Seeing Black

by Sidney Halston

  “I never intended for Jill to get hurt. I had to keep up an illusion of not knowing Jill with Brian. It was the only way to keep her safe. It was the only way Brian would open up to me and tell about his plans.”

  “Who the fuck is Brian? You need to start explaining.”

  “I’ll start from the beginning, but for now, forget Brian. He’s the least of the problems at the moment. Have you ever heard of The Stargate Project and Project MKULTRA?”

  Oliver nodded. “Wasn’t that some sort of conspiracy theory from some movie?”

  Agitated, Paul said, “No. It wasn’t a conspiracy theory. It’s a fact.”

  “So this is about some bullshit sci-fi experiment,” Alexander said.

  “Bullshit?” Paul looked bemused. “After all you’ve been through with Jillian, you’re going to sit there and question paranormal phenomenon?”

  “I suppose you have a point. Go on.” Alexander crossed his arms over his chest and sat back, impatiently.

  “During the Cold War, in response to the Soviet research in paranormal phenomena, the correct term being parapsychology, the United States, so they wouldn’t be outdone, began their own program. After Stalin, the ban on paranormal research was lifted in the USSR, and the KGB began all sorts of paranormal research ranging from telekinesis to life-after-death studies. All the studies were for the sole purpose of creating psychic super weapons. The U.S. wouldn’t be outdone, so they created various organizations, most under the Defense Intelligence Agency, better known as the DIA to research all sorts of paranormal phenomena. Rocco spearheaded the funding of The Stargate Project and Rocco’s half-brother brother, Dr. Josef Kraus, headed the scientific and medical aspect of MKULTRA.”

  “Which are?” Oliver asked.

  “Which were the United States’ version of the Soviet’s Institute for Brain Research in Petrograd, a top secret experiment for the research of paranormal activity for the creation of weapons and defense.”

  ‘This is all sounding a little too—”

  “Strange,” Paul interrupted Oliver.

  “Actually, I was going to say paranoid conspiracy theory-ish,” Oliver said.

  “Don’t beat around the bush, Oliver. You were going to say this sounds like a major load of bullshit.”

  “Well, yeah. It kind of does.” Oliver agreed.

  Paul sat back on the chair. “I know. It sounds like something straight out of a Dan Brown book, but it’s true and I can prove it. Let me just finish the damn story.”

  The twins nodded.

  “In these projects, people were given mescaline, heroin, LSD, and other psychotropic drugs and then hypnotized in an effort to produce what was called psychic driving. I know this is a lot of information, and I am trying to get to the point without going into too much detail about the science. Suffice it to say, things got real bad real fast. When the experiments didn’t work, the doctors were ordered to lobotomize or electroshock the test subjects into forgetting the experiments. By the way, most of these experiments were performed on unwilling participants: mostly soldiers, prisoners, and prostitutes.”

  “This is all very informative, but what the hell does this have to do with my Jill?” Alexander asked.

  “So,” Paul ignored him and continued. “In the early seventies, these projects were halted. First, it was found to be inhumane, and further, the funding stopped since nothing concrete came out of the research, but Rocco and his brother didn’t stop.”

  “Although, right now, they have no powers?”

  “The only thing I think they still have, or at least Rocco still has, is his ability to control Jill’s emotions, which explains why she’d never seemed frightened of him. And it’s the reason she can’t seem to get out of Wonderland.”

  “Pardon?” Oliver asked.

  “Wonderland?” Alexander repeated.

  “I’ll explain in a minute. Let me get back to Josef and Rocco. The government halted the research that they’d been working on for years, but Rocco and Josef wouldn’t just give up, so they continued the research on their own. The way that they were able to continue their very expensive testing and over-the-top lifestyle was by using their powers to gain wealth. You see Josef and Rocco were able to see the winning lotto tickets and the outcome of a few races, but there are only so many times a person can win stuff before it becomes suspicious. That’s when Esther became involved.”

  “Esther? As in Jillian’s mother, Esther?”

  “Yes. As in Jillian’s mother,” Paul deadpanned. “According to her journals, she willingly helped Rocco. She was in love with him, but she also liked the money. It started off simple. She’d be the one who purchased the ticket, went to the races, and so on and so forth. But they started to get greedy. If you think this sounds like some sort of James Bond movie so far, you’ve got no idea.”

  “Let me guess. They stole a shitload of money from the big Columbian drug lords?” Oliver interjected.

  “Yes. Exactly. How the hell did you know about that?” Paul asked.

  “It’s mentioned in Helen’s journals.”

  “It never occurred to me that Helen may have known the entire story.”

  “How’d you know about it?” Alexander asked.

  “It’s all here,” Paul grabbed one of the notebooks that he’d thrown on the table and slid it to Alexander. “It was Esther’s safety net if Rocco or Josef ever found her. Let’s face it. Esther was a thief. I know it’s blunt, but she was money hungry, had questionable morals, wanted to live the life of the rich, but she wasn’t a murderer. When the men died, that’s when she got scared.”

  “Helen’s journal does say Esther left because she was scared of Rocco. It says it a lot, but we didn’t know the extent of it until we read the passages about the drug deal gone bad and the murder,” Oliver said.

  “Does Jill know that her mother helped commit all those crimes? Did you tell her?” Alexander asked.

  “No. I didn’t want to tell her that her mother was a thief. It’s not a burden I wanted to put on her, especially not now. When we get her out, I’ll tell her. But she knows everything else.”

  “Esther wasn’t exactly a great person, then?”

  “I’m biased on that. Esther may have known about Rocco’s big secret, but she never thought Rocco would physically hurt anyone. You see he continued his research on his own long after the project was terminated. In the mid-eighties, when they kept hitting dead ends in their research, Rocco switched his test subjects from adults to children. Esther didn’t know any of this, by the way. Obviously, parents weren’t lining up to have their children tested in some paranormal, mumbo-jumbo experiment, so he used orphans.” Paul sat back and crossed his arms before he continued. “I was one of those orphans.”

  Paul certainly had the twins’ attention now. Alexander leaned forward and Oliver sat up straighter. They were all ears.

  “I was eight years old. My parents died in a car accident. Rocco came to the orphanage and fostered me. When I arrived at his home, he already had other children who had been there for years. At first, the experiments were what I thought to be silly card games. He or Josef would look at a card, and I had to concentrate and guess which one it was he was looking at. The year that I lived with him, there must have been six other children ranging in age from six to thirteen years old. As time went on, the experiments became more intense. Sometimes they involved sleep deprivation and other times sensory deprivation. They were extremely horrid. He conducted them in a laboratory in the basement of one of his homes. Some of the other kids, Jason, for example, he was given a daily shot of something that must have hurt because Jason cried every time he had to get that shot. I remember how Jason became super hyper one day and couldn’t stop running around. Looking back, they must have given him some sort of speed or adrenaline. After three days of being sleep deprived and running around rampant, the boy died. One of the other kids found him dead on the playground outside the house. Jason was the oldest one of us. A few other kids began losing t
heir memories. I remember that there was a point when they couldn’t even remember their own names. Those kids were given pills in addition to the tests that we all had to perform. There were tests as simple as the card games and as scary as being dropped off in the middle of nowhere at night and being expected to find our way back using only our thoughts. We all failed every time and were picked up by Josef the next day and punished by having more tests.”

  Alexander was getting impatient. He wanted to get to the bottom line. Jillian. She was the bottom line. “Get to the point, Black.”

  Paul was losing his patience with Alexander, as well. “I’m trying to get there, Jacobs. Fuck. But you need to hear the entire story.”

  “Fine, but just answer me this before you continue. Is she safe? Is she okay?”

  “I wouldn’t say she’s safe, but, yes, she’s okay. Physically, she’s fine. She thinks she’s going to see you today.”

  “Wait! What? I’m going to see her today?” Alexander started to feel a weight lift of his shoulders, but just as it began to lift, it was pushed back down when Paul continued.

  “I have been seeing her almost daily now, but, no, you aren’t going to see her today. She only thinks she’s going to see you.” Alexander stood, fists clenched again. “Just sit down. Let me finish my story. It’s the only way you’ll understand what’s going on with Jillian.” Paul stood and gestured towards the chair. Surprising even himself, Alexander complied and sat. “As I was saying, when I noticed I was the only one who hadn’t been given drugs or shots, I began getting frightened. I knew it was just a matter of time. I had gotten lucky that they had experimented on me without meds, even if those experiments were horrible. Imagine locking a kid up in a dark four-by-four room for two days in order to deprive him of most thoughts other than self-preservation and then asking him what fucking tarot card you were holding in your hand.” Paul was looking lost in thought and took a moment before continuing. “Anyway, my salvation came one morning as I played outside.”

  “They let you out?” Alexander asked.

  “Yes. When we weren’t ‘working,’ they would let us play outside, and they had tutors that would come to the house. We weren’t allowed to talk to them about what happened in the basement, though.”

  “Jesus.” Oliver whispered.

  Paul nodded, as if agreeing. “Anyway, Esther came in one morning to see Rocco.”

  “Esther?” Alexander asked.

  “Yes. We had never seen her before. She saved my life. That’s why I can’t see her as anything but my guardian angel. By this time, there were only two of us left, the other being Raquel, my sister. Esther looked frightened. She was pregnant with Jill. I remember when she saw me she looked surprised and came over and spoke to me. She was so sweet. She asked me what I was doing there and if I was hurt. Of course, I wasn’t allowed to tell her the truth, so I lied and told her everything was okay. But when she saw Raquel, who couldn’t even remember her own name, I suppose she became suspicious. The next day, she came to see me again, but this time she was in a hurry. She told me we were leaving town and we couldn’t tell anyone. It all happened so fast. I met Helen and her husband, Matthew, who ushered my sister and me quickly into a car. Remember that I was young and it was all very fast and scary. I wasn’t completely sure what was happening except that I felt, for the first time, safe. I remember Helen talking to Matthew about Esther, and they were nervous for her. She had stayed behind with Rocco to keep up the appearance that everything was fine, but within an hour, I was sitting in an airplane on my way to Thailand where I lived with Liam Reynolds. Esther talks a lot about that evening in the journal. Apparently when Josef found out we were gone, he looked everywhere for us. He never suspected Esther’s involvement, because she kept up the charade of the happy pregnant girlfriend. Raquel and I lived with Reynolds, a doctor and ex-boyfriend of Esther, until I was seventeen and Liam passed away. Esther had shipped most of her belongings, as well as her journals to Liam’s home before she left Texas. Then, ironically, the plane that Esther and Jill were on crashed on the way to meet Liam in Thailand, so I never got to see her again. Liam, who I consider to be my father, helped Raquel and I change our last names to Black so that I wouldn’t ever be found. He also helped Raquel with her memory. She never recovered any of the memories from the time of her birth to the time she was ten, which is when we arrived in Thailand. I suppose, those are memories best forgotten.”

  “So you knew Esther?”

  “For a brief moment, yes. I owe her my survival and that of Raquel. She wrote, in detail, all of Rocco’s misdoings including the murder, the heist, the testing—everything. She even implicated herself. As I said earlier, I think she was going to use it to blackmail him if he ever found her or threatened Jill. Her big fear was that he’d try to get his hands on Jill. Her leaving with that secret, with her knowledge, scared the shit out of Rocco and Josef.”

  “My God, he’s killed a lot of people,” Oliver said.

  “And stole a shitload of money,” Alexander said.

  “Yes, and Esther knew all of this. She was the only one who could ever implicate them.”

  Alexander chimed in, “Back to Jill. Why did you use her? That text?”

  “That goes back to Brian.” Paul explained Brian to the twins the same as he had explained it to Jill on numerous occasions, now.

  “So you were really just trying to help her, protect her,” Oliver said.

  “Yes. At least, that’s what I was trying to do. I’ve been following Jill for the last ten years or so. I owed it to Esther to make sure her daughter was safe. I began to watch over her, more or less when she was rescued from the island. When I saw the news of the rescue and I saw the redhead on the news with Helen, I knew that she was alive. Remember, Liam had been expecting Jill and Esther, so he knew she was born before they had departed to Thailand, but Rocco didn’t know that. She was born prematurely. Before they departed to Thailand, they stopped in California for some sort of family function, and she went into labor. I also knew that Rocco didn’t know this information, and luckily, he didn’t know Helen either, so he never made the connection. Although, those few weeks after the rescue were nerve-wracking. Every time Jill’s face was plastered on the television, my heart sank. I thought she’d be discovered, so I secretly went to see Helen, and we decided she needed to be sent away just in case Rocco made the connection.”

  “And you knew Helen too?”

  “Yes. I did. As soon as you were rescued, I made contact with her. We kept at a distance and only spoke a handful of times. I was the one who suggested sending Jill to boarding school. I was afraid Rocco would make the connection if he saw Helen and Jill together. You were all plastered all over the television after the rescue, and I wasn’t sure whether Rocco had ever met Helen. Regardless, I knew the moment Rocco and Josef found out about Jill they’d want her. First, he’d want to know if she knew their secrets. I mean, forget the money they could stand to lose. The people who they stole it from wouldn’t hesitate to kill them. Keeping their secret is paramount to them. They’d also want to know if she knew about the experiments. Those were two secrets that could potentially have them murdered, either by thugs or sentenced to death for the inhumane crimes they committed. When the plane crashed, Esther, the only person who had known their secrets, died. Her death took care of all the loose ends—or so they thought. Then Jill comes along; she’s the X factor. What she knows is the big question they want figured out. Second, Josef, never got over his obsession with replicating the psychic gene. That’s Josef’s life’s dream, to recreate the gene. He’s a doctor, a scientist. As far as he’s concerned, she holds the key to finding out what he wasn’t able to do all those years before.”

  “Because he never experimented on himself or Rocco, who are the only other psychics they’ve ever found. Fuck.” Alexander replied, figuring it out as the words came out of his mouth.

  “Now you’re seeing my concern.” Paul said. “Besides the fact that they’re evil lun
atics, thank God Jillian never knew any of their secrets; otherwise, she’d be fucked more than she is right now. Jillian holds that genetic material in her DNA. And a lot of technology has come to light in the last decade. Genetic engineering is not a thing of the future any longer. It may be possible for them to clone her genetic make-up, but at what cost?”

  “And he doesn’t know you’re looking for him because he can’t read your mind or see the future anymore?”

  “Exactly. The only ability he seems to have works only on Jill since they are genetically linked. He is also manipulating her moods into staying at Wonderland.”

  “Wonderland?”

  “That is what he calls his home. Everyday Jill wakes up confused, not knowing why she’s there. She gets anxious when she realizes she shouldn’t be there and that something is wrong. He then tells her she is free to leave, and something happens from that point until the next day. She makes her way out and is distracted by the gardens, butterflies, whatever, and never leaves. She is subconsciously trapped. There are no restraints, so to speak, but she can’t seem to leave. She isn’t even aware of the length of time she’s been there. But stupidly, in his researching, he’s also teaching her how to control her visions. He’s doing it for his benefit, but he underestimates her. We’ve been working on circumventing his powers. And we think once she has successfully learned how to control her visions, she can get over that haziness she sees. The confusion. She’s stopped taking all the meds they give her, and every night she writes in her journal. When the morning comes and I see her, she is less and less confused every time, especially when she reads her own handwriting from her journals. When I first saw her, weeks ago, she thought she’d only been gone for a few hours, not six months. Now, she seems to understand the fogginess that he is creating in her mind.”

  He stopped speaking a few moments before he continued. “Oliver, I am truly sorry that Heather got mixed up in all this. I didn’t know that Brian would use her to get to Rocco. I’ve stayed on the sidelines all these years. No one knows more about Rocco and Josef than I do. I’ve been studying and following them almost my entire life, even when I lived in Thailand with Liam. I made my home here in Texas in order to keep an eye on them. When I heard he had found out he had a daughter, things went downhill fast. First, being a faculty member, I was able to manipulate a scholarship for Jill. I needed her close so that I could keep an eye on her. She’s smart and got in on her own, but I had to make her go to Austin Law School, so I upped the ante by getting her a full scholarship with full stipends. Thank God she chose it.”