To Kill a Priest - The Priors, Episode 1 (3 page)

Jedd again felt the emotional uselessness he
had known that day. Perched atop the hill overlooking the
riverfront house, he watched Madelin through his binoculars. It
pained him that he couldn’t aid her in the presence of so many
armed men.

“
There’s never been a more
heartbreaking sight,” he muttered just as oncoming headlights
drifted in front of his eyes. Startled, he caught the wheel of the
car and swerved back into his lane. His heart rate tripled, but as
he sped down the asphalt road, the organ resumed its normal
pace.

Punching the door’s control pad at random,
he smiled as the window lowered to admit a comforting breeze. He
had to stay focused, but as the car motored on, his thoughts again
drifted to Patient 914. This was his Madelin, and it seemed that
the same memory was also haunting her.

What have they done to you? Even after the
wipe, if the memories are persisting, what PASTOR is doing should
be reversible. But how can such a thing be done…? First thing’s
first, though… There has to be a way to find you.

Pulling into the gas station, he wiped a few
tears from his face, then stepped out of the car and slipped his
new badge over the payment reader. The monitor responded, “Thank
you, Vanessa Carlisle.”

So far so good,
was all that came to mind as he pocketed the handy
ID with the reflective bar code. Setting the pump to auto-fill,
Jedd leaned against the car and massaged his bloodshot eyes.
How do I reach her?

Another memory came to him,
one of Madelin sitting on his lap at the age of three.
This is a more pleasant one,
he thought before his mind began searching for clues to his
next step.

The memory reappeared, and
questions came to mind.
How, at such an
early age, did she speak so clearly?
She
said a lot, but barely moved her lips.

He was sitting in the worn, brown sofa chair
that had always been Lane’s favorite. He remembered watching
football and soccer in that living room, with its rustic, western
feel. Throughout the years of friendship he and the Boatweit family
had cherished, they enjoyed numerous conversations and parties in
that room. On game nights, the chair was always reserved for Lane,
a tall lanky man with a jovial smile and wit that would put a
professional comic to shame. Earlier in their friendship, he
wouldn’t have imagined that smile leaving Lane’s face, but over the
last few months Lane had adopted a more somber demeanor.

Her father wasn’t there at
the moment, though, and the television was silent. Jedd had been
asked to watch Madelin while her parents were out. It was only
later, after Lane’s drastic change, that Jedd had been told about
PASTOR and the threat looming over his goddaughter’s life.
Eventually, Lane told him of Madelin’s extraordinary gift. Thinking
back on it and reliving a pleasant memory of Madelin’s early
childhood, it seemed to
click
. He hadn’t made the connection
until now, but as he remembered sitting in that old, worn chair, it
became clear how she said so much with so little effort.

As the memory played through his thoughts,
he watched Madelin’s lips. Nothing was said other than “Uncah,” her
endearing name for him. He had always assumed she said more, but as
he played back the scene like an old DVD, he wondered if his
subconscious were imagining things.

It would explain a lot,
but seems unlikely,
he
concluded.

In the memory he knew what she wanted, which
book she wanted him to read, and automatically knew when to refill
her sippi-cup. Thinking back to other memories, it became more and
more likely that her abilities that manifested later weren’t the
first. If telepathy were another one of her talents, maybe it
worked both ways. He might be able to speak with her.

But if this works, what do I say? Will she
even know who I am anymore or what she can do?

Based on his investigations of abducted
children, they rarely knew who they were or anything about their
pasts. Knowing what he would find, he suppressed the likely
outcome. He preferred to bet everything on the solitary hope that
she would retain one memory of her loving godfather.

The pump retracted, and Jedd jolted from his
wistful thoughts as a prerecorded voice spoke up from the pump.
“Thank you for visiting. Have a nice day.”

He pulled into the street and continued to
the coffee shop. At this time of day, it would be busy, with a host
of customers filling the lounge chairs and tables. Most people
would be glued to their laptops, accessing the café’s server. This
would help to hide his electronic footprints. A small smile crept
onto his face as he considered the next step, assuming his vain
hope worked at all.

At the café, ‘Cup o’ Jo’ was barely visible
on the sign above the storefront. Jedd ordered a hot mocha and
desert to calm his nerves, swiping his ID as payment at the
automated teller. The earthy tones of the café were relaxing and
pleasant, and the uninterrupted expanse of tinted windows left him
with a great view of the parking lot. He smiled inwardly as the
machine thanked yet another generous philanthropist for shopping at
the establishment. He could feel the PASTOR agents’ noose loosening
as his trail became more difficult to follow.

Gathering his meal, he found an uninhabited
corner with a leather, lounge chair, seated himself, and peered out
the window. The coast was still clear. It would be morning before a
report was made about the car, assuming the authorities were called
at all.

Pulling his phone out, Jedd started his
rerouting software and synchronized it with the portable hard
drive. Then, he logged onto the public server. After an hour, he
found what he was looking for. The first obstacle was to break the
encryption on the F&M Architecture and Contracting Firm’s
server. The company was hired to build the research facility where
she was being held… another tidbit he’d discovered earlier.

In an astute decision, PASTOR had chosen a
less than desirable location. Building on top of the abandoned site
where the original atomic bomb was tested would certainly deter any
curious visitors. White Sands, New Mexico, was known for its albino
sand dunes, and few would question the selection of such a site for
a government-run mental-health facility. Everyone knew the
government was thrifty when it came to health-care
expenditures.

Once he knew where to look,
discovering the exact location became easy. From then on, the
majority of his time was spent obtaining data files on current
employees at the institute and the various security systems the
facility had in place. Surprisingly, the system server was easier
to crack.
Thanks, you damned overconfident
dandees…
Having obtained the digital layout
of the complex and an assortment of employee files, he was certain
he could free Madelin from her prison.

Jedd took a generous bite of his cooling
Danish, logged out, and finished his coffee before grabbing a
refill from a young waitress. Then, he accessed earlier files he
had obtained on other test subjects. He scanned them for references
to strange abilities. If Madelin turned out to be unaware of what
she was capable of, then he would have to teach her whatever he
could. The waitress returned a moment later, and he slid the card
over the edge of the tray. Holding her eyes in his, a coy smile on
his lips, he muttered an affectionate, “Thank you,” while waiting
for the payment to process and the screen to clear. When it had, he
dismissed her with a wave and turned back to his research.

She stalked off, flustered.

Time passed quickly. His steaming coffee
turned cold as the sun crept below the barren mountains outside.
Its light cast a pale hue upon sparse clouds, illuminating the
horizon in pink and orange. The shadow of night loomed over the
city and its rocky guardians. Jedd massaged his chin, smoothing the
edges of his goatee as he stared at the screen. Consumed by the
task, he was oblivious to the fading light around him. However, as
the hours wound on, the fading pastels tempted his eyelids to droop
and lured his chin to his chest. Soon, a subtle snore was all that
escaped his corner of the world.

Undiscovered Talents

Many of the customers had left or been
replaced by new clientele. The traffic along the sidewalk outside
slowed as other stores closed for the evening. While Jedd’s
unconscious mind wondered, he dreamed about Madelin and where she
might be. His thoughts went to the facility imprisoning his beloved
goddaughter. Though he had never seen it before, an aerial image
solidified in his thoughts. He had seen the blueprints, and the
layout looked right.

Gazing down upon the research facility, he
sought her out with a wistful sigh. A moment later he felt himself
moving downward, through the meager clouds and into the confines of
the building itself. He gained momentum as his mind focused on
Madelin. He knew she waited inside. Within seconds he passed
through the brick-and-mortar outer layer, into the crawlspace and
vents. Unable to stop, Jedd slid through the ceiling and into a
hallway.

A young nurse in a white, fitted uniform
meandered through the sterile hall, and he again tried to stop, but
only managed to slow himself down. After gathering his bearings,
Jedd looked at the oncoming woman. It was odd. After so many years
of researching the agency’s heinous crimes, he was astonished that
a PASTOR employee could look so… normal. Instead of a sinister
smile, this woman walked with a composed, professional manner, as
though she were about to diagnose a child with a runny nose. The
white lab coat and her cordial smile gave her the look of a family
doctor. Perusing her notes, she strolled further down the hallway
without noticing him. It was as though she were oblivious, even
with Jedd less than an arm’s length away. She smiled to someone in
an open doorway and nodded her head before continuing around the
corner. Her shoes almost left tread marks on his forehead, yet she
hadn’t seen him. The thought baffled Jedd.

The limitless opportunities of the dream
brought a crooked smile to his face while he drifted through the
multistory structure. He floated along corridors and into rooms, at
times even drifting through the building’s various occupants.

After consideration, it occurred that the
details of these people and the building itself were too real to be
his subconscious at work. Their faces were perfectly flawed and too
well defined.

If this isn’t just a
passing dream,
he thought,
then it’s probably the best reconnaissance ever
discovered.
He was positive he would
recognize the people upon waking. Passing through a multitude of
sterile passages, he slowed to a stop in one of the rooms.
The whole place looks like a modern-day hospital,
from the outside in.

Once he had emerged from the room’s ceiling,
Jedd peered down and found the eyes of a bedridden patient staring
up at him. The young man was strapped to the railings of his bed,
his eyes fixated on the retired computer programmer. The look
stunned him and stopped his progress. It took a moment for the
shock to wear off. The boy looked familiar.

Jedd’s memory served him well, pulling up a
file he had once come across in his search. Although they had never
met, he remembered the boy’s picture. There were a few marked
differences, though, the most obvious being that the patient’s head
was clean-shaven, with fresh razor burns along his skin. His time
at the facility had allowed the dark tan in his picture to fade,
leaving him pale as a ghost. He also had a sunken complexion, as
though he just stepped out of Auschwitz. The sheets covering his
thin arms and legs moved up and down, but the patient’s icy, blue
stare seemed uninhabited, vacant, which disturbed Jedd most of
all.

What the hell did they do to you?

The earlier photograph was of a young man in
his late teens, whose eyes danced with exuberance. The unblinking
gaze supported his suspicion; the very tests they used to develop
these children into competent agents, also sapped their souls.

Tears welled in Jedd’s eyes. He wiped them
away, but found nothing present. Looking down, he could see his
hand, but as he attempted to touch his cheek, it unnervingly passed
through his face.

No matter how vivid this
is,
he reminded himself,
it’s nothing more than a dream.

His thoughts turned to his goddaughter with
growing concern. Without warning, his form angled southward,
building momentum as it went. The boy’s lifeless gaze drifted from
view, and Jedd felt a weight lift from his shoulders, only to be
replaced by something ten times larger.