Chapter 12: Silence for all

It wasn't often that someone got called into the Director's office for good behavior. As far as Lawr knew, it had never happened. Thus, he was more than a little worried when the Director personally summoned him to the massive office that the head of the Agency occupied. Vastile had once tried to explain the reasoning for such a large office, when all it held was a desk, a few chairs, and the Director.

"It's simple," she had said, "He uses it to keep an elephant there."

Taylan was the one who asked the question on everyone else's minds, "What elephant?"

"Exactly!" Vastile had replied, grinning until she realized that no one else understood what she was talking about, "Eh, screw it. You guys don't get any jokes."

She had also named the staircase that led up to his office, calling it "the Stairs of Shame".

"I would've called it the Trail of Tears," she said, "but it isn't a trail. It's a staircase. Besides, 'the Stairs of Tears' don't give off the same effect."

As Lawr climbed the Stairs of Shame, he could almost imagine Vastile beside him, humming some extremely happy song, like she always did when she was stressed. Not many people knew her well enough to know that, but both Lawr and Sienna did. Lawr could only assume that whoever Vastile's psychoanalyst was knew, and by extension, the Director did as well.

Lawr finally reached the door and raised his hand to knock, Well Kelly, here goes. You do know what to do if he keeps me from coming back in any way, right?

Kelly's mind was giving off a rather glum wave of emotion, Yes, I know. Let's just hope it doesn't have to come to that, okay? I don't want to lose you like I have everyone else.

Lawr nodded, knowing what she meant, I'll try my best to come back alive, Kelly. I don't want you to lose anyone else either.

With that, Lawr cut the conversation off and knocked on the door, which opened on his third knock. "Come in, Alpha," the Director's voice could be heard.

Lawr stepped inside and closed the door, walking up to the Director's desk and taking a seat, "You wanted to see me, sir?"

The Director nodded, "I'm glad you could come so quickly, Alpha. I'll get straight to the point: we've got another mission on our hands here. I've received some disturbing news of a telekine not too far from here. He seems intent on ravaging the world for his own enjoyment, and we're the only response force that's close enough to handle him right now. As such, you and I will be accompanied by a squad of agents to take this one down."

Lawr nodded, "How far away is the target?"

"Glad to see you're back to the way you used to be, all business," Lawr's blood ran cold for a moment, "For a while there, you weren't really yourself, were you?"

"I suppose not, sir," Lawr replied carefully, "The experience I had in the outside world was... jarring, to say the least. But now I'm back to the way I used to be. Sir," he was careful to look right above the Director's eyes- he'd been in the same room as the man when he'd interrogated captives, and the man had a knack for catching lies.

The Director seemed to pay him little heed, "Well, this time you shouldn't have to worry. We'll be moving by helicopter over to a local town. Hopefully, the telekine will be nearby. Depending on how powerful he is, we may be able to kill him before we even put our boots on the ground." With that, he waved for Lawr to follow him, and Lawr obediently fell in line behind him as they moved towards the hangar, where a quartet of other agents of varying ages stood ready and waiting for them.

The other four agents got into the helicopter without a word, one of them cradling a sniper rifle across his lap, should they get the chance. The Director signaled for take-off, and the rotors revved up to speed before the retroactive whisper motors kicked in, muffling the sound of the engines as the blades spun faster. The helicopter took off almost silently, and before Lawr knew it, they were off.

ΩΩ

It didn't take long before Lawr saw the smoking remains of a town. He knew as gas fire when he saw one- it was his job to know. Nevertheless, his assumptions were confirmed when one of the agents that accompanied them got the same results from the wreckage. The Director had taken the binoculars and found their prey amongst the debris and smoldering ruins of a gas station. Apparently, the telekine hadn't had enough practice before going on his rampage and had succeeded in destroying the town at the cost of blowing himself up. Luckily for all involved, the town was so backwater that no one even came by to get gas there, meaning there was no cleanup needed to keep the world more or less ignorant of the existence of those with supernatural abilities.

Lawr leaned back in his seat and sighed in relief, something he hoped not to convey to his superior, lest he start asking questions. He had been worried that something bad would happen, but it seemed as if everything was going to be just fine now. There was now no chance that anything would be attacking the helicopter. Aside from the Director—that was his main worry—the fact that a telekine could have simply smacked the helicopter out of the air if he had been powerful enough made his stomach drop. The Director, however, was still a threat, but Lawr couldn't help his eyes starting to droop. He hadn't been sleeping too well in the last few days, and upon the Director calling him he had been awake for over twenty-four hours, almost thirty-six. Even though he kept telling himself to stay awake, he eventually gave in to the urges from his brain and drifted off to sleep in his seat.

ΩΩ

Lawr was jarred awake when someone shook his shoulders. His eyes snapped open and he looked around, seeing the four agents and the Director around him.

"Wake up," one of the agents spat at Lawr, "The Director wishes to speak with you."

Lawr attempted to unbuckle himself, but the Director's hand over his chest restrained him before he could. "We don't enjoy harboring traitors, Alpha," the Director spoke coldly, and Lawr froze. The Director chuckled, enjoying his surprise and fear, and continued, "Yes, we knew about your betrayal quite early on. Why do you think we've been eliminating your team, one by one?"

Lawr tried to lunge forward, forgoing his fear for anger, "You!" he shouted, "What have you done with them? Where are they?"

The Director chuckled coldly as the other agents pinned Lawr against his seat and snapped a limiter collar on him, "That is of none of your concern, traitor. You should be more worried about yourself."

Lawr felt the emptiness that the collars imposed hit him, and he finally stopped struggling, "You've gotten all of the traitors, then," he spoke as calmly as he could, "What happens now?"

The Director smiled, "Well, your sister will need to go through a complete training and conditioning session first. We can't have her remembering who you are and getting any ideas when you don't come back, now can we?"

Lawr growled, "If you so much as touch her, I will tear your throat out!" By now, the helicopter had landed and the agents hauled Lawr out onto the permafrost, the Director climbing out behind them.

"And how will you do that, Lawrence?" the Director asked, "By the time we leave, you'll have no transportation, no food, and," he procured a pistol from its holster, "no legs." Having said that, the Director aimed and fired twice, one shot hitting one of Lawr's kneecaps, then the other doing the same.

Coldness more harsh than any blizzard hit Lawr as he crumpled to the ground, blood spilling out from the exit wounds of the shots, "I'll get you!" he shouted at the Director as he and the other agents climbed into the helicopter, "No matter what, I'll find you and I will destroy you and the Agency for all that you've done!"

The helicopter flew away, none of its passengers so much as sparing a glance over at the former agent who now lay in the snow. Inside, the Director turned to the agent who had put the collar on Lawr in the first place, "Deactivate the limiter."

The agent he'd spoken to raised an eyebrow, "Sir?"

The Director replied, "Turn off the limiter. He can't reach us from here, and considering whenever he produces flames, he loses body heat, he won't try. Should he survive, though, he may yet be useful to me." Luckily for me, the Director thought, that chip in his head is built to resist anything he could throw at it.

On the ground, Lawr's limiter collar beeped once and opened, releasing him and allowing him to light his hand on fire, albeit for a moment. He looked down at his legs and winced, "Need a tourniquet. Can't bleed out, not now." Lawr tore a strip of cloth off his shirt, which was underneath the jacket he was wearing, and tied it around one of his knees. Lawr bared his teeth as intense pain shot up his legs, but he was having trouble feeling anything below the knee. "C'mon, don't be gone, come on," he spoke as he tried to move his feet. His feet twitched below the ankle, signaling that the shots were damaging, but they could be healed. "Need to find a town," he muttered, "Need to find somewhere to heal," he looked up at the sky, "I'm sorry, Kelly, but I won't be any help. Good luck."

ΩΩ

He heard the engines of a helicopter landing. "... gone. He was a..."

No. It wasn't enough to understand. He needed more. Softer voice this time. Female. "... gone? But he can't..." Voices fading, replaced by the other sounds. Fans on computers as they heated up, pebbles tracked into the halls crunching as people stepped on them. Old ovens snapping and cracking as they heated up. Food sizzling. Screams of pain. Shouts of anger. Crowds of people arguing. The ever-changing voice.

The voices behind the glass as well. They spoke up too. "... working optimally. Keep running the tests..." Too much sound. So much sound, it blocked out every other sense. He was blind; too much sound. Footsteps as one of those behind the glass walked out. Door closing, back to normal.

Back to listening. Too much, though. Could hear everything, but couldn't understand it all. The Listener, that's who he was. The Listener. Always listening. Like now. He heard the voice he heard before. Female, young, considering the pitch. Maybe his age. Crying. He could hear her well. Could hear the tears land on cloth. Could hear her pain. If he could have helped her, he would. Deeper voice again. Not with the other voice. "... Alpha is gone. Traitors, all of them."

Different voice, deep but with only a bit less authority than the speaker. "Except for her?" He thought they were speaking about the crying girl.

"... shall see." the first voice spoke again. "... sure she's alone. The only thing left for her to hold on to is..."

No! Needed to know the answer! Deeper in the building, other voices. Hundreds. Maybe thousands. Too much. Couldn't find the voice anymore. Just noise, noise, noise. Then a sound. A bell chime. Too loud, much too loud. Next up was touch. The feeling of touching everything, everywhere, being stretched apart, being everywhere and yet nowhere at all. Had to find a way out. But he'd be blind again, and he would know nothing of the areas he was feeling. Next stop, oblivion.

The agent inside the booth turned the dial on the machine, and then Jarv heard no more.

ΩΩ

Kelly waited until nightfall before she walked into the hall that her brother had spoken of and let her mental barriers she'd built drop, I'm alone, Candace.

Candace's voice spoke in her mind, It seems you are. Your brother's gone?

Kelly withheld a whimper at the mention of him, Yes. My brother is dead.

Candace seemed to freeze for a moment, ...I'm sorry for your loss, then.

Kelly sat down on the floor, Tell me everything you told him and vice versa. I'm your only chance of escape now.

Candace mentally sighed, Make sure there's no one here, and then come inside. We have a lot to discuss.

ΩΩ

They waited until Epsilon had left her room. The Director didn't care where she was going anymore- she would be getting a new set of indoctrinated thoughts, erasing every bit of rebellion from her mind soon enough. All that mattered was that she had left, leaving the one thing she still could hold on to behind.

The Supervisor stepped into Kelly Thorton's room, his eyes scanning for the girl's most prized possession. He found it sleeping at the foot of her bed, curled up into a little ball. Taylan had called it an abomination. Vastile had jokingly called it a "morality pet". Kelly had called it a souvenir of sorts. To the rest of the world, it was called Perry the Platypus.

Only one thing was missing from the creature, though- its drive to fight evil. Once an agent to a defunct offshoot of the Department of Homeland Security, Perry the Platypus had lost all his skills and memories of fighting evil at all, thanks to Dr. Doofenshmirtz, who had unwittingly been victorious for once in his life. Now, Perry was a simple platypus, running off base instinct rather than a highly-advanced mind that had controlled the OWACA agent he had previously been.

The Supervisor scooped up Perry quickly and silently, the creature shifting slightly as it adjusted itself to its new bed. The Supervisor snarled, "Disgusting creature." Perry didn't respond, and so the Supervisor crouched down and picked up the fedora Perry used to wear, bringing it with him as they exited the room.

It took at most ten minutes for them to arrive at the place where they kept the animals. The Supervisor watched as dogs snarled at the bars of their cages, cats hissed and spat, and a few larger animals opened an eye to watch their master walk past them. Finally, the pair arrived at a large door, the Supervisor setting Perry on a small shelf before he entered. Behind the door, a manufactured cave sat, seven large dogs curled up near the back. They all heard the door open, and when they did, they got up, trotting over to their master, their tails wagging. The Supervisor rubbed each of their heads in turn before allowing them to sniff his gloves, which still had Perry's scent on them. Each dog sniffed his gloves and they each growled softly in turn, signaling that they were ready. The Supervisor stepped back outside for a moment.

He looked at the shelf that Perry sat on, grinning a little. "The world may have called you Perry the Platypus," he spoke to the animal, "but my dogs have a different name for you: dinner." With that, the Supervisor grabbed Perry and tossed him lightly through the doorway, closing it behind him.

As he walked away, he could hear growls and crunches, and perhaps a single gurgle, and then all was quiet.

ΩΩ

It was only a little past dawn when Isabella woke up in bed, the sunlight just starting to poke through the window. She rubbed her eyes as she sat up, "Ugh. What a horrible dream."

Someone shifted beside her, and she looked over to see who it was. The glimpse of red hair was all she needed to see to figure out who it was, I'm sleeping with Phineas.

Phineas rolled over to face her, his blue eyes staring into her own, "Morning, Isabella."

Isabella smiled and stroked his hair, catching the glimpse of gold around her finger, "It's a very good morning, isn't it?" She felt as though she was almost in a dream-like state, laying with him here. There had been nothing more that she wanted than what she had right now, and now that she had it, it felt wonderful.

Phineas grinned, "It's always a good morning with you around, Isabella." As one of his hands moved to brush a stray lock of hair out of her face, she saw a matching band of gold on his hand.

Isabella smiled softly as she felt his hand brush the hair behind her ear, his touch unnaturally cold. She drew back in surprise the slightest bit, a confused look appearing on Phineas' face as she did so. Isabella laughed a little and put his hand between both of hers, "Your hands are so cold, Phineas. Keep them under the blankets next time, ok?"

Phineas chuckled and interlaced his fingers with her own, "Of course, Isabella."

They sat there for what felt like hours, idly talking about what amounted to nothing, before Isabella finally decided to get up, "What do you want for breakfast? My treat."

Phineas grinned, "In that case, I think I'll have pancakes. Just try not to burn them this time, ok?"

Isabella smiled at him, "I'll try my best, dear." It took a few minutes to find something to dress in appropriately before she went out the door and headed downstairs to the kitchen.

As soon as she left their room, though, the bedroom door disappeared behind her, and the walls began to mottle and crack, exposing rusted metal panels beneath the paint. The ground crunched under Isabella's bare feet and she looked down to see a decaying concrete floor beneath her. A single fluorescent light flickered from the ceiling, barely giving enough light for Isabella to see as she slowly moved down the stairs, frightened beyond all belief.

A sound of metal scraping against metal to her right made her turn sharply toward the noise, planning for her hands to flare up with flames so she could illuminate the source. However, nothing happened. No powers, she thought to herself. Whatever it was, I won't be able to fight it if I need to. This isnotgood. So instead, Isabella turned and ran down a hall as fast as she could go, trying to get away from whatever the sound was.

She felt like she was running for hours before she found other people. They were two women in nurse outfits, sitting around her rusted and ruined kitchen table, sipping coffee. Isabella froze in the doorway and one of the nurses turned to see her, smiling comfortingly, "Hello, dear. Is there something wrong?"

Isabella stood there bewildered for a moment before she replied, "I-I don't know. There was something that sounded like metal on metal, and it sounded like it was chasing me, so I tried to get as far away from it as possible."

The other nurse looked curiously at Isabella, "As far as we know, we're the only two people here. Well, us and that very nice man."

Isabella looked at the other nurse, "Nice man?"

She nodded, "Yes. He gives us anything we need, and lets us stay in his home. I think his name is-" she froze before she could finish her sentence.

"What? What's his name?" Isabella asked, looking from one nurse to another, but each one had frozen, the one who had last spoken convulsing as well. "What's going on?" Isabella asked the first nurse, who had also started convulsing. The lights in the kitchen flickered and went out for a moment, and Isabella heard an inhuman roar then the scrape of metal on metal again. She searched frantically for the lights and found the switch, restoring light to the kitchen.

As soon as the lights flashed back on, Isabella was confronted by two bipedal abominations in nurse outfits, one of them holding a kitchen knife in a mangled knob that used to be a hand. Isabella stepped back and cried out in surprise as the creature closest to her, the one with the knife, took a swing at her, the blade barely missing her. Isabella did the only thing she could- turn and run as fast as she could down the hall, away from the "nurses" and whatever else was chasing her. For whatever reason, she seemed to remember there being weapons in the room she was coming up to, so she slowed down and carefully opened the door, closing behind her when she found nothing inside.

The room housed a boarded-up window, a flickering light bulb, and a pistol and one magazine that sat on a table in front of her. Carefully, Isabella stepped forward, her hand reaching out in front of her before she snatched up the pistol and magazine, loading the gun. She had no idea how she knew how to do it- as far as she knew, she had no experience with any lethal firearm -but the idea that she could possibly defend herself gave her some small comfort.

The noise, whoever or whatever it was, continued to move down the hall and Isabella took the other door in the room, which led into yet another hallway, this one even more decrepit than the last. Behind her, the door she had entered the room through buckled under her pursuer's blow, and Isabella slammed the door shut behind her, rushing forward with the pistol in hand. As she continued through the hall, the entire structure seemed to distort around Isabella, the walls warping and tearing open a bit as she moved deeper and deeper. Isabella tried her best to pay the new changes no heed, hoping that whatever was happening would end as soon as she got back to her room. Moving as fast as she could, Isabella finally found the stairs that she'd gone down before, and at the top of everything stood her bedroom door.

With a cry of relief, Isabella bounded up the stairs two at a time, throwing open the door and then locking it behind her as soon as she got inside, the pistol still gripped tightly in her hand, her knuckles white. "Phineas!" she shouted, "Where are you? There's something outsi-" she turned back to look at her bedroom, only to find a completely trashed room with the walls burned dark brown and the carpet ripped up to expose a rusted floor. "What... What happened here?" she asked no one in particular, "Ph-Phineas? Phineas, where are you?"

The only sound was the grating of metal on concrete and footsteps ascending the stairs, which Isabella knew could only be her pursuer. Slowly, she backed up towards the far wall, holding the pistol with both hand, trying to focus the shaking sights. She glanced down to realize her hands were shaking as well. Only a few moments later, the footsteps stopped at the top of the stairs and seemed to try the door, which Isabella had made sure was locked. There was another inhuman roar from behind the door, and suddenly, a five-foot long blade pierced the doorknob, stopping three or four feet away from Isabella's abdomen. Isabella cried out in surprise and the gun went off, sparking off the blade firmly fixed in her door. The blade was pulled back, and the creature smashed the door of its hinges, giving Isabella a full view of itself.

The creature looked human from the ground up to its neck, but after that, everything changed. The creature wore nothing except for a butcher's smock soaked in blood, originally colored white so it stood out in the darkness. Just like its smock, the creature's skin was extremely pale, almost as white as its one article of clothing. The creature's body itself was horribly mangled and deformed, and the creature seemed to hobble as it stepped out of the doorway, as if one of its legs wasn't as long as the other. Behind it, it dragged the blade it had used to cut through the door- a gigantic blade that almost shrieked as it was dragged along the ground. The biggest and most glaring deviation from a human was the creature's head, which was completely black and looked almost metallic. A few holes pockmarked the creature's head, but it seemed not to affect the creature whatsoever. What Isabella found most frightening, though, was the shape of the head. One end was much longer than the other, but there was no changing it: the creature's head was in the shape of a pyramid.

Isabella cried out in fear and took a step back even further as the creature advanced, pulling its blade back to strike again. Isabella retreated as fast as she could, aiming the gun at the creature's head and firing three times. All three times the bullets hit their mark, and all three times they bounced off the pyramid of a head the creature had. Isabella finally reached the far wall and almost jumped forward in surprise when she touched it, trying her best to focus on killing the monster before her. When she only counted two shots left in her pistol, she decided to try something else, this time aiming at the creature's chest and firing twice for good measure, both of the bullets piercing the creature's smock and exiting out of its back. Both of them froze for a moment before the creature dropped to its knees, the blade falling from its hand and hitting the floor with a resounding clang. Blood flowed steadily from the wound in its chest before it uttered a single rasping word in a familiar voice, "Isabella..."

Isabella froze on the spot, "...You know me? But how- oh no. No no no no no. Phineas? Phineas, is that you?" The creature just barely inclined its head before it slumped to the ground, dead. Isabella began to cry as she fell to her knees, touching the thing that had once been Phineas, "I'm so sorry, Phineas, I'm so sorry!"

She stayed there for what felt like an hour, crying until all the tears dried up, her sorrow and guilt continuing to grow the more she sat there. Finally, she slowly stood up, wiping the tears from her face, "I'm sorry, Phineas... I never meant to do something like this to you." Isabella headed for the door, her guilt continuing to rise, when she heard a scraping once again, and turned around, only to get hit by the blade of the creature that used to be Phineas. She screamed in pain as the blade pierced her abdomen and ran her into the wall, pinning her to it. The creature rumbled as it moved closer to her, its wound slowly closing up even as Isabella watched it, her guilt taking precedence over her fear, "I... I killed you..." she spoke, blood dribbling out of her mouth, "Now... Now you can kill me."

The last thing Isabella heard before the creature's fist cracked her head wide open against the wall was a screech, and then all was quiet.

ΩΩ

The Director sat and observed the feeds to each person's mind at his desk, watching as Isabella's head was smashed in by something he remembered Vastile calling "Pyramid Head". Each of the tortures was well-made and personalized especially to the victim, from the rape of Adyson's sister by Thaddeus to Phineas and his Angels of stone. They showed what was best and worst about their creator, Vastile, at the same time- her creativity. While it could be impressive, like it was here, it was also her downfall, causing her to take too much time in doing certain tasks, making her rather inefficient.

The Director's reverie was interrupted when the Supervisor stepped into the room. "How go the tests?" he asked, eyeing the screens in front of the Director.

"So far, Vastile seems to be doing well," the Director replied, turning the screens around so his lieutenant could see them. "It is interesting how when condensed, they seem to span only a few hours, when in reality, they've been going on for almost a month," he continued, "I'm sure it will break them, or at least put them on the very edge."

"Too bad we'll have to recondition Vastile, then," the Supervisor replied, "Speaking of which, how goes the campaign into her mind?"

The Director nodded at the first portion of the Supervisor's statement, "I should breach the inner sanctum soon. So far, her mind has been built as if it was a fortified library; castle walls surround a fortified central building, and the most I'm given are siege weaponry and unending reinforcements to work with. What of our newest recruit?"

"So far, Van Stromm seems to be doing rather well," the Supervisor replied, "We're saving the training with powers until a bit later, but for now we're considering placing him on the next Alpha team with Epsilon."

"A worthy path for one such as him," The Director replied, "Update me when you're further along with the project."

The Supervisor nodded and stepped back out of the Director's office, leaving his superior to prepare for his war against Vastile.

A/N: I blame my own laziness for not updating. This was supposed to get out much earlier in the year, but got delayed to what I'd hoped for was Halloween, and then delayed again. Consider it an early dark Christmas gift, if you like. (or Apocalypse gift, if you want to look at it that way) Hopefully, I'll get back into the swing of things soon enough. We'll just have to wait and see.