The Post Sunday Experiment | COMPLETED 2020

Chapter 35

By the time the morning sun rose above the horizon, the children were fast asleep on the notes they'd taken in the lab. As for Mae, straps held her down on the medical table in the testing room. Eric's body stirred on his cot.

Eric's eyes drifted about the room. He was alone. Creasing his brow, he rose and began to look for Ody and Penny. Memories of hours earlier finally broke through his mind.

After he rose from the bed it didn't take long for a security officer to open the door. The man had been there the night before and he had seen the way Eric's eyes grew shiny with unshed tears for Mae.

He opened the concrete door and nodded at Eric with a small smile. The guard removed his facial covering so Eric could see his red hair and freckles. The young man smiled, causing his eyes to crinkle. This told Eric that it was an act of kindness on the guard's part.

Following the red-head down the halls, Eric entered Mae's room where Mae. She lay in bed but was awake and appeared to have calmed down. Mae looked terribly unsettled. Her eyes screamed while her mouth remained closed. The center of her stunning blue eyes were slitted pupils.

"Mae..." Eric's voice broke as his eyes laid on her messy curly brown hair and clenched fists.

"They say she's beyond stage four now. If we let her out, the consequences would be deadly. We're hoping we can ride it out and she'll go back to normal soon. If I'm being honest with you, Mr. Bhurr, we don't know what'll happen to her. It's terribly hard to find cases and you're very lucky she was already here. I wish I could do more to help but-"

"Thank you, doctor," Eric replied. The guard took the hint and closed the door on his way out. When he was alone, Eric drew closer to her.

"Eric, did you help Ody and Penny? Are they okay? Are they hurt? Why won't they let me out?" Mae's panic filled her voice.

"Whoa, whoa," Eric tried to soothe her as he took her hand. "Yes, Ody and Penny are safe. Don't worry." He had no idea if it were true or not, but he knew Mae needed the reassurance. Mae calmed down a little. "Mae..." his voice trailed off.

Looking into her slitted eyes, his heart melted as he held her hand tightly. "Mae... can you hear me?" Eric's voice was soft and so tender that for a moment, Mae's eyes flashed back to normal. They returned to slits soon after. "Mae... I need you to come back to me. I need you. We all need you." Mae turned her face away sharply.

Eric stroked her cheek softly and took a deep breath as her gaze met his.

"Mae... I love you." Eric spoke breathily in fear of reaction. Yet, as soon as the three words, those eight letters fell from his lips, he was glad he'd done it. It felt as if a great burden he'd been carrying around for four years, lifted.

"You do?" Mae's voice responded with such a weak squeak that it alarmed Eric. Looking into her eyes, he noticed the pupils were solid again.

"Yes, I—" Tears moistened his eyes now, "I've loved you since the moment I met you but was too scared to say anything. I loved you while I was away at school. I loved you when I came back. I loved you even when you came back to Cazenovia. I love you now. Please, Mae stay with me."

Mae's eyes were damp now, but their pupils remained normal. There was something about Eric's admission that tethered her to reality.

"Eric..." she gulped down with a pain in her throat. Eric hesitated, in fear of what she'd say.

"I love you too."

***

The Winter children awoke the very next morning to someone tapping their shoulders. They yawned and pulled their faces off the papers they lay on. Ody and Penny's memories returned to them.

Recalling the events of the previous night, they turned to face the person who'd woken them up. It turned out it wasn't a single person, but instead multiple people that stood behind them. Rubbing their eyes to see a little more clearly, both children smiled nervously at the people standing behind them.

"When zey said zey needed us at headquarters right away, I didn't know it was because of two children," Ramona Ammon sighed as she crossed her arms. She couldn't contain the smirk as she did so, giving away her true emotion.

"Well, hello there, Winters," Benjamin Plomin grinned. "I see y'all finally found ya way to the heart of it, eh?"

Damien Neloms only smiled softly at the children who watched them with wide eyes.

"Well, anyway, what is it y'all had needed us for so suddenly?" asked Dr. Plomin to a man behind them. Walking into eye's view, Mr. Aldrich only smiled and pointed at the children.

"Why don't you ask them?"

Turning to the children, they inquired on what they'd been up to that morning doing. The Winters showed them the radiation monitor, the cell phones, and desktops. It turned out that Mr. Aldrich had gotten his three masters degrees in electricity, technology, and engineering. He was delighted to see Ody's progress.

As for Damien and Benjamin, they went straight to the lab to monitor the samples they had taken from Mae. They examined her brain scans, comparing the ones before and after the incident. Ramona was a chemist with an undergrad in human biology, so she was left to babysitting.

Luckily, Penny didn't need to be closely watched. She and Ramona sat down, out of the way, and prepared for whatever came next.