thirty-eight

                                    

                                          
"So you located the aunt and uncle?"
                          
"Yes."
                          
"Are they alive?"
                          
"It's unlikely. If they are, they won't be for long."
                          
"You look as if this saddens you. Do I need to worry that your personal feelings might cloud your judgment?"
                          
"You confuse my compassion for sadness."
                          
"There's no room for compassion right now. You know that. You have a mission. And if you can't stay the course, then I'll be forced to remove you from the project."
                          
"Oh, don't kid yourself. We both know there's no one else that can do what I do."
                          
"And what is it exactly that you do, because as of yet, you haven't produced the girl."
                          
"She'll surface. At some point, she'll slip up. Everyone slips up."
                          
"If that were true, then we would have found her a long time ago."
                          
"It's because of a slip up, that we lost her in the first place. Just give her time. She'll find her way back. We've made sure of that."
                          


                          
***
                          


                          
I can feel the pain. I'm not supposed to, but I can. Everything is fuzzy, but as things start to come into focus, I see a sharp blade. It digs into my neck. They're cutting a flap of skin open and removing something. A figure pulls away, and I can see what they're holding. It's a small square. My mom and dad are by my side and my father shouts that I've woken up. A man rushes over and sticks a needle in my arm. As I drift out of consciousness, the stranger's face gets closer.
                          
"I don't know what happened," he says. He sounds concerned, panicked even. "That shouldn't have worn off so quickly."
                          
The voice is familiar.
                          
"Ever, can you hear me?" He towers over me. It's a face I recognize.
                          
"Uncle Ben?" I mutter. But it's not my voice. I mean, it is, but it sounds different, childlike. Then everything goes black.
                          
When I come to, I'm running in the tunnel again, spiraling downward further and further into the earth. The pit seems to go on forever. Walls of rock loom high above, as I make my way farther into the cavernous black pit. I hear a girl giggling and I instinctively follow the sound of her laughter. Darkness surrounds me, but this place is familiar and I know where to step. I run towards the girl, trying to catch her, but she's always just barely out of reach. My fingertips gently brush the edge of her shirt but I'm unable to grab the fabric. Then just like that, streams of bright sunlight break through the darkness. Light reflects off of a snowy white ground. It's so bright, it pains my eyes. I blink and use my hands to shield my eyes from the sun's harsh rays. I kick the snow with my feet, but the texture is all wrong. It's not snow at all. It has a grainy quality to it, which leaves a strange white residue on my shoes. It's not winter that surrounds me, but a barren desert landscape. It almost looks as if I'm on another planet. Mountains surround me on all sides. I feel trapped. The land smells putrid and the stench of sulfur wafts through the air. The girl appears, beckoning me towards her, but I cannot make out who she is. I've almost caught up with the mystery girl. I reach for her, wanting her to turn around so that I can see her face. My hand reaches closer and closer until I'm able to grab her upper arm and swing her around. I scream when the face turns towards me. It's not that of a young girl, but of a man in a mask. He grabs me and pins me down to a chair. He clutches a scalpel in his right hand. There are others there, trying to hold me down. I kick and scream as a white cloth is placed against my mouth. "No," I yell, but the cloth muffles my cries and the stench of alcohol fills my nostrils.