Subjects

47 - Never Underestimate The Power Of Notebooks

"I still think this is a trap," says Ben. As always, he knows how to start a chapter on a good note.

"Still," Emily says. "We beat them twice already, I think we can do it again."

Only barely, Emily, and with a lot of luck. But she does have a point. They are standing on the opposite side of the road, across from Angie's house. All of the windows are shut and the place seems lifeless in a suspicious way.

Ben wants to say that maybe they got to Angie's mom already, but stops himself when he sees the look of hope in Angie's eyes. "Wait here," he says instead.

"No, Ben," Eva stops him. "I'll go, if you get influenced we're all doomed."

"I think they are passed trying to influence us," Ben says.

"We still need to be careful," Eva argues. "And this is the middle of the street, they won't do anything here."

So Eva goes to the house. She knocks on the door and wakes up Gretchen, the sleeping neighbor. There is no answer. Eva knocks again, even louder, but still there is no response. Oh, wait, there actually is. Gretchen, the neighbor who was just woken up from a very good nap, opens her window and shout at Eva.

"Shut it up! People are trying to sleep here!"

"You're the one screaming!" Eva yells back. There is something liberating about arguing with a stranger through the window. Eva clears her throat, ready to attack again.

"Stop making so much goddammed noise!" Gretchen waves her fist at Eva. The tower of rolls on her head shakes and almost falls. Gretchen stops to adjust it.

Eva hits the door even stronger, "I'm going to noise all I want to!"

"I'm warning you, girl!"

"What?? What will you do? Take off that flower pot on your head and actually come down here?" Eva is right, the rolls in Gretchen's hair do look a lot like a flower pot.

"You!!" Gretchen didn't know what she was getting into. Eva is actually enjoying the whole thing, yelling at people is like a hobby for her.

The door swings open and Eva jumps back, surprised. Gretchen straightens her flower pot but keeps watching the scene from her window. In the doorway stands Alice, Angie's mother, Leo's wife. Without the black spots under her eyes, the nest in her hair, and maybe a cleaner shirt, she could be considered good-looking.

"Who are you?" Alice asks Eva.

"Mommy!" Angie pushes Eva aside and jumps at her mom.

Alice is frozen, only for a few seconds, then she falls to her knees and takes her daughter in. She cries as she hugs her daughter tightly, unable to say a thing. Ben, Emily, and Roger come closer and stand next to Eva. There is something different in the air, they can feel the change. The dark cloud that hung over them has now shifted and they can feel the warm sun. They can feel Angie's happiness.

They sit in the messy living room. The windows are now open to let in some fresh air. Alice tried to find some food to offer them but she seriously neglected grocery shopping lately. She throws away a pack of months old cookies, before coming to the living room and sitting on the couch next to Angie.

"What happened?" Alice asks.

The four exchange nervous glances. They wonder how much she knows. As in, does she know she was married an alien?

Being the only one there who has a sense of... Initiative, Angie is the one to finally answer. "I was in a spaceship. The aliens there wanted me because of dad and... They found me," she points at the four teens, "and we escaped. We ended up in a military ship but it turned out that the Captain is an alien too so we ran away again and we took Jeff with us and we finally got to the city today."

Alice, if she is surprised, doesn't let it show. "Are you okay?" She asks Angie softly.

Angie nods. "But mom, dad is... He is..."

Alice takes Angie in her arms again. The last few months have been hell for her. She knew that something went wrong, or else Leo would have called her. She honestly thought she may never see him or Angie again. The detectives that were responsible for her case were seriously useless. Right now she just feels lucky to have one of them back.

"Did you know about Leo?" Eva asks and Ben elbows her, signaling that this isn't the right time to ask.

Alice doesn't seem to mind the question. "I knew he wasn't... Ordinary. I never knew exactly what was his story but I just always had a feeling. It didn't matter to me, though. I loved him-" Alice chokes as the realization sinks in. He is not coming back. He is never coming back.

Angie still cries into Alice's shirt. The four sit there quietly, not knowing what to do.

"I'm sorry you got caught up in all of this," Alice finally says to them. "Leo wouldn't have wanted anything bad to happen to you."

"He told you about us?" Ben asks.

Alice has a strange expression on her face. "Don't you remember?"

"Remember what?" Ben wonders if they ever met about the scholarship, but Leo never had anyone with him. Still, the memories from before Midway are all a little fuzzy.

"You were all here, many times," Alice says. "Aren't you Leo's students? You do look a little different but I'm sure I know you."

"When were we here?" Eva inquires.

"Every month or so," Alice furrows her brows. "He gave you private lessons."

The four exchange more worried looks. "Do you think he made us forget?" Emily asks.

"Could be," Ben says. "If he wanted to check that everything was going well with the experiment."

"Wait, what are you talking about?" Alice asks.

Angie is calm now, she is too curios to feel sad. The four never really told her everything, not about her dad's role in it anyway.

"We were all part of some experiment," Eva explains. "Or so Leo said. We have some weird gene that let's aliens control us. That's why he took us away to Midway, to protect us from it."

"So every time you came here," Alice says. "It was all a part of this... Experiment?"

"Must have been," Ben says.

"Do you think he has any notes, or something like that?" Emily asks Alice.

"We can look in his office," Alice suggests.

The moment they walk into the office, the four can sense that they were here before. The small room, with it's desk and shelves and pictures on the walls... It just all looks so familiar. They start going through his desk and drawers. Roger finds a pack of notebooks and opens the first one. It is full of signs of this strange alien language, but for some reason, Roger feels like he saw them before. He feels like he should be able to tell what they mean.

"I think there is something important in here," he says. "I just can't remember what."

"Maybe Ben can influence you to remember," Emily suggests.

"I can try," Ben says.

"Go ahead," Roger looks at Ben, ready for the influence.

Ben closes his eyes and takes a deep breath. Take care of them. "Remember," he says to Roger.

Roger doesn't feel any different. A memory for the first time he and Max got in trouble together resurfaced, if that has anything to do with it.

"Well?" Eva asks.

"I don't know," Roger looks back down at the notebook. "Whoa!" The notebook is the same, but something in him is different. He can read it! Not only can he read it, he also remembers where it came from. "I know this notebook! It's not Leo's, it's mine! I wrote this!"

"What?" Emily comes to take a closer look at the notebook. "What's written here?"

"Nothing important," Roger says. "Just random things Leo told me to write."

"So you remember?" Ben asks.

"I remember," Roger says. "He wasn't experimenting on us when we came here, he was teaching us."