Title: The Nemesis Project
Chapter 3: Tick Tock
Synopsis: A patient escapes a secret Psi-Corp facility on Mars struggling to reach Babylon 5 with the Rangers help.
Disclaimer: If I owned it I wouldn't be writing Fanfiction, now would I? So don't sue me.
Rating: Nothing to evil really!
A/N: Oh wow… Another chapter…
Chapter notes: Back to study now for a couple of days at least …
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Fondued Jicama: HEY! If Ido all my Uni work a) you won't get any more story b) I will go totally insane!
And thanks for your sweet comments. blushes
Evilclone: No I'm not… I'm tired…
Marcus felt a deep sinking in the pit of his stomach. A feeling of icy cold spread through him as he looked at a pair of grey eyes fixated on something only they could see. He felt a shiver climb up his spine as the body behind the glass, his contact, jumped as the Stephen ran Electric currents through his body. Stephen eventually gave up and stepped away.
"He fell." The voice was soft and high. A child's voice, light and chilling to the core. Marcus took a deep breath. And instantly regretted it as the small head turned to him. Eyes the color of storm clouds seemed to look straight through him. Like a blind person, but these eyes were focused, only not on reality.
He felt strangely relieved as her eyes wavered over and past him, she edged to one side, head cocked to one side, eyes wide and focused. Marcus dared to glance behind him and saw Sheridan's eyes were now locked into her almost hypnotic gaze.
"You fell." The words were hushed. SO soft he wondered if he had really heard them. He heard rather than saw Sheridan stiffen. "You fell out of the burning sky. You fell into the heart of night. You fell…" Her hands wrung together, her eyes staring without blinking. "You fell so far. Tick, you fell. Tock you - you…" she stuttered to a stop, she lifted he finger up before her face, her finger slipped over to the left. "Tick –" it went to the right. "tock." it repeated the move. "Tick-Tock. Tick-tock." She looked past her finger, eyes focusing, really focusing on Sheridan. "You tick but no tock." Marcus turned to see Sheridan's face go white, the Captain looked like he had been hit by a wall of icy water.
"The Tock will come." The words were louder. More certain. Marcus looked at the girl. Her eyes had faded again, they had that fey, mad look in them again. Her eyes snapped onto him.
"Not mad. She's not mad!" Marcus almost jumped out of his skin. The words were her loudest yet, and almost hoarse. She shook her head in a way that made his skin crawl. "Not mad, not mad, not mad, not mad, not mad…" she had turned away now, her little feet took firm but slow steps back to the bed.
She continued her little chant; she seemed to be saying it more to herself than anyone else, as though she could make it so by saying it. Marcus' skin was crawling. He didn't like to admit it but mental infirmity was one of the few things he feared. He had been on the brink of madness once or twice, maddened beyond caring by grief.
He knew it would take little more to push him back over that brink.
She had climbed up onto and now was climbing down the other side as Stephen edged further into the room, obviously aware that his patient was unstable.
She moved over to the other side of the room were idle pieces of medical equipment and store cupboards were, her hands reached out to touch things but never quite connected. Her chanting stopped.
"You cut." She looked accusingly straight at Stephen. Marcus shivered. He'd known there was something not right about this girl the minute he saw her.
"Sometimes…" Said Stephen in a calm voice, edging further into the room. "To help people…"
"NO!" the exclamation was shocking for its suddenness and . "No you cut you hurt! You make me see, I don't want to see! But you cut and you cut and you cut and you cut-" as she cried this new chant tears spilled onto her cheeks as her fingers clawed at her face, at her forehead. She was backing away from Stephen, crouching into the corner of the room.
"-cut!" as suddenly as her cries had started they stopped, she had slid down the wall and now was huddling in the corner. Wild eyes roved without focus around the room, tears and hair streaked across her face.
"Tick-tock. Tick-tock, tick-tock, tick-tock…"
The girl was wedged in between Jason and the wall of the end of the transport tube carriage. It was thirteen hours since he had grabbed her hand and let her lead him through Mars Dome 2 as though she was born their and they were now in Mars Dome 1. He had tried his best to hide her appearance, he bought a short plain shift like dress, pants, better fitting shoes and a plain long grey coat, and he had pulled her hair back into a messy bun. She still stood out but not as much as she had.
He glanced at her again and saw her face was slack, almost lifeless. Strapped to her body via rags he had found two bottles of a clear drug and two syringes. Her eyes were blank. She had said 'go all dark, then come true. Find the path back.'
After a while he had concluded she was telling him this was some sort of drug that would make her clear-headed. He only hoped it would, he had a feeling that was the only chance he had to first of all get out of this alive.
And second of all to figure out the 5 foot tall mystery that had now been put before him.
Marcus stood at the window looking into the observation room. Franklin had ordered everyone out and was now looking over her scan results while Sheridan had stalked off somewhere.
Marcus' palms were still slick with sweat, his mouth dry from tension. But the condition he was in was nothing he had a feeling compared to the young woman inside the observation room. Franklin and the nurses had left the young woman in the corner for the time being given her disturbing ranting.
There was one thing that was really disturbing Marcus, an idea that was slowly turning over in his mind. First of all what was it that she had said to scare Sheridan like that? Sheridan had faced down the Vorlons and the Shadows. So what could a young obviously mentally disturbed woman say that could distress him? There was only one thing he could think of – a secret.
That line of reasoning led him down a very dark train of thought indeed. How would she know something Sheridan was that afraid of? And that led him to his friend's strange quirk. It was not something his friend had admitted easily but Jason's fascination with the Psi-Corps and what they did to their own specifically had begun when he was a kid and his best friend had disappeared into the Corps.
It was something Marcus and others had warned him about. Being a ranger was dangerous, a ranger with a unhealthy interest in the Psi-Corps and particularly Black-Ops operations inside the Corps. Something that was likely to end in a quiet disappearance or permanent residency in a mental institution.
The girl had lifted her hand, it flicked out at the air, fluttering through the air before snapping, like she was trying to catch insects with her fingers.
Sheridan came back into the room, Marcus saw that his face was still pale and pinched. Sheridan gave him barely a glance as he watched the girl lying in the corner. After a few moments of shifting from foot to foot Shridan let loose an explosive breath.
"She's a Telepath." It wasn't really a question. But Marcus nodded anyway.
"That's my thought. She could be on dust" Sheridan nodded curtly, but those a dust-addict 'raped' didn't get to stand there and come to the conclusion that their mind had been violated, they were unconscious from the brutality of the assault on their mind. As Franklin came over the Doctor's face had a look of indignation and disgust that made Marcus' stomach twist.
"Well?" asked Sheridan shortly.
"I will need to run more tests." Said Franklin.
"But?" asked Sheridan impatiently. Franklin gave him a look.
"The simple version? She's a Telepath, the test ran a simple genetic test which caught that at least." Sheridan looked back at the girl, eyes narrowed. "But – and this is the real but – she has had extensive – and I mean extensive surgery."
"Surgery?" asked Sheridan. Franklin motioned for them to follow him.
"Come have a look." He led them over to a large screen on which an image of a skull was rotating. He hit a button and the image stopped moving. "See here, here and here." He indicated three marks on her forehead. And then he typed in a command. The image shifted to show the incision points lead inside her skull.
"Basically, they've gone in and – and… And lobotomized her…" he looked up.
"They took out part of her brain?" asked Sheridan quizzically, Franklin shrugged slightly.
"And put something in…" he changed the image again to the base of the skull on the back of the neck. A black spider-like mark spread across the base of her skull and into her brain…
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