No Name Trilogy, Book I: No Name

Chapter 17 - Pill

Everything centered on Henry. I couldn't get him out of my head. In fact, every moment that I sat in that dormitory room as Mallinkrodt had directed, waiting for whoever else stayed there to return, I felt him breathing, blinking, existing somewhere else, somewhere not too far but as far from me as ever. For every second that ticked by, he was in some other room, doing something or having something done to him, and I wanted to be there by his side. The torture of wondering what was happening, of wanting to be near him but being unable to be, was almost too much. I had to tame that part of me that wanted to run out of the room and start frantically trying doors, bolting through hallways. Reason told me I'd be taken down quickly. There were cameras, and they had resources I couldn't guess at. If they thought I was going to cause trouble, they'd restrict me even more or, as Mallinkrodt had implied, terminate me. I couldn't risk making rash decisions. I had to force my thoughts away from my current impotence and all the terrible images of what might be happening to Henry; I had to focus on more concrete matters or I'd totally lose it.

I tried to go over the information we'd gained. Our goal from the start had been to find out about ourselves, so what had we found? There'd been the article, which both of us had forgotten after running into Slim. That article—it had been about a murdered man whose son had been convicted and sent to Oliphant. We'd fleetingly wondered if Henry were that son, but if that were the case he'd had a family, and the Circuit--that red-haired woman--had said they took in only people without families. So that didn't make much sense. If the Circuit was bent on secrecy, why would they have taken in someone with a high-profile father? And why would they take him back, if Henry were indeed Mr. Hines's son? While the article was an intriguing coincidence, it probably didn't actually have anything to do with us. Additionally, Slim had said that Henry had been on the streets a long time, a scab for the Circuit. He could have been lying, of course, but I still didn't think the Circuit would've messed with some kid who actually had a family.

And then back to that woman. She'd told Henry he was a murderer as nonchalantly as if she'd told him he was a dog-walker. Very good at his job, she'd said. Could I really believe it of Henry? Who'd been so protective of me? Some cruel little voice in my head reminded me that I barely knew him, and that he'd committed larceny as easily and remorselessly as if he'd been doing it his whole life, and that yes, he was at the very least capable of killing someone . . . and even that maybe the only reason he'd been so concerned about me was because he'd hoped I could be of use to him . . . but my heart wouldn't listen to my head. I wanted so much to believe that Henry cared about me--I couldn't even consider what I'd do if he didn't.

And what about myself, anyway? Was I really a member of this Circuit, too? If so, I would have been at Oliphant for good reason. I would have committed crimes, too, just like my old roommates had. But Henry had said he'd felt something when that woman had told him he belonged here, and I still felt nothing. This place wasn't familiar to me, at least, not yet. And even with all we'd heard from Slim and from that woman and from these men, we still hadn't been told why our minds were gone. The woman had actually said that she didn't know why we couldn't remember, that Henry had just gone missing. Slim had said the same thing. But someone, somewhere had to know what had happened to us. Someone had sent us to Oliphant. That Mr. Aguado had certainly known about that and had tried to keep Henry there, hadn't wanted him to remember, yet . . . he was lying. They were all lying. They didn't want us to know what they'd done to us.

My stomach lurched. I'd tried to stop thinking about Henry and focus on myself, but everything came back to him. He was most definitely in danger. Mr. Aguado was going to lie to him for certain. He did know why Henry was at Oliphant. He did know why Henry couldn't remember. These Circuit people had to be lying to us. I instinctively stood and moved to the door, but then I stopped. Looking for Henry was still a stupid idea.