Interval 3 – Delirium
The implacable glow beating the outside of his eyelids was also warming his body. He could feel a soft touch around his ankles and the wind ruffling his hair.
"Quentin! Quentin!"
He opened his eyes to look around for the source of the sound. He was standing in the tall grass of a meadow peppered with dandelions. The sky was a brilliant blue, with no clouds in sight. Atop a hill nearby, a woman knelt on a square of bright checkered cloth, fiddling with a bag.
"Quentin!"
He glanced to his left. A little boy, dark haired and fair skinned, was running toward him, arm outstretched.
"Look! Look what I found." The boy, his green eyes sparkling with excitement, pointed down toward his open hand, where something glimmered. Looking down, he saw that it was a small stone. He took it, turning the smooth quartz slowly in the sunlight.
"Do you think it's a diamond?"
A shadow fell over the rock. The young woman had approached, holding a plate of cookies. He looked up at her. She was smiling tenderly as she offered the plate to him.
"Have a cookie, Quentin," she said. He took one, but he didn't even have the chance to taste it. In one mighty swish of black hair the woman was crouching in front of them, and held both boys gently in her arms. She smelled of wild flowers.
"I love you two," her voice said quietly beside his ear. "I won't ever let anyone hurt you. I'd die before I let that happen." He closed his eyes, and lurched forward unexpectedly. She was gone.
He opened his eyes to a pounding headache. The meadow was gone. The lighting in the room where he was now was nothing compared to the sun – here was a lamp hanging from the ceiling whose light seemed to pulse in time with his migraine. A tall, dark-eyed man, who wore a suit and tie, was watching him cautiously from the shadows shrouding the other end of the long conference table.
He looked down at himself. He was wearing a faded orange jumpsuit and was sitting in a chair, his arms twisted behind him in an awkward position. He shifted uncomfortably in a quiet metallic rustle, finding that that he had little or no room to maneuver. The man sitting opposite him leaned across the table and squinted, studying his captive's face.
"Ready to talk?" the man said.
"Where am I?" he asked drowsily.
"What's your name?" the man asked, and when his guest didn't answer, he leaned closer and stared silently.
"Alright, Ed," the man said quietly, sighing. "It doesn't matter. You killed eleven people today. Your life –" he slapped the table "– is over."
The man's voice was loud enough, but he couldn't listen to it. He couldn't focus. His head throbbed as though it was a ticking time bomb, just waiting to explode and take his consciousness with it. The light was blinding in such perfect darkness. He decided to close his eyes, if only for a moment.
Jin Sun-Kwon of the F.E.A.R. team glanced through the one-way glass as she passed the window with Commissioner Rowdy Betters. The Point man was fully conscious, though as he was sitting with his hands cuffed through the metal bars of a chair at the table, he couldn't look any more dead than he currently did. Leaning under the low-hanging lamp, a man stood close to him, gesticulating as he talked.
Betters opened a door and lead the way into the room. Jin followed. The first thing she noticed was that the Point man appeared to be asleep, though his eyes were half-open. He moved groggily when the detective shook him by the shoulder. Betters rapped on the doorframe and cleared his throat to make their presence known to the detective, who glanced up sharply.
"Who're you?" he asked, surprised. "Who let you in here?"
"We're here to take him back with us," Jin said.
"Wait a minute," the detective said, frowning. "Your friend here got caught red handed murdering eleven innocent people, volunteer staff at AMH, and you're talking about having him released from custody at this time? First, tell me who let you in here without permission."
"We were just wondering where we could speak to the Captain here," Betters intervened.
The detective crossed his arms across his chest. "That would be me."
"All right, could we have a few words with you; somewhere we can talk in private, Captain?" Betters said.
The Captain trudged out into the hallway and stood waiting for them to follow. Jin caught the detainee's eye long enough to mouth a quick "it'll be alright" before she exited the room with Betters.
"Let's talk in my office," the Captain said, closing the door.
Still sitting in his chair, surrounded by silence, the Point man closed his eyes and let his head drop.
In the space of an instant he was back in that long corridor again, walking to the door at its end, staring at the keypad lock around the handle. The small window in the door was entirely covered in steel meshing, but he could see who was inside. He could feel the cold weight of the gun in his hand.
The door opened without any resistance. Inside that eerily blue room, a motionless man knelt on the tiles. Only when the door shut did he look up, and the man known only as the F.E.A.R. Point man recognized him immediately.
His arm rose inexorably, a reflex born of his training and his frustration. The man kneeling before him didn't make a move. He didn't try to escape – he just stared at his would-be-killer with his green, unblinking eyes. And he opened his mouth.
"I'm your brother," he said.
The gun's muzzle leveled with the man's face.
"No!" a little girl's voice cried.
The Point man felt a small hand on his arm as his finger contracted to pull the trigger. Paxton Fettel fell back, dead, with a small, round bullet hole between the eyes.
"Hey," Jin said.
The Point man opened his eyes.
"Are you alright?" Jin asked. "We're leaving."
Betters entered, followed by the Captain, looking as though he were filled with impotent fury but didn't dare show it. He walked up to the prisoner and undid his cuffs, and then he stared at him as he stood up.
"You're free to go," he said.
Betters touched Jin's shoulder and spoke a few words to her. "I'll stay here and wrap a few things up with the Captain. You two get a move on. I'll catch up with you later."
The two of them left the room once more. Jin took some clothes out of a duffel bag and handed them silently to the Point man.
"Here, put these on," she said, turning away. "And then, we'll get the hell out of here."
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Author's Note: Several small points:
- I will explain why I call the Point man "Quentin" at the next interval.
- If you detect any problems (grammar, coherence, etc.) please tell me!
- AMH stands for Auburn Memorial Hospital.
- Also, there may be humongous changes brought to the entire fic, because I'm currently researching Auburn and the surrounding area.