Children of the New Dawn n-logy: Book 2 - Liberated.

Chapter 9: ''It starts with one.''

Lamark sighed as the pneumatic door slid closed after Dylan and looked around at the minor disaster area that something had turned the hospital room into. Dylan and that tiny girl had made some measure of order of the place again, but it was glaringly obvious that something had happened here. 

Suddenly, the door slid open again. Lamark was about to call out to whomever it was, when he heard the sound of stiletto heels stabbing at the floor. 

Click-click-click.

It sounded familiar and he recalled having heard something like it in one of his strange dreams.

In a matter of seconds, the Lip Stick Lady and the Lab Coat Woman were at his bedside. The former had stopped and surveyed the scene with a suspicious expression, the latter stood slack-jawed and just stared.

"Wha.." Lab Coat Woman began.

"Who did this, 13-2?" the other interrupted and fixed Lamark with a scrutinising stare.

Lamark blinked and swallowed, scrambling for time to get his thoughts ordered.

"I.. don't know. I just woke up and it was like this," he lied, hoping that he was close enough to the truth that he sounded convincing.

Lab Coat Woman was looking at the screens on his left.

"He's possibly telling the truth Directress," she said slowly. "Most of the activity is in the sinis.. the left side of his brain. If he was lying, it would be the creative right side. There is some activity, but not dominant."

"Sometimes, you say too much, Dollerhove," the Lip Stick Lady spat and was up close to Lamark in two steps. "I'm going to find out what happened here, 13-2. If I don't like what I find, you're out, and not in a good way."

Lamark paled and a cruel smile played on her crimson lips. "So, you've got an idea what that means, now. Did 05-6 tell you that?" Ice shot through Lamark's spine and he felt what little colour was left drain from his face.

All I know

That had been yesterday. Lamark's mind was still reeling and he couldn't quite remember what had happened after that. Eventually, Lip Stick Lady - "Directress" - and Lab Coat Woman - "Dollerhove" - must have gone. They weren't here now. He was, though. Still strapped to the bed and they had added padlocks to the restraints. 

 He was here, too. 

 It was an odd sensation, suddenly loathing someone you'd looked up to your whole life.

"..glad you're back with us, 13-2. I was concerned," the man he had come to know as Papa Brand was droning on, somehow failing to show any real worry. "Hopefully, this means that we can get back on track with your exercises. Can you show me what you can do?"

Lamark blinked. A different half remembered memory was tugging at the edges of his conscious. Stella telling him something, before he had to go and ruin it all.["Don't give them what they want. Just enough that they won't trash you,"] she'd cautioned him.

"Of course, Papa Brand," he replied back in the present, without any real enthusiasm.

Lamark closed his eyes and concentrated. His hand started to tremble and then a puff of metallic dust exploded from his palm, as black horns erupted from the front of his temples and curled back over his ears.

"I.. I'm sorry, Papa Brand. I.. just can't right now," he whimpered. "I'm sure I'll be able to do more, I just need to recover."

He tugged at the restraints.

"Maybe these could be taken off?" He ventured, with as much innocent hope in his voice, as he could fake right now.

"That's not my call," Papa Brand sighed. "Maybe, if you could tell...if you told us what happened here," the man offered.