CHAPTER ELEVEN
2172 Words
CHAPTER ELEVEN
Alina Guyer carefully secured a metal band over Reid’s cranium, some sort of expensive-looking halo outfitted with more than a dozen sensors. She leaned over him as she carefully fit the device on his head. “Comfortable?” she asked.
“Yeah, fine. What does it do?”
“This is just to read brainwave activity during the procedure,” she said. “Everything you’re about to experience is sensory.”
Reid frowned. “But the suppressor was an implant.”
“Yes,” said Dr. Guyer. He was across the white laboratory, fiddling with a touch-screen computer array. “But the way in which it works is by transmitting signals to your limbic system. A constant barrage of waves specifically intended to suppress certain functions in your brain. This machine is, of course, much larger, but it operates in much the same way, utilizing waves and signals. Imagine your brain is a lock, and this machine—”
“Is a giant key,” Reid finished. “Got it.”
Guyer nodded as his expression turned somber. “But I should forewarn you. If this works, some of the things that you recall may be subconscious: fantasies, wishes, suspicions from your past life. All of those non-memory aspects were removed with your actual memories.”
Reid frowned. “So you’re saying that if I remember things, some of the things I remember may not actually be real?”
“They’ll be real to you.” Guyer gestured to his wife. “Alina, the chamber.”
She unclasped the lid of the white cylinder and lifted it to reveal the narrow cot inside. “You’re not claustrophobic, are you Reid?” she asked with a smirk.
He shook his head and climbed quickly onto the cot. Doubt was rapidly setting in; the notion of having things return to him that may not be real was frightening to him, but he had come too far to back out now. Better to just get it over with, he thought.
Before they had begun, Reid had composed an email on his phone, set on a delayed send two hours from then. If anything went wrong, he couldn’t risk having his girls stranded in a foreign country with no idea what happened to him. If he didn’t delete it inside of two hours, the email would send to both Strickland and Watson’s personal accounts, detailing where he was, what he had done, and how to contact the girls.
He thought about them once more as he lay his head on the cushion of the cylindrical cot.
“Ah! One moment.” Dr. Guyer hurried over with a horseshoe-shaped piece of plastic. “Here. You might need this.”
Reid turned it over in his hands. “A mouth guard?”
“To protect your teeth and tongue,” the doctor said simply.
Reid sat up quickly. “What? Wait, just what the hell is about to happen—?”
“Lie back,” Alina instructed. She pushed gently on his shoulder and he complied, lying flat onto the cot. “Good luck.” Then she lowered the lid of the cylinder and Reid was thrust into complete silence and darkness.
For a moment, there was nothing. It reminded him of the aftermath of his fight with Rais on the walls of Dubrovnik, when he and the assassin had tumbled over the edge of a tower and Reid had lost consciousness for a few minutes. At the time he thought he had died; all he saw was black, and he heard absolutely nothing until Maria’s voice floated to him.
A voice floated to him now, but it was not Maria. It was Dr. Guyer’s.
“Can you hear me?” the doctor asked. His voice was tinny and distant, coming through a small speaker inside the cylinder.
“Um… yes.”
“Good. I want to warn you that some of what you are about to experience may disturb you,” the doctor told him.
“It would help if you told me what I was about to—”
“Please keep in mind,” the doctor interrupted, “that nothing in the chamber can harm you. You are perfectly safe in our hands.”
“Great,” Reid muttered. “Then what’s the mouthpiece for?”
“Ah, yes. Please insert that now.”
“Why?” Reid insisted.
“In case we induce a seizure.”
Reid reminded himself to have a closer look at Dr. Guyer’s medical degrees when all this was over as he put the plastic mouth guard over his teeth.
“We will now begin,” said Guyer. “Please remember what I said, and try to relax.”
Sure, Reid thought. I’m locked in a tube with no idea what’s about to happen to me. Relax.
Suddenly a white light shined right before his eyes, as if a camera flash went off in his face. He winced at the sudden blaze and spots danced in his vision. The light was gone as suddenly as it had appeared, but the colorful spots remained.
Then another light flashed, slightly to the left of the first. A third, to the right.
The lights flashed intermittently, with no discernible sequence or timing. A high-pitched whine rang in his ears, growing in timbre. Is that in my head? he thought. No, it’s coming from somewhere. Then, a scent wafted into the chamber. It was neither pleasant nor pungent, but rather bland. Was it the smell of dirt? Close, but not quite it. He couldn’t put his finger on it.
The lights continued to hammer his vision, the whining noise rising in pitch, the scent becoming stronger. Then, a tingling sensation on his scalp, his forehead.
Alina had lied to him. The halo was not just an array of sensors.
He realized what this was, at least partially; a sensory barrage, an assault on all of his primary methods of perception. As he thought it, he bit down on the plastic mouthpiece and tasted something bitter.
The tingling in his head grew stronger, right up to the border of being painful. Reid clenched his fists at his sides. He wanted to close his eyes against the harsh flashing lights but he knew he had to keep them open if he wanted this to be successful. The odor burned in his nostrils. Suddenly it seemed like everything ached. He was uncomfortable from head to toe. His limbs were cramping and a migraine had spurred in his skull.
This was far more than a sensory barrage; this was an intentional overload.
I need to get out of here, he thought desperately. I need to stop this.
His hands shook, convulsing on their own accord. As he tried to steady them his feet and legs began to quiver. All of his limbs shook as his heart raced, doubling in speed. His eyes rolled up against his will until he saw only darkness again.
And then he lost consciousness.
*
“Reid?”
He winced as he opened his eyes. His vision adjusted to the dim blue lighting of the room and Alina Guyer’s angelic face loomed over him, the corners of her eyes creased with concern. “Mr. Steele, can you hear me?” She shined an intense light in his eye. It watered instinctively and he blinked several times.
The cylinder was open; the halo was off his head. The procedure was over. But his first thought was of his girls.
“How long was I out?” he asked hoarsely.
“Only a couple of minutes… gently, please,” said Alina as he sat up with a groan.
His head was throbbing and there was a strange prickling sensation in his limbs that was quickly subsiding—but otherwise, he noted, he felt no different.
Dr. Guyer stood near Reid’s feet, patient but obviously eager. “How do you feel?” he asked evenly.
“The same,” Reid admitted. “Though my head hurts like hell. Did it work?”
“Only you could say. Tell me,” said Guyer, “how many times did we consult before I performed the implant procedure on you?”
“I…” Reid thought about it, tried to conjure the memory, but the only one that came to him was the one he had already recalled in Guyer’s office, he and Reidigger in front of the video camera. “I don’t know.”
Guyer’s shoulders slumped in defeat.
“So… what does this mean?” Reid asked.
The doctor exchanged a glance with Alina. “I’m afraid the procedure has failed,” he said simply, making no attempt to hide the disappointment in his voice. “My machine clearly requires some revisions, but I believe it is beyond my level of skill.”
Reid swung his legs off of the cot and rose to his feet. His knees were shaky. Alina held him by one arm and helped him steady. “I’m sorry, Dr. Guyer. I didn’t really…” He stopped himself from saying it, but he didn’t really believe that his memory would be reinstated so easily. There was a small glimmer of hope that the machine would work, but pessimism had largely reigned. Instead he said, “Thank you, both of you, for your help.” Despite his belief, he still found himself just as disappointed as Guyer, and there was no point in lingering further. He looked at his watch. “I know this sounds strange, but I need to go. My daughters are here with me in the city and I need to get back to them.”
Alina and Dr. Guyer followed him out of the procedure room, down the hall, and back into the opulent reception area. “Here.” Guyer handed him a white business card with his name and phone number on it. “This is my personal line. Please, keep in touch. I’m sorry I couldn’t be of more help to you.”
“Thanks.” He pocketed the card, shook the doctor’s hand and thanked them both again, and then he left through the heavy oak door. There was nothing more to say or do. Guyer’s machine had failed, and his mind was still as much a mess as ever.
He loitered outside the door for a moment as he deleted the delayed-send email that would have gone out to Strickland and Watson, and then he made his way down to the street level. But before he even reached the stairs, the morbid impact of what had occurred struck him. His old memories could not be brought back with technology. He was doomed to living like this, with old memories popping back into his brain from random stimuli. And when another icberg-top of a secret came back to him, something like the conspiracy, he would never fully know or understand it without what he used to know.
It sounded like a living hell. I’d rather take the suppressor, he mused grimly. But according to Guyer, that wasn’t even an option. If the technology could be replicated, it was still flawed and would eventually fail anyway.
He made his way down the stairs to the street and turned right to head back towards the museum, wondering what he was going to tell Maya. He had promised her the truth—and if he was going to have to live for at least another three months, possibly more, like this than he might have to face the music with his girls…
“Hey, stranger.”
Reid stopped suddenly, certain he had not heard the familiar feminine cadence that made goose bumps rise on his arms. He turned, and there she was, hands on her hips, blonde hair flowing around her shoulders, amusement in her gray eyes.
“Maria,” he said in astonishment. “What…? How are you here?”
She smiled and shrugged one shoulder. “I thought you might come to see him.”
“See him…?” Oh. He realized what she meant. Guyer’s office. Which means that she… “You knew about this place. You read Alan’s letter to me?”
She bit her lip and nodded slightly. “I’m sorry. I know I told you I didn’t, but—”
“But you held it for me for so long. Curiosity got the better of you.”
“I thought something in there might tell me where you had been all that time you were gone,” she admitted.
“Then that means… you knew, back in Rome, that I wasn’t dead.” He rubbed his forehead, thinking. “You knew that Alan helped me. You knew my memory had been affected.”
“I’m sorry,” Maria said genuinely. “I couldn’t let on because I didn’t know who might be watching me, or us. Are you angry?”
He sighed deeply. “No.” He had to admit that he probably would have done the same in her position, not knowing if a friend was alive or dead or where they might be if it was the former. “I’m not angry at all. I’m just wondering if there will ever be a time that we don’t have secrets from each other.”
“Probably not,” she said, both honestly and ruefully. “And I’m sorry I haven’t returned your calls. I thought you might need some time with your family.” She gestured upwards with her chin, towards Guyer’s office. “Did you find what you were looking for?”
“Not really,” Reid told her plainly. “At least not in the way I was hoping.” He looked at his watch again. The girls would be waiting for him soon. “Um, I hate to do it, but I kind of have to go.”
“Yeah,” Maria nodded. “Of course. I just heard you were here in Zurich and wanted to check in. They’re expecting me at regional HQ anyway. It was good to see you, Kent.”
“You too.” He hugged her tightly, breathing in her scent. She gently kissed his cheek before turning to head the other direction. “Come with me.”
Maria paused. “What?”
The words had spilled from his mouth so suddenly he hadn’t given it a single thought, but he realized that he wanted her around. Her presence was pacifying, and he felt he needed that right now. “Come with me. Just for a little while. Meet my daughters.”
“Are you sure? What about the agency?”
“I am sure,” Reid told her. “And screw the agency. They can do without you for a couple of hours. No one’s trying to end the world at the moment. Put your phone on silent and come with me.” He held out his hand.
Maria smiled and took it. “Yeah, alright. I will.” She held his hand as they started towards the Swiss National Museum. “But how are you going to explain this to your girls?”
“I have no idea.” Reid let out a short laugh. “Oh, just one thing though. When you meet the girls, you’re going to have to call me Reid.”
“Reid,” she said slowly, as if trying the word out. “Sure. I think I’ll manage.”
- Writer
