Project Pandora

by Aden Polydoros

  Rubbing his aching eyes, he turned his attention back to the computer screen. Over the last two hours, he had researched everything from mind control and Greek mythology to alien abductions. He discovered that the CIA had run a brainwashing experiment called Project MKULTRA from the 1950s to the early 1970s. He also found several other government-related projects that were named after Greek mythological figures, but none that resembled what he was looking for.

  Of all the possibilities, brainwashing seemed the most plausible but also the most confounding. Why brainwash a seventeen-year-old? Why order him to kill? Or could the brainwashing have occurred years earlier, as a child?

  Once during the night, it occurred to Tyler that he might just be schizophrenic. Maybe everything that had happened over the last day had simply been a break from reality, and he had finally gone off the deep end.

  Sometime after one o’clock in the morning, exhaustion caught up to him, and he rested his head on the table. His eyelids felt like they weighed two tons each, and keeping them open was a Herculean effort.

  As he drifted off, he thought back to the house of the woman he had killed. In his mind, he retraced his journey through it, through rooms bathed in late afternoon sunshine instead of anemic moonlight. There were still parts missing. The killing itself, for one. He had the vaguest idea of what had happened, but he avoided delving too deeply into the memory. He didn’t want to remember.

  Who was that person he had gone there with? Hades or someone else?

  He couldn’t remember.

  In the theater of his imagination, the film fast-forwarded. Through the house. Onto the street. Down the highway. Heading where?

  Down. Down the highway, driving deeper into darkness, darkness that weighed down his closed lids and filled his head. Deeper into a dream.

  As sleep took him, he found himself in a forest clearing. Leaves shuddered all around him, stirred by a gentle breeze.

  “So, what was Subset B like?” a calm, low voice asked, and Tyler turned around to find himself in the presence of a familiar young man.

  “I don’t remember,” he heard himself say. “I don’t remember anything anymore.”

  “That happens,” Hades said, loading cartridges into the cylinder of the revolver he carried. He wore a pair of acoustic earmuffs around his neck. “But you should at least remember how to shoot a gun. Especially if you’re supposed to go into the military one day.”

  “What about you? Where are you going after this?”

  “I’m never leaving.” Hades smiled. “You’d better behave, or you’ll end up like me. If you aren’t cut out to be a leader, they’ll only have one use for you.”

  “What do you mean?”

  “Murder.”

  Then he felt a hand on his shoulder, shaking him awake.

  “Your time’s up,” a man said as Tyler opened his eyes. The café employee frowned down at him, arms crossed. “You really shouldn’t sleep in here.”

  “Sorry, I just drifted off.” He looked around at the dim space. “What time is it?”

  “Four o’clock,” the man said.

  “Can I pay for three more hours?”

  The man smiled thinly. “Sleep or computer use?”

  “Both,” he said, chuckling in spite of himself.

  “It’s your money,” the man said, and after taking Tyler’s cash, returned to the front desk.

  As much as Tyler wanted to go back to sleep, he found himself unable to. After staring at the dark computer screen for ten minutes, he stood and walked to the counter. He ordered a coffee and a sandwich and ate them while he continued researching MKULTRA and other similar experiments.

  MKULTRA had ended back in the 1970s, with no notable successes, but wasn’t it possible that over the last forty years, other scientists had perfected the art of brainwashing?

  No, not perfected. He had broken free somehow, so that meant the technique was still flawed.

  At 7:30, he left the café and took a train back to Dupont Circle. A miserable drizzle had started up sometime during the night and was still going steadily. His coat was lined with a water-resistant polyester shell, but the rain blew in his face and dripped down into his shirt. Even though keeping his jacket zipped made the gun inaccessible, the last thing he needed was for a passing cop to get a flash of his pistol if the wind blew back the jacket flaps.

  Leaving the station, he walked toward Shannon’s house and took a bus the rest of the way. In the drizzle, her street looked even more menacing than it had the night before. At the sight of the brick row house, he felt a cold, sinking dread that, like the descending storm clouds, brought a promise of impending turbulence.

  He stood on the sidewalk for a while, staring at the home.

  There were no cars parked in front, but because of the limited curb space, he thought if Shannon owned a car, it might be parked elsewhere, within walking distance. Or maybe her friend had dropped her off.

  Maybe she was already dead.

  Steeling himself for what would be an uncomfortable conversation at best, Tyler stepped onto the concrete stoop and reached for the doorbell.

  Case Notes 25:

  Artemis

  Shannon sat at her desk, staring at her smartphone. As soon as the battery had recharged enough that she was able to turn the device on, she had texted Tyler. He had never responded. Her two calls went equally unanswered.

  He had sounded more than just tired last night, now that she thought about it. He had sounded scared.

  What if something had happened to him? What if he had another panic attack?

  Biting her lip, she glanced out the window by chance and noticed a figure standing across the street.

  The rainfall was so dense she could only make out the man’s clothes—a dark jacket and blue jeans—and little else. His face was just a pale blur.

  It’s probably nothing. Just one of the neighbors.

  The man did not move. He stared at her house with his hands in his pockets. Although she was seated far enough from the window that she was almost certain he couldn’t see her, she had a disturbing notion that he was looking directly at her.

  Scolding herself for being so paranoid, Shannon stood and closed the curtains. Even as she stepped away from her desk, unease bit away at her in small nibbles, eating her stability piece by piece.

  “I’m going insane,” she mumbled to herself, then went over to the rat cage. Poking her finger through the bars, she said, “Mommy’s going insane, isn’t she, Snowflake?”

  The obese albino rat waddled up to her, seized her finger in his tiny pink hands, and began to lick it.

  “What are we going to do about that, Snowflake? Hmm?”

  The rat, of course, did not respond. He seemed enthralled by her finger. Vacantly, she wondered if her nail polish could be toxic and pulled her hand away, even as she kept talking.

  “Are we going to see if the front door’s locked, hmm? Is that what we’re going to do?”

  Shannon opened the cage door and reached inside. Snowflake scampered away from her groping hand. After a few tries at grabbing him, he allowed himself to be picked up. She stroked his back and head to calm him, rubbing the surface of one velvety ear. Once she placed Snowflake on her shoulder, he burrowed into her hair.

  Even as she went into the foyer, she reproached herself for being so paranoid. It didn’t matter that someone was standing out in the downpour. It didn’t mean he was watching her. The only reason the stranger even intimidated her in the first place was because she was stressed.

  Why was she stressed? School, that had to be it.

  Senior year had just begun, but by this time next year, she would have graduated. Then there came the matter of housing, the worry that she would be expected to move out. But perhaps most of all, she was scared about growing up, getting older. Her eighteenth birthday was coming up, less than seven months away. She was on the brink of adulthood.

  It wasn’t that she didn’t welcome growing old. She did, in a way. It was
a new adventure. Something to look forward to. Freedom.

  Yet it also meant the death of adolescence and the burial of childhood. She feared that by reaching the milestone called adulthood, she would be giving up as much as she’d be gaining. She wouldn’t be able to justify lounging around in her pajamas on the weekends, watching TV and eating ice cream. She would have to actually make an effort at her job, not quit after the first few months or gossip between checkout counters.

  That has to be it, she thought as she checked the front door. Call it a midlife crisis. Or whatever the teenage equivalent was.

  Shannon looked through the peephole of her front door. The rain obscured her view of the street beyond. She couldn’t see the man, and she didn’t want to open the door to check if he was still there.

  When she went into the kitchen to make some hot cocoa, her footsteps sounded deep and ominous against the floorboards, like the echo of distant gunshots.

  It was probably a neighbor. Nothing to get worked up or alarmed over. But as Shannon took the coffeemaker from the cupboard, she found herself straining to hear the sounds of footsteps. Her hands shook as she poured water into the reservoir.

  She went into the pantry to retrieve the box of hot cocoa mix, then to the cabinets above the counter to fetch a cup. As she moved about the kitchen, her gaze was drawn repeatedly to the knife block on the counter.

  For no rational reason, she thought, Apollo.

  Apollo. The name felt as deadly as an earthquake and swept through her like seismic waves. Apollo. Apollo.

  Who was Apollo?

  As Snowflake curled against her neck, Shannon glanced at the knives again. Feeling foolish and a little bit afraid, she walked over to the wooden block. She pulled a small paring knife from its slot. The blade was sharpened to a lethal edge, yet after examining it for a moment, she exchanged it for another larger knife. She set it on the counter, within reach.

  As scalding water sputtered into the glass coffeepot, she tore open the cocoa packet and poured the powder into the mug. Beginning to feel a little better, a little more herself, she started humming the beat of a song she’d heard on the radio.

  As she mixed her cocoa, she looked at the knife repeatedly. For some reason, its closeness comforted her. Even though she couldn’t see herself using it against an adversary, she liked the thought of having it there. Just in case.

  Until, as her fingers closed around the slim ceramic handle of the mug, a sudden image came to mind: her hand wrapped around a different knife. Not the one that lay on the counter but one with the handle of a tactical weapon. Matte steel or plastic, sprayed black, slightly ribbed. The blade, about six inches long, partially serrated. Coated with blood.

  Her hand flew off the mug, yanked away as though she’d been burned. Except the sensation that lingered on the pads of her fingers wasn’t heat. It was wetness—cold, clammy, sticky wetness. The tacky feel of drying blood.

  She could even see it, drenching her gloved hands, dripping from the cracks between her fingers in long, oozing strings. Then she blinked, and everything was as it had been. She wasn’t wearing gloves. Her skin was clean, although paler than she recalled. Damp from sweat, not gore. Cold.

  Shannon blotted her palms on the pleats of her skirt, then on the lacy trim, kneading the stiff design between her fingers. Cocoa forgotten, knife abandoned, she backed away from the counter. Her ears rang with a shrill hazard sound, and even Snowflake’s presence failed to comfort her.

  “Calm down,” she told her pounding heart, which seemed about ready to leap up her throat and out of her mouth. “Just calm down. Close your eyes. Take a deep breath. Calm down.”

  When she opened her eyes, she didn’t return to the mug of cocoa or even look in that direction. She knew her gaze would again be drawn to the knife by a force as powerful as gravity.

  She didn’t want to stay in the kitchen, either, for that matter. As she stood there, staring at her chipped ruby toenails, she thought about how many weapons there were in the kitchen alone. Not just knives. Corkscrews. Carving forks. Even the cast-iron skillet forgotten on the stove from today’s breakfast could be used as a bludgeon. Or the rolling pin, for that matter.

  And her hands… What of her hands that until now had seemed so small, so frail in the dim, wet glow? Weren’t they as lethal as any instrument, her nails sharp enough to scratch and gouge at the eyes and face?

  Troubled by that notion, she returned to her bedroom. She reached behind her neck and caught the wiggling rat, then cradled him against her chest. His bristly tail snaked around her wrist, dry and scratchy against her skin. She was almost afraid she would hurt the rodent.

  As she put Snowflake in his cage and latched the door, the doorbell rang below.

  Shannon froze and listened in petrified silence.

  The doorbell stopped. Then began again. Though the noise was no louder than before, it sounded as shrill and ominous as an air raid siren.

  Licking her lips nervously, Shannon left her room and walked downstairs.

  Although it occurred to her to call the police, she didn’t act upon the thought. They wouldn’t take her seriously. Yet it wasn’t just that. Something else held her back. The same driving force that made her leave her room and enter the kitchen. That drew her arm forward and caused her fingers to curl around the smooth plastic handle of the cleaver. And that carried her to the front door, to the very stranger she’d hoped to avoid.

  With the knife behind her back, she unlocked the door and opened it a crack.

  Tyler stood on the front step, dripping wet. The sheer fabric of his navy windbreaker clung to his broad chest and tapered waist, drawing attention to a suspicious bulge just below one of his coat’s upper pockets. Even though the bulge could have been caused by something in an inner pocket, somehow she knew that wasn’t the case. She knew it was a gun.

  Just like she knew Tyler had come here to kill her.

  “Shann—” Before Tyler could even finish saying her name, she threw the door wide open and lunged forward.

  Case Notes 26:

  Hades

  There were only whispers and darkness.

  “I am Hades,” a voice said from all around him. “I am absolutely loyal to the Project. I would die if it meant benefiting my superiors. I am Hades. I am a weapon.”

  After the first hour of floating, Hades lost all sense of time and place. His body dissolved into the warm water, and he could not feel his limbs or even recall if he had ever had limbs, much less eyes to see with. There was no clear distinction between himself and his surroundings.

  “I believe that violence is necessary for the greater good,” the voice said. “Violence is good. I am Hades.”

  He was the darkness.

  He felt like a brain floating in a vat, or maybe a fetus swaddled in the womb, not yet formed. In the process of being made.

  “I am a soldier proud to serve the Project. I am Hades. I am absolutely loyal to the Project. I would die if it meant benefiting my superiors.”

  At first, there was terror at the birth to come. Then there was resignation. Resignation was not peace. It was absolute misery.

  I am still here.

  He could not remember where he was. Was he asleep?

  I was here once.

  Time stretched into nothing. The recording played over and over again.

  “I am Hades. I am a weapon.”

  A slit of light appeared before him, and he watched in awe as the searing glow widened. He had a terrible intuition that the door of a furnace was opening before him, and he shied away from the light. If the glow touched him, it would burn him to ashes.

  The hatch’s airtight seal gave way with a soft, sucking pop. After spending so long listening to just whispers, the sound was almost deafening.

  Hands pulled him from the tank and guided him into the light, onto a slippery rubber mat.

  Whereas before it had been too dark to see, now it was too bright. The sterile white glow washed over every surface, excisi
ng the shadows in even the deepest corners. Even after his eyes adjusted, Hades felt like he was standing under a surgical lamp, naked and vivisected, cut open and hollowed out.

  A face filled his vision. Cold gray eyes and salt-and-pepper hair.

  “Where am I?” Hades asked distantly, trying to adjust to the sudden change.

  “You’re at the safe house.”

  “Where am…”

  “The safe house,” Dimitri repeated. “You just had a tank session, Hades.”

  “How long?” he asked, and when Dimitri handed him a towel, it took him a moment to remember how to use his fingers properly. He didn’t feel hatred or anger toward the man. He felt almost nothing at all.

  “Eight hours,” Dimitri said, helping him onto the bench.

  Eight hours. Impossible. It had felt like far longer than that. Days, even months.

  Dimitri took a hypodermic syringe from a tray balanced on the bench and injected its contents into the IV port. “This will counteract the effects of the dissociative.”

  “I don’t feel very good.” Hades stared at the floor. The angles of the tiles troubled him. They seemed wrong somehow, like they had been cut as imperfect squares.

  “You should feel better in a few minutes,” Dimitri said after removing the IV and catheter. “Just sit for a while, then get cleaned up.”

  Hades listened to the door close behind Dimitri and waited for his disorientation to pass. After a few minutes, he stood and walked over to the shower cubicle. He turned the water as cold as it would go and stood under the showerhead, washing the salt off his hair and skin.

  As he lifted his face to the icy spray, goose bumps erupted on his shoulders and he began shivering. He kept his eyes open even though the water stung them and blurred his vision. If he closed his eyes for longer than a couple seconds, he worried he might go back into the darkness and be consumed by it.

  As Hades dried himself off and got dressed, he thought about Elizabeth Hawthorne. Now, he knew that wasn’t her real name. He knew why the word “Persephone” had disquieted him, back when she had first said it.