Plague #OpenNovellaContest 2019

Chapter 19

Rachel sits on the cold metal bench, staring at the glass mirror making up two of her walls. She knows what is on the other side, scientists and doctors and maybe the sandy-haired boy or the Queen girl are staring in at her. The people who trap her here and deny her her basic needs, they are free and out there and watching her as she suffers. They are free while she is trapped. They are whole while she is broken.

There is an emptiness settled within her that leaves her mind blank in the places that used to be filled with happy memories, and awakens strange needs. Needs for screams and power and blood splattering across the floor. Needs for her knife.

But they took it away from her.

Sometimes, a button is pressed and a small window slides open, revealing a glass pane separating her from whoever is on the other side. Whether it be a worker or someone she used to trust.

The boy has been there several times, the girl too, but not half as much. In the murky waters of her memory, Rachel can make out that the girl has some sort of big responsibility. She has some sort of weight on her shoulders that she is not, and has never been ready for. And then the boy was someone Rachel had known for a long time. They worked together, for awhile. She can't remember what they were working on, though. Nor can she remember her feelings towards either of them.

She feels... indifferent, about both of them. She remembers a connection between them three, but she doesn't know if it was good or bad. And no matter how much she reaches for any emotion, only a hint of it slips back before escaping from her grasping fingertips. She does feel anger though, anger at the people around her and the doctors who trapped her. But while she's awake, it's never strong. It makes her feel small and weak, empty, like a candle that's gone out. Because her anger at the people around her is hardly ever strong. And when it is, she's hardly awake.

She has sudden flares of fury, sometimes. When the candle is lit again and the flames somehow consume it. Where afterwards, she wakes up to a hazy memory of anger and hurt and loss so powerful that she can't breathe. When afterwards, she wakes on the floor with the stone bench knocked over and thrown half across the room. She wakes with bruises lining her arms and tangled, wild hair and blood seeping out of her knees and elbows and tears staining her torn shirt. She doesn't have any sense of time, what with the lack of windows in her cell, so she doesn't know how often the flares happen. All she knows is that they used to happen more.

But is that good? Bad? She doesn't know. She can't tell right from wrong anymore.

She hears soft footsteps outside. Muffled voices too. Who's coming in this time? Her last injection couldn't have been that long ago.

A panel on her mirror wall slides open to reveal the boy, watching her through the glass pane. He flicks a switch on the wall and speaks into a microphone, "Rachel," he says. It sounds like he's choosing his words so carefully. He doesn't want the monster to be set loose, "We contacted your parents. They're here now."

Her parents. Memories are resurfacing, but she can't make sense of any of them. Balancing on her first bike, riding on the dark wood floorboards of her house with Ma pushing her from behind. Squealing with delight as Pa chased her through the house. Following Pa's movements as he cooked and groaning every time she did something wrong. And then they turned bitter. All those times she stared out of the window, slowly pulling back the curtains to watch the streets before Ma slapped her hand away. Every time Rachel yelled at Pa when he explained why she couldn't go outside.

Rachel tilts her head to one side, staring at the boy. She stands, and takes a small step forward, before nodding to him.

She's ready.

The boy moves aside to make room, and is replaced by a woman. She looks different from when Rachel last saw her. Her bushy hair is shorter, cut to her ears, and she's wearing glasses. Hints of grey peak out at the roots of her hair.

Ma looks old.

It's the same with Pa. The dark skin surrounding his eyes is wrinkled, and his hair is almost white.

Rachel takes another step, and she sees her parents' faces contorting. She isn't sure what the expressions are that come across their faces, but she knows that she doesn't like it.

"Ma?" she whispers, uncertain, "Pa?"

After a moment that seems to stretch into infinity, Pa begins to cry.

Ma soon follows, tears of joy - or is it sadness? - rolling over her cheeks.

The glass expands, taking away the entire surrounding mirror, and when the mirror has slid away, Rachel sees the boy standing at the side with his hand over a lever. There's a spark of hope in his eyes, but it's shadowed by his fear.

Rachel reaches the glass and lifts a hand to touch it. Ma does the same. And suddenly Rachel can't tell if Ma's tears are from the joy of finding her child, or from the pain of letting her go to an empty place - ever spiralling downwards - where she cannot follow.

As Rachel gazes at Ma's familiar brown skin and large eyes, the bushy hair that falls in her face, a wave of emotion crashes over her. She feels like she's woken up after weeks of sleeping. Her mind corrects itself, reassembling the pieces that had been lost for so long. Her parents. Her parents are in front of her. The parents that she hasn't seen in four years.

The parents that she abandoned.

"Ma, Pa. I'm so sorry."

And then the tears let loose.

____________________________________

Ethan takes one last look at the family as they cry and crumble and apologize. As soon as Rachel's parents said it was alright for her to work as a scientist at the palace, he decided to go. Surely there's some sort of work left for him. Maybe to improve the cure, or to recruit more servants. Whatever it is, he needs to be ready.

The door groans as it opens for him, and he exits the quarantines. The labs before him are so big, it's something that he never thought he would have. The best labs in Achain, and they're here. In front of him. For him to work in.

Finally, he can do what he's dreamed of doing since he was a child.

Ethan lets himself smile, and he throws open the doors.