by Amy Hale
“Jane, Colt. Come quick. I think I found something!” Jeremy’s excited voice echoed down the hall.
They quickly found the room he was in. Jeremy sat in a chair surrounded by monitors. Spread out before him was some kind of complicated looking control panel. He pushed a couple of buttons and video appeared on the main screen in front of him.
He smiled. “I found video. This one is from the night you tore this place up.” He hit play.
The screen showed armed thugs running in various directions, yelling into their two-way radios, and eventually panicking. Organized planning quickly turned into crazed chaos as children ran from their rooms, trying to escape during the confusion. It was only one angle out of possibly hundreds of cameras on the premises, but it was a good representation of how quickly she demolished Professor Russell’s well-laid plans.
Jeremy punched another button and they caught a brief glimpse of what was going on outside that day. It showed Jane protecting herself and Colt with a wall of dirt then flinging the gate out of her way.
Jeremy was doubled over in the chair, laughing as if he’d just watched the funniest show on television. “That’s the best thing I’ve ever seen.” He looked up at Jane. “You’re pretty bad ass when you put your mind to it.”
She shrugged, trying to downplay what she did. It was necessary, but she wasn’t proud of it.
Jeremy gave his attention to the controls once more. “You may not think so, but it’s true.” Then he pushed another button causing the video to fast forward. It showed several box trucks lined up outside of the overhead doors. Julia was directing several large men regarding what child belonged in which truck. After they were all loaded, they noticed she was arguing with a younger man and pointing to a clipboard. There was no sound, but it was obvious she was very unhappy. Jane shivered. She knew that guy probably suffered dearly later for whatever was making Julia upset.
Jeremy worked the controls again, and another screen started rotating through videos of each sleeping area. He flipped through them until he found the one he was looking for.
“This is Julia’s room. As Jane mentioned, she hid things from Professor Russell, just in case. Maybe if we run it back a few days before the incident we can see if she’ll show us her hiding spot.”
Jane shook her head. “She wouldn’t be that careless. She knew about the cameras.”
Jeremy gave her a wide grin. “No, she didn’t. Well, she knew about all the others, but hers was hidden. The professor didn’t trust her as much as she thought he did.”
Jane looked hopeful. “Well, it’d be worth taking a look.”
Colt put his hand up and motioned for them to wait. “Hold up. How do you know this, Jeremy?”
He looked embarrassed. “I was in her room a few times.” Jane’s stunned expression caused Jeremy to quickly amend his statement with “Not like that. Anyway, I was snooping and found it one day, and since the professor was monitoring it, he knew I’d discovered it. He took me into his confidence and asked me to keep it a secret. In exchange for my silence, I was allowed a few more privileges than before. I was shocked that he wasn’t going to punish me. I didn’t turn it down.”
Colt sighed. “Let’s just look at the video.”
Jeremy started scanning through the recordings then hit pause. “This could take a while. Do you guys want to keep searching while I do this?”
Jane and Colt both agreed that was a good idea, so they left him to work while they continued to explore the rest of that level. Most of the rooms were sleeping quarters, but they did stumble across what appeared to be a room the guards used when taking a break. Vending machines and a few lockers lined the walls. Tables were in the center of the room, and a couple of sofas were pushed back-to-back near one of the far walls.
Colt made his way to the lockers and began searching. They were mostly empty, but he did find a couple of gym bags, a lunch box, and a jacket. Colt dumped the contents of both gym bags on the table and started sorting through the contents. Jane joined him and they discovered little more than dirty laundry. The lunch box was next, and Jane gagged when Colt unlatched and raised the lid. Inside were the remains of a very moldy sandwich and a rotting apple. He quickly shut the lid again and pushed it aside.
Jane picked up the jacket and searched the pockets. When she reached an inside pocket, she found a pen and a folded sheet of paper. Colt moved next to her as she read it out loud.
Dearest Mary,
I was hoping to get a few days off to come see you, but that problem I mentioned has returned and we are having to evacuate the building quickly. I know I promised you I’d quit this job as soon as I could, but this latest development is going to make leaving tricky. As I’ve told you before, I can’t just clock out and not come back. It’s much more complicated than that. Even getting this letter to you risks my getting caught.
I don’t have all the specifics, but it looks like we are moving operations to somewhere in Tennessee. I’ll come see you as soon as I can. I have to go.
All my love,
Joe
Colt smiled. “Thank goodness Joe never got this letter to Mary. It’s the first solid clue we’ve had.”
Jane felt a little excited at the prospect of finding the others. “We might actually find them, Colt. But why would he write such a letter and never send it?”
“I don’t know. Maybe there wasn’t enough time.”
“I guess, but… What if it’s a trap?”
“It’s still all we have. We’ll have to be sure we’re prepared for anything.”
He pulled her in for a hug, and she placed her head against his chest, her ear over his heart. Despite the layers of clothing, she thought she could still hear it beating. Sometimes he made her feel like it beat specifically for her. As if his very existence relied on her happiness. That made her feel joy and guilt simultaneously. She didn’t want anyone to rely on her that much, especially after her last vision of Colt and the cemetery. She worried she was a danger to him, and yet his devotion to her made her heart soar. Love was such a complicated emotion.
He kissed the top of her head and gave her one last squeeze before letting her go. “We should tell Jeremy. Maybe he’s found something, too.”
She grasped Colt’s hand, and they walked back to the control room together. Jeremy had turned off the monitors and was sitting there in silence. When they entered, he turned and gave them a smirk. “Did you two actually look for information, or just find a spot to make out?”
Colt smiled. “Wouldn’t you like to know?” He took the letter from Jane and handed it to Jeremy.
After a moment of reading, Jeremy held the letter up. “So, we’re going to Tennessee then.”
Jane frowned. “Not just yet. We need something a little more specific, and we still need to find the others that escaped. We need a unified group of the gifted to make this work.”
Jeremy nodded thoughtfully. “Yeah, I think you’re right.” He spun himself in the chair once and then planted his feet firmly on the floor, pulling himself up quickly. “I found Julia’s hiding spot. Let’s see what Hideous Hag left behind.”
A few minutes later they were all standing in Julia’s room. Jeremy removed a large mirror from the wall and dug a pocket knife from his backpack. He poked the end inside a crease in the sheetrock and pried back a loose section. Reaching inside he pulled out a small metal box then handed it to Jane.
She sat the box down and opened the lid. Inside, she found a map with several latitude and longitude markings written in the margins. She also found a small scrap of ribbon. “That’s weird. I get hiding the map in case she wanted to escape herself, but why this blue ribbon?”
She lifted the ribbon from the box and was rewarded with another temple-splitting headache. She cried out. Colt and Jeremy tried to help, but all they could do was make sure she was safely seated while the vision took over.
Jane found herself walking down a trail littered with brightly-colored leaves. Some had fallen recently, others were long
dead and crunched beneath her feet as she walked. Children were hurrying around her, giving her anxious sidelong glances as they passed. She tried to speak to one of the children, but he only ran away in fear. Behind her, guards were herding the children forward, keeping a close eye on those in the very back. Those with the strongest gifts. Jane wondered if they were still drugging everyone. She could only assume they were, as outside of fear, it was the only way to keep them under control.
A particularly nasty fella named Geoff walked to her side and leaned in. “We should be there soon, ma’am.”
“What? Where?”
He didn’t answer her, but he pointed ahead of them. She could only see the tops of mountains in the near distance. Nothing else stood out as a true destination. Jane looked down at the ribbon in her hand and screamed, dropping the ribbon to the ground.
She blinked her eyes, and as her vision focused she saw Jeremy and Colt, both with concern etched on their features.
Colt spoke first. “Are you okay? Is it over?”
Jeremy looked ready to jump out of his skin. “Is what over? What the hell just happened?”
Jane closed her eyes a moment to get her bearings. “Colt, help me stand, please.” He took her hand and lifted her slowly.
Jeremy ran his fingers through his hair, and he appeared frantic and panicked. “Is somebody gonna explain that to me?” He was almost shrieking.
“Hush a moment,” she said. She allowed another minute for the last bit of throbbing to subside before she answered him. “I’ve been getting headaches, and they come with visions.”
His eyes went wide. “No way.”
“Yeah. They suck.”
Jeremy took in a deep breath. “I get visions too, but they don’t happen like that.”
Colt interrupted. “What did you see?”
“I think it was Tennessee. Maybe the Smokey Mountains. But… I wasn’t me.”
Colt frowned. “You weren’t you? What does that mean?”
Jane looked at the floor where the blue ribbon landed when she dropped it. “I’m not sure. But those in the vision didn’t treat me like Jane. And when I looked at my hands, they weren’t mine.” She pointed at the satiny object. “I think that thing connected me to its owner somehow. I think, for just a moment, I was Julia.”
After Jane’s headache, they all agreed it was best to go home. It was likely they had found all they could in the compound anyway. Colt helped Jane to the truck then ran back inside for a moment to grab the backpack he’d forgotten in the front office. He’d asked Jeremy to stay with Jane. Colt had purposely left the bag to give him an excuse to go back without them. Something outside had caught his attention earlier, and he wanted to give it a quick look. He grabbed the bag and slipped out of the door, swiftly jogging to the far side of the building. The flash of light caught his eye once again, and he zeroed in on its position.
He slowed as he neared the object, and the smell hit him first. He covered his nose and mouth as he walked up on the remains of a body. The sunlight was glinting off the man’s belt buckle. The body before him had been there for quite some time, and it looked like the wildlife had started picking him over. He knelt down and searched for some identification. Colt carefully fished a wallet out of the corpse’s pocket and opened it. Frowning, he then turned and went back to the truck.
Once he was seated behind the wheel, Jeremy questioned him.
“What took you so long?”
“I found a body, and this.” He handed the wallet to Jeremy.
It only took a moment for the significance to register once Jeremy looked at the driver’s license. “So, it appears Joe was caught after all. That’s why his letter never got to Mary.”
Jane’s stricken expression assured Colt he’d done the right thing by waiting until she was at the truck before investigating. He knew the idea of anyone getting hurt broke her heart, and she was prone to blaming herself when it came to that specific group of people. He leaned over and kissed her cheek.
“We’ll put a stop to this, baby. I promise.”
He backed the truck out of its spot then pointed it toward home.
Colt quietly shut the bedroom door. They’d been home about an hour, and Jane had finally fallen asleep. Technically, she’d cried herself to sleep. Her overwhelming guilt mixed with the strong memories and headaches had taken too much out of her. He held her until her quiet sobs turned into light snores then he slipped out of the room.
He walked into the living room to find Jeremy on the couch studying the coordinates on the map. The anger he was feeling was obvious as he tapped a pen on the coffee table. Colt sat in the recliner next to the couch.
“What’s on your mind, kid?”
Jeremy shot him an irritated look. “Well, let’s see. Thanks to you, Jane and I have been subjected to extremely painful memories that we’ve been trying so hard to put behind us. She suffered some kind of attack while we were there, and she learned that someone died because of the incident that happened the last time she was there. Now she’s in bed crying her eyes out.” The sarcasm was thick in his voice as he slowly said, “What do think is wrong with this picture?”
Colt stood up. “Now wait just a damn minute. I didn’t force anyone to do anything.”
Jeremy stood too. “You knew it was a bad idea to go, and you took her there anyway!”
Colt took a step toward Jeremy and looked him in the eye. “She would have gone without me. I couldn’t allow that.”
Jeremy growled. “Oh yes, that’s another issue. God forbid you let Jane have any time to herself. You’re practically her damn shadow.”
“I’m keeping her safe, you little prick.”
“Are you? Are you really? Because from what I saw on that video, she was saving your ass, not the other way around.”
“You don’t know the whole story.” Colt’s voice was deadly calm. “I suggest you shut your little trap until you know what you’re talking about.”
Jeremy accepted Colt’s words as a challenge. “Is that so? And just what are you gonna do about it if I don’t? You gonna beat me up with all those tattooed muscles of yours?” He scoffed. “I’m guessing you’re all brawn and no brains.”
Colt took a menacing step in Jeremy’s direction, and the next thing he knew, he was pinned against the wall, but Jeremy wasn’t touching him physically.
“Whatcha’ gonna do now, big man? Huh? Muscles don’t mean crap against the gifted. You seem to need to learn that lesson.” Jeremy released him, and he fell to the floor with a loud crash, destroying a small, cheap end table in the process.
Colt was picking himself up and wondering if he could smother the little twerp in his sleep when Jane walked in. Her red-rimmed eyes looked at them both accusingly.
“Why are you fighting? We need to pull together!”
Jeremy frowned. “He doesn’t get it, Jane. He doesn’t truly understand us, or what he’s up against. He’ll just get us killed.”
She sighed. “Jeremy, cut Colt some slack. This is new to him.”
Colt looked at them both, feeling more like a third wheel than ever. He shook his head and walked to the counter, grabbing his keys along the way. “I’m going out. I expect Jeremy to clean up the mess he just made by the time I get back.”
Jane tried to stop him. “Colt, wait…”
He pretended he didn’t hear her. She didn’t say she agreed with Jeremy’s assessment of his usefulness, but she didn’t argue with him either. That hurt.
He threw his leg over his Harley and fired up the engine, then pulled out of the drive without even a backward glance. Jane stood in the doorway fighting the urge to use her gifts to stop him. As tempting as it was, she knew he needed time. He’d only resent her if she prevented him from the escape he seemed to desperately require.
She walked back inside and looked at Jeremy. He had the good sense to look ashamed.
“I’m sorry, Jane. I didn’t mean to start a fight. I just don’t think he knows what he’s doing.”
“And you do? Because I don’t, Jeremy. I don’t have a clue. I’m flying blind in this thing and praying that each move we make is the right one. Colt was the only one I could rely on when my life was literally falling apart. You’re like family, but Colt is one of the most important people in my life. And he cares for me. He’d never do anything to hurt me. Don’t ever forget that.”
Jeremy didn’t say anything, but he nodded in compliance.
She walked over to him and gave him a hug. “I’m sorry. I didn’t mean to be harsh. But we need to all be on the same team here. Trust is essential. I know you don’t know Colt very well, but please give him a chance. He’s already given you more than he had to.”
He sighed. “I’ll try.”
“Thank you.” She kissed his cheek. “You’ll need to apologize when he gets home.”
Jeremy rolled his eyes, but he gave her a smirk. “Yes, Mom.”
Colt sat at the bar, a whiskey neat in one hand and his cell phone in the other. He’d been at The Rusty Hinge for roughly two hours, and he’d barely touched his drink. James, the bartender, tried to get him to lay out his troubles, but Colt wasn’t interested in adding stories to the small town gossip pool. So, he sat brooding but not drinking.
James pushed a cola in front of Colt. “Here, drink something, or my boss is gonna throw you out.” Colt held up his mostly full tumbler of Jack Daniels and took a sip. James shook his head. “You aren’t here to get drunk, so forget the JD and drink the damn soda.”
Colt pushed away the whiskey, realizing that James was right. He was frustrated, but he didn’t want to get wasted. He needed a clear head to figure out what the hell he was going to do about Jane. Her little smart-ass friend had gotten to him. Jeremy knew just what buttons to push to get under his skin. Colt was afraid he might be right.
He took another drink of the soda and then looked at his cell phone once more. He didn’t know if he should call her or just apologize face-to-face when he got home. She deserved face-to-face—maybe flowers or something.
Making up his mind, he paid his tab and left. He searched but couldn’t find a flower shop open that late on a Saturday, so he turned his motorcycle around and went to see his friend Kevin.
