VII
Dinner
Liz sat on the bed, staring at the telephone by her nightstand. She knew that once she picked it up there was no way she could dial away from this complex, but still, the hope wouldn't die until she actually picked it up and heard for herself.
Max was taking a shower, so she had scouted the length of their apartment to see what there was to find. Ray had just gotten them to the corner of the hall, and saying that he would leave them alone till dinner time around 9:00 p.m., had disappeared just like Dave had done two hours before. Now it was almost 3:30 p.m., and she was feeling all the weariness of the day wash all over her body. Sure, she had taken a nap with Max earlier, but since she had been all tense and stressed out, it hadn't exactly done wonders for her need for rest. Now that she was somewhat calmer, sleepiness was trying to win her over, her body not caring what was worrying her mind.
Still, the phone had made her forget all about her tiredness and think all about the world that was beyond these walls. Who would she call first? Her parents, of course, and then Max's parents, and then Jim, and last Amy. There was no one else she needed to talk to… She blinked once, then twice, her eyes refusing to leave the white object. Dave had said he would arrange the ways for them to talk to their parents, and actually, she needed time to think what else she was going to say after "I love you so much and I miss you with all my heart." Because, come on, granted, she had sent her journal, and they should understand why she had done what she had done, but…
When they had decided to call their parents, it had been against the clock. One minute for each one of them. So, basically, she had said "I'm fine, I love you, I miss you. I might not call again for some time. Bye." She could still remember her mother crying in the background for her father to give her the phone. Oh, he had been beyond mad at Max for taking her away, and at her, for being foolish enough to throw her future away as well.
"No, Dad, I swear you'll understand—"
"When are you coming home? For crying out loud! You are only 19! Do you think—"
"Dad! Listen, I'm going to hang up in seven seconds, okay?"
"Why!"
"Because I love you!"
Because she loved them. Her journal had been sent that same morning, just a week after her wedding. Gosh, she hadn't even got to tell her parents she had married Max. Except that, assuming her journal had arrived, now they knew… now they knew everything, and she had no idea what they were going to say. Now she wished she would only have one minute to hear all about it and be done with it.
Her eyes went to the side of the phone and stayed on a small yellow book. "Phone guide", it read in black letters. She picked it up and went through its pages at once. There were about 120 labs listed in there, and another 43 non-research phone numbers as well. At the back of the guide was written: "If you wish to call any apartment, press 444 – 0 + the number of the apartment."
The phone rang.
Liz froze.
The second ring brought her out of her shock. Quickly, she left the phone guide at her side and picked up the phone.
"Yeah?"
"Oh! Hi!" A female voice said in the other side of the receiver. "I thought you still weren't home." Liz winced at the word. Well, I'm not home, she absently thought. "I'm Samantha, and I was wondering if you—"
"The analyst?" Liz cut her off. She remembered the name. She had been the one who had been analyzing her engagement ring. Neither Dave nor Ray had said anything about any lab test starting today. Ray had even said that they would meet at dinner time, so—
"Yeah, I work as an analyst. But William and I were wondering if you would like a visit from your neighbors. We know how it feels to be in here and all." Samantha sounded… well, cheerful. Was Samantha –and apparently William- in here because of some sort of deal? Were they supposed to talk about their own deals at all? Liz chewed her lower lip.
"Hello?" Samantha said, thinking Liz wasn't there anymore.
"Um, well, you know, Max and I have just come—"
"Who is it?" Max asked coming out of the bathroom, wearing a pair of gray pants and just a white towel over his shoulders. It isn't fair, Liz thought staring at him, Max already knows what his bare chest does to me. It made all her thoughts collide with each other, to say the least.
"Oh, I understand", Samantha was saying, "we can wait till you are settled down, leave it for another occasion…"
"Hold on a second," Liz put her hand over the speaker. "It's Samantha."
"The analyst?" Max said tensing.
"Apparently, she's not one right this moment. She wants to visit us as in some sort of 'welcome to the neighborhood' thing or something." Max thought for a second.
"Ask her if she can come tomorrow, so we can all gather in here. It can't harm us to have information from other sources, can it?"
"Samantha?"
"Yeah?"
"As I was telling you, we are just coming in, but if you would like to come tomorrow? We'll gather the others so you'll get to meet all of us," Liz said trying very hard to sound as cheerful as Samantha was being. Gosh, how could she manage? And would they even have the time to meet anyone tomorrow? Who knew what Dave or Ray would want then?
"Fabulous. We'll be there then. Oh, and so you know, we are in apartment number 156. Bye."
Hanging on, Liz turned to see Max sitting in the bed, throwing his towel on a nearby chair. She was about to tell him about the phone guide and how that would help them to see what they could choose to study, but she stopped herself before starting. Max looked tired, just like she was feeling. When they had left Maria's apartment half an hour before, the six of them had said what exactly they wanted to do now: Sleep. Michael had stayed with Maria, while Isabel and Kyle had gone to their own apartments. Kyle had said that he couldn't believe he was having his own room for the first time in ages, making Isabel glare at him.
"We should get some sleep," Liz said reaching for him and softly pushed him down. Max didn't resist. Instead, he put his arm around her, so they both were lying in the middle of the bed. In the silence of the room, Liz started to review everything they had done in the past 24 hours, and she started to doubt it all. The fears she had so desperately tried to hush were now getting louder.
"Are we doing the right thing?" Liz asked above a whisper, knowing that Max's voice would make her doubts go quiet for a while.
"If we had let Samantha come now, Michael would have killed us for waking him up, not to mention Maria…"
"You're right…" Liz answered, pretending that that had been the meaning of her question to begin with. Max only did that when he wasn't sure of the answer either. He would just re-direct the question to something else, something that, generally, would make her laugh. It was just that now none of them were laughing…
"God, I love you," Max whispered breaking the silence, while accommodating her so she would fit perfectly beside his body, her head between his chin and his left shoulder. Max held her closer, opening their connection in a total way for the first time since they had passed through the gates of the complex.
He was feeling everything she was feeling ten times worse. In so many ways Max was just human, with as many and as strong feelings as she had, but it was in times like these, when he was really scared, that it hit her for how long Max had been hiding and what he had been hiding too. How long he had been thinking about ending in places like this one or worse, about being separated from his family. Feelings that put everything he had done for her in perspective. He had risked his safety to save her… had risked his heart later on so she could know who he really was. That it was still him and not some monster from outer space. At least Dave didn't seem to think that of Max, and that was what gave her hope that it would work.
"I think we did the right thing," she answered her own question, Max tightening his embrace around her, but his own fears diminishing a little bit.
"I want to believe that so bad," he said quietly, caressing her back in a slow motion, making her feel sleepier by the second. He was closing his side of the connection now, trying to let her fall asleep without any obstacle. The light of the room grew dimmer, and by almost closed eyes she could see Max's right hand aiming at the light controller, one of those that let people chose how intense they wanted the light to be.
"It has its advantages," Liz barely murmured referring to Max's powers, feeling Max's chest move with the sound of quiet laughter.
"Yeah, it does," he replied sounding sleepy himself. Let's just hope, she thought before falling asleep, that when we wake up we'll still be here and not someplace else…
-------------------------------------Isabel tossed and turned on her bed, on her perfectly comfortable bed, with her perfectly comfortable pillow… but there was no way on Earth she would just fall asleep. She had too many worries in her head, too many questions to be able to. Every second that passed, she grew more and more impatient, and the desire to talk to someone about what was eating her inside grew deeper too.
She usually had Kyle to wake up in the middle of the night to talk about what was bothering her. Granted, it had only happened three or four times during all their time together, but having Kyle nearby was enough to make her feel calm. Now Kyle had his own room -apartment, really- and she was all alone. Usually she wouldn't mind the commodity and the luxury of privacy, but not this time… Could she just dreamwalk Kyle and be over with it?
But it wasn't Kyle who she needed to talk to right now. As lovely and receptive and… well, Kyle-ness as Kyle was, he didn't really understood what it was to be like her, like them. She needed to talk to Max, not only because he was her brother, but because right now she wasn't in the mood to hear Michael complaining about everything. As a matter of fact, she had her own complaining to do. But she had to wait a little bit longer. Give time Max to fall asleep and start dreaming. Otherwise, there wouldn't be any dream to actually walk in…
Max usually fell asleep pretty fast, and started to dream before ten minutes hit. She had learned all about Max's habits of sleeping during that long summer three years ago, when they were trying to not jump at every shadow thinking an unknown enemy was hiding there, waiting to attack them or anyone they cared about. She had learned it in order to help him, because back then Max wouldn't dare to fall asleep knowing what his subconscious was waiting to show him. She had only gotten glimpses of it when she had dreamwalked him to rescue him, so she only had ideas of her own about what Max could have been dreaming of.
That first week after hearing their mother's message had been… disastrous would have been an understatement. Of catastrophic proportions was closer to the truth for all of them, but not quite there. There was just not a word to describe it. With finals, dealing with Valenti, dealing with themselves and their new roles, with Tess still adapting to their group, with Liz avoiding Max and Michael avoiding Maria… she still wasn't sure how she had gotten through it all, Alex having a big part in her conserving her sanity. To the contrary, Max had just shut himself up, had gone through the whole mess almost in automatic, not even bothering to study because that would have required actual thinking, and had pretty much just collapsed in his bed every night. But as the week wore off, so did his defenses.
"I don't think I can put it off anymore," Max had said in a tired tone that Friday night when every single high school scholar was out partying, celebrating the end of classes. She had gone to his bedroom to finally start discussing what they were going to do for the summer, but instead she had found him sitting in his bed with a white small plastic bottle in his hands. He was reading the label over and over again, almost as if searching for any mistake.
Isabel recognized it almost immediately. They were their father's sleeping pills that he took when he was too stressed out to conciliate sleep. What was Max thinking? She didn't dare to ask, she didn't let herself go into that train of thought either. Instead, she just stood in the doorway, watching how Max started yet one more time to read the whole thing. He finally turned his face to her, looking way beyond tired and way beyond worried for someone who had just gone through finals. No wonder her parents had started to worry.
"I really don't think I can go to sleep without seeing… it… all over again—"
"Max, maybe I can help you… maybe if I'm in your dream—"
"No! I don't want you to see it, okay? It was bad enough that you had to when you were trying to find out where I was, but I don't want you to do it now. There's no reason for you to know it. So, I'm just thinking of taking one of these to see if I can sleep through the night."
Realization had hit her then. He wasn't thinking about taking the whole bottle, but just one pill. Their dad always said that those pills were miraculous, made him sleep like a rock. The problem was that they didn't know how it would affect them. When they were kids they never got sick, so why bother with trying any kind of medicine, right? And when they had grown up a little bit more, and read a little bit more about biology, a new fear had settled in their minds: What would happen if they had to take medicines? Would it react the same way? So Max reading and reading about the warnings and all that over and over again was to see if somehow he could guess if it was safe or not. But the fear of dreaming overcame the fear of the unknown.
And, oh, it had worked. It had worked so perfectly well that Max had not only slept through all Friday night, but through all Saturday morning and half the afternoon as well. She had tried calling his name and shaking him a little, but nothing so subtle worked. She had been so worried by 3:00 p.m. that she had called Michael.
"How could he be so irresponsible!" Michael had exploded, the first discussion of that summer about Max's decisions of many, many, to come.
"You can't blame him for wanting to sleep!" she had defended her brother. Michael had glared at her. Max hadn't wanted to talk about anything that had happened to him, he had kept saying that it was over and that that was enough. But Michael had seen how weak Max had been when he had rescued him. Michael had his own ideas of what had happened to his best friend in there, so he hadn't argued the point. For once.
"We need to get more help to know what we should do," Isabel had said, sitting by her brother's side. At least sleeping like that he wasn't having any nightmares.
They would have called Liz to see if she knew anything about this, but the girl had disappeared off the map –they would know days later that she was in Florida- and they were all alone. There was Tess, of course, who they weren't still perfectly comfortable with, and then, there was Valenti… Still, like Michael had answered back, "who the hell is going to know what to do?"
Which had led to the obvious answer: Nasedo. He had to know what to do, didn't he? But Nasedo had been gone for six days now, and they weren't even sure of how to contact him. In that early time, he hadn't given them the number to reach him, things at the Special Unit being too chaotic to risk such thing. Not only did he have to impersonate Pierce and avoid all their X-ray scanners, he had to make a believable story as to why he was no longer interested in at least one certified alien. And yet they could try, sure, and Isabel was willing to risk the exposure again if that meant saving her brother's life.
But Max had woken up half an hour later, more tired than rested and with a headache. That hadn't stopped Michael from arguing with him or Isabel from telling him one or two things about worries and risks. It didn't matter; Max already knew he didn't want to keep taking them. This had finally led him that night years ago to ask her for help.
Isabel looked at her watch. Was it only 4:12 in the afternoon? But now sleepiness was finally winning her over. She would take her chance at Max being asleep now. Though it was harder to dreamwalk someone without a picture, it wasn't impossible, especially with Max sleeping in the next apartment to hers.
Back in their summer from hell, it had been the easiest thing to do, to dreamwalk Max, because he was expecting it. Though she couldn't change a thing about his dreams, she could tell him that he was actually dreaming. Because, after all, the worst part of a nightmare is that you don't know it isn't real. It had taken her brother about a month to recognize and change his dreams, to control them, but he had managed. Of course, by the time he had finally stopped having nightmares, their parents were so worried about his behavior that they had set him up with a therapist. It wasn't long before they set her up with her own appointments as well. But who could blame them for jumping at every sound and not wanting to go outside and keep arguing about what to do?
Isabel easily slid into the dream plane, and surprisingly, got just as easily into Max's dream as well. He was expecting her, she realized, when the dream version of her brother was sitting in a bench, right in the middle of their favorite playground at the park where they used to play when they were kids. It was just a perfect Sunday morning.
"I thought you might want to talk," he said with a knowing smile, "maybe about Jesse…"
Isabel closed her eyes at the mention of her husband's name. But was Jesse still her husband? Did she still have the right to think about him like that? She sat up by Max's right, the sounds of cars passing by and kids laughing in the distance almost making her forget that they were in a dream. Max's dreams were always so detailed. She had dreamwalked a lot of people, and had encountered a lot of dreams too. People who dreamed in black and white or with such brilliant colors it almost hurt to see. People who never put faces to the persons in their dreams or who never were part of their dreams at all, just like ghosts. But her brother's were the only ones that were so rich in detail of the real world, with sounds and smells and colors. She was almost sure that if he were dreaming that they were in a restaurant, she would be able to taste the food.
Putting a hand on her right shoulder, he pulled her closer to him, embracing her, making her head rest on his shoulder.
"He's okay wherever he is," he said in that quiet way of his that made her believe that he actually knew Jesse was okay. But he didn't know. None of them did.
"I thought that he would be covered too, you know?" she said, barely suppressing a sob. "That somehow Dave would bring it up, something about where Jesse was and how he was going to protect him. I was so certain he would bring Jesse into the deal… I was such a fool." Isabel ended, her own tears feeling so real in this dream world.
"No, you're not. I was expecting it too… but it wasn't my place to ask for him. Why didn't you do it?" Max tentatively asked. Isabel thought for a minute.
"I was about to… but if Dave doesn't know anything about Jesse now, then he must be safe... Dave would have known if the FBI had gotten to him, right?" She asked with fear, second guessing her own thoughts and conclusions, dreading what Max's answer would be.
"I would think so… yeah." Isabel relaxed a little bit. Of course, Max didn't know that either, but this time, it didn't bother her at all.
"So I thought that Jesse might just be getting over us, starting a new life. And if I opened my mouth he would be dragged again to our world. How could I do that to him, Max? If he's out there, finally living the life he was supposed to have to, why should I take it away from him again? Just so I could feel safer?"
"You would have done it to keep him safe," Max said, soothing her back.
"Are we doing the right thing Max? Things are turning into such… unexpected ways…" Isabel said straightening herself up, facing her brother.
"I know… it seems impossible that things might actually work for us for the better. It's kind of… kind of believing in miracles I guess… But I have a feeling it's time to try, or we are going to mess up this thing before we can do anything about it." Max paused for two seconds, as if weighing something, deciding whether to tell her something or not. He finally spoke again. "Still, I think Dave knows where Jesse is. It wouldn't make sense if he didn't, since he has taken such… precautions with us. I bet he was expecting you to say something about Jesse too. He would have had that covered."
"You seriously believe that, don't you?" Isabel said with fear, Max's perfect dream day starting to cover up with gray clouds. If it had been a real day, she would have expected rain in less than half an hour.
"Yes. Dave is keeping us here for something else, I just can feel it. The way he said that us staying in here made it easier for him to keep the record of our progress… there's something wrong about that. I don't know what it is yet, but I'm sure it has everything to do with whatever his real motives are." Max concluded frustrated. He had been thinking a lot about it, she was sure.
"If you are so certain that there's more than he's letting us see, why did you accept too? If you had said no, we wouldn't have doubted you, we would have backed you up," she said, confused and a little bit angry too. Why would Max have kept his mouth shut when he knew something was wrong?
"Because like I said to Maria, this is safe." Max said, resigned. "The FBI would have gotten to us sooner or later without Liz's guidance, that is true, but it is also true that while we are here, no one would want to see us dead. This is a shelter, even if a dangerous one, and we need to get in shape. Dave knows that too. Like Ray said, he must have thought about this a lot. Whatever he wants," Max said thinking it through, "he must want it so bad that he's willing to keep his part of the deal if only to keep us here. I bet that even if we break some rules he wouldn't mind."
Max's dream shifted, the temperature dropping, the sounds and the people disappearing. The park was virtually deserted now.
"That's why he's giving us such freedom down here," Max said more to himself than to her, "so there isn't much we can break… God, I wish I knew what he wants!" Max stood up, clearly angry at himself for not being able to figure it out.
"Do you think that it is dangerous?" she asked quietly, not wanting to upset him more, but needing to ask too.
"I don't know. But whatever it is he knows we wouldn't have accepted if we knew… or maybe we wouldn't have accepted for the right reasons… I just don't know. What if we really made a bad decision, Iz? What if we really shouldn't be here? What am I going to do if something happens to any of you?"
Rain started to fall, to pour actually, Max being completely oblivious to that, his eyes fixated on hers, as if she had the answers to that. But she didn't have any; she had actually come to get her own answers. How selfish of her, she thought, but it had been true. And now she was in Max's position, and it wasn't pretty.
"Max, you said it yourself: This is safe, and I believe that too. Even if my main reason was Jesse, everything Dave is offering us is what we need right now. That's why we all accepted. And we are going to figure out why he really wants us here, okay? We'll make that our goal."
As if he were a five year old who had been told to stop crying so he'll get an ice cream, Max simply nodded. "Okay," he said quietly, making himself believe that too. As fast as it had come, the rain just stopped falling, and Isabel wasn't surprised when she found herself dry, the logic of dreams never following the logic of the real world. Isabel stood up, going to her brother and embracing him in a soothing embrace. It was so weird to do that, it was he who always went to her. And for this once, being in Max's positions wasn't a bad thing.
"Just," Max said still in her embrace, "don't tell Michael about my theory about breaking rules, or he'll be more than happy to try it…"
"Deal."
---------------------------------------------
Actually, Michael was having his own theories about breaking rules. He was staring at the ceiling while holding a very asleep Maria beside him. It was 8:49 p.m., so dinner time was getting closer. Still, he didn't want to disturb her, so whatever "dinner" meant, it would have to go without her. There was no way he was going to wake her up when she could perfectly well sleep through the whole night. Tomorrow he would deal with her wrath about not being included, but right now… God, she looked like an angel, even when she was kicking the sheets in her sleep, and occasionally kicking him too. If someone dared to even hint that something would happen to her if he didn't cooperate…
Would they do that? Would Dave or Ray or whoever this Jake was do that? Just break the contract? What were they going to do then? Sue? He knew perfectly well there was no real way out of this, and yet, here they were. Michael could feel his own energy building up inside him, his frustration threatening to let his powers go and have some fun. His self control had to do wonders to keep him in check, because it was one thing to break things, and a whole different thing to put them together… He needed to calm down.
They –the aliens- had never really needed to sleep all that much to begin with, so he was now wide awake, trying to not drown himself in misery and frustration about being stuck in here. Which was a very hard thing to do, especially since he was an expert on seeing the dark side of things. But he had to try. They all feared the worst now with Max's revelation earlier about Dave not really wanting them to go, and if he had learned one thing on the road it was that panic, just like fear, was a contagious thing, a very bad contagious thing, and if you added frustration and anger and pointing fingers, you wouldn't get anything done at all. So, for the sake of the group, he needed to stay calm.
His eyes left the ceiling and stared at the picture that was hanging on the front wall. He hated it. It was about a bed of flowers losing their petals to the wind. He hoped that whatever was in his own apartment had nothing to do with flowers or something cheesy like that. Still, he kept staring at it. There was something odd with the frame. Even if the lights were completely off, the ceiling gave a certain light, a clarity to the room, almost as if there were moonlight rays entering. It was an eerie effect, but it was so dim that it didn't bother you to sleep. Still, in that almost non-existent light, Michael was trying to decipher what was wrong with the frame. Because he had seen something like that before, hadn't he?
Realization hit him, but he couldn't believe it at first. Was it one of those two inches flat plasma TV's? Because if it was, then he would be able to turn it on, right? Michael slowly raised his hand, expectation building inside of him. Did they have satellite too? Maybe this place wasn't going to be as bad as he thought…
A low knock on the front door ended his little experiment. Glancing at his watch he guessed it was Ray calling for dinner, and seriously, this schedule thing wasn't working for him. The knock repeated, and Michael glanced at Maria. Nope, he wasn't going to wake her up. So he slowly disentangled himself from her, Maria not even registering that he was moving, and giving an evil glare to the –hopefully- two inches flat plasma TV, left the room.
He got to the front door before whoever was outside knocked by the third time. Didn't they have door bells, now that he was thinking about it? Like he had paid all that much attention to begin with… He opened the door, and was surprised when he found Max standing there, wearing a t-shirt, pants and his favorite sneakers. Clearly, his clothes had been waiting in his apartment, just as Maria's had been in here. Michael hadn't checked his apartment yet, but sure enough, he knew his belongings would be there. The two boys stared at each other for two seconds. The weird thing being that Max was alone and not with Liz.
"I didn't want to wake up Maria," Max said before Michael could jump to any conclusions, as a way of explaining why he had knocked instead of using the door bell. Stepping outside, Michael just nodded. Closing the door behind him, he glanced to the corridor, his eyes lingering a moment on the camera that he couldn't see but that Ray had said was there earlier. He hated knowing he was being watched.
"Let's go to my apartment," Michael said starting to go to his left, assuming Max wanted to talk to him alone. Kyle, Maria and Michael's apartments were all in a row, while Max and Isabel's were in front of them. They were the only five apartments in the whole corridor. Every single corridor they had passed to get here had been the same.
"Actually," Max said turning to Michael's right, "we are going to Isabel's. We are having dinner there."
"What? Why? Aren't we supposed to meet with Ray for that?"
"He actually came here. He brought pizza too. He's there now," Max replied frowning a little, like the idea of Ray bringing pizza was somehow… odd. Which it certainly was.
"I don't like that we have to do whatever he wants," Michael said under his breath, changing his direction.
"I know," was Max's flat answer before they reached apartment # 136. When he entered, it surprised him that, aside from Isabel and Ray, there wasn't anyone else in there.
"Didn't want to wake up Liz?" he asked Max while Ray and Isabel both came out of the kitchen, she bringing some napkins and he bringing some sodas.
"No, and she's going to hate me for that tomorrow…" Michael just gave him an I-know-your-pain look before meeting with Ray. While the three men in the room where dressed pretty much in the same way –except that Ray was wearing a jacket- Isabel had clearly put more attention to what she was wearing: jeans and a gray sweater. How did she manage to look so… 'well dressed' just with that? There was never something off with whatever she was wearing… something Maria had complained a lot while on the road. Something he couldn't believe he was actually noticing now.
"I'm glad you could come," the older man said balancing the sodas to shake Michael's hand. If Max had been lucky enough to get a good flash earlier, Michael wasn't going to waste any opportunities of getting one himself. So he shook Ray's hand without hesitating. Rays' handshake was firm and short and, unfortunately, it didn't give him any flashes.
"Yeah… I thought we were going to the cafeteria. Isn't it open like you said?"
"Sure it is, but you barely got, what? Five hours of sleep? I thought about not coming at all, but since I had said I would, I thought I should bring dinner for you. I was surprised to find Max and Isabel already waiting for me."
Michael turned to look at Max, a hurt expression in his eyes. They had met Ray without him?
"We were just about to get you," Isabel said with a firm tone, not letting him doubt that it wasn't the truth. "I went to Max first and he was telling me that he wasn't going to wake up Liz when Ray crossed the corner."
Silence fell in the room, clearly the exchange of doubts and explanations in front of Ray making them uncomfortable.
"What kind of pizza did you bring?" Isabel jumped in, sounding a little bit too rushed, but Ray went for it, making the awkward moment go away.
"Well, I didn't know what to bring, so I brought just about everything I could," Ray said showing the three huge boxes that were waiting on the table in the middle of the living room. Michael was about to tell him that it was weird that he didn't already know their tastes in pizza, but let it pass. He had to play diplomatic if he wanted to get some answers, right? God, this was going to be one long evening…
"You really thought we were going to eat that much?" Isabel asked while sitting on the larger sofa, wincing her nose. Clearly, the girl had never seen Michael and his shift devouring one of these babies. Three pizzas like those would barely be enough for them. The three men followed her example and sat as well.
"You can always save it for breakfast," Ray said opening the first box, which apparently was half vegetarian, half Hawaiian.
"Men," Isabel said passing the cherry Cokes.
"And," Ray said reaching into one of the inner pockets of his jacket, "a guy at the gym told me he still had a bottle of Tabasco," he said with a smile, placing the half full jumbo size bottle on the table. Except that none of them smiled back. Michael just wanted to explode the damn thing as a statement of how much he hated them for knowing all those details and keep rubbing them in their faces. Ray noticed too, because leaning backward in his place he let his smile go as well. Instead, he sighed.
"Listen," he said in a serious way now, "I know you are all thinking what the hell are you doing here and that it isn't fair that we know so much about you. I was beyond mad when Dave approached me the first time too. But you accepted the deal and now we are all stuck in here with each other. I'm not your guard and I'm certainly not your baby sitter, but I do need that we start to build some trust or we are going to go nowhere." He paused, looking at each one of them in the eye, trying to make it sink in to them.
"Don't you think I'm scared too?" Ray asked, this time leaning forward, the three of them stared at him with surprise. "You are afraid of what we are going to do to you, but it goes both ways, you know? You could kill with a touch. Hell, you could kill me without even touching me. And I bet you can do worse things than that, but I have to trust that you won't. So I'm going to stop being Mr. Nice Guy if this isn't working for you, but you have to say what you want or you are not going to get it otherwise."
"We want more answers," Max said in the same serious tone, leaning forward as well, clearly not going to let the opportunity go.
Ray's eyes held doubt for two seconds. He certainly didn't like to be in this position, but it felt good that for once they weren't the ones being interrogated. "I'll tell you whatever I know if that's going to calm you down, but I'm sure most of those questions are for Dave to answer."
"Where is he?" Michael asked narrowing his eyes. This was about to get interesting.
"Sleeping, I guess." Ray replied shrugging, like whatever Dave was doing was not important to him, and shouldn't be important to them.
"Where was he earlier?" Isabel asked, her Cherry Coke completely forgotten in her hand.
"With Jake. Jake had an allergic reaction this morning, that's why he couldn't come. Jake and Dave have been friends since forever, so he had to check on him. By the time he was free you were already sleeping. There's no big mystery about what Dave does, you know?"
Yeah, right… Michael was sure both Max and Isabel were thinking exactly the same thing.
"What does he do?" Max asked, his expression firm, his body tense. "He said he travels a lot and has all these places, but what exactly does he do? Where do the resources to keep all this come from? Research?"
Ray seemed to doubt this one for a second, clearly not sure if he should answer or not. He glanced at them, almost as if deciding that, if he wanted trust, he needed to give a little too. The thing that Ray didn't know was that, no matter how hard he tried, none of them would actually trust him. They couldn't afford to.
"In part, but not really. Those are his projects, you can say. What Dave really does is to get information and sell it later on; all kind of information, from all kind of sources. He also uses it as he sees fit."
"Blackmail?" Isabel elaborated.
"Sure, why not? To intimidate, to get favors, to keep people where he wants them to be. Just about anything you can think of."
"So he has some sort of spy agency?" Max said, a little confused.
"No, he's the intermediary between the spies and whoever they work for. Do you have any idea how hard it is to pass information from one point to the other? Most of the work he does is just that, doing that particular service. There's no more lucrative value than information. And you know what they say about information: It's power. That's why he researches as well… it's kind of a circle, I guess. Projects create information as well."
"And now we are his next project," Max said as a matter of fact. Michael knew that his friend was barely holding in check, his whole body tense, sending angry vibes impossible to miss.
"I don't know if he would call you that," Ray said reaching for a piece of pizza. Maybe that lonely hot dog from lunch hadn't been enough, Michael absently thought.
"What would he call us?" Isabel said, still forgetting that she was holding a can in her hands, the thing just seconds from dropping to the floor.
"I don't know," Ray said truthfully. "But he went through a lot of trouble to get you here, that much I can tell you. Still, ultimately, it was your decision to stay that made you stay. Don't ever forget that."
Like they could. But it wasn't that simple either. Dave had manipulated them into accepting, with his big offer and his plans for their future. What the hell did Dave know about what they wanted to do with their future? Michael wasn't even sure himself. He had never really thought about a future on Earth when he was a kid, and by the time he had found out that he was staying, didn't give a damn about it either.
"That's the reason why you are here too? You accepted an offer?" Michael ventured to ask. Getting to know Ray was something that they should add to the list of "things to know".
"It started like that, yeah. My contract is indefinite like yours, but even if it wasn't, I'd stay. Being around Dave has taught me a lot of interesting things."
Like aliens? Michael bitterly thought. What could Ray have that Dave had offered him an indefinite contract as well? He didn't think that Ray would tell them even if they asked it, though.
"What do you do in here, anyway?" Michael asked, deciding that was a better question. He had the feeling this Q. and A. wasn't going to last long.
"Now, that's a good question," Ray said with half a smile. "My main job was to look after you, to know where you were, as Dave said. But now that you are here, things changed. Even though I still have to keep you safe, I'm more like a representative of Dave's deal. While he's absent, you can turn to me. I have to make sure that Dave's part of the deal is carried on properly. And that you are carrying yours properly as well."
So that was why Ray was trying so hard to be Mr. Nice Guy, as he had said earlier. Dave wasn't going to be around, but he had made sure they weren't going to be left unguarded or unwatched. How thoughtful of him.
"Is he going to keep it?" Isabel asked, not quite looking Ray in the eye. "Is he really going to keep his side of the deal?"
Ray reached for a Cherry Coke and in one movement opened the can, making Michael wonder if he not being able to open his Pepsi earlier that day had been just an act.
"I'm going to tell you this once and I hope it will sink in on you: I've never even heard of Dave breaking a deal, and he will do whatever he can to keep his side of the contract. That's how his business works, his credibility and the way other people know his word is worth it. But what I have indeed seen is people breaking their side of the deal, and it isn't pretty. If you betray him, he'll make sure you pay for it. You think he's being convenient? Hope that you never have to see him being inconvenient."
"So, he kills whoever wants to get out?" Michael said, not sure whether to believe Ray's words were true. He could be just trying to scare them into being nice little guinea pigs. And that word, convenient, was it just a coincidence, or had Ray somehow listened to their conversation in the cafeteria?
"That's not what I said," Ray turned his dark eyes to him. "If you want to end the deal, you can do so. That's part of the contract. But you have to say so, don't go and do anything behind Dave's back. He just doesn't tolerate being betrayed. And trust me, Dave thinks that death is not a punishment at all. Now, if you want to know more about him, you'll have to ask him yourselves. He's set up individual meetings with you all this week, and since he's leaving in exactly seven days, he expects you to keep with the schedule. Because tomorrow is Sunday, he said you should rest, get to know your surroundings."
"What are we supposed to do? Walk around?" Isabel asked a little bit irritated.
"It's your Sunday, you do whatever you want. You have free pass, you have all day."
"Samantha called to see if she could come. She and someone named William, I think. Liz and I told her to come tomorrow to meet all of us." Max said turning to Michael and Isabel, as if not knowing if he had done the right thing.
"The analyst?" Isabel asked frowning. The three of them turned as one to see Ray, who was now half through his slice of pizza. The man was hungry. Putting the half slice down, and wiping his hands on a napkin, he cleared his throat.
"You'll love Samantha. Everyone loves Samantha." Ray said not really caring about that. "Just make sure you have your story straight up before you start spreading it around. Anyway, the meetings." Reaching into his other inner pocket, he took out a paper sheet, neatly fold. "Here are your times and meeting places for next week. My number and Dave's are at the bottom if you have any more… questions," he said while handling it to Isabel, who just took it. She stared at it, not saying nor doing anything. Ray kept talking; Michael and Max were fixated as well with the white paper sheet that Isabel was not letting them see.
"You are good kids, that much I know about you. But you think Dave is hiding something from you," the three of them forgot all about the schedule and put all their attention to the man speaking, "and he probably is, but he must have his reasons. The guy is a genius, has this… I don't know, this 'view' of things wider than most people. And if keeping you safe is part of the offer, he'll make sure you stay safe."
He stood up and took the second pizza box into his hands. "I think you have a lot to talk about," he said as a means of ending their conversation, and without any other word, he let himself out of Isabel's apartment. It didn't pass even two seconds before they had forgotten all about Ray and had returned to see what the schedule was all about. Isabel quickly unfolded it, her hands slightly shaking. Max and Michael positioned themselves at both her sides to read over her shoulder.
"We are going to the lab on Monday," she said in a flat tone, for the first time Michael feeling cold inside, a shudder running all over his spine, paralyzing him. Who would guess that eight words could have such an effect on him?
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TBC…
Author's note: The line that says "It's kind of… kind of believing in miracles I guess… But I have a feeling it's time to try," is from the song "You Make Loving Fun" by Fleetwood Mac from their album Rumours.
