by Brad Kelln
There was a gasp on the other end of the phone. Dr. Claric stuttered, "I…I… No, that's not it at all. I think someone is trying to drive me crazy."
"Is that what your display was all about at the interview today?"
It took Dr. Claric awhile to respond. "Yes, I guess so."
Wenton grunted.
"So, can I drop by, or better yet, can you come here?"
"I'm eating. I'm going to finish my pizza and I'll come over to your place later. What's your address?"
***
Dr. Claric had rehearsed things very carefully. He knew exactly what he wanted to tell Wenton and in what order. When Wenton arrived, Dr. Claric took him through the house and showed him the various things he'd dis- covered, including a few new things. There was a spice in his drawer that he'd never seen before. He thought there was a computer disc missing from the office. He showed Wenton the latch on a window that was open. There were scratches on the mirror in the bathroom that he'd never seen before. They ended up seated in the living room. Dr. Claric was sipping an orange pop and Wenton refused everything offered to him.
Once seated Dr. Claric explained the events at the hospital, Catherine Mercer's story, the Web sites, the mysterious e-mail, the phone calls and the white vans. Finally, he told Wenton about Catherine's suicide.
After he'd said everything he asked Wenton a single question, "So what do you think?"
Wenton nodded. "Sounds like you're pretty worked up by all of this."
"Wouldn't you be?"
Wenton ignored the question. "I suppose what this Boseman character said today just made things worse, eh?"
"No," Dr. Claric said in surprise. "It explains quite a bit. The drug companies would be the one developing the technology. Of course they would. Who benefits more from an increase in mental illness than the drug companies? They'd love it if they could just zap people and drum up business. It's perfect."
Wenton picked the spice bottle up off the coffee table in front of him. He looked at the label and read "cardamom powder."
"What do you think this means?" He held the bottle out for Dr. Claric to see,
"I don't know. I think we should get that analyzed and see what's in it. I'm sure there's something in there that I'm supposed to eat. It might help the process along or something."
"What process?"
"Making me insane!"
"Right. And they snuck a bottle of some spice you've never heard of in here because they figured that you'd be making chili one night, root through the spice drawer, find a mysterious spice and just load the chili down with it."
"I 'know. It sounds crazy. I don't want this to be happening. I didn't ask to be the target. I just shouldn't have asked questions, gone poking around for more information."
Wenton set the bottle down again. "What do you want from me?"
"Help. I need someone to help me get out of this mess."
"I don't think you're in a mess. Like I told you this afternoon, I think you're too stressed, too worked-up about nonsense. That's all that's going on. Take a week off work."
"No. I'm serious. There's something going on and I'm convinced that ECOR knows about it. I think they're involved."
"You think ECOR is involved because the newest nut on the block spit that name out. Just because Barry Boseman has a grudge with ECOR doesn't mean that they have a Frankenstein lab and are doing experiments with electronic guns."
"It's possible though," Dr. Claric resisted softly.
"It's possible I wasted my fuckin' time coming over here," Wenton barked as he stood up. "Get some help, Brian. Get some real help."
"Dr. Wenton, don't-"
"Don't what?" Wenton noted the desperation in his colleague's face. "I'll tell you one thing," he said, changing the tone of his voice. "You did call the right person. Most other people would probably turn you in to the nearest loony-bin, get you taken off duty at the hospital. But not me. I'm not getting involved in your shit. It would just mean more work for me."
Dr. Claric looked panicked. His eyes darted around the room as he tired to think of a way to convince Wenton that he wasn't crazy. He considered blocking the exit, but he knew that the large, imposing Wenton would barely even notice and push right past him.
Wenton stepped out the front door with Dr. Claric immediately behind him.
"Just think about it, though," Dr. Claric was urging when he stopped suddenly.
His abruptness made Wenton pause. Wenton turned back to Dr. Claric. "What's the matter?"
"Look," Dr. Claric said, pointing.
There was a white van parked directly across the street. The driver's side window was tinted but there was a visible outline of someone.
"Wait here!" Wenton barked behind the wheel. He headed directly for the van.
Dr. Claric took a step to follow and then stopped.
As he walked, Wenton heard the van's engine start. He increased the length of his considerable stride.
There was movement in the front of the van, barely visible through the tinted window. It looked like someone else had come out of the back to sit in the passenger seat.
"HEY!" Wenton yelled and waved at the van. He started a slow run and was only a few steps away. The van suddenly lurched and pulled away from the curb. The action pushed Wenton back, and he put a hand against the side panel to keep from being struck.
"HEY!" Wenton shouted again as the van carried on down the street. He could only watch as it sped away. He checked for the license plate. Nothing. The van maintained a steady pace until it turned the corner and was gone. When he couldn't see it anymore he turned and headed back to Dr. Claric.
"What the fuck?" he muttered to himself.
"What do you think now, Dr. Wenton?" Dr. Claric asked. He was almost smug with relief.
"I still think you're crazy," Wenton said flatly. He couldn't even look at Dr. Claric as his mind filled with rage. No one fucking drives away from me.
TWENTY
Wenton wasn''t convinced. It would take more thanna couple of assholes in a white van to prove that people were being shot by electronic weapons.
He was just arriving home after leaving Dr. Claric's place. When he left, Dr. Claric was still shaking with paranoia. Wenton didn't want to waste time trying to console him.
Wenton pounded down the hallway of the condo building and threw open his front door with such force that it bent back over the doorstop and hit the wall behind. He moved through the door frame quickly and caught the door as it bounced back towards him. Even the springs couldn't slow its progress and he gave it a little shove to let it slam behind him. He didn't like mysteries. He didn't like unanswered questions and he especially didn't like people speeding away from him in vans.
Wenton stepped into the kitchen and reached into the cupboard where he kept liquor. He pulled down a bottle of Alberta Premium Rye and po
ured four ringers into a glass. It occurred to him that rye and Coke was Tim Dallons' drink. Sergeant Dallons had eventually lost it and killed himself when the Edward Carter case became too much for him to handle. That case pushed him over the edge, poor bastard. Wenton added some flat pop to his drink and threw in a couple of ice cubes before heading into the living room.
He stopped and stared at the bookcase that held his DVDs. He didn't need to see his collection to know what movies were there. Fight Club, Pulp Fiction, True Romance, Kalifornia, Seven, 12 Monkeys and a hundred other titles with similarly violent themes. Some people assumed that forensic psychologists worked with violent people all day long so and would want to escape this in the evenings. Wenton knew that wasn't true. Every good forensic psychologist had a dark streak. But the ugliness of the Carter case had stretched Wenton's dark streak into something bigger, something that was swallowing him whole.
"Fuck," he said and turned away from the DVDs. There wasn't anything there to interest him. Not tonight.
He took a long pull off his drink. His head swam with Dr. Claric's stories of electronic weapons and white vans. He hated games and he felt like someone was playing games with him.
He took a step and immediately felt dizzy. He knew it wasn't the drink. Even on an empty stomach he'd have to drink at least a half dozen shots of rye before he'd feel anything.
He shook his head and clenched his teeth. He wouldn't let this Brian Claric mystery get to him. Fuckin' Claric. He headed back down the hall.
Wenton moved into a small study near his front entrance. He pulled his desk chair out and sat down in front of the computer. The screen flickered and came to life as he touched the keyboard, and he was soon looking at an Internet search engine. He typed in "electronic mind control" and hit return, "Let's just see what the hell spooked you, Dr. Brian Claric," Wenton said as he watched the screen for a response.
The search engine spit out a list of sites. He scanned through the brief descriptions and clicked on eterror.net. He was soon reading descriptions of electronic weaponry specifically designed to affect the electrical pathways in the brain.
He moved from link to link, soaking up the bits and pieces of informa- tion as he went. Everything Dr. Claric had explained was there, the studies in the 19603, the electromagnetic burst off a nuclear explosion, the studies around microwaves and the blood-brain barrier. The secret military projects designed to test the limits of new technologies for lethal, semi-lethal and non-lethal applications. The possible benefits of new technology were impressive:
Most can be employed without detection-either during employment or in the aftermath.
Most have the capacity for unlimited and reliable discharge.
The weapons have precise or diffuse discharge capabilities.
The production of the weapons can be relatively inexpensive.
Overall, Wenton had to admit the articles were convincing. As he con- tinued to read, one type of technology kept surfacing over and over: Extreme Low Frequency. The growing research on ELF identified a number of reliable effects depending on the duration of the pulses and the specific frequency setting. The effects on the targets ranged from nausea and motion sickness to simulated symptoms of psychosis (e.g., aural and visual hallucinations). Whether the effect was permanent depended on an even larger list of variables including genetic predisposition to mental illness in the subject. He glanced away from the computer screen and noticed the clock hanging on the wall over his desk.
Shit, he thought. He clicked the Internet browser and got up from the computer. It'd been over three hours.
He reached for his drink. It was still half-full and the ice was gone. He'd been so engrossed in the Web sites that he'd forgotten about it. He finished it in one gulp and left the office.
Never got a mysterious e-mail, he thought as he settled onto the couch.
That would've made the experience complete.
Wenton leaned back and stared at the high, stuccoed ceiling. He decid- ed he'd have to check the references on the sites before he'd make any final decisions on the topic, but he was suddenly curious. Dr. Claric didn't seem as insane anymore. The idea of electronic weapons was suddenly plausible and so the idea of a company carrying out illegal research on the public might not be crazy after all.
Wenton dropped down on the sofa letting his feet kick up onto the coffee table. Time to get good and drunk. Fuckiri Claric. Another few Wenton sized rye and Cokes and he soon drifted to sleep.
TWENTY-ONE
His home. It should have been a refuge, but he didn't know if it was safe anymore. He didn't know if there were any safe places. He wanted to be angry. He wanted to be outraged that someone had taken his life away, but he couldn't find strength. He only felt weak and hopeless.
After Wenton left, Dr. Claric stepped carefully through each room of his house. His eyes darted back and forth, searching, but he didn't know what he was looking for. He just needed to check every room, looking for anomalies.
"Anomalies," he laughed out loud. I'm being crazy.
He was in the bedroom, staring at the red numbers on the display. The alarm clock didn't look familiar at all. Sure he'd looked at it every morning, but had he ever examined it? No, it was just one of those things everyone has but doesn't pay close attention to. Now he was paying close attention and it just didn't look right. He turned it over and looked underneath. There was a little plastic door that he popped open. Inside there was room for bat- teries. He never knew the clock had a battery back up. Would I have put batteries in here if I'd known this was here? He didn't know. He thought he probably would have but he wasn't sure. What if my alarm clock never had a battery back up? What if this isn't my alarm clock? I honestly don't remember there being a space for batteries under this clock. Damn it!
He threw the clock across the room. The electrical cord pulled tight just before the clock struck the wall and yanked it back. Then the clock dropped to the floor.
Dr. Claric stomped out of the bedroom and continued through the house, picking up various objects-a desk light, a book, a toothbrush- examining each one closely. He was having trouble recognizing even the most basic things. He couldn't take it any more and headed to the living room. He had to consciously keep looking straight ahead so he wouldn't drift into another room to look for "anomalies."
Dr. Claric stared at the couch in the living room. The last thing he wanted to do was sit and try to relax, but he forced himself to fall onto the couch.
He closed his eyes and tried to slow his breathing. His chest felt tight. He was having difficulty catching his breath. He reflexively put a hand over his heart and felt it pounding. Take it easy, Brian.
He opened h
is eyes, blinked twice in a wide-eyed stare and took a long, deep breath. He felt a little better. I'm not going to let this thing get to me.
I can't.
He sat up. It was nearing dark and the sun was already retreating, leav- ing the big windows in the living room glowing softly. He glanced over and felt another surge of panic. The van. He wondered if the white van was outside, right now. He couldn't take his eyes away from the window.
Maybe I can take a quick peek. That won't hurt.
He put his hands on his knees and stood. Turning towards the window he stopped. This is stupid. I shouldn't put myself through this. He turned his back to the window and stepped towards the kitchen.
Dr. Claric was hungry, but he wasn't sure what he would eat, or more accurately, what he could keep down. He opened the fridge and stooped to look inside. The choices were slim: a carton of milk, a few eggs, a wilting head of lettuce, orange juice, miscellaneous condiments, jams and other spreads. He opened the freezer and found more of the same, an empty ice- cube tray, package of spinach, half a bag of crinkle-cut french fries, and a Lean Cuisine pasta dish. He picked up the frozen pasta and looked at the picture on the front. Nope. He dropped it back and shut the door.
Dr. Claric leaned back against the fridge and looked over the rest of the kitchen, hoping for inspiration. He knew there were crackers around, some tins of soup and probably a box of cereal. And then something caught his attention. There was a knife missing from the wooden block on the counter.
Panic. His eyes darted around the kitchen searching for the missing knife. He took small steps around the kitchen, pulling drawers open, looking everywhere, but it was nowhere to be found. He stopped and put both hands on top of his head. What the hell is happening?