushing all around me. Too many voices told me to stay put and somehow my body obeyed. I heard him struggling, he whimpered under my hold and I felt like crying but I couldn’t.
I heard a shout and realized that Holland was behind me again. “Lena. Find yourself. Get strength and let go.” I wanted her to be safe and she wasn’t. I wanted to claw at my own face but I couldn’t bring myself to fight through the blackness. Something was holding me in place.
I felt a wild wind. It brought chills down my back and before I knew it, a rich voice approached me. “Oh Jared. How naïve of you to think you could win.” It was Dr. Ravana; he was the main voice in my head always. I wanted to take this anger out on him; the voices told me to stay in place. “Our Lena here is going to kill you if I tell her to. She can do it.” I heard the command and felt my hand involuntarily squeezing his neck harder with his accompanying rattles.
“Lena can’t think anymore. I gave her some space to let her think willingly and she remembered you. To my disappointment, she betrayed me and now she will be punished for it. But finally, she is mine. She really is mindless and she is in my control. I should have just done this to begin with. But I wanted to see how the mind works. How the mind remembers even when it is almost taken. I gave her powers and abilities and she tried to defy me. Now look at her. She is going to be trapped and blind forever. Thanks to you.” He laughed menacingly. I tried hard to release Jared but I could not. “That’s okay. I have had help to know all about her and you. I have had help to know how to control her. I know everything about her mind.”
Jared struggled to talk and I felt my grip tighten. “Release him.” Dr. Ravana told me and the power that controlled me let me release him.
He gasped for air and spoke with a voice that was scratchy and raspy. “Lena is still in there. I will bring her out again. You’re a liar. You tried to put full control and it worked but she fought through it.” Jared shouted to him.
There was silence. “A betrayal runs deep, son.” Dr. Ravana’s cruel voice told Jared.
“I am no son of yours.” Jared said viciously. I could imagine his jaw clenched. I was still eloped in blindness.
“So many have betrayed you. And you will soon find out that you are alone.” He said simply. “Take him away.” I could imagine him throwing up his hands.
Before I knew it. My hand was eloped around his body and I was walking forward. I didn’t know where I was but I knew where I was going.
My head continued to tell me that we were headed to headquarters. I wanted to feel the violent strikes of tears down my face. I wanted to know that I was alive. That I was human. That I was a companion to Jared. If I could cry, that meant I still had some humanity left. I wanted him to know I was here. I would fight. I would not give up and I wouldn’t let myself be controlled.
Suddenly, I felt the control on me wavering. The voices in my head were only a murmur now. I had to try to scream at the voices in my head. So I thought as hard as I could, “You will lose. I will have control of my mind and kill you all.” I shouted and knew I was triumph. I couldn’t hear the voices.
All at once, the voices spoke loudly and one screamed over the others, “That is what you think Lena. You will lose and have lost everything. Say goodbye to your humanity. Say goodbye to Jared. You are under my control now.”
I felt my heart break. Bile raised in my throat. I could remember that voice anywhere. I forgot all about it. All about what brought me here. Hearing that voice, I remembered everything. The voice of the last hope was my enemy now. It wasn’t something I could forget.
PART TWO:
JARED
Chapter Sixteen: What I Know Is Useless In Saving Her
NOW WHAT? THAT is all I can manage to comprehend in my mind right now. Lena is being controlled. She was never with my dad. I shouldn’t have listened to Gabe when he told me she was on my dad’s side. He imprisoned her mind and now she was gone by the looks of it. He just told me. I can’t believe I let her get sicker. She shouldn’t be here. I didn’t know who lied to me, but I knew it wasn’t her.
I wanted more than anything to take back those last moments. We fought with one another. Yes, it wasn’t that bad but I didn’t want it to be the last thing she remembers of me. If she ever remembers anything again.
Lena was squeezing my waist, and I didn’t dare move from her grasp because if I did, she might have ripped some skin off. I tried as hard as I could to search her eyes. She only showed the whites of her eyes and they glowed an emerald green that Joseph once had. Sometimes when Lena was watching me from the tree, I could see that glow. When Lena first showed up there, I thought it was the end for me.
To be honest, if Lena would have killed me, I think I would have gone gladly. She was so beautiful. She was always stunning but now she had a glow to her. It was as if they turned up the volume of her beauty. The thing that made her so beautiful to me was the fact that she was somehow still in there. She was somehow still Lena.
We rushed up into the air and for a second, it was just the two of us. I watched below as the waves crashed over huge rocks. I remembered Lena saying that she never got to see this ocean, and I decided I would try to figure out why. The ocean was rough but underneath all those waves, what could there be? That must be what they didn’t want her to see.
When we landed on the sand, I looked beside me to see my dad and his posse of four behind him. Each of the four with him looked identical. They all had blonde hair. They each towered over my dad.
Lena shoved me forward, and I was yanked back into reality. I was being led to a long island. A silver and gold glass tower was the only building on the island. It was huge and I wasn’t sure how I never saw it until I was on the sand. As we approached the building, the doors slid open. Joseph walked out and bowed down to my father. I snickered only to get his eyes turned to me.
Lena was g
uiding me and stopped abruptly, bringing me to bang into her chest. She felt like bricks, and I cringed. That would bruise.
“He is waiting for us upstairs.” Joseph spoke to Lena. “Take him there.” Joseph stayed behind to talk to Dr. Ravana. I froze. Lena treaded on and yanked me from my frozen state.
We walked through the glass door. Lena moved quickly because the breeze picked up some water, spraying us in the arms. To me, it felt wonderful to feel coldness in the warmth outside. It was night, but the humidity was excruciating. To Lena, the water seemed to leave red welts on her body. Then it hit me, they were surrounded by water, even though they could not go near the water or in it. Why were they enclosed around it? Was it to keep them in?
“Welcome.” Many voices called to me. I curtly turned my head and saw a crowd surrounding Lena and I. I spotted a boy with green hair looking at Lena intently. Jealousy coursed through me.
“Lena?” he asked calmly, my wariness thickened. He ran to her and touched her arm. I wanted to jerk it away but I couldn’t. “What is wrong with her? The last time this happened to someone, they were gone forever.” He faced me now and looked like he was in pain. “Help her. Whoever you are.” He pleaded with me.
I nodded and was about to speak but that was when I saw Joseph approaching us quickly. The boy was hit in the back of the head with something sharp. I couldn’t help it. I ducked away from it. Joseph quickly dragged the green haired boy to the side and laid him against the wall. He slumped over and fell to his side with a thud. We quickly began to walk again and I tried to turn back to him but Lena still prevented any movement from me.
I needed to pay attention to as much detail as I could. I had to remember all the turns I made and all the pictures that connected to each pathway. I cut my eyes to the side to examine the walls and was disappointed to see that each hallway held the same things. The walls were a dark blue and there were no pictures on the walls. There was no way I could decipher from each hallway and I grunted in frustration. I felt a sharp hit to my back and I turned my head to Joseph. He smirked at me and was enjoying that he was finally controlling me. I examined his eyes and noticed that he was not being controlled.
His eyes were not glowing as Lena’s were, which meant he worked on his own, evil and all. Every once in a while, his eyes would flicker red. I stared at him in disbelief. Red eyes? The hit to my head must have been messing with me. I turned quickly away from him when he raised his hand as if to hit me again.
The hallways were endless. We turned right then left, then left again and I couldn’t keep up. I had to contact Gabe. He was my only hope of finding a way out of here. Just then my heart started to pound all the way up to my ears. I remembered that my phone had not been removed and that was a good thing. I kept my untraceable phone hidden away all the time.
I checked for cameras. Every single hallway had a new camera. The staircase seemed to have a camera at every floor too. There was no way out without being spotted. After ten flights of stairs, we reached a black door. Lena kicked it open with her foot, careful not to release me. We continued walking a few more turns and then we reached a new black door. It opened without anyone touching it. I stopped and Lena pushed me forward.
Inside held a man pacing back and forth. His pace reminded me of my own pace. It was as if we would never just stay in one place. We couldn’t because our minds were running so fast. We tried to pace ourselves on the outside and hoped it would work on the inside somehow. He was looking down and his face was forced in concentration. Could it really be him?
He finally looked up with a blank look on his face. He smiled deeply at Lena with pride and I felt rage. His eyes reached my face and his smile turned into a sadistic one.
“Ah. I wondered when I would see you again.” I was frozen in place. I couldn’t breathe anymore.
“Why are you here?” My voice was barely a whisper. “What are you doing?”
“Yes, I am alive and I have chosen the path that you were too weak to chose.” He spoke from across the room but the words pierced my ears as if he were shouting in my ears while standing right next to me.
I couldn’t believe my eyes. How could it be?
My brother Aiden stepped before me. “And Lena seems to be under full control. Excellent.” He walked forward, right in front of Lena’s wide, bright eyes. He caressed her face, and I flinched under her weight. She no longer was pulling at me from my movement. It was as if she were frozen by his touch. I jerked harder to reach him but it was like I was attached to a statue. “Although she was much more fun with her own will.” I lunged forward; my goal to knock his hands away, but she held me still.
“Aiden knows a lot about Lena; maybe a little too much. Lena was very willing to get to know Aiden.” Dr. Ravana spoke up from behind me, but I couldn’t bear to hear it. I felt my body shake with anger.
“I swear if you did anything to her.” I screamed. Aiden didn’t move his hand but stopped his caressing. “She didn’t know what she was doing, and Aiden doesn’t know her as I do.” I said facing my father. I still defended her grace. I didn’t believe a word of it.
“And if I did? What will you do?” Aiden approached me with his forehead almost touching mine.
“I will kill you.” I said through clenched teeth. Aiden scowled but backed away.
“You know, you’re right. Lena didn’t know what she wanted or whom she loved before. You know, I don’t think you ever loved her. You wanted to control her and you sent her here to die.” He said simply. He crossed his arms over his body.
“I didn’t bring her here.” I said defensively.
“No, but you told her to come here. We know all about it. Lena’s memories became ours as soon as she was sent here. We get everything. It’s like we suck all their life out and get all their precious moments. You know what really pissed me off?” I saw Dr. Ravana flinch but he stayed composed. “Lena’s memories had a block on them. How very strange. Isn’t it?”
My heart quickened. “What do you mean?” I asked calmly. I felt as if my heart was going to explode from pounding so fast.
“The first memory we received was when Lena’s family died. How could that be? An insignificant amount with nothing to tell us.” Aiden’s voice cracked and his exterior features turned up angry.
“Enough.” My father’s even tone came out jagged. “Enough.” He tried once more. “We are giving the enemy the upper hand Aiden.”
“Have a given away a secret?” Aiden spoke through clenched teeth. “Father, you have hidden so much from me. Forgive me if I don’t know what secrets are too precious to tell.”
I didn’t have to look at my father to know he was angry because Aiden shrunk into himself and nodded in agreement. The conversation was over. For now.
This was obviously something important, and Aiden didn’t have my father’s full trust. I would play into that, when the time came that Aiden and I were alone. I knew Aiden. I knew how to make him tick and I would get the truth about her memories. Aiden turned quickly on me as if he were going to pounce.
“Could you not bare to see her die as you couldn’t bear to see our mother die?” He mocked me, and I tried my best to stay calm. He started to circle me and I felt his voice pricking my skin with its roughness. “You walked away from her when the going got tough. As you walked away when mother was dying. Father and I haven’t forgotten.”
“I never left mother’s side. What could you possibly be referring to, Aiden? When I took care of you, while father was out making millions; and for what? So he could take care of our mother? She wanted to have people around her. She didn’t want to be alone. Money meant nothing to her. So tell me, how did I abandon the family?” I felt my heart swell with memories of my mother. I didn’t talk about her ever. She had died when I was younger and I didn’t want to relive the images.
He got up into my face once more. “We all know that you killed mother. Not us.”
My muscles clenched in response to his words. I didn’t kill my mother bu
t it never stopped Aiden from blaming me. It was no use to try to explain to Aiden that it was actually our father who was the monster.
“I think I’ll go back to Lena now. You were useless to her and she knew it. We all knew she would die but you couldn’t face it, so you ran off to make a safe house, when the real answer was to control the world with your father. As I have done now. What would mother want?”
I laughed half-heartedly. “You will lose.” I said cold but I knew in my heart, they kind of already won. I looked to Lena, at my latest failure. She was being controlled and it was me who had to take the blame for it. She stared forward, dragging me on; I knew she couldn’t hear anything. I wished she could because she would know the truth about so much.
“Oh, are we going to lose, Jared? We own every single mind in this building. And many more outside of these walls. Lena here was the big test. The final test was to see if a resistant could be fully controlled. We have come to find out that we can fully control without damaging the brain and destroying the body.” He laughed cruelly. “Tomorrow, we are going to generate a new way to control all of these people. Those that have been controlled will be given the cure in a new way.”
I heard Holland for the first time and jumped at the sound of her voice. “Faith isn’t lost; I know we have someone who can stop you.” She screamed at the top of her lungs. I knew she meant Gabe. I hoped she wouldn’t tell them about him. He was our only secret weapon.
“Ah. He isn’t much of a threat anymore.” Her jaw clenched and her mouth moved to a solid line. Her eyes widened and I felt mine widen as well. How had they known about Gabe? And how did they know that we meant him at all?
“What the hell do you mean?” she said weakly, her eyes begin to water a little. Then as if she were going into a fire, she was screaming. “Where is he?” She shouted as she thrashed about.
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