Chasing Phantoms
Part I: Mad World
Chapter Nine: Put Insomnia to Sleep
Sam seethed silently outside. She walked quickly away from the place she had been trapped in for…God knows how long. Zipping up the asymmetrical slit on her wool jacket, she pulled the deep burgundy cloth close to her body and shivered against the chill. The sun was a hazy white orb behind a thick layer of gray clouds and the ground wet from the evening rain. She strode hurriedly down the street, staring down at her feet as she walked, mesmerized by the simple rhythm of her walking. Something was tugging at her, but the anxious feeling seemed less and less logical the more she thought about it.
Sam looked up at the bright but colorless sky as she felt the first drops of rain on her face. Walking faster, she removed her bat-eared umbrella from her bag and opened it noisily. The automatic swoosh effectively startled a middle aged woman heading in the opposite direction, who jumped and stared blankly at the white-skinned graduate student striding down the street. The woman shook her head and shuddered as if to dispel the aura Sam was casting off with her chunky boots, studded belt, and heavy silver rosary that moved in time with steps.
Her chunky steel-toed boots made light splashing noises as she hurriedly made her way down the street, simmering beneath her dark umbrella as the dull patter of rain echoed above her. Outside was cold and dreary, but little green buds were appearing on the trees. The wide sidewalk was slick with rain but the colors of the city were washed out and dull, as if the rain had simply pulled the brightness and life out of everything. She quickly found the subway entrance and closed her umbrella hurriedly, the drops of rain that had accumulated on it hitting her face as it closed. She flew down the stone stairs of the station and punched her fare card without hesitation.
Sam was quiet and agitated as she waited patiently on the platform. There were few people riding the metro, but then again it wasn't rush hour that Tuesday. The station was dim and the fluorescent lights flickered every once in a while above her. The red tile was slick with rain that had been brought in by the shoes of hundreds of commuters far earlier. There was a space where the tile was not slick, but dotted with wet footprints of people like Sam who had walked down into the station just after the rain showed its face again. She looked down into the tunnel, begging the train to come, but she knew that the will of her mind couldn't bring the lights on the edge of the platform to light up. Of course, she knew this, but she had never been very patient and so she willed it to come anyways. God, did she want a coffee right about then.
A few moments later, as if some higher power decided that today was not a day to go against Sam's will, the white light of the train came in from the north end of the station. The platform lights lit up, but Sam didn't move any farther from the edge as the rush of the train's slipstream ruffled her damp hair. The mechanical voice announced the name of the station and the doors opened to let out a few people, but not many.
Sam crossed the small space between the train and the platform, looking down at her feet to make sure her boots didn't get caught. It was an irrational fear, but she never really liked that foreboding little space. The doors of the subway closed as she found a seat near the door. Sam sat with her elbows on her knees the entire ride, not moving for anyone that came in or left, barely noticing the movement of the train as it stopped and started and curved its way south. She just couldn't get what was bothering her off of her mind; there were just too many things to think about these days.
What was she doing? Why had she even bothered accepting the young bookkeeper's invitation? She just couldn't shake the feeling that something was unbelievably wrong. Maybe this time it was real. She shook the notion from her head. Every time that it seemed that she had found someone who took the time to be around her, to talk to her, they only wanted her money, her status in the unofficial aristocracy that her family was a part of it. Why would the bookkeeper be any different? He was so jumbled…all the signals she usually picked up on and pieced together quickly were all off with him. He was probably just trying to get her money. That had to be it.
She was shaken from her trance as the obnoxious, overly feminine mechanical voice announced her stop. Sam rushed quickly through the doors and onto the platform of West 77th Street Station. Punching her fare card again, she walked carefully, but quickly, to the stairs. She sped up and slipped lightly on the stairs, but regained her balance and opened up her bat umbrella. Once her boots hit the pavement she jogged lightly, not caring that her boots were covered in dirt from the street and the puddles in the street were lightly splashing up water onto her jeans and chilling her.
She continued to jog down the street, anxiety building in her ever since she left the building, and she tried to dispel it with the light exercise, anything to channel her energy. Even if she hated to do anything that required any real physical involvement. Her hair was damp and wavy from the rain and the black liner around her eyes was blurred. Her complexion was shiny from the humidity and the jogging, and her cheeks reddened, to her distaste, from the cold.
She slowed as she rounded the block to lower her heart rate and calm herself down a tiny bit, but the flashing lights down the street caused her to stop in shock. Panicking, her eyes went wide and her heart hammered against her chest. She gripped her umbrella and bag tighter and broke into a flat run, as fast as her chunky, steel toed boots allowed her to. No, she repeated over and over in her head…no, no, no, that couldn't be what was happened, surely…there was no way that…was there? What had happened?
A whole team of ambulances, fire trucks and police cars came into view from behind a tree at the same time that Sam saw the front of Birch's Music Store. Her run slowed for a moment as she saw a woman being wheeled out on a gurney, but she still kept even pace up to the offending yellow crime scene tape. There was a flurry of activity. Men and women milled about in the heavy rain, police officers walking in and out of the store regularly, but slowly. If there were people in there, Sam wondered angrily, why wasn't anyone moving any faster to save them? Wasn't that their jobs? To protect people?
A police officer came up to her as she stood at the crime scene tape, gripping it with a horrified expression on her pale face. She was an elder woman, perhaps in her fifties, with her silver hair in an elegant bun. Sam turned her gaze from the mysterious scene and turned it to the officer. She instantly admired the woman, with her pretty, pale face almost devoid of wrinkles because of a lifetime away from the sun. But, perhaps it was also the striking black liner against her starkly light gray eyes, or the ruby and onyx cross around her neck. However, Sam knew it was neither of those things that really struck her. It was her eyes, which radiated compassion, hurt, fire and spirit.
They compelled her she saw the rest of her figure come into focus through the now-torrential rain. Her silver hair was slick with rain – Sam guessed that it was really stark white when it was dry. Her blazer was soaked and it was the only thing covering her wiry frame – not a single shiver or chatter of her teeth betrayed any kind of cold from the officer.
"Hey, miss, are you looking for someone?" she asked Sam, compassion and genuine concern in her voice.
Sam looked the woman in the eye and replied in a panicky tone, "I don't really know what's going on, I'm just wondering…"
The older officer saw the young woman's face go stark white and her body rigid as she stared past the police cars to the gurney being wheeled to the ambulance. Sam couldn't move. She completely blanched, more horrified that she had ever been in her life. This was real. This may have felt like a horrible dream before, but now, she knew it was real. She just caught the shock of black hair on the man being lifted into the ambulance quickly, men and women surrounding him with cloth in their hands to stop the blood that was everywhere.
Her heart stopped for a second. There was blood. There was blood absolutely everywhere. Like a deer making the decision to rouse from a mortified stupor, she broke into a run after quickly ducking under the tape, dropping her bag and bat umbrella carelessly behind her as the rain assaulted her face and chest fully, her thoughts running wildly and in panic.
"Casey!" she screamed into the crowd of sirens, not caring who chased after her or who tried to stop her or who got in the way.
She heard a far-off voice call somewhere behind her, "Cecilia! Cecilia, she's not supposed to be inside the crime scene!"
Sam could have cared less. There was the only person she had ever met that actually offered her a hand of friendship, and there he was lying on a gurney bleeding to death because of…God knows why he was bleeding everywhere. She hated herself for doubting him, for not refusing Lancer's request, for not being there to help him – to stop whatever had happened. She just needed to be there, with him. She didn't even really know why, but she had to.
"Hey, lady, this is a crime scene; you need to get out of here!'
Sam heard more voices like this yelling around her and suddenly two strong arms caught her around the waist. She gasped as the wind was knocked out of her – her momentum had been abruptly interrupted. Through the sheets of rain between her and the ambulance, she saw Casey's face. It was bruised and bloody, with distinct claw marks on his clean-shaven cheek. She gasped and struggled against the officer holding her back, blinking rain out of her eyes as it accumulated on her lashes and ran down her face.
"Let me go, you big brute! He's my friend! Let me go, I need to see him!"
"Calm down, he's still alive for now! There's nothing you can do to help him, miss!"
Sam stopped her struggle at the sound of the distinct female voice behind her, and the arms holding her slackened.
The elegant woman that she had first seen stood in front of her, her face and clothing slick with rain. She saw the panic in Sam's eyes and the hardness in her eyes fell away to understanding.
"If you would like, I can take you to the hospital in my car. I can question you while we are driving."
Sam's initial reaction would have been to say no adamantly, but her mistrust of law enforcement just didn't apply with this woman. She made Sam feel like everything would be okay – that no matter how horrific the scene before her was, it would turn out for the better.
"Thank you," Sam said purposefully, her amethyst eyes burning vividly through the thick sheets of cold rain.
The elder officer gave Sam a warm smile.
"I am Agent Cecilia Thompson of the FBI. My car is this way," she finished briskly before walking strait past Sam, who was left to catch up with her wide strides in confusion.
That woman was…FBI? What the hell was the FBI doing here, and not the New York Police Department? Still, Sam wasn't complaining about getting out of the rain, and after watching the ambulance Casey was in round the corner, she swiftly followed Agent Thompson into her black Mini Cooper. Sam silently praised the woman for her taste in compact cars, but the thought fell away at the reminder of what was going on.
Actually, Sam knew very little of what was going on; all she had seen were three bodies on gurneys speeding away in ambulances to the nearest hospital with a state of the art ICU. There had been blood all over the people she had seen. She quickly lifted her eyes to notice a black body bag being wheeled on a gurney into a truck with the logo of the NYPD morgue on it.
Agent Thompson noticed Sam's absolutely mortified expression – the girl may have been Goth, but it was her first crime scene – her first murder. Perhaps, even her first taste of the streak of violence in the human race.
"Snap out of it, honey, we're getting out of here."
With that, Cecilia Thompson started the engine of her car and turned the windshield wipers on at full speed, and with a screech of complaining tires, she turned the car around in the street and sped off in the direction of the ambulances.
"What's your name honey? I mean your full, legal name."
"Samantha Manson."
"Holy…!" the older agent said loudly as the car's brakes complained at the sudden stop, "Holy Hell, you're the Manson heiress? Jesus Christ, Samantha, what's a girl like you even doing in the Upper West Side?"
Sam growled dangerously.
"It's Sam, Agent Thompson. And, I could care less what 'a girl like me' should be doing. I'm an adult, and I'll do whatever the hell I want. For your information, I was going to Casper's Books to help Casey unpack a new shipment."
"Sam, I know who your parents are and I can tell you're nothing like them. I was just trying to get you to stop beating yourself up over Casey. Did you work with him in the store?"
Sam continued to stare through the windshield that was marbled with a thick layer of water every time the wipers got even half a second's rest.
"No, I go to graduate school. I don't have a job, except as a teacher's assistant at Columbia University. I met Casey the other day when I was just stopping by, and we just started talking. He said he didn't know many people. He seemed like such a goofy, nice kid…what the hell happened?"
"I can't tell yet, and I can't tell you, to be completely honest. Hold on, honey, I need to make a phone call."
She pulled a business card out of her pocket and flipped open a plain gray cell phone.
"Read this to me,' the agent said as she handed the card over to Sam.
Sam read her the number on the card and Agent Thompson punched in the numbers on her cell phone accordingly. From her place in the passenger's seat, Sam couldn't hear the rings on the other line because of the police siren on the tiny car, but she guessed that it was only one ring before someone picked up.
"Hey Kim…" Cecilia said morosely.
"Cecilia…Cecilia, what the hell happened? Where the hell is Daniel! What the hell happened to my agent!"
"Hell happened. I already scheduled a flight for you. Dulles Airport; ten-thirty Red-Eye flight to New York. He's at Columbia Hospital's ICU, so you better get your ass over here soon.
"Oh my God. I'll be there. No matter what, Cee, he doesn't die. He's got the heart of a lion and the stubbornness of an ass, that's why he's on my team. Cecilia, you do whatever it takes to keep him alive until I get there. Don't let him forget that he has to stay alive. You got that?"
"I will, honey. Kim…?"
"Yes, Cecilia?"
"I'm so sorry."
"There's nothing we can do now. Just let the doctors do their jobs. See you in about an hour."
Agent Thompson snapped her cell phone shut with one hand. Her gray eyes were full of sadness; a kind of desolation that came when one knew someone who could be dying – or already dead. It was the same pain echoed twice over in Sam's eyes.
In the hospital, Sam and Cecilia sat in the waiting room close the ICU where Casey was being kept until he woke up. It was about eleven fifteen in the morning, and Agent Thompson was just waiting until this Kim woman arrived. Sam sat with her legs pulled up to her chest on the floor of the waiting room, a towel pulled against her as she shivered in a pair of purple scrubs. Her own clothes were in the dryer; as well as Agent Thompson's, although she had chosen to sit in a squishy chair and not the floor. Rocking back and forth in an attempt to regain her body heat, Sam worried incessantly about Casey.
Her reverie was broken by a sudden movement on the part of Agent Thompson. Looking up, Sam noticed she was greeting a formidable, fiery haired woman that would have been pretty, but her disheveled appearance was not most flattering. Her hair was bushy from the rain and pulled into a high ponytail. Deep purple bags situated themselves under her eyes and her eyes looked red and tired. She also wouldn't stop fidgeting with her belt, which made Sam quite nervous. Who was this woman? Who was she to Casey?
The two older women left Sam to talk to Casey's doctor. She kept observing the red-haired woman's behavior. She was extremely protective of Casey – could she be his sister? No, they didn't share any similar features…perhaps she was a close friend from wherever he had moved from? That made more sense. Still, it didn't explain why she was so haunted and afraid. There was a wild look in her emerald eyes, as if she were desperately willing the doctor to perform a miracle right then and there – to wake up Casey from his unconscious state. What sort of wrong was she trying to make right? How many people had she watched die? She had the eyes of a soldier – haunted, unyielding, and passionate.
Sam felt her eyes closing despite the morning hour. She lay down in a more comfortable position on the floor and was soon asleep. Kim and Cecilia were still talking amongst themselves.
"Who the hell is she, Cecilia?" Kim asked bitingly, but the more experienced woman before her could pick up the tone of sympathy behind it.
"It seems like your Daniel made a little friend here. She's the daughter of the Manson's and is almost finished with her graduate degree in Psychology. She's a strong girl – she walked in on the crime scene as we were getting all the living people out of there."
"She still thinks that he's Casey Whitman?"
"Apparently, she does. But, it doesn't matter if she finds out otherwise. We caught that bitch and her little assistant."
Kim's eyes went wide for a split second before her lips curved into a smile.
"Daniel caught the black market organ harvester? Thank God this wasn't in vain. At least now she can pay her time."
"I'm afraid not, Kim."
Her face furrowed in confusion.
"Kim, he killed her. That's why he's so beaten up. She put up a fight, and it was two against one. He was a little rash running headlong into that store, but if not, that woman would be dead."
Kim turned to face the glass of the ICU where Daniel was being kept, tubes running through his nose and IV's stuck in his arms. Bandages covered the newly stitched up wounds, but his bruises were vividly purple. A bag of deep burgundy blood dripped down a tube and into his arm; he had lost a lot of blood, and that was the reason he was unconscious.
It was about nine in the evening. Sam had been moved onto a sofa by one of the nurses, but she was still fast asleep and a world away from the day's traumatic events. Kim and Cecilia sat on the couch opposite her, waiting patiently for a doctor to tell them it was okay to go inside Daniel's room. Cecilia sat silently reading the police report that someone from NYPD stopped by to give her a few hours ago. She was adding her comments, since she felt that there was not much mystery as to what happened in the store. There had been a closed-circuit security camera in the corner that Mr. Bertrand did not have the privilege of erasing.
Kim was trying to read a thick novel, but her eyes kept flitting between Sam lying on the couch fast asleep and Daniel's room. Eventually, she was too restless and asked the doctor if she could just sit near his bad and talk to him. She remembered when she was in a coma; the only thing that had kept her going was Valerie constantly chatting about this or that. She thought that it would help Daniel snap out of whatever was going on. Thank God he wasn't in a coma, but he was still walking the line between the dead and the living, and without any kind of guidance, he might just fall on the wrong side of that line.
The doctor agreed reluctantly, and Kim pulled up a chair next to his bed.
"Hey, Daniel, I know you can't hear the exact words I'm saying, but I know you can hear my voice. You did it. You finally got that monster off the streets for good. I'm sorry Daniel, but…you killed her. She's dead. Bertrand is still alive, but he needs a hip replacement – that register shattered his hip. I wouldn't worry about it. You did the right thing. That woman is alive because of you; even if you do look like complete crap right now."
She sighed; feeling like the message wasn't getting through. He looked like a corpse, lying there in the hospital bed. His face was devoid of its usual color and purple and green marred his cheekbone. Below that were four deep claw marks from Dr. Spectra's nails. Cecilia had been right. Hell had happened to him.
"God damnit, wake up! Listen to me! You…will…not…die! Did you hear that? You will not die!"
"Do you really think he can hear you?"
Kim jumped at the voice. It was Sam standing in the doorway in the purple scrubs. Her hair was dry and the majority was pulled up in a defiant little ponytail. The dark makeup that had been on her face earlier that day was gone and without it she seemed almost soft. She walked a few steps into the room, but was still nowhere near the bed where Daniel, or to her, Casey, lay. It was as if she was afraid to come near him; as if she would break him or that being near the bad would make everything she was going through real.
"Sometimes I do. But, I imagine being stuck in your head for so long with nothing to pay attention to can be a bit difficult."
"What happened?"
Her voice was breaking slightly, the pain and guilt was leaking through the strong front. It wasn't a façade though, Kim noticed. This girl was genuinely hard on the outside and halfway to the core, but she still felt. She may have been strong, but this was still the most terrifying thing she had ever experienced.
"He saved a woman from the organ harvester that has been running around the block."
Sam's eyes widened.
"What a brave guy. I can't imagine that a bookkeeper would have the courage for that – it's not exactly a risk-taking kind job."
Kim paled a bit. She still didn't know who 'Casey' really was. She should probably know before it was too late.
"Um…"
She was cut off.
"Could I ask who you are though? I guess you talked to Agent Thompson and already know who I am, but I don't know anything past your first name."
Kim smiled wanly.
"I'm Kim Possible, I'm his boss. Cecilia called me telling me the news and I took the quickest flight out of D.C. to get here."
Sam nodded, unsure of why a boss was taking such personal interest in someone she had not seen in months. But, her thoughts were cut off by a slight groan from the bed. She turned her head from the vividly haired woman.
"Oh my God, Daniel!" Kim cried suddenly, and moved to take his hand in hers.
Sam saw tears begin to run down the older woman's cheeks. Wait…who was Daniel? Sam backed away from the bed a few steps quickly and warily. Why had everyone told her his name was Casey? Why did he tell her he was Casey? His name was Daniel? He had lied to her face about something important like his name?
"Daniel?" she repeated back, her eyes filled with confusion and hurt.
His cerulean eyes locked with hers and she saw the haze of physical pain behind them.
"Yep," he laughed quietly, barely raising his slightly hoarse voice.
So it wasn't just some slip up on Kim's part…he really had lied to her. Anger boiled underneath her skin. What else had he lied to her about?
"What about Casey?" she spat at him before turning on her heel and running out of the ICU.
"Oh God, Kim, you didn't tell her?" Daniel said behind the glass, so quietly that Kim had to lean in a bit to hear him.
"I think you should, wait here."
"Um, I don't really have a choice here…"
She was out the door before he had the chance to finish his thought. Kim looked down the hallway and saw the slightly familiar ponytail walking away quickly. She followed the pale young woman and caught up to her right before the elevators. The security light shone through the large window and cast an eerie light in Sam's already unusual eyes.
"Wait Sam, stop!"
She turned and Kim finally saw the livid features accompanying the ghostly eyes.
"Why should I? No one has really bothered to tell me what's going on. I walked into a crime scene this morning! There was blood everywhere! A murder, Miss Kim Possible, a freaking murder! And now, I find out that Casey is actually Daniel, and has been lying to me about his name? How am I supposed to know that you all weren't trying to steal my family's money!"
"Samantha, calm down and come with me, Daniel will explain everything to you."
Sam just stood there in her scrubs, openmouthed. That Kim lady just called her Samantha. No one ever, ever, ever, called her Samantha. But, the commanding tone in Kim's voice was hypnotic, and she found herself following the redhead back to the ICU. She had only heard law enforcement use that tone so effectively.
The sliding glass door shut behind her, leaving her all alone in the room with Ca- no, Daniel. She reluctantly met his eyes, tying to ignore the bruise and scratches on his face.
"So she managed to drag you back here with just that tone of voice?"
"What the hell is going on?" Sam snapped harshly.
He may have been dying a few minutes ago, but now he was alive and she felt like she could be angry without him having a heart attack and just keeling over.
He looked down tiredly, the lamp beside his bed casting a stark light on half his features, leaving the rest in shadow. After a moment he let out a labored breath; Sam winced as she saw that there was a bit of blood leaking through his hospital gown, and what she guessed were bandages beneath that. His pure blue eyes locked with hers – the pain of some internal struggle finally surfacing above the physical pain.
'"My name is Daniel Fenton."
"I got that much," Sam said dismissively.
He sensed her distrust, so he continued.
"I am twenty-five years old, and am turning twenty-six."
"And that is completely relevant," she cut in sarcastically.
"Sam! Focus, please? I got stabbed in the lungs twice and once in the arm; twice with a scalpel and once with the closed point of surgical scissors. I'm trying really, really hard to stay conscious and tell you what's going on."
That shut her up pretty quickly. Ordinarily, she would have been vehement, but Daniel had a point. Then she registered what he said.
"Oh my God, how the hell did you get…?"
He smiled a bit and beckoned for her to sit down in the seat that Kim had previously occupied.
"I am an FBI agent. No, Sam don't give me that look, I am an FBI agent. I work in D.C., and I just started working for the Feds last August. I was a police officer for the Baltimore Police Department for three years before that."
"So this was a case? Why were you working on it?"
"Like I said, I just got hired. That means that I still have a series of training procedures to go through before I can become a full agent – I'm still only a trainee. Maybe the battle wounds will earn me a promotion."
He paused with a smile, his mind occupied with thoughts that she could never begin to guess.
"I was undercover, Sam. It's part of the process of becoming a full agent, but caught the bastard – or should I say bitch. Regardless, Dr. Spectra won't ever see the light of day."
A bitter, confused look flitted across his features. Sam understood immediately. That body bag she had seen was the body of the killer he was trying to stop. It was that organ harvester that Sam had briefly read a psychological profile of a few months back. Daniel had killed her in self defense; she could see that he was torn – that he wasn't sure if he made the right call.
"I think you did the right thing."
His face snapped up and his baby blue eyes met hers. A small, appreciative smile flitted across his face.
"What she said about isn't true either. You aren't weak. That woman is alive and Spectra is dead because of you. You saved a lot of people there, not just one."
The blue orbs widened in shock and incredulity.
Sam rolled her eyes and replied to his silent question, "I almost have my Ph.D., Daniel. You would think that a psychologist would have some clue as to what is going on in that head of yours."
Daniel relaxed and closed his eyes for a second.
"Thanks Sam."
"No problem."
"I mean, for waiting for me to wake up, for coming here in the first place, and for helping me unpack those books. I guess I never really expected you to do any of those things."
She was mildly shocked – he was thanking her for the gesture? She should be thanking him. He kind of gave her a second chance. At that moment the door slid open and Kim stood in the doorway with her cell phone in hand.
"The director says that you're coming home, Daniel. In about a week, when the doctors estimate you will be able to handle the plane ride home."
She gave him a smile.
"I listened, Kim."
She had been turning to leave, but whipped her head around in surprise.
"You told me not to die. I didn't," he finished with a goofy grin.
"Good night Danny," she said before sliding the door behind her.
REVIEW. They encourage me to write better, longer chapters. I am absolutely fed up with the lack of reviews. IS IT REAAALLLLYY THAT HARD TO CLICK THE LITTLE BUTTON AND TYPE SOME WORDS? You all are lazy. I have 5 reviews for 9 chapters. Do you know how hard I've worked to get this story written? PLEASE, PLEASE, PLEASE, take the time to REVIEW! No more updates until I get at least ten reviews. That means five more!
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Are the characters making sense? or are they too OOC?
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This is the first story i posted, and ive been getting good readership, but a measly number of reviews. I really, really, just want to know what you think. I you liked it, all I need is a few encouraging words and maybe some questions. I will ask kindly, if you have favorited or put this story on alert, please make a point to review at least once.
The people who have reviewed or PMed me have given me some reaallllyy good ideas, especially Quantos Prime - i hope you picked up on that little bit in Chapter...six... i think?
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