Chapter 5
I guess we all live in whatever cage life puts us in. It just so happens that mine seem to be smaller than most. Somehow I've managed to spend most of my life locked away in one place or another. When I was younger my parents locked me away in a room with lead paint on the walls. I screamed and screamed but they wouldn't let me out. For awhile I even tried to scratch the paint off the walls with my fingernails, until my fingers bled. Eventually I gave up on that one. My parents let me out after who-knows-how long. You tend to lose all track of time when you're locked away. It was them who became the prisoners after that.
Perhaps you wouldn't call it freedom for me either; I was after all a slave to my feelings, first with someone who didn't understand my abilities, then with Clark. Clark can't be blamed for my lack of freedom then; though he too had me locked away. Don't misunderstand – I'm grateful to him now. Thanks to him I was able to get the help I needed. But at the time I remember feeling so hurt and betrayed.
I wasn't cured overnight, after all. Remember, it's been two years since I was locked up in that cell. In the early days I was barely even aware of the doctors. Clark was still my obsession, and I used to believe – truly believe – that he was in that cell with me at times. He'd tell me how much he loved me, and how he was going to get me out of this place so we could always be together. I really believed that for so long. I really believed that Clark was going to get me out. He'd realise how much he really loved me, realise that he couldn't live without me. Of course, he never came.
The spider was crawling across my face, my only companion - real or imagined - in this tiny prison. Just like back in my lead bedroom it was difficult keeping track of time. Ronald's clock was ticking on the wall, but its relentless mark of time didn't mean all that much to me. Then I missed hearing it one time as the sound of the door opening drowned it out.
"Ah, there you are. You left your book behind when you went off to talk to that man earlier. 'The Collapse of Chaos: Discovering Simplicity in a Complex World'. Interesting reading choice – I'd never have pegged someone as beautiful as you as being so interested in science."
It was him, I realised with some degree of fear. At first, I'd actually thought it might be Clark, come to get me out of here. But maybe Clark wasn't going to get me out of this prison either. I resisted the sudden, desperate urge to call him for help. Instead I was willing him to stay away, unable to bear the thought of bringing him into danger because I was afraid.
"What do you want with me?" I asked in what I hoped was an even tone. If it weren't for my lead bracelet, this box and even the straightjacket would have been no barrier. I could have easily teleported out of both. As it was, it kept me a prisoner too, just as it had the past two years.
"With you? Nothing anymore. Oh, I see… you think this is down to me?"
"What have you done? GET AWAY FROM HER!"
My heart leaped into my throat as I heard Clark's voice. I'd never heard him so angry before. I'm not proud of it, but a part of me was happy: he's this angry for me, I was thinking.
"Clark, you have to get away, it's a trap!" I shouted. I couldn't see anything that was going on; the box had only one tiny air hole. Then I heard the sound of someone slamming against the wall. Something – presumably Ronald's clock – fell and smashed on the floor.
"Let go of me. You're making a mistake. I'm not the one you want. She's controlling most of the people here now."
"You mean Stacy?" Clark said. I could hear suspicion in his voice. He wasn't ready to believe this guy yet.
"That isn't Stacy! Look, that's why I was so interested in Alicia. I couldn't be sure which of them it was so I had to monitor both. But it seems she's gotten more powerful than I thought if she can do something like this…"
I had no idea what he was talking about, but Clark seemed to know something. The next thing I knew the lid was being lifted from the box. The light hurt my eyes a little at first. If I'd been kept in there too long, I probably would have been blinded for life by it. Clark reached in and carefully pulled me out. The straightjacket was removed in seconds. I gave Clark a hug, holding back tears. It had been an emotional day, but this wasn't the time. Behind Clark I saw the man slumped on the floor recovering. The wind had been knocked out of him.
"Are you all right? Why didn't you call me?" he asked, with such tenderness in his voice I had to fight back tears all over again.
"Stacy said she knew how to hurt you. I couldn't risk you coming here and getting killed because of me."
"I told you: that isn't Stacy anymore," said the man as he struggled to his feet. He sounded absolutely miserable.
"Your sister… she didn't disappear, did she?" asked Clark. The man's eyes narrowed at that; clearly suspicious of him.
"Not… entirely, no. How do you know about that?"
"Never mind. We have to stop her. Do you know a way?"
"Yes, I know a way. It'll take some time to set it up though. In the meantime she could go anywhere. I doubt she's even on the grounds anymore."
"No, she's here somewhere. It's me she's after. She trapped Alicia to bring me back here. There's no question of her leaving until I'm taken care of."
The young man considered this for a moment, then nodded. I didn't like the idea of Clark being used as bait, but deferred to his judgement. I knew that Stacy – or whatever she was – had to be stopped.
"It's best that both of you wait here for now. I'm going to set a trap of my own for her. I'll come get you when it's time."
As the man turned and left, Clark tilted his head and concentrated for a moment.
"You're listening in on him, aren't you? Do you trust him?" I asked.
"Well I know he's telling the truth about Stacy, at any rate. She isn't just another person who's been infected by the meteors."
He told me about the magic show, and how 'Edward' had made his sister vanish. But as it turned out, something of her essence survived. It had no physical form of its own, he told me, but could take over other people.
"So why didn't it just leave Stacy when it got in here? It can't exactly have enjoyed being a prisoner."
"I don't know. Edward might, I guess."
Clark fetched me a glass of water then, gently rubbing my shoulders, soothing me as I recovered from my ordeal. I was aware that I was trembling slightly, but soon calmed down. We sat on the edge of Roland's desk in silence for a moment.
"Clark?"
"What is it?"
I hesitated before asking the question. I thought Clark might get angry, but I wanted to try and reach out to him. To give him a chance to open up to someone, the one good thing I had offered him in the past.
"Stacy's not the only one who was affected by more than the meteors is she?"
There was something in Clark's eyes then that I couldn't read. He turned his head away from me. In that moment, Clark looked horribly, terribly alone.
"I don't know what you mean," he mumbled. Taking his hand in mine, I gently turned his head so he had to look at me.
"It's all right Clark. You can tell me. What really happened to you?"
He didn't speak for awhile, and I knew he was struggling, fighting some battle inside himself. There was a desperate sadness in his eyes. I didn't know what else to say. Finally Clark pulled away, and I felt that I had lost him forever.
