Chapter 2

Vincent dreamed of when he'd been younger, and scenes of past years played out in his head. There he was with Father, reading Shakespeare and acting out the parts, being nursed by his Father and Ellie when he'd been sick, and later, Catherine made appearances, talking with him and sitting with him, her arm holding him close. He leaned against her shoulder, feeling as if he'd found Heaven, but in the next moment Heaven was torn away. Hunters were after him and they were going to lock him up! He heard Father calling to him, telling him to run home, but he was not able to move a step. The hunters advanced, closing in on him with their guns, and he screamed for Father to help him, but to Vincent's horror, he did not answer. Next, he heard Catherine telling him to run, but as he turned to face her, he saw the hunters pointing their guns at her! He shouted her name, trying to warn her, but she did not heed him. In an explosion of a shot, he went back to the waking world.

"I'm telling you, Hughes, I heard him speak!" Gould was saying, taking out some recording equipment.

"But we were in the other room, Dr. Gould," Hughes said patiently. "It could have been someone in another part of the building."

"Are you sure you heard nothing?" Gould demanded, turning to face his colleague.

"I didn't hear anything at all," Hughes told him, helping him with the equipment. "But if you want to try recording, I'll help."

"Certainly," Gould said, sounding much more satisfied now that things were going his way.

"By the way, what did you hear?" Hughes asked, interested.

"I heard him say the words 'Father' and 'Catherine.'"

Hughes stared at Gould. "Father? Catherine?"

"That's what I heard," Gould assured him.

Vincent saw Hughes sneak a look at him, and he started at seeing Vincent awake. "Sir, he's conscious."

"Good," Gould said, finishing with the recorder. "Let's see if he'll talk to us." He went and stood in front of the cage, but Vincent noticed that he stood well out of reach. "I know you can speak," Gould told him. "I want you to answer my questions. While you were asleep you said the words 'Father' and 'Catherine.' Who are they? What is your name? Where do you come from?"

Vincent said nothing.

"Come now," Gould said, suddenly acting kind. "You can talk to us. Tell us your name."

Vincent decided not to remind the good doctor that anyone who would lock someone up in a cage was not a person that that individual would want to talk to.

"How old are you? Is there anything different you'd like to eat?"

Why yes, Vincent thought wickedly. I'd like some chicken carbonara over pasta, cream of broccoli soup, a slice of chocolate cake for dessert, and to drink I'll have some raspberry iced tea. He wondered what Gould would make of that request!

Gould turned away and went to Hughes' side to consult with him, and Vincent allowed himself to think about Father. If that drug had put him under for another ten hours, then he'd been missing for about thirty hours now. Father would be ready to kill him or weep over him when he got home, and William, the kind man who did most of the cooking for the Tunnels, would be making his favorite stew in an attempt to lure him home. His mouth watered, remembering that stew, and he wished he had a big bowl of it in front of him. It would be thick with carrots, potatoes, cubes of beef, peas, and the gravy was joy in a spoon.

A sudden blow to the cage frightened him enough that he jumped back and growled in a defensive gesture, but he kept himself from speaking only with Herculean effort. It appeared Gould had been trying to frighten him into speaking by banging the cage with a metal bar. While Vincent waited for his heartbeat to return to normal Gould discussed options with Hughes.

"Perhaps we could get him to respond with pain?" Gould was suggesting. "There's a cattle prod somewhere in the building…"

They're playing games with my head and trying to scare me into speaking, Vincent told himself firmly. What sadists.

He ignored them and closed his eyes in an attempt to get his head to stop pounding so much. That pentobarbital was really starting to bother him. If anything, his headache was worse, and the only time he had any relief from the pain was when he was asleep. He was thirsty, so he drank some water, ignoring the two men who had moved into the next room to argue. He curled up in a corner, leaning against the bars, and closed his eyes, willing his headache to deepest Hades. He must have fallen asleep, because the next thing he felt was searing pain in the middle of his back! He roared and leapt away from it, banging into the bars on the other side of the cage with sufficient force to knock the breath from his body. He dropped to the floor, winded, and he heard a voice from a thousand miles away gasp "Oooohhh." With horror, he realized that it was his own.

"Dr. Gould!" Hughes cried as he came running in. "What did you do?" His eyes fell on the stun gun with a gasp, and he grabbed it away from Gould, saying that Gould was a professor, for Heaven's sake, and not an inhumane torturer.

Too late if you're trying to convince him not to become one, Vincent reflected from his supine position. Oh, my back. Oh, my head. Oh, my bruised and battered dignity.

"Well, it worked, even though it wasn't a cattle prod," Gould said, letting Hughes take it away from him at last. "And don't look at me like that, it was at the lowest setting. All it did was sting him. He did say something."

All it did was "sting" me? Vincent thought incredulously. Tell that to my back!

"What did he say?" Hughes asked, turning the stunner off.

"He moaned 'oh.' It was just a moan, but it was a human and fully intelligible moan. Now all we have to do is get him to say other things and determine if he has expressive and receptive language," Gould told him, sounding very excited by the prospect. "We've already seen his expressions, so he expresses himself, but I would like to see if he has words. Think of it, Hughes! A beast that acts like a human and speaks human words! It will make both of our careers!"

Oh, I have words for you, Vincent thought, wishing he could have the man's neck between his hands. Heartless mercenary! Inhuman scientist! Faustian satyr! Let me know when I impress you, I could go all day!

"I'm going to go and get some more food for him, see if I can bribe him into speaking with it," Gould said. "You keep an eye on him, all right?"

Hughes waited until Gould was well away, and he turned to Vincent. "Are you all right?" he asked, his concern plain to see.

"For a beast that may or may not have human words, I'm fine," Vincent told him, sitting up. "My back feels as if I have been stabbed with a flaming torch and my head feels as if it's been hit with a subway train, and my dignity is in miniscule shreds, but I'm fine. I know that stun gun was his idea, so I'm not that angry with you."

"Not that angry?" Hughes repeated. "What did I do that you're angry?"

"I think the word 'cage' has something to do with it," Vincent growled. "Let me out of here, or I swear I'll go mad!"

"I can't let you out," Hughes told him. "We've been through this."

"Oh, yes, you can," Vincent told him, getting to his feet. "You just won't. Despite your kind demeanor, you can't help thinking of how I'll…how did Dr. Gould put it? Oh yes, how I'll make your career. You wish to be kind to me, but you won't be kind enough to let me go."

Hughes didn't say anything, and that was when Dr. Gould returned. He had, of all things, a plate of raw meat. Vincent recoiled from it and would not speak no matter how often Gould offered it to him. The smell of raw meat had always bothered him, and the very idea of eating it was repugnant.

"Maybe he likes his meat cooked?" Hughes suggested.

"Or maybe he is determined not to talk to us. I know you understand us and that you are able to speak, so I'll tell you what," he said, addressing Vincent directly. "You'll eat only when you talk to us."

"Sir, what if he really can't speak?" Hughes protested. "What if he doesn't understand?"

"Oh, I think he does," Gould said, removing all the food from the cage and moving out of Vincent's grasping range with alacrity. "He'll get hungry enough to talk, I promise you."

Gould left the room, and Hughes turned to Vincent. "Look, just talk to him," he pleaded. "You don't have to starve yourself."

"Well, he's the one who took it, so who exactly is starving me?" Vincent replied, glaring at Hughes. "I wouldn't eat raw meat anyway, or that fruit. Raw meat is disgusting and barbaric and most of that fruit was spoiled. I was being starved even with that stuff you call food. I couldn't possibly have eaten it."

"Just…talk to him," Hughes pleaded again. "I won't be able to bring you anything to eat since he'll be watching me. I don't want you to suffer needlessly."

"What do you call this?" Vincent demanded, motioning to the cage. "Something for my own good? Hmm?"

Hughes turned away, spotted the tape recorder, and realized that it had been on that whole time. He removed the tape and showed it to Vincent.

"I'm surprised we both forgot this was on," he said, holding up the tape. "Tell you what. I won't play this for Dr. Gould if you speak to him on your own."

"If he hears it, he'll realize that you've spoken to me before," Vincent pointed out.

"He doesn't have to hear all of it," Hughes countered. "Think about it." He left, tucking the tape into a pocket, and Vincent wondered what to do.

Space

Catherine stared at the tabloid cover, wondering if it had to do anything with Vincent.

"GRANNY SPOTS BEAST IN CENTRAL PARK THROUGH TELESCOPE!"

Even though she hated tabloids and the lurid reporting they did, she bought a copy and hurried with it to her apartment, having called off from work. She'd gone to the newsstand on a hunch, feeling that if someone had seen Vincent, the media would have found out about it somehow. Hopefully, this tabloid article was her clue. Once back in her apartment, she read through it once, then twice. Certain that it was about Vincent, she rushed downstairs to the basement and started tapping on a pipe to let Father know that she had a possible lead. She kept her message short and to the point: "Possible lead. Am checking it out. Will report once I know something definite. Catherine." She knew that someone down Below would hear it and report directly to Father.

Since she worked in the DA's office, she knew several ways of tracking people down. Using one of those ways, she found out where this old woman lived. Mrs. Anna Lausch lived in an apartment in one of the buildings near Central Park, and according to the tabloid article, she watched Central Park through her telescope. That was how she'd spotted a "beast" running through the park. Catherine drove straight there and took the elevator up to talk with this woman.

When the tabloid had described her as a "granny," they hadn't been exaggerating. Catherine was reminded strongly of her grandmother or anyone's grandmother: small, white-haired, sweater-wearing, smiling old lady. That summed up Anna Lausch. Catherine introduced herself as an investigator and said she'd come to investigate the story in the tabloid. Was it true, she asked, that Mrs. Lausch had actually seen a monster in the park?

"Of course it's true!" the old woman insisted, pouring tea into two mugs. "I've seen him more than once, but I could tell even from a distance that he's a gentle beast. He's not a monster at all. I've seen him help baby birds back into their nests and sprinkle crumbs for the parents to find. If anyone comes along he hides very quickly, but I've seen him, that's the truth."

Catherine found herself smiling. That sounded like her Vincent.

Then, she realized what else she could have seen. "Did you ever see where he came from or where he goes?" Catherine asked, fighting down a sudden feeling of panic. What if she'd seen where Vincent entered the Tunnels?

"No, I never have," Mrs. Lausch said, pouring honey into her cup of tea. "That's what I told those scientists who came by here and asked me about him a few days ago. I told them I didn't know where he came from, he just showed up some times."

"Scientists were here asking about him?" Catherine asked, feeling her heart lurch. Scientists? Oh, dear God...

"Yes, a Dr. Hughes and Dr. Gould. Said they were anthropoligists at Columbia, I think. Hughes was more his student, I think, but still, I liked him better than Dr. Gould. That man gave me shivers! They asked all sorts of questions about him and then they went away. I saw them in the park later looking around--I saw them through my telescope--but they didn't find much, I can tell you."

"And where exactly were they looking?" Catherine asked, going to the window.

Mrs. Lausch was all too happy to point the spot out to her and let her see it through the telescope. Catherine thanked her and headed straight there, determined to see if there was anything she could find that could lead her to Vincent.

For a few minutes, she didn't see anything, but then she saw the first dart, lying underneath a bush. It was silver and had an orange fluffy fletching, reminding her of a carrot with a color problem. The second dart was not far from the first, and she realized that they could definitely been used on Vincent. All the evidence pointed that way.

All right, so she now had a probable idea what had happened to Vincent. Now she had to track down Professors Hughes and Gould. They could probably tell her where he was now.

Space

Vincent fell back asleep shortly after Hughes left, and he wondered if he had some kind of drug still in his system. His mind was always foggy and he couldn't focus too long on any one thought, and it was so easy to sleep. While he slept, he dreamed of Catherine, and he wished beyond all else that he could see her and feel her arms wrap about him just once. That wishing turned into reality in his dream, as she stepped close and enveloped him in an embrace.

He knew it was a dream, and oh, how he wished it wasn't! "Catherine," he said, wishing to tell her how much he longed to be free and by her side again.

"Catherine?" she said in a man's voice, and Vincent came back to waking with a start. Looking up through the bars, he saw Hughes, and he realized that he was still in a cage in hell.

"What?" Vincent said, too tired to be angry with Hughes.

"You spoke the name Catherine," Hughes persisted, kneeling down next to the cage. "Who is Catherine?"

Vincent didn't know how to describe Catherine to this man. It felt almost as if he were polluting his thoughts of her by doing so, but speaking the words aloud was too irresistible for him. Saying the words aloud to himself had always left him with a feeling of peace and quiet joy, so perhaps it would do the same now.

"She is a woman of warmth and beauty and courage, and she is the kindest person I have ever known. I am never happier than when I am with her, for she sees me for who I am, and not what I am."

Hughes looked at him. "Does she look like you?"

Vincent shook his head. "No, she does not. She is beautiful, and she brings sunlight into my life."

"Ah," Hughes said, getting to his feet. "You're in love."

Vincent looked at him, but he said nothing.

"Does she come from where you do? Does she live in the same place?"

"No. She comes from this place. New York."

"Oh."

Vincent watched while Hughes made notes on a clipboard, and then decided to speak. "How long do you plan to keep me? Just what do you plan to do with me?"

"Dr. Gould plans to unveil you to the scientific community as a great discovery," Hughes told him, not looking up from his clipboard. "He doesn't intend to let you go since his work with you will--"

"Make his career," Vincent finished, frustrated. "And what about you? Aren't you a professor yourself?"

"I'm a professor, but I'm more Dr. Gould's student. It's a complicated arrangement, but it works for both of us. I came to work with him in order to learn more about the field. He's the top in anthropology in the States at this time."

"When does the great unveiling take place?" Vincent wanted to know, fighting down a feeling of fear. He did not want to be stuck in a cage with people staring in at him! It was bad enough now!

"When we've learned all we can about you," Hughes said as he tucked some papers away. "Not before."

"Listen to me. I'm dying," Vincent said, holding onto the bars of the cage and looking at Hughes entreatingly. "There is only me. I am only what I am. If you cut me I will bleed. If you strike me I will strike back, and if you keep me in chains I will die."

Hughes looked at him with something like compassion in his face. "I can't say I know how you must feel, but Gould is determined to keep you for a while. Perhaps later, if you can convince him that you don't need to be locked up he will let you out, but he doesn't intend to let you go, and I don't, either. You have to understand that."

Vincent said nothing, but he allowed his head to sag against the bars, the picture of defeat and despair.

"Well done, Hughes," Gould said, coming out from behind the door to the other room. "I knew you would get him talking. You're so personable."

Vincent looked up, horrified. Oh, he should have thought to check for Gould before speaking!

"Well, now that I know that you talk and you know that I know, let's have a chat," Gould said, smiling coldly. That cold smile went straight to Vincent's heart, leaving him cold all over.