Family (Insanity Book 7) (17 page)

I pull his hands away. “Listen to me! It’s just hallucinations. You’re safe here with me.”

“It’s a memory, not hallucinations, Alice. I’m trying to remember as much as I can.” The March tilts his head and glares at me. “And I’m not really safe with you here.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean…” He shrugs. “You’ve done terrible things with Him.”

“I know.” How many times do I have to apologize for my past? “But I’m not that Alice anymore. I will take care of you. Want me to hide the writing on the wall? I think it’s what’s influencing your pain.”

The March relaxes a little. He props himself up and combs his white hair back with his hands. “Alice?”

“Yes, March?”

“How much time do we have left?”

“Not sure, but it’s less than two hours.”

“How about Constance?”

I look at the floor. “We’ve lost contact.”

“Poor Constance.”

“It’s my fault. But I won’t lose hope. Maybe she’s still alive.”

“I hope so, too,” he says. “But now that we have a little time left, I’ll have to ask you to do something terrible.”

“What?” I grimace.

“Listen to me.” He sounds like a child, but a saner one, full of wisdom. It’s strange. “I’m free of my memory’s influence now.”

“That’s good to hear.”

“And I haven’t seen enough.”

“It’s okay. I was selfish asking you to remember more.”

“No, you weren’t, because it helped me realize something. Actually, remember something, from my days in The Hole.”

“Like what?”

“I never lost my memories due to the shock therapy,” he says.

My heart slows down. I have a feeling he is going to drop a bomb on me. “Then what was it?”

“Lullaby pills,” the March says. “They fed them to me. Countless amounts. I remember thinking they were M&M’s or something. Sweetened lullaby pills.”

“Who gave them to you?”

“No one.”

“You lost me. I’m not following.”

“I gave them to me. It’s not clear why or what happened. But the memory of feeding myself the pills in The Hole attacked me while remembering Wonderland as a child. It all meshed together.”

“I wish you knew why.”

“I think I have an idea.” The March’s eyes show my reflection in them. Seeing myself, I remember his words:
I will ask you to do something terrible.

“What is it?”

“I think I swallowed the pills after Black Chess installed the light bulb in my head.”

I’m not sure how to process that. I’ve never actually considered the light bulb to be real. “What are you trying to tell me, March?”

“I want you to access the memories in my head, Alice.” He pulls my hands near and pats them. “Please.”

“I’m not going to allow you to read the writing on the wall again.”

“Actually you will have to do worse,” he says. “Time is running out. I need you to dig into my head.”

“Worse like what?”

“Forget about the writing. I know how to get my memories back.”

Suddenly, I think I know what he is asking me. “No,” I say firmly, without even listening.

“Yes.” He squeezes my hands. “I may be a child inside, but my physical body is that of an old man. I don’t think I can handle the escape or whatever the police do when they enter.”

“We could always still push the button and lock ourselves in here.”

“Forever?” the March says. I feel like he is the adult, and I’m the child who needs convincing now. “You know you’re destined for much bigger things than a bunker for the rest of your life, Alice.”

I’m fighting the tears. Shaking my head. “No, I won’t do it.”

“It’s the only way. The shock therapy didn’t make me forget. It’s the opposite, if used on me, I’d remember things. That’s why they’ve used on you too. They wanted you to remember the things they were looking for.” He stops for a breath. “If you want me to remember, Alice, you have to send me to the Mush Room and do to me what Waltraud did to you.”

Chapter 66

The Tunnels

“Do you trust this map?” Constance asked the Dude. As much as she was risking her life, and others, by trust this stranger, she had no other choice. He’d shown her tunnels she could finally walk through instead of crawl. Besides, his red cloak showed bright enough to light the way ahead.

“It’s an old map,” he said. “When the asylum was designed for war. The tunnels were meant for its inhabitants to escape. I’m not sure how much they’ve changed through the years.”

“So we’re like the blind following the blind?”

“Pretty much,” he said and seemed determined to keep on walking.

“I’m Constance,” she called out behind him. “But you know that already. How do you know me?”

“That’s a long story, kiddo.” He stopped at puddle of water and knelt down.

“Don’t call me kiddo.” She knelt beside him. “I’m tens of girls in one body.”

“That’s true. You’re brave,” he said, reaching for the water.

Constance wished she could see his face. She was so curious about him.

“But there is one thing wrong about you, brave girl,” he said.

“Nothing is wrong about me?” She had her hands on her waist.

“There is.” He scooped up the water and splashed it on her face.

Constance froze, not from the water, but from how she considered it an insult.

The Dude splashed her again. This time, her clothes. Again and again.

“Stop!”

“You smell like shit,” he said. “Of actual shit.”

Constance’s mouth was full of water. She was soaking wet, and could not do anything before he was finished. But he was right, she’d smelled of shit from crawling into the tunnels.

“See?” he said with a smirking voice. “You’re a pretty little mermaid now.” He stood up and walked away again, following the map.

“I’m not little!” Constance stomped after him. “And I’m not a mermaid.”

“From what I see, I have to kneel down to talk to you,” the Dude said, still examining his map on the walk.

Constance had no come back for that. She was much shorter. But then she’d decided to play stubborn. “Maybe it’s you who is too tall. Pathetic.”

She heard the Dude chuckle but couldn’t see his face. She gripped the edge of his cloak and he stopped.

“What now?” he sighed.

“If we’re going to be a team, I demand respect.”

“But of course, Nancy Drew.”

“I’m not Nancy Drew, you tall red giraffe!”

“I’m a tall red giraffe?” The Dude seemed to lose his temper, as if he were a child too. “Do you have any idea what I did to come here and save your little ass?”

“It’s not little ass. Just ass.”

The Dude threw his hands up and sighed, then turned back. “You’re something. I don’t believe I came here to save you.”

“Who sent you?”

“Doesn’t matter. Just follow me and try to keep your mouth shut.”

“I will not. I crawled in a narrow tunnel full of shit. What did you do?”

“I haven’t done anything yet, but I might have to end up zipping your mouth with a binder. Or better yet, pull out all of your teeth, so you can grow old exponentially and finally shut up.”

They suddenly stood before another dead end wall. The Dude crumpled the map in his hands and grunted.

Constance laughed. “Another dead end. And you say you came here to save me. What was your plan actually?”

“According to the map, there is a door, leading to a secret room in the asylum.”

“So? We find the door and get back in. Brilliant!” She mirrored his grunt, even the way he stood.

“The door leads to the room, but also leads back to another opposite door which opens into the river,” the Dude said. “It’s a short swim and we can escape from where the police never thought was possible. I just need to find the door.”

Chapter 67

The Mush Room

Dragging the March Hare to the Mush Room is sinful. Unforgivable. I’m not sure why my legs allow me to go the distance or why my head allows me the possibility.

“What are you doing, Alice?” Tom appears out of nowhere.

“The March thinks he can remember if exposed to the torture of the shock therapy,” I reply while the March willingly lays himself on the table.

“What a brilliant idea!” Tom mocks us. “We only have an hour and a half left. I’m contemplating whether to push the button or not, and you’re here having fun.”

“Does that look fun to you?” I pull him from his collar and drag him to a corner against the side of the room. “I’m about to shock my best friend.”

“Best friend, huh!” Tom is losing his temper. He too is scared with the ticking clock in the back of our heads. “All mad people are friends, I suppose.”

“You’re a piece of…” I push him back against the wall.

“You shouldn’t be swearing, Alice,” the March, in his child’s persona again, says.

“That’s why I shut up.” I pat him. “Are you comfortable laying here?”

He chuckles. “That’s a neat question. Asking a man if he’s comfortable in his grave.”

I chuckle back in masked pain. It’s hard to understand whether the March is a man or a child sometimes. It seems like the two personas come and go. But aren’t we all both child and adult inside?

“You will need to strap my feet and hands down, Alice,” he says.

“How do you even know that?”

“I’ve been shocked before. Don’t remember when, but someone was trying to get the information out of my head. When I said strap, I really mean chain. But I don’t want to freak myself out.” He stares at the ceiling like someone who’s expecting a needle in the buttocks and looks away.

Chaining him, I see his limbs stiffen. I pat him again, but it has no effect on him. I wonder if I have the courage to sacrifice myself for a bigger cause like him.

“Now you have to put the cap on my head. The one with the six screws,” he says, still looking up.

Tom beats me to it and pulls it out of the wardrobe. “May I?” He makes the March wear it. “I’ve always wanted to do that.”

The darker, messed up inner Tom surfaces. I’d once heard that some men apply to the military not to serve their country, but to scratch an itch of wanting to kill and harm others. Sometimes I wonder about people who work in asylums like Tom. Maybe they aren’t here to help, but to scratch an itch. An insane one.

“Four of the six screws on the cap need to be turned,” the March reminds Tom. It’s something I know for a fact since the days when I’d been shocked by Waltraud. More than four screws guarantees the death of the patient. Some patients can only handle three. The screws end with electrical pads that stick to the side of the brain.

“Four screws turned,” Tom says with the enthusiasm of a psycho wearing clown’s make up, two bananas instead of devil’s horns on his head.

I dismiss him and watch the March Hare. It’d be stupid patting him again, knowing it doesn’t make a difference. I’m admiring his solid posture, trying not to vocalize his utter fear.

I stand right next to him, and bend over to whisper in his ear. “We can still not do this.”

“If I died in an hour and a half, I think I’d regret not having tried this,” he says. “I once heard people’s most common regret on their death bed is not trying things.”

I chuckle lightly. Even in his darkest hour, he is trying to make me laugh.

“I, too, don’t want to regret anything,” Tom says. “So let me do the shock therapy.”

“Get out!” I push Tom away. “Go wait for me to tell you if we’re going to have to push the button.”

“But, Alice…”

“If you don’t leave this room right now, I’m going to shock you instead of him.” I show him my Dark Alice face.

Tom swallows hard, so much so that he can’t swallow at all. He leaves the room, his eyes glued to mine. It’s like when you gently leave the room with a lion in it; you have your eyes glued on the predator, making sure you’re safe to go.

“Now back to you, March,” I say. “Like I said, we can still stop this.”

The March reaches for my hands, but his fingers stop midway due to the chains. I reach for him instead. He is in a cold sweat. “I have to do it, Alice.”

“Why? I can’t understand. Even if we dig into your mind, what memory exactly will help us get out of here?”

“One memory.”

“Are you sure? What memory is that?”

“The memory of a patient who lived in this asylum and wrote on those walls. A patient who knew a big secret. Probably the whereabouts of the Six Keys. What the Wonderland War is about. And more.”

“We’re not sure of any of this, March.”

“I’m sure,” he insists. “I’m sure that Patient 14 knows something big and that we need to find him.”

“How can you be so sure?”

The March’s frightened eyes stare back at me. “I have an inescapable feeling inside of me.”

“What feeling?”

Again, he tries to crane his neck closer but the cap with the screws stops him halfway. He whispers, “That I’ve met Patient 14 in The Hole.”

Chapter 68

The BBC Report - Wire Release

The new pope is about to turn the tables of politics upside down!

Angelo Cardone, the new and youngest, pope to date, has an eccentric and unmatched personality. Other than allowing music in his speech and speaking like a ten-year old, Cardone is suggesting new ways to face terrorism.

Unconventional, unacceptable, and borderline insane ways.

The problem is that the crowd likes him — in other words, they ‘dig’ him.

All over the world, fans of Cardone have expressed their support for his ideas. After the Queen’s sudden assassination by the ruthless Pillar, many citizens have sought a clear and blunt revenge on the war on terror. Within minutes of Cardone’s speech at the Vatican, people all over the world have declared their loyalty to him. This is a one of a kind and unprecedented incident. From Zimbabwe to Mexico, followers are gathered on social networks ready to hear more from him. In fact, they’re ready to do what he wants.