Snap, Crackle ...

by Dale Mayer

  She nodded. “Too much, in a way. We became good friends, and that made this all the much harder for her, I’m sure.”

  “Because she has to hunt you?”

  “Yes. It can’t be that easy to turn around and hunt down a friend.”

  “Some people take to it without a problem,” he muttered. “Not everybody is affected by simple things, like guilt.”

  She shook her head at that. “Our bosses certainly weren’t.”

  “Tell me about them.”

  “Besides the boss, I only remember one other man,” she said. “Initially there were a lot of different people, and then it broke down to just the one I dealt with primarily. He was ironically called my caregiver.”

  “What was he like?”

  “A man lacking a conscience,” she said succinctly. “I don’t know.” She gave a one-arm shrug. “It’s hard to even know what to say. He was somebody fairly unique and fairly well versed in all this. But, at the same time, he is somebody I hated because my involvement with him included what this testing was all about.”

  “Well, that makes perfect sense though, doesn’t it?”

  She sighed. “None of it makes sense, so applying the standards of common sense to any of this mess is beyond any of us.”

  Hunter apparently didn’t know what else to say to that, so he changed the subject instead. “You want to come into the grocery store?”

  She nodded. “Yes,” she said. “I need to get a few things.”

  “Like what?”

  “Tea, for one,” she said. “I’d love coffee, but tea is cheaper.”

  “We can get coffee, if you want.”

  “Good,” she said, “I could use a cup. Maybe we can even pick up a cup to-go on the road with us.”

  “We can, indeed.”

  They walked into the store, and she searched around constantly.

  “Can you sense her?”

  “Out there,” she said, with an arm movement toward the trees. He stopped and looked in that direction. She shook her head. “No, I don’t mean there specifically but, as in, at the edge of my awareness.”

  “Ah, so she’s just keeping an eye on you.”

  “Yes.”

  “So, why doesn’t she just come in and take you down?”

  She looked at him. “Well, I don’t exactly stay in one spot. What would be the sense of that?”

  He nodded slowly. “Did you ever see the person who shot you?”

  She shook her head. “I just ran. I headed like a jackrabbit through the woods and never once saw the shooter. It’s too bad though,” she said. “It would have given me some confirmation as to who might be with her.”

  “Or it could have been her,” he said.

  She nodded. “I know it could have been, but I just don’t have any way to know for sure.”

  “Which is part of the problem, of course,” he said. “We’re operating blind.”

  “Seems to be my thing,” she said bitterly. “A lifetime of running without necessarily even knowing what I’m running from.”

  “That’s a good way to put it too,” he said, studying her face.

  She shrugged. “I don’t have any answers for you. I told you that I’m broken.”

  He didn’t say anything but led the way through the store, as they quickly picked up a few items.

  She stopped and said, “It would be nice to go for a swim in the lake.”

  He looked at her. “That’s hardly the sign of somebody in hiding.”

  “Sometimes I decide that I shouldn’t even bother hiding because I’ll never get free of this anyway. On those days I think maybe I should just go out in a blaze of glory and enjoy myself anyway.” He studied her for a long moment, and she just laughed. “I know. Everything that comes out of my mouth is something you’re not expecting.”

  “Well, you got that right,” he said. “It is definitely a bit of a surprise to hear what you have to say sometimes.”

  “And again, I don’t know how much of that is even viable,” she said, “but it just feels like everything is wrong all the time.”

  “I get it,” he said. “Let’s pay for these groceries and get home. I need to talk to Stefan and do some research.”

  “I could probably help.”

  “Nope,” he said, “I don’t think so.”

  “Fine,” she said.

  “So, what were you doing in your last job?”

  “Customer service. It paid cash at the end of the day,” she said, with a smile. “A fast-food restaurant and nobody was keeping tabs on the paperwork.”

  “No,” he said, “that way it’s easier on them for taxes.”

  “Sure,” she said, “and for me a lot better too. I could just stay on the move, without anybody knowing or caring.”

  “If that’s better, yes,” he said, “but sometimes you have to wonder what your definition of better is.”

  She laughed. “I’m not sure there is a definition of better,” she said. “Sometimes it just is what it is.”

  Again, he didn’t say anything but moved her through the check stand and paid for the few things they’d picked up. As soon as they got outside, she unwrapped the sandwich she’d bought and started plowing through it.

  “You could have waited until we got home,” he said.

  “I didn’t know how much farther that would be.” When he frowned at her, she said, “I am not a very good judge of distance. It seems like I’m always walking one side in the dark and one side in the light, so it’s a hard thing for me to judge.”

  “Hmm.” He motioned at the vehicle and headed back toward the cabin.

  She was delighted to see it again, and honestly it was a perfect way to spend some time. Yet even that just felt wrong, like everything else in her life felt wrong. She groaned and stepped up onto the front porch, then said, “Maybe I should talk to somebody. If only there was somebody to talk to.”

  “There is,” he said. “If nobody else, you could try Dr. Maddy.”

  “I’m sure she’s got better things to do,” she said instantly.

  “Do you think so?” he said. “I don’t. She’s already been working on your system, so it’ll be interesting to talk to her.”

  “Everything is interesting with you.”

  “Well, it is fascinating, isn’t it?” he said. “We’ve got all these problems facing us and no solutions. I’m still intrigued by the fact that this person is always out there, yet, so far, we haven’t seen any sign of anybody.”

  “You won’t,” she said in exasperation. “I was shot in the side, from behind me. Remember?”

  He winced at that. “That’s very true,” he said. “Meaning that people will come and attack from the outside, without ever giving us a chance to discover any of the answers we’re after.”

  “Exactly,” she said. “Nothing’s good about any of this.”

  “I got it,” he said calmly, “but there has to be more in the way of answers available to us.”

  She shrugged. “Says you.”

  He laughed. “Yes. Says me.”

  “How can you always be so upbeat?”

  “Because I’ve seen a lot in my life too,” he said, “and, although we win some, and we lose some, we win a lot. I’m always confident going into a scenario, believing that we can get out of it, safe and sound.”

  “And there’s that Pollyanna attitude again,” she murmured.

  He laughed. “Maybe so, but you have to keep trusting in something, so you might as well trust in me.”

  She shrugged. “If nothing is better, then why not, I suppose. But I’m telling you that it’ll all blow up in our faces.”

  “And yet you don’t seem to be too worried at the moment.”

  “I’m not,” she said. “I don’t know why.”

  “Whatever,” he said, “just keep it up. It’ll be much easier to function this way.”

  *

  Stefan strode from his bedroom and paced the huge living room along the expansive wall of windows. He w
rapped his arms around his chest, as if his stomach was hurting. Not just his stomach but his legs, his arms, his back. His wife appeared in the subdued shadowy light, her voice soft as she called out, “Is there anything I can do?”

  He gave her the gentlest of smiles. “Just being here is a help.”

  She nodded. “And yet it’s very hard for me to sit and watch, knowing you’re going through this purgatory every time.”

  “Not every time,” he protested, then gave a self-deprecating laugh. “Okay, so maybe every time.”

  “It’s different this time, isn’t it?” she murmured.

  He nodded. “I don’t know why though.”

  “Do you remember her?”

  He shook his head. “Sort of, but not really, and I hate to say that because obviously she held on to the image of me all these years.”

  “What about this Lizzy?”

  “Vaguely,” he said, “but honestly, it’s hard for me to even remember that far back with any clarity. And then there’s the part of me deliberately avoiding keeping those kinds of memories alive. I’ve done my best to shoot them down and suffocate them, so I didn’t have to deal with that torment all the time.”

  “Which is a good thing,” she murmured.

  “A good thing except for now, when it rears its ugly head again.”

  “And that’s not your fault.”

  “It doesn’t matter if it’s my fault or not,” he said quietly. “There’s still this sense that I should have done more.”

  “When she said she was broken, she meant it,” Celina said.

  “And I get that. I really do. But what are we supposed to do?” he asked. “Just so much is wrong in this world.”

  “There is, indeed, and you can’t fix all these ails on your own,” she said.

  “No,” he said. “I know that, and it’s one of the hardest things I’ve ever had to adjust to, something that I am slowly coming to terms with.”

  “Just not fast enough,” she said, with a half smile.

  He shrugged. “That I’ve even gotten that far is something, and it’s only to preserve my sanity that I’m staying here.”

  “Are you sure you can do nothing to help her?”

  “I don’t know,” he said, with brutal honesty. “I’ve never seen this before.”

  “So much we’ve never seen before,” she murmured. “And every time it seems like the evil just never quite goes away, and yet something good and new is even more shocking, more awe-inspiring than the case before.”

  “Isn’t that the truth. What do we even know about this?”

  “Only that a young woman has been in hiding for five years, after she escaped an institution, where they imprisoned people, attempting to control and develop paranormal abilities. The people there, those in charge, were so dysfunctional—to the point that they tortured these people to discern and to strengthen those who had real abilities from those who did not, as well as to determine who was controllable and who was not. It’s so scary to think that such a thing is even possible in this day and age,” Celina murmured.

  “It’ll be a problem going forward, no matter what we do,” Stefan said. “When you think about it, as soon as anybody knows of any kind of superpowers to control, everybody wants control of them.”

  “They shouldn’t be able to.”

  “No, they shouldn’t, but that’s well past what any of us can do in this world,” Stefan said. “It’s scary to think that other people want to take possession of somebody because of what they can do with these gifts. I mean, it’s not like any of the Mensa people are kidnapped because they have a higher brain capacity or intelligence than the common man—but that’s only based on the IQ exams they’re given at the time,” he said. “That’s where the problem is. Many people with a lot of intelligence don’t do well on the IQ tests of today. So, therefore, we can’t truly measure their abilities. In this case, somebody found a way to measure paranormal abilities and was using Beth to help with the test.”

  “But I don’t understand how that works,” Celina replied.

  “I don’t know either,” he said, “but I don’t doubt it. No, definitely something is going on. I don’t even know if Beth remembers clearly. Like she said, she’s broken.”

  “It broke my heart to hear her say that too,” Celina said. “And it’s just shocking that somebody could do any of that to a child.”

  “That was one of the things I did send out,” he said, turning to look at her. “A request for information, hoping to find out who she is, but, so far, nobody has a clue.”

  “And it’s not in her file?”

  “I’ve been through the file that Hunter sent me photos of, and I’ve sent it off to a couple FBI agents, wondering if they have any information or another way to source out what we’re missing in this. So far, I haven’t gotten any positive responses.”

  “I suppose,” Celina said, “if the mother had a home birth or something, there wouldn’t be any need to register the child’s birth.”

  “That’s one way,” he said. “The other way is that a lot of these kids just slip through the cracks. The parents could be homeless. The parents could be somebody who adopted them and then moved around between states. We don’t know that the child has even been reported as missing,” he said. “Just no real way to understand what happened with Beth’s family.”

  “What I don’t get is how she went from her parents to this institution guy,” Celina noted. “He must have known, or somebody had some idea that she had these abilities, and it was passed on to him somehow, so that he would do something about it. A lot of things had to happen in a certain order for all this to come together, and that’s what I don’t get, I guess. The fact that it even happened at all.”

  “The fact that it happened at all,” he said, with a nod, “and the fact that people are out there looking for more people like her.”

  “It is a scary thought,” she murmured. “I mean, she didn’t do anything to deserve this. She was just born.”

  “And, I think, in that case,” he said, “that’s all that was required. She was born and had this supernatural ability, whatever that was at the time, because I can’t see any sign of what it is like now.”

  “Because she’s broken?”

  He nodded. “Because everything in her broke apart at some point.”

  “In that case, the very fact that she’s even cognizant and functioning in the real world is an incredible feat.”

  “And somehow I worry that she’ll flip and do something seriously odd,” Stefan said.

  “You mean, she could be dangerous?”

  He turned to look at her and said, “Yes, I think she is dangerous. I think she has the potential to be very dangerous, but I don’t know in what way.”

  “So then Hunter is in danger too?” Celina asked.

  “Yes,” he said quietly, “Hunter is definitely in danger, but is he in danger from her? That I can’t answer.”

  She groaned. “I get it,” she said. “I mean, I’ve been with you long enough to understand that frequently there are no answers, but I sure wish there were.”

  He gave a broken laugh. “You and me both, especially when it comes to things like this. Just no way to know where this will end up. We must protect her as much as we can and keep her safe. I don’t want her to become another victim, and, if we can do anything to help her regain some semblance of normality, then I feel obligated to help with that as well.”

  “Is obligated the right word?” she said quietly. “That makes it sound as if you feel like you owe her.”

  “If she came from that place, and I missed getting her out, then I do owe her,” he said, his voice harsh. “You don’t know what that was like.”

  “No, I don’t know what that’s like,” she said, walking steadily toward him. “But I know you can’t fix the world.”

  He glared at her, and then his shoulders sagged. “I know that,” he said. “I really do, and most times I manage it well. But—when it becomes p
ersonal like this—”

  “You can’t allow it to become personal,” she whispered. “You can only save those whom you can save. You can’t save everyone, and, in this case, this person, this woman, might be someone we can’t help.”

  He shook his head. “Something is so very familiar about her, and yet at the same time I can’t quite place her. Intellectually I know who she is, yet, when I think back, I just—”

  “Is it because her energy is so different now?”

  He nodded. “I think so. I just think that so much damage has been done to her energy that the sense of recognition is also damaged. She doesn’t have the same pathways, the same wavey signature that I would have instinctively recognized.”

  “It’s hard to imagine somebody being so damaged,” she murmured, “that you can’t recognize her.”

  “And it’s disturbing,” he said, “on so many levels.”

  She walked up, slipped her arms around him, and just stood gently with her head against his chest. “And remember,” she said. “We can’t save everyone.”

  “No,” he said, “but I need to save this one.”

  She squeezed him gently, looked back up at him, and said, “Because you feel like that’s the only way to save yourself?”

  He looked down, smiled, and whispered, “Oh, once again, I’d forgotten just how wise you are.”

  “Oh, you can’t do that,” she said, with a beguiling look on her face. “Because I’ll just be here, reminding you all the time.”

  He burst out laughing, wrapped his arms around her, and held her close. “I am so grateful we found each other again.”

  “No kidding,” she said. “Our lives were not the same without us. And that’s what’s wrong with Beth. Her life is not the same because she’s not herself, and we’ll do what we can to help her find those missing pieces,” she said firmly. “Remembering that, we won’t do anything that puts you in danger either.”

  He kissed the top of her head gently. “No,” he said, “that’s not on the agenda.”

  But he also knew that sometimes things happened, and sometimes nobody could do anything to stop it.

  Chapter 19

  Early the next morning Beth dipped her toe in the lake, wondering at the wisdom of diving in without a care if she were being hunted or not. She was just seizing the moment for the time that she had, and, if she failed, then at least she would have had these few glorious minutes. Yet it seemed so selfish and wrong to even think that way. She’d been on the run for so long, hiding, looking behind her constantly, always wondering when the boogeyman would pop out at her. And yet, when it had happened, all she had done was go into an automated mode, where she’d immediately gone on the run from everyone, preserving all the bits and pieces she could of herself, before the hunters caught up to her again.