by Amy Cross
"It's not for me," I say. "It's for stopping the noise."
"What noise?" my mother asks.
"Can't you hear it?" I reply.
"Put the gun down," my father says.
"She's going to shoot us," my mother says, sounding terrified. "Oh God, she's going to shoot us, John."
"I'm not going to shoot you," I say.
"Then put the gun down, Annie," my father says.
"Sorry," I say, stepping out of the room, pulling the door shut and quickly locking it. As I turn the key, the static in the air seems to flare for a moment.
"Annie!" my mother screams from inside, but it's too late. I hurry back along the corridor and find Taylor still standing in the kitchen with that buzzing sound coming from his mouth. It's louder than before, and it feels like it's getting right into my brain. I start feeling nauseous, as if I might throw up at any moment, but I grab his arm and pull him toward the front door. "Taylor," I say, "can you hear me? You have to stop making that noise, do you understand?"
We reach the door and I turn to him. If anything, the noise is getting louder. I don't know how much longer I can stand it before it drives me nuts.
"Wait," Taylor says, speaking with the man's voice again. The buzzing sound becomes a little quieter. "The signal's all over the place," he continues. "It's Julia. She's phasing in and out. This is all wrong."
"Where's my brother?" I shout at him. In the distance, I can hear my parents banging on their bedroom door; every time their fists hit the wood, the static jolts.
"Is this thing two-way?" the male voice asks, speaking through Taylor. "Fuck." There's a pause, and Taylor just stares at me, the buzzing noise still there but quieter now.
"Let's go for a walk," I say. "Come on."
Obediently, Taylor turns and follows me away from the house. I glance back to make sure that our parents haven't got out of their room yet, and I realize we probably don't have long before they come after us. My father's smart enough to have a spare set, and he and my mother probably still have the keys to their window. They'll be out any moment. Feeling the cold steel of the gun in my pocket, I find myself wondering if I can really do this. Can I really put a gun to my little brother's head and kill him? It sounds monstrous and cruel, but I feel like I'm good at seeing the bigger picture. Taylor is dangerous. It's not his fault, necessarily, but he's dangerous. That buzzing sound is driving me crazy. It has to be stopped.
"Where are we going?" Taylor asks, using his own voice.
"Not much further," I say. We're out of sight of the house now, which is perfect. Anyway, it's not like anyone can do anything to save him. Once the bullet's in his brain, he'll be gone. I have no idea how long it would take an ambulance to get out here, but I know it would be many hours. We're so far from civilization, thanks to my mother's determination to get us away from anything dangerous, that there's no help for miles. It's just us. No-one can stop me.
"Here," I say suddenly, and we stop in a clearing. All around us, the forest floor is covered in leaves. There's a gentle wind blowing through the trees, causing a rustling sound. I try to imagine the busy world far away - New York, Los Angeles, places like that - and it's hard to believe that we're part of the same world. It's as if time has slowed down and stood still out here. There's nothing to do but embrace the emptiness.
"Don't move," I tell Taylor, taking a few steps back.
He stares at me. "You're being weird," he says.
I feel the gun in my pocket. "Yeah," I say. "Maybe."
"Why are you looking at me like that?" he asks.
"Because... Close your eyes," I say. "I've got a surprise for you."
"I'm tired," he says. The buzzing sound is getting louder. "Do you know what that dial means?" he says suddenly, using the man's voice again. "It's been twitching for a while now. I don't remember what it means, but it definitely means something. Can you look it up?"
"Who are you talking to?" I shout at him.
"Shut up!" Taylor says with the man's voice. "She can hear us. I can hear her too, on the AM frequencies. Listen."
With the buzzing getting louder, I aim the gun directly at his forehead.
"Can you hear me?" the man's voice asks.
I stare at Taylor.
"Is there anybody there?" the man's voice says, still speaking through Taylor's mouth.
"Who are you?" I ask, keeping the gun steady.
"Fuck," the man's voice says. "Shut it down. Shut it off. Everything. Pull the plug if you have to, but get everything off."
"Who are you?" I shout at him, with tears in my eyes.
Taylor stares at me, his mouth hanging open as the buzz starts to get even louder. It's becoming overbearing, and I can't handle it for much longer. It's as if, all around us, the trees are vibrating.
"Stop that!" I shout.
The buzz seems to be getting scrambled, and suddenly I hear the man's voice again, saying "Not that way", but this time his voice isn't coming from Taylor's mouth, it's coming from inside my own head.
"Get out!" I shout. "Get out of my head!"
"These readings are totally wrong," the man continues. "We have to stop this now and work out what's gone wrong. Do you realize how much damage we could be causing here?"
"Stop it!" I scream, my voice sounding so loud against the silence of the forest.
Taylor stares at me as the buzzing sounds gets quieter and finally fades away. He blinks a couple of times. "Annie?" he says. "What are you doing?"
"Close your eyes," I say, keeping the gun trained on him.
"Can we go home?" he asks.
"There's some residual," the man's voice says, deep in my head. "Should be another minute or two."
"Close your eyes," I say.
He frowns for a moment, but then he does what I say. With his eyes tight shut, he waits for whatever I'm going to give him. Slowly, I double-check that the gun is aiming right at the middle of his forehead. I can't afford to miss. This is it. It's going to happen. I pause, enjoying the sensation of being free and innocent. In a few seconds, I'll lose that feeling forever. I'll be Annie Radford, the girl who killed her brother. I'll be a monster. I'll be vilified. My parents will never, ever want to see me again. But hopefully it won't hurt Taylor, and at least the voice will be gone from my head. Somehow Taylor is acting as a receiver for the voice, helping it get into me.
"It should have shut off by now," the voice says. "Take a look. It's like there's some kind of residual energy loop. I don't get it at all. Not one fucking bit."
"Annie?" Taylor says, opening his eyes.
The gun fires once, there's the sound of his body hitting the leaf-covered forest floor, and then everything goes completely silent.
I just stand there, feeling the cold gunmetal in my hand, my finger pressed against the trigger. I'm completely unable to move; it feels as if passing angels have put their hands on my shoulders, stilling me, forcing me to stay and face what I've done. They want me to be found like this, with a thin wisp of smoke still rising from the barrel of the gun, and my little brother's body at my feet.
I could turn and run. I'd probably get quite far before they tracked me down. Eventually, though, they'd drag me back here and force me to face the evil I've committed. I can't stand the thought of being forced, kicking and screaming, back to this place. I'd rather just wait here and show them that I understand. Besides, they'll want to know why I did what I did. If I'm to stand any chance of making them accept that I was justified, I have to stay and face them. This is the test.
So far, this is nothing like a movie. On the forest floor, my little brother's body is completely still. The only movement is a slow trickle of dark red blood that seeps from the wound in his skull. I expected his head to explode when I shot him, but all that happened was that the bullet went straight in and out again, leaving behind a single, growing red spot on his forehead. He didn't scream; he didn't struggle; he just dropped to the ground and that was that. In the end, it was remarkably easy. I just pulled the
trigger and he died.
No-one will understand, though. Little children are supposed to be innocent and sweet. Nobody ever believes they could do anything truly evil. My parents have always seen me as the difficult one. The weird one. The plain one. They'll see me standing over Taylor's body and they'll immediately assume it's all my fault. I understand that, but if only they'll let me explain, I can show them that this was the right thing to do; if they'll just give me time to tell them what Taylor was doing, and why he had to die, surely they have to know that I had to do this. I had to save the world.
I can hear them coming now. Their voices raised, they've heard the gunshot and they're racing through the forest. They'll be here any second, coming up behind me and seeing the terrible scene. I can already feel the tears in my eyes, but I have to hold it together. I can't cry, not yet. I have to stay strong, so that I can explain myself. If I start crying, they'll just see me as a monster and I won't be able to make them understand the truth. I have to keep my eyes dry, but they're here now. They've seen what's happened, and as my father pulls the gun from my hand and pushes me aside, my mother's screams ring out through the forest.
Dear God, why did you make me do this?
"Annie," my father says, his voice filled with shock. "What the hell did you do?"
"I saved us," I mutter, staring down at Taylor's body.
"You what?" my father asks, turning to me.
"I saved us," I say, a little louder this time as my mother cradles Taylor in her arms. Blood from his head is flowing out over her arms as she gently rocks him.
"You saved us?" my father says. "From what?"
"From Taylor," I say. "I saved us from Taylor. I made everything okay." I pause for a moment, unable to stop watching my mother as she cradles Taylor's dead body on the forest floor. "What's going to happen to me?" I ask. I look at my father, and I'm shocked to see tears in his eyes. "Dad?" I say. "What's going to happen to me now?"
Epilogue
Six months later.
"Do you understand, Annie?" asks Mr. Stephens, my lawyer. We're sitting in a small, carefully guarded room in the back of the courthouse.
I nod.
"Good," he says. "Lakehurst has a really strong reputation. It's been known to get great results, but you need to understand that this won't be a quick or easy process, okay? We're talking years. Decades, perhaps. These people are professional mental health workers and they're going to help you, but it won't be easy." He pauses. "You're very lucky that we managed to get you declared mentally unfit, otherwise you'd have ended up in an adult correctional facility and I don't think anyone could have guaranteed your safety."
I nod again. He's talking to me like I'm a child, but I understand perfectly. I can hear the crowd outside. Even from this room at the back of the building, I can hear chants and calls for me to be dragged out and executed. As soon as my story hit the newspapers, people started calling for my death. There were photos of Taylor all over the news, and my parents gave a teary interview to one of the major TV networks. My father visited me once, just to tell me that he and my Mom wouldn't be coming to see me for a while. Since then, the only contact with the outside world is the screams I hear from the crowd every day when I'm driven to the courthouse. Now, even that's going to stop.
"I'll still be involved with your case," Mr. Stephens says. "I'll still be your lawyer, so if any issues come up, I'll be the one who sorts them out, okay? Your parents have agreed that I should be your legal representative, rather than them. I assure you, I'll have your best interests at heart, at all times." He pauses for a moment. "Annie, do you have any questions so far?"
I shake my head, and then I think of something. "One question," I say. "Did anyone call to ask about me? There's this guy named Kieran, I thought maybe..." My voice trails off as I realize how pathetic I sound.
"I don't think anyone called for you," Mr. Stephens says, checking one of his print-outs. "No, no-one."
"Okay," I say.
"If you have some contact details," he continues, "I can try to pass on a message."
"No," I reply, "that's fine. When do I go to this Lakehurst place?"
"You'll be taken there directly from here," he says. "It's a long trip, so you'll probably be driven to a jail in another county to spend the night, and then from there you'll go to Lakehurst tomorrow morning. I promise, it'll all be okay. Like I said, Lakehurst is known as one of the very best hospitals in the country. They have a fine tradition of helping people like you."
I stare at him. "There are other people like me?"
"Well," he says, looking a little uncomfortable, "not exactly like you, but you know what I mean. People who need help. People who have problems." He smiles. "One day, Annie, you're going to be okay. You're going to be able to live a normal life. You'll be given a new identity eventually, so you can start living a normal life again."
"Is that because people want to kill me?" I ask.
"It's standard procedure in sensitive cases," he replies.
"Because people think I should be killed," I continue. "If I walked out the front of this building, the crowd would tear me to pieces, wouldn't they?"
"Yes," he says bluntly. "Yes, they would."
"But they don't understand," I say. "They didn't hear it."
"Hear what?" Mr. Stephens asks.
"The voices," I say. "When the frequency is right, the voices can get into your head and there's only one way to stop them."
He smiles, and it's clear that he thinks I'm insane. Gathering his papers, he heads over to the door. "It's all going to be okay, Annie," he says. "Just wait in here for a moment, okay?" He steps out, closing the door as he goes, leaving me sitting in silence. Well, almost silence. I can just about make out the sound of some people shouting in the distance. I guess those are the protesters, calling for me to be executed. But after a few minutes, I find I'm able to ignore them. I focus, instead, on creating complete silence in my mind. No thoughts, no external or internal sounds, just total silence. There's a slight buzz coming from the electric light, but even that vanishes after a moment. I'm empty, but I know it won't last. Those voices are going to come back at some point. For now, though I have to get rid of everything... even my deepest thoughts. Staring straight ahead, I try to stop thinking. It's hard. I find myself thinking about the fact that I'm not thinking, but finally I get the hang of it, and my mind goes completely and truly blank.
Blank.
Blank.
Blank.
Blank.
Blank.
Part 8:
Burning Down the House
Prologue 1
Altensalzkoth, Germany, 1945.
There are three of them: American soldiers, walking across the street, looking relatively relaxed. The question is: why are they here? Hiding in the shadows, Dr. Rudolf Langheim considers two possibilities: perhaps they're simply here to spend a few hours off-duty; or perhaps they're here because they know about Langheim and the others. While both explanations are perfectly plausible, there's no room for error here. If there's even the slightest chance that the Americans know what is being planned in Altensalzkoth, it will be necessary to get out of here and start again. And although the others in Langheim's group tend to be more willing to risk discovery in order to expedite their escape, Langheim is methodical; he wants nothing left to chance, and he'll do anything necessary to wipe out any threats. It's for that reason that he follows the three Americans. They have to die.
Since it became evident that Germany was going to lose the Second World War, Langheim has been running. His role in the Nazi experiments means he's high on the Allies' list of targets. They don't understand the aims of his work, and they don't see that he was close to a breakthrough in several fields; all they see are the dead bodies and twisted limbs, and the surviving paperwork that documents the results of experiments conducted on live subjects. High on a sense of their own importance, the Allies believe it's their job to stamp out all the 'evil' of the Nazi regime, includ
ing those who conducted the experiments. They're blinded by self-righteousness, and this stupidity threatens all of Langheim's plans. He's determined to get away, to find somewhere else that will allow him to continue his work. If his future experiments must be conducted in secret, then so be it. He was never in it for the glory. He has always sought only true scientific excellence.
Langheim watches as two of the Americans walk into a cafe, while the third heads around behind the little building. Langheim follows the third man, fearing that he's preparing to cover the cafe's back entrance in case any of the occupants decide to flee. Moments later, however, the third American takes a detour down a small alleyway, before stopping and urinating against a wall. Langheim seizes his moment, quietly walking up behind the man, pulling a knife from his pocket, and slitting his throat. The man gurgles as blood pours from the wound, but within a few seconds he's down on the ground, dead. Langheim takes a deep breath, having enjoyed the kill. For good measure, he kicks the dead soldier in the face, just for the pleasure of feeling the man's bones break. After spending eight years working in a laboratory, Langheim is enjoying the opportunity to get his hands dirty again.
After hiding the dead American's body behind some crates, Langheim pauses as he tries to decide what to do next. Killing the other two Americans would be pleasurable, but perhaps counter-productive. He smiles as a better plan forms in his mind. Pulling the dead American back out from behind the crates, he positions the corpse so that it will be easily found. He then turns and runs along the alley until he reaches the next street. Looking up at the window of a small house, he decides he must make a sacrifice. He is not alone in Altensalzkoth: there are five other former Nazi scientists with him, and they're all seeking a route to South America so they can escape from the Allies. Langheim knows there's little chance that they can all get away, so he decides he might as well allow the others to be caught so that he himself has a better chance. They'll almost certainly be executed, a fate that Langheim himself is keen to avoid.