Love and Darkness (Small Town Secrets Book 7), page 28
The man’s words and demeanor didn’t seem nervous or sinister, but Brandon stood the second the latch clicked on the door, moving to the other side of the desk and staring at the computer screen, seeming unsure. “There are so many icons here. I have no idea where to even start.” He shot a look at me. “But that doesn’t change the fact that my bullshit alarm is going off. We need to get out of here.”
“What?”
“Something’s not right, Kimberly. Trust me on this.” Picking up the clipboard, he ripped the paper he’d completed out from under the metal clamp before wadding it into his pocket. Now alarmed and almost frightened, I stood, ready. In this regard, I did trust him. I didn’t realize, though, that my heightened sense of fear might have been feeding into my reaction.
Then, walking past me to the door, he gripped the knob, slowly twisting before pulling on it so it didn’t make a sound. He peeked out the crack and then stuck his head out more before stepping back in and closing the door most of the way. Without a word, he glanced at me for a few seconds before peeking out the door again. “Okay,” he whispered, easing out into the hallway.
Should I follow him? What lay in store for me if I did? And what would potentially happen if I didn’t? Before he even grabbed my hand, I made the choice to go with him. Brandon, at least, was the devil I knew. I knew nothing about the people here and, if Brandon’s unspoken fears were any indication, I was better off with him.
Or was I? Only time would tell…
Chapter Thirty-five
We’d been taking quick, furtive steps down the carpeted hallway and hadn’t seen a soul, although we’d heard plenty of activity in the distance. The noise wavered from close to farther away but, so far, we’d been lucky.
I didn’t know how long that would hold out.
Brandon had been testing doors but all had been locked and we kept moving at a pace designed to get us out of there. Only we weren’t. Instead, we were moving deeper into the hospital, and I had no idea if that was Brandon’s intent or not.
We got closer to where the hallway intersected with another and as we got ready to turn, we heard voices nearby. Brandon squeezed my hand and pulled me back, turning to a door and punching in a code before I could even register what was happening. Five beeps and then a click and he turned the doorknob, letting us into the room. He pulled me inside what appeared to be a storeroom of some kind. “How did you—?” I started to ask, but he put his finger to his lips and then pressed the light switch. It had automatically turned on when we’d entered, but he made it pitch black in there to keep anyone passing by from noticing that it was occupied. In the darkness, I was trying to reason out how Brandon had gotten us in there, ultimately deciding that he must have watched the man who’d led us into the back punching in a code that miraculously worked on this door as well.
When the voices got near the door, I strained to hear what they were saying. Meanwhile, I wondered if I should keep quiet or shout for help.
It came down to if I trusted them or Brandon more…so I kept my mouth shut. My hands were shaking, though, and I still didn’t know if it was for fear of Brandon or the people outside the door. I finally recognized a voice in the hallway as the man who’d brought us to his office in the first place. And I knew he was talking about us when he said, “They couldn’t have gone far.”
Then a woman spoke, but her voice was harder to understand. “The front desk said they haven’t gone out that way. They’re keeping an eye out for them.”
Another voice spoke but it was clear to me that the group was walking away from us down the hall, and I couldn’t make out any other words. After it grew quiet again, Brandon moved to the door, slowly opening it. The light streamed in as a sliver, widening second by second, until he paused to glance out. Then he opened it the rest of the way, taking me by the hand and leading me out into the hall. Because it had sounded like the party of three or more who’d been searching for us had gone to our right, Brandon took us to the left.
We came to the end of the hallway where it split into two, and Brandon didn’t hesitate, taking us to the right. As we moved deeper into the hospital, I could hear more voices. This time, though, there were lots of them—like a crowd. Brandon turned to me and said, “Cafeteria’s ahead.”
Although I thought it odd that there was a cafeteria hidden in the back of a hospital where it would be difficult for visitors to access, I couldn’t deny that there were lots of people in there based on sound alone. Brandon navigated us through the hall, but patients were now passing by us. Fortunately, none of them seemed to really even notice us. Just when I started to relax, though, the PA system jolted me back into a tingly state of fear. “Code Gray. Repeat, Code Gray. Location unknown.” Searching my brain, I didn’t remember seeing that color on the back of the man’s badge earlier.
Brandon’s eyes narrowed. “That’s us. Come on.”
Us? Meaning…they were stepping up their efforts to find us? The entire hospital now? Brandon picked up the pace, taking me with him, his grip on my wrist close to painful. If we were caught, I wondered, then what? Questioning? Jail?
It depended on one thing and one thing only.
If these folks were who and what Brandon claimed, then there might be unsavory consequences to suffer upon capture…but if this was just an ordinary hospital and Brandon had completely lost his mind, then I figured they’d take us, hold us, call the cops, haul him off to jail—and maybe me, as well.
The second scenario offered me some hope and relief—but I feared the first was just as likely.
I didn’t have much time to ponder, though, because we were moving quickly. We passed a few more patients, most of whom seemed to be either in pain or not in their right mind, so they weren’t a threat. They didn’t seem to be in any hurry to report us.
One, though…a bald man with green eyes like a hawk who seemed to be paying attention looked at us as we rushed past. And he made eye contact with me.
He wasn’t in pain and he certainly wasn’t insane—and, somehow, I knew with my last glance that he’d figured out we were the people who’d instigated the Code Gray. So I had to hope we got far enough away to be safe before he reported us.
We turned one corner and then another and I marveled that I hadn’t seen a window in a while, making me feel like I had lost my sense of direction. Then, as we got near the end of the hallway we were in, Brandon pushed on an unmarked door after punching in another code, pulling me inside behind him.
It was a stairwell—plain and also windowless. White walls, gray steps. As we began walking down, our footsteps echoed off the walls. The sound seemed so loud, making me consider removing my black shoes with the noisy heels, but Brandon was hauling ass now, and there was no stopping. All I could do at this point was keep up with him.
When we got to the bottom of the stairs, there was no place to go except through a white steel door. There was a tiny rectangular window on the door, and inside the glass were woven metal threads. Again, without hesitation, Brandon pushed through the door…
And then he stopped cold in his tracks.
“What the hell?”
His pace slowed as he took in the sight. The room was cavernous—stark white, bathed in fluorescent rays triggered by our motion—but it was divided by cubicle-like walls. We moved through the room, and each cubicle appeared to have MRI-like machines for testing patients. But I could tell from the feel and sound that there was no one there. Not a soul. That in itself was odd, because why would a hospital have all this expensive equipment and space and not be using it to help the people they were serving? But, in spite of the machines that appeared to be state of the art and the carpeted cubicle walls that had a new smell, everything else—the floors, the ceiling, and the outer walls—felt and looked old, used and abused.
But I sensed none of that was what had made Brandon pause. No longer could I hold my tongue any longer. “What is it?”
When he turned to me, his pupils were wide and his breathing had become shallow. “This…” Once again, he looked around, struggling to take in a breath. “Kimberly, this is where the program was run.” Another slow, difficult breath. “I had no fucking idea it was here, below the hospital.”
“Here?”
“Yeah, but…” As he started to move again, he took one slow step at a time, his grip on my wrist as tight as ever. “It didn’t look like this. Not at all.” I wasn’t sure what he was saying, unable to keep up in my frightened, panicked state. Before I could ask a question to clarify, though, he said, “This place used to be wide open, except for the back. And there were lots of beds along the wall. They’d—” His voice cracking, he bent his head, covering his brow with his hand. “They usually hooked us up to IVs to give us some shit and then sometimes they’d shoot us with radiation or whatever but…this place looked so different.”
I found my voice but kept it low. “Are you sure this is the place?”
“If you were fucking tortured day after day for months on end and, during the brief moments of rest they gave you, you had to hear the screams of your comrades, don’t you think you’d remember the place? Never forget it?”
“Yes, but…maybe, with time and if they tormented you that much, maybe you might—”
“This is it, Kimberly. I’m telling you.” A fresh, painful yank on my wrist had me moving forward again. We flew a few feet and then he stopped once more. “Like right here. Here. This is where we were injected, where we were tested—over and over.” The tone of his voice and his insistence sounded sincere… real. It was in that moment that I wanted to believe him.
Except…this room. It seemed so innocuous. Not completely, to be sure, but it certainly didn’t have the feel of a torturous space. Instead, it felt like it was created to discover diseases and, with that knowledge, to help sufferers heal or recover. This didn’t seem like an area used to torment people.
But being near Brandon helped me feel that maybe there was a psychic remnant of what might have happened here before. Countering that idea, I reminded myself that any psychic reverberations were likely caused by the fact that hospitals hold people already in pain, already hurting from something happening to them.
As though he were in a daze, Brandon kept moving, looking inside each enclosed space, fresh pain contorting his features. But after walking a little farther, his grip loosened and he stumbled toward a chair before slumping in it. I rubbed my wrist but stayed close while Brandon cradled his face in his hands, his elbows digging into his thighs.
Squatting near him, I placed a hand on his knee. There was now no doubt in my mind that this man was suffering—and then I felt guilty.
Yet still cautious.
I didn’t want to say a word, didn’t want to add to what he was going through. I simply squeezed his knee, letting him know I was there and listening if he needed to talk.
But he was quiet for a long while, sobbing silently, before his voice finally cracked. “I didn’t want to do it, Kimberly. I swear.”
“Do what?”
“Order him to test the wires.”
I couldn’t even pretend to know what Brandon was talking about, but I was curious. My need to nurture and support was overruled by my urge to understand. “I believe you, Brandon, but tell me what you mean.”
After drawing in a deep breath, he removed his hands from his eyes, wiping his face with his sleeve. He didn’t look at me, though, instead focusing at a spot on the floor. “Gabe. I told you I talked him into signing up for the program. I might have told you that decision led to his death. But…I didn’t tell you about the wires.” Jesus. He was talking about my son, and suddenly, I wanted to prod him, demand that he spit it out right now, but I kept my jaw clamped shut. He was trying to make his way there, and I needed to say nothing. “It’s been kind of fuzzy, but being here brought it all back, flooding my brain like a dam breaking.” Once more, the silence engulfed us like fog until he spoke again—and then I had to strain to hear. “It was a day like any other in the program, a day where we probably all were praying for death or release. And Gabe didn’t know that he was going to be the reason why we were liberated from a fate worse than dying. At that point, they were injecting us all with different shit, trying to see what our bodies could handle, ‘cause being a perfect soldier wasn’t just becoming a killing machine, and it definitely wasn’t what they’d told us we’d signed up for. Being the perfect soldier wasn’t just having the ability to sneak into hostile territory and complete a mission. It was also withstanding torture when you got caught.”
A chill charged up my spine but I had to resist the impulse to speak. Brandon seemed to be half in another world and I was afraid that asking anything would pull him out of his trance. And I needed to know.
“So the wires. I’d…” As he let out a long breath, his hands started shaking again. “I’d survived waterboarding the day before—but that’s not really a superhero move. I wasn’t the first guy in the world to undergo that shit and survive. I was starting to wonder if any of the treatments they’d given us worked. You know—were we stronger and able to handle this stuff better or were we just stupid enough to sign up to be tortured voluntarily?
“Anyway, each one of us was being tested, and a couple of guys were injured badly enough that they were transported to medical—apparently just upstairs, but I didn’t know that then. As far as we knew, no one had died from anything they’d done to us—but we knew about the suffering, because even if we didn’t see it or talk about it, we heard the screams. We couldn’t get away from it. And when we could spend a couple minutes unmonitored, we’d talk among ourselves and share stories. One guy had been whipped nearly to death; another had been hung upside down for days; another guy had all his finger bones broken. And Gabe—the night before, he’d told me he wanted me to find you if something happened to him.” Brandon squeezed his eyes shut and his voice became strained. “It’s like he knew. So the next day…he was wavering, you know? He was resisting—and if I’d been any kind of friend, I would have instead helped him revolt. Gabe was that kind of guy. He fought when things weren’t right. And me…I was a good old soldier boy. Do what I’m told. Don’t question it. They ask me to jump? I ask how high. They tell me to drop and give them twenty? I’ll give ‘em thirty for good measure. So Gabe’s turn was next…and we all knew what was coming. It was on the wires—and they were right over there.” He pointed toward the wall lined with cabinets not two yards away. “They looked almost like coils of razor wire—but they weren’t sharp.
“They were for electrocution.”
I swallowed then, somehow knowing what was coming. Part of me wanted to hear every single detail, because it felt like it was my duty as a mother to do so, to hear everything that had happened, to suffer what my son had. The other part of me knew it would do no good. Gabriel had already passed, was already in a better place, and I didn’t know that I could stomach what Brandon had to say, and yet I knew he needed to talk about it—and a little piece of me believed I needed to listen. I was beginning to believe it was this particular event—Gabriel’s death—that had traumatized Brandon.
Obviously, his whole experience in “the program” had disturbed him, but it seemed that Gabriel’s death had pushed him over the edge. I realized as I focused on the heavy silence awaiting his words that I was squeezing his knee too hard, gripping it as though my life depended on it. I loosened my fingers so they would be less a vice and more a comfort. Then I nodded to encourage Brandon to continue talking.
“He didn’t want to do it. Not because of the pain he knew it would cause but because he was fed up with the program. ‘This isn’t what we signed up for,’ he kept saying, and I’d tell him, ‘You don’t know what we signed up for. What if this is it?’ But I didn’t really feel that way. For some reason, I was justifying in my mind and even out loud the shit they were doing. It had to be for some noble, greater good, right? It had to be. Why else would those people willingly hurt all of us on a daily basis?
“But the next day, he did it. He screamed, yeah, but he never gave in. We could hear them yelling at him, asking him to tell them his pain level. That was something they did. They wanted to know the intensity of the pain we felt. And then they’d sometimes inject us with more stuff and do it again, asking us if the intensity changed. But he just kept telling them one. They’d shock him—and we could hear the wires charging and, later, even the lights would flicker—and after they’d turn it off, they’d ask, ‘Pain level?’ After he kept saying ‘One’ no matter what they did, they explained to him that one meant minor pain and ten meant unspeakable. At first, I think they thought their experiment was finally working, that Gabe was handling it like it was nothing. I wondered if Gabe was saying one because his pain was so intense, he couldn’t think straight. But the next time, Gabe told them his pain level was zero…when it was clear to all of us from his screams that his pain level had to be at least a seven or eight. There was no way it was nothing.” Brandon clenched his jaw then and balled his hands up into fists. When he spoke, it was through his teeth, as if he was an angry dog. “But the fuckers kept doing it—more and more with less time in between. It was as if they were challenging him. ‘Oh, yeah? A zero? How about this?’”
Again, Brandon dropped his head in his hands and began weeping. I realized then that the tears had started to fall from my eyes as well as I’d been imagining the horrible death my dear, sweet boy had suffered. Brandon kept talking through it, though. “And then it stopped. And it was like a cloud descended on this fucking cave. We could feel it. Something had gone horribly wrong. They’d gone too far.” It was quiet for a while and when Brandon spoke again, his voice was shaky. “We knew. We just knew. They never said a word to us about it, but when Gabe never came back to his bunk…and they didn’t tell us he was being treated by medical…we knew. They’d killed him. They’d killed the best one of us. He’d protested by not giving them what they wanted—a true measure of the pain they were putting him through—and they killed him for it.” His shoulders slumped farther as he grappled with the memories engulfing his mind.
