A/N: It occurred to me that I hadn't updated this in while... sorry about that. I always start out my stories while they are not completely meshed out. Meaning that there usually are one or more major plot holes. I always solve them, it just took me a little bit longer with this one. I'm on chapter 10 right now, but I need to be sure I don't need to do any more foreshadowing in the chapter I put out, so that's why I'm holding back on posting.

Solved the plot hole now. On with it.

Edit 3/5/2008: Corrected a mistake. Nobody noticed so far, but I feel stupid.


LOST

Chapter 7: Hypnotic


It turned out that we could get closer to the cabin by car than the road I had walked to a little less than a month ago. A small, narrow back road, a trail really, lead all the way up into the hills and the forest, twisting and turning until I had no longer any idea of direction. The cloudy sky provided no clue as to which was south, and the map Maddie was holding just showed a lot of green with a thin black line on it, depicting this very road. I looked at it over her shoulder, but either it wasn't a very good map or I'm not good at reading maps. Or maybe both.

The police car in front of us had considerably more trouble with the bumpy road than the Fenton GAV, and I was glad I was riding with Jack and Maddie, even if Jack was driving the thing. Jazz was off to college, and I felt both glad and uneasy that she wasn't there. For some reason she was very protective of me, even more so than my... parents. It was nice and disturbing.

Finally, we stopped at a small clearing. I saw no sign of the cabin anywhere, but somebody had tied some yellow crime scene tape to a tree, and upon closer inspection I could see a narrow trail leading into the forest. The doors of the police car opened, and detective Raskin and Mrs Crown got out. They both looked frazzled. Jack, Maddie and I got out of the GAV, and the five of us stood there for a moment, looking at each other. Then Raskin opened the trunk of his car and told us to go ahead up the trail, it was only a thirty minute walk, he'd follow.

"Danny?"

I looked behind me, at Mrs Crown's smiling face.

"How are you holding up?"

She was prodding again. When we met in front of the police station early this morning, she had objected again to Raskin, arguing that it would be better to do it in a more neutral environment. It could traumatize me beyond repair. It was against her strongest advice. Both Raskin and I took note of it and then dismissed it. Jack looked worried and Maddie slightly desperate.

"I'm fine," I said do her, "It's no big deal. There's nothing in that cabin that scares me."

Other than the fact that I had sat there, staring at the blood pouring out of my arm, wondering whether anybody would miss me. Staring at the trains go by at the railroad track, wondering what it would be like to see the thing approach at me. Staring at an empty beer can wondering how much more I could drink before I passed out.

I pushed all of that away. I was way better off now. I had a home, a family, a life. I had a billionaire family friend who took care of my hospital bills and lawyers. I would not go to jail. Too bad I betrayed my new found friends to get here.

It took us even less than thirty minutes to arrive at the cabin, and I examined it from the outside. It was sort of like I remembered it, only it looked even more shaggy and run down. Nobody had lived in it for years. It was probably some sort of hunter's cabin. I followed Maddie inside.

The light shining through the dirty window was barely enough to see by, so Maddie took the old oil lamp from the shelf and lit it. She had brought some oil with her to fill it, and I was surprised until I remembered she had been here before. Then she quickly cleaned the table with a rag she had brought, wiping off black dust.

"Fingerprints," she explained to me as I ran my finger over the back of the one remaining chair, "They took them from all over the cabin. Most of them were your's, there were some others too but they told me they were very old. You were here on your own."

I nodded and examined the wall behind the bed. There were indeed scorch marks there, three parallel ones, as if it was hit with some sort of blow torch. I couldn't make anything from it, but it looked recent. Some dark stains on the floor, and a lager stain near the table. Maddie saw me looking and swallowed.

"Blood," she said. "Yours."

I just nodded. Dr Crown, who had been standing outside waiting for detective Raskin and Jack, entered and looked around. I saw her eyes move from the scorch marks above the bed to the dark stains on the floor. Her eyes widened, and she glanced a my arm before looking away. I started shifting uncomfortably. If she thought I was suicidal, she'd have me locked up.

Then Raskin entered with the video equipment and started setting things up, putting the camcorder on a tripod in the corner near the door, next to the dirty mirror. I remembered that first look at myself, the amazement at what I saw, and how it somehow didn't connect to the feeling of who I was. Jack stood in the doorway, surveying the room, seemingly unsure of his place. His bulk took almost all the light away.

"All set?" Raskin asked.

Dr Crown sighed, looked at me and Maddie for conformation and then sat down on the one remaining chair. Raskin shot us one last look and, as by agreement, stepped outside. I had flatly refused to let him stay in there with me. That was what the video equipment was for. He was going to look at it afterwards. Plus, if I said something that implicated me, he'd have it on tape. The man who was my father had stepped aside to let him out, looked at me and Dr Crown one more time and then left to keep Raskin company. I hoped Raskin liked ghosts.

I sat down on the bed, my back against the wall. Maddie sat down next to me, and I looked expectantly at Dr Crown. This was it. Now we would find out. She reached behind her and pressed the play button of the small cassette player she had brought. A soft, esoteric sounding music filled the room.

"Alright, Danny, let's begin by taking a deep breath in."

I was nervous. I didn't know what was going to happen, not exactly, although she had explained it to me. Hypnosis, Dr Crown had said, isn't about mind control, or making you do funny things without you being aware of it. It's a heightened state of awareness, and you are in full control. She had told me that, and I knew it, but I was still jittery. Maybe because of the video camera standing in the corner, pointing at me.

"Breathe out, let your body relax, let your shoulders drop, let your mind relax, let all the muscles in your face relax. Listen to the sound of my voice. Notice how quickly you can let your body and your mind relax. Because you want it to happen."

I tried to to as she said, still looking at the camera. The cabin itself didn't worry me as much as I had thought it would. It was just there, even shabbier than I remembered, and the only time I shivered was when I looked at the dark stains on the floor again. My blood.

"Another deep breath. This time, as you let it out, let your eyes close. Shoulders dropping, jaw relaxing, you feel relaxed."

I closed my eyes and concentrated on her voice. The strange, esoteric music coming from the small cassette player drifted in and out of my mind. I felt comforted by the fact that Maddie, my mother, was sitting on the edge of the bed, watching quietly. Mrs Crown's voice droned on.

"You allow yourself to be more relaxed than you ever thought you could. Let your eyes roll up inside of your eyelids, as if you're looking up inside your own head. You're looking at the mind's eye. You can see. You can solve problems, easily, effortlessly. Imagine that you are seeing your mind's eye."

This was weird. Not at all like you see in the movies, where someone would swing a watch in front of somebody's eyes and told them they felt sleepy. I didn't feel hypnotized at all. Not that I knew what it should feel like.

"Maybe you see a color, or twinkling lights, or maybe just darkness, let the music relax you, let my voice relax you. Every word that I say floats into your mind, let yourself float to that place in your mind that knows, on the count of three, let your eyelids relax."

Her voice was now the only thing that existed. I listened to her as she talked to me in that soothing voice, not really thinking anything in particular. It was rather nice, really. I felt more relaxed than ever before.

"Danny, I want you to think back to the day you woke up. You woke up, alone, in this cabin. You can open your eyes if you want, and look around. You're waking up and you look around. What do you see?"

I opened my eyes and looked around. A strange place, a shabby place. My eyes wandered over the table, the two chairs, the filthy window with red, flowery rags for curtains. I wondered where I was.

"A strange place," I said, "A cabin of sorts."

Light filtered through the window, sunbeams shining on the floor and the table. How did I get there?

"How are you feeling, Danny?"

Danny? My breathing quickened. The person speaking to me called me Danny. It must be my name, but I didn't remember. I didn't remember anything. Fear spread over me and I whimpered. It'll come to me in a minute, I thought, it has to, everybody knows their name...

"Scared," I whispered, "Who am I? How did I get here? I want to go home..."

"Take it easy, Danny, you have nothing to worry about, you are relaxed and you feel wonderful. Take a deep breath. Return to that safe place, the mind's eye, the place where you can solve all your problems. If you want to close your eyes, you can."

I relaxed instantly and closed my eyes. I had nothing to worry about.

"Danny, we are going to take you further back. You are not in the cabin, but you're going to be there. You don't know that yet, but you're just about to enter the cabin. Tell me where you are, Danny."

Darkness. Cold. Death. Bony hands, touching me. Infinity. I was stuck somewhere, I couldn't see, only hear. Somehow, seeing was blocked, I wasn't allowed to see. I heard voices, some screaming, some whispering. I clawed around aimlessly, searching for a way out, a way to the light, I knew I could do it. And then I saw it. An escape...

I was dreaming. I was sure I was dreaming, because I was flying, flying over the town. I could see the park, the pond, the playground, little toy cars on the road, people walking, small, like ants. It was pleasant. I liked flying.

And then, suddenly, darkness engulfed me and I was alone, floating, cold. A booming voice started talking to me and I tried to listen, but I couldn't understand what he was saying. I strained my ears, knowing it was essential that I would hear, that I needed to do as he said, but I just couldn't make out the words.

Then pain shot through me, through my arms, my legs and I wanted to scream, but I had no air. I needed to stay silent... silence was my only defense. I closed my eyes and endured it. They'd stop, I knew they'd stop, they always stopped, eventually.

And then I was breathing again. Slowly. I was on my back, laying... on a bed? Moving my hands a little, I felt the fabric of the sheets beneath me. Confused, I tried to open my eyes, involuntarily letting out a long moan.

"He's coming to."

A familiar voice, sounding relieved. Again, I tried to open my eyes, this time with a little more success. I squinted up at the hazy frame with brown hair and some blue jump suit.

"M-Maddie," I whispered.

The dream was fading away, thankfully, as I managed to open my eyes all the way and focus on my mother, standing next to the bed, and my father, standing next to her. I looked around. I seemed to be laying in some kind of hospital room, white, with large windows overlooking part of the town.

"What the hell happened?" I asked.

Maddie's mouth twitched and I saw a tear coming from her eyes, but then she visibly gathered herself together. Jack wrapped his arms around her shoulders.

"Mrs Crown will be here shortly, she'll explain," she said.

I shook my head.

"What happened," I demanded, sitting up in the bed.

Bad move. The room started spinning as if I had drunk too much, an all too familiar feeling. I fell back on the bed.

"I didn't drink anything," I said dejectedly.

"I know you didn't, sweetie, we... they had to sedate you. It's the sedation wearing off, that's what you're feeling."

Sedate me? How bad had it been? I didn't remember... A cold fear gripped me. I didn't remember. Again. How come I didn't remember? What was wrong with me? I started to sweat.

"I don't remember," I said, panic clear in my voice.

"No, you don't," the voice of Dr Crown came from the door.

She stepped into the room and closed the door softly behind her.

"What did you do to me? What happened? Why am I sedated?" I asked, the words tumbling out of my mouth.

Dr Crown grabbed a chair and sat down next to me, a serious expression on her face.

"You don't remember because you didn't want to. And you were sedated because you were extremely stressed over something."

I looked outside. It seemed to be around noon. I couldn't have been out for long. Dr Crown saw my gaze and cleared her throat.

"You've slept for more than twenty-four hours. We, um, had to use a high dosage on you. You seemed to resist the first shot."

"So that's why I feel so crappy," I grumbled, "I'd rather have a hangover. At least I'd get something out of it first."

Maddie looked shocked. I had noticed that the beer was gone from the refrigerator in the morning, yesterday morning. Jazz or Maddie? It was probably for the best.

"Would you like to talk about that, Danny?" Dr Crown asked in that friendly, calm voice of hers, a voice that I suddenly hated.

"No," I said.

I looked her directly in the eyes.

"I wanna see the tape."

She looked at my mother, who frowned back at her.

"I don't know," she said, "I don't think..."

"Then don't think. It's my tape. Let me see it. Did Raskin take it with him?"

She shook her head.

"So there wasn't anything useful on it then."

She got up. "Rest," she said, "Recover. We'll see about the tape."

With that, she left the room. Maddie was fidgeting a little, and then moved closer.

"Danny," she said awkwardly, "Jazz talked to me. About the beer..."

I looked away. "Just keep it out of my reach," I said.

I wanted to tell her I really didn't want to drink the stuff, but that it was so easy to do it, so easy to let my mind numb over until I didn't feel anything anymore. That I didn't know what it was like to be happy, as happy as the boy in the picture, the boy that was me and yet wasn't me at all. That I could only laugh when I was drunk.

Instead, I said, "When can I go home?"

It turned out that I could leave whenever I felt up to it, so I declared myself up to it and we left, Jack practically carrying me. At home, I laid down on the couch and watched TV the whole afternoon, feeling better by the hour. Jazz came home, dumped her book bag on the floor and uncharacteristically sat next to me instead of installing herself in the kitchen with her books. I didn't look at her and kept staring at the cartoon on the screen, not really taking in what was happening.

"Mom told me what happened," she said.

I watched a cartoon kid get smacked by his red head sisters who looked oddly familiar. I sympathized with him.

"Are you gonna keep on ignoring me?"

To make a point, I kept staring at the silly cartoon, which also, it seemed, involved a talking dog. I didn't want her analyzing me.

"Danny you can't keep doing this."

"Watch me."

I grabbed the remote and switched channels, landing myself in a CSI version. Jazz grabbed the remote from my hands and shut the TV off.

"Hey," I said, "I was watching that."

"How are you feeling?" she asked.

"Fine, now gimme that."

I got up and tried to get the remote from her, but she jumped backwards and I stumbled over the soda cans I had accumulated next to the couch. With a thud, I landed on the floor.

"Come on," she said, "You haven't been in the lab yet. Maybe that'll jog your memory."

I hadn't been in the lab because I didn't want to go down there. Whatever it was that was pulling at me, it was coming from there and I didn't want to deal with it.

"Come on," she said, "You live in this house. You can't avoid it forever."

I didn't see why not, but maybe she was right. I sighed and rubbed my eyes, glad that this time she didn't start about me having powers. She had been watching me like a hawk whenever she was home, constantly hinting at strange things I should be able to do. Deciding that it was easier to give in instead of having her nag me the whole evening, I followed her downstairs.

It was nothing like I expected. For starters, the place was huge. It had desks and shelves and closets, all overflowing with what looked like old household appliances. There were soldering irons, loose wires sticking out of half finished inventions, overflowing trashcans, vials containing strange, glowing liquids and a huge metal door.

It was the door that caught my attention. The door was the source of the strange feeling I had whenever I was in the house. I suddenly found myself right in front of it, without remembering having moved at all.

"The ghost portal," Jazz said.

Maddie, who had been in the lab working on something that involved a lot of wiring, stood next to me.

"Our biggest achievement," she said, "Come, I'll show you."

She dragged me away from it and led me to a huge red button.

"Press it," she said happily, "It's a genetic lock. Only a Fenton can open it."

I pressed the button and the doors slid aside. Figures. I was a Fenton. I stared at the strange, green swirling. Maddie was talking to me, but I didn't hear what she was saying, mesmerized by the chill that came off the open portal. I wanted to touch it, feel it, breathe it. My heart was pounding, a slow thump, thump in my ears, blocking all other sound. The tenuous grip I had started slipping away.

Someone shook my shoulders and I blinked. Jazz came into focus, her green eyes looking worried. Behind me, Maddie was still talking, oblivious.

"Close your eyes," Jazz hissed, "They're glowing green. Control it."

Suddenly, I wanted out of there. I closed my eyes obediently and turned myself away from the alluring portal.

"I'm tired," I said abruptly to Maddie, who stopped in mid sentence.

"Oh," she said, "Alright, sweetie, we'll do this some other time then."

I left, letting Jazz guide me up the stairs back into the living room. I sat down on the couch again and wrapped my arms around myself, still acutely aware of the entrance of the ghost zone beneath me. Jazz knelt in front of me and looked me straight into the eyes.

"Look," she said earnestly, "I know you don't want me to say this but I'm going to anyway. You have ghost powers. Look."

She pulled out a strange device she must have grabbed from the lab and turned it on.

"Ghost detected," the thing said in a metallic, flat voice.

She pointed it at me.

"Ghost right in front of you. You must be an idiot not to see the ghost."

She turned it off and put it down.

"All ghost equipment responds to you," she said, and now I heard the despair in her voice, "Danny, you have to try. We have to find Sam and Tucker. You're a hero, Danny, you've never abandoned anybody. They count on you."

I got up, suddenly angry. I didn't want to be a ghost. Ghosts were dead. I was very much alive.

"They shouldn't," I growled, "I'm no hero. I'm a criminal, a loser, a nobody. Just leave me alone."

I ran upstairs, leaving her sitting in front of the couch, looking defeated. Instead of going into my own room, I walked into my parents room, reached under the bed and retrieved the sixpack of beer they had hidden there. Six, I thought, would probably be enough.



They found out – of course they found out, they couldn't really not find out – and hauled me straight back to Mrs Crown the next morning. She tried to get me to talk about what had led me to drink myself unconscious, but I just looked at the floor and said nothing. Her friendly voice droned on in my ears as I studied the design of the Persian carpet on the floor, following it's lines and curves, trying to make sense of it. It was easier than trying to make sense of my life.

Finally, she gave up and called in my parents and Jazz, who had been waiting outside. I didn't look at them when they entered, knowing I had let them down and they'd probably hate me now. I couldn't help who I was, couldn't face myself and felt totally and utterly lost.

My mother sat down next to me and hugged me, and I cringed. She let go. Mrs Crown sighed.

"I'm going to recommend that we increase the therapy sessions," she said, "Whatever it is that is causing his depression and his anxiety attacks, we need to get out in the open so we can treat it. Daniel, I want you to come in daily after school next week. I'd prescribe medication, but I need a diagnosis for that, and right now I can't give you one. If that doesn't work..." She looked at me sternly, "We may have to put you in a closed facility to protect you from yourself."

Great. I was crazy. I shuddered at the thought of being locked up again, so I looked up at her pleadingly.

"Please don't lock me up," I said, "I won't do it again, I promise."

I meant it. I felt horrible, not only from the after effects of the alcohol, but also because I knew I was a disappointment. They counted on me to help them find Sam and Tucker, and all I could do is crawl into my little hole and get drunk.

"We got rid of everything containing alcohol in the house," Maddie said, her voice quavering, "And you can't go out and buy some. I know you didn't want to do it, sweetie, and I'm sorry I didn't notice how stressed you were last night."

She sounded sincere.

"But," she continued, sounding a little bit more secure, "I'm not sure if it's a good idea for him to start school on Monday..."

"No!" I jumped up. "Don't let me hang around the house all day! It drives me crazy!"

As long as I was distracted, I thought I would be alright, although the idea of going to school brought about a whole new source of anxiety. They would all remember me, and I wouldn't know anybody. Fortunately, Mrs Crown seemed to agree with me, so she convinced Jack and Maddie not to keep me at home. Meeting with fellow students, she said, might do me good. It might even jog my memory, although I heard the insincerity in her voice. She didn't really believe that.

We rode home in the absurd Fenton GAV, Jazz and me sitting in the back, Jack driving in his usual kamikaze way. I was actually getting used to it.

"I'm sorry, Danny," Jazz said, leaning over to whisper in my ear, "I know I caused it. If I had known you'd find the beer I wouldn't have."

I glanced at her and shrugged. In the end, it was my own fault. I was the one who didn't want to face his past. She was just trying to help me. I told her that and she looked relieved.

"Good," she said, "Then you won't hate me for what I'm gonna do to you later."

She refused to elaborate, and that got me very worried. I just knew she was planning some psychological assault on me to force me to remember, and although I sort of agreed with her that it was necessary – Mrs Crown wasn't getting anywhere – I didn't know how to handle another emotional breakdown without...

I didn't finish that thought. I had promised. I would keep that promise.


If you're wondering about the hypnosis gibberish, I listened to a tape, OK? Didn't want to bore you with all of it, so I abridged it. A lot.