Chapter 27: An unexpected revelation

[December 2373 AD – January 2374 AD – POV Timotheus Mellark]

Rue had told me before I had left for my Christmas family time that she'd miss me, and I had promised to cut the time short and be back for New Year's Eve, to spend that holiday with her and her grandparents on the farm.

Naturally, celebrating Christmas with extended family in Riesenwald was great as always. Strictly spoken I was not really close family, but we were related, and my twin cousin always ensured me that I'd be more then welcome. Since I had become a teenager, I did not think that I had missed a single one of those events.

The winter hike through nature and the tour through the frozen valley had been wonderful and enjoyable, and it has also been good to see the Heidecker family again. It had also been good to talk to Grandfather for a few minutes. He, the Sinterguth family patriarch and CEO of the family business, was not my real grandfather, of course, but due to the family bonds and my closeness to Tim S he had declared me as kind of adopted grandson many years ago. He was apparently getting increasingly uneasy about our problems to find a nice girlfriend. Finding a suitable partner for life and getting married was something a 'typical' Sinterguth family member was good in and kind of 'mandatory', but my twin cousin and I somehow failed to show that particular perk. Hopefully, though, that was going to happen sooner or later. For myself, I was not in a hurry to get a girlfriend; if I had one, I'd have to split my time between Rue and her, and that might be complicated. I also doubted that a potential girlfriend would like me spending some nights with Rue in her bed. Above and beyond that, it was hard to imagine that having an actual girlfriend in my bed would be even better than being with Rue. No, maybe for now at least, I might be better off without a girlfriend.

When I returned from the Riesenwald area a few days before New Year's Day, I first met with Peeta and Lizzy and told them about what we had done and how much fun we had had. For the last few years, Peeta had not usually joined our celebrations, because this was always a very busy time in the bakery, and he was very focused. In my opinion he earned some time off, too, but he usually had to be almost forced to leave the bakery behind. Same applied for Uncle Peter, by the way.

This year, though, I learned that Lizzy and Peeta were now starting their wedding preparations, and they wanted to have a summer wedding. They told me that they had spent the holidays with the initial planing, and I was looking forward to hearing about their plans at some later time. At they very least that would imply a nice honeymoon somewhere and a well earned time off for my brother.

On the last day of the old year I drove out to the farm, and both Rex and I were very warmly welcomed. Although this was winter time, there was no snow around, and temperatures were well above freezing.

This was the quiet time of the year, with work on the fields being less than at other times, and with Rue and her grandparents I felt almost like with my own little family. Mr. and Mrs. Jones had a tradition to stay up on New Year's Eve and toast to each other at midnight, welcoming the new year, and I was encouraged to stay up as well. It took some convincing, as I was not a night person, and in addition I had just arrived from Europe a couple of days earlier, so that my internal clock was still off by six hours. I had compensated by having a nap in the early afternoon before driving out, though, and that helped me to somehow manage.

We spend most of the evening with talking and playing a few board games, and in between I talked about some details related to the past Christmas celebration in Bavaria. I could see that Rue got slightly wet eyes when she listened to me, and when I was done, I asked what bothered her. Her response was:

"I am a little bit envious of you for having such a big family. It must be wonderful to have hundreds of people around, and all are part of the same family. Yes, I know that I would not be able to participate much anyway because of my shyness, but a girl can have dreams at least."

"Rue, while it is sure nice to have such a large family, I don't think I could stand it to be with all of them all year round. I am a shy person, too, and in general I like to be alone or only with very few people. With my extended family, it is all right for a few weeks, as I have known most of them for many years, but I enjoy even more to spend time all on my own, like I did last April when I found you. Only Rex was with me, but that's different; he does not talk all of the time."

The others laughed briefly, and then Rue said:

"Yeah, and then I dropped on you and your nice and quiet vacation was over."

"Oh Rue, yes, it was, but that was just the start of an amazing new chapter in my life, and when you are with me, this is also different. I believe that I could not only stand having you with me all of the time, but I'd actually enjoy it. We share so many things: We can be quiet together, we can talk on a level we both like, we mostly understand each other without words, and we accept each other as we are; I love your looks and your thoughts and you are fine with my nerdy attitude. No, Rue, that is entirely different, and I am so glad that you came into my life!"

Instead of an answer Rue started to drop tears again; she climbed onto my lap once more, buried her head between my neck and shoulder and hugged me tightly. I knew her well enough by now to realize that she wept from happiness, and it appeared like I had found the right words. The looks I got from Grandpa and Grandma Jones confirmed that, and it even looked like Mrs. Jones shed a few tears as well.

At midnight we all stood up. Rue's grandparents kissed each other, I pressed a light kiss on Rue's forehead, and we all said that we hoped that the new year was going to be a good one. I started to yawn and so did Rue, and we quickly retired to our bed. When the light was out and Rue was on top of me as usual, she sighed and said:

"Oh Tim, it is so good that you are here with me. That's the perfect way to start a new year – being in your arms."

"I know, Rue, and I feel like this as well. Good night!"

I could not help myself and placed a couple of more kisses on her forehead, before I closed my eyes and allowed the wonderful feeling of having Rue so close, of smelling her hair and feeling her breathe, encompass me, until I drifted off to sleep.

Of course we slept in on the next day, New Year's Day, and we more or less skipped breakfast; after lunch Mr. Jones talked to me:

"Mr. Mellark, do you recall last October when we looked at that area around the hills, with the fog coming up and all?"

"Oh yes, I do, Mr. Jones."

"Something really odd must be going on there. People claim that they hear all kind of odd noises, and there are more rumors about the area being haunted. I barely dare to get close myself, and I would like to find out what's going on on my grounds."

"Shall we have another look?"

"Yes, please."

We took his pickup truck again, had Rex jump in as well, and drove out to the area once more. When we got out of the truck, we hard some noise, too, like metal on metal, and some scary ghost like sounds as well. We were probably both tempted to leave again very quickly, but we did have a big god with us, and with a quick look at each other we agreed to proceed, despite our mixed feelings. Thus, we cautiously stepped ahead, into the fog which was there as well, and soon found an entrance to some mine or so on the side of one of the low hills. The metallic sounds came from inside, but the scary sounds from top of the hill. I suggested to check out the hilltop first, and once we had reached it we found fog generators and sound amplifiers. The fog was clearly artificial, and the scary ghost like sounds were just recordings. This, was, in my opinion, very strange. Why had this been installed? Who had gone through the effort, and for which purpose? Was that somebody's idea of an open air haunted house or so? When we got down again, two people stepped out from the entrance; they noticed us, and one of them called out:

"Hey, who are you? Come here right now, or else…"

His voice was very threatening; I did not like the way he had spoken the 'or else', and Rex had also noticed that. He took that as a threat and raced forward, uttering loud barks repeatedly. For the two men it must have looked like a predator jumping out of the fog; they yelled and ran back into the mine entrance as quickly as they could, slamming the door behind them just before Rex got there.

Mr. Jones and I looked at each other, and I suggested:

"Assuming that there might be more people inside, I strongly advise against following them. Let's get out of here."

"Agreed, son!"

We quickly walked back to the pickup truck, had Rex jump into the back, and drove back to the farm. From the phone there I called the local police first and my ranger headquarters second, reported what we had seen and asked for assistance; after all there had been people threatening us on the Jones' own ground, and we did not know if those men might follow us to the farm. A police cruiser showed up twenty minutes later, and it had barely arrived when a big van was driven towards the farmhouse from the direction of the hills where we had been earlier. At least two men seemed to be inside, and when they saw the cruiser they stopped. One of the policemen shouted over for them to get out and identify themselves, but they turned the van around and raced towards the access road to the main road. While they passed the cruiser, the van's sliding door opened, a gun was shoved out, and several shots were fired in the direction of the police cruiser; both the car and one of the officers were hit, and the van was gone towards the main road a few seconds later. Wow, what was going on here?

The other police officer immediately got on the wireless radio in the car and called in for more support and an ambulance, and I helped him to provide first aid to his wounded colleague. My tricorder told me that life functions were stable, and the bullet had actually passed through his left leg, probably missing one of the major blood vessels. We had been able to recognize and memorize the van's ID, and a call went out for that one, too.

Rue was totally afraid now, and while her grandpa and I helped the police officer, she and her grandma went into the kitchen. The ambulance arrived within a quarter of an hour, and a few minutes later three more police cars were here as well, followed by a ranger van. One of my ranger colleagues had her own dog with her, and after coordinating with the police we decided that the ranger team, including Rex and me, were going to the hill together with two police cruisers, while the others and the Jones family were going to stay at the farm.

I led the way, and when we arrived, I first pointed out the fog generator and sound machine, before I showed the mine entrance. The door was actually partially hidden behind a bush, and without knowing that it was there or paying attention to the tracks on the ground, one might have easily passed without being any wiser. The door was closed and locked now, but one of my fellow rangers got some heavy equipment out and broke the lock. Darkness was in front of us inside, and as we did not know about potential traps, we sent Rex and the other dog ahead. They had been in risky situations before and knew to be careful, and a few policemen and rangers followed at some distance.

A passage led us down, below some wooden beams and rock walls, dimly illuminated by our flashlights, and for a moment I felt like investigating a mine in Cyrodiil. Were there goblins going to show up next? As a matter of fact, it turned out that our caution was justified. After the next corner we found the two dogs stopped, and when we checked what the reason might be, we saw a thin string across the passage, at about 20 cm height. If we had not been warned, we might easily had torn it, and this smelled like a trap indeed. Fortunately, one of the rangers in the team was trained in explosives, and he stepped forward now. The rest of us, minus one colleague who held the lights, got out of the underground area for now, and we only stepped back in half an hour later when we got the message that the trap had been disarmed. The string had been connected to a mechanism which had been rigged to trigger explosives, and most of us would have been killed it we had set if off.

After another turn the passage opened up into a larger cavern, and it was obvious that some of the machines around us were mining machines and tools. One of the police officers asked me:

"You are close to the farmer and ground owner, aren't you?"

"Yes I am, officer."

"According to what you know, this is nothing the farmer operates, or is it?"

"No, certainly not. I was already out here with Mr. Jones last fall, and he was as surprised as I was to see fog coming up and hearing those strange noises. He would certainly have told me if he had known what was going on here."

"Okay, so we can assume that this is some illegal operation."

"It does appear like that, officer. The Jones and I had assumed all of the mines around here to be abandoned."

It was also obvious that the underground area was quite extensive, as it not only covered this one level, but there were stairs leading down to at least a few more, and maybe there was a second exit as well.

"Look at that!" I said. "There is no way that those big machines were brought in here through the small door and the narrow passage we came in through. I do expect there is another exit somewhere."

"I agree" the lead police officer nodded. "I guess that we need a special and larger team to search the whole place."

We decided to call it a day and get back to the place at a later time, once a proper search and expert team had been found.

One week later, another appointment for Rue with Dr. Aurelius was on the calendar, and her grandparents had insisted that I join them again, pointing out that they'd want to explain something. They had claimed that, being so close to Rue and being an important person for her, I should learn more about her and her problems, and I obliged, not really knowing what I should expect. I had taken the day off and met the three of them in the doctor's office. After Rue had been briefly examined, Dr. Aurelius addressed me:

"Mr. Sinterguth, Mr. and Mrs. Jones have provided explicit permission to talk to you about Rue's state of health and her medical background, and they have asked me to talk about that in some detail. As you spend so much time together, it seems to be appropriate for you to know."

I turned to Rue and asked her:

"Is that going to be all right for you?"

The young girl did not reply verbally, but she nodded and scooted over to me, placing herself on my lap, and she pulled my arms around her chest.

"All right, now, how do I start? I have received a lot of background information from a colleague in District Eleven, where Rue's family used to be at home. When Rue's mother, Mrs. Madison, was pregnant with her, she was kidnapped for a couple of weeks, and during most of that time she had been sedated. They got her back, but we never learned what had happened to her during that time and what the intent behind the kidnapping had been; there had never been any ransom demands or anything like that. When Rue was born, it was immediately obvious that she was different; the size of her eyes and form of her pupils as well as her long ears were impossible to miss, and some parts of her body were fur covered at birth already. The fur covering can potentially be explained with spontaneous mutations, and there had been reports from a few other people like this, but I am not aware of any records about human beings with such long ears and slit pupils in supersized eyes. Above and beyond that her teeth are also different from typical human teeth; not only does she still have all of her baby teeth, but the canines are extra long and her jaw is somewhat longer than usual and slightly protruding from the face. Genetic manipulation might be able to achieve all of that, but those experiments are strictly forbidden, of course. Fortunately, though, those differences are not dangerous, and Rue's life is not made hard by them, except for the mobbing. Much later, when Rue's mother started to become sick, my colleague in Eleven found some abnormal brain waves, and those probably contributed to her premature death about three years ago. When Rue was checked, similar abnormalities in her brain waves were detected as well, just more pronounced."

"Really?" I chimed in. "Okay, that matches the readings I got from my tricorder when I checked her out after the plane crash."

"Tricorder?" Dr. Aurelis asked.

I got the device out and explained:

"This is a very advanced prototype model I got from my cousin Europe. It can do basic health checks, like this."

I activated the tricorder and moved along Rue's head, and some waves were shown on the small screen; after a minute or of scanning a warning message appeared, saying:

"WARNING – abnormal readings in the delta section – suggest expert diagnosis."

The good doctor was quite surprised to see that:

"I did not know that such a compact device is available; that's remarkable!"

"As I said, it's a prototype, but maybe in a few years this will be available to the public."

"Okay, so what we see here is similar to what a more complex scan shows, and her brain waves are actually dangerous. We do not know where this comes from, but we have to assume that something was done done to Rue's mother and her unborn child while she was in captivity; what exactly that might have been, we do not know yet. As result of that, Rue may possibly die in a few years, before she reaches adulthood, from brain overload, unless we find something to do about it."

Now I knew why Rue had mentioned a couple of times that she would not have to live long. That was not good news at all. I asked:

"So, Dr. Aurelius, Rue knew about some of that even before she came here?"

"Yes, indeed, she and her father were informed by my colleague a few years ago, right after her mother's death."

There was another statement:

"Probably related to all of that, her growth has been significantly slower than usual, and for the last ten years speed of growth has been about half as fast as for most other children; that's why she still looks like she's about nine years old, rather than her real age of fourteen. Puberty has not started yet, and we don't know when it will start, if ever."

The doctor continued:

"That was the bad news. The good news is that the readings are fluctuating. There seem to be times when the brain activity is more moderate, and there are times where it is more dangerous. I believe that this is related to Rue's state of mind. When she feels happy and comfortable, the levels are good, and when she is not, the levels are bad. It is probably not quite a simple as that, but that's the starting point. Above and beyond that, I also believe that the girl's social shyness is connected to this brain activity. Not only that, but whatever is happening causes her brain to collect more body reserves than normal, which might explain the slow body growth as well as her extraordinary intelligence."

"So, about helping her, what you are basically saying is we need to make Rue happy and comfortable to increase her life span?"

Dr. Aurelius nodded:

"That's it essentially, yes. Of course, I am also looking in other directions, but that's the best I can offer at this time. Please understand that this kind of brain activity is something I have not seen before. I would like to investigate it further, and maybe a colleague at Capitol University hospital has some references available. If I get something, I will let you know next time."

He continued with a very somber voice:

"Honestly, it's quite possible that the brain activity escalates and Rue is going to die with the next few years. At this time, I do not know what we can do to stop that."

I did not know what to say and just wrapped my arms around the trembling little girl on my lap a little bit tighter.

"As I have already mentioned," the psychologist added, "her brainwave readings are fluctuating a lot, and it might help to find out which factors trigger that. Maybe her brain waves calm down when she is happy, or when she is at a place she likes, or it depends on weather and the phase of the moon. Rue, if it's all right for you, I'd like you to wear a portable scanner for a few months. It is like a large alice band you have in your hair, connected to a larger device on your belt. For sleeping or sports and such you can remove the belt device, and the band will communicate wireless. If we can find out what makes your brain waves behave, we might be able to increase your life expectancy significantly."

Rue nodded, and Dr. Aurelius got the device out and introduced her in proper handling. He also mentioned:

"Rue, I'd like to suggest that you keep a diary until we meet next, in a few months. When we evaluate the recordings, it would be very good to be able to see what you had been doing and where you had been staying when the readings show particularly bad or good values. Maybe we can find if this depends on specific locations, weather, people around you, or whatever. Can you do that?"

The little girl nodded. Well, we would see if we got some valuable data from that.

When I got home on that day, my mind was in turmoil. So, Rue had not been joking or exaggerating when she had claimed that she might not have to live for much longer, and it was actually surprising that she was still a happy girl most of the time. What could I do to help? Make her happy and comfortable, sure. Whatever I could do to contribute, I would certainly do. Sure the doctors would sooner or later find out what to do about the brain anomaly, right?

Thoughts like that kept me awake for some time when I was in my bed in the evening. Thinking about Rue maybe having to die in the next few years even made a few tears appear in my eyes.

[Author's Notes: The thought about goblins in a mine in Cyrodiil is related to the computer game 'The Elder Scrolls IV: Oblivion'.

BTW, I'd greatly appreciate to get the occasional review, even if it's just a few words - thank you very much!]