Dylan Small only had one patient – and that was the Greyhound. He'd spent the first few months of their counselling relationship behind a one-way glass window, talking to her, checking her heart rate, watching her every move. When she began to calm down and learn to co-operate, he'd been brave enough to sit with her at a table. Surprisingly, she hadn't tried to kill him, but she never said a word to him. It was actually at the beginning of January that she actually said anything to him. They had been sat staring at each other, him asking questions that almost seemed rhetorical because she never answered them. She almost seemed dead to the world; eyes blank, mind somewhere else.He'd began to leave when she said her first words to him. "I'm not crazy." She had a soft, quiet voice that had a little bit of a French accent to it, due to her being part French. Dylan didn't respond and only stood in the door way, waiting for her to say something else. Only silence followed, and eventually Dylan left the room.
The next day, after Dylan's meeting with Harriet, he sat in his little room behind the glass, with other Doctors among him. The Greyhound on the other side looked at the glass, almost as if she could see everyone in the room behind it. She sat on the steel table that sat in the center of the room, legs folded, arms gently placed on her knees. She was actually very pretty; she had long, curly black hair that flowed down her back in a ponytail. Her eyes were a light grey, and her light coloured lips were always slightly parted. Her skin was so pale, you could practically see the veins curling and flowing in her arms and shoulders. She wore a grey jumpsuit with short sleeves, and wore flat black pumps instead of the boots most people wore in the ECLIPSE headquarters.
"Okay, Gray. We're going to try this again, got it?" A voice, Dylan's voice echoed a long the room through a speaker in the corner. The girl, Gray, didn't flinch. She remained as she was, staring through the glass.
A few seconds later, a man wearing a full set of body armour stepped through the door. Gray's head snapped in the direction that the man came from, staring at him intently. The man gulped nervously as he walked along the perimeter of the room, keeping his distance. Gray's eyes followed him as he walked, her body staying completely calm a she moved slightly closer to her. The man clenched the needle in his hand tightly, carefully hiding it so that Gray couldn't see, but Gray knew what he was hiding as soon as the bead of sweat slithered down his face.
Ina millisecond, Gray had jumped off the table and kicked it towards the man, he grabbed just in time, and shoved it aside. He prepared the needle in his hand, and went forward, trying to stab the mad girl in the arm. Gray screamed, and kicked at his ankles, making him fall to the floor. He lost grip of the object and it skidded to the floor, lying in the other corner of the room. Gray had managed to rip the helmet of the guy, and wrapped her arms around his throat tightly.The man kicked about, trying to free himself her grasp, but even though Gray was tiny, she was still too heavy to move. The man's face slowly started to turn red, and he choked for air as Gray squeezed harder at his throat.
"Grace!" Dylan shouted as he ran into the room. He stood, breathless, leaving the door wide open with the other doctors standing inside. He looked tired; small, grey bags under his eyes, his light brown hair slightly ruffled. "Gray, just let him go, okay?"
Gray looked at him softly. "You're tired." Dylan blinked in confusion as he processed the words Gray had just said. "Why didn't you sleep?"
"Well,um, I – I had a lot on my mind." Dylan replied, speechless. Gray shifted so she could see the people behind him, before turning towards him. "They're only observers, Gray."
"No but why are they- Ow!" Gray grabbed her arm in panic as something stabbed her arm. Looking down, she saw the man had injected the sedative into her arm without her realizing. Panicking, she began to back into a corner, taking quick and shallows breaths whilst doing so. Dylan ran up to and gently grabbed her arms, trying to get her to look at him.
"Gray it's fine, your okay." Dylan whispered, catching her as she fell over her own jelly legs. Her vision began to turn blurry, and soon enough, she faded into a peaceful sleep. Two bodyguards, not including the man Gray tried to kill, came into the white room and carried her on a stretcher, carrying the lifeless body out of the room. Dylan sat for a moment as the room cleared, thinking of Gray.When she was 17 she'd been tortured and experimented on, leaving her officially broken mentally. But, with her strength and enhanced senses, she was perfectly capable at fighting, or so Dylan thought.
A knock on the door made Dylan jump. Turning around, he saw Harriet in the doorway holding Gray's file.
He smiled lightly. "How did you find me in all this madness?" Dylan joked, standing up and facing her. She shook her head, and smiled.
"God knows. She looks peaceful, for a change." Harriet said, looking around the room. "Why knock her out?"
"Transferring her," Dylan said, looking at the wall opposite the window. "This is an observing room. Trying to get her to be more social. It's not very healthy keeping her cooped up in here."
"And why's that?" Harriet asked. Dylan looked at her, and then at the wall. He moved forward, and grabbed the multi-coloured padding that covered the wall. Pulling the soft material back, the wall behind showed endless amounts of scratching, foreign words written messily, the word 'Boggs' written in different sized fonts. You could practically here the screams bouncing off the walls.
"These were back when she first got out. We made a mistake putting her in a stone room." Dylan explained, tracing the scratches with his bony fingers.
"She did these?" Harriet asked, shocked. Dylan nodded, before putting the padding back to where it belonged. "When did she stop?"
"When we put the padding up. She can't scratch that." Dylan said, before leading Harriet out of the room and into the room behind the glass.
"I've made a decision." Harriet announced.
"And?" Dylan asked. He picked up some books off of one of the tables, and slipped them into his bag on one of the hooks.
"I've arranged a meeting for you and her tomorrow. I want to go over her tactics. She needs to do a physical assessment, and then meet the others." Harriet said. Dylan quickly put the bag over his shoulders, and looked at her in amazement. "What we're up against is nothing like we imagined. I think we need her to make it more of a challenge for the people we're fighting against." Harriet smirked,before walking out of the room leaving Dylan to his thoughts.
---
Gray curled up in the covers. Hugging her legs, she felt tears starting to form in her eyes. Don't cry. She thought. Don't do it, Gray. But the silent tears came before she could stop herself.
How had she ended up so broken? Just over a year ago she had been perfectly normal; healthy, happy, strong. Now? She couldn't even look in a mirror without freaking out. She spent nights with the light on, telling the nightmares to go away. Days spent looking out different windows, falling asleep standing up, some days where she couldn't handle it and tried to tear her hair out. Hours spent trying to block out sounds of tortured screams and maniacal laughter, sounds that were never really there.
This was simple compared to what she used to be like. In the early days, when she had no concept of time or reality, the doctors and Dylan had to wrap her face in thick bandages, just so it could prevent her from tearing her eyes out of trying to rip her ears from her head. There were even worse days, days where spent in the white room, clawing at the walls, trying to get free.
Those were the days where she never saw sunlight. Never saw the sky. Never even had a breath of fresh air. Cooped up in a box.
She hated being this way. The worst thing about it was that she couldn't trust anyone, couldn't tell if what they were saying was true or false. Then later on when she'd try and remember what the person had said, her mind would distort it and she couldn't remember what they'd originally said, so she ended up believing the lie. The distorted version.
As she laid in her new bed, she remembered the days out in the cold, no warmth at all. Just remember the white room she had stayed in.
Gray slammed her head against the pillow. She squeezed her eyes shut, and gripped her ears, trying to block out the invisible voices. Tears had begun streaming down her face, and she bit the blanket to help her block out the sound. She sat up quickly, and immediately the voice disappeared. She decided she needed to leave. Grabbing her grey hoodie, she quietly left her room in the hospital wing of ECLIPSE,and made for the stairs.
There was no one about as she walked down random halls in ECLIPSE. It was late, so she didn't expect anyone to be about. As she climbed more sets of stairs, she noticed that there were more people about. They didn't seem to notice her as she continued her way up, trying to getaway from the hospital wing. These people wore blue suits or office attire, and most of the time they were on the phone or looking at paper work. As she reached what seemed to be a final set of stairs, she heard a Dylan's voice, quietly talking.
"This virus – whatever it is – attacks the brain, but then leaves marks sort of like the ones Schizophrenia does. After researching, it turns out it doesn't just attack the brain, it controls it." She reached the top of the stairs, to be confronted by a large room, lined with desks and computers. At the end of the room, where Gray was stood, was a balcony which was lined with panels and screens. At either side, were two large sets of stairs that lead to the other desks. In the center of the room was a large glass table, with Dylan sat at one end. At the other, was a woman with dark skin and large eyes, and she stood looking at the screen which Dylan was gesturing too. "It basically attacks the living brain cells, the one with all the memories and facts, and replaces them with distorted thoughts."
"Any physical damage?" The woman said as she peered over at Dylan.
"Not only does this virus damage the brain, it damages the body." Dylan pressed a button, and on the computer above them a picture of a man appeared. He looked slightly normal, mid 40's or so, but the fact that his skin was a pale light purple, and a vein the size of stick stuck out of his chest at an odd angle made him seem scary. The vein looked like it was wriggling, and from this vein lead hundreds of others, consuming his torso, neck and arms. The larger vein crept up from his heart, all the way to his left temple. The other veins went out in different directions, the redness of them almost glowing on the mans complexions.
"Radged, that's what they become." Dylan stared at the man in shock. The woman looked away in disgust, after turning the photo off the screen.
"How far has it gone?"
Dylan sighed before looking at the data on his paper. "Just over 14 million people. It's airborne, strange enough. Boggs may be a superior drug lord, but he can't do any basic science." Dylan looked through some paper work that scattered the table, carefully reading the figures that were highlighted. "So far it's covered a quarter of Russia, and is quickly spreading along the continent. Some people don't even know they have it, it attacks the brain within 24 hours."
Gray felt liked someone had punched in the stomach. She collapsed, falling to her hand and knees. "Boggs," she breathed. It seemed to be the only word she could think of. "Boggs, Boggs." She gasped. Dylan and the woman turned to look at her in shock, almost horrified to see her walking. They quietly stared as Gray tried to catch her breath, but before anyone could react Dylan immediately jumped for her, grabbing her gently by the wrists and helping her to her feet.
"Gray, what are you doing here?" Dylan asked, but the only response he got was Boggs' name being repeated.
"Get her out of here, Dylan." The woman said, shutting down the screens."She can't see this yet." Dylan, who know had Gray sat on one of the plush chairs, ignored Harriet's decision and looked at the mad girl before him.
"It's okay, Gray. He's not here. He's far away." Dylan said softly, as Gray's words were over taken by shallow and quick breaths.
"He's alive, though!" Gray shouted, nearly in tears. "What – what's going on?" Gray asked, looking between the woman and Dylan. The woman – Harriet, shook her head, before looking at Gray.
"Miss Annora, I feel you need an explanation." The woman said, before grabbing the files off her desk and walking down the stairs.
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PHOTO: Boggs
