Chasing Wolves (completed)

Chapter 31 Isadora

Chapter 31

Isadora

"As you can see, our facilities aren't very extensive, but we use what space we have the best we can."

I can't believe this is actually working! After my whole 'power' confession Royce seems to believe me. We talked for a few more minutes, mostly just outlining why I would be a good person to collaborate with (without revealing just how powerful I am), and now he's giving me a tour of the farmhouse, or 'facilities' as he calls it. It's pretty straight forward; offices, bathrooms, a kitchen, bedrooms for him and everyone that works here upstairs.

"Why don't you renovate, add more room if you need it?"

"Because we don't. There aren't that many people who work here, mostly just guards and my fellow researchers, and the house is perfectly adequate for our needs. The basement, where we hold our experiments, is rather much larger than the first floor, not that it needs to be. The test subjects don't usually last long enough for us to have to worry about needing room for more than... five or six at a time."

As he finishes talking he opens a steel enforced door at the end of the hall, revealing the stairs that presumably lead to the basement. He closes the door behind us, it closing with an unsettling click, and as we descent it starts to get darker, the few light bulbs illuminating the way barely still working. He opens the door at the bottom and I'm blinded for a second until my eyes adjust and I take in the lab.

Everything is bright white, from the walls to the floor and ceiling, the tables covered in equipment, to the doors. There really isn't that much to see in this room, besides the one scientist/doctor guy (I'll just call him a Whitecoat) that turned away from what he was doing when we came in and returned my nod as we walked past him.

The next room we enter makes me choke on my breathe. Everyone's strapped to gurneys along one of the walls, Meg, Eli, and Kate the only ones conscious. Kate! My heart nearly explodes seeing her alive and... relatively well. She looks like she hasn't bathed since she was kidnapped, and she's awfully thin, but she's alive and that's what matters.

She looks up as I'm inspecting her and our eyes lock. I can see all the hope, the anticipation in her gaze slowly die as she takes in my stony, emotionless expression. I hate to have to do this to her, especially since she doesn't know what's going on, but if Royce saw how I actually felt about her He'd probably kill us all. She cranes her neck as far as she can, noticing everyone else in row with her, and suddenly turns back to me, unadulterated hate and betrayal glowing in her eyes. Good, let her think I've betrayed them all, it'll be easier to fool Royce.

Speaking of Royce, he's moved away from me and is now whispering something with one of the Whitecoats. Seth shows up out of nowhere and nearly makes me squeak in surprise. Royce turns to him, "how are they doing?"

Seth looks over everyone, their monitors beeping quietly in the silence, "they seem to be recovering from the sedatives nicely. It wasn't anything too extreme, just something to keep them unconscious while they were strapped in and then docile as we did what we needed. As you can see some of them are waking up."

All I can do is nod, my heart being pummeled into oblivion as I think about what they had to go through. Seth, as planned, hasn't let on that he knows any of them, not using their names even though he knows them, and I can't help but notice Meg give me an imperceptible nod as she catches my eye. At least they aren't being mistreated (besides the whole being-tied-to-gurneys thing). According to both Seth and Royce, their test subjects (as of now my friends and husband) don't tend to live too long. I've got to free them before anything happens to anyone. I don't think I could possibly live with the guilt.

Royce comes back over, barely even acknowledging Seth's presence, "so, Isadora, what do you think?"

I turn to him, smiling, and ignore the gut-wrenching unease as I shake his hand. "I think you have a deal."