Her slender left hand lifted as he pulled the Velcro strap up, the sound making her grunt and flinch. She sank further into the chair as if to get away from him, curling up tight in her seat while he stepped cautiously around her to do the same with the other side. The moment he un-Velcroed the other wrist she pushed back, the metal chair tipping back with the intensity of her push.
Billy jumped back and out of the way, sighing as she screeched-her head colliding with the wall behind her. She whined, hissing at him as she reached down to un-Velcro her ankles. Scrambling to her feet she ran to the door and pushed against it, grasping the handle and twisting furiously. He winced, leaning against the wall while she screamed at the door, yanking so hard on the handle that he was almost positive that she would break it off of the frame.
The interrogation room's intercom speaker hummed, clicking as static died off. "Brennan, can you try and keep her from hurting herself. The room is basically indestructible, but she isn't. We need her whole."
Billy looked at the large glass window and nodded his head. All he saw was a reflection of his tired aging self, staring into the glass as if waiting for the faces of those outside to magically appear before him. He turned back to the woman who looked at him, absolutely petrified-so much so that she literally shook against the crook of the door jamb and adjacent wall.
He did not move, did not make a sound. His breathing was cool, calm, and so shallow that he barely knew that he was breathing himself. Carefully, quietly, he leaned back against the wall, staring at her.
Her breathing grew ragged as her hisses and screeches (which gave Billy the chills for how similar to the raptor's calls they were) wore out her throat. She gasped like a fish out of water, wheezing sickly. She gripped the door handle which had broken off with her ferocity like a hammer, tapping the ragged side against the metal door. He couldn't imagine how frightened she was, the entire scene was heartbreaking.
He slowly slid down the wall until he was sitting with his legs out in front of him, his pants bunching around his upper thighs almost painfully. "Lily Rhodes."
The room fell silent, the only sound other than his steady breathing was his heart humming in his chest, ears, he could even feel the lively beat in his fingertips. He slowly looked up, his eyes following the contour lines of the tile floor until her toned, slender frame finally came into view. She tilted her head to the side, her eyes large almost glistening as she looked right at him. Lily recognized her name. So he said it again. And again. Each time he said it she leaned forward, lips twitching, eyes gazing through him.
"Lily," he said with a smile, looking at her with a slight nod, "Rhodes. Lily Rhodes."
She tilted her head to the side, clambering onto her knees and crawling over to him. Much like those she'd lived with for the last 8 years or more, she came close to him. Very slowly she parted her lips, her tongue flicking her teeth, clicking wetly behind her lips. She slowed as she neared his extended feet and leaned down, literally sniffing him. He smirked, watching her smell his shoes.
Twitching his foot, she jumped back, screeching loudly as if to call her raptor family that in this situation would never call. She glared at him, her legs tucked under her body, arms out on either side to stabilize herself as she cautiously hopped closer again. She genuinely wanted to investigate him, he only hoped that everyone was watching outside. Billy was almost positive that he couldn't reproduce such a scenario of they didn't catch it. Then again, the entire compound had cameras literally on every corner, there had to be a few if not more than a few in the interrogation room. They just got sneakier since this compound had more people and less dinosaurs. People are always harder to keep track of.
"Lily," he said to her while she leaned down again to smell his shoe. He said her name three more times before she looked up from inspecting the folds in his pants around his ankles.
Her blue-grey eyes locked on his as he spoke, as if she could somehow learn to say her own name through staring into his eyes. Her tongue continued to dance behind her teeth until she spoke, a tiny croak of a word. He nodded his head slowly. She backed up a half-step and sat on her heels, kneeling beside him, so close that he could smell the honey shampoo they'd used to wash her hair.
He smiled, "Li-ly." Breaking her name into syllables seemed to help, she spoke it quietly. He nodded and said it again. "Lily Rhodes. Lily."
His repetition was working.
She looked down, touching her jaw and then her lips, speaking louder and then louder until she nearly yelled it at him, "Lily!"
Billy smiled and nodded, "You're Lily. I am Billy." He pointed to her, making her flinch but remain close. "Lily," he let it set in before putting his palm flat onto his chest, "Billy." He nodded and repeated it three times before she swatted his hand away while he pointed.
"Rude," she grumbled lowly, pushing his hand away with the back of her hand. "Billy rude."
He laughed and set his hand down for a few moments before lifting it again, pointing at her. She smacked his hand and jumped back while she yelled, "Rude!"
The intercom clicked on, "Good, keep it up Brennan."
Lily spun around, standing and looking at the corners of the room, searching for where it came from. "Rude!" She said again, looking into the mirror and pausing. Her head tilted to the side as she stared at herself. "Lily…" she whispered, her lips hanging open just slightly. Lifting her hand she ran her fingertips over the raised scars on her face, a pained expression filling her eyes.
On the other side of the wall stood the nurse who'd been caring for Lily, a psychologist, current CEO of InGen Naomi Wilder and a speech pathologist. They stared into the raptor girl's eyes as she looked into the mirror and spoke, her quiet voice the only sound in the hallway outside.
Wilder turned to the nurse, a diamond encrusted Tennis bracelet clanking as it hit the wall when she turned. Her maroon dress suit paired with her long wavy hair made her look sultry, but the sharp hook at the corners of each jaw and the downward turn of her nose made mulled over the sultry aspect of her appearance to give her a harsh look. Her narrow deep caramel eyes glared at the nurse-she always glared-as she spoke, "Progress, correct?"
The nurse nodded when the speech pathologist barged into the conversation, "Tremendous progress, Wilder. You see, she still possesses the same vocabulary that she had when she was first missing on the island, it has just been locked away in reserve. Her communication skills have dulled tremendously, but with any hope, she'll rehabilitate in no time. Refreshing her memory of basic words and commands is of course of the most importance."
"The fact that she still associates pointing at someone with being rude is a fantastic development or rather, re-development," the psychologist began. "It seems that she's building a trusting relationship with Brennan. The fact that she came to him is tremendous, she already trusts him and probably trusted him long before she returned to the main land."
Wilder nodded her head, lifting a hand close against her waist while the elbow of her other nudged into the crook of her side, hand curling to rest under her pointy chin. Her eyes searched Lily's, who remained at the mirror, fingers hurriedly pushing over her smooth deeply tanned skin. The CEO couldn't find a single imperfection in her flesh that didn't make the Amazonian all the more beautiful-even the gnarled scar on her face was beautiful in some way or the other.
"Let's break for lunch. Give her a lunch in the room, I want Brennan debriefed. Give him what he wants, we need him more than I thought," turning on her heels she walked down the hall with an irritating clickity-clack of the witch-toed high heels adorning her bony feet.