by Simon Rose
Following his research into mental illness, Max decided to look into another possible explanation for what had been happening recently. His mother had mentioned that her grandmother had told her that she was a psychic, although Max’s mother had dismissed this idea. Max knew about psychic phenomena and people that were supposed to have incredible mental powers, allowing them to read minds or communicate with the dead, but he’d never taken it very seriously. And yet, what had happened to him was certainly very bizarre, and there had to be some explanation, no matter how irrational.
He conducted a search into psychic phenomena of all different kinds, including the types of people that were supposed to exhibit such abilities. There was even a mention on one web page of a local woman that had helped the police with a few cases involving missing people or locating the remains of murder victims, but Max didn’t read the whole story. At the bottom of the page of Max’s search results he opened a website called SecretConspiracyXpose, which featured articles related to a wide range of conspiracy theories, clandestine government operations, and unsolved crimes. Max quickly scanned the home page but the site contained either information that he’d seen before or the individual page headlines simply didn’t grab his attention.
Max yawned again. It sounded as if his parents were still watching TV downstairs as he closed the website and turned off the laptop before heading to bed.
Chapter Eight
Digging Deeper
JULIA WAS BACK at the hospital. After the police had captured her, she’d remained quiet in the back of the car, realizing that any resistance was futile. From what she’d been able to gather from the police radio transmissions on the journey back to Mountain View Hospital, her distinctive hair and clothing had given her away. The alarm had been raised at the hospital, and as a result of sheer bad luck, a police car on a routine patrol close to Max’s neighbourhood had heard the report of a dangerous patient’s escape and had spotted Julia getting off the bus. The officers had lost track of her but then found Julia again as she headed to the park, at which point the officers had called for backup.
Julia was in the private area at the hospital with no further chance of escape. She was secured to the bed with restraints and felt as if she’d been drugged. After the nurses had checked on her, a tall, thin man in his late fifties stepped into the room.
“How is she?”
“She’s in good shape, Dr. Eastwood,” the nurse replied. “I’ve checked her over.”
“Good,” he said. “You can leave us.”
The nurse nodded and quickly left the room. As she opened the door, another man and a woman entered.
“Dr. Hammond?” said Eastwood. “And Dr. Bethany. I wasn’t expecting you so quickly.”
Julia guessed that Bethany was in her mid-forties, tall and slim with dark brown hair and spectacles perched on the edge of her nose. The man looked older, with thick gray hair and a deeply lined face. Julia immediately recognized the man. He was, of course, older than when she’d last seen him when she was a child, but it was definitely the same Dr. Hammond. She wondered what he was like in this universe.
“We set off from the clinic as soon as we heard that she’d escaped,” said Bethany.
“How did she get out?” Hammond demanded. “I thought you said that she was secure in here?”
“I really don’t know,” replied Eastwood. “There were several nurses on duty and there’s only one way out of here, through the main doors. She’d also had enough medication in her body to put her out until morning.”
“For God’s sake, Eastwood,” said Hammond, angrily. “Now we can’t even do the death certificate. And the police are going to be even more involved.”
“It really doesn’t matter,” said Bethany, calmly. “She’s here now and she’s not going anywhere. The transfer to the clinic’s already been approved, and I can handle the police if they want to do an investigation. It also won’t be a problem doing the death certificate at the clinic. All the others had ID but she’s got nothing. Don’t worry about it, okay? Now, let’s see what Jane Doe has to say, shall we?”
Bethany moved a chair closer to the bed and sat down.
“Hello, Jane,” Bethany said, softly. “How are you feeling?”
Julia stared directly at her but refused to answer. She contemplated probing the woman’s mind but still felt drowsy. She also didn’t want any of them to suspect that she had any kind of psychic abilities.
“We haven’t involved the police yet,” Bethany continued. “The official story is that you’re a dangerous mental patient that might be a threat to herself and to others. Now, can you tell me what you were talking about to that boy at the park?”
“I don’t remember,” said Julia, displaying her best poker face.
“Really?” said Bethany, raising an eyebrow. “You don’t remember anything at all?”
“And you don’t know that boy?” Hammond added.
Julia shrugged.
“No, who is he?”
Bethany smiled.
“That’s what we were hoping you’d be able to tell us. You left the hospital on a bus and headed for that particular part of town. The police said you were talking to the boy and seemed very agitated, even trying to attack him at one point.”
Julia shook her head.
“I don’t remember any of that. All I remember is hearing the sirens and running, and that’s when they caught me.”
“So, you don’t know him?” said Hammond.
“I already told you,” Julia replied. “I don’t even know who I am, never mind anyone else.”
“She seems to be telling the truth, Doctor,” said Eastwood. “Perhaps we were wrong about her? I need to go and talk to the police. Can I leave her with you?”
“Yes, that’ll be fine,” said Bethany. “Thank you.”
Eastwood nodded and left the room.
“So, you don’t remember anything, is that right?” said Hammond.
“Yes, that’s right,” Julia replied.
Hammond smiled before continuing.
“Well, I think you do, Jane, or whatever your name is. The police and Dr. Eastwood won’t ask you certain questions but I will. You see, I’ve been doing research into parallel universes for years now. Oh, it might sound like science fiction but it’s real, believe me, and I’ve visited such worlds personally. I’ve often thought that some people that are deemed insane, especially those with multiple personality disorder, can actually be from those other worlds. I think you’re one of those too.”
“I have no idea what you’re talking about,” said Julia.
“No,” Hammond continued, “I don’t suppose you do, but there’s something different about you, isn’t there? You claim not to know that boy but if you really are just unbalanced, or even someone with something to hide, like a criminal record, why wouldn’t you try and get as far as away as possible? Why head over to that particular part of town?”
“I told you,” said Julia, firmly. “I don’t remember.”
Hammond fixed her with an icy glare.
“I think you know him, but he didn’t know you. You’re actually from another world and know him there but not here. Is that it?”
“Do you know how crazy this sounds?” said Julia.
She maintained a straight face, trying not to show any kind of reaction. What could they possibly have learned about her? She remembered them discussing the results of some tests that had been completed but she couldn’t recall any specific details.
“And like I said,” Hammond added, “there’s something different about you, and now we have proof of that too. For my experiments related to traveling to other worlds, I’ve developed a serum drawn from the brains of people like you.”
“What the hell are you talking about?” said Julia.
Hammond smiled again.
“It’s what helps them to travel to, or at least exist mentally inside, those other timelines. I won’t bore you with the details, it’s all very scientific, but
suffice to say that as Eastwood suspected, your readings are off the scale. When we get you to the clinic we’ll be able to have a good look at you.”
“Why are you telling me all this?” asked Julia.
“Because, Jane,” replied Bethany, calmly, “soon after you leave here you’re going to be officially dead. No one will know what happened to you, not even the police that brought you in. And, of course, by the time we’re finished with that fascinating brain of yours, you’ll be very actually dead.”
“You can’t do this,” Julia exclaimed, struggling against the restraints at the side of the bed.
“Oh, and by the way,” Bethany added, “we’re going to test another theory. I’m going to ask that boy if he’d like to come and visit you at the clinic. Perhaps you’d like that? Catching up with old friends?”
“I’ve told you I don’t know him,” insisted Julia. “He was just there and I wanted help from someone to hide or to help me to get away.”
“Yes,” said Bethany. “I know that’s your story, but we’ll see if he’ll be able to trigger your memories when you see him tomorrow.”
“You can’t do this!” Julia repeated, twisting and struggling in vain against the restraints.
“Shut her up,” said Hammond. “Give her another shot.”
Bethany produced a syringe equipped with a hypodermic needle, inserting it into Julia’s forearm. She only continued to protest for a few seconds as the sedative immediately took effect and Julia lost consciousness.
Chapter Nine
Wheels Within Wheels
MAX WAS SURROUNDED by thick white mist and could barely see more than a couple of feet in any direction. He thought that he could discern a shape somewhere up ahead but it was no more than a blur. As the shape drew closer, Max peered into the gloom and recognized the girl from the park as she steadily approached him. She was smiling, but suddenly she was gone and the mist vanished.
Max was sitting on a bench in a park. On the grass beside him lay a small black dog. Young mothers pushing strollers passed by on the path, as children ran around in the nearby playground.
“There are still probably people who’d kill to keep it all quiet.”
Max turned to see an old man wearing a blue baseball cap sitting beside him on the bench. Then the scene changed, and Max was sitting in a chair inside an unfamiliar house. Seated opposite him was a woman with shoulder-length brown hair.
“Do you know exactly what it is that I do, Max?” she asked, as her deep brown eyes fixed him with an intense stare.
Then everything altered again, and Max was in a different house containing elegant and antique furniture, including a polished black grand piano. A shelf on the wall beside him was filled with framed photographs in a variety of sizes. One showed a group of boys in school uniforms in front of an old building. In another, a boy was standing on a boat in a tropical location next to a suntanned middle-aged man proudly holding a huge fish. The same boy was also pictured at a ski resort with a blonde girl. When he saw his reflection in the frame’s glass, Max was astonished to see the face of a boy with a thick mop of black hair that almost completely obscured his blue eyes.
Max was then in some kind of laboratory or operating theatre.
“Are the restraints tight enough?”
“Yes, of course they are. I told you, I know what I’m doing.”
“Now keep still, David, this won’t hurt a bit.”
Max was terrified as he struggled against the restraints securing him to the operating table. The old man’s hand moved closer, the hypodermic needle only inches from Max’s eye.
Then everything shifted again. Max was standing beside a kiosk on a train station platform in the sunshine with a group of other people as they waited for the next train. Further along the platform a young couple was standing beside a stroller, in which their baby was crying.
“Is he okay?” said the woman.
“Yeah, just a little hungry, I think,” the man replied. “Let’s hope he can wait until we get home.”
The woman leaned into the stroller, kissing her baby on the cheek.
“Okay,” she said. “Just drive him up and down the platform a little. I’ll see if the train’s nearly here.”
As the woman walked away, the man began slowly pushing the stroller along the platform. Max then heard screaming and the piercing screech of the train’s brakes before everything went black.
MAX WOKE UP with a jolt, gasping for air. He sat up in bed, clutching his chest as his heart pounded and he struggled to breathe. His head was throbbing and his forehead was covered in perspiration. He was aware that dreams were often disjointed and made little sense, but that had been so intense and had felt so real. The faces of the people he’d seen had been completely unfamiliar and the old man with the needle had been terrifying. Max had no idea who the people were. And then there was some kind of train accident. He’d never seen anything like that, either in real life or in a movie as far as he could recall.
As his breathing slowly returned to normal and the pressure in his head subsided, Max knew that he had to talk to his mother. He had no choice now. Following the things he’d imagined at the mall, the incident the previous day in the kitchen, the odd sensations of having been in certain places before, and now the dreams, he knew that something was seriously wrong. His hand was still shaking as he reached to grab his phone on the bedside table beside the lamp. It was already 10.45.
The front doorbell rang, and Max heard his mother answer the door. She greeted someone and invited them inside. At first Max didn’t recognize the person’s voice but then realized that it was Officer Jensen, whom he’d met the night before. A moment later, there was a knock on Max’s bedroom door.
“Max?” said his mother. “Are you awake?”
“Yeah,” he replied. “What’s up?”
“Officer Jensen’s here. He’d like a quick chat with you.”
“Okay, I’ll be right down.”
Max quickly got out of bed and got dressed, pulling on his dark blue jeans and a plain black tee shirt before heading downstairs.
“HELLO, MAX,” SAID Jensen. “How are you feeling this morning?”
“Good,” Max replied, yawning. “Thank you.”
“Excellent,” said Jensen. “I’m sure it must have been scary last night but it was good that you weren’t injured. I was just telling your mom that the doctors that are treating that girl wondered if you’d like to help them out.”
“At the hospital?” asked Max.
“No, she’s not at the hospital anymore. She’s been taken to a private clinic run by Dr. Hammond. He and his staff specialize in her kind of disorders, I guess.”
“Dr. Hammond?” said Max, thinking that the name sounded familiar.
“Yes, do you know him?” Jensen asked.
Max shook his head.
“No, I don’t think so. I think I saw his name in the news or something, that’s all.”
“So why exactly do they need Max?” his mother asked.
“The doctors think that him being at the clinic might help to trigger the girl’s memory,” replied Jensen.
“But I don’t know her at all,” said Max.
“They know that,” Jensen added. “But for some reason she’s convinced that she knows you. Dr. Hammond thinks that just seeing you might produce some kind of reaction and give them a few clues about her true identity. Right now, they have nothing to go on.”
“Okay, I guess,” said Max. “If you think that it might help.”
“We can’t go over today,” said his mother. “Your dad’s out all weekend and I have to go back to the hospital to visit your grandma. Then I have to fill out some paperwork about the therapy that she’ll need once she’s back at home.”
“I can take him over there if you like, Mrs. Garrison,” said Jensen. “That’s if you’ll be able to pick Max up later?”
“Well, I guess if that’s okay with you, Max,” said his mother. “I don’t think I’ll be to
o long at the hospital, but you never know.”
“I’ll be fine, Mom, no need to worry.”
His mother smiled.
“Okay, well, text me when you’re done then. I’ll come over there and collect you. Thanks for your help, Officer Jensen.”
“You’re very welcome,” he replied. “Ready to go, Max?”
“Sure. See you later, Mom.”
ONCE THEY WERE in the police car, Jensen didn’t discuss the girl or the investigation on their drive to the clinic, simply making general conversation. He began by asking Max about his school as they drove past the Queen’s Park cemetery. Jensen had children that were a little older than Max so at least they had something to talk about. The journey was relatively uneventful, although Max did have another strange feeling of déjà vu as they drove by the waterfront. It housed a trendy and expensive shopping district along the water that Max had only visited once when he was in the first grade. Jensen explained how both his father and grandfather had worked at the waterfront several decades earlier when it had been a thriving commercial centre before settling into decline. Before Max was born the waterfront had been a dismal rundown part of the city, but he had never seen photographs of the area in its worst condition. Yet for a fleeting second as they drove by, his view of the shopping district was replaced by a scene filled with abandoned warehouses, rusting cranes, and obsolete industrial equipment, which was gone as quickly as it had appeared.
“You okay, Max?” asked Jensen.
“What? Oh yeah, sorry. I was just thinking about something.”
The fleeting image of the old waterfront was yet another glaring example of things that Max simply couldn’t explain. Something was clearly wrong and it reinforced his determination to discuss everything with his mother as soon as he got home.
