Let me break it down: My objective is to terminate Williams and destroy his work. How can I make that happen? How can I use what resources I have to put this man out of commission? What does he value? Power? Money?
The salty, thick air washed over me as I ran following the curves and hills of the road. And with every beat of my pounding heart I wished I were just a normal sixteen-year-old girl walking the halls of a normal high school where all I had to worry about was final exams and who was going to take me to the prom. I wish I could listen to music and write in a diary and make plans for college. I wish I could dream of growing up and growing old with the love of my life, but none of that was in my future. No. Instead, my future was primed and ready to be filled with metabattles, blood, evil doctors bent on world domination and imminent death before I even make it to twenty-one.
Crap!
I picked up my already breakneck speed, pushing away the self-pity and allowing myself to be enveloped in anger instead. Feeling my new determination wash over and empower me opened my mind to clarity. I knew what I had to do. I need to find Dr. Kenneth Williams, and God forgive me, I need to terminate him and his work.
21 It’s Not Just Nostalgia
The room was completely dark except for the images flashing on the large flat screen on the far side. In a supple, brushed, black leather recliner sat the aging Dr. Williams. His left hand was methodically rotating the metallic orbs—his self-soothing technique. The doctor’s face was only visible because of the reflection from the screen. He looked distinctly older than he had just two years before. Stress and revenge will do that to a man.
On the screen was the case study, M57, his first success. She was perched on her bed, her small, slender legs dangling several inches above the tiled flooring. In her dainty, three-year-old hands, she lovingly held a rag doll. The doll was nothing spectacular. To his memory, it was the only one he allowed her as he was more interested in honing her fighting skills, battle tactics, problem solving, and so on. He remembered being frustrated that the experiment continued to seek that one doll out instead of playing with the brain researched-based robotics, puzzles and mazes. There she was, singing to the faceless, yarn-haired, doll.
He scowled at the image wondering, not for the first time, why he even bothered with a female case study. Then, as though justifying himself, he made himself remember how much harder it was to come by the human samples on which he could carry out his research back then. Yes, times were tough, he thought.
On the screen, M57 looked up, as though she heard something, and scampered under the bed, bringing the ratty doll with her. The room looked empty for several minutes before the door opened and a lab worker who was there to collect a blood sample, walked in. He scanned the room looking confused.
Look under the bed, you idiot! thought Williams, not for the first time.
Instead, the white lab coat looked down at the chart in his hand and flipped a few pages up before stupidly scratching his head, turning and walking out of the room. The door closed with a loud, locking click behind him and moments later M57 crawled out from under the bed, looking quite pleased with herself. She smiled widely, held the doll up into the air, spun, then hugged it tightly.
What just happened? Williams was thinking. He knew she could sense the emotions of others. That was documented and factual. But this one scene, of all the hours of footage he had videotaped of her time at the Institute, this seemed different.
Did she sense the worker’s hesitation to do his job and collect data from what he saw as a little girl and use that against him? Or was it something else? She was always able to sense emotions but it looked like, in this scene, she was able to manipulate his emotions so he didn’t search for her. Instead, he looked full of doubt and walked out of the room without so much as seeing the subject. And if that were the case, why had she only displayed this ability this once?
Why, when she came to the Institute last year, did she not just manipulate me into freeing her mother and ending our conflict? He thought.
Dr. Williams grabbed the remote, clicked to rewind and began the scene for the umpteenth time. Though the event took place more than a decade before, something here was important to present events. The worry lines deepened in his brow. There was more to M57, and he needed to know what it was.
The cell phone in his upper breast pocket warbled announcing a call and interrupting his thoughts. Irritated, he answered, “What.”
“Dr. Williams. Creed here, calling with a status report.”
“Go on,” Williams barked, pressing pause on the video playback right where M57 looks up from her doll as though she heard something…or was it felt something?
“Your assistant, Farrow arrived with the ‘gift’ right on schedule. We are on target for secured delivery, sir.”
“Excellent. When?”