Charlotte was the last to enter the dining room of the main house. The campsite was still under the shroud of night, though morning was not far off. The stars were bright and the air still clung to the night's chill. The house was still and even the cabins slept silently beneath the clear night sky waiting for the encroaching dawn.
The others were waiting for her, their expressions marred by exhaustion and weariness. Ethan was sitting at the head of the table while Matt, Ian, Maria, Carrie, Ronnie, Wallace, Harris and Mary were seated around it. Nobody spoke as Charlotte took her seat between Ethan and Ian and exhaled a heavy sigh.
The room was long and narrow, with the same whitewashed walls and pale wooden floors as the rest of the house. The only window in the room looked out on to the gravel yard where their stolen cars were parked. Ian's blue station wagon looked worse for wear after James had dragged it across the rough stones. A lampshade, woven from some sort of grass, hung low over the table, casting shadows across the walls and furniture. The surface of the table was worn and scratched after decades of use, stained from the sunshine that cascaded through the window during the morning hours. A large map of the area was framed on one of the long walls and sun-bleached photographs of past campers ordained the other. Their smiles and bright, happy faces didn't seem to belong in the house now shrouded by the darkness that seemed to accompany the Kingston students wherever they went.
"How are you holding up?" Ian whispered, leaning in close to Charlotte as she tore her gaze away from the faded photos.
She shrugged. "I'm just tired," she lied, not meeting his eyes. "I'll be glad to get a few hours of sleep".
Ian nodded, taking her hand as Ethan cleared his throat, demanding their attention.
"So we are beginning to get to grips with what we're dealing with here," he sighed. "Not one of them has any memory of anything that came before the imprisonment. Their previous existence has been erased, as has all knowledge of us".
There was a long silence and Charlotte could taste the hurt and worry in the air, tainting it.
"But it will come back, right?" Mary breathed.
"There's nothing there to come back," Wallace said.
"But wait – how could this have even happened?" Ian asked, his grip on Charlotte's hand tightening.
"It had to have been an alteration..." Ethan exhaled, pinching the top of his nose between his thumb and index finger.
"An alteration that can delete memories?" Maria frowned. There was another tense pause as they considered Ethan's words.
"That's impossible," Matt said, leaning forward, his thick eyebrows coming together in a frown. For the briefest moment his dark gaze met Charlotte's across the table before he directed his attention to Ethan.
"Don't tell me you find that beyond believing?" Ian scoffed. "I mean it's far from impossible – look at Annakiya. That's more or less her alteration".
Matt shook his head. "That's just it. I spent my time at Kingston trawling through alterations trying to find somebody like Harris to help my brother. I even went back into the files of former pupils and the only student in the history of Kingston that had the power to manipulate memory was Annakiya Fall. Nobody else had that power".
Charlotte sat up, glancing from Matt to Ethan and back again.
"Are you sure?" Ethan frowned, confusion knitting his brows together.
"Yes. The filing system was sorted by alteration. There was a lot under mind manipulation, like Charlotte, but under the subcategory of memory manipulation – it was only her," he nodded.
YOU ARE READING
Feared
Science Fiction'Play the game, she thought, remembering the only three words that had helped her to survive at Kingston. Only back then she had known the game, she had known what they wanted her to be, what they had wanted her to do - this man was different. She d...
