Chapter 2
CHAPTER TWO
EMERY
“It’s beautiful, isn’t it?”
She stood on the edge of a small dune, long beach grass sprouting out of the sand, dipping in a soft breeze. The sound of waves crashing one after another was melodic.
She meant the sunset, orange and red reflecting off the vast ocean before us. She walked in front of me, her silhouette blocking out the light.
“Yes,” I said.
She smiled, tendrils of her hair brushing over her face. Her pink dress hugged her body perfectly, skirt whipping in the breeze, brushing against her thighs.
“I love you, Emery.”
I closed my eyes and felt the swell of ecstasy at those words.
No one ever loved me. And I didn’t deserve it.
Especially not from her.
Not after what I had done to her.
But I felt utter bliss at her words, at her voice, her scent, her everything.
My Eve.
“Don’t go, Emery.”
I opened my eyes, and the sun sank below the horizon. Darkness spilled in, bringing in the coldness with it.
She was just a shadow now, unmoving.
Only her face…
She had a wide, split open smile. Not hers.
Not her.
“Don’t go.”
A wave overtook us. I was under, and she was gone. And there was nothing but awful, sick pain.
I gasped and woke up. The pain followed me out of the dream. I lay, staring at a bare white ceiling. Blinking, I took several slow breaths. There were only the sounds of voices outside the room. My ribs throbbed along with my upper back. I felt sluggish, dazed.
Drugged.
No, not this hell again, not the warehouse, not again. I’d kill anyone who touched me. I’d kill them.
I ripped off the IV and the oxygen tube, then lurched into a sitting position, ready to lunge off the bed.
A bell went off, drumming in my head. Faces flooded the room. They surrounded me. If I wasn’t drugged up, I would have smacked them away like flies, but I got dizzy. My stomach churned, sweat breaking out over my body.
They held me down on the bed. Stabbed the IV in me and pumped more of whatever drug they had me on. I wanted to cry and scream, to lash out as if I was that little boy all over again. Scared shitless.
My heart felt like it was going to explode as I slowly lost consciousness. Before the darkness took me, I saw the window on one side of the room, and a tag on one of the nurses that read Victory Hospital.
I went in and out of sleep. I dreamed of my girl. When I awoke, I caught her sitting beside me. Then I blinked and she was gone. My sister, merged now with the smiling woman who once haunted me, would take her place, giving me that trademark creepy-ass grin.
She whispered to me every so often. Just a few words to set me straight.
Dumbass.
Loser.
Degenerate.
I tried to ignore her, taking in the sounds outside instead. Nurses talking, soft footsteps, someone crying.
The lights were dimmed, keeping me in half darkness. Most of the time, I was alone, but every so often, someone came in to check on me.
Once or twice, others came into the room and spoke quietly. I pretended to be asleep while I listened.
“Still no idea,” one said. “Couple construction guys found him on the shoreline with no phone or ID. No tag on his clothes either. We’ll just have to wait.”
“Police might have something.”
“I have an officer coming in this evening, says she will take the statement and might be able to make a confirmation.”
“Good. Hopefully, he doesn’t have another episode before then…”
I opened my eyes, and they were gone. I looked down at myself—a thick strap was over my chest to keep me in place, but I wasn’t handcuffed.
They didn’t know who I was yet.
Lucky for them…and for me .
Too bad I was running out of time. As soon as that cop identified me, I was done for. Shipped off to prison.
I tried to sit up and the room spun even as I lifted my head. They really pumped me hard with whatever drug knocked me out and it was still working on me.
It made me want to vomit, but I took more deep breaths, forcing myself to calm. I needed to get out of here. I needed to find Eve.
I tried lifting myself again but the strap kept me down. I fumbled around to try and unlatch it, then figured I could probably rip it off if I tugged hard enough. I moved my arm across and gripped it tight, ready to break the latch.
“Emery.”
I glanced over to the window and there she was, my Eve, sitting close by. She smiled, but her eyes were sad, her face ashen.
“What’s wrong, sweetheart?” I asked, concerned.
“I’m so scared.”
I let go of the strap. “Don’t be, baby. I’m right here. See? I’ll get out and I’ll find you, no matter what it takes.”
The room darkened, and somewhere beyond the window, I heard the waves crashing.
“You promise?”
“Always.”
Her smile widened. We were on the beach again. I laid back, watching her. So happy…so…goddamn…happy.
“He’s stable?” came a sharp female voice above me.
I blinked and the hospital room came into focus.
“For now. Had a bad episode earlier today but that can happen sometimes,” said a familiar voice. One of the nurses from before.
I shut my eyes, confused. Then reality slammed into me. Remembering where I was, I had to choke down a curse.
Fuck, I fell asleep again.
I felt a hand on my shoulder and it took everything in me not to flinch away and crush it.
“The surgery went fine then? No issues?”
“No, not yet, but only time will tell. He seems to be taking it better than most at least. He’s a real survivor.”
“No surprise there.” Their hand slipped off my shoulder. “Best guess is he’s a victim of one of the gangs. We had several calls earlier today. You know how it is.”
“I had a feeling…” the nurse said. “Figured we’d call it in.”
“I’ve already made the report. We are sending him over to Detroit Medical for now. He’s being referred to Dr. Kline. She specializes in gunshot wounds. Her treatment is the best.”
“We’ll have to get the authorization.”
“I have the paperwork sent already.”
“Didn’t think you guys worked this quickly, no offense.”
“He’s a special case. We want to question him when we can, but we’ll have him out of here right away.”
No, I wouldn’t let them get the chance. I’d escape again once I was transferred. I had to.
She called me a special case. But there weren’t any feds here and I wasn’t handcuffed. Did she know who I was or not?
Maybe she did and was keeping my identity secret until they showed up. She had to be lying to the nurse.
Liar, Liar , my sister repeated.
“We’ll have him ready to go,” said the nurse. “Do you need anything else?”
“No,” replied the cop with the sharp voice. “I’ll be back with the others.”
I just needed to bide my time now. Once I was out of here, I’d find a place to recover.
I slipped out of consciousness and dreamed of her again. Only when hands started grabbing at me did I wake.
I glared at more faces, ready to tell them not to fucking touch me. I tried to jerk away, but they held me fast.
There was the cop, a young black woman around my age, with a scarred eye. Then, an older woman in a doctor’s coat followed by three men whose faces were covered by medical masks, each wearing EMT uniforms.
One man with white-blond hair gripped my left shoulder, pushing me down. “Hold him still.”
“I’m trying. Motherfucker is a tank,” said another on my right, his sharp green eyes flashing at me.
The man on my left gave the one on my right a death glare, and he shut up. The doctor’s face came into my view, blocking them, her graying sandy blonde hair falling over her shoulders, hazel eyes regarding me carefully. “It’s okay,” she told me. “You have to calm down or you'll tear your wounds open, got it?”
I didn’t know them, didn’t trust them. Unfortunately, the drugs made it hard to fight their grip. Still, I didn’t make it easy for them as they moved me onto a carrier and strapped me down—a little too good—and rolled me out of the room.
The hallways were emptier than others. They took me out a side entrance and, parked right out front, was an old white van, dented, with 'Detroit Medical' on the side.
I wasn’t one to complain about medical amenities, but this did not look certified to transport a guy with several bullet holes in his body. The only legitimacy this group gave me was the cop car parked right behind, lights flashing and all.
As they rolled me out, the carrier shook and that hurt like a bitch, but I gritted my teeth. I considered if I should try to just escape now and leave these five on the pavement. But the cop would definitely have a gun, and I wouldn’t get far, not in my current state. I forced myself to bear it and let them lift me inside, into the back of the van, which was windowless and empty.
This wasn’t right.
I started to jerk against the straps. The two men who’d kept me down got in the front while the doctor and third EMT got in the back. The cop shut the doors on us and the pair gripped the carrier. The car roared to life, then sprung forward.
Strapped down…in the dark…a bad memory. Bad. Bad.
Need to get out.
Only the movement of the car kept me from snapping.
The doctor cursed beside me as I pushed against the straps. She placed a trembling hand on me, and I glared at her.
Finally, I found my voice, grating and scratchy. “Where are you taking me?”
“To Detroit.”
I heard a little giggle in my right ear. “She’s lying,” my sister whispered.
Why? What the fuck did they want?
For a second, I wondered if they were the feds in disguise and they were taking me somewhere secluded, to question me like the cop had said.
“If you don’t let me go, you’ll really regret it.” I wished I could sound more intimidating but the swerving of the car made my stomach tighten, and the pain made it hard to concentrate.
The guy on my other side gripped my arm.
“Just wait, Emery,” said the woman. “We’ll be there soon.”
Who the fuck were they?
Now, I was certain we weren’t going to a hospital. I could hear dogs barking and the roar of cars flying by. Then things got quiet, real quiet.
They turned one last time before the car jerked to a halt. A loud sliding sound signaled the opening of a garage door. The car pulled forward, dipped slightly, and stopped again before the engine shut off.
They pulled me out as the cop car idled nearby, and I heard the garage door closing behind us. They rolled me across the garage, past several parked cars, including one that looked like it was being worked on. Then, they took me through a door on the right and into a dark hallway. I was sure I had seen this horror movie somewhere and I couldn’t stop the little laugh escaping from me because I thought I was done playing the role of the victim. But some things just come full circle like that.
“You fucked up big time, brother,” my sister said from behind. “You deserve this.”
Did I? Maybe. But then she was mad that I picked Eve over her. She wasn’t even there. She haunted my mind and yet her words still stung.
I wish I had the strength to tear myself off the stretcher, fight them, and march back the way we came. Before I could decide if it was worth a try, someone flipped on a switch. They wheeled me past a kitchen into what looked like some sort of community hall with tables and chairs, a couch against one wall, and a piano in one corner. On one side, a large computer station was set up, several wide screens and two little laptops flanking in between two narrow windows up high that were shuttered. Two of the men stopped there while the rest went on to wheel me in a room just beyond. It was bare except for a hospital bed and EKG monitor. On one side was a doorway leading into another room with—
I thrashed, almost making the stretcher fall to one side. I even broke one of the straps and got myself nearly into a sitting position. Someone yelped in surprise and another cursed loudly, calling for the others. One guy lunged forward to hold me down. They tried to contain me but failed.
No, not again, not fucking again.
A nightmare. This was the warehouse all over again. Or I really had died in the river and this was my hell. A hell in that fucking awful place alone and without Eve.
Please, please no.
“Hold him, hold him!” someone yelled.
“Andrea, get the tranquilizer, quickly,” another said over my shoulder.
The doctor rushed into the room I was staring at. A room with a doctor’s exam table next to a counter full of medical tools and supplies. Just like the one from the warehouse. An exam chair sat somewhere in the back, with those awful flickering white and green lights. The fumes of chemicals soaked my senses, the sounds of whirring noises made my ears ring. Then I saw red.
I must have blacked out because one minute I was losing my shit and the next, I was in the bed with the EKG machine next to me and an IV strapped to me. My arms were now chained to the sides of the bed. Two of the guys, still in their EMT uniform and face masks, sat nearby, watching me. A curtain closed off the room ahead. I could hear people speaking softly within, one groaning and cursing.
I stared at the curtain, then let my gaze drift to the two men, glaring at them.
“What the fuck is this?” They didn’t say a word at first, and I jerked at one of the chains. “Am I in hell?”
One of them, a man with dark hair, a mangled ear, and a gun now on his lap, shrugged. “Probably.”
The other man, with white-blonde hair, and deep blue eyes, elbowed him. He rose and inched closer then took off his medical mask.
I stared at him and had a sudden feeling of deja vu.
“This is a safe place, Emery. We aren’t here to hurt you.”
“Oh yeah?” I jerked the chain again.
“That’s more for us than you.”
“What am I doing here?”
He brought his seat closer, then sat beside me. “I didn’t think we’d ever see you outside prison walls.”
I watched him carefully, wondering if this was a game. Or an intense hallucination. I shifted on the bed, my eyes drifting from him over to the others. If it was a hallucination, it was becoming harder to distinguish from reality.
Hallucination or not, I chose to answer. “Whose we?”
He smiled, a sort of distant smile. There was nothing about him that told me he wasn’t real, that he wasn’t really sitting next to me. “The only ones left,” he said.
I glanced at the guy sitting by the wall with the gun, then noticed the third man standing quietly by the door, his dark eyes studying me. The cop and the doctor peeked out from behind the curtain in the other room. They came out and stood a few feet away. The doctor’s wrist was wrapped up and the cop had a cut on her lip.
Did I do that? My head felt fuzzy and on the verge of a bad headache, but I couldn’t remember what had happened after I’d seen the exam room.
I looked back at the man beside me, who watched me closely. “The only ones left?” I repeated.
He leaned forward, bowing his head. “That got out of…that bad place underground.”
I stared at him, confused. Then I took in the others. My gaze halted on the doctor. Now that I really looked at her, there was something familiar about her.
Then it dawned on me.
She was just a little older now, with wrinkles around her eyes. I hadn’t really noticed her before, but now, as I took a closer look, I knew.
“Y-you…you were a nurse from the…” My heart hammered as rage curled in my stomach.
She came forward cautiously. “Nurse Andrea.”
“You were there,” I hissed, feeling the chains rattle as I tried to lift myself.
“But she’s with us now, Emery.”
I stilled, glancing at the man beside me in disbelief. Why? No, that was wrong. “Who are you?”
“I’m Micheal.”
Micheal.
He straightened in his seat. “I was only there for a brief time that you were. You and your sister were new.” He glanced at Andrea, then back at me. “I was lucky enough to steal a surgical knife and stab one of the nurses. They threw me out after.”
The memory of a boy a couple years older than me being dragged away with blood on his hands slipped into my head. A boy with white-blonde hair and blue eyes.
Before I uttered a word, I caught the cop’s gaze. I saw her scarred eye with the faded pupil. Memories assaulted my senses, cooling my rage.
“Cassidy,” I breathed.
Her tight lip twitched a little. She crossed her arms. “And I thought I got all messed up from that shithole.” She shook her head. “Still got the hallucinations?”
I saw my sister at the corner of my eye and nodded.
“Too bad. I only get them every so often now. And some bad dreams.” She glanced at Nurse Andrea. “Even the meds can’t make them go away permanently, but it’s better than nothing.”
“You got out,” I said. “I didn’t know…I thought maybe…”
“That I got the same fate as your sis?” she snapped, and I flinched. “Sorry, that was uncalled for. But, no, just like you, I got thrown out. Ended up on the streets for a while. Got thrown in a mental ward for little while until Micheal found me.”
I turned my gaze back to the man. “I remember you now.”
“I wasn’t there as long as you,” he answered. “Or Cassidy. Or even Leslie and Dominic.”
My gaze trailed over to the man sitting by the wall who took off his mask and tossed it on the ground. The third man standing by the door followed suit. Twins. Identical except for the eyes. The one by the wall had sharp green, while his brother at the door had jet-black. I remembered them too.
Not hallucinations. They were really here. Survivors from the warehouse. Grown up like me. Just as damaged. “The twins,” I said. “You were only a couple years younger…I remember your screams from across the building.”
Leslie, who rubbed at his mangled ear, pretended to study the curtain. “Yeah, well, Dom stopped speaking so I had to scream for the both of us.”
“Is he still that way?”
“Yeah.”
And Martel had done that to him. Another core memory shot into my head. I was walking past the exam room with a nurse and had seen Dom on the cold metal slab, blood dripping from his mouth, his eyes glassed over. Some bad drug gone wrong. They had tried to operate on him and only botched it more. Leslie’s screams had been ear-shattering. They separated them once, and Dom had been placed beside my room. We’d started to tap on the walls to each other.
I heard a soft tap and looked over to the door. Dom smiled at me, nodding in acknowledgment.
“We’re all that’s left?” I said, unsure yet how to feel about…any of this.
“Yes,” Micheal said. “There were a few others I went looking for. One of them died by suicide. Another ended up in a mental ward and dissociated from this reality entirely. The last died of alcohol poisoning. We’re the only ones who…well…got out alive.”
“Not our sanity though,” Cassidy said, tilting her head, grinning.
“I don’t know. I think I came out all right,” Leslie said, flipping his gun over on his lap.
“Dude, shut your dumbass mouth,” Cassidy spat. “You go into full psychosis mode and start thinking everyone around you are parasitic aliens who abducted you so we can impregnate you. How many times did we have to lock up your weapon stash so you didn’t blow us away? Huh?”
“That’s what the password is for,” he argued.
“You’re a fucking psycho like the rest of us!”
“Okay, let’s calm down,” Nurse Andrea said calmly.
“Why is she here?” I asked, glaring at her. “She’s definitely not one of us.”
“I brought her,” Micheal answered. “She’s agreed to help us.”
“With what exactly?”
After a moment of silence, Micheal said, “My initial plan was to find survivors and just try to help each other. To find some kind of closure, knowing that we weren’t alone. I had the resources since I work in law, finding justice for neglected kids. I had connections to help me track everyone down.”
Liar. Not everyone. Not once did I ever receive a call while locked up or a letter. “I never heard from you. Not once,” I remarked.
He looked at his hands, trying to hide the shadow that passed over his gaze. “I learned what you did. And that you’d be locked up for the rest of your life. I didn’t expect you to ever get out. Still, I did try calling once…They told me you wouldn’t take the call, wouldn’t talk.”
So like the one who ended up dissociating from reality, he considered me a lost cause. As did everyone.
No. Not everyone.
More than ever, it physically hurt not to have Eve with me, to wonder where she was and what she was going through.
Micheal leaned in closer. “But you did get out. Then you disappeared. And I knew we needed you here.”
It felt odd being told I was needed anywhere. “And you just so happened to find me at a hospital?”
“Cassidy learned from the police chief that you were shot before you went into the river. They were tasked with helping the feds search for your body. Andrea and Dom dug through hospital records, hoping you’d somehow survived and made it to a medical facility. It was worth a shot—knowing you, like the others, have a better chance of surviving that kind of situation than the average person. One no-name with a few bullet holes and a scarred-up face was enough to make us start looking. And sure enough, we found you.” He rolled his shoulders. “Maybe it was fate.”
Cassidy snorted. “No. Just crazy luck.”
I closed my eyes. The how wasn’t my main concern; it was the why.
“You took your justice six years ago, Emery,” Micheal continued. “But it’s not over. The rest of us want our pound of flesh too. We learned a lot more after the murders. The experiments didn’t stop with Martel.”
I opened my eyes. No. No, they had to.
It never ends , my sister cried. It never stops.
“That’s why you can help us now, " Micheal said softly. “Help us end the experiments for good. Help save others from suffering like us.” He gripped the side of the bed. “Martel is gone. But they were only the heart of the monster, not the head.”
“Not all of Martel is gone,” Cassidy said. She tilted her head, her cloudy eye narrowing. “You had the Martel girl in your grasp. Trying to finish the job?”
Leslie leaned forward in his chair. “I heard that too. Were you?”
“Guys,” Micheal warned.
I didn’t say a word. Heat rose in me, but it was something else, something more dangerous, more... protective. No, I wouldn’t tell them about Eve.
Micheal gave me a judgmental look. Despite his warning, he was curious too. “You mad I took them out?” I said to him. “Or are you just mad I got there first?”
His jaw tensed. “It could have gone better, I think. I’m disappointed but…no, I’m not mad. They deserved it and more.”
“I just wish I had been there,” Leslie added.
“Me too,” Cassidy said.
“What’s done is done,” Micheal said. He got up from his seat, putting his hand in his pockets. “As I said, Martel wasn't the only one. We know now. They were paid for these experiments. And those heading the project are working again. And they are a far bigger threat than Martel.”
“Tell me,” I said, even though a part of me was done with revenge. I just wanted Eve. Maybe they could help me find her.
“In time,” Micheal said. “We’ll tell you everything. But you tore open one of your wounds and Andrea needs to fix it. Let her do that. Then we’ll talk.”
He slipped from the room before I could respond. The others followed him out, save for Andrea.
“Please don’t make this difficult,” she said.
I glared at her, then drifted my gaze back to the curtained room. “No promises.”