Capture Me

What Wasn't Was Real

Ryder

"Who took Cassandra in?" I fired at Gid upon his answer.

"Me?" Bewilderment laced his voice as he answered. And then, the line went dead.

My phone dinged, indicating a text just arrived.

'Are u done with the interrogation? Can we just meet? Reception's so bad, I barely understood u.'

This floor looked like a maze with its turns and multiple hallways. And there was a high possibility that a rookie might get lost and come out next year if they were not familiar to the place.

I texted him back. 'South wing. Storage C.'

'On it.' Was his only reply.

I showered after I left Cassandra. It was a practice that I got used to over the years, showering made me feel like washing away the things that I had done in those rooms the cries, the pleading for mercy, the blood, and sometimes the last breaths slid down my body along with the spray of water and into the drain.

I waited for a solid five minutes before I spotted Gid's—I swear it was glowing—electric blue hair. All the while Cassandra's words kept ringing in my ear. Although I knew I didn't do anything with her, there was still this voice in my head that said it was still a possibility because somehow it connected with the events that day.

"Yo," Gid greeted and came to lean with me on the wall in front of Storage Room C. "What were you asking me about the Cassandra chick? I just answered on a whim." He stared ahead and I did the same.

I held the big sigh that was about to come out of my mouth. "When you extracted Cassandra, did you see any kid in the house?" My heart started pounding in anticipation, even as I said the words.

"Yeah," he answered after a second.

My world seemed to rumble, tumble, crash and burn. Hell.  How do I tell this to my wife—fuck, how do I tell that the cruel family she loved with all her heart was not her real one? How the fuck do I tell her I have a kid with her sister?

"Ryde," Gid interrupted my mini-mental breakdown, gaining my attention. I looked at him. "You seemed to have left me and moved to another galaxy for a moment there. But yeah, chick was crazy, I'm telling ya. She's got this big jar that contained a probably nine-month old preserved baby placed on one of the cabinets in her living room. It gave me the bumps." He shivered a little as if to emphasize his point.

I opened my mouth, but he was not done talking yet.

"I had it tested for DNA so we know her connection to the baby, but I haven't had the chance to claim it from the lab department yet."

The urgency to know the result gnawed at me. "Can you get it now? It's just a couple floors up anyway."

He frowned. "What's with the excitement?"

I heaved myself from the wall, "She told me we had a child, Gid." I released the sigh I had been holding back. "It fucked up my mind."

His mouth opened but I didn't let him talk.

"I still doubt, but, I couldn't stop myself from thinking that it was also real. Hell, maybe she managed to screw with my head in the interrogation." I stared at the white ceiling, defeated.

Gid took pity on me and patted my back sympathetically. "If that will put your restless macho mind at ease then, let's go and get it." He started walking before I even got to make a sound.

"Nara's waiting for me, she doesn't have anyone with her there."

He stopped and turned around, "Psh, this area is more secure than Fort Knox. Nothing bad will happen to her here, man." He continued walking. "Better rip the band aid while it's hot."

I didn't know what shit he'd said last, but I followed and got in to the elevator.

The agonizing anticipation clawed at me as we reached the lab. I let Gid do the talking inside while I waited out, staring at the white wall in front of me.

My mind played different scenarios about how my wife would take the news I was about to deliver to her. The one that stood out was her leaving me again, for real this time. I couldn't help but let out a groan and bump my head on the wall where I was leaning.

"Ta-da!" Gid happily waved the white folder in his hand as the door he left gaping, automatically closed. "And this is where you stop fidgeting with your fingers and man up." He made his way to me. "Took a peek in it by the way." He smirked as he handed me the folder.

"Sure you did," I murmured as my shaky hands flip the hard paper. What I read made my eyes almost bulge out of their sockets.

"While you're at it absorbing what you just read, I'll go ahead and give you the additional info I received while I was inside."

I barely heard him as he went and leaned on the wall beside me. I was busy making myself believe of the data that was printed on the paper.

"Seems like Cassandra stole the remains of the baby in a hospital while disguised as a nurse for some reason that I don't know, nobody knows except her actually. And then, she immediately bought a huge-ass jar, filled it with formaldehyde that she also stole slash asked for in an embalming parlor at gun point. The crazy thing was that, one of her neighbors saw her rocking the said baby to sleep—jar and all. You know what's crazier?"

This time I closed the folder and looked at him. I could be happy later, because I felt that there was more to it than just Cassandra's secret crush on me. "What?"

Gid exhaled. "She's crazy. Period." He looked back at the white wall in front of us. "She's been in and out of psychiatric institutions because of diagnosed severe Schizophrenia and other mental shit. Moving on, she's been taking her meds since she was a teen but then stopped after graduating high school because she got pregnant, the parents called the shots to abort the baby, she left home and became a drug junkie instead—"

Motherfucker, what a fucked up life she had. "Did her family ever tried to find her?" The fake family that Nara loved but got reciprocated with hate and cruelty did the same thing to real fucking daughter. Fuck! Even they couldn't take care of their own child.

"They bailed on her, man. I tried to track them after the Cassandra thing but they were nowhere in the city or the areas close by. Why would Rebecca Alastair take Cassandra under her wing despite her condition? The better question is, why would she target you? I know you were the first team to compromise her and only you and another one in your team survived but, why did she not attempt the other one?" I wish I knew.

The hate I felt for Cassandra slowly transformed into pity, she had no one to take care and understand her, and so she resulted in the company of people who would be the cause of her early death one day. And now, she was in this situation that I bet wouldn't even make the bitch who took her in, fucking flinch. She was expendable, just like the others, a fucking wall to stall everyone that planned to kill the White Queen.

I heaved myself off the support of the wall and started walking, Gid did the same. "Johnson's dead. Heart attack or should I say hospital sabotage. Three years ago, man. Rebecca wanted to leave nothing so she's cleaning her mess, and apparently willing to use anything or anyone to make her floors squeaky again."

"After we take this bitch down, I'll go and take a month-long vacation in the Maldives, the stress she's putting us all is making me feel older and wrinkly. Like sixties older."

I chuckled. Some of the weight on my shoulder got chipped off and I felt slightly lighter. "When you get home, better check if you still have your balls or if you already grew a pussy, because you're starting to talk like a chick." I pressed the down button on the elevator pad.

"Fuck you, Colton," he said with a chuckle of his own.