In which Michael finally makes an appearance.

-

Samuel Loomis gripped his clipboard more tightly to his chest as he approached the Conference Room. His palms were sweating, his heart rate elevated. He should try to get a handle on his excitement – Michael would notice instantly that something was off - but he found that he couldn't. Today was momentous; his idea, brilliant. Why hadn't he thought of it before?!

Dr. Emory Brighton kept pace at his side, a poster-girl for calm serenity. Loomis smirked inwardly. She was nervous. She had to be nervous. She was about to meet the infamous psychopath, Michael Myers.

Loomis paused outside the door and turned to the girl.

"Wait here," he instructed. "I will let you in once I've explained everything to him."

Irritation flickered in Dr. Brighton's slate-gray eyes. Loomis ignored it. He turned and gestured for one of the three armed guards to open the door.

Michael was sitting at the table, wrists chained behind him, face hidden behind a blank white mask. So today it was Nothingness. Loomis had nicknamed each of the masks his patient wore, and had found that they corresponded with something that vaguely passed as emotion in the monster.

Nothingness was as close to sorrow as Michael could get.

This would be interesting.

"Good morning, Michael," Loomis said, settling into a seat across the table from the hulking form of his patient. It had been sixteen years now. Sixteen years of talking to a brick wall. Why hadn't he thought of this before?!

Michael's eyes flickered behind his mask. He knew something was amiss.

"Yes, Michael. Something is different. I've brought someone to meet you." He paused, watched Michael closely. "Her name is Dr. Brighton. She's quite pretty." Ah, there it was, that flicker again! Just a slight movement of eyes beneath eyelids. Excitement surged through Loomis.

He stood, and knocked twice on the door. Dr. Brighton stepped through, and Loomis watched her eyes as they fell on Michael. Her expression did not alter but for a slight thinning of her lips. Loomis frowned. Most of the doctors he brought to Michael showed shock or fear at his unusual size. Sitting down, he was almost as tall as a normal man standing.

Dr. Brighton turned to Loomis. "I'd like to speak to him alone." It was more a command than a suggestion. Loomis bridled indignantly.

"He is my patient - "

"And you asked me to analyze him," she interrupted sharply. "I have done my time under observation, Dr. Loomis. I assure you I am perfectly capable of handling a routine analysis on my own."

Loomis felt anger unfurl within him, but he clamped it down tightly. She was right. He did not have the authority to oversee another Psychologist's examination. He would have to watch from behind sound-proof, bullet-proof glass to see how Michael reacted to her.

With a curt nod, he turned and left the room.

-

Emory let out a small sigh. In truth, Loomis had been the one factor in this whole equation that had worried her. She had studied him, his history, his books, and his methods. And she had discovered something very interesting.

Samuel Loomis had stopped trying to help Michael a long time ago.

She supposed this was a point in Michael's favor, proof of his skill.

Emory sat down across from Michael and looked at him. His hair was long and tangled, he wore a tattered bathrobe over a pair of dirty scrubs. His face was hidden by a white mask with small holes cut out for the lips and eyes.

He sat perfectly still, and the only movement came from his steady breathing.

"My name is Emory Brighton," she stated. She would not coddle this man. Not if he was what she thought he was. "Dr. Loomis asked me to come here because he thinks that you might react to an attractive female near your age." She watched him for signs that he understood her, that he even heard her, and saw nothing.

"He wrote a book about you. He's taught lectures about you. About what he thinks is wrong with you. But he's way off the mark, isn't he?" There was no amusement in her voice, no smugness. Only simple fact. "He believes you are a child trapped in a man's body, that you were consumed by a sociopathic personality at a very young age and that you have lost all capability for emotion."

Emory lowered her voice. "But that's not true, is it?" She paused and her eyes narrowed. "I have studied hundreds of cases like yours; men, women, children, all suffering from some form of Fugue State..." She trailed off suddenly. Images of Jack surfaced in her mind, cutting off her voice. Sadness washed over her.

"You are not mentally unstable," she said softly, looking out the thick glass windows, out over an autumn forest. "You are just very, very smart."

She felt his eyes on her, as if they were a physical force. She looked over and met his gaze, held it. Sharp blue eyes, calculating eyes, stared out of that blank, empty mask, and Emory thought she had never seen such a contrast. She wanted to smile and frown at the same time. Those eyes...

They were issuing a challenge.

"I didn't come here to expose you, Michael," she said softly. "It would be difficult, if not impossible, to prove and I won't waste my time or my good name in doing so. I came here because Loomis doesn't understand you. And I would like to." She raised an eyebrow. And now for the final blow. "Surely you've gotten bored these past few years. It will be an interesting challenge for you to find a way to kill me."

A long moment of silence passed between them. Each watched the other, each waiting. Emory gazed into his crystal blue gaze. She would never in her life, even under threat of torture, tell anyone just how enraptured she was by those eyes.

And then, like some ancient stone statue come to life, Michael slowly tilted his head a fraction to the left. An indication of curiosity for Dr. Loomis, the man watching from behind the mirror.

Emory smiled. "I'll see you in a few days, then."

She stood, paused for a moment, and sighed. "Loomis will probably insist on sitting in on our next meeting. I'll have to treat you like he does or he'll never allow me to continue seeing you. I apologize in advance." With that, she turned and moved towards the exit, knocked on the door once, and left the room. She felt Michael's gaze on her the entire time.

-

AN: I had originally wanted their first encounter to be longer, but there's only so much you can do with a one-sided conversation and a short-tempered psychologist who refuses to play to Michael's tune. Let me know what you think!