Dark Matter (5 page)

The lighting is soft and unthreatening, like a movie theater moments before the film begins.

There are two straight-backed wooden chairs, and on the small table a laptop, a pitcher of water, two drinking glasses, a steel carafe, and a steaming mug that fills the room with the aroma of good coffee.

The walls and ceiling are made of smoked glass.

“Jason, if you have a seat, we can get started.”

I hesitate for five long seconds, debating just walking out, but something tells me that would be a bad, possibly catastrophic, idea.

So I sit in the chair, reach for the pitcher, and pour myself a glass of water.

The woman says, “If you're hungry, we can have food brought in.”

“No thanks.”

Finally taking her seat across from me, she pushes her glasses up the bridge of her nose and types something on the laptop.

“It is—” She checks her wristwatch. “—12:07 a.m., October the second. I'm Amanda Lucas, employee ID number nine-five-six-seven, and I'm joined tonight by…” She gestures to me.

“Um, Jason Dessen.”

“Thank you, Jason. By way of background, and for the record, at approximately 10:59 p.m. on October first, Technician Chad Hodge, during a routine interior locality audit, discovered Dr. Dessen lying unconscious on the floor of the hangar. The extraction team was activated, and Dr. Dessen was removed to quarantine at 11:24 p.m. Following decontamination and primary lab work clearance by Dr. Leighton Vance, Dr. Dessen was escorted to the conference theater on sublevel two, where our first debriefing interview begins.”

She looks up at me, smiling now.

“Jason, we are thrilled to have you back. The hour is late, but most of the team rushed in from the city for this. As you might have guessed, they're all looking on behind the glass.”

Applause breaks out all around us, accompanied by cheers and several people shouting my name.

The lights come up just enough for me to see through the walls. Theater seating surrounds the glassed-in interview cubicle. Fifteen or twenty people are on their feet, most smiling, a few even wiping their eyes as if I've returned from some heroic mission.

I notice that two of them are armed, the butts of their pistols gleaming under the lights.

These men aren't smiling or clapping.

Amanda scoots her chair back and, rising, begins to clap along with the others.

She seems to be deeply moved as well.

And all I can think is, What the hell has happened to me?

When the applause subsides, Amanda settles back into her seat.

She says, “Pardon our enthusiasm, but so far, you're the only one to return.”

I have no idea what she's talking about. Part of me wants to say just that, but part of me suspects that maybe I shouldn't.

The lights dim back down.

I clutch my glass of water in my hands like a lifeline.

“Do you know how long you've been gone?” she asks.

Gone where?

“No.”

“Fourteen months.”

Jesus.

“Is that a shock to you, Jason?”

“You could say that.”

“Well, pins and needles and bated breath and asses on the edges of our seats. We've been waiting for over a year to ask these questions: What did you see? Where did you go? How did you get back? Tell us everything, and please start from the beginning.”

I take a sip of water, clinging to my last solid memory like a crumbling handhold on a cliff face—leaving my house on family night.

And then…

I walked down the sidewalk through a cool, autumn night. I could hear the noise of the Cubs game in all the bars.

To where?

Where was I going?

“Just take your time, Jason. We're in no rush.”

Ryan Holder.

That's who I was going to see.

I walked to Village Tap and had a drink—two drinks, world-class Scotch, to be exact—with my old college roommate, Ryan Holder.

Is he somehow responsible for this?

I wonder again: Is this actually happening?

I raise the glass of water. It looks perfectly real, right down to the way it sweats and the cold wetness of it on my fingertips.

I look into Amanda's eyes.

I examine the walls.

They're not melting.

If this is some drug-induced trip, it's like none I've ever heard of. No visual or auditory distortions. No euphoria. It's not that this place doesn't feel real. I just shouldn't be here. It's somehow
my
presence that's the lie. I'm not even exactly sure what that means, only that I feel it in my core.

No, this is not a hallucination. This is something else entirely.

“Let's try a different approach,” Amanda says. “What's the last thing you remember before waking up in the hangar?”

“I was at a bar.”

“What were you doing there?”

“Seeing an old friend.”

“And where was this bar?” she asks.

“Logan Square.”

“So you were still in Chicago.”

“Yeah.”

“Okay, can you describe…?”

Her voice drops off into silence.

I see the El.

It's dark.

It's quiet.

Too quiet for Chicago.

Someone is coming.

Someone who wants to hurt me.

My heart begins to race.

My hands sweat.

I set the glass down on the table.

“Jason, Leighton is telling me your vitals are becoming elevated.”

Her voice is back but still an ocean away.

Is this a trick?

Am I being messed with?

No, do not ask her that. Do not say those words. Be the man they think you are. These people are cool, calm, and
two of them are armed
. Whatever they need to hear you say, say it. Because if they realize you aren't the person they think you are, then what?

Then maybe you never leave this place.

My head is beginning to throb. Reaching up, I touch the back of my skull and graze a knot that's so tender it causes me to wince.

“Jason?”

Was I hurt?

Did someone attack me? What if I was brought here? What if these people, despite how nice they seem, are in league with the person who did this to me?

I touch the side of my head, feel the damage from a second blow.

“Jason.”

I see a geisha mask.

I'm naked and helpless.

“Jason.”

Just a few hours ago I was home, cooking dinner.

I am not the man they think I am. What happens when they figure that out?

“Leighton, could you come down, please?”

Nothing good.

I need to not be in this room anymore.

I need to get away from these people.

I need to think.

“Amanda.” I drag myself back into the moment, try to drive the questions and the fear out of my mind, but it's like shoring up a failing levee. It won't last. It won't hold. “This is embarrassing,” I say. “I'm just so exhausted, and to be honest, decontamination was no fun.”

“Do you want to break for a minute?”

“Would that be okay? I just need a moment to clear my head.” I point at the laptop. “I also want to sound mildly intelligent for this thing.”

“Of course.” She types something. “We're off the record now.”

I get up.

She says, “I can show you to a private room—”

“Not necessary.”

I open the door and step out into the corridor.

Leighton Vance is waiting.

“Jason, I'd like you to lie down. Your vitals are headed in the wrong direction.”

I rip the device off my arm and hand it to the doctor.

“Appreciate the concern, but what I really need is a bathroom stall.”

“Oh. Of course. I'll take you.”

We head down the corridor.

Digging his shoulder into the heavy glass door, he leads me back into the stairwell, which at the moment is empty. No sound but the ventilation system pumping heated air through a nearby vent. I grasp the railing and lean out over the core of open space.

Two flights to the bottom, two to the top.

What did Amanda say at the start of the interview? That we're on sublevel two? Does that mean this is all underground?

“Jason? You coming?”

I follow Leighton, climbing, fighting through the weakness in my legs, the pain in my head.

At the top of the stairwell, a sign beside a reinforced-steel door reads
GROUND
. Leighton swipes a keycard, punches in a code, and holds the door open.

The words
V
ELOCITY
L
ABORATORIES
are affixed in block letters across the wall straight ahead.

Left: a bank of elevators.

Right: a security checkpoint, with a hard-looking guard standing between the metal detector and the turnstile, the exit just beyond.

It seems like the security here is outward facing, focused more on preventing people from getting in than getting out.

Leighton directs me past the elevators and down a hallway to a pair of double doors at the far end, which he opens with his keycard.

As we enter, he hits the lights, revealing a well-appointed office, the walls adorned in aviation photographs of commercial airliners and military supersonic jets and the engines that power them.

A framed photo on the desk draws my focus—an older man holding a boy in his arms that looks very much like Leighton. They're standing in a hangar in front of a massive turbofan in the midst of assembly.

“I thought you'd be more comfortable in my private bathroom.” Leighton points toward a door in the far corner. “I'll be right here,” he says, sitting down on the edge of his desk and pulling a phone out of his pocket. “Shout if you need anything.”

The bathroom is cold and immaculate.

There's a toilet, a urinal, a walk-in shower, and a small window halfway up the back wall.

I take a seat on the toilet.

My chest feels so tight I can barely breathe.

They've been waiting for me to return for fourteen months. There's no way they're letting me walk out of this building. Not tonight. Maybe not for a long time considering I'm not the man they think they're talking to.

Unless this is all some elaborate test or game.

Leighton's voice pushes through the door: “Everything all right in there?”

“Yeah.”

“I don't know what you saw inside that thing, but I want you to know I'm here for you, brother. If you're freaking out, you got to tell me, so I can help you.”

I rise.

He continues, “I was watching you from the theater, and I have to say, you looked out of it.”

If I were to walk back into the lobby with him, could I break away, make a dash through security? I picture that massive guard standing by the metal detector. Probably not.

“Physically, I think you're going to be fine, but I worry about your psychological state.”

I have to step onto the lip of the porcelain urinal to reach the window. The glass appears to be locked shut by means of a lever on each side.

It's only two feet by two feet, and I'm not sure if I can fit through.

Leighton's voice echoes through the bathroom, and as I creep back toward the sink, his words become clear again.

“…worst thing you can do is try to manage this on your own. Let's be honest. You're the kind of guy who thinks he's strong enough to push through anything.”

I approach the door.

There's a deadbolt.

With trembling fingers, I slowly turn the lock cylinder.

“But no matter what you're feeling,” his voice close now, inches away, “I want you to share it with me, and if we need to push this debriefing until tomorrow or the next—”

He goes silent as the bolt shoots home with a soft
click
.

For a moment, nothing happens.

I take a careful step back.

The door moves imperceptibly, and then rattles ferociously inside its frame.

Leighton says, “Jason. Jason!” And then: “I need a security team to my office right now. Dessen has locked himself inside the bathroom.”

The door shudders as Leighton crashes into it, but the lock holds.

I rush for the window, climb up onto the urinal, and flip the levers on either side of the glass.

Leighton is shouting at someone, and although I can't make out the words, I think I hear approaching footsteps.

The window opens.

Night air funnels in.

Even standing on the urinal, I'm not sure if I can make it up there.

Leaping off the edge, I hurl myself toward the open frame, but only manage to get one arm through.

As something bangs into the bathroom door, my shoes scrape across the smooth, vertical surface of the wall. There's no traction or purchase to be had.

I drop to the floor, climb back up onto the urinal.

Leighton screams at someone, “Come on!”

I jump again, and this time, I manage to land both arms across the windowsill. It isn't much of a hold, but it's just enough to keep me from falling.

I wriggle through as the bathroom door breaks down behind me.

Leighton yells my name.

I tumble for a half second through darkness.

Crash face-first into pavement.

Up on my feet, stunned, dazed, ears ringing, blood running down the side of my face.

I'm outside, in a dark alley between two buildings.

Leighton appears in the open window frame above me.

“Jason, don't do this. Let me help you.”

I turn and run, no idea where I'm going, just blazing toward the opening at the end of the alley.

I reach it.

Launch down a set of brick steps.

I'm in an office park.

Bland, low-rise buildings cluster around a sad little pond with a lighted fountain in the middle.

Considering the hour, it's no surprise there's no one out.

I fly past benches, trimmed shrubbery, a gazebo, a sign with an arrow under the words
T
O
W
ALKING
P
ATH
.