Chapter 3 A New Day

October 29th, 2013

9:59 AM

Portland, Oregon

Chrysalis HQ

After waiting a of couple hours for the attack to die down and for investigators to cleanse the scene; Cayce, Dr. Hendricks, and I took and elevator to the top floor where I would be meeting the CEO Derrick Crosby for the first time. I barely knew Benson for twenty minutes and he gets shot between the eyes in front of me and proclaimed a traitor. Couldn't blame Hendricks for the accusation and giving Benson what he deserved. Cayce and Hendricks gave me a change of clothes to change from my gown. I had to wear a Chrysalis T-shirt from the gift shop and a simple pair of jeans with some shoes. They even kept my old blue feathered ear ring I used to wear and put that on as well.

I had been awake and alive for merely two hours and I still needed answers about myself, this strange company, and everybody and everything else. I was still unsure if I could trust the people around me. I may have been dead and brought back from the dead by these people, but that meant less for what I was in for. Whatever I was in for, I couldn't stay dead to everyone in Arcadia Bay forever. I needed to get back. Everyone deserves to know I'm alive. The right to know I'm a walking corpse taking more breaths in this strange facility. Especially Frank. Especially Chloe.

Six months they had said. For six months I was sent here to be induced in a coma until I could be awakened into my next life. No one's a cat who has nine lives. But I was just served with another in fact. I can't imagine all the people I care about feeling about how they believe me to be dead. I would imagine Chloe reacting the same way she felt about her father's death in a way she'd undeniably react to mine. I vowed to Chloe that I would never leave her the way Max did five months past and for six months I had officially broken my vows to her.

Cayce had mentioned that Max had returned to Arcadia some months back to start an education at Blackwell. At least it's not a total loss for Chloe. I just can't imagine what she must go through having to loose me and her real dad, William. Damn you to hell, Jefferson. You and Nathan are the reason I'm here. To add more fuel to the fire, I have Frank to go through my death too. All the good people I've left behind and I don't get to wake up next to them awake and alive. Up on the elevator I was taking, Dr. Hendricks had some questions to run a test on my past memories.

"Before you meet with Derrick Crosby," began Hendricks. "We need to ask you a few questions to evaluate your condition."

"What? We have to do this now?" Cayce asked.

"We should have done weeks of testing to confirm the success of Project Lazarus. A few questions on the way up will have to suffice."

"Okay. Records show you were born and raised in Long Beach. Three parents. One of them in the District Attorney, James Amber, one who married your father to be your adopted mother, Rose Amber, and the other your birth mother named Sera Gearhardt. You were accepted into Blackwell Academy for the 2009 and 2010 semesters when you first enrolled at fifteen. You were known to students and faculty to be the pride of Blackwell. Do you remember that?"

"Yeah, I remember. Everyone used to go Rachel this and Rachel that. Everywhere I went, everyone followed. Earning me the role of a Blackwell celebrity. Story of my life."

"I've read your reports. You seem to have a quintessential Blackwell record. One that exceeded everyone's expectations whenever. Satisfied, Hendricks?"

"Almost," she replied. "Let's try something more recent. Arcadia Bay, where you in a relationship with a Chloe Price and a Frank Bowers. Then the Vortex Club party where you were drugged."

"Nathan Prescott and Mark Jefferson initiated your abduction," reminded Cayce. "That place they referred as the dark room. What do you remember from there?"

"You want me to stand here and chat about the most colossally scaring situation of my life in that so-called dark room?" I ask firmly. "I think your in over your heads. In all honesty, the simple version is that a psycho Jared Leto thought he can make me his doll of innocence while lying down like sleeping beauty with the help of the son of the Prescott blood. The end."

"I understand, Rachel," said Cayce. "And we're sorry we asked. Everybody at Chrysalis knows that dark room was staked out by the ABPD."

"There are other test we should run," suggested Hendricks.

"Come on, Doc," whined Cayce. "Enough with the quizzes. The memories are there and I can vouch for Rachel's health personally."

"I suppose your right," digressed Hendricks. "We'll have to hope Crosby accepts our little field test as evidence enough."

We're on the top floor of the building and Cayce and Hendricks allow me to enter the boss's office alone. I step inside to see an enormous room with nice furniture, an enormous window with light rays from the morning sun beaming the room, and a desk where the man himself sits there waiting for me. Sitting down on a spinning chair turning around to the glass overlooking the city of Portland and drinking a cup of scotch while smoking a cigarette.

I approach the man slowly and stop in the center of the room. Then man himself takes notice of my presence and turns his chair around to talk eye to eye. And there he was. The man was bald with an expensive coat and tie on. A Lex Luthor looking figure. My first conversation with the man himself began.

"Rachel Amber," he began. "Just the woman I was waiting for.

"Derrick Crosby," I begin. "Just the man I was waiting for."

"I must say it's honor to see the pride of Blackwell awake and alive. Most common knowledge for people who know what you and I know."

"From what I hear, I cost you a fortune. Why'd you do it?"

"For the defense and preservation of Chrysalis. I didn't spend six months and billions of dollars to bring you back as a common prodigy. But Chrysalis is up against the greatest threat of our brief existence."

"And what is that?"

"We have a civil war in Bolivia that all started with a coup and a dictatorship run by an extremist superpower cult named El Eterno. One week ago, President Evo Morales of Bolivia was executed on national television by El Eterno's leader Hugo Alvarez. A terrorist leader who rules with fear and violence. Dr. Hendricks tells me your memory is still intact. How are you feeling?"

"Cut to the chase. I was just drugged to death by two psychos, I may have just ditched everyone I cared about in Arcadia Bay who now think I'm dead, and now I wake up from my death bed only to hear you talk about terrorist? Not mention I haven't been filled in about how I dodged bullets and formed a bullet proof dome in front of myself."

Crosby gets off his chair to approach me and talk up close.

"We're at war," said Crosby. "No one wants to admit it, but humanity is under attack. While you've been sleeping, your friend Chloe has relentlessly searched for you across Arcadia Bay. When Max Caulfield returned, it was only a matter of time before her and Chloe discovered your body in that landfill. Your counterfeit body that is. Meanwhile, Arcadia Bay is in ruins from an anonymous tornado storm that struck down hundreds dead and only half the population left standing. But that's another story. We believe El Eterno has taken over Bolivia for reasons unnatural. In a way we're just now suspecting the Arcadia storm to be unnatural. When bringing you to life, we discovered something special in you. That's just one reason we chose you."

"You could've trained an entire army for what you've spent to bring me back," I said.

"You're unique. Not just in ability or what you've experienced, but what you represent. You stood for Blackwell at a key moment. You're more than a prodigy. You're a symbol. And I don't know if you're one for stopping quantum terrorism, but the gift we've discovered in you just might be enough for my faith. We have to respect that."

"Fighting a war doesn't sound like the Rachel Amber everyone knows. Why should I be involved? Why are you involved?"

"We are committed to the advancement and preservation of humanity. If quantum terrorist are targeting us, trying to wipe us out, Chrysalis will stop them. If we wait for politics or bureaucracy to act, no more humanity will be left."

"About my gift, Mr. Crosby, how do I have it and where did it come from?"

"That's a rather complicated question, Ms. Amber. I'll keep it simple. You are exposed to something in your blood vessel called chronons. Chronons are what keep your powers at bay. Anyone exposed to chronons have the ability to manipulate time. Weather it'd be reversing time, freezing time, you name it. We understand you had a gift to trick minds to your own cause back during your Blackwell days. Chronons can have a tight influence on weak minds. Your abilities you just recently performed during the merc attack are something your just getting used to now. We can prepare you for how to control them."

"What your asking me to do is something I never done before. Nor do I believe I should do. I should at least get back to Arcadia Bay. People like Chloe, Frank, and my parents deserve to know I'm alive. Whatever happened to them, I can't turn my back on them now after all these months. Chloe is never the one to put her grieving aside. Not after losing both her father and Max. Frank is just a low life living in an RV who always needed someone special in his life like myself. And parents...that's rather complicated."

"And they've all moved on with their lives, Rachel. As uneasy as it was for them believing your dead, it's best to keep it that way. For now."

"For now?! For how long?"

"For as long as we need it to be."

"That's not good enough! I want to go home! You can't just let me leave everyone behind forever!"

"Let me make this clear, Rachel. You aren't in a position to make demands. I regret the sorrow I'm letting you put everyone through, but you need to put your emotion aside. Going back will be the last thing you'll do only after what we tell you to do. Do I make myself clear?"

"Crystal. Could at least tell me what's happening to everyone I knew now? What happened to Chloe Price? Cayce told me she's hooked up with her childhood buddy Max Caulfield."

"And what he said was true. Ms. Caulfield started her Blackwell education over a month ago and just three weeks ago she got back to together with Ms. Price. They've successfully been reconciling their relationship five years from then since."

"What happened to Frank Bowers?"

"Not much is known to us about him. He's only been himself in drug dealing from where our knowledge goes."

"How did Nathan Prescott die? Cayce told me he was just killed by Jefferson. How? Why?"

"How he died is an answer you already know. Why he died is classified. It was a devastating tragedy for the Prescott family is more than I can say. Are there any other questions?"

"I can assume Mark Jefferson was brought to justice for this dark room thing of his?"

"Indeed he was. Only a week ago he was put on trial and from this moment forward has been given the death penalty as his charge for first degree murder. Next question?"

"What happened to Victoria Chase? Her and I high were school rivals but she was close to Nathan. Safe to assume she was devastated about his death as well."

"Certainly. It was a tragedy for all of Blackwell. Ms. Chase alone however is still going through her loss and is now doing her best to taking over to run that Vortex Club of hers now that Mr. Prescott is gone. Another question?"

"What happened to Chloe's mom and step-dad Joyce and David Madsen?"

"Mr. and Mrs. Madsen are helping support the rebuild for Arcadia Bay after the storm that destroyed it. With Blackwell under sanctuary and Mrs. Madsen's diner totaled from the storm, they're making due in repairing the damage that had been done to the town itself."

"And what happened to my parents? What did they do when I vanished?"

"They moved back to California where you grew up to start new lives. Knowing you had been gone and nowhere to be found, that was there way forward. Now no more questions. Corporal Foley will provide you with a quarters for you to live in. Your training for Chrysalis will begin Friday morning. No request made. I will make that mandatory."

"Hendricks killed Benson in cold blood. Cayce is just a gun for hire. You expect me to trust them?"

"Benson was one of my best workers, but he was a traitor. Hendricks did exactly what I expected of her. And she saved your life in more ways than one. Cayce is a soldier. One of the best. He's never fully trusted me, but he's always been honest about it. You'll just be fine with them. For now."

"Is this a volunteer job or am I being volunteered?"

"You always have a choice, Rachel. If we don't think you're ready or worthy to our endeavors, we can part ways. But first things first. Cayce will show you to your chamber and your training begins Friday at dawn. Do your best and you'll do just fine. I brought you back. It's up to you to do the rest. You are dismissed, Ms. Amber. Make yourself at home as you can."