Curse (Blur Trilogy Book 3) (12 page)

CHAPTER TWENTY-FIVE

Last night is fuzzy.

It’s as if my memory is wandering through a thick fog and every once in a while something solid, something tangible appears, but then the mist covers it again and it’s gone.

I remember returning to the dorm and sorting through the pictures from my mom.

Grandpa as a child.

Christmas photos of the family.

A picture from when I was five, just before he died.

Then there’s the flicker of a memory about a phone call.

And then something about an SUV and—

Oh, yes

The driver.

Malcolm Zacharias.

Yes.

He texted you. He called you. He’s the one who brought you here.

I sit up in bed and look around.

Nope. Definitely not in Berringer Hall anymore.

It might be a hotel room, but it’s pretty Spartan. No wall hangings. No windows.

No TV.

No phone.

When I get out of bed, I see that I’m still wearing the clothes I had on last night when I returned to the dorm after leaving Sue Ellen’s place.

Other than my shoulder sling, which is lying on the dresser near the door, I don’t see anything else that belongs to me.

My shoulder is aching, so I gently ease my arm into the sling.

I wish I had some of the pain meds, but I don’t see them anywhere. When I check in the dresser, I come up empty on the medication but find that the drawers are stocked with clothes that all look my size.

Weird.

And a little creepy.

Curiously, there’s a mini fridge in the corner, and when I open it, I discover that it’s filled only with bottled water and green apples.

It makes me think of forbidden fruit and fairy tales with choices that have deadly consequences, and I decide that, even though I’m hungry, I’ll pass on the apples.

And the water too. Just to be safe.

I have no idea how long I’ve been asleep or what time it is.

There’s no closet, just that door beside the dresser.

I try the knob.

It’s unlocked.

An empt
y,
cream-colored hallwa
y
stretches out in both directions. There aren’t an
y
windows, but the series of recessed fluorescent lights beside the ceiling offers a soft, ethereal glow.

As I walk forward it’s almost like I’m entering a dream.

Maybe you are.

Maybe this is all just a blur.

If it is, it would be my most elaborate one yet.

But I can’t dismiss that possibility.

It’s too bad that I don’t have a phone with me so I could record things and see if they’re real.

However, blur or not, I need to figure out what all this is about.

A low, stead
y
hum comes from the lights, but other than that, the hallwa
y
is quiet. I don’t see an
y
vents, but the air conditioning is cranked up almost high enough to make me shiver.

A securit
y
camera stares down at me from across the hall.

As I go left, it swivels, following my movement.

Maybe it’s wired to a motion sensor—but it’s also possible that someone is on the other end, manually controlling it, watching me.

The floor is tiled with geometric shapes that appear random, but when I study them more closely, I realize that there are ten different ones, and that each represents a number from zero to nine.

There are also other symbols that obviously correspond to mathematical operations. Together, their arrangement on the floor forms elaborate equations.

Whoever designed this place had to be a math genius—although, why anyone would put so much work into a floor’s layout is beyond me.

I walk to another door, about forty feet away.

A camera identical to the one outside the room I came from picks me up as I approach it and tracks me as I try twisting the doorknob.

Locked.

Although for a couple seconds I’m tempted to call out to see if anyone’s in there, honestly, I’m glad for the chance to have a look around before whoever’s monitoring me through those cameras comes to find me.

For the next ten minutes or so, I explore the maze of hallways, mentally mapping them out, using the geometric shapes and the equations they represent to get my bearings so that, even though the intersecting hallways are confusing, I’m able to keep myself oriented.

Finally, I meet up with a T that I haven’t come to before.

I’m debating which way to go when I hear a door bang shut somewhere out of sight around the bend on the left.

Sharp-sounding footsteps approach me.

I figure I’ll get more answers talking to whoever this is than I will wandering around these halls.

However, I have no idea if the person will be happy to see me or not, so I brace myself for a possible fight, tightening my one good hand into a fist.

The stride is quick and firm.

Coming closer.

I wait, becoming more tense—but also more directed and focused—with every passing second.

At last, a man comes into view and stops when he sees me.

Malcolm Zacharias.

Though last night is still haz
y,
he looks just like I remem
ber him from when we met in December: mid-thirties;
straight dark hair; a piercing, intelligent gaze.

He’s wearing blue jeans and a black turtleneck.

A scar he didn’t have in the winter trails across his cheek.

“Daniel.”

“What’s going on here, Mr. Zacharias? What do you want from me?”

“It’s time for you to meet the others—and we’re going to be working pretty closely together. How about we just go by first names from here on out. You can call me Malcolm.”

CHAPTER TWENTY-SIX

“I know you must have a lot of questions,” he tells me as he leads me down the hall.

“Why don’t I remember last night?”

“I gave you a slight hypnotic.”

“You drugged me?”

“I took certain steps to ensure plausible deniability for you.”

“Plausible denia—what is this about?”

“Trust me, we’re going to get you the answers you’re looking for.”

“Where’s my phone?”

“I returned it to your dorm room for you.”

A single elevator lies before us, the silver doors standing in stark contrast to the blank, monotonous walls surrounding them.

I study the patterns on the floor, visualize them mathematically, and commit this location to memory so I can find it again if I need to. “What is this place?”

“A training center. I’d show you around more, but time is of the essence.”

We arrive at the elevator and he presses the “Down” button.

“Why is time of the essence?”

“We’ll cover that in a minute.”

“Last December you told me your job was recruitment, but you never explained who you were looking for, who you were recruiting.”

“Those with the gift to see what most people miss.”

“You mean when we have blurs?”

“There’s a rare combination of factors that have come together in a fraction of a percent of the population. You’re one of the few we’ve been able to locate.”

The doors swish open and we step into a cramped, narrow elevator.

“So you want to study us?”

“Think of
yo
ur blurs as a flashlight beam. Your subconscious is shining it through the darkness of all the distractions that are out there ever
y
da
y,
all around
you—a
ll the untid
y
details of lif
e—u
ntil it finds cohesion where there seems to be chaos, and then it draws
yo
ur attention to it.”

On the elevator’s panel there’s an upper level that appears to require a key card to access it. We’re on B1. He presses B3, two levels down.

“So, like I said, you want to study us.”

The doors close.

We descend.

“The agency I work with wants to help you focus the beam.”

“I’ve read about the different aspects of schizophrenia. Is that what we have? Some sort of mental illness?”

“We’re still trying to understand it,” he says, which doesn’t quite reassure me. “But we’re going to have to put some of that on hold. A young woman is missing and we don’t have a lot of time to find her.”

“Who is she?”

“Senator Amundsen’s daughter. She’s like you. She has blurs. And we need to find her before nine o’clock tonight.”

“Or?”

“Or her abductors are going to kill her, Daniel. But if they get what they want in their ransom demands, the very foundation of our justice system could be left in ruins.”

I wonder if he might be exaggerating things, but the way he says it makes me believe him.

He doesn’t elaborate.

The elevator stops.

The doors part.

Another hallway.

We walk for a few minutes in silence and, although the layout of the halls on this level appears to be identical to B1, the equations represented are different.

Well, at least if you get lost, you’ll be able to tell what floor you’re on.

Also different: All the rooms on this level require a key card.

Finally, we come to an unremarkable door in the middle of an unremarkable hallway and Malcolm waves the card in front of the reader.

With a slight whisper that reminds me of someone exhaling, the door whisks open, and he gestures for me to go inside.

CHAPTER TWENTY-SEVEN

10:00 A.M.

11 HOURS UNTIL THE DEADLINE

It’s a huge contrast to the austere room where I woke up.

One wall of the lush apartment is covered with a panoramic window. It looks like we’re on the ground floor of a building in a dense forest.

Another wall contains an array of screens that display the security footage from the cameras that were in the hallways I was walking through earlier.

An imposing gu
y—
maybe Hawaiian or Polynesian—stands beside the window. Near him, a fair-skinned girl is seated on a large, L-shaped black leather couch. They both appear to be about my age and when Malcolm and I step into the room and the door slides shut behind us, both of them turn our way.

The boy has me by at least thirty pounds, and it’s all muscle. He looks street-tough and doesn’t seem too happy to be here.

The girl’s strawberry-blonde hair is trimmed into a neat pixie cut. She’s almost as slender as Mia. Dark sunglasses hide her eyes.

“Daniel,” Malcolm says, “I’d like you to meet Alysha and Tane. They’ve both agreed to help me.” He sets his key card between an elaborate lava lamp and a vase on a table pushed up against the wall.

“With what? Finding the senator’s daughter?”

“Petra. Yes. There’s a man who’s performing chronobiolog
y
tests on prisoners. You’ll remember him from last winter.”

“Dr. Waxford.”

“Right. My employer wants to stop him, and also wants to—let me back up for a second. As I told you upstairs, your subconscious is drawing meaning from the random data that passes by each of us all the time. It’s the same for Alysha and Tane. We need to find a template for your conscious minds to interact with—”

His phone rings softly, with a distinctive, chiming ringtone. He glances at the screen, and worry etches across his face. “I’m sorry. I need to take this. I’ll give you a few minutes to get to know each other, then we’ll have to get started. Please excuse me.”

Tane silently watches Malcolm leave. As soon as we’re alone, he strides toward me. I’m about to ask if he knows what exactly is going on, but before I can say a word, he cocks his fist back and sends it flying at me, connecting solidly with my jaw.

I can take a punch, but this guy has some serious heft to him and the force of the blow snaps my head around and almost sends me to the floor.

With my left arm out of commission, I don’t really want to fight him, but I figure I’ll do what I have to do.

Slowly, I turn and face him, wiping the blood off my lip.

I undo the Velcro strap on the sling and slough it off my arm, letting it drop to the floor beside me. “Hit me again and see how that goes for you.”

I’m partly bluffing.

Partly not.

Tane opens his mouth slightly as if he’s going to reply, but then closes it again.

He doesn’t take another swing at me.

We both stand our ground.

“You’ll have to forgive him,” Alysha says in a soft, delicate voice. “We’re both a little on edge here.”

“How did Malcolm find you?” Tane asks me.

“Someone told him about me last winter. Why did you hit me?”

“Where are you from?”

“Wisconsin. I asked why you punched me.”

“To see what you’re made of. I’m from L.A.”

“And I’m from Montana,” Alysha inserts. “Do you see things that aren’t there?”

“Hang on.” I’m not satisfied with Tane’s answer. “You wanted to see what I’m made of? That’s not enough of a reason to walk up to someone you just met and slug him in the face.”

“You can tell a lot about a person by how he reacts when you punch him.”

“Really? And what could you tell about me?”

He leans over, picks up my sling, and hands it to me. “That I wouldn’t want to fight you. Unless I had to.”

The feeling is mutual, but I don’t say that. I just put the sling back on.

The shoulder hurts, but I hold back from wincing as I strap the sling in place.

“So, do you see things?” Alysha presses me.

“You mean hallucinations?”

“Visions, revelations, whatever you want to call them.”

“Yes. I do.”

“When did it start for you?”

“Last fall. At a funeral. Do you see them too?”

“Well, not exactly.” She removes her sunglasses and, although she’s facing me, her gaze tips past me, her eyes cloudy and unfocused.

“You’re blind?”

“Visually impaired,” Tane corrects me.

“Let’s just stick with ‘blind,’” she says. “I hate all that stupid politically correct stuff. But to answer your question, Daniel, no, I don’t see things. I hear them. And sometimes I feel them touch me.”

“I see them. And I hear them too,” Tane adds. “It’s almost like other people are talking to me, right inside my head, even when there’s no way I should be able to know what they’re saying.”

He seems more forthcoming than I would’ve expected.

Alysha is still turned toward me. “Do you have headaches first?”

“I used to, but then, in time, they stopped, and I just started having the blurs without any warning. Look, how long have you two been here?”

“Blurs?”

“That’s what I call them. When reality blurs along the edges and I can’t tell what’s real and what’s not.”

“Blurs.” She nods reflectively. “Yeah, that makes sense. We’ll go with that. Do you know what causes them? Your blurs?”

“I’m still trying to figure that out. So—how long were you saying you’ve been here?”

“Malcolm picked me up Saturday night,” Tane tells me.

“And I’ve been here since last week,” Alysha explains. “He told my parents that I was going to some sort of student leadership conference or something. I’m not sure. He’s had me busy listening to 911 calls from missing persons cases.”

“Why?”

“To see if I can notice things other people miss.”

That was pretty much the same phrase Malcolm had used just a few minutes ago when he was explaining things to me.

Tane retrieves the key card that Malcolm left next to the lava lamp and studies it as if it might reveal clues about our situation. Then, once again he opens up more than I think he will. “I live with my mom. Dad’s out of the picture. Well, he was never really in it. I don’t know what Malcolm told her, but she was probably just glad to not have to worry about taking care of me for a while. She’s not exactly a finalist for Mother of the Year. What about you?”

“My mom?”

“No. Does anyone else know you’re here?”

“I . . . well . . . I’m not sure.”

I realize that if they haven’t already, my friends and my parents will be missing me soon.

Though my memory of what happened last night is still murky, I don’t recall leaving any sort of note behind. It wouldn’t have helped anything though, since I don’t know where I am or how long I’ll be here.

“Do you know why we’re here?” Tane asks.

“Malcolm mentioned finding the senator’s daughter.”

“Petra.”

“Yes. That’s about all I know.”

“You mentioned that someone told Malcolm about you,” Alysha says. “That’s how he found you?”

“Yes.”

“Was he tracking your online activity?”

“Yes, actually he was.”

“It’s the same for both of us.”

Tane is distractedly flipping the key card through his fingers. “He’s looking for a convergence.”

“A convergence?”

“Of knowledge and desire, of curiosity and ability. At least that’s what he told me. Through algorithms and analyzing metadata, searches, interests, posts, and profiles. They look for people with certain, well, gifts.”

I wondered if that might be connected somehow to the equations represented in the hallways.

Someone with the gift for solving equations just like me might have created them.

Tane glances at the window, then back at me. “Do you know what floor we’re on?”

“The ground floor, I guess.” A bird lands on one of the branches, chirps lightly, then starts to strut back and forth.

“Keep an eye on the bird,” Alysha says. “Two more chirps and it’ll fly away. Give it ten seconds or so.”

I watch the bird and wait.

Within a few seconds it chirps once, then after a short pause, it does so again before lifting softly into flight.

Astonished, I turn to her. “How did you know that?”

“Every hour and five minutes it lands there. It’s on a loop.”

“A loop?” I walk to the window and put m
y
hand against the glass. “This is just a video screen?”

“Yes.”

“It’s amazing. It’s so realistic.”

“So, do you have any idea where we are?” Tane asks. “The last I heard, Malcolm was going to bring me to Atlanta, but I’m not sure if that’s where we ended up.”

I’m still intrigued by Alysha’s observation about the bird. “How did you realize the video is on a loop? I mean, I could see if it happened over the span of a few minutes, but you’re saying it’s over an hour?”

Tane gestures toward the monitors on the wall. “There’s a time marker on the security cameras.”

“But still.”

“I heard it,” she tells me.

“And you remembered it?”

She shrugs. “I just tend to remember things pretty well. That’s all.”

“That’s incredible.”

“Everyone’s a virtuoso at something. It’s just that some people haven’t discovered their instrument yet. Mine is listening.”

Everyone’s a virtuoso at something.

Huh, I like it.

What about you?

Math?

I guess that would be my instrument.

As we wait for Malcolm to return, the conversation shifts from the gift of noticing what other people miss to how that affects the dreams we have.

Alysha starts talking about her nightmares, and I’m especially interested in what she has to say since she doesn’t have visual dreams.

No images.

No colors.

“I was born blind so I’ve never seen anything, but I hear things and feel pressure in my dreams. Like, for example, I’m terrified of wasps. So I sometimes have a nightmare where I hear them circling around my head and I can feel them crawling on my face and my neck, but, obviously, I can’t see where they are so I can’t stop them or swat them away.”

Then she asks us to tell her about our nightmares.

I go first, starting with that dream of the boy and the bats.

Kyle left the field house.

Nothing.

He’d even snuck into the locker rooms and wandered into the reception area of the office, where a bearded guy in his mid-twenties was filing the basketball camp registration forms.

He looked up at Kyle and asked somewhat brusquely if he needed anything.

“No. I’m just looking for someone.”

“Well, no one’s come through here.”

“You’ve been here all morning?”

“I’m the receptionist. So. Yes.”

“Right.”

Although it was possible that the coaches would have noticed Daniel’s absence, with so many basketball players, it would be easy for someone to slip through the cracks without drawing too much attention.

On his way to the fountain to meet the girls, Kyle texted them:
Nada. You?

Mia responded first:
No.

Then, Nicole:
He’s not in the cafeteria.

Nicole was waiting for him at the fountain and a minute or so later Mia walked up and asked, “What should we do now?”

“I guess we go to campus security after all,” Kyle replied. “I’m not sure where else to look.”

Using his phone, he pulled up a map of the university, located the security office on the far side of campus, and the three of them headed toward it.