Frivlok (Appointments on Plum Street Book 2)

by Eli Ingle

  The children ate their conventional food first and then moved onto the other items. Pinching his nose, Rigel downed the green drink at the same time as Rona, grimacing at the pungent taste.

  “Why is anyone motivated to eat healthy food if it tastes so disgusting?” asked Rona.

  “Beats me,” replied Rigel, picking up his knife and then the Kozenian bubble. The orb shimmered slickly in his hand. Driving the knife forwards, he punctured it, pulled the knife away and drank the syrup. It tasted heavy and cloying, like fizzy chalk. He coughed as he finished it, feeling queasy. They ate the skin at the same time.

  “Let’s go,” said Rona, standing and picking up her tray. Rigel followed her as they made their way to the tray station and then out into the main hall.

  The main hall (called the Okturn) was probably Rigel’s favourite area of the whole Institute. The walls consisted of interconnecting staircases that were built out of the walls and spiralled upwards with doors leading off to other areas. Set on the roof was a dome of orange tinted glass, cut through with a wrought brass frame. The sun shone through this for most of the day and cast a golden glow over the whole hall.

  Climbing up the first flight of stairs, they walked along a corridor adorned with photos of muscular athletes. Rigel presumed they must be famous in Kozenia because he did not recognise any of them.

  Entering the gym at the end of the hall, they stepped onto the chalk-dusted floorboards and looked around. The class was obviously not in favour today as there were only two other students – Barton and a thin man they did not recognise. Barton was busy bench-pressing what looked like half the Institute’s weight collection and did not notice them. The instructor – L. Scott – was a sinewy man who looked lighter than Rigel. Despite this, he could lift an extraordinary amount of weight, although Rigel was at a loss to explain this phenomenon.

  “Morning, you two!” Scott called cheerfully. “How are you?”

  “Fine, thank you,” replied Rigel.

  “Fine.”

  “Good, good. Ready to get swole?”

  “You know it,” said Rona, yawning.

  “Not with that attitude, you’re not. I said: ARE YOU READY TO GET SWOLE?!”

  “Yes, sir!” They shouted back.

  L. Scott was one of those people who believed that repeatedly shouting their enthusiasm at a person would somehow transpose that enthusiasm over to them. Rigel believed these people were mistaken. In the case of L. Scott, this unfortunately did not stop him from trying. Rigel and Rona knew better than to argue, Scott would only make them do star jumps and sing You Are My Sunshine until they were grinning like idiots … even if that was only to stop him making them do more.

  “Good, now let’s do a quick warm up and then get you pumping some iron!”

  “Yay!” said the children, dying a little inside.

  The next hour was filled with skipping, pull-ups, bench presses, dips, press-ups, sit-ups, bicep curls, shoulder raises, squats and calf raises. By the end, they were a weak mass of useless misfiring nerve clusters.

  “How are we feeling, guys?” asked Scott, walking over with a pitcher of water and a separate one of protein drink.

  “Kill me,” gasped Rona, puddled in sweat.

  “Come on, get up.”

  “Kill meeeee,” she said, rolling around on the floor.

  “I wouldn’t usually make the routines so strenuous,” admitted L. Scott, “but I’ve been instructed to do as much as I can in the shortest amount of time. I wish we had longer. I see a lot of potential in you both.” He sat down on a bench and patted the space on either side. “Saddle up. You need to rehydrate before you lose too much water.”

  Clambering onto the bench, they drank a glass of water each before downing the protein mix.

  “That’s all for the day then. I’ll see you when I next see you,” L. Scott said, smiling.

  “Goodbye.”

  “See you, Scotty,” said Rona.

  They left and got halfway along the corridor before slumping against the wall.

  “Never mind Frivlok,” said Rigel. “That man in there will be the death of me.”

  “You and me both,” replied Rona.

  They rested for a minute, still out of breath.

  “What’s next?” asked Rona.

  “Something sitting down … desensitisation class, I guess,” said Rigel.

  Rona looked daggers at him. “I’m not going back there,” she said.

  “We haven’t got a choice, Rona.”

  “I don’t care! It’s vile and I refuse to do it!”

  “Do you think I don’t feel the same?” he snapped. “It’s disgusting but we don’t have a choice – we have to go.”

  “We don’t have to go! That’s the whole point of this place. It’s optional.”

  “Not for us.”

  “I don’t care. I’m still not going.”

  “Look, we might have been adults in a past life but we’re not now. We’re children and we appear to have the minds of children. We’ve faced horrific things in the past and we’re going to come up against them again. You know that in the future we could well be causing those horrific things and how are we supposed to deal with it if we think like children? The desensitisation is horrible. It’s designed to help us cope with that in the future. In this regard, the meditation is only going to go so far.”

  Rona turned away and refused to look at him.

  “Do what you want,” grumbled Rigel. “I’m going. I’ll wait outside for five minutes for you. After that, I’m going in.” He walked down the corridor and left her to her thoughts.

  Arriving back at the dining hall, he got a cup of tea and went out onto the veranda through the back doors.

  Warm sunlight splashed across the decking and warmed his arms. He leant against the railings and looked out over the grounds. In the distance, he could just make out the assault course and hear Gironda shouting at another group of unfortunate students. He finished the tea and went back inside, returning the cup before going out into the Okturn.

  After giving an appreciative glance up to the beautiful dome, he walked over to one of the three tresculator doors and pressed the button. The tresculators were essentially coffin-sized lifts that travelled through the walls. Rigel avoided them like the plague – after all, if they broke down, anyone travelling in them would be trapped inside the walls. But they were lightning fast and the alternative was walking down flights of mildew-covered spiral staircases for half an hour.

  The doors opened. Rigel turned around and stepped in backwards. Sliding a hand up, he pulled down a speaking horn.

  “Desensitisation, please,” he said before letting go. It reeled back up to the roof.

  The doors slid shut silently and Rigel was bathed in darkness. His heartbeat doubled.

  The lift slammed right. If he had not been packed in so tight, Rigel would have flown across it and smacked into the wall. A second later it stopped dead. A creaking sounded above him, then what sounded like something being unhooked.

  He dropped. His stomach lurched and his eyes rolled up. He grimaced, trying to fight the desire to pass out. Five hundred feet in three seconds was intensely unpleasant.

  “Desensitisation,” said a cool female voice. The doors slid open and Rigel stumbled out.

  The chamber in which he now found himself was decorated with dark stone and nothing else. There were no windows this far down. Three brass lamps were screwed onto the wall and filled the chamber with a faint orange glow. The only other things set into the wall were the three tresculator doors, the exit of the spiral staircase and a pair of double doors. Above these doors, “Desensitisation” was painted in whitewash. The liquid had dribbled down and dried across the doors, as no-one had bothered to clean it off. “Screen Room One” was stamped on the door, drizzled lightly with the whitewash from above.

  Rigel shivered and wished he had worn something warmer. After his workout, he had been ho
t, but down here it was always cold and the screening room was no warmer. Wrapping his arms around himself, he waited to see if Rona would turn up.

  Several minutes later, the roar of the tresculator filled the chamber. The middle pair of doors opened and she fell out onto the floor.

  “Hateful thing!” she screamed and ran back at the door, kicking it.

  “Hello,” said Rigel.

  “I’m not talking to you,” she replied. After giving the door another kick, she turned on her heel and stormed through into the screen room, Rigel following close behind.

  Inside, the classroom was intensely hushed. After asking, the children had found out the walls were soundproofed so the noise did not spread to other parts of the Institute. This did not make them feel any better. The room was dark but there was a faint red glow over the whole of it, giving everything inside a flat, surreal appearance. Where the glow came from, he also had no idea. Five rows of five seats were in the middle of the room, none of them occupied. The room was circular and a dull dark grey. Behind them were three projectors that shone images onto the screens from behind, creating a panoramic view. The roof was one large mirror, which had fascinated the Light Ones the first time they had come in. Polished to a bright sheen, it was like looking up at another version of themselves. After their first screening, however, the mirror only brought them further dread – it reflected everything off the panoramic screens onto the roof as well. There was no escape.

  “Glad to be seeing you two again,” came a quivering voice out of the shadows.

  Rona jumped and spun around. Appearing from behind, Mry grinned crookedly at them. She had the skin of a teenager, but her voice made her sound much older. Her hair was a greasy blonde, scraped back over her skull but then left to dangle below her shoulders in oily ribbons. Her face was so pale it was almost luminescent. Her eyes were covered with sunglasses and the skin around them pink and sore. She was wearing a plain dress that used to be white but had stained to an awful yellowish-grey. A black rubber apron was tied to the front, and black elbow length rubber gloves covered most of her arms. Underneath, she looked malnourished. A thick pair of goggles with green lenses rested on her forehead.

  Neither of the children answered her. Her appearance and apparent delight in the activity she taught was enough to repulse them. How long since she had seen the sunlight? Rigel wondered, but dared not ask.

  “How glad indeed,” came another voice from the opposite direction. Stepping forward was a man almost identical to Mry except that his hair was short. They looked related but had never alluded to this, and neither of the children had wanted to stay long enough to make conversation and ask. The man, Bry, smiled at them, the gesture looking more like a grimace than something happy.

  “Can we just get this over with?” asked Rigel, quietly.

  Mry and Bry looked at one other and giggled before each taking a Light One by the arm. They led them down the side of the seats to the front, sitting them down in the middle. Mry pushed Rigel down and pulled out a strap from the head rest, buckling it so tight that he could only look forwards. She looked at him for a moment and stroked his cheek, smiling. Rigel shuddered at the cold touch of her hand. Then she secured his wrists, elbows, waist, knees and ankles whilst next to him, Bry did the same to Rona. It was all very Clockwork Orange. The professors moved out of view. If he strained his eyes, Rigel could just see Rona’s outline in his peripheral vision, but not enough to draw any comfort from her presence. When you went to desensitisation, you went alone.

  A moment later the squeaking of wheels announced that the technicians were back. Beside each child, they had wheeled a device that consisted of a metal box with three tanks of phosphorescent liquid screwed into the top. Neon green, neon blue, neon pink. Tubes with needles at the end were attached to each tank. Firstly, Mry pulled out a neck and wrist strap and secured it to Rigel, fixing the coiled wire back into the box and switching it on. A small screen showed his heart rate and brain activity. Next, she took the tubes from the green tank and brought a needle to the side of each eye.

  “You’ll feel a sharp scratch,” she said and stuck it into the skin beside his eyes. Rigel cried out and buckled but the securing straps prevented him from moving.

  “It’s not a sharp scratch!” he hissed. “It’s like two needles stuck in my eyes.”

  “If you like,” she said, smiling.

  Beside him, Rona screamed in pain.

  “Hold still!” snapped Bry. “You’ll only hurt yourself.”

  “I’m already hurt!” she shouted and swore at him.

  Next, Mry stuck two needles from the blue tank into each of his ears and finally from the pink tank into his jugular vein.

  “Three, two, one!” She turned on the valves and the liquid coursed through the tubes and into his body.

  Suddenly his vision was ten times sharper, his hearing ten times more acute, and his blood buzzed as though he were on an adrenaline high. Rigel grunted and strained against his bonds but it did no good.

  “All done?” Bry asked. Mry nodded. “Film starts in one minute,” he announced and walked to the back of the screening room.

  Then, Mry was on Rigel’s right-hand side and leaning towards his ear.

  “Don’t fight it,” she whispered, her breath tickling him and sounding much louder thanks to the drugs she had pumped into him. “You’ll only make it worse. Just let it happen.” Suddenly she was gone, scurrying up the aisle to join Bry at the back. Rigel shuddered.

  “Ready?” called Bry. Rona swore at him again. “Alright ….”

  A whirring like the sound of an old cinema projector filled the room. Something was different this time, though. Whereas before they had watched the film, now it was beamed straight into their heads. The countdown began and a large number ten was imprinted inside Rigel’s eyes.

  Nine. Sound blared all around them, a soundtrack made of repeating piano chords. Eight. Whispering, someone laughing and repeated phrases of reversed speech … seven … the likes of which Rigel could not make out. Six. This was worse. So much worse than last time.

  The drugs were beginning to affect him. Five. Each number was now a different colour. Four although he was not sure if that was supposed to happen. Three. Music was playing in the background, each note sending a swirl of colour across his vision. Two. Why could he smell toast and mowed grass? No, why had he come back? One. He could not do this again.

  Zero.

  With a flash of light that hurt his retinas, the film began. There was no escaping it.

  Awful images of violence and suffering. To Rigel, the pictures were hyperreal, but whether this was drug-induced or the nature of the film, he could not tell. Late at night at the end of his first desensitisation lesson he had lay awake wondering how the professors had got the film – was it real? Or images from his own subconcious projected through his mind? Both options were disturbing.

  On and on the images came, no respite, no peace. The first time Rona had burst into tears and Rigel had thrown up. Not that it had made any difference. They had been left to the end of the film. It was different each time and seemed to be getting worse.

  How long they were there, Rigel did not know. What was different this time was that halfway through, Mry and Bry returned, carrying a jar of glowing white liquid. Plugging this into the machine, they opened the valve that sent the liquid into their necks before leaving again.

  At first, nothing happened. Then a creeping euphoria began to steal over Rigel. Waves of delight that he could barely control. Suddenly the images were not horrifying – they were delightful. Hilarious! He began laughing and once he had started, he found he could not stop.

  That was the worst thing about it.

  The film flickered off, returning their vision to normal. The faint red glow of the room returned. Mry and Bry scurried down the aisle and unstrapped the children, who were still grinning like idiots.

  “What have you done to us?!” laughed Rona.


  “Yes, please, have a seat,” said Bry. The children sat. Although he was still smiling, Rigel was beginning to feel uneasy as the drug began to wear off. Why had they been laughing?

  “Do you understand the process here?” asked Mry.

  “You’re desensitising us to horrible things,” replied Rigel.

  “Exactly. The brain is a remarkable thing. An event that would have incapacitated a person with horror the first time they saw it could have almost no effect on them once they’ve seen it many times. We’re here simply to speed up the process, which in your case is very important. We’re selective about who we offer it to – if everyone were desensitised, the world would be a horrific place, but for a few select people … it could be of great benefit,” continued Mry.

  “The first time, we let you experience the horror so you would appreciate what you are being desensitised to,” said Bry. “This time, we made you think it was funny. It’s amazing how humour can be used as a coping mechanism and how everything has a funny side if you look at it in the right way. In subsequent sessions, we will stimulate you only with a chemical that is aimed to increase apathy and detachment.”

  “Why?” asked Rigel.

  “If the treatment goes correctly,” said Mry.

  “And if we say so ourselves,” said Bry.

  “We’re the leading experts at it,” finished Mry. “By doing that, we allow you to be able to cope with the situation by not being incapacitated by the horror of it. Furthermore, we aim to balance that so you may still feel empathy for the victims, the people affected by an event and the situation, but you can control your emotions.”