Calm down, Chloe. Just breathe. Breathe.
Chloe took one more puff from her cigarette, letting the smoke and ash resonate through the air around her. The entire neighborhood had fallen silent; the deafening silence alleviated by the distant chirping of crickets and the tinkling of the buckles on her favorite boots. She sauntered down the gentle decline in the road leading up to the nearby creek, walking with pace and purpose.
But truthfully, she really had no intention of going anywhere nor doing anything. She just wanted to get away from it all. Her memory of the past few hours was being replayed in her mind constantly, a nagging problem that she would inevitably need to confront.
God, Price. What were you thinking? You kissed your best friend. You kissed Max! You know she isn't prepared for that.
Chloe rubbed her temples, placing the cigarette between two of her fingers. She paced up and down anxiously.
Well, I could play it off! I could say "Hey, it was just a spur of the moment kind of thing! I was being emotional, vulnerable - as I always do - and she was just there. Her perfect self. And I just went in for it. That's good enough, right? Plus, it's like it's not a hella big deal. I've kissed people multiple times before, that's how people show affection for someone right?
But that kiss felt different, like it meant something genuine this time. I don't know - I feel as though I've done it with her before. In another lifetime, perhaps?
Or I could tell her that I really hella like her? Like, I would drop anything and everything regardless of the circumstances, just for her. Like, despite everything that she's done - leaving me for five years, leaving me when I needed her most - I am willing to take a bullet for her.
Sounds morbid, but that's the truth.
Chloe took one final drag from her cigarette. With all the excuses seemingly lined up at her disposal, she still was not convinced that it would be good enough.
What am I going to do? What am I going to do? What am I going to do?
Fuck's sake.
Chloe threw the cigarette carelessly onto the grass patch next to her, smothering the flame with the heel of her boot. She reached into her jacket to pull out another one.
Just as that thought came in, Chloe felt a vibration in her pocket, the silence of the creek punctured by the deafening ringtone, which seemed to be a distorted remix of her favourite heavy metal band. Her eyes narrowed in suspicion, as the name 'David' popped up on her phone screen.
He never really calls me…
"Hello, what do you want?"
"Chloe, it's David. I need you to return to the house right now." David responded on the other end, Chloe's eyebrows furrowing in concern as his voice betrayed a sense of panic.
"Wh-what? What's going on?"
"It's Max. There is something wrong with her, and I really need you to help me with this."
At that very moment, all worries, all anxieties, and any regrets vanished.
"On my way."
One hour ago…
David's blue mustang pulled into the driveway of the Price household, the tires grinding to a halt as it was driven into the garage. As he stepped out, he took off his hat, a cup of coffee still within his clutches. It had been another shitty day at the office, although he noted that today had been particularly more shitty compared to the rest.
Stepping through the garage and into the house, he was stunned that it was awfully silent. The living room lights had gone out and the silence was drowned out by the tinkering of the generator outside. As David took steps towards the kitchen, he found dirty dishes still left on the counter - more specifically, two half-eaten bowls and two glasses of beer.
"Chloe!" David called out, "Get down here. You didn't do the dishes again!"
David's eyes darted side to side; He anticipated the creaking open of the doors upstairs, followed by the thumping of his stepdaughter's footsteps down the stairs and - more often than not - her sarcastic and witty remark that would have left David stunned.
But that never came, none of them did. David's eyes narrowed in suspicion, but softened before proceeding to scrub the dishes clean.
She's probably just asleep. Max too.
He felt his ears grow hot and raise up, almost like an animalistic instinct that alerted him to someone. But he had learned to dismiss that as a byproduct of old experiences.
There is no one here to hurt you, big man. You're safe.
Yet, he could not deny that something felt particularly off. The house was never this quiet - Joyce would always have something to do to make sure the house was in shape, and Chloe would always have something to do to do the exact opposite.
Maybe his senses weren't betraying him. As he turned the tap of the kitchen sink slightly to reduce the flow of water, he paused as his ears picked up on a faint sound behind the water hitting the metal sink.
Knocks. Faint ones - the sound of flesh hitting the wall. He looked upwards. He felt as though that the walls seemingly reverberated as the sounds came. They came irregularly; The last he heard, three thuds came in a certain consistent rhythm, followed by two thuds in quick succession. David's eyebrows narrowed, betraying his confusion.
Just as he was about to turn the tap off-
THUD.
David, startled, felt the grip around the plate slip from his grasp. He watched in alarm as it clanked noisily against the metal sink. He froze, gazing upwards.
The thudding noise had stopped. David drew his gun from his holster belt secured firmly around his waist, and paced cautiously towards the stairs.
Fool me once, shame on me. But you're not gonna fool me again. No backing down now.
As he ascended the stairs, his gaze fully transfixed on the top step, almost anticipating a figure to pop out at him. That never came. As he peered through the grills upon approaching the top step, he swept the floor; There seemed to be no one there. Yet, he felt an eerie feeling creep upon him; as though eyes - no, a couple of them - seemed to be staring into his back. He paced slowly, his eyes focusing on a bright orange light emanating from Chloe's room.
David's labored breathing seemingly demonstrated his composure, yet deep down, he was anticipating the worst. As he stood right in front of the door, he could feel the sweat drip down the sides of his neck. He grasped the door handle, feeling rusty in his grip, and turned slowly.
He shuffled suddenly inside, quickly sweeping the room. He spotted Max's slender figure lying on Chloe's bed, wrapped within the duvet, in a deep sleep. He darted from one corner of the room to the other, checking Chloe's closet, beneath her desk and any other obscured areas.
Room clear. Just another false alarm. Nice one, David.
At this, he eased up. He sighed, before holstering his gun once more. As he approached Max, he could pick up on the brunette muttering to herself in her slumber. With his tall build looming over, he leaned up close to Max.
"Max," David uttered softly, "where is Chloe?" Just as he was about to shake her awake gently, Max shook uncomfortably in her bed.
"Get away from me!" she cried, seemingly struggling beneath the duvet. David recoiled and raised his hands defensively, startled. "Please… I'm not who you want… I don't want to be here…" David's eyebrows furrowed in concern. He noticed Max's eyes were still closed, her faces contorting, showing her discomfort.
Without much thought, David pulled the duvet off Max's body, throwing it over the side of the bed. David watched as she continued to rock back and forth against a seemingly invisible force, her two wrists pressed close together, much like her ankles.
Almost as if they were bound together.
His eyes turned towards Max's ankles, seeing as she was using both feet to bang repeatedly against the wall - emanating that thudding noise. That noise. That was Max? His eyes turned back to Max's face, where he found fresh tear marks lining the sides of her cheeks.
"Please, Mr. Jefferson! Let me go! STOP!" Max cried, her ragged voice betraying her desperation. David watched in horror as Max began chewing her wrists, which to his surprise, had already been bloodied from her previous bite marks.
Jefferson? What the fuck did that bastard do to her?
"Max! Wake up, it's just a bad dream," David said softly. Just as he was about to place his hands on Max to shake her awake, almost immediately, a pulsating electrical pulse began to course through his veins; a string of memories began to replay in his mind like old tape.
David kicked away the dirt which lined the sides of the bunker entrance, as he stepped onto the polished metal floors, almost laughing at the contrast between the two environments. With Officer Corn leading the squadron of 10 armed officers, the duo broke into the Dark Room. David felt his hands grip and turn the turn wheel lock on the metal door.
David followed behind the squadron of officers as they made their way further into the room. He first noticed the shelves upon shelves of supplies - food, water, medicine. Moving inwards, his eyes were blinded by the light escaping behind the plastic partition.
"Room clear!" At this, David quickly made his way into the Dark Room. He stood there in momentary shock as he took in his surroundings.
"What the fuck is this place?" he muttered, his eyes scanning the room.
"Looks like Jefferson's personal photoshoot room," called out one of the officers, who was inspecting the equipment in fascination. David noticed a tray sitting beside the black leather couch, and picked up a vial that was left half-opened.
"You guys know what this is?," David asked, shaking the vial at Lieutenant Rossi, who was walking over to his side, "you know what it is, Rossi?"
"GHB," Lieutenant Rossi responded, reading the label, "classic date-rape drug. Guess we know how Prescott and Jefferson get em' in here." David swallowed, as the events of what transpired in the room began to fall into place.
"So he drugs these girls from Blackwell, takes photos of them… and for what?"
"I don't know. He has his own thing. I mean, we kinda already know he's a pervert and a psycho."
"And then what?"
"He kills them." David and Lieutenant Rossi's eyes shoot up to Officer Corn, who was perusing the red binders stored in Jefferson's locker. David walks hurriedly to him, taking the red binder from his hands. He could feel his hairs on the back of his neck stand upon looking at the pictures of a girl laid in contorted positions, in a daze and definitely out of it.
"Kate Marsh? She still goes to Blackwell…" David said as he continued to flip through the binder.
"Yes, she's still alive, surprisingly. Perhaps the young Prescott was too much of a chicken-shit to kill her at the end of it all." Rossi remarked, offhandedly. David passed the binder to Rossi, as he went ahead to look through the rest of the ransacked cabinet. His eyes glide across the binders of the shelves;
"Tyra, Jerry, Lula, Suzie, Lynn, Kelly and-" David's breath hitched, "Rachel? Rachel Amber?"
At the mere mention of Rachel's name, Lieutenant Rossi and Officer Corn began to huddle around David, hoping to get a glimpse of the contents of the binder. At that moment, a mixture of emotions began to engulf David; anger, sadness but more pertinently, disgust. As he took a step away from the scene, he surveyed his surroundings, taking in the magnitude of this perverted setting.
"At the back of my mind," David thought, "I knew Nathan Prescott could not be responsible for all of this. This Dark Room, these facilities, this entire fucking bunker? No way could a troubled teenager like him think of all of this shit. Come to think of it; people say that Jefferson and Nathan had a weird, fucked up father-son relationship, yet ultimately at the end of the day, Jefferson just used Nathan and his daddy's money to make his perverted dreams a reality."
"Funny, I almost feel sorry for the boy."
David heard the thudding of boots approach him. Upon turning around, he faced Lieutenant Rossi with an empty binder in hand.
"We found an empty binder on the shelf. This person could have been a potential target, but it seemed we caught that good ol' Jefferson just in time."
"Oh yeah? Someone from Blackwell too?"
"It says, MAX, on the back."
"Max… Caulfield?"
At that moment, David felt his world become a blur; He watched as the Dark Room evolved, seemingly warped around a wall of dark orange. He clutched the sides of his head, groaning in pain, feeling as if his head was about to explode. He felt the world around him swirl in a gust of wind, David being brushed around, held at the mercy of the forces around him.
He dared not open his eyes.
As the environment around him went silent, he opened his eyes. David found himself just outside the dark room again, behind the plastic partition. The light coming from the dark room shined brighter than ever. As David steadied himself, he felt blood drip down from his nose.
A nosebleed. That's new.
Gun in hand, he sauntered cautiously towards the Dark Room.
"David! Watch out!" A voice escaped from beyond the wall in front of him.
"How? How did you know that?" David could hear Jefferson cry out from the same area. David, despite feeling slightly disoriented, felt his senses heightened hearing Jefferson's panicked voice from across the wall. Upon crossing the partition, the movement out of the corner of his left eye caused David to fire the gun instinctively.
His eyes widened as he came face to face with Jefferson, clutching onto his camera stand, ready to swing. David struggled to steady himself, and Jefferson dealt a singular blow to his stomach. A loud grunt escaped from David, as a cough of blood erupted from his mouth.
With his back hunched over, the last thing he heard before his vision gave way to nothingness was the desperate cry of a girl seated not too far from him.
"No, David! NO!"
David fell backward on his ass in almost like an instinctive reaction. He looked around in a panic; he was back in Chloe's room, safe and sound. His heart was beating out of his chest and he could feel his breathing quicken by the minute.
What the hell was that? What the heck just happened?
As David struggled to regain his footing, he watched as Max, still trapped in her seemingly eternal slumber, continued to struggle against her invisible binds. For once, David did not know what to do. He reached into his back pocket and pulled out his cell phone, frantically dialing in a number, sitting by Max's bedside.
"Please for Christ's sake, pick up," David muttered, his hands careful not to touch Max again.
I'm sure Chloe knows Max more than me about this. Whatever THIS… is.
Chloe bounded up the stairs, two steps at a time, and burst through the door of her room. She found David seated by Max's side, who almost immediately stood up to meet her.
"What the hell is going on?" Chloe asked, as she approached Max hurriedly.
"I don't know what's going on. I went to check on Max and I then saw her just having a really bad dream. I went to wake up her up-"
"You didn't touch her, did you?" Chloe retorted angrily.
"I did not, I swear. That's why I called you for help."
"Good, I swear I would have killed you if you did."
David stared back in annoyance but realised there were more pressing things to worry about than Chloe's witty remark.
"Chloe. There is something you should know."
"What? What is it?"
Before David opened his mouth, a wail escaped from Max's mouth, startling both of them. Chloe wrapped her arms around Max, one hand of Max's head as she caressed the brunette gently.
"No! Let go of me! LET GO!"
Chloe looked back at David, in confusion and perhaps, for reassurance.. She was met with David's equally puzzled look, his hands raised in surrender.
"Shh… Max. It's okay! I'm here! It's just a bad dream!" Max continued to struggle against Chloe's comforting arms, with Chloe resisting Max pushing her away. "David! Help me out here!"
At that moment, Max broke free from Chloe's arms, causing the latter to fall off her bed, and lay sprawled on the floor. Max, now fully awake, pressed herself against the wall, her eyes darting nervously from left to right. Chloe and David looked on cautiously.
"Max… are you okay?" Chloe asked nervously, her arms outstretched.
"Chloe…? You're here!" Max cried, scrambling off the bed and into Chloe's arms. Chloe cupped Max's head against her chest. She could feel the brunette sobbing in her arms, immediately rubbing Max's back reassuringly. With her back to David, Chloe cooed softly, hoping to ease Max's tension.
David, still trying to take everything in, gazed back into Max's eyes. Beyond the tears which lined her eyes, he was looking back into a seemingly vulnerable and petrified girl. Her eyes seemed to read:
I'm so sorry you had to experience that, David.
David sat alone at the dining room table, clutching onto his favourite coffee mug, staring vacantly into the nothingness. His ears would occasionally perk up, seeing Chloe caressing Max's small figure on the couch, hoping to put her into an easy sleep. It seemed like that surreal experience had left him asking a multitude of questions, finding out that he had little to no answers.
Alright, soldier. Repeat after me: You are not going crazy. You are not going crazy. You are not going crazy. Whatever happened in that dream - for when we found Jefferson secret lair AFTER he got arrested - was real. But the thing that happened after…
Did I really go and confront Jefferson in his own bunker? How did I even find out about it? It's weird, it's almost like a deja vu moment - like this has all happened before. Plus, how did Max know I was coming?
Things have gotten strange around here ever since we caught Nathan in that bathroom. And Max… seems to be at the centre of it all. What does she know about this…?
"Hello, Earth to David?" Chloe interjected, waving her hand in front of David's face. David coughed, refocusing his attention. "You alright there buddy, you kinda spaced out."
"Yeah sorry, soldier," David responded, "was kind of… processing the things that happened earlier." Chloe sat down on the chair next to David, rubbing her palms anxiously.
"Sorry, if that… you know, tripped you out or something." David waved his hand dismissively, choosing not to talk about it. "Listen, I remember earlier you wanted to tell me something. Is there something you're hiding?"
David looked back at Chloe, her eyebrows raised in anticipation. He felt his hands clam up. Man, should I tell her about those weird visions that I had? I swear on my life that felt so different than… those other ones. But she would think I've gone completely nuts.
Come on, David. Let's be practical here.
"Chloe, when Max was having those nightmares," David began, "I managed to pick up on some of the things she was saying. She was… almost against these binds, almost like she was tied up or kidnapped or something. She was screaming out in desperation, pleading with Jefferson to let her go."
"Jefferson? You mean the creepy teacher that worked with Nathan?"
"Yes, that's him."
Chloe sighed, almost at a loss for words.
"You mean, this happened, WAY before that encounter in the bathroom?"
"No, I don't think so. It doesn't make sense. It sounds incredibly morbid, but she would not be alive right now if that was the case. If it were Nathan, I would understand since weeny Prescott didn't really have the balls to do that sorta thing, much like what happened to Kate Marsh."
"But I saw him, Chloe. I saw Jefferson had her tied up in a corner of the Dark Room, taking pictures of her. He was holding onto a syringe with that drug Prescott supplied him and-"
"Okay, okay, okay," Chloe interjected, rubbing her temples, "let's pull back for a minute, big guy. You're going back into 'crazy, loony-bin, paranoid' David territory right now. You're saying you SAW Jefferson?"
David went silent. Crap. A Freudian slip.
"Uhh… no, I heard Max say that." David saw Chloe's face remain unchanged, clearly not impressed with his excuse.
"You know you're not a good liar, David. What's going on here? What are you trying to tell me?"
"All I'm saying here… Is that you cannot deny there are some inconsistencies in her dreams - how can you have nightmares about something that has yet to happen before. Unless you're telling me that Max has developed some prophetic powers to look into the future?"
Chloe nodded. He was right - some of these things didn't make sense. She felt David lean up closer to her.
"There could be things Max is not telling you, for what reason, I don't know. That's for you to find out."
Chloe turned around, as the duo turned to look at Max sleeping peacefully on the couch. Her lips were pursed, deep in thought.
Life is getting hella weird ever since she popped up back into my life again. It almost makes me doubt everything that we've done together as friends. Like all the memories we've made, it's as if I've lived that exact same memory differently.
Almost like I've been there before.
A.N: Well, good things come to those who wait :-) It's been almost a year and a half since I last updated this story, and I'm glad to be back writing again. That being said, I sort of remembered why I loved writing this series and that gave me a pat on the back come back. With that, thank you for reading thus far, and do give a review!
Thank you again, I love this so much.
-Z.