The Alternate State

chapter 3

*beep beep beep*
The alarm on my phone goes off. It's time to get ready, but I hardly have the energy to care, what little sleep I got last night was restless but thankfully I don't see val at my door, what a sweet mercy for once she's not barging in my door, where today she would discover Linc is still here. Here in my bed and we both look tired. There's too much I can't explain, can't say to her about the why and the where and the what. I can't trust anyone now to take the fall for me and my actions.
Lincoln sits with his legs dangling off my bed. He is mumbling to himself. I can't say for sure whether he got any sleep either, though he kept a firm arm around me all night as the truth weighed so heavily between us. I sit up thickly as the grogginess and the grief sit heavily upon my head and my heart. Twisting around and sitting thigh to thigh next to me he looks sympathetically in to my tired and aching eyes and says
"Hey, hey listen It's gonna be okay." he wraps an arm around me and leans my limp body on to his shoulder. He adjusts strokes his hand through my hair the best he can, a restless night of sleep has left it matted in spots.
"How! how is this okay? How could they do that! I don't even know who they are anymore."
He stops me with a gentle hand on my arm " hey hey, calm down. We'll figure this out. Ok, together.."
I feel tears begin to flow down my face, as he gently begins to rub circles on my back
"What else did you find?" I ask slowly, sitting up and wiping my tears, and trying to get a hold of myself. I suddenly remember he kept digging after we found what we were looking for. The sound of his fingers blazing across the keyboard, slowly come to memory
"There was a lot... are you sure you want to know?" i think about this for a second and then quickly nod my head. Might as well get it over with now, what more could they be capable of. A million thoughts are flowing through my mind. How many innocent people have they taken? How many have been my fault?
"Well.." he thinks to himself trying to find the right words. " The Alternate State, how much do you know about it?"
I think to myself for a minute. Do I really know what they've been doing? How many people have they done this to? What do I know anymore? I think I know everything else, right?
"Everything." i say slowly, wondering if that's really true anymore.
"Well it is a um, a testing facility. You know that right, They are trying to create the perfect human. And.. well they don't care how many people they hurt in the process."
I stare at him blankly, I knew that we worked in pharmaceuticals, a lot of gene therapies, we're helping people, curing people, we were the good guys. People who were lost, hopeless, not up to the standard necessary for our development, our survival. We helped them. We had training facilities, nutritional specialists, medicines all aimed at making someone their best, ensuring they not only survive, but thrive.
"They are testing chemicals on them, and a lot of them. Experimental stuff, testing it on human subjects.. Trying to make us perfect, making us immortal."
I instantly think of gabe. He was sent there. He got sent there 5 years ago, he's probably dead now I think darkly. Gabes is dead. If this is true, if they're trying to turn our fragile mortal bodies into something superhuman, something immortal, who could survive that, humans weren't meant to live forever. I feel the tears come, I didn't think I had any left after last night. I sob uncontrollably at the thought of it all Gabe, my sweet Gabe must have had to endure there, alone and so young. He was nearly fourteen when they took him, it was a week before his Birthday when he left. I picture him there, hooked up to monitors, needles in his arm. I can't take this. I lean my head on his shoulder, and wrap an arm around him and nestling my face in his neck. He pulls me into him, fully on his lap and rubs my back, letting me get it all out. And when i finally look at him it's almost as if he's about to cry. I can tell he's let a few out, they probably still sit gently in my hair.
"Hey what's going through your head?" i ask, suddenly aware I may not be the only one grieving, he may have lost someone to the Alternate state too. I wonder if maybe he had cousins, aunts or uncles lost to my parents' madness. In all our years of friendship he's never talked about his distant relatives.
Link looks heavily into my eyes and I see as a thousand thoughts pass behind his lids. I place a hand on his cheek and ask again, "What is it. You can tell me, it won't hurt my feelings." He sighs and slides me off his lap, striding over to my window where he sits in silence for a beat more than I fear I can take. The dread of his next words begin to build in my chest, what if he does have someone my family took, what if this is it, the end of our friendship, what if he leaves too, just like Gabe. I could do that, I could take it, I could let him walk out the door right now and I'd be strong for him, wouldn't' punish him for leaving, it's what I would do. I wouldn't be cruel to him in the halls, and all his secrets I'd still keep. It would be ok, I'd let him leave, I'd champion him from afar. I could take it.
After what feels like an eternity he looks at his feet, takes a deep breath and says, "It's just, it's a lot. I"m just processing what we've learned and where we go from here." He slowly returns to his spot beside me taking one more deep breath. He smiles at me with his signature smile and says, " so princess when do we get a little breakfast around here."
"Val!" I call hoping what's left of my hoarse voice echoes through the house. In a minute's notice she rushes into my room. Apologizing for not being in sooner, apparently she was distracted polishing the silver, again. After a few awkward moments explaining he fell asleep while we watched movies, and pointing to the fact we made him a fort on the floor, she after a long hard stare at Link turns and begins preparing our breakfast. I let Link order breakfast, basically ordering a full six course meal. He is honestly such a pig. She pauses at the door and says quietly over her shoulder, that we are both very lucky my parents left first thing this morning and didn't have time to spare checking in on me.