Shining among Darkness

By
WingzemonX

Chapter 44.
I'm not okay

Esther didn't calm down or breathe easy until they were several miles from Eola and were driving south on 99W. Once Lily got into Esther's truck hidden behind the mental hospital, they headed toward the highway, taking the route west toward Rickreall. She hadn't yet heard the police sirens coming from Salem, but she was sure it wouldn't take much longer.

They wouldn't stop at Rickreall or anywhere else for the next two hours at least. Although the next step in their mission was to deliver both girls to Los Angeles, they did not have an immediately fixed destination at the moment. They would only drive south until they felt safe, or Esther got tired of driving and needed to rest.

Everything had turned out relatively well, but Esther did not wish to over-tempt her apparent good luck.

Lily was sitting in the passenger seat while Samara had sat in the back. The latter had not said a word since they left Eola. In fact, she wasn't even moving. The girl was sitting, with her head leaning against the window. Her whole body limps as if she were sleeping. However, her eyes were open, fixed on the darkness that enveloped the floor of the van under her feet, only illuminated from time to time by the light from other vehicles passing by. Esther had improvised a quick bandage on her hand and a band-aid on her cheek from the medicine cabinet she used to treat Lily's injured leg.

"And what happens to our new traveling companion?" Lily questioned curiously, looking back over her seat.

"Leave her alone," Esther chided without taking her eyes off the road. "I think she just killed her mother."

"Really?" Lily took a more careful look at the girl in the back seat.

Samara looked somewhat scrawny, and Lily didn't feel a big threat coming from her. In fact, she felt nothing from her: no fear, no sadness... nothing. As if it were a mere corpse, and in truth, it almost looked like one. Either way, it wasn't her problem at the moment.

Lily shrugged and settled back in her seat.

"Not a big deal," Lily murmured. "I killed my father, and you don't see me whining."

Esther glanced at her subtly out of the corner of her eye for a few moments, but almost immediately turned back to the path.

"I killed them both," Esther whispered slowly as if she had no genuine interest in being heard by her companion. "My mom and dad... more than once."

Matilda had suffered various types of wounds throughout her life, but never a bullet through her body, even though it was not the first time she had been shot. The same woman had just a few days ago done it under quite similar circumstances.

It hadn't been so painful at the time, but more like an annoying burn. However, after a while and with the adrenaline of the moment reduced, this burning was increasing until it became unbearable. By comparison, the bite on her ankle from that dog at the Portland hospital felt insignificant.

The hospital's staff found her sitting in a corridor when she couldn't walk anymore. She was barely conscious. She had applied some alcohol that she had found in one of the doctors' offices. Then she bandaged herself with the best of her ability using only her left hand. Two nurses treated her as quickly as possible, cleaning the wound and bandaging it more appropriately. As they did so, they repeatedly mentioned how lucky she was, as the bullet had entered and exited, and there did not appear to be anything significantly wounded. Matilda could hardly believe that there could be any good luck in all of that.

After treating her, they laid her on a gurney and injected her with a tranquilizer to help her relax. She did not want them to do it since the least she wanted right now was sleep. But in the end, she fell exhausted.

While she did so, she seemed to have seen Cole standing on the side of her gurney talking to her and wasn't sure if she answered something or not.

Anyway, the sleep had served her well, and hours later, when she woke up, she felt somewhat better. Her entire shoulder had been bandaged, and a sling had been placed to keep her arm still. It hurts a bit, but with the anti-inflammatories, pain relievers, and antibiotics, everything should be fine in a few days.

Matilda sat down carefully on the gurney, holding her head a little. She felt that it was spinning a bit.

She felt someone approach her from the side. Her first thought was that it was a nurse coming to reprimand her and tell her to stay in bed, and she was more than willing to tell them to mind their own business. People say that a doctor is always a lousy patient; that seemed accurate in her case. But it wasn't a nurse; it was Cody who approached her cautiously.

Cody was a mess at the time. His hair was disheveled, his tie had been removed, and his shirt was misaligned and stained. He wasn't wearing his glasses, and it also looked like he had just woken up not long ago.

"Matilda, are you ...?" Cody murmured doubtfully, discreetly glancing at her sling.

"I was shot," the psychiatrist replied, though almost immediately, she assumed he must already know. "Don't tell my mom. She'll go crazy as soon as she finds out..."

She brought the fingers of her free hand to her forehead and rubbed it hard.

"Samara is gone. That... woman took her... or she wanted to go with her. Her mother is dead... I couldn't stop it ..."

"I know," Cody answered in a muffled voice, and then he allowed himself to sit on the gurney next to her. "I couldn't do anything either. Lily Sullivan," Matilda was startled when she heard that name. "She was here. She got into my head, but not like others have done before. The protection Eleven gave us not only was useless; she was able to go even deeper and bring to light errors that I thought I had forgotten."

He paused and took a deep breath as if trying to regain the energy he'd lost saying all that.

"These girls… are not like the other children we have helped before, Matilda."

"These girls?" Matilda repeated doubtfully. "Are you talking about Lily Sullivan…?"

Cody was quiet for a few moments, and then he turned slowly to her, almost as if he was afraid to look directly at her eyes.

"And Samara," he finally answered, leaving Matilda speechless. "Eleven was right. There is something… that is not right with them… Maybe we should have listened to her and stepped aside; leave this matter to Cole."

Matilda had nothing to answer him. A few days ago, that comment would have angered her quite a bit and would have led to a marked defensive attitude. But, just at that moment, after everything that had happened, she had neither the strength nor the weapons to affirm otherwise. Maybe it was true; maybe she should have left as soon as Eleven warned her.

"Where is he now?" Matilda asked abruptly.

"Cole? He's fine," Cody replied. "He has a few bumps, but nothing serious. Apparently, he got into a fight with another individual who was also helping Leena Klammer. And Cole thinks he also had… abilities," he whispered that last as if afraid someone else would hear him even though they were alone at the moment. "He's with the police, giving his statement and trying again not to keep us here too long, I guess..."

"I'm sorry," Matilda muttered suddenly, taking Cody by surprise. "I am the one who got you involved in this."

"It wasn't what I meant. I wasn't blaming you."

"But I do." Matilda lowered her gaze with a certain melancholy. "I failed Samara, as I failed..."

The door was opened without warning, making them both a bit tense as if they had been caught in the middle of a prank. This time it was not a nurse nor a policeman. It was Dr. Johnson, not in better shape than theirs.

"Dr. Honey, you woke up," Johnson mentioned, pointing to the obvious.

"Dr. Jhonson, are you okay?" Matilda questioned with genuine concern. Johnson nodded in response. He seemed to hesitate for a few moments, and then he spoke.

"Mr. Morgan just arrived," he murmured in a muffled voice, catching Matilda entirely off guard, and she abruptly felt her head spin again. "He asked to speak to you. I told him you were hurt and maybe unwell, but… he insisted a lot."

Dr. Jhonson was trying too insistently to justify himself, so much so that he was beginning to border on the false.

"I can tell him that you're still asleep..."

"No, it's fine," the psychiatrist declared firmly and began to stand up with the care her condition warranted. "I'll go to see him."

"Matilda, it might not be a good idea," Cody pointed out with considerable concern. Not only because of her shoulder but also because he already knew why this man wanted to talk to her. Not only was her daughter missing… her wife was dead.

Matilda knew it too, and quite clearly. The least she wanted was to face him, to hear what he was going to say to her or to recriminate her. But she couldn't hide from it; sooner or later, she would have to have that awkward conversation, to call it somehow.

"I must," was the only thing Matilda managed to answer, and then she walked carefully to the door. The rhythm of her steps grew more confident as her lethargic state dissipated. However, the same did not happen with her longing for the meeting she was about to have.

Police arrived as quickly as they could, closely followed by firefighters and paramedics. There was no fire to turn off, but there were people to deal with. There were more than twenty injuries among staff, patients, and visitors; the most serious was Matilda and her gunshot wound. But in addition, there were seven dead in total: a janitor, a nurse, and two security guards, all four killed by firearms, presumably by Leena Klammer. In addition, one more nurse suffered a severe blow to the head to be attacked by a frantic patient. A patient, Anna Morgan, seemed to indicate that she had stabbed herself several times in her own neck. And finally, Dr. Scott jumped from the roof of the building before all that madness began and whose relationship to it was still imprecise.

The press came flying in from Salem, perhaps further afield, and began to congregate outside the hospital in less than an hour.

It was all in a way a replay of what happened in Portland; two similar attacks perpetrated a few days apart and by the same person. If the name of Leena Klammer was not known, little by little, it would begin to be. In a way, that was a good thing, as it reduced the places where she could hide without being recognized. However, considering who was accompanying and helping her, Cole Sear was convinced that she would end up vanishing into the air, and it would be a long time before the police could find her. Of course, he did not say that directly to the officers who questioned him.

As a law enforcement officer, Cole cooperated and told them whatever was appropriate for them to know. Most of the story focused on the man who had attacked him when he was trying to apprehend Leena Klammer. He gave them the most detailed description he could and provided them with the weapon the suspect had taken and left behind on the run to search for his prints. However, Cole suspected they would find none or match no one at all. He omitted the part about people going crazy seeing things that weren't there or that the same man who had attacked him somehow managed to turn off his brain for a few moments as if pulling the chain on a ceiling lamp.

And of course, he was pretty careful trying to explain what he was really doing in that place, who Matilda and Cody were, and feigned ignorance when they asked why this woman named Leena would want to take Lily Sullivan and Samara Morgan with her. And he faked it pretty well, it was fair to say. But that was simply because, in reality, it was not like he was entirely sure about Leena's motivations or who was behind her. Although he had his theories...

At first, the Oregon officials were somewhat reluctant to take his word for it. Above all, it seemed highly suspicious that the three (Cole, Matilda, and Cody) had been at both crime scenes just by chance. Cole had to give them credit for that; it would be something that would also seem quite strange to him. The officers insisted a lot, using this as the primary basis of their interrogation. But when the hours passed, and a little boy in a dark suit arrived (who Cole assumed must be an assistant prosecutor), they only had to accept that they had nothing to relate him, or one of his friends, with this horrible event.

The site was a mess of forensics, officers, and medical personnel. Seeing a bit of the cynical side of everything, Cole thought that if you had more than twenty people injured, it was in a way good luck that it was right in a hospital, even if it was a psychiatric one; maybe thanks to that, Matilda was fine...

Of all the horrible things that had happened that night, learning that Matilda had been shot was perhaps what affected the Philadelphia detective the most. He did not care if the other officers wanted to stop him; he made his way to the consulting room where she was resting, just to see that she was really okay. And indeed she was, or something like that. Apparently, she was so confused by what her doctors had injected her that she probably hadn't been aware of his presence. And once the police left him, he just thought about going to see her again.

He told himself that it was a normal concern of colleagues, especially now that they had apparently started to become friends (or so he believed). But he knew it wasn't exactly that; it was so evident in his intentions that he felt ashamed.

Before he could get to where Matilda was, Cole passed through one of the waiting rooms, and there he saw Vazquez, sitting in one of the chairs staring wildly at absolute nothingness as if he too had been injected with a good dose of tranquilizers. The detective had some blows to the face, a couple done by Cole himself, and the wounds on his arm and ankle probably had to be rechecked. But he was still in one piece. Cole had to admit it: he was a tough man.

Cole decided to take a slight detour and walked over to him; he had to give him something back anyway. Vazquez didn't notice him until he was by his side. Cole sat in the chair next to him without saying anything at first. Then he reached into the inside pocket of his jacket, pulling the pistol he had borrowed from him, and held it out.

"I think this is yours," he pointed out simply.

Vazquez took the weapon with his free hand and examined it for a few moments in silence as if it were the first time he had seen it. He did not ask why Cole had it or reprimand him for taking it, yelling about how irresponsible it was to take another officer's gun or the trouble it could have gotten him into. Incidentally, he didn't seem interested in thanking it either. He just put it back in its holster and then returned to the same almost lethargic state as moments ago.

Cole took something else out of his pocket: a pack of cigarettes. It was a hospital, and he had been reprimanded for it too much in recent days. However, he didn't think that with all the fuss, anyone would care. He placed one on his lips and then held the pack out to Vazquez. He glanced at it and just shook his head slowly, denying the offer. Cole put the package in his coat again and lit the cigarette with his lighter. He thought he would feel better after a few puffs, but it seemed that the nicotine was not enough this time.

"What happened here?" Vazquez blurted out suddenly without apparent provocation.

A lot happened, but Cole guessed he was referring specifically to what had happened to him and the others.

"Lily Sullivan, that happened," Cole answered without hesitation. Vazquez turned to see him with amazement in his eyes. "I think my friends tried their best to explain it to you the other day. Is there something I could tell you so you can believe it now?"

"Psychic powers, illusions, telepathy... Are these all real?" Vazquez exclaimed, still clinging to a fragile skepticism.

"More than I would like. And I'm afraid everything is even much worse than you imagine. Even I, who have seen so many things before, cannot fully understand what happened here. So don't feel bad if you're a little confused; everyone here will be for quite a while. There is no way that mainstream officers could understand or deal with all of this. We are not trained for this at the academy, I assure you."

The last thing he had apparently tried to say with some humor, but he didn't think it sounded funny.

"And who can deal with something like this?" Vazquez questioned in an interrogation voice, staring sharply at Cole with some mistrust. "You and your Foundation?"

Cole was silent and exhaled some smoke a few seconds later through his mouth with a small snort.

"I question myself the same," he whispered in a muffled voice.

They were silent again for a few seconds. A couple of officers walked past them, entering one door and exiting another without paying attention to them.

A yawn suddenly escaped from Cole. It had been several hours now, and even before this, the day had been quite exhausting getting to and from Silverdale. He felt tired, but he didn't think he could sleep yet.

"I need to… get out of here…" Vazquez murmured, again out of nowhere and without provocation, getting up from his seat as fast as his crutches allowed.

"Sure? You don't look in good condition. In addition, you fired your weapon twice inside a hospital. If Portland's internal affairs are like Philadelphia, that will have to mean a lot of paperwork."

"Fuck that," the detective snapped with some conviction, and Cole could applaud that. Vazquez took a few steps away on his crutches, then stopped abruptly and turned back to Cole. "There is more behind all of this than even you realize. After the incident in Portland, people from the government showed up to ask questions, demand evidence... and only God knows what else."

Cole looked at him, confused. Government people? That was a pretty ambiguous term.

"Federals?"

"I don't know what the fuck they are. But I think they'll be here very soon too. You and your friends better not be around when that happens."

Cole did not know how to interpret that strange warning. It would not seem odd to him that people from higher offices showed up at a crime scene like that, especially one involving a murderer like Leena Klammer. The Estonian woman had committed crimes not just crossing state lines but country borders. It was something Cole already knew he had to deal with and was something so common in his job, even though his career wasn't quite that long yet. And he supposed Vazquez must be more used to it.

But even so, he looked especially disturbed by that. Could it be that these people he was talking about weren't like the usual agencies who used to poke their noses from time to time when they sniffed out publicity and recognition? Who were they really talking about?

"Why are you telling me this?" He asked curiously, starting with the idea that he seemed willing to hit him a few hours ago or even Matilda if necessary.

Vazquez hesitated.

"I don't know... I don't know anything tonight..."

He turned back on his crutches, and now he did walk away without turning back, and Cole didn't do anything to stop him either.

He sat for a few moments and continued to smoke for a while longer, brooding over that piece of information he had just received. On top of all the worries he already had, now he must add that a mysterious government agency may or may not be doing suspicious things around them. Whoever they were, Cole hoped they didn't want to get too involved in that matter because it could not end anything well.

His phone suddenly rang, causing him to jump in his chair in surprise. He groped for it in each of his pockets until he found it on the front left of his pants. The number on the screen was unknown; the area code was not from Pennsylvania or Oregon, and at the moment, he could not identify exactly where it was from. It was not the best time to answer strange calls, or maybe it was the right time depending on how you saw it; a strange call was just the beginning of all his meddling in this matter in which he was involved.

He decided to attend.

"Detective Se…" He started to introduce himself with the phone to his ear, but he couldn't finish pronouncing his last name.

"Finally, I managed to contact one of you!" He heard a female voice yell quite loudly, perhaps angrily, on the other end of the line. Cole even had a reflex action to push the device away from him a bit because of the loud volume of that voice. "What's wrong with everyone?! Do I need to call you telepathically to attend?!"

"Hey, slow down," Cole replied defensively. "Who are you? Monica?"

"Who are you? Monica?" The woman on the phone repeated, using a more than dismissive tone of voice. "Yes, who else? I don't have time for bullshit, Sear. What the hell happened?"

It wasn't like Cole was in the best mood in the world before, but that abrupt call definitely didn't do much to improve him either.

Monica was one of the Foundation's trackers and one of the best, according to some people. A couple of times, he had asked for her help to investigate some information in some of his cases, and she had done it... with a rather unpleasant attitude. Apparently, helping the law was not one of her favorite activities. Therefore he was not one of his favorite people either.

"Look, we've had a very busy night around here," Cole sighed wearily, running his hand over his face, "so you'll have to be a lot more specific. Which of all the things that happened are you talking about?"

After a hurtful comment that Cole tried to ignore, Monica got straight to the point, revealing the true intent of her call. What Cole heard so surprised him that the cigarette he held between his fingers slipped to the ground.

Cole thought none could give him more bad news that night. He was so wrong...

Matilda was not surprised to learn where Mr. Morgan was, but the lack of surprise did not prevent a knot in her stomach at the thought of going there. Dr. Johnson did her the favor of guiding her into the hall where the double doors were located, but he did not go any further, and she did not blame him. An experienced doctor had learned to deal with the relatives of a deceased patient… but this time was different.

She stood for a few moments silently contemplating the closed doors and the sign above them that read: morgue.

Matilda took a deep breath to gather strength and hide the slight dizziness caused by the medicines. She carefully opened one of the doors and peeked into the dark, cold room. The first thing she saw was Mr. Morgan's broad back and his dark hair with a few grays. He was right in front of one of the plates, illuminated by a brilliant light suspended above it. Mr. Morgan's body blocks Matilda's view of his face, but she knew without a problem that the body on the plate must have been his wife's. He watched her silently, indeed gazing at her serene face.

Matilda took a couple of steps inside, then let the door close on its own behind her. Richard Morgan didn't seem to have noticed her, or if he did, he didn't seem to care enough to turn to look at her. Matilda had at that moment a thought a little out of place about how long she had really slept because the trip from Moesko to there should not be short.

"Mr. Morgan," the psychiatrist said slowly, thus trying to announce her presence. He still didn't look at her.

"They said you were hurt," the man said in an alarmingly calm tone. "You are okay?"

"I'm recovering," was the only thing Matilda could think of to reply, regretting it a little later for no reason.

Then she dared to get a little closer until she could see, willingly or not, the face of the woman leaning on the plate. Her skin looked even paler than before, and some of the veins were popping out underneath it. Her eyes were closed, and the wound on his neck had been closed somewhat hastily. Its expression, sometimes uttered in a futile attempt to comfort as "seems to be only sleeping," did not apply at all in that case.

Only her face was visible; the rest of the body was covered with a thin white sheet. Matilda subtly glanced around the rest of the room. Other plates and stretchers were occupied, all completely covered with a sheet similar to the one that covered Anna Morgan's body.

"I loved her from the first time I spoke to her, you know?" Mr. Morgan commented suddenly, pulling her attention back to him. The man reached his large hand toward the dark hair of the body in front of him, stroking it very gently, as if afraid to break it. "The passion with which she spoke about her horses and all the dreams she had for the future. And I witnessed how she fulfilled them all, one after another... except one. I told her that we didn't need children, that we, our ranch, and our horses were enough. But I think they weren't for her. I just wanted her to be happy, completely happy. And for a moment, you made me believe that it might still be possible. That we would get over this, she would come home, we would buy new foals, and we could start over. Keep fulfilling our dreams, and build some new ones. That just the two of us could be happy after she left this place, and we got rid of that demon."

He paused a little before finishing.

"Hope is the cruelest thing in this world, isn't it? And you seem to be an expert in that kind of cruelty."

There was no apparent sadness or recrimination in his words, just a grim, cold calm that, for that matter, could be even worse. Matilda felt totally disarmed in those moments, unable to react in any sensible way. Her mind had been wandering mainly on that last thing he had said: "Hope is the cruelest thing in this world." She had no way to deny such a statement; she had thought the same not long ago while remembering Carrie White...

"Samara was getting better, Mr. Morgan," Matilda murmured as firmly as possible, which wasn't really much. "Our sessions were helping her. I am convinced that with the proper care, she could have..."

"Do you think I give a damn about what you might or might not have done with that girl?!" Richard snapped loudly, turning her to see just a little over his shoulder. His voice echoed in the room, and for the first time, Matilda felt a trace of crying creep into it. "My wife is dead, lying on this cold table, and her killer is still breathing; the girl who was supposed to be her daughter, who would make her happier than I could."

Mr. Morgan then leaned forward, letting out a few little sobs that he could no longer contain. He kept running his hand through the hair of the body while he looked at her, melancholy.

Matilda tried to speak, but her voice trailed off.

"What happened… it wasn't Samara's fault…"

"And whose is it then? Yours?" He looked back at her over his shoulder, and Matilda wanted to say yes; it was all her fault. However, nothing left her lips.

Richard turned almost immediately to the front once more, not caring anymore.

"Perhaps it was mine, despite all having been fooled by her angel face and not having fully seen what she really was when Anna told me. I didn't just put my wife here for trying to kill herself, you know. She wanted to kill Samara too." That fact revealed so suddenly chilled Matilda. "I should have allowed her... Now she is free in the world, and God only knows what kind of horrors she is about to unleash on us."

They didn't say much more after that, and there was really nothing else to say. The message Mr. Morgan was trying to convey to her was too clear: she had failed, and that was something she could hardly argue with.

Matilda left him alone when she thought it appropriate. She walked slowly down the hallway aimlessly but actually only advanced a couple of meters before having to stop and hold onto the wall with one hand to keep from falling. But in reality, it had been more of a reflex act because she really did want to fall. She slammed her shoulder against the wall, then her back, and let it slide across the surface until she landed on the floor. Her blue eyes were staring blankly at the opposite wall, not looking at anything specific in it.

Her free fist clenched tightly, and in a vague attempt to release all the frustration and anger inside her, she slammed it to the ground hard. She did it once, then two and three times. But it was not hitting the ground. What she really wanted to do: she wanted to scream, kick, and make that whole building fly into the air; that everything and everyone went very far from her.

She wanted to get rid of that overwhelming and suffocating anguish that was not letting her breathe. She wanted to do a lot of things, but she didn't do any… just hit the ground and let a few tears slide down her cheeks, not allowing herself to fully cry out.

"You told me you would help me, Matilda… You told me that you would help me control my powers! You said to me that I wouldn't hurt anyone else anymore! And look what I did! I killed my mom! I killed her!"

"I'm sorry," the psychiatrist kept repeating in her mind over and over. "Sorry, sorry, sorry, sorry..."

"Matilda, hey…" She heard someone call her suddenly, but it wasn't enough to bring her entirely out of the state she had fallen into. The person approached her and crouched aside. Only then did Matilda turn and meet Cole's concerned face, and behind him came Cody. "Are you okay?"

"No! I'm not okay!" Matilda replied sternly. "Nothing in all of this is okay!"

She leaned her body forward and pressed her hand against her eyes as if she wanted to soothe some throbbing pain. She held that position for only a few seconds before turning back to her two companions. They were both looking at her seriously… too seriously. At first, she told herself that it was a normal reaction to the situation, especially if she was found in such a deplorable state. However, the more she watched their faces, the more it seemed that it was not precisely that. They both seemed doubtful like they were looking for the way and the moment to say or do something.

"What?" Matilda questioned them bluntly. "What's going on now?"

Cole turned to Cody, and they both looked at each other, more doubtful than before. The policeman looked at her again, seemingly exerting great effort at it, and the seriousness in his gaze deepened even more.

"It's Eleven…" he finally answered in a solemn tone.

Matilda looked at him confused, although a part of her knew it before Cole explained. Among all that pile of misfortunes, something even more horrible had happened...

END OF CHAPTER 44