by Jana Janeway
The sound of a throat being cleared caught their attention.
“Sorry to interrupt.” Shea seemed genuinely remorseful, corroborating those words. “Just thought you’d want to know… it’s safe to come back inside. Mom and Dad are resting now.”
Jessica moved first, sliding off the hood. Craddock followed. “What was said after we left?” she asked.
“Not much,” Josiah answered, hovering behind Shea with Bibi by his side.
“Elsa suggested they rest before we continue,” Shea added. “We gave them our room.”
“Wade showed us the note,” Bibi mentioned, as Craddock and Jessica approached. “Why would your dad ask you to lie?”
Jessica glanced at Shea before replying. “I think he’s trying to protect Mom. I think this might be too much for her to handle.”
“The house is worried,” Bibi said, with a careful inflection of respect. “What do you think she’s having the bigger problem with? Mengliads, or your relationship with Craddock?”
‘I’m not the only one who caught it, Jess.’
‘They wouldn’t do that. They’re just having a little trouble understanding, that’s all. When they wake up, we’ll help them.’
Sighing, Craddock led Jessica towards the house; Shea, Bibi, and Josiah followed behind them. “Whatever their difficulties,” he said in response to Bibi’s question, “we’ll just have to keep trying until we get through to them.”
****
The tension in the house was palpable. Not much was said, but the few things that were left no doubt as to the concerns. If the Mitchell parents refused to believe the truth, everyone was in danger.
Jessica and Shea continued to insist that their parents wouldn’t do anything foolish, but every contingency needed to be taken into consideration. As soon as the couple had finished resting, a firm approach would be required, to make them understand.
The impending meeting had Jessica tense and anxious, and clinging to Craddock for comfort. Even though she was a grown woman, her parents’ approval meant something to her.
‘Your mom is a lot like Shea. He eventually came to terms. And your dad seems flexible.’
‘Even if they believe the truth about Mengliads, that still leaves the problem of us. Our relationship. I don’t even want to consider their reaction when we tell them about the baby.’
Another wishful vision floated through her head – her parents smiling at Craddock as they held their new grandchild. It instantly brought tears to her eyes, knowing it was unlikely to happen, so she pushed it away.
‘I can’t live without you. If they can’t accept you, where does that leave us?’
‘It leaves us trying until they do. A lot of people don’t get along with their in-laws. They just find ways to coexist. We’ll find a way.’
“Go see if they’re ready to wake up yet.” Elsa’s request brought Jessica out of her haze; her heart raced wildly in response. “The house is going to explode from the tension. The sooner we get this over with, the better.”
Since she asked for this of no one in specific, Wade assigned himself the task.
He moved to stand and walked down the hall, disappearing from sight. They heard the quiet knock on the door and the creaking sound; moments later, there was a loudly spoken curse word. Everyone but Jessica and Craddock jumped from their seats.
“They’re gone!”
Chapter Twenty-One
“They took off out the window!” Wade exclaimed as he reentered the living room. Several people ran off to investigate as others started shouting back and forth. The situation and din of noise was little more than organized chaos.
Jessica burst into tears, her face falling into her hands. “I’m sorry. I’m so sorry.”
Certain she was on the brink of mental collapse, Craddock held her tighter. ‘This isn’t your fault.’
“Nobody is blaming you.” Marcy’s body was tense, as if an impending battle was imminent. “We all sensed the possibility.”
“I should have thought ahead,” Elsa self-scolded.
“We should have installed bars on the windows,” Kiffen mentioned, berating herself as well.
“That’s a moot point now.” Elsa sighed, resigned. “This location is no longer safe. Jeramey,” she tossed him her cell phone, “get the word out.”
“I’m on it!” He immediately pulled up her contacts list, prepared to send out a mass text message.
“Those who can safely do so, go home.” Elsa’s eyes then landed on Jessica and Craddock. “You’ll have to go to the Idyllwild location now. No one else is set up to take on a group of people your size. They all have neighbors.”
Nodding, Craddock helped Jessica to her feet; Shea immediately gathered his sister into his arms.
“They went to the police, how much you want to bet?”
“What are they hoping to achieve by doing that?” Jessica asked, still crying. “It’s obvious we’re here because we want to be!”
‘They think we’re a cult, Jess. They think we’ve brainwashed you.’
“Car assignments,” Elsa announced suddenly. “Marcy, you and Jeramey go with Wade. If he runs into trouble, he’ll need backup. Take the van they came in. Kiff and I will follow behind you with Shea and Stacy. Carl!” She then walked away to talk to him.
“Can’t Shea and Stacy come with us?” Jessica asked Marcy, but her attention was divided; she just shook her head in answer, then followed after Elsa. For once, Shea didn’t argue. He merely shrugged and moved to stand next to Stacy. ‘Why can’t they?’
‘They must have their reasons, baby. They’ll be right behind us, okay? You’ll see them again when we get there.’ Wrapping an arm around her, he inched her towards the back door that led out into the garage. ‘Just breathe. We’ll get through this.’
Her shaky gasps continued despite his words. ‘What’s going to happen to my parents?’
‘If they’re lucky, the officer, or whoever they talk to, won’t be Mengliad. But if they go back to their lives, they will be captured again.’
‘So we did all that for nothing.’
He sighed as he pulled the van’s sliding door open. ‘You couldn’t know they’d do this, Jess.’
‘You suspected they would, and you weren’t raised by them! I should have listened to you.’
Taking her elbow, he helped her into the van. ‘Sometimes it’s harder to be impartial when it comes to someone you know and love. I won’t let you blame yourself for this.’
But it was too late for that. Her mind was slipping further into despair, all thoughts swallowed and destroyed by her guilt. She was imagining every worst case scenario, every vision more horrific than the last.
There was no stopping it, and the knowledge of that had him freefalling into panic. The activity surrounding them picked up, but it was ignored. His focus was solely on Jessica.
‘Please, Jessica, don’t do this.’
His plea hit a wall. She was lost, almost catatonic as she stared at nothing in front of her. Tears fell silently to her cheeks; her body was almost limp in his arms.
“Don’t do this!” he demanded out loud, hoping his voice would startle her back from the edge she seemed to be teetering on. There wasn’t so much as a flinch in response.
“What’s going on?” Marcy’s question caused Craddock to jump. In answer, his terror filled eyes locked with hers, and then returned to Jessica. Realizing the problem, she rendered a cursory diagnosis. “She’ll snap out of it. Just give her time.”
As she said that, Bibi, Wade, and Josiah stepped up behind her. She moved to allow them entry into the vehicle, but they stopped short when seeing Jessica’s blank expression.
“What happened?” Bibi asked. “She was fine a minute ago!”
“Get in the van,” Marcy ordered, kind but firm. “She’ll snap out of it.”
They all complied but with wary focus on Jessica, as Jeramey slid into the driver’s seat, turned the key, threw it in reverse, and just about floored it
pulling out of the garage.
And then everyone’s concern widened to include Craddock.
His forehead was pressed to Jessica’s hair, and he shook as he sobbed silently.
“I’m surprised it didn’t happen sooner,” Jeramey muttered in Marcy’s direction. “How much crap can a brain take, anyway?”
She shushed him with a hiss, her eyes glancing back at the heartbreaking display. “Hold it together, Doc. She’s just in protection mode. The grief has caused her to go into lockdown. Just give it time.”
“She was imagining—” He choked on his voice, then found it again. “She was imagining every kind of horrible death imaginable. And now she’s just… blank.”
“Which just confirms it.” Marcy turned in her seat; her tone was reassuring and insistent. “Do you think I would be at all calm if I didn’t think she was okay? I care for her, too, ya’know.”
The solace he found in her words was slight, but enough for him to be able to glare back at Josiah for what he so ignorantly suggested next.
“Maybe if you slap her or something?”
“I’m not going to assault my wife because she’s grief stricken, Joe!”
Shrugging sheepishly, Josiah mumbled, “Seems to work in movies.”
A heavy, frustrated sigh escaped as Craddock leaned against Jessica once again. “This isn’t a movie.”
The car fell silent then – an awkward silence that dragged on for the whole of the two hours it took to run low on gas. Craddock’s eyes rarely left Jessica, her state remaining through every lane change and turn, her mind devoid of all thought. It was slowly plunging him into madness.
Marcy shared a knowing look with Jeramey as they pulled into the gas station. It was brief, but expressed everything. They needed to be on their guard.
“This will be the only stop for a while,” she informed the thick air that lingered all around them. “Everyone should use the facilities.”
They all filed out after Jeramey parked in front of the self-service pump… all except Jessica, Craddock, and Marcy. She was poised at the ready, her door ajar, but she hesitated as she waited for the others to drift anxiously towards the bathrooms.
“Are you going to be okay, alone with her? It feels like you’re barely hanging on by a thread back there.”
She wasn’t exactly wrong, but he had enough wits about him to keep himself levelheaded. Nodding once only, he closed his eyes and averted his face from her unwavering stare.
“If you’re sure…?” The sentence dangled for a moment, but with no response forthcoming, she sighed and left the vehicle.
The door shutting seemed ridiculously loud, his mind sensitive to every sound in the absence of his wife’s constant thoughts.
“I need you back inside my head. Please.”
To have her so close yet so detached… it was almost worse than when she was missing, held captive by the Registry. At least then he’d had a goal. A purpose. Action had sent the pain of silence to the back of his brain, the task ahead of him a sort of company in his loneliness.
There was no reprieve from the ache this time. All he could do was hold her and wait, praying she would return.
“Dude, you look like shit.”
‘Josiah has always been too direct for his own good.’ Silence. “Fitting. I feel like shit. Thought you were going to the bathroom.”
Josiah shrugged, leaning against the van near where the sliding door still sat open. “It’s not like it’s complicated. I was the first one in. Why not just believe Marcy?” He changed the subject back without even a pause.
“I believe her,” Craddock answered. “Doesn’t take away my worry, though.”
“Ever think about the last year? How things would have been if—?”
Craddock pulled away from Jessica and was out of the vehicle before Josiah could even register what had happened. “This is not her fault!” he growled.
“Whoa!” Holding up his hands in a gesture of surrender or submission, Josiah took a step back instinctively. It was almost a stumble.
Jeramey abandoned the fuel nozzle sticking out of the gas tank, set to intervene. “Guys…” This was said in warning.
“I didn’t mean anything, Doc,” Josiah insisted apologetically. “It’s just… this has been a hard year for her.”
Craddock stared at his friend for a long moment, his eyes softening, shifting away from the flash of rage he had felt. He had misunderstood the partial question.
“Guys?” This time Jeramey said it like a question.
Another long moment passed. “It’s fine,” Craddock muttered, dropping his gaze to the ground. With the slack in tension, Jeramey hid a smirk and nodded, returning to his task. “Sorry, Joe.”
Shoving his hands in his pockets, Josiah shrugged again, leaving his shoulders tense around his neck as he gave the litter around them attention it didn’t deserve.
“Is something wrong?” Bibi called out; her and Wade were closing the distance from the small attached convenience store.
“Other than Craddock almost snapping Josiah’s neck? Nope.” Jeramey laughed to himself, obviously amused by the entire exchange.
“Doc, fighting will only create more problems, and we have enough of those already.”
When Wade touched his shoulder, he flinched and turned away, his gaze fixed on Jessica inside the van.
She was exactly how he had left her, eerily still, staring into space, barely blinking. The heated exchange had done nothing to release her from her mental prison.
“It was just a misunderstanding,” Craddock said, straining to even whisper.
“A bit of an overreaction, then, don’t’cha think?”
The root of the issue wasn’t difficult to guess at. “We all care about her,” Bibi added.
Anger, brought on by fear and frustration, seethed just below the surface, scarcely contained. “When it happens to someone who is the other half of your soul, then you can lecture me about it.” He left the weighted comment there as he climbed in and settled back into his seat. Softening, he gathered Jessica back into his arms.
The sounds of Marcy joining them, her steps crunching the gravel beneath her feet, were ignored, as was the murmured conversation that followed. He didn’t care if they thought he was losing it. He was.
****
Time was beginning to lose all meaning. It ticked by remorselessly, bringing tension to an almost volatile level. No one dared speak for fear it would set Craddock off, causing him to snap.
He had been antsy in his own skin, moaning one moment, whimpering the next. It was heartwrenching, and a little bit frightening.
Finally, eventually, the silence became unbearable.
“Someone say something! I need a distraction!”
Everyone but Jessica startled at the abrupt outburst. They all shared brief looks of concern before Marcy responded.
“She’s going to be okay, Craddock.”
“Not that,” Craddock grumbled. “Not that subject. Any other subject.” His eyes squeezed shut as if in physical pain, his face still buried in Jessica’s hair.
“Ever hear of fake Chimie?”
Craddock’s interest was instantly piqued. His attention was given to Marcy, but his thoughts went to Bibi. She had said something about such a thing existing a year ago, when his connection to Jessica had been realized.
His expression must have told Marcy to continue, because she did.
“Yeah, the Registry thinks you have that with Jessica. Though,” she added, “it’s not so much ‘fake Chimie’, as it is ‘forced Chimie’. At least as far as the Registry is concerned.”
Scowling, confused, Craddock inched a little towards the edge of his seat. “I don’t understand.”
Turning better to face him, Marcy got settled as she prepared to explain. “In the last… oh, I don’t know, decade or so, I guess, the Registry has become very interested in Chimie. What it is. Why it happens. Etcetera. Through this interest, they learned that a large percentage of Lat
e Converts develop Chimie within the first two weeks of the conversion, when their Enyoh is highest.”
“What does Enyoh have to do with Chimie?” he asked.
“I don’t know. Maybe nothing, but it was interesting enough to them that they started a research program dedicated to it. Then they started doing trials.”
Craddock winced. “What sort of trials?”
Marcy noted the reaction but continued anyway. “Six test subjects so far, that I know of, all Late Converts. They introduced them to undercover Registry agents and, basically, had those agents seduce them. Four of the LCs developed Chimie. The agents didn’t, though. Jessica was set to be the seventh test subject.”
This caused Craddock to nearly launch off his seat. “What? Why?”
“Think about it, Doc,” she stated calmly. “She’s not just an LC, but an Accidental Convert. They were chomping at the bit to use her as a guinea pig! But when we reported back that she had developed Chimie with you, and you with her, they removed her from the program. They knew she wouldn’t develop it with anyone else, and they knew you wouldn’t stand for them trying. But she is now listed in the research stats.”
Craddock sighed, his body tense as he processed what was being shared. “This doesn’t make any sense. Why would they even care?”
“Think about it,” Jeramey interjected. “With as power hungry as they are… To be able to control love?”
“I’m not sure of the exact motivation,” Marcy added. “I wasn’t involved with the program, so I didn’t see all the docs pertaining to it, but I think what it comes down to is… control. If you had Chimie with someone who asked you to kill your own mother, you would. Or, at least, you would seriously consider it.”
Shocked, Craddock asked, “So they’re doing this to gain an army of assassins?”
“Not as such, but the potential is there. Whatever their true reasons are for doing this, they can’t be any good, knowing them.”
Feeling a sense of defeat, Craddock sat back and took Jessica’s hand into his, entwining their fingers. “I had no idea things had gotten this bad. You hear rumors, you know? But you just figure the people starting them are paranoid.”
